As most of us know, the new maps were out as of Tuesday and all the Guilders went straight to downloading them. We got into forge as soon as possible and started to work on new maps with the countless tools we were given. One of the most important additions to these maps are the instant floating of objects using the methods shown in the Advanced Floating Forging 101. The Shield doors are good for keeping vehicles and soccer balls inside or outside of your map. Well anyway, in this article we will give our impressions of the new levels put into the Heroic Map Pack. Rat's Nest This level looks very similar to Crow's Nest from campaign. It is a human stronghold that looks like it is taking place during the covenant invasion. It is very vehicle based which makes it an ideal race track. The inside of the level is good for some close combat fighting while on the roads, it is set up for some more long range playing. Personally, it is the worst out of the three; partially because of the poor forging options on it, but as said, it is ideal for racetracks. Standoff Think of this as an attempt to make a Coagulation/ Blood Gulch after the not very cannon Valhalla. The bases are not the same as Coagulation's but that does not mean that they are bad. They are built into the hillside and inside each are switches to open doors around the bases. I would compare them to the bunkers in Call of Duty 3. Other than that they layout could be compared to a shortened Coagulation, but no ridge or caves. I would still say that this is my favorite map of this map pack. Foundry What else is there to say except this map was made for forge. Almost everything is removable, and most of the scenery is so big you can make almost anything and block off anything you could dream of. The maps have already started to flow. There have been mazes and remakes of almost every level from the past Halo© games. The sky is the limit in this map or in this case, the ceiling, which I feel is way too low.
Yeah I can't wait till I get them tomorrow. That's when I get my Microsoft points. I drew a map in the layout design thing for Forge Bungie but on. I'm going to get right to making it. I also have an idea for Standoff.
Standoff was dissapointing...it's way to f*cking small for an outdoor map, Foundry was more than i expected, and Rats Nest just doesnt seem like it will be played much, cept for machinima and/or playing around :/
Foundry is like every map ever with custom games. If you've got FH Community on your FL, you can easily set up big custom games on custom maps.
I have to say rat's nest disappointed me a lot more than I thought it would. Foundry lived up to the expectations and more. Standoff, great machinima and big team games. I love the labyrinth by the way. I was making something like that when you posted that (guess you guys are faster than me alone lol).
Standoff really disappointed for a few reasons. The first is that the warthogs dominate way too much, and yes there are laser and rockets but the warthogs respawn way to fast and the flat land makes it hard to get a shot off before you are dead. Also because of the relatively flat land there is no sniper which in close combat games a sniper can separate the great from the good. Maybe I will grow into but from the 6v6 games so far i am not convinced but 4v4 wont be as hectic which will maybe result in more skill and BR using which is what i thought this map was all about until i realized how overpowering the turrets and warthogs are. Foundry is just amazing for custom games and the default map is the best of the new IMO. Although I have only played Rat's Nest a few time i don't know what to think about it, I like how there is a mixture of close combat and long range combat remind me of a map that needs to be recreated hint Acension hint. The saver for me with this updated was the installation of Team BRs and Team Snipers in team slayer which gives it variety with Shotty Snipes, Team BRs, Team Snipers, and Team Slayer. I am doing much better because BR and sniper are my best weapons. I cant wait till BTB is ranked in a couple weeks.
I got to play some on Tuesday (was home alone, can't play on weekdays) so I played matchmaking DLC for maybe 7 games and never played Standoff. The 2 times I could have it was vetoed. Both by just by the minimum number of people needed and one at the 1 second mark!
I tried the DLC Playlist, and I was paired up with a bunch of English/Scottish people yelling at American's, and it was just so annoying I got an invite and quit. I never quit. But it was just so annoying.
Wait, so does this mean any item will float using this method on the new maps? I saw in the Standoff screenshot there's a floating box, for example. Does it spawn and stay up there? I noticed while screwing around in Foundry objects didn't fall when stuff was deleted from below them, but didn't think there spawns would float as well. Was I mistaken? ~Jakester1024 P.S. I haven't really played MatchMaking since Tuesday, so I can't really pick which one is my favorite yet.
