Things I learnt from TMU (Jozii)

The fuel barrel has been stealthily smugled into Jozii’s house, and Jozii, being the honest fool he is, couldn’t help it but fill it with these remarks:

1. Four wheel drive isn’t required to go off-road.
2. Gas prices appear to have gone down (at least I haven’t paid a thing, and I’ve been driving for years).
3. In the desert, vehicles laying on the side tend to tip back up on their wheels. Something about heatwaves…
4. All lights go on automatically when it’s dark.
5. A technology to keep things floating in the air has already been invented. (Damn, I was so close!)
6. When on the road, you don’t really have to take other driver’s into consideration.
7. When crossing a dirty Rally road with a car made for desert driving, you get a dirty American!

Oh, and TimeBreaker, you must have done something bad to Jozii, since he chose you as his victim

Avatar tutorial – part 2

this is the 2nd half of The Doctor’s Avatar tutorial. This time, you’ll delve into some advanced topics.

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Things I learnt from TM 2 (Mr. A)

Mr.A from TMX faced the challenge vigorously and here comes his hepta-set (is that even word?)

1. Everything in the world is made of titanium.

2. In the American desert you can drive under a lake and re-emerge the otherside still dry.

3. If you work in a building with a flat roof, dont pop out to catch some rays else you might get run over.

4. What goes up, must come down… but only eventually!

5. If you wear glasses the world looks more 3D.

6. Poles usually grow up out of the middle of the road… go figure!

7. When you reach you destination, no need to stop, just take your foot off the gas and see what you hit.

Mr.A decided that the ideal person to carry the FUEL BARREL is >>Tuta<<, so… we’re waiting, Tuta!

In other news, Hillary Clinton fractured her dog, and the “Five into One challenge round 2″ (see the side panel for a link) is still open!

Avatar tutorial (part 1)

this article was written and prepared by team ATP member “The Doctor”. Due to its length, I’m going to cut this article into two parts, with the second part coming on Thursday.

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Things I learnt from TMU (Alcator’s kick-off)

“Things I learnt from TMU” (aka TILT) is a brand new wickedness for all you TMU fans. The rules are simple:

The person that receives the fuel barrel must add 7 (as is the number of environments) witty or funny facts derived from Trackmania, and then choose the next victim that will receive the fuel barrel (preferrably someone who’s registered on TMX and is still active there, because we need to contact that person and ask him or her to cooperate). That person will then have to add 7 more facts and choose another victim

I’ll kick this TILT with the first 7 facts so that you get the picture:

1. Cars can run for as long as you wish without needing to refuel.
2. Places where you can accelerate are marked with clearly visible yellow arrows.
3. There are Chinese-looking towers and Shaolin-like monasteries in the Alps.
4. Mediterranean folks love big lighting poles sticking from the ground and sea. Gotta be a Freudian thing or something…
5. If you strike water fast enough, the water strikes you back.
6. You can fly through windmill flaps if you are driving Cooper mini.
7. Running a cargo ship business in San Francisco puts you in danger of getting ran over by a minivan.

OK, that would be my run, and now I’m passing the fuel barrel onto… Mr. A! He’s got nothing to do anyway, right?

A checklist for improving tracks – part 2

A week ago, the first part of the checklist listed some things to check when you finish a track to see if you did all you can to make it better. The list continues here…

11. An intro clip: is there a 10 to 20 seconds introductory “movie” that introduces the track? Does it show the key (or the most interesting) part(s) of the track? Notice how every track in Trackmania Nations Forever has an introduction consisting of (usually) 3 short camera moves, one showing the overall track, and the other two or three showing key areas — try to do the same for your track. But don’t make the intro too long.

12. Is there an outro (replay) for your track? Will the player be rewarded for finishing the race by seeing himself in action from interesting view angles?

13. Does the replay work reasonably well even for a worse driver? Make sure those who are slower can still see themselves, and if a longer replay clip tends to “run away” from a slower car, cut it into two or more partial clips so that those who can finish can also see themselves in the replay. An extra benefit of this approach is that Spectators in online races can then use the Replay mode to observe other racers!

14. Light trails: Have you considered adding trails to jumps? It looks pretty awesome, especially in night and evening mood tracks, if you approach a jump during online play and see the colorful stripes ahead of you, showing you what’s gonna happen.

