Few weeks ago, I asked Mr.A of TMX (the largest track-exchange server for Trackmania) few questions about StarContest. Today, you get the chance to read the answers…
(Al)Q(ator): When did you first learn about Nadeo’s plan for a community-built campaign?
(Mr.)A: It was in the build up to the the release of the Forever games. We had alot of chats with Nadeo about it and actually the StarTrack Contest might have happoned much earlier in the year. The original idea was to do it with the beta version of United Forever, but for various reasons that diddn’t happen and so we decided to wait until after the summer (when people are less likely to have holidays booked during the contest).
Q: Have you had any influence on the structure of the competition, or did Nadeo already have the rules pretty much cast in stone??
A: It was Nadeo’s idea for a rounds based contestest where builders are eliminated at each stage. I guess you can liken that to the way those TV shows work where a contestant is voted out each week. The detail of the schedule, the way tracks are named, the rule set, all that stuff was a collaboration between us. Quite alot of things changed from the orirginal plans becuase you really only start to realise how things need to be when you are trying to put the whole thing together.
Q: How much coding (code lines, scripts, database structures) were needed to allow for the competition?
A: I dont know about lines of code, but it was a huge ammount of work. Buzz made the initial work on the allocation program and then Ricardo Rix picked that up, finished it, built the front end presentation and the way TMX handles the changing stages of the contest through the rounds. We spent weeks and weeks with him coding, then me running simulation contests (we had a button to randomly enter people) and reporting back with what happoned and how things looked or worked.
Q: How long did the coding and other tasks take before the competition was announced to the public?
A: Well, the idea was always to be ready before Forever came out, so we were ready by then. I think it was 2 or 3 months in developement, as we knew right from the first rumblings of the Forever update that we might do a contest… not a bad length of time to keep a secret 
Q: Are there any plans for some special TMX awards for those who either make it into the campaign or make it to the final few rounds?
A: Nothing like that is planned at the moment, but we will see. We still need to decide how we will deal with the Star tracks once the contest is over. (ed.: As it turned out, several TMX mugs were distributed to the finalists and some of the best drivers on the finalists’ tracks. Also, as you may already know, Nadeo promised an ingame TAG for PapyChampy as the ultimate winner.)
Thanks to Mr.A for answering the questions!
Nice interview!
The questions weren’t many but they were very interesting all of them.
Yes, good read. I didn’t even know the contest was planned that early :O I knew it was originally meant for before Forever was released, but THAt early?
Way to go MrA 
Oh, and funny little touch with the “(Al)Q(ator)” and “(Mr.)A”
It’s nice to hear on how long stuff took, makes the whole compo even more epic
I’d like to see the TAG from PC ingame, i wonder what it looks like
We’re close to the 200,000th hit on this blog :O
So, if I’m running TrackMania Nations through Steam, where do I put the downloaded maps to be able to play them?
Banaticus, you have several options:
1. Download a map to any folder you wish, then doubleclick the file –> TMN should launch and open that map.
2. Find the “Challenges” folder inside TMN’s folder (you can do this by launching the in-game map editor, making any map, saving it as “My first map”, then searching for “My first map” in the operating system), and inside the “Challenges” folder, find “My Challenges” folder and at the same depth as My Challenges, create “Downloaded” folder (if it does not exist already) and put all downloaded challenges inside –> this way, you will have them accessible when you launch the game.
Nice interview, MrA
and thank you Alcator for all your great articles ^_^
cool interview
And for the most important question: will the pack ever be ready?
It is scheduled to be announce this week ^_^
Florent
Can`t wait for StarTrack campaign. ^^
Nice interview…
Even tho its old…
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