#i'm still holding out hope for a future season where the terrain is a major factor / part of the gimmick

[greenscreen-dress]

I think Life series fandom could do more with the artificiality of the game world.

Can't remember what season they started doing it... LimLife, maybe? The world border has always been there, but for the past few Traffic Games it feels like there's a lot more intentionality behind the map they play in. Always plenty of blank canvas plains-like areas for easy building, a couple points of elevation to fight over and survey from, little to no "extreme" temperature biomes like jungles, deserts or any of the snowy biomes... Even natural spruce forests seem rarer in recent games— though a couple seasons had dark oak forests and SL had a decent patch of savanna iirc, so it's not totally devoid of variation.

And of course, there's the clusters of 3-4 obviously bonemealed exotic wood saplings, dotted all over the map regardless of biom, periodically replenished throughout the season.

Blatant builder enrichment right here ↓

(Images for illustration purposes. I was watching Bdubs' Ep 1 of Wild Life when this thought struck so excuse the lack of variety... I don't feel like going screenshot-hunting you all get what I mean.)

This is all to make things more streamlined on the CC's side— it's a timed series played in 3hr increments, it makes sense to give plenty of options to find an easy place to settle, collect resources, etc. And I assume the CCs have a bit of say in what biomes etc they'd prefer when a new season is being organised.

But from a lore perspective this has SO much potential! Especially given the popular "Watchers periodically yoink their 16-18 Silly Little Guys™ away from whatever they're doing, drop them into a terrarium, give it a little shake and watch them fight to the death" interpretation of the Life Series. People love to talk about how said Silly Guys are mentally/emotionally affected by this. So I think it'd be fun for fanworks to bring a little attention to the uncanny perfection of the terrarium itself.

...also I realise I'm probably a bit blinded by nostalgia for 3L. But I really feel like the maps of the early seasons were more unbalanced and "natural" somehow. Spruce and swamps and deserts and squabbling for resources, more potential for lucky spawns & creative uses of quirky terrain and I LIKED it!

Surely something could be done with the map becoming more tailored and "welcoming" to the players the more games they play, the more involved the gimmick is... Idk. Something about filing down the teeth and claws and random inconveniences of the world, season after season, to make sure the players are the ones actually tearing each other apart.