15. Finetuning (smoothing): After you’ve driven the car enough times, you might have noticed some areas that are not perhaps the smoothest possible. Don’t hesitate to take an extra time making them smoother. It does not mean “easier” — if you have a sharp turn that was intentional and the player is warned that it’s a sharp turn, then it’s OK, but if at certain combination of speed and angle the car just bounces off of a landing platform, then something’s not right.

Well, that’s my tips for making your tracks better, but I’m sure there are other tips that you use. Please, share them in the comments!

Mission statement

Hello, dear readers and visitors!

In this post, I’d like to let you know about my commitment for this blog.

So, without further ado, here comes the mission statement:

I promise to deliver 10 posts per month (roughtly 1 post every 3 days), of which

• at least 5 posts should be useful articles (tutorials and tips)
• approximately 3 articles should talk about existing (or just created) tracks

Help from other trackmaniacs who have something to say would be appreciated, please contact me if you’d like to write a track review, track comparison, an article about track construction tricks that you or someone you know uses, or just about anything TM-related. Because as much as I’m able to do all this by myself, truth be told it might become somewhat biased, simply because I am just one type of trackmaniac and there are other types that have different “ways of the samurai”

– Alcator

A checklist for improving tracks – part 1

I’ve compiled this (incomplete) list of things that you can check to see if the track you’ve finished can be any better. Please, if you know some other things to check, please share them in the comment section below!

1. Checkpoint respawning: Is it possible to reach the finish after respawning in every checkpoint?
2. Respawning smoothness: In many tracks, authors build spectacular areas that are pleasant to drive through IF you manage to maintain your speed and direction; however, if you lose speed, such as due to a CP respawn, suddenly the very same areas become very bad – what serves as a landing platform for the fast driver becomes a nasty bump for the slow driver, and what is an easy loop for the fast driver becomes a dead-end for the slow driver. If this is the case, you can either try to help the slow driver gain speed in order for the area to work OK, or you may add an alternate route that will take him “around”.
3. Decorations: Is the scenery around the track varied enough? Do the scenery tiles work as markers, so that the player may remember “When I pass the inflatable castle, I should make a hard right turn”? Or did you just place thousands of the same cactus trees all around the track? No scenery at all is bad as well – add some!
4. Loop cams and wallride cams: Does the view automatically switch to front-camera when the player enters a loop or a wallride? Does it stay on long enough even for a car that is going slowly (if that car is able to finish the loop or wallride, the camera SHOULD stay on for the whole ride)? Does an empty clip’s trigger switch off the camera when the loop or wallride ends?
5. Loopcam emergencies: If the car flies out of a loop or wallride, does the loopcam switch off? Add empty clip’s triggers around the loop/wallride tiles, so that as soon as the car is out, the player can drive the car normally, potentially trying to get back on the track (yes, there are players who do not restart/respawn when that happens!).
6. Clearly visible and informative navigation signs: Are nasty turns and other confusing parts preceded with navigation and warning signs? Will the player know that he should slow down due to a sharp turn? (i.e., is there “WARNING” and “LEFT/RIGHT” sign before the turn?)
7. Length of the race: The optimal race length for each environment is somewhat different, which greatly depends on the general speed impression of that environment (Island is the most “taxing” on reflexes, while coastal rides are more casual). Lengths of 30 to 70 seconds are generally OK for all environments; making the race between 40 and 55 seconds is optimal.
8. Learning curve: this is not something you as an author can check easily, but in general, players like it when they gradually learn to drive the track (i.e., on their first attempt, they crash after 15 seconds, but on the second run, they last for 25 seconds, and then they almost finish, and on the fourth run, they make it to the finish. Ask a friend to try the track and report to you how the “learning curve” progressed.
9. Description and snapshot: Did you set the snapshot to some interesting position and angle? Don’t leave it to TM to make the snapshot for you! Have you filled in the description of the track? Will the player learn something useful about your track (style, speed, difficulty) from it?
10. Author time and medal times: Have your tried at least 10 times to set the author time? Don’t give up too soon, make many validation attempts and try to make a perfect run! Set the gold medal time to about 5% more than the author time, and the silver and bronze to cca 115% and 140% of your author time, respectively.

