Lousy Smarch weather!
Greetings, my little forgelings. We are mired in perhaps the worst part of the year: the holidays are over, your vacation is likely over, the next major holiday is months away, yet unendurably hostile weather persists. Even as I type this, more snow is falling here on top of the snow that fell a few days ago, which was just icing (so to speak) on the crappy cake of all the snow we got a week ago. But even when it's cold and miserable outside, it's warm and comfortable inside. Inside our hearts. In the cockles area of the heart, specifically. Because that's where we glow warmly like E.T. the Extraterrestrial every time we pull off a wicked-looking flagsassination.
Caption Contest
This old site tradition is now a current site tradition, and we're entering week three of its re-existence. Keep in mind, winning the Caption Contest rewards you with a nifty new Custom Title. This week's Custom Title up for grabs is: Forgehub Funny Guy
Our previous winner was Chuck, who submitted this startlingly realistic Photoshop piece:
This week, we're asking you to simply walk into Mordor... er, to caption a video... or something. You know what - just read Organite's description, because it was hard enough to explain once without me making a hash of it by trying to explain it again in slightly different words. So get thee to the official thread, here.
If you have any questions you can contact Organite.
Forgotten Treasures III
The submission period for this contest has now ended, but the fun has just begun, as a faceless goon squad rumored to be headed by 343i's own Frankie "Muniz" O'Connor and Bill "William" Gates himself, but actually headed by some of the unpaid and grumpy volunteer staffers you see floating around here, play and judge the many submitted maps. It's a fine lot full of many beautiful remakes of beloved classics (and one fugly remake of a map we all hated... just kidding).
Please visit the thread if you want to take a look at the dazzling array of work our members put into this thing. Good luck to everyone who made a map!
Map sketch contest
Dax, Goat and Spin (not a law firm) are running a contest which is not your usual kind of contest. It opened up less than a week ago, and is still running. Here's the thing: you're not making a map, you're just designing one. On paper, or on your computer in some kind of a modeling program... thingy. What the heck, I'm not a good English speaking guy. You represent a map that you might build; you're not actually building it. That's the gist. And many cool prizes are up for grabs, including the Forge Hub-standard custom title which will make you the envy of perhaps several people. Please check out their thread and submit. SUBMIT. Or try to submit. It seems that officially all their slots are taken, but they may be offering more soon, so check the thread regular-like if you're interested!
BIOC, TCOJ & the Customs Lobby
The Customs Lobby is one of the darker corners of our little forum - might I be so bold as to offer you a flashlight so you can go explore it? After both groups went on hiatus near the end of Halo Reach, their return is either in process (in the case of TCOJ, a general-purpose testing and customs lobby) or imminent (in the case of BIOC, a frightening and blood-soaked survival infection lobby). Besides these two long-running groups, you can hook up your own custom games in the forum - find people to test your maps, or help them test theirs; meet some like-minded souls for matchmaking; even start your own group, perhaps, which meets on a regular basis and becomes the acorn from which a mighty oak will grow. Then that oak will get some sort of withering arboreal disease and have to be cut into pieces and tossed section by depressing section into a wood chipper. But until then, it'll be fun!
Click here to get started on your journey into a new universe of custom games, and look for the sign-up threads for BIOC and TCOJ, both marked with a shiny red prefix. There should also, as of this writing (or shortly thereafter) be appearing a Spotlight interview with two of the BIOC leaders, REMKings and Ticky, so give that a read for insight into how a regular customs lobby gets off the ground.
The Guild
[l-col]The Tester’s Guild: among the piles of armor and glistening weapon racks you’ll find a large number of Hubbers march into the digital battlefields and test the crap out of your newly crafted map. The guys in the Tester’s Guild may have personalized opinions, but each is capable of giving you input both on things they enjoyed and disliked about your map, helping you achieve a perfect gameplay balance before you post your newly polished battlefield here in our map database. Should you want them to give your map a run through, redirect your browser to this forum here, read the posting guidelines, and set yourself up for success through the men at work behind the scenes in the Tester’s Guild. Enjoy playing Halo? Enjoy giving map creators input? Work for the Guild![/l-col][r-col]Every so often (every other Friday to be exact) a selection of refined and scholarly individuals from our forums host an evening full of custom games and shenanigans. Depending on what those individuals choose to host, whether it be competitive, casual, infection, invasion, mini-game oriented or a mix of them all is up to these bastions of fun, but it's up to you which of these lobbies you join. Sit back, put your feet up, throw back that shot-glass full of Jack Daniels, and enjoy a night with cool dudes from all around the world. If you'd like to host your own official lobby for our next TGIF, send a private message to RightSideTheory.[/r-col]
Question of the Site Update:
Last Update we asked you what you were doing for the holidays. This week, we're returning to more familiar territory for you videogame-obsessed shut-ins who lack families:
Have you been playing in the Infinity Challenge playlists this past month or so? If so, how did you like the games, and did you show up anywhere on the leaderboards?
If you have any thoughts on this article, or the front page in general, that you would like to share with us then we invite you to post your opinions in the Front Page Feedback thread.