Maniaplanet Forum

I also share many of the concerns of the previous posts. I was super excited with the reveal for TM Turbo yesterday, seeing what looks like a revamped Canyon, Valley and Stadium, and the super awesome looking Lagoon Rollercoaster. When I had first heard it was coming to console, my first fear was that we weren't getting the new environment on PC.

Then when I watched the trailer and saw that PC gets it too, I got excited about the possibilities: Cross-Platform play and an opportunity to bring a wider set of gamers to the PC versions of TrackMania. However, when I went to the website to pre-order, and saw I had to do this through the Uplay store, I shuddered. Here is why...

I made the mistake of purchasing Ubisoft's Trials Fusion through Steam. As many of you know, Trials Fusion only runs on Uplay, and thus, whenever I want to play the game, I have to be logged in to BOTH Steam AND Uplay. I'm not a fan of Uplay... I understand their goal to be like Steam, but I don't want another Steam. In fact, I rarely fire up Steam anymore ... because I play ManiaPlanet and TMUF. Going into a game that requires me to be logged into a "system" has become cumbersome and annoying.

That said, I wonder if I can only play TM Turbo if logged into Uplay, which will make the Steam zealots that only purchase through Steam as frustrated as I am with Trials Fusion... they will be required to be logged in to both in order to play TM Turbo. That will not go well with gamers. So my optimism led me to believe that:

• The PC version of TM Turbo would just be a new Lagoon Rollercoaster title pack and an addition to the TM2 title pack to include it; which means no Uplay or Steam required, and even those that purchased through Uplay or Steam would be able to play the Standalone ManiaPlanet and be fine.
• Nadeo's epic software architecture skills would have utilized the same dedicated server for this new environment, but just re-used/ported the same netcode to allow the consoles to communicate with it, so we could all play together, because the server wouldn't know any different... the same data would be passed in the same standard way, and the server doesn't care what client it is...?

It sounds like both of these hopes have been dashed. That said, I fear the worst as far as community split goes. We seemed to have a good community started with Canyon, and then it split some with ShootMania alpha/beta, but was looking to be somewhat coming back together until the announcements of Valley and Stadium, and not having those "united" together in one title further split the community. To put the icing on the cake, a few more awesome modes were introduced right before the ShootMania release, which spread us all about as thin as they come. Team FNG tried to spread across it some, but it only worked when we happened to be in the same titles as everyone else, but playing musical titles made a lot of people give up quickly and move back to other games.

Things have seemed to settle some again, where at least people know to check around to see if people are playing in any of the titles they like, but with the omission of the old ManiaPlanet home that listed all your favorite servers from all of your owned titles in one place, that takes time that people don't necessarily want to take (a discussion for another day...)

Anyway, I've been way super excited for the potential this new environment has, and was even more excited about the potential for console gamers to be able to share in the goodness of the plethora of user-created maps, skins, etc out there thanks to our awesome community... but being that PC version is standalone, and having the community split even more (having to go between three separate executables to find people to play with) is going to cause more frustration due to making all titles look more limited than they might already look.

Please know that we appreciate your desire to appeal to more of the masses; I really hope they will fall in love with TrackMania and come explore the entire universe on PC, which would build our community back up and make it a thriving game again... but if my suspicions are correct, many console gamers prefer to stick with consoles, in which case cross-platform play seems the best solution for the ManiaPlanet games as a whole.

I realize we can't change where things are currently, and maybe this was the fastest way for Nadeo to get to market (understandable with the small size of the company) -- I just hope this doesn't set things back. I hope it will be step toward a more awesome TrackMania again and if we can weather the "Storm" (forgive the pun) -- this may ultimately be a good thing (if in a more indirect way.)

Nadeo, please understand that we are so passionate about our ManiaPlanet and so very much appreciate the hard work you always put into the game. We want to help you succeed so that we can continue to enjoy the fruits of your labor. I hope you will be able to quickly rectify these disconnects so the community can stay "United Forever" (sorry, I can't help myself!)

to all of Nadeo and all of the awesome ManiaPlanet community! Thanks for considering these thoughts.

Rots wrote:Why didn't you prioritize ManiaPlanet as your main project and finishing/polish it instead of porting the unfinished work into a multiplatform game?

Can we get maniaplanet news besides "lagoon 2016" ? We've been waiting for something on trackmania IN maniaplanet, not another game. Yes, "year of tm" but not in maniaplanet.

idd.

