I know what you are probably thinking, "Oh man, here is another hater whining about Halo 4." Well I am generally not one to complain. In fact I say very little on these forums most of the time. I like to try and make do and get along without making waves, but I just have to speak up about Halo 4's issues too because they are there, every time I pick up the controller to forge and to play customs. I just feel the need to truly voice my frustrations and sadness about what I have personally discovered and honestly share with this great community that I have come to appreciate over the past few years. I host a small group of casual gamers weekly for custom games, as I am sure many of you do as well. Most of these guys I have known and played Halo with since the first Halo came out. We would get together for the old school pizza and LAN parties before Xbox live even existed, TVs and wires everywhere. Good times with great friends who simply love Halo. Now a days we play on maps I have made or found as well as play mini games. Based on feedback that I am getting from several gamers that I play with regularly on our custom game nights, I think I am going to go back to forging and hosting custom games on Halo Reach rather than Halo 4. I have been in denial and hate to say it, but Halo 4's forge custom games are just simply not as well made as Reach's. Guest chat is gone which is a real bummer Many of the custom mini games are no longer possible There are glitches galore in forging and playing The small maps with bad terrain are growing annoying to forge on There are so many poor forging tools or lack there of The split screen has major issues These are just a few of the problems that I am seeing and hearing about with Halo 4. The way I see it, if my custom game night players are not having as much fun as they once were, then I see no reason to continue pushing Halo 4 on everyone on our game nights when we all have a perfectly good game that we all love available to play. Don't get me wrong, I like Halo 4's campaign and online matchmaking okay, but for our custom game night, I think Halo Reach is the clear winner for so many reasons. I really wanted to like Halo 4 for customs, but the sad truth is I don't. I wanted it to continue the tradition of THIS Halo being better than all the previous Halo games, but it's not. I am simply tired of trying to "make it work" on so many levels. So my creative forging efforts for the most part will return to Reach. I will probably still tinker from time to time with Halo 4's forge and maybe some future updates will fix some of these issues, but my heart is still with, as the Vidoc put it "Bungie's swan song". So I will see you Reach lovers in the Halo Reach forums. I will still try to contribute Halo 4 maps and info from time to time, but this is a true turning point for me. I would like to know how you other seasoned players and forgers feel about doing a 180 back to Reach. Is it something you have done or considered doing as well?
I would say consider waiting for the title update to give up hope. Obviously it won't fix everything but I'm sure it will help out a lot. But basically I'm with you, I'm a huge fan of Reach and I will probably go back to playing it eventually, while I wait out H5 (which I'm still optimistic about). I'm not one to excessively or blindly bash H4 either, it is fun but at the end of the day I feel more limited by it.
It's funny. People were complaining about Halo 3 being terrible before Reach got releasd, then Halo 4 news got out and people said Reach was the worst Halo ever made. And here we are, people slowly going back to Reach. Generally speaking I'm with you. Some game modes (Flood in particular) are extremely restricted, and no one even seems to play customs anymore. I'll wait it out, and if updates don't seem to cut it then I'm taking Reach out of the attic
That's not very fair to say. For its time, Reach was the worst Halo game to me. Halo 4 just managed to actually do even worse.
I think you are right in doing so, going back to Reach that is. And just how many bug fixes will the update repair? Not as many as I too am used to in Reach, the ability to set precise movement of pieces is my biggest gripe, as well as the fact that the Forge maps are so small. Fortunately, the Reach gametype is still very active, and the Halo 4 Forge is still very much in it's trial run, it is a shiny new toy that everyone must try out, you are just bored with it sooner than others, no big deal. I will probably Forge again on Reach, simply because there is so much more room to do so. Maybe I will see you there?
Yeah I am hopeful the update will dazzle us all, but I doubt it. Making the forgers happy didn't seem to be high on the priority list to begin with so it's not likely they will hook us up with an update, but anything is possible. I have a feeling that Reach will get a new shot in the arm after Halo 4 gets a bit old for most. It's just got that staying power with the custom game community. [br][/br]Edited by merge: I wasn't crazy about the Reach campaign. It way just okay for me. I missed the Chief quite a bit, but all in all it was okay. You cannot argue however that forge and custom game types are king in Reach compared to the other Halo games in the franchise. Never before or since have we had so much control in a Halo game to create maps and game types. If only they took what they had in Reach and upped the ante instead of dropping features and screwing up new ones in Halo 4. So much wasted potential. [br][/br]Edited by merge: Agreed, Halo 4 isn't going away, but I think once the newness wears thin the forge community will just say "Forget this hot mess, me and my buddies are going back to Reach for some customs." I'd love to see a rebound in the player numbers for Reach if only to send a message about how important custom games are to the community. So yeah, I will mostly be forging in Reach unless something drastic happens in the Halo 4 updates.
