Once again at it with this incredible community, what are some common design philosophies that you see in successful and popular forge maps? Is there really any overarching guideline to very roughly adhere to, is it specific to what you're doing, or is there just none at all? Do aesthetics play a large role? Are there any really overdone or just hated styles? Is there a good way to get any type of encounter you want? What are the various types of encounters? What makes a map good, in your eyes? What are some maps in Halo 5 that just worked well? Did they focus on Spartan Abilities or adjust for sprint, thrust, and clamber? Are they emulations of other designs? Are they completely unique, or did they just combine a bunch of good designs and mesh in an interesting way? What do you define as interesting in a map? What makes a map feel fun to play to you? Is there a community wide preference for certain styles or design choices? Can you make a bunch of incredible design choices and still end up with a bad map? What makes a map bad, uninteresting, or boring to play on in your eyes? Will this wall of text never end? But being serious again, thanks for being awesome, I would not be as good in forge as I am without you. I guess this could also make a really good thread to some common questions.
Holy mother of questionmarks, I don't know where to begin. I'm pretty sure some people here can anwser those question waaay better than me.
What are some common design philosophies that you see in successful and popular forge maps? Is there really any overarching guideline to very roughly adhere to, is it specific to what you're doing, or is there just none at all? To answer this and every question below I will first say that every map is different and will require different ideas and solutions to different problems to succeed. It is easier to look at a style of map and then ask yourself what makes that style of map successful than it is to lump every single map into it. For example, a room based map in this game needs to have short transitions between the rooms, but viable playspace within them that allows the encounters to play out in an interesting way. Do aesthetics play a large role? The visual presentation of a map helps orient players and market your design. If the art is not inherent to the way the map is built, then it obviously wont play a large role in its design. Nevertheless, being successful at Forge in Halo 5 and henceforth is largely going to be determined by how creative you can get with the art. Are there any really overdone or just hated styles? Symmetric 2 base 2 tower donut arenas were overdone in MCC because 343 wanted Forge maps for HCS and that's all the pros wanted to play. So you will see some people who swear off of those maps on principle alone. However, the current most popular style are room based asyms, so I'd say those are the most overdone at this point. Ironically, there aren't many symmetric arena maps out right now, let alone good ones, so that style is actually making a comeback. In the end, it doesn't really matter what map you make as long as it is good. Is there a good way to get any type of encounter you want? What are the various types of encounters? Depends on what you want. Do you want cycling around the map like Prisoner? Do you want cross mapping between doors like Guardian? Do you want platforming from one ledge to another? Do you want push pull gameplay like Narrows? Or do you want something more free flowing? Just ask yourself what kind of gameplay you want and think of the geometry that would support that encounter. What makes a map good, in your eyes? Replay value. I don't think a map has to be the most interesting design or the most ground breaking visuals. I just think it has to be fun enough for me to want to play it again. What are some maps in Halo 5 that just worked well? Did they focus on Spartan Abilities or adjust for sprint, thrust, and clamber? Are they emulations of other designs? Are they completely unique, or did they just combine a bunch of good designs and mesh in an interesting way? I'm going to assume you are talking about Forge maps and to that I will say every map is different. There are many maps that are completely original designs and there are many others that take inspiration from existing maps, whether they're in Halo or other games. The map Fullmetal by xDemption is a combination of Guardian and Standoff. It works because he focused on making players go somewhere for a specific sightline. Obviously everyone is building with the abilities and the range of the pistol in mind for scaling, but the goal is to bring out the kind of gameplay you want in the map. What do you define as interesting in a map? What makes a map feel fun to play to you? A map with unique pathing and dynamic encounters that change depending on how people want to play on the map. The most interesting maps support creative gameplay and allow the player to improvise during a given scenario to do something cool. Is there a community wide preference for certain styles or design choices? The only thing the Forge community agrees on is that they will never agree on anything. Can you make a bunch of incredible design choices and still end up with a bad map? If the layout didn't have any potential to begin with then it doesn't matter how well you flesh it out. What makes a map bad, uninteresting, or boring to play on in your eyes? Lazy paths that were placed to complete the circuit and not to offer anything for the gameplay. Usually kindergarten ramps. Excessive cross mapping is also boring and so are excessive flat hallways
If you want to build on your forging skills, stop forging planned maps and just make fleshed out and comprehensive improvs. This way, you build muscle memory for forging and you know what pieces work for what.
Ignore the comments above. Just do 2 bases and a center structure. Look at how successful onslaught and amplified were in Halo 3. Or take a look at Regret or Truth from Halo 5. Just overall solid designs.
Those games have nothing to do with Halo. Here, what you need to do is learn the history of Halo map design. Play these: Marathon (An old BUNGiE game, the entire trilogy is free and on PC) Marathon 2: Durandal Marathon: Infinity Play these and pay close attention to the environment and design througout: Halo CE Halo 2 Halo 3 Halo 3: ODST maybe Halo Reach IF you just want to make a lockout / guardian clone, then skip this and be on your way, but if you want to know something about map design, you have to follow in the footsteps of Max Hoberman. Only then can you know what truly makes a Halo map successful every time.
All you need to know to tell if a map is good or not is to look at the author name. If it's SaLoT, it's great. If it's anyone else, it sucks.
Hit the nail on the head. If you want your name known, make good maps. If your name is known, chances are you make good maps. Most unkowns or less "popular" forgers are in the situation they are in due to there maps quality. Shut up and Forge.
"Successful" is completely relative in this context. Personally I'd say you should watch and analyse a ton of Champion-Pro tier gameplay (or whatever the next best thing is for the style of map you're making; basically you want to see people playing for higher stakes than the typical player will experience so that when push comes to shove you can learn what consequences can come from certain design choices) in a group so you can become more adept at picking out the kind of things that players can exploit during a game and coming out with item placement more likely to stand the test of time. That way you're better equipped to make good judgement calls on sections of a map after a playtest session and can parse feedback more confidently. I'd recommend watching gameplay in groups because it can get boring alone, and in a group there's the chance for someone to notice something that another person missed, at which point you can rewind and go over it again and again until a lesson is learned. At least, if we define "successful" as "a map which is fit for purpose at all levels of play for the intended gametype(s)" this is likely to be helpful.
Successful? Aesthetics. Or sucking someone's a**. But you want to make a good map that you and your friends enjoy. Success isn't what it's cracked up to be if that isn't your main goal.
I just like maps where I'm not confused, don't get stuck on ****, and don't get quickly filled with bullets from several unexpected directions. It's getting harder to meet these requirements with my brain getting all mushed up... Or is it less mushy? I just can't process visual info well now and there aren't the equivalents of handicap parking space objects in Forge nor should there be, unless it's a map based on the Denis Leary song "Asshole".