THE MAJESTIC MAP PACK ============================= As all of you know, the Majestic Map Pack came out this morning. Now that I ran through the maps in forge and had some matches on all 3, I think it's an excellent map pack and none of the maps are bad at all. I thought Skyline felt small and cramped when I was looking in Forge, but it's actually a blast to play. Landfall and Monolith are both great as well and I love the Man Cannon gameplay on Monolith. The maps are beautiful also with an excellent atmosphere for each. These maps are a must-have for your Halo 4 map collection. HALO 4 MAPS FALL SHORT IN THE END? ============================= Unfortunately, I think we have a major issue with Halo 4 regarding MAPS. We only have 3 more maps left with the upcoming Castle Map Pack. I feel like this "just isn't enough", even if all 3 Castle maps are excellent maps like the Majestic ones. We really "NEED" a 4th Map Pack for Halo 4, as it feels like it falls really short on great maps compared to Halo 3... and yes, even Reach in my opinion. Maybe it isn't so much the amount of maps but rather the amount of quality maps that makes me feel this way in Halo 4. The maps "Haven, Exile, Ragnarock, Longbow, Harvest, Skyline, Landfall, Monolith, Impact, & Ravine", really stand out as awesome maps in Halo 4. "Complex", "Adrift", & "Wreckage" are great also but not as good; although some may disagree. While "Solace" is a decent/mediocre map that has a nice brown color theme and looks great. "Abandon" is flat out horrible for Team Slayer and I never had one fun match with that gametype on it, but I do think it has a beautiful atmosphere and nice aesthetics with the trees. It's good for the Flood Gametype for sure and I can appreciate it's uniqueness in style compared to the other maps. "Vortex", "Meltdown", & "Shatter" are my least favorite maps and I would go so far as to say they suck. FORGE MAPS ============================= As far as the 3 FORGE MAPS go, "Impact" & "Ravine" I consider them top notch as previously mentioned and they really are beautiful looking maps to forge on. "Erosion" on the other hand, is nowhere near as good and it can be really difficult to make a map look good with the forge palette. The terrain is horribly difficult to try and incorporate into a balanced map. The terrain on all 3 maps is much to small to even use it effectively for a BTB Map. Even on the largest map (probably in the whole game) "Impact", both of the asteroid's terrain are to small for this. You have to build your own floors, which shouldn't be forced upon you when you want to make a Big Team Map. We need one more Forge map the size of Hemorrhage's battlefield. THE CASTLE MAP PACK (via Wikipedia) ============================= These additional maps form the third and "speculated final DLC". It is expected for release on April Fools Day 2013. - DAYBREAK Speculated to be a small map set in a UNSC camp around a grassy terrain. - OUTCAST Speculated to be a large map set in a rocky, exotic environment with many tunnels and arches. - PERDITION Speculated to be set in an urban area. CONCLUSION & 4TH MAP PACK ============================= So in my opinion there are 10 Great maps, and 2 of those are Forge canvases. After the Castle Map Pack comes out there will be a total of 22 Halo 4 Maps. Halo: Reach had 20 if you count ForgeWorld as one map, but Bungie counted it as 5 and I think we should too. According to this logic, we are going to be missing 3 maps compared to Reach's roster. Now of course every map in any FPS game is not going to be amazing, but there is no reason we shouldn't have an additional 4th Map Pack with at least 3 maps included. One of which should be a large terrain forge map similar in size to Hemorrhage. If all of the maps are excellent in the Castle Map Pack, that will be a total of 13 really good maps out of 22... I don't think it's enough high quality maps, almost but not quite. - What do you guys think of the Majestic Map Pack? - Do you think Halo 4 is fine with the map roster if we are only getting 3 more maps, assumming all three are really good? Let's let 343i know that we will pay another $10 for a 4th Map Pack that includes a larger terrain Forge Map. If they want to make it 6 or more Maps in that 4th Map Pack I will pay up to $20 for it.