I would say that if I felt the way he does i would just go back to Reach and when the TU comes out treat it and evaluate it like a whole new game. But personally I doubt there is going to be much change. Everyone of his concerns is valid. That said, I would never pop in my Reach disc again except to determine how something changed with Halo 4 (to make a comparison)... NEVER LOOK BACK... Life is too short.... stay with the latest and move forward with the crowd. I don't care how bad Halo 4 is perceived by the community, it is the next step in the Halo titles... the next step to Halo 5 or whatever the next title might be. Okay, back to sleep for me...
I just wanted to update you guys a bit. I just hosted some custom games with friends and we played Halo Reach. We all agreed we haven't had that much fun since Halo 4 came out. I guess sometimes it's okay to look back if it helps you have a blast with your friends No regrets! I'm not trying to convience anybody of anything, I just highly recommend you give it a try with your comrades and tell me how your experience compares now that you have had a good taste of Halo 4.
I agree the ability to click the ball and move items tiny bits into place was a great thing idk why they took out...but aside from that and the huge forge world, what features are in reach forge that arent in h4? magnets and locking are godsends...even tho thats about the only new editing tools ive found
he's talking specifically of having fun playing the game, not necessarily forge, though that does correlate to a degree.
While I do use magnets on rare occasions, it's really kind of a redundant feature if you forge using coordinates, which I usually try to do. I'd say the most useful new forge feature is the ability to copy a piece with all of it's attributes. Other than that, it's basically Halo Reach's forge, only buggier and uglier: Dynamic lighting makes everything look too dark or stops working Hit boxes are screwed up on many of the pieces Pieces can just disappear if you merge them into the background Textures used on the pieces are ugly in my opinion (I never thought I'd miss the forerunner grey) Gravity volumes are kinda neat, but why in the WORLD can't you re-size them?! That's a few of my biggest gripes with the forge in Halo forge and I can work around all of that, but my point is customs are just not as fun as they are in Reach. Halo 4's custom game experience is a poor carbon copy of Reach's custom game experience. The gametype limitations, removal of infection game types, smaller maps, bugs, gameplay changes, lighting glitches, split screen lag, lack of guest chat, and focus on personal loadouts all contribute to making the experience more frustrating for custom game lovers. It's like all the attention was put on making the match making "loan wolf" players happy while forge and custom games was an after thought, pawned off onto another developer. They obviously didn't even consult hard core forgers of custom maps and games or it wouldn't be like it is. Bottom line is, I just don't think they care like Bungie did about the custom game community. For example the forge experience from Halo 3 to Halo reach was improved so dramatically that people were literally cheering when it was first presented at comic-con. Halo Reach Panel at Comic-Con 2010 - Part 2 - YouTube As I watch this moment again, I realize how much Bungie loved the community and created a much better forge for us. They even admit they have been watching us and they responded accordingly. This is not how Halo 4's team has reacted to the fans. I don't think they care as much and that is evidenced by the many mistakes made in the new Halo 4 forge and custom games. Halo's soul was the Bungie team and I hated to see them go. So I've said my piece. I know people want to march forward with Halo 4 and I will still enjoy it myself, it's not that bad of a game. I know will not be able to swim against the current forever, but for now I am back on Reach and loving it all over again. I just hate to see the Halo franchise take a side step from what made Halo great in the first place which is the unique relationship between the community and the game developers. Perhaps it will be so again.
I can't go back to a previous Halo game unless it's just for good old times sake or a night of nostalgic fun. That's just me though... my main "home" game has to be the new updated Halo that is currently out. You can do enough custom stuff with Halo 4 and there is modded gametypes for giving Flood weapons. I also love the Flood character model instead of spartan infected...I think that alone makes infection a lot better and more "horror-like" which is what it is suppose to be.