Hello Forgers! I've posted this far and wide (to no avail, multiple subreddits buried my posts) because I really want to kick-start the growth of this project, my Halo 5 Customs Database Now I know this seems a little on the retarded side, spreading the news of a database to a website which essentially already has their own database. However, this database of mine isn't exactly meant to take traffic away from, or replace anywhere else one might submit their custom content to. If anything, this database is meant to become a companion to those places, and a place where multiple communities can unify their collections of custom content. The database features a simple submission form (heavy emphasis on the simplicity aspect) in which you don't need to sign up for anything before submitting, you can paste in a link to an image/image set/video, and even insert a link to someplace other where you have your content listed at (Such as ForgeHub). Without going too too in depth, unlike a lot of other 'databases' out there, the content on this is more like ForgeHub. Everyone can be a contributor instead of just a select few who go out and manually add custom game by custom game. We currently have 10 types of categories in which you can classify your submission under and for the extra mile, we have statistical charts that tally every submission and show just where the community is booming with content and where the community is lacking, spanning from just the past week and even up to the entire lifespan of the project. There's a kicker to all of this, since this is all done with Google Spreadsheets and Google Forms, the entire system can be edited with relative ease, additional categories can be added if need be, if anyone suggests feasible improvements I can easily implement them, and both the database and submission form can be embedded into other webpages with an html code in case it really expands. I designed this with future proofing in mind but to also keep it as simple but statistically entertaining as this system can be. I've rambled on for long enough now, so if you're still reading this, I want feedback from you. How can I improve this? Should I just give up and stop wasting my time on this? Do you support me behind this little project I've tried to make? Whatever your response may be, I'm desperately needing some feedback. Thank you in advance for responding, and thank you for taking the time to read my wall of text. Any form of community involvement means a great deal to me.
You have a few things working against you in this endeavor. I can see this being beneficial as a personal database of maps that you like. However, there are a few reasons why I wouldn't go out of my way to add maps, or use this as a resource to find maps. When it comes to submitting maps, it's missing the community interaction. I'm not going to receive feedback, whether it's good or bad. If I'm looking for more exposure, I don't feel like I'm really getting that either. I also can't really 'sell' my maps on this database. I can't even give someone a taste of what it looks like. This also ties into why I would be unlikely to use the database as a resource to find maps - I'm not going to download anything without either a picture or a video of what I'd be downloading. As is, I think it does something pretty similar to what a handful of other sites do, but doesn't do it as well as they do. I appreciate any effort to grow and/or unify the community. I just don't see anything here substantial enough to do that yet. My honest advice is to try to take this a different direction. Here are a couple of possibilities I can think of off the top of my head: - Make it into a tool people can use to compile their own list of favorite maps. - Develop this into your personal list of 'must have' maps. If you could build up a reputation for being a trustworthy source of quality maps, you may be able to gain a little bit of traction.
A very thorough and logical response, thank you. Unfortunately even though I had thought about the implementation of feedback features, I couldn't really expand upon that due to the limitations of google spreadsheets, which definitely gets into what you were mentioning. Although as far as the picture and video thing goes, I'm pretty certain all the submissions besides the two canvas maps I submitted (mainly for testing placeholders) have a picture or video linked to them, but it's definitely not seeing this information upfront like here, it's more of a layout like Reddit, which again gets into some limitations, although I could rearrange some sizes and display pictures into cells, there's no way I could do such a thing with a video currently. I definitely appreciate the advice as to what directions I could go in because they are based off the few strengths it has, and I may honestly take that to heart and go for one of those and embrace further into the local community here. Again, thank you, and I am honored to have a response from someone of your ranking.