Hi everebody, I create this topic in order to share experiences and knowledges about the importance of the driving line when we create a tracks. Has Cannibalshogun says in the firsts tutorial videos, there is a thin line between challenging and frustrating.
For people who knows my tracks, you can see that the work of the driving line is not my best quality. I think without arrogance that i'm a good creator, but I recently realized that it's a big problem I have to resolved and I think I'm not the only one in this case.
So that's why I think it could be interesting to know how you prepare this part of your track. Is it writed down on paper? is it instinctive? How you test it? How you graduate the difficulty? etc...
I know it's hard to write and explain what is a good line. I'm open minded and ready to get punches , maybe you can start with my tracks to explain as example what "NOT TO DO"... it's up to you...
Senior Member
Test, test and test again. Then get other people to test it. Then test it again. And again! I'm not being facetious, but thats the one real key to getting consistency in your line. It helps you to make sure the difficulty is consistent throughout the track and to make sure that there is nothing that stands out. No awkward part, no poor collisions from objects and nothing that is harder or easier than the rest of the track.
In terms of difficulty, something that might be handy is to ignore the difficulty rating. Just make a track that is consistent in difficulty through the whole track. Then gauge what that difficulty is, wether its hard or medium, etc. If all the testers agree that it is a certain difficulty and that that difficulty is consistent then its ok!
Other than that, its probably best to ask everyone what NOT to do in a track. That way you have a track that fits its difficulty rating, is consistent and has nothing bad in it. From there you can do what I'm trying to do and work on trying to make the lines better. I personally feel that my lines dont have any particularly bad aspects. But I also feel that there are certain subtleties and more "advanced" aspects that I need to work on. Making a fairly simple line isnt too hard tbh, its trying to learn how to add in the timesavers, shortcuts and less obvious shortcuts/timesavers that makes for a really good line. Which is where I still feel I have a lot of room to improve.
But if you can make a consistent line, that matches the difficulty rating and has no bad aspects to it then that is a great base to build from imo. This isnt aimed at yourself necessarily, just a general response to your question. I'm not too sure what your lines are like, so some of this may or may not apply to you. But hopefully there's something useful in there for you anyway! lol
Senior Member
I have one rule that stands out above all others when I make a line...if it doesnt make me feel like a badass trials rider when I hit it right...I keep tweaking it until it does. I stick to tracks that are around my skill level because then I know it flows well. I test my own tracks, because my main concern is its fun for me, and then if others like it when I put it out its all good (that and im an antisocial bastard) I dont add checkpoints until the track is finished, this way I always have to test the whole line at full speed every single time. If a track takes 20 hours to build 10 of those would be spent testing probably
You will never please everyone, so please yourself and then if it isnt well received at least you enjoyed it. Theres no perfect line mate...keep plugging away
you should test two checkpoint row
example:
chckpt 0> 1 and 2 and then 1> 2 and 3 and then 2> 3 and 4
in order to allow you to have enough speed when you arrive on your obstacles and those who do run can get to the end (do not forget they are still at full speed) without catching or meet after a board for receiving the front wheel in a vacuum, or both wheels off of the board for receiving
bad lines are due to manufacturers who test starting from a checkpoint A and B reach and continue their construction, but they forget that the bike does not have a constant speed when you start and when you roll (hence the speed defined according to your location, or the space between two front, two obstacles ...)
after adjustment:
when your conducting liner attery or jumps an obstacle, look at how it is set for a simple reason is that the next hurdle will your players from the previous position
example: your player landed considered the only way forward for your next hurdle is to pull the lever back if you put an obstacle or the player must be leaning forward (yet) it is a risk Crash
manipulating the joystick is often: back, forward, back, forward, ... hence the importance of knowing how the rider is positioned your hen pass an obstacle (at this obstacle)
... and then test your joystick (your bike) in vacuum to get an idea of ??the next obstacle (possible angle, distance suit your own, needs to put a flat board between the two barriers ...)
I guarantee you the invoice if you watch a replay of my tracks you will see that I am a piece of ****, but by doing this I can guarantee you that extreme runners will be used to their full potential (hopefully I can always spend two consecutive checkpoint but sometimes I have to resume it several times)
and of course: Test, test and test again
I hope so this helps
Senior Member
My advice to you is the same advice I give less experienced map designers: Start simple. The more simple the line is, the less likely that it will have major flaws. As you get better with your judgement, you can start doing some more complex lines.
1. Make sure the rider knows what the driving line is. When I was on your track, I sometimes didn't know what object I was going to come into contact with.
2. Try to give each obstacle it's own unique technique. On your track, it was more like a showcase of your scenery with some jump-land, jump-land obstacles. Try to mix it up more.
3. Flow and difficulty consistency. This is important. Try to look at each obstacle individually, and see if they belong in the same difficulty. It's okay to have a couple more challenging obstacles in a line, but don't have one obstacle that is way harder (difficulty spike).
as mc said, no cps until its over. track has to go balls out from the getgo.
Senior Member
Strongly disagree with this. This method may work for some, but a lot of people may not do a good job with it. Fundamentally, an obstacle is supposed to be easiest from a dead stop at the start of a checkpoint. If you build a track to flow perfectly from the start, and don't do checkpoints til it's finished, there's probably a good chance you might not leave room for optimum checkpoints. I've played lots of tracks where they were easiest when done with perfect flow, but restart at a checkpoint and it becomes really hard. I would guess these tracks were built with this method.Originally Posted by zapata
If you do it this way and your successful, fine. But it's not an easy way to make a track work right, I seriously wouldn't recommend that to anyone who is troubleshooting for a better line.
Senior Member
What you are almost saying is to build a track around checkpoints, when most people aim to finish a track with 0 faults anyway. Of course for extreme tracks its gonna be a different ball game, and I dont make those so I cant comment.Originally Posted by Stllbreathnbuty
Its gonna be different for everyone since we all like different flows, and you cant really say one way is right over another. Ive played tracks that are built the way you describe, and when you get speed up you are stopped dead in your tracks because the builder only tested that stretch from the checkpoint and not the beginning where speed differences will affect the way you take an obstacle.
Senior Member
the only way to build good lines is to learn and understand what is, in your own opinion, a good line.
the builders who lack that kind of understanding have very little chance of ever building a good rideline imo.
spend a lot of time riding, a lot of time trying to improve on the ingame tracks and gaining a better feel for how the bike reacts to different surfaces, different obstacles, different rider movements etc... then spend a lot of time playing custom tracks and finding out what feels "right" to you, what feels fun yet challenging and look at those lines and how theyre built - the more experience you have the easier it becomes knowing what works and what doesnt
Senior Member
@emcee
Im not saying a track should only be made to flow from checkpoint to checkpoint. A good builder can make sure that the track still has a line that flows from start to finish, while still being easiest from the start of a checkpoint.
Ill use loot monkeys last pure trials pick as an example. First off, I love that track and recomended it. Second, I recomended it for pure FUN, not trials, because that track is significantly harder from checkpoint to checkpoint than it is in one smooth run. Make one slip, and you might as well start over. I think this track had to be made in the mindset that you are talking about.
An excellent line does both, flows from start to finish, AND has well positioned checkpoints that make the obstacle simple to break down.
Does this make sense?
