OLD_FlatWheel’s latest effort is called “Tuindorp”. The name loosely translates to “Garden City”, and it happens to be a place where he raced as a kid in Holland, where he’s from. He also added that it’s where some people would steal cars from and…well, lol we’ll just leave that part of the story out! “Tuindorp” is listed as a motocross (MX) track, but from what I can tell it’s a cross between an MX and a circuit. Nevertheless, the author says it’s an MX, so that’s what we’ll go with!
Upon starting the race, you’ll notice two things right away. The first is that your truck will probably be slightly airborne as if something extremely hard and heavy slapped the ground, causing the trucks to pop up into the air lol. I’m guessing it’s because the starting point is on a hill. Hopefully Mal or Phin can expand/clarify for us. The second thing that jumps out at ya is the color. Hehe if you own a decent pair of sunglasses, get ‘em! The texture sets he used are unusual to say the least, and somewhat reminiscent of a guy by the name of Yves_B, who’s probably best known for Autocross I, II, and III. Initially I thought Flat simply wanted to get radical with his color choices, but according to him, it’s a somewhat accurate depiction of how this place actually looks, with exception of the grass, which is lighter than he wanted it to be. Kinda makes you want to fly over to Holland and take a look at this place, doesn’t it? Oh hey, Flat also pointed out that the “checkpoint babes” don’t actually exist, so if you do go to Holland and find yourself in Tuindorp, don’t be disappointed if you don’t see ‘em standing out there holding checkpoint signs lol.
I like the mixture of MX/traditional circuit this track gives you. The MX portion is undoubtedly the focal point of the track, for it’s where lots of lead changes take place. If you don’t nail the timing on the jumps just right, it throws your rhythm off for the duration of the stretch. I know firsthand because I ran it with Flat and SLO_HotShoe, and it was an incredibly fun ride. I think the lead changed hands about five or 6 times over 4 laps! It’s not easy, that’s for sure, and Flat did a pretty nice job of adjusting the course to make it the MX section very “do-able”, but also challenging. If you lose the edge in the MX section, there are several other spots on the course that will undoubtedly force errors from racers, allowing you to make up lost time…provided you don’t fall prey to the same errors yourself!
Objectively speaking, the two most notable flaws (if you will) are the lag it induces at certain spots in the game (even with minimum graphic settings), and the tree models. There is a process by which you set the tree model to no-collide, then use a non-visible pole (?) as the trunk, which you set to collide. The result is your truck doesn’t hit non-visible portions of the tree model, and the branches, as in real life, don’t bring your truck to a dead stop. Finally, there are quite a few misaligned road textures. Most racers won’t even notice it, and it has no physical effect on the track itself, but if you want the track to “look” as nice as it possibly can (particularly if it’s fashioned after a place that actually exist), you may want to pay closer attention to those details. For input or help with your tracks, try posting them at MTMG’s Beta Test Room. I think it’s a great place to post tracks in the making. Give it a shot next time around!
In my opinion “Tuindorp” isn’t the kind of track you sample offline and fall in love with it. Hehe in fact, you probably won’t like it at all. But if you play it online with others, it’s fun, fun stuff – it really is. This one gets a “Copey Rating of
7.5 out of
10 possible points. Sure, there are some technical issues that could’ve been attended to, but it’s a learning process…like everything else.
As I said, the track itself is great fun in a multiplayer format, and it’s definitely unique, which I happen to like. Good effort, Flat, and anytime you want to run a few on this baby, definitely look me up!
