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Halo: Reach's Forge Mode Revealed
- Thread starter GhaleonEB
- Start date
Voltron64
Member
Wow. just got back to my room a while ago and I log onto GAF and see those new map leaks.
What an amazing night. I had the chance to play lots of REACH MP tonight. Here's an off screen video of the last match I played. I believe it's called "The Cage" built into the side of the cliff as seen in the vidoc. I could be wrong though. Keep in mind this is the first time I've ever played on this map (obviously) and I had a few drinks. :lol I have more videos and impressions but I'm tired and they will take forever to upload with my 3G connection.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G1Kzh_UxWzo
What an amazing night. I had the chance to play lots of REACH MP tonight. Here's an off screen video of the last match I played. I believe it's called "The Cage" built into the side of the cliff as seen in the vidoc. I could be wrong though. Keep in mind this is the first time I've ever played on this map (obviously) and I had a few drinks. :lol I have more videos and impressions but I'm tired and they will take forever to upload with my 3G connection.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G1Kzh_UxWzo
Photolysis
Banned
Wow, that's a pretty amazing set of improvements, and it's great to see some of those remakes.
Wow, those three new maps look incredible. I can't wait to play on Ivory Tower again.
On that note, do we think that Spire, Reflection and Zealot are campaign spaces as well, or is this part of the "That's not the whole story" comment in that one BWU? (I assume Forge World is not part of the campaign, for obvious reasons.)
On that note, do we think that Spire, Reflection and Zealot are campaign spaces as well, or is this part of the "That's not the whole story" comment in that one BWU? (I assume Forge World is not part of the campaign, for obvious reasons.)
Shake Appeal
Member
Firefight Versus was also revealed as a game mode.Eye Drop said:
Diablohead
Member
I love how you can clip stuff inside other objects now, that was rather annoying in halo 3 where you would bump into things and watch them just fall over, lot's of FFFFUUUU moments.
Having a ctf where you climb the side of a huge rock wall and then have to take the flag down safely will be super epic.
Having a ctf where you climb the side of a huge rock wall and then have to take the flag down safely will be super epic.
Nice video Voltron, thanks! It's nice to see some new gameplay from someone who knows what they're doing. The jump height definitely appears to be increased. The map looks like a jumper's HEAVEN. Give me no radar on that map and I'll jump circles around everyone 
As for Ivory Tower, I'm excited. Back when I first started playing Halo 2, it was my favorite map. After a while, I noticed it had some problems.(Too many power weapons being one of them) The geometry already appears to be pretty different and I hope the maps weapon set improves on the original as well. The art style is pretty fucking sexy, I must say.
About Zealot..."A very modified version of the Map Midship with more space in the center, with a bottom floor, and the possibility of getting out of the ship, in the space, which has different gravity."
I'm curious to see how this plays. It's not Midship, which is a bummer but it might be good. Interested to see what it's like outside of the map.
Also, it seems like The Pit will be pretty simple to make in Forge 2.0 huh? I think I might try to make it...Forerunner style Pit? HAWT.
As for Ivory Tower, I'm excited. Back when I first started playing Halo 2, it was my favorite map. After a while, I noticed it had some problems.(Too many power weapons being one of them) The geometry already appears to be pretty different and I hope the maps weapon set improves on the original as well. The art style is pretty fucking sexy, I must say.
About Zealot..."A very modified version of the Map Midship with more space in the center, with a bottom floor, and the possibility of getting out of the ship, in the space, which has different gravity."
I'm curious to see how this plays. It's not Midship, which is a bummer but it might be good. Interested to see what it's like outside of the map.
Also, it seems like The Pit will be pretty simple to make in Forge 2.0 huh? I think I might try to make it...Forerunner style Pit? HAWT.
Shake Appeal
Member
Well, there are nine maps (eight and Forge World, right?), with nine 'palettes' of textures and lighting. Eight of these are custom built with their own textures, lighting, objects, blah blah. The ninth has a set palette and lighting too, but you can manipulate these on an impressively grand scale. That all seems reasonable enough, but I have some concerns.Zeouterlimits said:
One problem is Reach's maps are more 'designed' and focused around particular gametypes; they explicitly said that Halo 3's maps were designed to be 'jack of all trades' maps, and so ended up being master of none. The obvious example is that Boneyard and Spire are designed pretty intensively for Invasion. Now, they've said you can play other gametypes too (and if that involves radical fencing/sealing off parts of the map, colour me a little more impressed), but that really leaves six 'default' multiplayer maps and whatever you want to do with Forge World. Some of those six may be particularly good for Slayer, but only one or two might be good for CTF (in the beta, none of the maps were good for CTF). Zealot is also the closest we've seen to a small, symmetrical arena map (ignoring, for the moment, Forged creations like 'Asylum').
