City by the Sea is a small team or FFA map made for intense, strategic games and the occasional spectacular death-by-falling-and-drowning. The map sits high above the ocean but it's not a floating map - everything is supported all the way to the waterline and below. It gives the impression of being larger than it is, thanks to a big aesthetic-only city that wraps around half of the map, and makes player orientation easy. The other side of the map gives an unimpeded view of Forge World's gorgeous mountains in the distance. It supports most common gametypes and up to 8 players, but is especially made for 1 vs. 1 or 2 vs. 2 slayer; FFA slayer for 3-4 people; and oddball (team or otherwise). For 1 vs. 1 matches I highly recommend turning off motion trackers to get the full experience. Video and screenshots YouTube - Halo: Reach map preview - City by the Sea Weapons and equipment - 3 DMRs - 1 needle rifle - 1 needler - 2 magnums - 2 assault rifles - 1 spiker - 1 plasma rifle - 2 plasma repeaters - 2 plasma pistols - 1 grenade launcher (3 shots only, 2 minute respawn) - 1 shotgun (6 shots or 1 clip only, 2 minute respawn) - 2 health stations - Various frag and plasma grenades Features - Gorgeous, towering city backdrop - Atrium room specially designed for interesting strategic approaches and outbursts of chaos - Cool grav lift tube made of doors Comments from the preview "the bridge and door lift tube look sweet." - Titmar "If you're testing it inv me... cause this looks freaking epic" - N33b "Nice map. 1v1 on it was awesome. You should add another small building if you have budget left but other than that this map was one of the best 1v1 maps in reach." - N33b "this map looks sweet!!... i would love to test this... wow i cant beleive that tube thing.. it just looks so great from the pictures this just looks like one of the best city maps ever" - Keg Please let me know how you like the map! I'm willing to make revisions as needed, but based on multiple tests I believe it plays well as it is today.
The map looks very amazing. I love the unique building structures, the layout, the bridge/tunnel, I love it all. good work
Wow, I just downloaded it and then remembered I'm using a different account.... Fail. lol. Was a blast testing this with you and everything. Makes for some very intense 2v2 games. And thanks for the shout out in the vid.
This map looks great! It's hard to even find a part to criticize. All I can see is that maybe it would look more natural if the area across from the arched bridge was connected to the water by some parts, and maybe if the tunnel continued down a little farther. Really nice job on the backdrop as well. Great job!
Thanks guys, very much appreciate the kind words. And Schnitzel, I am especially grateful to you on this one - you play-tested it a couple of times, you helped me tweak the weapon spawns to make the map more enjoyable. So you definitely deserved your shout-out in the vid.
It looks like a very nice 1v1 map. The building looks awesome, and are those other building-looking things possible to get into? or are those just for aesthetics? Anyways, the only little problem I can see from the pictures is that the outside looks like it needs to be cleaned up a small amount. Just my opinion. I will have to dl and try it out.
Thanks, give it a try and let me know what you think! The other buildings are all strictly aesthetic - someone with a jetpack could fly up and land on parts of them, but all of that is outside the soft safe zone, so you wouldn't be there for long. There's also no way to get inside any of them, or much to see if you did get in. At some point I may try making a similar map with more playable areas, but this one was deliberately made for much smaller games.
I like the map altought I think it's too small. It's looks fun to play in FFA but I wouldn't say so for a team slayer gametype. With the abilities, you can travel the entire map within the time you need to say it. But nice work overall, the background makes the map even more realistic!
I enjoyed the aesthetic structures in the background since they make the location feel larger, which in turn leads to the problem that is it a bit too small. I think if you were to create 1-2 small structures flanking the central structure with some alternate routes the map really would improve vastly. Also, the interior layout feels unpolished and out of place in my opinion. The upper walkways don't feel naturally placed, and neither does the centerpiece. If I would change one part of the map, it would be that interior.
Thanks. I believe it plays smoothly, I ran a bunch of play tests with different people (mostly 1v1 and 2v2) and everybody felt at home and liked how it played. Not that there's much layout to learn, of course, but people seemed to take to it very quickly. (By the way, in case you meant frame rate rather than gameplay - I had frame rate issues initially and made changes specifically to eliminate that. If you see any let me know, but it should run very well, at least on full screen mode.) Regarding the few comments about the size - it's deliberately about as big as a very large closet! The intent is that small games of 2-4 players should play as frantically and with as much action as larger games on mid-sized maps do. Therefore there's not much running around space. But there are a lot of available paths even in the small area available, and with the wrap-around, bi-level structure of the ramps there's a lot of strategy about how best to run from combat, or how best to pursue.
Hello! Wow this has some nice features! This is an awesome map! Played really well on slayer! pleanty of cover and well placed weapons! I liked the main room the most! Nice aesthetic touches! Good job on this map
This is a really great map. I downloaded it before I got a Forge Hub account and I've got to say that this map plays really well. With my two brothers playing together on FFA Swat, I found the map really great as far as cover goes and the additional open spaces make Swat a really good gametype for this map. The spawn points being only on either side of the map makes it a bit of a problem, but other than that the gameplay worked out great. I really like maps that use a combination of gameplay aesthetics and a lot of scenery beyond the traditional playing area. You did a good job forging this map.
KerianH - thanks for the feedback, I feel honored to have inspired your only post thus far. About the spawn points, what game types were you playing? Can you describe a little more how the spawning went? It should have spawn points in all playable areas - a handful on the back deck, on the front deck (where the one-way shields are), a couple on the curved bridge area and one on the narrower bridge above, a few in the downstairs atrium room, and a few on each side of the wrap-around walkways (both levels). Basically all areas should be covered more or less equally, though of course I'm at the mercy of Bungie's spawn system. The only respawn areas are specific to CTF and assault - in those games players will only spawn on their half of the map (divided basically straight down the middle, from one deck to the other) and on the deck they "own," where their objective stuff is. In other game types you should be free to spawn any and everywhere.
el megapwn - You're welcome. Actually, this is the first time I've commented on Forge Hub, so I'm glad that I left such a significant impression in my praise for your map... Anyway, it was just Free For All Swat. We were respawning mostly in the same spots; the back and front decks. I think it was rather rare that we ever spawned in other spots, though I wasn't really paying attention...hard to do so when your little brother decides to use your head for target practice...lol.
There are only so many spawn points available and such a small map... I'm sure a lot of the fault for bad spawns lies with Bungie. Mega, I can go over this with you in forge again. Think I might be able to remedy the spawn issue KerianH brought up. lol.