Interesting. What does your playstyle lean towards?
Gemini / Backwash were the only maps in Halo 2 I ever felt were just terrible.
I miss Colossus, definitely an unsung hero for me.
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Halo |OT13|
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Interesting. What does your playstyle lean towards?
Gemini / Backwash were the only maps in Halo 2 I ever felt were just terrible.
I miss Colossus, definitely an unsung hero for me.
Poker Face
Member
Halo 2's maps are legendary. There were awesome maps for any style of play, whether it be 4v4 or 8v8.
Not as far as I know.
re: map discussion. A Halo 2 map I used to love but in hindsight was terrible was Burial Mounds. They had a pretty good idea with the defense side of the map but it was hell spawning as offense in 1-side objective.
"1 heading for switch! The gates open! They got the gate!!"
"Rockets in stairwell"
Oh Zanzibar I miss you.
Yeah defense was way too fortified for assault.
1-flag was doable, but getting that bomb in there for assault was mind-numbing.
I remember the rush of sneaking around the front crouched and not being able to talk because of proximity chat. Then finally making that push for the flag and throwing it out the window to body-pile it home.
Good times.
"Rockets in stairwell"
Oh Zanzibar I miss you.
Yeah defense was way too fortified for assault.
1-flag was doable, but getting that bomb in there for assault was mind-numbing.
I remember the rush of sneaking around the front crouched and not being able to talk because of proximity chat. Then finally making that push for the flag and throwing it out the window to body-pile it home.
Good times.
I miss switches. Seriously BRING THEM BACK ALREADY!!!
Skel1ingt0n
I can't *believe* these lazy developers keep making file sizes so damn large. Btw, how does technology work?
Oh yeah! Containment! Freaking LOVED that map, too.
Nowadays I don't love any map... I'm actually relatively impartial and half the time don't even know the names of the maps.
You know what also has killed these games? Freaking party chat. I remember quite vividly taking a banshee to the top of the enemies flag with like a minute to go and then hiding above, creating a sudden-death for sometimes 15+ minutes. They'd be FREAKING out - I could hear the enemy talking about trying to find me, and "clearing" areas like SWAT. Meanwhile, I could send recon to my entire team from above, so they knew what to expect when they got to the flag.
Good times.
EDIT: Yup, and switches! Man, I miss so much. Why did they take that stuff out?!
Nowadays I don't love any map... I'm actually relatively impartial and half the time don't even know the names of the maps.
You know what also has killed these games? Freaking party chat. I remember quite vividly taking a banshee to the top of the enemies flag with like a minute to go and then hiding above, creating a sudden-death for sometimes 15+ minutes. They'd be FREAKING out - I could hear the enemy talking about trying to find me, and "clearing" areas like SWAT. Meanwhile, I could send recon to my entire team from above, so they knew what to expect when they got to the flag.
Good times.
EDIT: Yup, and switches! Man, I miss so much. Why did they take that stuff out?!
Yeah I would like a "No party chat" option in my games now. So that when I select it I am put with people that are also all in game chat.
The Librarian
Banned
I have no idea. If I had to say, my play-style is pretty sporadic. Like my thoughts.
I've never understood the love for Zanzibar or Headlong, though Land Grab on Last Resort was a lot of fun for me. If I were forced to choose, I would say I liked Terminal the most when it came to asymmetric maps, but I wouldn't say I exactly enjoyed my time on it.
My memory's fuzzy from that time, but overall I really enjoyed my time with Halo 2. I'd probably say I had more fun doing glitches and superbounces in custom games than playing the actual game.
The Lamonster
Member
Containment was awesome. I loved getting out of that map too.
Party chat did not kill the scenario you described. It's proximity voice, which for some unknown retarded reason is not in Halo 4. I used to come across people camping and yell SURPRISE! and kill them, and it was fun to hear them yell out in agony. It was also cool sneaking into the enemy base and eavesdropping in on their strategy.
In Halo 4 the enemy can never hear you and you can never hear them. All we get is the 20 seconds before and after a match. It's so lame.