There are some of the objects that will float without assistance (i.e. using teleporters isn't needed.) But you still have to get them to the level you want them with something else in order for them to be stable. It's a pretty handy tool, I can't wait for the next round of forge objects already. As for the new maps. I haven't actually played them enough to have a complete opinion on them yet, but Stand off is beautiful, Horrible flag spawn. Foundry's default configuration sucks. Rat's Nest seems to be a pretty fun map, it's also huge comparedto what I expected, but I haven't played a match on it yet.
I seem to either get: Neutral Assault on Rats Nest which always gets vetoed by noobs and goes to Territories on Standoff which is very fun, as long as the Hogs arent spammed too much... Or I get CTF on Standoff which noobs veto and it becomes one of the above. Sometimes i get TS on Foundry or Standoff, which is fun, but imo Foundry's default kinda blows. I agree with tygrad though, i havent played them enough to formulate an opinion yet.
If anyone didn't notice already, the wraiths on Foundry have Reflections turned on and look DAMN BEAUTIFUL!!!
Rat's nest did not live up to what I thought it would be. However, there are quite a few neat areas that can be accessed with a little forgery(as in sealed rooms, areas sealed by barriers above rooms). Note that it is IMPOSSIBLE to overload this map. A few friends and I have tried again and again with different methods and it refuses to do it. I have not done it with the other maps at this point but they probably wont do it either. Bungie said that there would be a lot of racetracks on this level. I doubt that since there is only about two ways ( the two directions) which gives very little possibility of variation. This just might be one of the worse maps that I have played from Bungie, along with Standoff. Standoff was about what I expected it to be. There really isn't a whole lot that can be done with it. One thing that really angers me about that map is that about half of the branches in the tree in the back corner(the ones that would be good to climb on like for say sniping or zombies or hide and seek that would be real in any other map ever) ARE NOT REAL! THEY ARE JUST IMAGE MAPS IN 3d! WTF! I thought the days of that were gone. It seems that Developers, now including Bungie are focusing more and more and more on the graphics and making it "real" than on the quality, fun, replay value, entertainment, story, etc. This is truly sad era for gaming. There are very few developers left that still focus on making a great game instead of making it look cool. Take Tim Schaeffer (forgive spelling if its wrong), he makes original(seriously!) original games that aren't focused on looks. His games are focused on being good, in particular, the story, replay value, and fun that can be had(Pshychonauts for example, monkey/treasure island? come on people). Foundry came to be what I expected, then spiraled down into oblivion when I realized that it was WAY WAY WAY to small. For those of you that have read Ghosts of Onyx, You know that Foundry is in Cuba and that the orbital lift was destroyed by the other (other than Spartan 117) Blue Team, which was around the beginning of Halo 1(when In Amber Clad leaves)I know that it was made this size for the one reason of matchmaking. Who cares if walls(forge) are used to be a barrier! This map is supposed to be for Forge! Everyone seems to veto slayer on this map unanimously to constantly get the ever-satisfing territories on Rat's Nest(extreme sarcasm on that one). Bungie said that they listened to the public, saying that these new maps satisfy those requests. It could be said that they do, to the tune of about .01% of one degree(1%). For example, people wanted maps like Foundation back, or at least Human maps, and Bungie gave a human map. The community wanted a forge map, so Bungie gave one that fits SOME of the community needs(objects, not size). The people wanted Blood Gulch or Coagulation, so Bungie gave them one that somewhat LOOKs like them. In addition, the price was just too much. Map packs in Halo 2 cost only five dollars. The map packs so far in Halo 3 cost like TWELVE dollars! It wouldnt hurt, only help, Bungie for them to just reissue some if not all of the old and BETTER maps, and not change them at all. They could at least leave the possibility of getting out of the map, even if there are no superjumps. I will be completely honest when I say that I have had more fun (a large amount more in this case) on ONE, just ONE, single, uno, etc. occasion of playing a glitches game and getting out of the map in Halo 2 than I have had in ALL of the hundreds of matchmade games(even that I am no able to play with good RL friends), custom games, and the forge up to this point COMBINED!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!