(to be continued…)

Let’s talk about puzzle tracks

In puzzle tracks, player is given up to 8 different track tiles in different quantities (such as: 3 normal road tiles, 2 curves (2×2), 1 jump ramp etc.), and a partial track with start, finish, some checkpoints and other preplaced tiles, obstacles and decorations; the terrain of the track is also preset.

Player’s goal is to use the tiles given to complete the track so that he can then drive it from start to finish in shortest time possible.

If you want to create a puzzle track, you usually first build a track that requires some skill to finish, then remove some of the tiles that you placed in it and remember what you removed and how many of each tile type you removed; then, you set the needed amount for these tile types, and you are good.

However, there are different styles of puzzle tracks, so let’s describe them and talk about what makes them “puzzling”…

 

Optimization style

In this style of puzzle track, it is quite obvious what needs to be placed where – such as when you see that the checkpoints are placed in a zig-zag pattern and you have 45 normal road tiles, which means you must build a simple road between the CPs. The only trick here is to optimize the added tiles placement: will you build an L shaped road, or will you build a zig-zag road, which will allow you to drive diagonically between the CPs? Will you shift the curve tiles closer towards the earlier CP, or further from it?

Similarly, you may be provided with a couple of boosters, and you have to find the best spacing between them, so that the car gets the greatest boost; unfortunately, this may also mean that by the time your car is gaining the maximum boost, someone who placed one of the boosters closer to the start may not have the peak speed, but he got that speed earlier, and may surprisingly get to the finish sooner.

In this style, minor changes result in minor time improvements (less than a second).

 

Unusual tile placement

In this style, players, who are used to the most common sequences of tiles from standard tracks, are deceived by the preset tiles and environment and they overlook a possible placement. Typical example would be a jump over a water channel: If the road leading to this jump is straight, players often don’t see that they might actually jump diagonically across the channel and thus avoid an area that would be costly (considering how long it takes to pass through it). Or you may provide the player with a tile that is most often used for one purpose, but in fact if he lets the car smash into the tile or bounce off of it, he may get to otherwise inaccessible area and save some time.

Useless tiles

In this style, you provide the player with tiles that, although they seem they should be used, are totally useless for the fastest solution. Once the player becomes convinced that the tile HAS TO GO SOMEWHERE, he becomes his own worst enemy and will torture himself with endless attempts to optimize something that in fact wasn’t meant to be present at all.

Changing the car into an airplane

Considering the Trackmania cars are indestructible, there is no real reason to treat them like cars. Why on Earth should you think that you are supposed to drive through a CP? Do you see the ugly red engine killer behind that CP? Hm… I know! What about building an uphill ramp towards the CP, so that the car flies through the CP and above the engine killer, thus keeping the engine running?

The key in building this type of track is to not make the trick obvious. Just as in the previous style – if you allow the player to become convinced that he simply has to go through the CP and get his engine killed, especially if you convince him that he will need that ramp elsewhere, you will have the benefit of dreaming about players who, while sweating, finally manage to get the SILVER time on the track, only to learn that they are actually supposed to cut additional 10 seconds to get GOLD. Trust me, that look on their faces when they learn such thing is priceless.

Oh, and just so you can check if you’ve learnt something from this article – try this track!

Do you know about some other tricks that make a great puzzle track? Please share them in the comments below!

Five Into One Competition, round 2

Welcome, welcome, welcome to Round 2 of the “Five Into One” competition!

First of all, what is FiO? FiO is a competition/cooperative map construction where each stage’s builder builds the stage at the same time, without knowing what the other stages will look like.

This is possible by limiting the building area for each builder so that the stages built can later be joined into a sequence.

In this round, round 2, the environment of choice is Stadium, and the building area is 6 x 16 squares, with Finish tile in the 7th row (or column, depending how you count it). Once joined, the track that comes out of this competition will be 31 (5×6 + 1 for finish) x 24 (due to offset) tiles large.

There are no artificial constraints on the height, just make sure that you bring the car back to the height in which the finish is. You can’t dig into the grass either.

