Ideas to Bring Forge and Custom Games to Full Potential in Halo 4 or Future Halo Games

[LanceLercher]

Hey guys this Thread is a place where the community can post great ideas on what could be improved upon as far as Forge and Custom games go. I'm kinda infuriated about most of the cuts that 343 made to forge pallets, gametype options, and object options. Here is a list of what I feel could be improved upon to bring Forge up to its full potential.

 

 

1. Bring back custom power-ups. The new Trait zones are awesome, and I love how you can have many different types of trait zones that can be placed; however, these trait zones are limited to one area of the map, and they apply to everybody. I feel that the reimplementation of custom power-ups would exponentially increase the number of cool gametypes that could be made. There are time limits on them, and it allows players flexibility all over the map on what sort of customizations could be made.

 

2. Bring back the option of changing the color of Mongooses. I like the new color pallets of so many of the items in the new forge environments, but I feel like 343 did the same thing that Bungie did: they put too many pieces with the same color. In Halo Reach it was gray, and in Halo 4 it is dark green. The most exciting thing about riding a Mongoose in Reach was knowing that I had my own Blue mongoose compared to everyone else's gray or red mongoose.

 

3. Bring back the Covanant Forge items. Now don't get me wrong, the UNSC items that replaced all of the Covenant ones look amazing, but there isn't as much diversity without the Covenant ones. The plasma battery was one of my favorite forge items because it had pulsating and glowing parts that made amazing aesthetic effects. Even when the plasma battery blew up, it had an awesome looking explosion. The data dispersion effect of the new extraction crates is pretty sweet, but I think the plasma battery explosion would be nice to have too. Forging with the portable shield was also really helpful in custom games. It allowed people to create weapon and vehicle dispensers that could be accessed by everybody. The extraction crates and dominion shields are nice for this too, but they can be too bulky. Also, the base of the portable shield looked really cool and worked nice in aesthetic forging.

 

4. Bring back the ability to forge in water or the poison stuff in Erosion. There were quite a few maps that were made in Halo Reach that used water as a central theme, game mechanic, or part of the aesthetics of the map. I think it would be amazing to forge in that green stuff on Erosion because it could go well with the theme of a lot of maps.

 

5. Put more lighting on Erosion and Impact. I love the dynamic lighting that 343 implmented, but the players were promised that things wouldn't be too dark in places where they should be lit up. Even without items near certain places on Erosion, and a lot of places on impact, the natural structures are completely black, and a lot of times, they can't even be improved very much with lights. It's very frustrating trying to forge on a map without light.

 

6. Bring back some old Halo vehicles to forge with. This is a major want that I have heard over and over. People are really frustrated about the lack of a flying UNSC vehicle in Forge. Personally I want the chopper back. Don't say that that wouldn't work because there aren't any brutes in Halo 4, because 343 brought back the Gravity Hammer--a Brute weapon.

 

7. Give us more options for gametypes. It's insanely frustrating trying to create the perfect gametype when very simple options are missing from the customization options. Are you kidding me 343?! I can't even change the look of my Spartan in Flood mode, or make it a classic version of infection. The new options for gametypes are great improvements, but that doesn't mean that the old options should be thrown out.

 

8. Give us some of our old gametypes back!! These would include Halo Ball, Infection (or give us better options in Flood), Race, and Invasion. These gametypes span a lot of interests, and would satisfy almost any forger or person who plays custom games.

 

 

These are the options that I can think of right now, but I may have more later. I may sound like a Bungie fan boy right now, but in fact it's quite the opposite. I love all of the new implementations and a lot of the revamps that 343 made to forge, gametypes, and overall the Halo universe. I just feel like 343 tried too hard to distance themselves from Bungie that they didn't bring back some key elements that made Halo Reach's Forge and Custom Games amazing. Don't get me wrong though, I do have a future wish list for things that haven't been implemented that I think would be awesome, but that's for a different time.

