Trackmania Transit
Sometimes it's just faster to reset at the checkpoint!
Summary
Trackmania Transit is a collection of projects centered on the Trackmania franchise that is home to multiplayer broadcasting, server radio mixes, custom car skins, and track packs. It contains tracks from both Trackmania United Forever and Trackmania 2020 that were built during the summer of the latter game’s release. Some of the contents of the projects drastically changed or were greatly expanded upon in later revisions featuring altered track routes, more skins, and overhauled media layouts. All of the components of this project can be viewed through the Trackmania Transit YouTube Playlist where Arcmaevotix is home to the original versions and Nehrpsyznet is home to the remade versions.
Process
The design of Trackmania Transit started with a longplay of Trackmania United Forever Star Edition (TMUFSE). This was done as a part of the Horizon Wave project in order to showcase its Radiant Crate Digital Home (RCDH) component. The RCDH theme in particular, Rainforest Wii, was being demonstrated with various games as a part of the HWTV channel. This longplay inspired other creations featuring Trackmania United Forever (TMUF) and other titles from the Trackmania franchise. Most notably, there was a summertime track pack that I was building for both Trackmania United Forever and Trackmania 2020 (TM2020) that was going to be the first in a collection of track packs that would be based on the different seasons of the year. Finding that I had plenty of custom content designed for the Trackmania games and was curious as to what an ambient radio featuring Trackmania would look like, I created two other projects that would eventually become “Racing in Style” and “F101 Hardcore”. The tracks that were created for TMUF and TM2020 were also showcased separately in two different formats. The “Tropical Flame” track pack for TMUF saw a full demonstration that gave summaries to the tracks and the TM2020 creations were showcased in a live streamed event.
Reflection
Trackmania Transit allowed me to document over a decade’s worth of content that I have created for the Trackmania games and complete one of the longest racing games that I have ever played, Trackmania United Forever Star Edition. It was a joy getting to show off all of the different classes of courses and shine a spotlight on some of the contributions that I have made myself in the way of vehicle skins or custom tracks. Being able to share my vision for a Trackmania Radio broadcast took me back in time to the days of finding player-hosted servers with custom radios implemented where you could hear genres ranging from Swing Jazz to Progressive Trance while trying to grind for the best times on the most high octane or ridiculously silly maps. This project was largely about capturing those feelings, those experiences, and that entire era.