OBLIVION | Fight Like Hell - Preview (MultiLockOn)

So here it is. I listed my Xbox for sale two days ago so this'll be it. I consider this my Halo 5 masterpiece so if you don't like it I'll probably cry.

If you know me, I'm a huge fan of Quake. It's literally the face and lifeline of arena shooters, everything an arena shooter has ever aspired to be; quake has it. Every proponent of its gameplay is the ultimate derivative of promoting mental and technical skill in a game. And in my humble opinion, it's not only the king of shooters, but the most skill based game of all time. If I can replicate any facet of Quake in a Halo map, I will.

If you've ever watched a duel between the Quake gods, things move at breakneck pace. The movement speed is comically fast (and it doesn't have sprint! so weird..) and it allows the level design to very flexible as a result. Many maps are large but play deceiving fast (even though quake is strictly a 1v1 game) and you'll find that the two players will often be on opposite ends of the map, circling around and around. Even though they only have extremely brief glimpses of visibility of their opponent as they run past an open doorway far opposite of them, the action never stops. Rockets continue to fly in every direction as quake has evolved into a game of prediction, so that although you might only see your enemy for fractions of a second at a time, the two players don't have the luxury of stopping the flow of combat. Always predicting, always pre-firing through doorways, always chipping away little by little until one player goes down and the dance starts over again. Constant damage and gunplay, all the time. There's no retreating in quake, all damage is permanent and you have to consciously move, collect health, and outplay your enemy.

This is what I sought to capture in Halo. Which sounds impossible! How can a team based game with Sprint, a short range -slow killing utility weapon, and recharging health possibly capture this, in fact Halo 5s gameplay is fundamentally the opposite of everything quake has established. You can't chip away damage over time with recharging health, the pistol can hardly shoot across the map, it doesn't do enough damage to be lethal, you can't even move full speed and shoot at the same time. You either sprint, or you stop and shoot.

I wanted a map with constant pacing where you couldn't back down from action, no matter where you went you couldn't run away, but it couldn't be wide open because the pistol suffers at longer ranges. Which means I'd need a tightly knit map, with plenty of line of sights to punish players. I couldn't have players endlessly running away so there needed to be a level of punishment. This ultimately meant that while you could shoot anywhere, you couldn't get anywhere. This was a very difficult concept. And most important, my favorite design philosophy that I'll follow until the day I die - the map needed to be flexible enough to allow players to play the way they wanted. I wanted it to be a sandbox where players of different preferences and styles could approach and maneuver combat in the way they wished.

You'll see when playing the map that you'll be subject to soooo many intricate lines of sights. I took hours upon hours just about every forge session just shifting what may have been 1 rock per day, making sure that everything lined up the way I wanted it to. While I'm not going to sit here and take a picture of every LOS, rest assured when you play Oblivion, you'll find yourself learning more and more with every play through. You'll become quite skilled very quickly, I hope you fall in love with the design in the same way I did The end result is that no matter where you or an enemy player are standing on the map, if you put damage on them and they run away, you can cut off the enemy player before their shields recharge. Every single time. No matter where you're both standing, by using either of the two cross map teles, or by using the central labrynth to run through, with enough aggression you can *in theory* punish a bad play on Oblivion, every single time*. Almost every single LOS on the map is red reticle pistol range while UNSCOPED. Overall I think this map will take all of Halo 5's strengths and build around it, while also retaining the ability to apply constant pressure that I love about Quake.

I also began this around the time id's new Doom reboot started showcasing more gameplay prerelease. Id has always been at the forefront of the gaming industry in terms of their art and game engines, but wow does Doom 2016 look ****ing incredible. I love the soundtrack, the art, the colors, all the different hell themes rang so many bells in my head. I had to try it for myself! I'm not one to hold a picture in front of me and copy it piece by piece, I wanted it to resemble DOOM and all the feelings you get when you play DOOM, but to also be my own. I don't think copying an art style makes you a great artist, pioneering your own does. So I took a lot of cues from the color palette, the shapes of the rocks in Doom as they jut upwards to a point, I looked at the narrow winding pathways crumbling just over flowing lava, I looked at the rocks and how the demons had burrowed their ways into the hell stone. All these I took and I made my own. There's a lot of thematic repetition to the map that you'll see with even the natural terrain. All the holes in the rock are cut in the same fashion, all the walls incline in the same way, all the stone is beveled in concave. The terrain on the floor is settled to the side the way it would after years of wind and decay. I'm very happy with the map artistically, I hope it passes the test of time several months from now when I look back.

All the winding paths that hug the lava pit are extremely narrow and slope down, giving you the feeling you're slipping off. The rocks are shaved, giving the appearance that they were dug out by claws. The throne room of the Demon King is burrowed deep into the heart of the hellstone, just at the end of the lava estuary. The teleporters are great wells that you jump into and fall for several seconds before teleporting. I originally had these great wells with many bodies piled at the bottom and a glowing pentagram that was wreathed in fire. I wanted it to feel like you were a Demon being summoned, where you're being sucked into another dimension down the wall and then you fall out of the ceiling in another room, landing on top of a blood pentagram like you were being summoned ritualistically. Unfortunately like every map, it's a balancing act of resources and the teleporters were quite object consuming. They're much simpler now, but the functionality remains. You fall in one end, and fall out the ceiling on the other. It gives the players at the receiving end a few seconds to react and adjust their position, and it gives players who are teleporting the ability to ground pound through the teleporter. Anyways, enough talking, here's some gameplay clips of me walking around in forge earlier on the maps. I didn't render the lighting because it's at 250% lightmap and everything is polka dotted lol.

http://xboxdvr.com/gamer/BOWTOTHEMILKMAN/video/18390302

http://xboxdvr.com/gamer/BOWTOTHEMILKMAN/video/18390299

It might require you to run around on the map yourself to understand it better, I recognize that nat geo maps can be hard when it comes to readability.

I've gotten a little more done since I recorded that walk through. As you can see, I'm remarkably close to the object limit and I'm going to need quite a few pieces for lighting. I'm going to have to make sacrifices, we'll see how it goes. Hopefully I don't need to cut too much.

I'm posting those links because they include the gamertag to my alt account i do my forging on - BowToTheMilkMan. I've kept it hidden since forge launched but since I'm done I don't mind if people look. I've got some other projects on that account that I'm not ever going to finish, you're all welcome to add the GT and take whatever you'd like for your own. Except Oblivion obviously lol the most current version is called SqualLuigi 2 I believe lol. So there's that. I hope to get it done soonish, I couldn't be happier with the design. I hope you all enjoy playing it as much as I've enjoyed making it. I'll update this as progress comes.

 

Nope!

And make your case! Xandrith told me he thinks starcraft 2 is a harder game, but I disagree.

 

You mean the bridge of khazad-dum? Or the great halls of stone?

Ahahaha this is true. I can get on if need be but it's not even my Xbox so it'll be sparse. I don't even think Halo is installed on the other.

Thank you!

Hold on I have to make a run to the grocery store, I'll be back though

--- Double Post Merged, Jun 10, 2016 ---

Starcraft requires very little mechanical skill

 

When we're discussing whether or not a game requires more skill, and your game lacks 1 of 2 skillful components, I think that changes something.

 

So that picture is actually the Chamber of Mazarbul, specifically Balins Tomb.




Noob.

 

Well the rest of the room with the huge columns looks like the great hall