Forge Suggestions

[Xor]

Hello. I'm new here so sorry if I post this in the wrong place. I have been a big fan of Halo's forge and would be very happy to see anything from my list added, but I don't expect very many to be added. As a game developer myself, I know what I'm asking for.
 
I would like to make several suggestions here, so I'll put them in order (from most important to least important):

• Better options. It would nice to edit trait fields without the need of pausing the game or edit a custom power up on the map rather than in the game mode. Also it would be cool to choose when to generate lighting instead of generating lighting every time you switch to player mode.
• Better budget. I know that the Xbox One should increase the budget, but I would rather either have a budget or an object limit, not both. Currently we have a budget and a limit per object which makes it hard to make scenes with a lot of one object type
• Color and texturing. Some objects like the mongoose and small parts of blocks can have the color changed. I would like to see this available for all vehicles, weapons and all of the blocks. This way you can have more diversity. Also it would awesome if we could change the texture of the blocks. You could have bricks, metal, wood, etc. The possibilities are endless.
• Time, lighting, weather and background settings. If you could change the time of day, weather or background, it would make a huge difference to the feel of the map. You could use the same map over and over.
• Animals and AI​. It would​ be nice to be able to set frogs, birds or crickets around a scene to add to the atmosphere. It also be nice to be able to put out covenant or forerunners behind a wall for example, to keep you in a certain area. Or you could make an epic map where you battle hunters in arena if you wanted.
• Vegetation and water.​ Imagine the maps people would make if they had access to ponds, rivers, lakes or waterfalls. Also if you could use a brush to paint grass moss or ferns over terrain. I'd also like to see more tree or bush types.

The is the stuff I would like to see sooner or later, but I really doubt it would be possible for Halo: 5:

• Terrain Customization.​ We have seen a lot more terrain chunks and pieces, but it doesn't help very much if you want truly smooth custom terrain. You are stuck using the same shapes and materials for all of your terrain and it is expensive with the budget and object limits. I would love to see a more dynamic approach to terrain. If you could use a brush type of system to raise or lower sections of terrain you would have true custom terrain especially if you could texture it too with grass, dirt or rock.
• Weapon and vehicle editor. To make my own weapons and vehicles would be my ultimate dream for halo. I understand this isn't a game studio, but I imagine it would be one of the best games if you could make and share weapons or vehicles. I how ever doubt anything like this would be compatible with the current engine.

So that's that. This is what I would really like to see. If any game had all these features, I dare say it I would buy it.

Thanks for listening.

[Maestro]

Welcome to the community! Unless a mod says otherwise, I'd say you've posted this in the right place.

 

1. I like that powerup idea! I tend to forget to add custom powerup options in the gametype itself, and then when I use custom powerups, they do nothing in-game.

As for generating lighting, it would be a nice option as well, although it generates lighting every time you switch to player mode to give you an idea of how your map looks while you're building it. Then, if something looks off, you can fix it before your map gets too complicated.

 

2. MCC scrapped the budget and uses an object limit instead. However, each type of piece is limited as well, so you can't drop 200 Kill Balls in your map and call it a day. It all depends on how much strain an object puts on the engine. (This is typically the part where Twin sheds some of his Blam engine knowledge)

 

3. Yes. All of my yes. Covenant textures would be a bit tricky, however, as their architecture is very smooth and rounded and would look awkward on blocks. Curves aren't easy to deal with. Forerunner architecture tends to be more sharp and triangular, which would be easier to work with.

 

4. I'd say this one is most likely to be in the game in regards to brand new features. Even if the number of forge canvases is limited, it would give each one a huge amount of replay value. However, I imagine that different weather effects could put a lot of stress on the engine, especially when playing online.

 

5. Animals, yes. I'd say that's a possibility (so long as they're passive and not aggressive like Guta), especially since CoD's "revolutionary" fish AI was first featured in Super Mario 64 almost 20 years ago.

AI enemies, however, are a different story. You'd need to give them the ability to find paths, which is extremely difficult, if not impossible, for the average Joe. Stationary AI enemies, like those Promethean Turrets in Halo 4, would be much easier to implement.

 

6. Vegetation would be fairly easy to add in. Water, however, could be tricky to work with. If a map were to be submerged, you'd need to alter the player physics. If it were to follow fluid mechanics, that could be extremely taxing on the engine. Xbox One is a very powerful system, but the game engine itself and online play hinder its abilities.

 

Those last two are developer level tools. It'd be rather tricky to implement them in a way that is user-friendly. Of those two, however, terrain customization seems fairly likely to show up in a future Halo game.

 

 

With all that being said, it's far too late in the Halo 5 development process to implement brand new features. However, maybe some (perhaps all if we're lucky!) will appear in forge. We'll find out when it's released on October 27th!

 

Hope to see you around in the forge!

[BLUE ICE 6]

Not sure where to put these but figured why not add to this list.
Here are a few of my own suggestions to add.
1. I would like if in scripting objects could spawn on score greater than. the objects could be team specific. so as each team scored points objects could spawn in and either help there team or (ala Mario Carte) help the losing team. New routes around the map could spawn influencing movement across map. mini games would explode over this feature.
2. Define whether objects hard or soft spawn. if soft spawn it will spawn safely after players aren't occupying its space. Hard spawn would force it to spawn immediately at said point and if a player is occupying its space they die. killed by those pesky guardians.
3. The idea of object grouping. I would like to see at least four groups you could assign objects to and then be able to move, rotate, copy, and save group to fileshare.
4. Better rotate options. when selecting an object or group rotate based off where selected. maybe in advanced menu have it selectable to rotate off selecting point or off center of mass or even rotate around player.
5. A simple placeable magnet. A single spot in which other objects would snap to while using no part of object count as once saved the magnet could be removed as there is no physical object and nothing to render.
6. I forgot to mention with number one but the ability to despawn objects based off score as well.
All of these I believe to quite in the realm of possibility. yet this is still only a wish list

[haloman 2]

if just like forge to be easy, im a really bad forger