Your stage must have an author time of 17.00 seconds or less. That means that submitting a stage in which the author time is 17.01 will result in automatic refusal, even if someone might be able to drive it in 17.00 or less. If YOU cannot make a 17.00 or better run on your stage, make it shorter.

Your stage can contain at most 1 checkpoint, but it is not required to add one; please note that the finish gate will be replaced with a checkpoint and joined with the next stage by this checkpoint.

About speeds: While on start, your car has the speed 0 mph, after joining the submitted stages, it is entirely possible that cars will be entering your stage at higher speeds; however, if they crash in your stage, they may respawn in the CP (start of your stage), in which case they again have the speed of 0. In the first round of this competition, all the builders were able to successfully deal with this aspect, so I believe you will be able to make your stage work for both “fast-enterees” and “slow-respawnees”

And now, the base track for this round!

http://united.tm-exchange.com/main.aspx?action=trackshow&id=950678#auto

The link above will bring you to “united.TMX” to the track page. Please download the track and if you wish to participate, follow these steps:

 

1. Open the track in the track editor.
2. Note the Start tile and the “oval track” that leads to the nearest finish.
3. Below this oval, there’s a rectangular road – this rectangular road below oval shows you YOUR building space’s horizontal limits. DON’T BUILD outside the space designated by this first rectangle. You can, however, remove any and all tiles of this rectangular marker, you can (and probably will) remove the oval track or any part of it as well.
4. Build a track that connects the start and finish tile of the original oval track. If you included any stunt parts such as wallrides or loops, you MAY add in-game MT (loop cameras) for them, but it is not required (if you don’t know how to make a loop cam, don’t bother). 
5. Validate your track and make ABSOLUTELY sure that your AUTHOR TIME is 17.00 seconds OR BETTER. That means, and I want to state it very clearly, that your author time can be between 00:00.00 and 00:17.00, but if you submit a track that has the author time 00:17.01 or more, your track will be rejected.
6. There can be at most 1 checkpoint in your stage. But you don’t have to place any checkpoints in it. 
7. You can’t add any “working” finish gates to your stage either (technically speaking, if you add a “fly-through” or “go-through” finish gate, you have to add a CP somewhere behind it so that the race doesn’t end in that gate. You have to do that even though after joining the track, the race wouldn’t end there).
8. Don’t bother with intro or outro – if you add them, there is no guarantee they will be used (as your part can be anywhere in the track, but even if it comes first, your intro and outro will probably be removed).
9. Improve your track as much as you want, make it challenging and exciting and cool and whatever. Decorate your part (but don’t leave your designated building area, which also means you have to make sure that the eventual addition of DIRT ground does not leave the building area; basically, if adding a decoration or tile or ground causes any part of the second rectangle to disappear, then you have ti undo that change, since you are entering forbidden territory  
10. Satisfied with your track? Is it 17.00 seconds or faster? GOOOD!
11. Save the track (MEGA ROTFL IMHO LOL) under the name (aha!) “FiO rnd2 – [Your name here]“; if I were allowed to participate, I would save it as “FiO rnd2 – Alcator”. Please, no colors or other styles in the track name, thank you.
12. (optional) ZIP the track file (ZIP files seem to be less prone to being caught by spam filters)
13. Send either the GBX file or (preferably) the ZIP file with it by e-mail to me [ alcator#seznam,cz - please replace the first strange sign with the "at" character, and the comma with a dot ]
14. Make a comment here that you submitted the track, so that I can make sure I received it; if I don’t (or if it got spamfiltered), I’ll contact you and we will find another solution.
15. Don’t post your track to TMX, otherwise people might copy your ideas.

Today it’s 5th of September. On the 4th of October, which should be a Saturday, the submission phase ends and the judging phase will begin.

During the judging phase, 5 of the submitted tracks will be picked – those which are “best”, although it is not easy to describe what makes a submission “best”.

Those 5 winning stages will then quickly be combined together (tile by tile copying) into one (hopefully) masterful track. Cool MT will be added and the track will be released, perhaps this time with more attention from the player community.

On this image, you see – on the left – the orange rectangular area in which you can build. The red circles mark start and finish that YOU will build between; the arrows indicate that you MUST exit the start towards right and you MUST enter the finish (generally) from the left.

The other four rectangular areas just show where the other 4 stages will be after joining.