Rots wrote:Why didn't you prioritize ManiaPlanet as your main project and finishing/polish it instead of porting the unfinished work into a multiplatform game?

Turbo will broaden the audience for the Trackmania brand and will help TM2 to get more people in it. It may have lower TM2 player population at the release of Turbo but we're confident that it'll not last (that's the effect to want to try something new and then return on the plateform where you have more options to have fun and where your friends/community are)

Maniaplanet players are likely to stay on Maniaplanet to enjoyed the advanced features of the plateform and Turbo players may be interested to see what the community cook on Maniaplanet.

For those who ask if Turbo player can play with Maniaplanet players :

Hylis wrote:TM Turbo for a finished product & Maniaplanet in a constant evolution by players & us.

Cerovan wrote:

Rots wrote:Why didn't you prioritize ManiaPlanet as your main project and finishing/polish it instead of porting the unfinished work into a multiplatform game?

Turbo will broaden the audience for the Trackmania brand and will help TM2 to get more people in it. It may have lower TM2 player population at the release of Turbo but we're confident that it'll not last (that's the effect to want to try something new and then return on the plateform where you have more options to have fun and where your friends/community are)

so you release TM Turbo as a cashgrab to try to bring more people to maniaplanet? am I understanding this correctly? and also you ask us to help you in that?

For those who ask if Turbo player can play with Maniaplanet players :

Hylis wrote:TM Turbo for a finished product & Maniaplanet in a constant evolution by players & us.

It's not an answer.
Why not "Yes" or "No".
With the most respect : I hardly understand NADEO's English 75% of the time.

AND

Omnixor wrote: so you release TM Turbo as a cashgrab to try to bring more people to maniaplanet? am I understanding this correctly? and also you ask us to help you in that?

6pages of negative comments...( 1 page is mine )

not trying to be negative or rude, I'm just being real:
I'm 100% sure Lagoon will fail just like canyon and valley did, as soon that players are done with the stupid solo mode the game will just die. you guys at Nadeo never learn.. (and also never listen to what the community wants.) its all because of the crazy hard and weird handling that you make! thats not what new players want when they cant finish the easiest maps or even when they do finish they set slow times, they loose hope beating the experienced players which lead them to quit playing the game.

stadium is the only solid and big thing that you ever made right, instead of keeping most focus on it making it better(make it bug free for example) to grow an even bigger community on it, you keep creating useless stuff hoping for bigger profit.

remember:
-Tmnf/stadium is what made you this big Nadeo. don't let it down.
-its not by chance that there is people playing stadium for 10YEARS and still want to keep playing it
-original stadium players are the majority that play the other environments.
-the other environments were ONLY an OK addition.

Cerovan wrote: For those who ask if Turbo player can play with Maniaplanet players :

Hylis wrote:TM Turbo for a finished product & Maniaplanet in a constant evolution by players & us.

May i ask the question again because i don't understand what you said, will we be able to play MP player vs Turbo player or not ?

Or you mean "At the moment it is/is not possible but as Maniaplanet is evolving it may change" ?
(If that's what you mean, will it be possible at turbo's release to play MP vs Turbo ? )

Cerovan wrote: Turbo will broaden the audience for the Trackmania brand and will help TM2 to get more people in it. It may have lower TM2 player population at the release of Turbo but we're confident that it'll not last (that's the effect to want to try something new and then return on the plateform where you have more options to have fun and where your friends/community are)

Maniaplanet players are likely to stay on Maniaplanet to enjoyed the advanced features of the plateform and Turbo players may be interested to see what the community cook on Maniaplanet.

Are you really suggesting that people new to the trackmania that will buy the TMT will just randomly decide...Oh hey, I can also buy the same games I already have in TMT because there's other players and titlepacks and...uh, seriously?

Even if you'll gift free access to MP titles to those who have bought the TMT - there's no way they are going to switch because there's no good reason for it.

Cerovan wrote:Turbo will broaden the audience for the Trackmania brand and will help TM2 to get more people in it. It may have lower TM2 player population at the release of Turbo but we're confident that it'll not last

Such a risky move.

Unless TM turbo license gives you access to maniaplanet TM titles, I don't see how you would encourage someone to buy again the same game in (maybe) another platform. Justs makes no sense to me, you have a game and a platform and launch another game to encourage people play the main platform. Loss of time, invest in what you have to make it big, not in something odd

I'm just gonna throw this in here, interpret it how ever you want.