[vulcankilljoy]

Totally agree and then some

[MrWebslinger]

I totally agree. The most important thing at the moment seems to be the lack of gametype options. 70% of my play time and lots of my friend's as well was custom games. Here are some of the games we are missing like crazy.

 

1.Speedflag (currently we can't drive over and pick up the flag like we could in Reach)

2. Assault, one bomb, two bomb. (I know I can use Griffball for neutral bomb but common! We need assault back)

3. One flag CTF (this should have been obvious)

4. Ability to set different pick up, return spots for CTF. I don't always want to pick up the flag in the base. We had some great CTF games in H3 that where setup where you pick up the flag somewhere other than the opponents base.

5. Neutral flag (again, obvious)

 

I also want to echo having more lighting options would be great as well as another open area for forging in. Impact has a great open space but that map is too gray and dark. Would love another Forge World environment. Would it be that hard to port that map over to H4?

[alty1443]

bigger forge worlds, and i didnt see a hard kill zone area thing. was that taken away?

[LanceLercher]

9. Forgeable NPCs. It would be awesome to fight alongside UNSC, Flood, Promethians, or Covenant against the opposing team. You could customize their traits just like you can your own, but you can also choose their intelligence level. It would be so awesome to at least be able to place up to 16 characters (probably 8 for each team).

[LanceLercher]

10. Weather effects and natural effects. It would be awesome to have sandstorms, rain, tornadoes, lightning, fog or mist, earthquakes, etc. These things could randomize some of the outcomes in custom games because out of nowhere this tornado sweeps you up, or an earthquake shakes you just wrong into a hole. They could just be aesthetic effects if that would be the only plausible option. It would be cool to have different rooms in a custom game that have different weather effects.

 

11. Forgeable Bodies and Debris. This would help so much with the aesthetics of certain maps that it could actually make them believeable. It would also cost a lot less on the budget of people who try to forge debris out of a bunch of different pieces.

[TKer15]

Although this game is not suppose to be about robot warfare, adding a jet pack to the Mantis vehicle would be cool. Making it being able to sprint would also be a good addition if balanced well with the rest of its featues. I just think having a 4v4 (or more if possible) mantis battle on Impact would be an awesome space battle, and maybe having lower gravity so each mantis can fly longer distances. Also, I'm sure tons of people have said this...but please bring back a UNSC flying vehicle.

[LanceLercher]

11. Vehicle Perks. These would work so that in exchange for a normal quality that you have, you get a perk for the vehicle you are in. For example, Grenades and Dimes--In exchange for being able to carry grenades, vehicles you are in turn a lot quicker (like the saying turns on a dime). These would be awesome, and 343 even implemented one of these in Halo 4 campaign. You could choose one of these perks, or none of them. Here is a list of perks that I think you could get. The perk I mentioned above is included too. A Hope, A Prayer, and Lots of Speed--In exchange for not having shields, vehicles you are in gain 3X speed. One Manned, One Gun Army--In exchange for not being able to carry a secondary weapon, vehicles you are in have 2X fire rate. Running on Empty--In exchange for only being able to carry up to 1/3 of the maximum ammo for any weapon, vehicles you are in don't have a cool-down period on weapons or abilities. Eagle Eye--In exchange for having a HUD, vehicles you are in allow passengers or drivers to see waypoints over medium to short distance enemies.

 

12. FINE EDITING IN FORGE!!!!!!! There isn't much to say here but that I'm PISSED that this isn't in Halo 4. There is no way on Earth that aesthetic things, or certain mechanics can be just right like they were in Halo Reach, without Fine Editing. This is my number one complaint, and number one want back!!

[...]

Make the spawn timer on objects go up to at least 10 minutes not just three. I don't think it would be hard at all to implement unlike other suggestions. I'd also like the ability to put 16 vehicles so custom games can support 16 players better, not just eight.

[LanceLercher]

13. Dynamic Lighting in Theater Mode. I know this isn't forge or customs or games types, but I does deal with them. If I create a dark map, or a map that has light in specifc places, I want to record the specific experiences I had while playing on that map. This is yet another simple improvement.