Last preview for Maniaplanet 4

[mvv0105]

Not sure if I should ask this but, will the reflection effect from Stadium in Turbo will be added in TM2? That effect on the road looks so good

As i know, all graphics improvements from Turbo will be ported into TM2.

Possibility to define player's car is really great, maybe i should to revive my NFS-alike title, who knows.

[Vrba]

Please make that in the graphics option then as a slider if so, I really don't wanna look at a shiny road. It's not a graphic improvement at all, it's more of a downgrade. Too shiny road might bring more problems than any/ if any good.

[MPotK]

Hello,

Just a small question :

I am just a player actually (don't have time to mod, learn to code for SM or make maps) and I am not interested in MP4 ( I have read each preview and sorry, can't win each time). I just want to play on battle servers 100k (fu or search) or eventually (if no players on 100k) I fall back on the server BATTLE PLAY (I just check where people in my friend-list play or the "favourite" part of the server browser). I play between 6pm and 8pm each day. So the question is... (drum roll...) :

Can I still do the same thing without changing my habits during the beta and of course after MP4 release ?

Regards,
LotK

PS : I have read the whole topic and my question is related to the "shut down of the server browser during the Beta" but perhaps I have misunderstand.

[Hylis]

Beta will start quite private and I don't think it's useful to create confusion by talking about it here. Saying that you would want to be able to play any day between 6 /8 pm on a 100K battle in the beta is probably far from something compatible from the number of players that will be invited in first phases of the beta anway.

At release, what we look after is to define specific time for specific modes to be played by a maximum number of players. I think the first program schedule include a Battle program of 1h between 6 pm and 8 pm each night, but it may change. Apart from that, creating and joining server will be available like in MP3, and in MP3 as well. But as you should understand, if people are channeled toward MP4, it's logical that you will have less players in MP3. So, making things at the same place can help concentrate and increase the arrival of new players, like new battle ones, so they one day go in the highest ranked matches.

[MPotK]

OK, thanks for the answer. I take that for a yes.

regards,
LotK

[Miss]

Does that mean that MP4 will have a completely different masterserver than MP3? Will people not be able to auto update (or be forced to update) to MP4?

[Chris92]

Does that mean that MP4 will have a completely different masterserver than MP3? Will people not be able to auto update (or be forced to update) to MP4?

Betas (and Alphas for that matter) use a different master server, yes.
This is most likely to not cause any issues for the stable master server and to have no impact on the experience for players that aren't in the beta.

[Miss]

I understand it for beta, but I was asking about production. Or maybe Hylis was implicitly talking about beta and I'm just not paying attention

[Hylis]

At the moment, we still try to make MP3 live at the same time at MP4 with completely two different master servers (quite a job!) Players will be updated automatically to MP4 and a setup may be provided to enable connect to MP3 for people who would wish to be able to. It's done on purpose of enabling us to break compatibility without dooming everything. It could be seen as a danger of split but it's mainly to secure a more agile development environment while preserving as much as possible the opportunity for creators and players to go back for some reasons (compare, look back, keep a track of old creations, records etc.)

[toffe]

it's mainly to secure a more agile development environment

Ooo. That sounds good

Will the new masterservers affect anything related on the webservice, or will MP4 affect the webservice at all? Can I prepare for some changes ?

Toffe