I think the next step for the whole party chat thing is to make it so that once in a game, all your teammates hear those on your team regardless of party chat or not. Don't disable their party chat, just broadcast them along anyway even if it's just a one way conversation where you just hear them.
Quick mute features are a must, but the silence of playing online now has definitely changed the nature of teamwork and resulted in things like waypoints on flag carriers and things like that.
For me it's quite simple.
It was the first time 1flag was ever introduced in a console setting ever.
Prior to halo my favorite game was counter-strike which was all attack and defend round based.
These two maps and modes were the first time something like that was successful in the console space and also had voice chat which added this interesting layer to it.
This intrigues me - Colossus always seemed like the least-fun Halo 2 map for me. Part of that was how easily the entire map was dominated by a good sniper (and that one single beam rifle) - you got the rifle, your team crushed. You didn't... you were fucked. That never seemed right to me. (And I can't think of another Halo 2 map that was THAT controlled by a single weapon.)
Also, I was terrible at jumping, and getting the flag up the reversing ramps always pissed me off; I'd try and cut off some of the running by jumping at the end, miss the jump, and have even FARTHER to go. But that's just me being bad, not really a reflection on the map.
)This intrigues me - Colossus always seemed like the least-fun Halo 2 map for me. Part of that was how easily the entire map was dominated by a good sniper (and that one single beam rifle) - you got the rifle, your team crushed. You didn't... you were fucked. That never seemed right to me. (And I can't think of another Halo 2 map that was THAT controlled by a single weapon.)
Also, I was terrible at jumping, and getting the flag up the reversing ramps always pissed me off; I'd try and cut off some of the running by jumping at the end, miss the jump, and have even FARTHER to go. But that's just me being bad, not really a reflection on the map.
Yeah the update that gave both sides snipers fixed that tremendously. I think I just missed the vibe of the map and as a shotgun junkie, I'd love running around the upper spaces and cleaning up kills. I think it was the first map to feature that big ole jump pad also?
I've said this before but I always loved feeding fake information to the other team using proximity voice. Say we are going one way when we are really going the opposite way.
And not just switches, but the idea of almost secondary objectives on maps, AKA; opening/defending the gate on Zanzibar/Containment, opening/defending the portal on Relic, dodging the train on Terminal, etc. etc. Why Halo moved away from this I will never fucking understand.
The idea of invasion really intrigued me, the implementation and to a greater extent.. Reach is what killed it for me personally.
Garrett 2U
Member
Multiplayer map quality has gone down hill in general in FPS games.
Sure the maps don't sell copies, but they make or break PvP multiplayer.
I'm not sure if it is caused from a lack of iteration for budget reasons, or if they have less time per map because they need to design DLC as well, or what.
Sure the maps don't sell copies, but they make or break PvP multiplayer.
I'm not sure if it is caused from a lack of iteration for budget reasons, or if they have less time per map because they need to design DLC as well, or what.
Poker Face
Member
Probably because no one communicates on Xbox Live anymore
Honestly it really does not make any sense to me at all. Even some members at 343 loved that stuff from when I talked to them at SDCC so I REALLY don't understand why they don't just bring it back.
Everyone knows you have to have your DLC map pack ready for 1 month out. So that is part of it right from the start.
Also you need to make your maps look insane now, which almost always comes at the expense of a clean layout. Now you get clutter in almost everything you play.
They excelled at the specific gametype they were good at but stunk at anything else.
Headlong? Dreamy for 1 Flag and 1 Bomb. Crap at Slayer.
Turf? A map designed for 3 Plots and it showed. 1 Flag was corpsecap central and 1 Bomb was "you're getting spawncamped" (had a similar issue to Burial Mounds with the exposed objective point/spawn). I guess Slayer worked.
Coag was good at 1/2Flag and 1/2Bomb variants, but a total stinker for KotH, Territories, Oddball..