I can appreciate the production load (there were also an uncertain number of Firefight maps to be built; I'd speculate between four and six), but with the number of multiplayer maps steadily decreasing game by game, most of these spaces being drawn from Campaign, and the limited palette of Forge World, there's a real danger that things are going to feel samey a few months after release.
Put it this way: remember how quickly you burned out on Powerhouse and Sword Base, two maps no one was particularly wild about? Well, if you don't like Invasion or Forging, you're already burned out on roughly a third of Reach's 'default' multiplayer maps.
Maybe they'll prove me wrong. Perhaps the DLC schedule is hectic, and other 'Forge Worlds' with other palettes (Covenant, human industrial, snow, sand) are planned shortly after release (i.e. within six months), but it's just a little worrying that the increased number of 'game modes' means a decreased map load for each of those modes.
(It's called being spoilt, I guess.)
Shake Appeal
Member
It's a 2v2 gametype. 2 Spartans fight against AI Covenant as they would in Firefight normally, only now there are 2 Elites with the Covenant controlled by other players. The Elites win if they kill the Spartans often enough to end the game. The Spartans, meanwhile, get a boost to their score and an extra life every time they kill a player-controlled Elite.Xblog said:
From what they showed, I presume it has the same level of customization as regular Firefight, and is also available in Matchmaking.
Zeouterlimits
Member
Shake: Are the 8 usable in the same modes at that the 11 with H3 would be?
I'm not trying to be smart, I'm actually a little confused as to how Firefight, Forge (well I assume that's just Forge World) and Traditional Multiplayer figures into the map breakdown.
I'm not trying to be smart, I'm actually a little confused as to how Firefight, Forge (well I assume that's just Forge World) and Traditional Multiplayer figures into the map breakdown.
Diablohead
Member
When I think about it Reach is a huge step like halo 2 was to halo 1.
Halo 1 to 2 had a huge jump in visual quality, Reach is another large step (halo 3 was sorry to say, a 2.5 imo)
Halo 1 to 2 changed up quite a few weapons, Reach has given us the best of both with new tools also.
Halo 1 you can pick chief's colour for LAN play, Halo 2 you can pick and mix 2 colours and make a simple emblem for online and lan play, Reach you can FUlly customise your spartan and use him for lan, online & campaign.
I am so pumped for this game and to think its out in under 2 months or so! so much content that I don't think I will ever need to buy another game ever again.
Halo 1 to 2 had a huge jump in visual quality, Reach is another large step (halo 3 was sorry to say, a 2.5 imo)
Halo 1 to 2 changed up quite a few weapons, Reach has given us the best of both with new tools also.
Halo 1 you can pick chief's colour for LAN play, Halo 2 you can pick and mix 2 colours and make a simple emblem for online and lan play, Reach you can FUlly customise your spartan and use him for lan, online & campaign.
I am so pumped for this game and to think its out in under 2 months or so! so much content that I don't think I will ever need to buy another game ever again.
Shake Appeal said:
From what I understand, it's actually played in two rounds, with each team taking on each side once. The winner is the team with the highest score in their round as Spartans.
I'm guessing that in the beta they were using "Generator Defense" partly to test whether 6-player Firefight (i.e. 3v3 Firefight Versus) is possible. I suppose they concluded it runs much better as 2v2.
Zeouterlimits said:
I understand it to be as follows: Those 8 maps, plus the Bungie-made maps from Forge World, will be playable in the traditional multiplayer playlists. Obviously they will be sorted into appropriate categories (Invasion, Arena, Objective, ...). I imagine these 8 maps are Forge-enabled as well, but the showpiece is obviously Forge World.
In addition to that, there will probably be several Firefight-only maps (I belive we have already seen four or so). These will only be used for Firefight, and are not Forge-enabled.
jump_button
Banned
I really dont give a flying fuck about halo, but i know a cool thing when i see it LlittleBigHalo?
Shake Appeal
Member
My understanding, and this is based on no small amount of speculation.Zeouterlimits said:
1. There are a number of Firefight maps (number TBC) on which you exclusively play Firefight and Firefight Versus. While the gametype here is highly customizable, the maps cannot be Forged. Both Firefight and its Versus form are available in Matchmaking.
2. There are nine 'competitive multiplayer' maps (Boardwalk, Boneyard, Countdown, Forge World, Powerhouse, Reflection, Spire, Sword Base, Zealot). All of these are Forgeable with the new tools, with Forge World being especially so (it's like Sandbox x5, whereas the other eight will contain 90% pre-baked geometry, just like regular Halo 3 maps did). The eight 'normal' maps are available in Matchmaking, and certain premade variants of Forge World are also in Matchmaking (off the top of my head, for starters: Asylum/Sanctuary, Pinnacle/Ascension, Hemorrhage/Blood Gulch, and two 'new' Forge creations, The Cage and Paradiso... you can see them listed in a screenshot somewhere, as they have a different icon beside them in the map selection list when compared to the 'Sweet New Map' or 'Halo Classic').
