Ballrace compared to every single other game mode only really got one bit of content in the years since woodlands release, and that is the Ballrace Level Leaderboard HUD. A HUD that the average can’t use nor doesn’t know about.
Every other game mode last year got either some sort of new map or visual overhaul of a map. Ballrace has gotten nothing. This is funny to me as not only does Ballrace have the second most popular player base for its game modes. It also has one of the more active communities in Tower Unite. With the current discord having multiple players getting new top ten PB’s on the daily and with it also having a current tournament going on. I feel that ballrace deserves at least one of these few things
A new map, back in 2019, Ballrace got 2 new maps, Event Horizon and Woodlands. These maps were for the most part enjoyed by the community. Since then its been almost two years without any new content. I feel that ballrace could use another map. Whether that be a brand new designed map like you guys did with Event Horizon, or a port from GMT, like Ice World or the old version of Paradise.
This in my opinion would a nice change of pace for the game mode allowing players to play a new map.
A Visual Overhaul, Ballrace is the only game mode to have not gotten a visual overhaul on any map in the last 3 years. In 2020 alone, MiniGolf, Virus, and Zombie Massacre got all-new visual overhauls to their maps. With MiniGolf getting Forest, Garden, and Waterhole. ZM getting Gasoline and Compound and Virus getting Overtime, Desertion, and Hosptial. All 3 of these gamemodes got new art passes on them in 2020 and MiniGolf, since then as gotten another with Sweet Tooth.
Even Little Crusaders got new lighting on every single one of its maps.
If I had to point out what maps I believe need a new Art Pass. Its Midori, and Summit with mainly Midori being the one who just straight up needs a new tune-up as Midori is the most unoptimized map due to things like the entire ground and scenery being completely solid ground that you can walk on, and the constant jitters that the platforms and players get when there are more than 6 people in a public lobby.
While this isn’t anything new that would provide new content to the game. One of the main things that needs to be fixed is the timer. There are many glitched times on the leaderboards that the community members have found or had happen to them. That it requires the need to message Caboose on discord to fix these times…
This was the main reason the ballrace leaderboards had reset a few months back. At the time, it was basically impossible on most levels to get top 10 on the leaderboards due to these times, and on certain levels, it was impossible to get top 50 legit.
The thing is, is that this problem was fixed months ago. It was all fine and dandy and people weren’t getting any glitched times anymore. But suddenly it was reverted back to the old buggy timer code that is still available to get cheated times/glitched times in.
This was brought up back in November 2020 and at the time, they were knees deep in crashes and other issues like MiniGolf desync. The dev mentioned that he reverted the code back to what we have now because of a visual glitch that made the stopwatch timer sometimes show the incorrect amount of time you had remaining in a level. He mentioned that he planned to look at the code connected to the timer again once the crashes had died done a little.
At the time we were happy that we got a response and were willing to deal with that answer. But since then its been about 6 months since that response and the timer is still broken and even easier to fuck with. I’m not going to mention how you fuck with it since I don’t want people fucking with the leaderboards even more. But the fact that it’s still an issue is why I writing this section
So my simple request is that the code for the timer either be edited to prevent this from happening, or for to simply input the new code that is not in the game at the moment.
Also if you want the whole message that I referencing then here you go.
I hope at some point we will get every GMT Ball Race map remastered and ported over. Especially old Paradise. I really miss that old version of the map and I have always preferred it over the new one.
I get that the devs constantly have higher priorities to work on but it is a little sad to see the amount of attention ball race gets being the 2nd most popular game
The reason Ball Race hasn’t received a lot of art passes is because most of the levels look fine. Midori looks fine, other than maybe some of the landscape could be improved, but generally the art style looks how Ball Race should look like. It’s a simplistic art style. Where as, Virus and Zombie Massacre have a more realistic art style prompting the art passes.
As for the timer, the timer system is used in all the games. The net synchronization work needed to be reverted back because they caused issues in all the moving platforms in Minigolf, along with many other issues dealing with packet loss. We moved it back to the old method and it appears to be a lot more stable. Addressing Ball Race’s timer is all that is left.
Does a new map (or one that could return from GMT, I do personnally hope for Skyworld) could be considered this year?
Trello displays no ballrace maps in upcoming tab.
I can see where your coming from with what you mention with ballrace. But why does mini-golf need so many art passes?
Honestly I can understand an art pass for sweet tooth, but why did forest and waterhole need one. Their art styles were fine and imo they looked good the way they are.
Also when it came to Midori while I was speaking on the terms of an art pass. The main thing I said is that it’s unoptimised. The very fact that playing midori with lobby over 6-8 people can cause issues with the map is the main annoyance.
I just felt like Midori is unfinished because there were way more levels in gmt and it looked way cooler and had more attention to detail (there was actually a robot in the sky), Tower’s version of the map just seemed like an afterthought
Another thing I’m speaking really generally, why hasn’t ballrace gotten basically any attention in the last year. I really enjoy the game mode and it makes me sad to see little to no development for the game.
It feels like you practically ignored as a game mode this past year.
Like anything, anything can be added to it and I be happy, like for example. The kill bind to ballrace, that feature is just sitting on the trello collecting dust. Maybe add that, or any of the highly voted suggestions that are also being ignored.
I personally think Ballrace’s content is wide enough for a good while at the moment, and its popularity is definitely an indicator of that. I do think we’re soon due for work on a new map, but I also think other game worlds are in more immediate need of content. Mutators will also help to quell how repetitive replaying the same set of maps may be.
I do agree that other game modes like LC need more content over ballrace. But it’s the main game mode I play so of course I’m going to say that it needs more content.
Also mutators is a feature that is gonna take a good while to get here. So I feel something new would suffice.
In my opinion, Ball Race has gotten a lot of attention over the years and is sitting pretty with 11 maps, tied with Minigolf for the most. Virus and ZM have 5 each. LC with 6, Acc. with 4. While MG and BR are a little more dependent on level design for gameplay, I think the other game worlds should be getting content for now.
(I am in agreement that Midori needs a tune-up sometime)
Midori looks fine to me, even if this map is one of the oldest in the game, it’s tagged “Very hard” and I do love it this way, of course, a little refresh wouldn’t hurt too much.
I do agree that other game modes need more content. IE LC and Virus, but I feel the constant attention that minigolf gets when it comes to new content is one of the main reasons I made this forum post.
MiniGolf in the last year has gotten 4 revisions and 1.5 new maps. Plus a bunch of bug fixes and other cool additions to it.
Its just my love for Ballrace as a game mode that makes me want to see some of that attention on mini-golf on to ballrace or another game mode like LC.