Relic was even more of a one-trick pony and was pretty much THE map for 1 Flag CTF. For anything else, it was a bore. Also the only BTB map I can say with a straight face that got broken by BR starts in Objective. So open and flat, not fun. You could have fun with 3 plots but it still heavily favored the base team.
Containment was pretty much only good for BTB and 2 Flag at that, with Territories coming second. Bungie never gave it a chance at 1 flag because they just deleted the gametype off of it instead of giving you more than 3 minutes to get across the map (2 and half spent getting there in the first place).
We all love Terminal but once again, it was pretty much 1 Bomb and 1 Flag only.
Colossus had a nice idea with a terrible weapon layout. It had one sniper rifle and the sniper rifle was in roughly the best spot to use the sniper rifle. Also the other team spawned against an open back wall. If they had put the sniper where OS spawned and not had OS at all, things would have been a lot better.
Boneyard and Breakpoint suffer the same way, they're stellar at Invasion and are terrible at anything else. Spire at least works for Slayer. Objectives on Breakpoint are a joke.
Some of the more recent Halo 3/Reach/4 maps are a jack of all trades and work for more gametypes, but not really a master at any of them.
Also special mention for Tombstone as it was the only Halo 2 map to ever support all 8 territories in the gametype settings, which was loads of fun to play a gametype on where it was 8 teams of 2 or 5 teams of 3 , with 8 capture points and 30 minutes of cap time to win (sounds like a lot, but when you started capturing even half the points your timer would start taking off)
Because they fucked these modes up entirely with ordinance and global ordinance and loadouts.
Static weapon spawns are crucial to balancing 1 sided round-based play. You can't have different weapons and loadouts randomly reshape a mode like that without exposing how cheap these systems feel.
Skel1ingt0n
I can't *believe* these lazy developers keep making file sizes so damn large. Btw, how does technology work?
I agree with everything you said. The idea of having teams "split up" to work on different objectives was fantastic. The start of a Zanzibar map with two people rushing rockets, one warthog rushing in for the flag, one person rushes for the switch and unlocks the door, and then the flag guy from the first hog runs out only to be picked up by Driver #2 who is waiting to do the pick up. Great times.
Stupid. Stupid. Stupid. I'll never understand it.
Midship had 'em, too - so did Foundation. (And Ivory Tower? Hmm. Maybe not. Can't remember.)
But yeah, Colossus' out-in-the-open one was definitely unique.
I really liked Invasion/Invasion Slayer, more than anything in h4.
Maps shouldn't be jack of all trades. Think back on how few playlists there were in Halo 2. They kept you playing the right rotation of modes paired with the map right from the start. They didn't dilute everything like you see now.
bobs...onGaf
Member
It was a throwaway generalisation and shouldn't have been taken so seriously. At the end of the day though his point was that a game like halo ce/2 would put off new players and my point is that I can live with that if it appeals to the older fans.
Wording could be more careful for sure - but I Would hope its obvious im not actually talking bout every single person out there when I make those kinds of posts
Garrett 2U
Member
I remember playing Invasion Slayer and really hating the way you had to drop power weapons in.
Once one team got a significant lead, it was almost impossible to come back because they had all the power weapons and vehicles.
Once one team got a significant lead, it was almost impossible to come back because they had all the power weapons and vehicles.
Sort of like personal ordinance on a smaller level /343
It probably didn't help that Spartans got a Scorpion at Phase 3 and Elites got a Wraith. Unfair as hell.
Skel1ingt0n
I can't *believe* these lazy developers keep making file sizes so damn large. Btw, how does technology work?
I can't say I'm a fan of Jack-of-all-trades maps. Doesn't make sense. The only reason you'd need them now is because there are a billion different playlists.
-BTB Objective or 4v4 Objective
-BTB Slayer or 4v4 Slayer
-Free-For-all
So long as every map is good at one of those gametypes, it will fall fine into "subcategories" of gametypes.
Ducking someones BXR then hearing the rage ensue after you kill him is priceless.
Skel1ingt0n
I can't *believe* these lazy developers keep making file sizes so damn large. Btw, how does technology work?