3. Two (TBC) of the nine competitive multiplayer maps (Boneyard and Spire) are designed intensively for Invasion. However, other gametypes are playable on them as well. In fact, I imagine all gametypes are potentially available on all maps, but it remains to be seen how this affects the actual map layouts. We could see a lot of small changes like the lifts being shut off for CTF on Sword Base, or there could be larger changes (like half of Boneyard being sealed off).
4. Bungie's design philosophy for Reach has been for both Firefight and competitive multiplayer maps to be slight reworkings of Campaign environments (in most cases, at least; it is not clear whether this is universal given the variety of environments, and it seems obvious that the Halo of Forge World, at least, will not appear in Campaign, except maybe in the ending cutscene -_^). They have also tried to make maps more specific in their purpose. Powerhouse, for example, is good for Slayer and King of the Hill, but not as good for CTF or Oddball (at least it wasn't in the beta).
5. You can still play Customs as before. Forge is only available among up to 8 friends, I would guess; Matchmade Forge would still be an abortion. Customs are more customizable than ever: whatever you want to do to the 11 maps, and whatever you want to play on them, you can... at least with your friends. Bungie are looking to cherrypick the best of what "bubbles to the surface" from Customs to introduce into Matchmaking, but the details of how they are going to do this are worryingly vague, especially given their track record. Hopefully the improved File Browser helps.
6. There may be more to be revealed: there are other Forge 'gametypes' that haven't been shown past 'Basic Editing'. If I had to guess, they include all the wacky gametypes listed in beta code (Golf, Bumper Cars, etc.), with a monitor playing the role of umpire/referee (there are better editing controls/locks over Forge now). There is probably a lot more to be revealed about how deep the gametype editor/Game Options/rabbit hole goes. What I'd love to see in a BWU some day soon is a list of all these options (and the options in Forge) typed out, similar to how urk typed out all the Firefight options.
I'd imagine there will be about one Firefight map per campaign mission like in ODST. At least I hope so. For example Courtyard and Overlook really look like they could be on the same mission. Maybe culling some multiplayer maps from campaign will make that number smaller, but 8-9 maps would be nice.
Broman1978
Junior Member
In that ViDoc..It looked like they had made "Halo Kart" in one sequence
Shake Appeal
Member
Kart gametypes were already hugely popular in Halo 3, thanks to certain gametype loopholes and people's persistent Forging. See, for instance:Broman1978 said:In that ViDoc..It looked like they had made "Halo Kart" in one sequence
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tpV_RXAz-bc
In Reach they have made it a standard gametype, put in lap counters, timers, speedometers, etc. It's still a diversion from all the shooting, but pretty well fleshed out now.
Zeouterlimits
Member
Thank you Brainboy and a big thanks Shake.
I had the right idea, but was very unsure.
While I can see the potential problem of getting worn out with the main map set there, I'm pretty hopeful on what we'll at least see a good dlc selection. Whether Bungie follow through on Forge monitoring and matchmaking integregation... we'll see.
They seem a little oddly focused on tagging system, it doesn't exactly work in LBP, I'm not sure it'll work here.
I had the right idea, but was very unsure.
While I can see the potential problem of getting worn out with the main map set there, I'm pretty hopeful on what we'll at least see a good dlc selection. Whether Bungie follow through on Forge monitoring and matchmaking integregation... we'll see.
They seem a little oddly focused on tagging system, it doesn't exactly work in LBP, I'm not sure it'll work here.
Shake Appeal
Member
One final, bonus guess based on nothing but the name: 'Halo Classic' is in fact the teased racing variant that goes right around Forge World, though it's not a shipping variant (at least, not right now).
(If it was a gametype and not a map, I would speculate that it is "Halo: CE settings" for multiplayer: full fall damage, adjusted movement speed and jump height, pistol starts, no AA, etc.)
(If it was a gametype and not a map, I would speculate that it is "Halo: CE settings" for multiplayer: full fall damage, adjusted movement speed and jump height, pistol starts, no AA, etc.)
SimpleDesign
Member
"There were a lot of people telling us that no we could not ship this as one big map."
So Microsoft was against Forge World and I guess the idea of more user generated content?
So Microsoft was against Forge World and I guess the idea of more user generated content?
Shake Appeal
Member
Yeah, it was more likely the production guys and networking team shouting at the artists and designers.
