I am realizing I picked an extremely safe and boring map and I have been seeing some crazy interesting towns full of lakes and waterfalls. Does anyone have tips in terms of how I work around all the buildings and where to even start? I would love to do something super creative and unique but yeah don"t know how
I started out by completely getting rid of all my cliffs and rivers/lakes. I then made a path that connected all of my buildings together, and then I added the rivers and cliffs to split up the land into smaller chunks. There's probably better ways of doing it but I think starting completely from scratch limits you a bit less.
Watch videos of other people's islands to see what they're doing, then do something completely different because you want your town to be your town and not just copycat someone else's layout.
Use a modular format! Decide what main focal points you want to have (usually focused around buildings, but some people do things like a market, garden, shrine, hot spring, etc...) and where they'll be on the map, and build them first. Then fill in the parts between them—you'll have a better feel for what looks right, and what sorts of interesting things you can do with cliffs and water.
Watch YouTube island tours and get inspired by the insane landscaping other people have made. Then, make crazy cliffs with insane amounts of waterfall and surround all your buildings with them just like they did. Then, try to chase after a balloon and pop it to see what happens. I’m sure you’ll tear them all back down in a heartbeat. Lol. Just kidding.
Seriously, it’s your island so do what you think will best make you happy. I suggest plotting on the program or paper or even just in your head your plans for each section of your map first then try to make it happen slowly part by part so you don’t get overwhelmed.