Lol, yep, that too. This thread is filling me with loads of nostalgia.
I'd prefer maps centered around a gametype, but with the realities of manpower and budget and the fact that creating maps has gotten more expensive, developers are going to lean towards maps that can be used in more and more modes so they can get more bang for the buck. Doesn't explain how Prisoner made it into the Anniversary map pack though
StalkerUKCG
Banned
Halo 2 despite its flaws was the best online game iv ever played.
I have some of the best custom memories from that game
I have some of the best custom memories from that game
Its interesting to note that what I'm finding memorable about all this halo 2 gushing is that everything has a mode pairing or a moment that I'm reflecting on. You just dont see that with these maps now.
Ivory Tower / sniper clear out of 1 flag while your carrier window jumps that lower corner for the steal. Now I'd just sprint straight at it or camo sneak to it without any of the planning. Meh
Ivory Tower / sniper clear out of 1 flag while your carrier window jumps that lower corner for the steal. Now I'd just sprint straight at it or camo sneak to it without any of the planning. Meh
Skel1ingt0n
I can't *believe* these lazy developers keep making file sizes so damn large. Btw, how does technology work?
I'd prefer maps centered around a gametype, but with the realities of manpower and budget and the fact that creating maps has gotten more expensive, developers are going to lean towards maps that can be used in more and more modes so they can get more bang for the buck. Doesn't explain how Prisoner made it into the Anniversary map pack though
I have to disagree with the advent of DLC. If you're going to make me pay ~$8 for three maps, then you should have the manpower to make those maps good.
Quite a few people here and my own friends (anecdotal, I know) agree that nearly every Halo 2 map was at least good. It's a shame I wouldn't call a single one from Halo 4 great - even though the game costs $10 more, they've sold more copies, and have already gotten some of that DLC money from me.
Poker Face
Member
I remember from some Halo 2 vidoc someone said, "If we can pull this off it will destroy everything else out there" or something.
they were right
yup. i don't think anything will ever match what halo 2's level of fun.
Now 343 just says, "Eh, lets make it like Call of Duty and try to take some of those sales."
Yeah this DLC pack was very unimpressive for me. Framerate issues aside, they just aren't well executed maps. Wreckage feels like a dis-jointed turf with horrible bloom for one side and shatter is a vehicle map for game that has essentially ruined vehicles or just made them a chore to use. I personally hate using the Mantis, strong as it is, its not really any fun to pilot. I still dont know what I feel about harvest. Awkward at best. Glad I got to try them out first before buying them.
That's what console games have evolved into sadly. No thinking things through, no punishment for death, no earning power-ups/weapons.
Halo needs to go back to it's roots. I'm all for having AA's, sprint, instant respawns, loadouts and the rest of the fluff exclusively in custom games. Keep it out of the core gameplay and matchmaking. Halo is best when everyone starts out on an even playing field and fights for power-ups, weapons, and map control.
I believe it was Luke who said it best: "two men enter, the better man leaves, and the lesser man is left respawning".
Mister Negative
Member
The 12yr old trolls ruined live chat
The weak ruined competition
The collectors/customizers ruined the focus of MP
The studios want all their money
The developers are either pussy whipped / uninspired / or too egotistical and stubborn to give a shit.
At the end of the day for them its either a job or their passion.
Halo used to be about giving people something they've never seen with some ripples of everything I've mentioned here. I honestly dont know where 343 is headed with the franchise but it does feel like an aggregate of many games now.
The weak ruined competition
The collectors/customizers ruined the focus of MP
The studios want all their money
The developers are either pussy whipped / uninspired / or too egotistical and stubborn to give a shit.
At the end of the day for them its either a job or their passion.
Halo used to be about giving people something they've never seen with some ripples of everything I've mentioned here. I honestly dont know where 343 is headed with the franchise but it does feel like an aggregate of many games now.
I wouldn't go that far...
Sanctuary was probably the map that worked best for the most modes in halo history.
Even mlg loved it.
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