Another thing I haven't seen mentioned or discussed, and maybe it just hasn't sunk in while we're all thinking about Firefight and Forge, is what the results might be like when Bungie's cheap-LOD tricks (which allow for the mammoth size of Forge World) are applied to a Campaign environment...
Another thing I haven't seen mentioned or discussed, and maybe it just hasn't sunk in while we're all thinking about Firefight and Forge, is what the results might be like when Bungie's cheap-LOD tricks (which allow for the mammoth size of Forge World) are applied to a Campaign environment...
Prophet Steve
Member
Popeck said:
Yeah, probably.
Shake Appeal
Member
Since there are so many people locked out of making actual changes to Reach at this stage in the process, it would be nice if they were spending time cooking up a lot of Forge variants and gametypes to be included on the disc.
But I imagine they're all just lounging about eating pizza.
But I imagine they're all just lounging about eating pizza.
I was wondering the same thing in the other thread: http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showpost.php?p=22516568&postcount=1133.Shake Appeal said:
Now we really need to see some aerial action in the skies of Forge World or Spire to see how well that really works during gameplay.
Well, they can always push more variants into Bungie favourites of whatever that's called in Reach. Has there been any discussion about this?Shake Appeal said:
Diablohead
Member
About time they had a good break, we are already getting a shit load of content.Shake Appeal said:
Monocle
Member
All three are stunning. Bungie's art truly sets the standard for this generation. It's incredibly exciting to imagine how Forge 2.0 will allow those spaces to be manipulated.MendicantBS said:I didn't know in what thread should it be this info, so I'll just put it here. Also i'm going to translate some of it.
Spanish site Levelup wrote a summary about Firefight VS, and these 3 maps
[snip]
RedSparrows
Member
I imagine all maps can be Forged, of course. Not just FW.
Zeouterlimits
Member
All maps except the Firefight ones, yes.RedSparrows said:
Shake Appeal
Member
They can (the list appears in the Forge menu, after all), but I imagine they are heavily pre-baked and have far fewer objects to place. It would be like Forging Standoff compared to Forging Sandbox.RedSparrows said:
Diablohead
Member
That would be a plasma pistol paradise :lolPopeck said:
Genesis Knight
Member
Just to summarize, and correct me if I'm wrong, but:
Halo 3 shipped with 11 maps, Halo 2 with 12 and CE with 13. This one ships with 6 dedicated and visually unique maps for competitive multiplayer, 2 that can be used for Invasion as well, plus a handful of Forge remakes of Halo 2 maps in Forge World?
EDIT: Updated because I'd confused Countdown with Courtyard, a FF map.
Halo 3 shipped with 11 maps, Halo 2 with 12 and CE with 13. This one ships with 6 dedicated and visually unique maps for competitive multiplayer, 2 that can be used for Invasion as well, plus a handful of Forge remakes of Halo 2 maps in Forge World?
EDIT: Updated because I'd confused Countdown with Courtyard, a FF map.
Devin Olsen
Member
Seems odd that there are the least maps yet, considering they are all campaign rips and no truly 'new' spaces (Except Forge World, I imagine).Genesis Knight said:
I do not mean to complain, but it does seem a little weird.
Genesis Knight
Member
Devin Olsen said:
Well yeah, I'm thinking the same thing.
As far as 'Forge will give us all the maps we will ever need), I mean, look at Ivory Tower. Just visually that's about 10x more interesting remake of the original Ivory Tower than the Wizard remake is of Wizard from Halo 2. The former is a dedicated, artist-created remake, and the other is a Forge remake. I don't care how awesome Forge 2.0 is (and it seems to be a nice step up from the original) - a Forge map is still a Forge map, and multiple Forge maps are very samey because they're all built from the same kit.
From the beta you could tell they have built these awesome mechanics and they have this extensive armor system to encourage customization and a bunch of play time, but they have not as many visually unique maps to experience it in. So unlike a lot of people here I'm really hoping they put out some DLC maps before the end of the year.
So I'm excited for Forge 2.0, but I am pretty sure I'm going to be sick of Forerunner architecture in green hills fast.
EDIT: But some Halo 2 maps are better suited for Forge than others. Wizard is a bad choice, since that map was so interesting because of its greenery and architecture - it doesn't convert well to Forerunner Lego bocks. Hemorrhage/Blood Gulch and Pinnacle/Ascension, however, are better suited because they had that look to begin with. So if you count those two then you're up to 8. (And then of course there's four other Forge World maps as well, so a total of 12 in the rotation, equal to Halo 2.)
I think it's clear I'll be playing a bunch of Invasion and versus Firefight just to get the a change of pace from Forge World.
Son of Godzilla
Banned
So what are the chances that the Forge toolsets are unique to the level? Humie doodads on Boneyard and such, Covie ones on... whatever?