When you're judging the various Halo 4 maps, are you talking about your experiences playing them in matchmaking or in customs? (Just as a precaution.. figures someone will assume you're talking about customs when you're talking about matchmaking and vice versa) Halo 4's 6v6 roster is off well, I suppose Halo 4's 8v8 roster is alright, 4v4 is not absolutely terrible (compared to Reach), but everything below is.
I think that this map pack is great. Definitely a huge step up from the Crimson map pack. All three are solid maps, Skyline is already being dubbed as an instant classic. There is enough maps in Halo 4, the problem is that there isn't enough good map. Still, better than Reach in my opinion. And the crimson map pack, yeah, the maps are ****.
I don't think you have to play the maps in both matchmaking and customs to be able to tell if it's a good map, but that's just my opinion. I was judging the maps in general though, not for one or the other. Although, most of my experience playing them has been in matchmaking. [br][/br]Edited by merge: haha @ crimson maps being **** (although I have to disagree as Harvest is as good as Complex or Adrift and they aren't "****" per say). Wreckage isn't bad if you get a nice 4v4 match going or maybe 5v5 tops but anything more is too many people for that map. The framerate in the center structure can get extremely low with action in there. Shatter is the only map I don't like in Crimson map pack. I don't agree Halo 4 has more good maps than Reach, not yet anyway.
I think their all pretty cool maps. My only issue with Skyline is that it doesn't take very long for someone to grab the shotgun and then head up the nearest Grav-lift. Once they do, they camp the opposite grave lift. The shotgun should either have a delay in it's spawn time, or it should be moved to another location. Same with the rocket launcher on Landfall and Monolith, both spawn in the same location. It should either have a delay in it's spawn time before the match begines, or it should be moved to a different location. My only other issue with Monolith is that it's smaller than Landfall or Skyline, and way too open. The other problem I have with Monolith is that above the man-cannon, which is located to the right of Red Base (left if your facing out from Blue Base), is a platform from which any one with either the Rocket Launcher, or Beam Rifle, can command the entire map as it allows you an unobstructed view of the map, the only exception being the opposite man-cannon. Other than those points, it's a pretty decent map pack.
I don't camp (I use too on Hemmorage in Reach if all of my team quit and all vehicles were taken by the opposing team, I would just duck in my base and listen to them blasting it with Wraiths and Revenants... until they got me ). I only had one game on each map so I didn't notice the things you mention. I did get a shotgun off the ground in Skyline and had a blast running around killing everyone with it. Then my Ordnance came and I got a Forerunner Shotgun and did the same. After I get some more games on these maps I will have more opinion on them but they seem great so far. My only game on Monolith was King of the Hill, which isn't one of my favorite gametypes so I need to get more games on it. EDIT: I've had some more games on the maps.... Just now on Landfall (Infinity Rumble), some kid was raping with a shotgun camping kind of. But I don't think it matters too much where they put the shotgun, does it? You can go anywhere on the map with it, and there is personal ordnance too where you could drop one anywhere from holographic orbit. It's just a powerful weapon for small maps especially if they have corridors and hallways, rooms, etc.
Jumping around on Skyline is hella fun. Loving the map pack so far, the sizes and design approaches are just what I was hoping for. Being able to play proper FFA again is fantastic as well.
You're right about Skyline it was really fun to jump around on top of everything. I'm going to update the thread tomorrow. There isn't many bad maps in Halo 4 at all, I probably only dislike 4 of them, but only 9 or 10 total so far stand out, including the Majestic 3. There was a total of 20 maps in Reach I think, if you count ForgeWorld as one... but that was just an amazing map and you could count it as 5... they sure did when Reach Launched. After the Castle Map Pack is released, Halo 4 will have 22. Since there is no ForgeWorld and only 9 or so maps are excellent in Halo 4 we do need another DLC Map Pack with 3 "good" maps after the Castle Pack.
I haven't got any of the DLC so I can't say if they are good or not, so I will follow the flow here. If there was a fourth DLC, it should feature either forge maps or the biggest, hugest maps in Halo history, ha, that would be a blast.
