Orient Express

Malibu350 · Post by **Malibu350** » Sun Sep 28, 2003 2:43 pm

click the pic for a full size image.

<a href="http://mtm2.com/~tracks/dl.cgi?dl=3751">OrientExpress.zip</a>

ch_2005 · Post by **ch_2005** » Sun Sep 28, 2003 10:57 pm

Looks sweet - cant wait to race it - actually i have to wait cause i need sleep desperatly and i have to go to school after that - and i have to .. oh nevermind. i hope i'll get to race it in the next month or two before i forget about it lol.

keep up the great work. i wish i had time for it. thanx.

SLO_Jumper · Post by **SLO_Jumper** » Mon Sep 29, 2003 9:26 am

Here's another winner by Malibu. You have enough of racing on tracks with the same textures and model? Then this one is for you. The Layout is fairly simple but make no misstake about it, it's not that easy. Mal really did a good job to give this one the oriental feel. The way the models fit in or around the layout is real cool as not only does it provide a nice scenery but at time it become part of the layout. Great job Mal
i love it.

SLO_Scrooch · Post by **SLO_Scrooch** » Tue Sep 30, 2003 1:33 pm

I drove for half an hour on it, and I really love it

Still not getting those '21 yet though

lol

Rep Fan · Post by **Rep Fan** » Tue Sep 30, 2003 9:06 pm

As usual, amazing work.

WTH? with the "Nice Try" stuff?

I wanted to come to Cali and find you, when I hit that wall and saw that sign [:P]

Good air, high speed, beautiful scenery, excellent layout.

Top notch, even though I don't totally agree with letting the Bots have a shortcut, I still whooped em anyway, but it was tough the first race. Second one, they never had a chance, should probably give them a couple more.

Clawfford · Post by **Clawfford** » Tue Sep 30, 2003 10:40 pm

Great track!

It has all the things I look for in a race; nice scenery, with smooth, realistic hills and a great backdrop. The path is easy to follow without resorting to the overhead map. And most importantly (to me) you aren't necessarily out of the race if you make one mistake. (No call-the-helicopter drops).

Some of the track has "stair-stepping" downhill runs that remind me of "Winding Way", one of my favorites from MTM1. I mostly rumble, so only the finest add-on races stay on my pod list. This is certainly one of them!

Way to go, Mal!

Malibu350 · Post by **Malibu350** » Sat Oct 04, 2003 1:10 am

>i hope i'll get to race it in the next month or two before i forget about it lol.

No worries CH, so long as I and a few other die hards have any say in the matter this and many many other tr?cks will be around for a very very long time to come.

>The Layout is fairly simple but make no misstake about it, it's not that easy

mission accomplished :o) ... after running a few zone events I came to the conclusion and the re-realization that beauty is not only skin deep (snowbound, baha cross, dog country etc) :o) lol

>Still not getting those '21 yet though

LOL, neither am I, nor will I ever on this keyboard lol... but I bet if ya really tried you'd be posting 18's... that I'd love to see :o)

>WTH? with the "Nice Try" stuff?

the single and only agonizing part of putting a track together (for me) is getting those bots to drive halfway sober, that 'nice try' part of the track is a result of that agony lol... but if I had left that part open to all it would have destroyed the track.

>you aren't necessarily out of the race if you make one mistake

That is something that has always factored into all my tracks since day one... to me, there's nothing worse than being taken out of a race completely because a simple mistake, mistakes happen to the best of us and should never penalize one for more than a few seconds, because lets face it... the best, most enjoyable, most memorable, most exciting, yeehaaa races have been the close ones... blowouts are lame and very tiresome.

thanks for the comments everyone :o)

rocketalces · Post by **rocketalces** » Mon Oct 06, 2003 9:48 am

There are two topics I'd like to discuss before expressing my overall opinion on this track.

AI
Mal took an innovative approach to make the AI more competitive. Taking advantage of the different collision rules for computer and human driven trucks, the bots follow a path that you cannot take.
I don't really care about competitive bots since I barely ever play with computer opponents on, but I guess this stratagem will not improve the immersion factor. I wonder what people driving against bots think about that. Are there still people driving against bots at all? I totally agree with the statement "the single and only agonizing part of putting a track together (for me) is getting those bots to drive halfway sober". The major problem with the bots is the machine (frame rate) dependent behavior for which no workaround is yet available. This gets increasingly worse with people having more and more powerful hardware. I'm really sorry to tell you that on my spanking new machine (Athlon 2600+, ATI 9600 pro) the efforts prove to be vain with bots being unable to achieve times below 2 minutes. (It is not much of a consolation that the bots on my tracks don't do better, quite the opposite, lol).

CPs
I have nothing against non-collideable CPs when this property seems plausible, e.g. the ski-run type of flags used in Panama (think they are flexible and get back in place after being overridden). But personally I prefer when solid CPs are set as collideable. Having to drive through wooden poles detracts somewhat from the atmosphere and the immersion factor is greater when you are trying to shave collideable poles. Widening posts by one truck-width and making them collideable would offer the same room without making racing any harder.
Finally, I wonder what the inscription means: you will understand that I'm a bit reluctant to drive on a track with plenty of inscriptions possibly stating "elks are morons", lol.

Overall impression
The overall feeling reminds me very much of Panama (another of Mal's great tracks). "Slightly" bumpy terrain where you constantly have the impression of driving way too fast, a couple of wide and open sections and a place with monuments where you have to find a way through the artwork. I should say between rather than through because these things are collideable, believe me, lol. Great care has been taken to get the collision boxes right. I can imagine that the "what you feel is what you see" effect for the rock tunnel section was not so easy to achieve.
The most important for me is that it is a drivers track. A lot of places require appropriate and precise steering and throttle control to be fast. A slight mistake at a critical place is more likely to cost you seconds than tenths of seconds, e.g. when jumping off the big bridge or turning into the monument zone.
I also find it very pleasant to get from time to time a track with new unseen textures and objects, both, almost needless to say, in the usual Malibu satisfied-or-money-back quality .
Don't let the relative length of the comments at the beginning fool you: I like this track and recommend it to anybody for download.
Great job, Mal.
[tu]

SLO_Jumper · Post by **SLO_Jumper** » Mon Oct 06, 2003 4:55 pm

with bots being unable to achieve times below 2 minutes

I never race with them. No matter how short you'll make their circuit to match my times these thing cant drive like human and make them unplesant to pass. They give me the impression they're trying to take me out lol. Anyway, I either run by myself to improve lap time or race with others (human) online.

Having to drive through wooden poles detracts somewhat from the atmosphere and the immersion factor is greater when you are trying to shave collideable poles

When cp's are collideable, the poles better be darn accurate. There's nothing more frustrating than having to shave something when you cant see it. Personnally, i like it when i can drive over small bush and other things a monster truck would'nt be stoped by and stoped by objects like large trees and concrete blocks etc...
I realize the margine is hard to acheive with the different caracteristics this game can offer. So i'm talking ideally here. As it's not yet easy to get perfection. i'll say you guys took this game already much further than what it was desinged for. Y'all making great tracks.