I have the fattest gripe with these maps, and it goes for all maps 343 is pumping out. The amount of detail LACKING in the surrounding skybox and distant scenery is astounding. At first sight it seems beautiful, but then you take a close look and suddenly it looks a lot less visually appealing. Zoom in with just the BR, and the background suddenly looks a quick sketch that was whipped up in an hour. I find something tends to be a lot better as a complete package. The maps themselves are awesome, Id say better than the Crimson DLC. I just hate how little effort they put in to the scenery compared to Bungie. The ideas are there, the execution not quite yet.
Yeah I've edited the original post with that idea I've had. Although, they would never do the largest map in Halo history for forge because the Xbox couldn't handle dynamic lighting for something that big. Maybe for Halo 5 that's a possibility but not sure if it would work for something as big as ForgeWorld even in Halo 5. They just need something like the size of Hemorrhage's large terrain. [br][/br]Edited by merge: I've zoomed in on all of them when they came out and even on official maps, they all do that and it did it in Reach Certain Affinity DLC maps like Highlands I recall. Not sure if it did it in Bungie's launch maps? I think 343i puts effort into it, just to get the map running a good framerate on the Xbox console, which is extremely outdated, you have to downsize those skyboxes to a very low resolution. It's a hardware issue really, in my opinion. They look fine without zooming in. People don't pay attention to skyboxes like that in the middle of a match so it's not all bad.
I get the whole immersion thing, but seriously? We actually get 3 maps with good frame rate and people complain that things get a little grainy when you specifically zoom in on the skybox with your BR? Whilst you do that, I'm gonna be enjoying functional maps that are still plenty pretty.
I love Landfall and Skyline for Slayer. Landfall was pretty good on extraction. I hate Skyline flag though. Way to small and we need to go back to 3 captures to win. Monolith isn't bad but I dislike the layout. All in all, very good map pack.
Interesting. I agree that it's very small, but I actually prefer 5 caps to win for small maps, Skyline being a perfect example. I the MLG practice of both 3 cap and 5 cap gametypes being employed depending on map size, though I can see why 343 avoid such fundamentally different CTF variants since they could cause confusion.
Small isn't a bad thing, it's when they load 8 people into the map that are skilled where it really gets hectic. Not sure if Monolith and Skyline are ideal for 8 people. I'd like to see 4 to 6.
Never said I didnt like the playable spaces. I think they are amazing. Better than Crimson at least. I tend to focus on the details so thats why I have this thing bugging me.
But you are playing a console... and not only that, it's a 7 year old one. It's not even in Full HD, it's upscaled from 720p so it's blurry and low res anyway. I don't know what ya expect but it's not a PC. EDIT: To be honest, if it wasn't for Halo I wouldn't even own an Xbox. Microsoft has absolutely no exclusive games that are good other than Halos and some Japanese Import Shmups. Oh and the Gears of War series and Fable 2 and 3. Both of which I hate, but they can be considered Microsoft's other two "good" exclusive games. Everything else is on PC and if it's not it's on PS3. So Xbox to me is just a "Halobox". [br][/br]Edited by merge: I'm starting to get a little annoyed by the Beam Rifle on Monolith. The map is small enough but with invisible beam rifle snipers and the layout of the map can be confusing to tell where you are to avoid that same sniper that killed you.
I'd say it's a decent map pack. While the maps are all solid and worthy of being in the game (read: better than pretty much every on-disc map), they're nothing special. By that I mean that I can't imagine anyone 3 games from now going "You know what we need? A Monolith remake!" On the subject of the skyboxes, I have to disagree that I dislike them. The only reason is that they use them WAY to close to the playable space. What bungie used to do is make the playable space (3D objects), then make a layer of space outside the playable space (3D objects) then make a skybox (2D portrait). Certain Affinity has gotten rid of the 2nd layer and moved the skybox a lot closer to the playable space, which makes seeing all the imperfections really easy and obvious. On Landfall, for example, the skyline would look beautiful if it was further out, but because of how close it is all the edges look absolutely horrible. This is because the 2D background is a simple drawing, not a rendered 3D background with AA. Anything on a HD console without AA looks fugly from up-close.