[Subtitles by danielsangeo] Yeah, yeah, yeah. I know last time I
said the follow-up episode was next, but it's summer... ...sort of... ...and I've been dying to have
a summer game on the show, and that is what we have today. Hi! Welcome to the Game Dungeon! Today we have a plot twist,
AND I'm bringing you a scandal. Now it's a small scandal, but it is
real--it is SO real. I have proof. So with that we have
TrackMania...uh... Squared Canyon. Yeah, I THINK the name of this
game is "TrackMania 2 Canyon", but I'm not sure I'll ever really know. If you go to the store page,
it says "TrackMania²‚". Now the famous example of this
sort of thing is "Half-Life 2". On their title, they always made the "2"
looks like it's "Half-Life²‚" instead. But this goes back farther than that. It's less overt, but "Descent
3" is looking like "Descent³‚". See? On MobyGames, they
even call it "Descent³‚". All right... Though, in fairness, the Descent
series is as 3D as it gets, so no doubt they wanted to drive
that home with the number 3. As for Half-Life, whatever you
want to say about the game, it's clear they're building
a math theme here. The lambda symbol has
become the game's logo, we have some fragments of
equations or something on the box, you play as a physicist, we have rows of computers, guys in labcoats doing equations... Half-Life has always given the impression
that none of this would be possible if there weren't mathematical geniuses working around the clock to
tear down reality for you. See, look at that. This is what
happens when math gets out of control. So Half-Life earns the
right to make their sequel look like it's squared instead of just 2. Because, hey, we were about guys in
labcoats doing math from the beginning; we'll square any damn thing we want. But TrackMania, where the
hell is this coming from? Even Half-Life 2 doesn't
ACTUALLY square the title. Dammit, "Fury³‚" did this even earlier. Now
I don't even know how far back this goes. And the real slap in the face is
there is no Fury 1 or 2--just Cubed-- so at least TrackMania has that
going for it. It is indeed a sequel. Yeah, this is another one of those games
where I haven't even played the originals. The original TrackMania goes back to 2003, and it's gained a cult
following with five expansions, but I'm an environments junkie and the
screenshots of the TrackMania 1 games never quite did it for me, so I passed. But then, in 2011, TrackMania
Canyon showed a trailer, and WHOA! Look at this!
This looks almost real! Except it's not--these are
crazy courses--but wow! It says "TrackMania Canyon" and
THAT is a canyon! I like canyons. All right! Sold! I'm going to buy this as soon as
it becomes as cheap as a sandwich. And that's exactly what
happened--years later. So, I feel like a bit of a hypocrite because I think this may be the
only game I bought for the graphics, because best I can tell, it's
almost the same game as TrackMania. But, DAMN! They went all-in on the
visuals, and now I want to play it. I mean, it's not JUST the graphics,
because hey, I love "Need for Speed 3", but that has WAY better art
direction with their canyon despite coming out years earlier. Hell, even Need for Speed 2's
canyon looks more appealing. So we're in a weird space
where maybe it's the graphics, maybe it's just the art direction... I don't know. Let's start. Oh wait, we CAN'T start. This game not only has its own launcher, but you have to sign in
and create a new password. But you CAN play offline IF you've
downloaded it first...I think? So this game isn't online-only,
except it kind of is? Whatever. Kudos for
maintaining that gray area. I almost never see something
like this. More on that later. Once you start, you have a few game
modes, but really it's all the same thing. This game is about racing through
tracks, and getting the best time. Solo is the closest thing we have to
a campaign, so we'll go with that. You have a bunch of tracks that
you normally have to unlock, but I can't show you that without
buying another copy of the game, because this is another one of
those no-backwards-progress games, and I've unlocked these. Just imagine you can't play all these
at the start. More on THAT later. And here is the game. You rocket out the start, drive
through the course, and... Yeah, that's pretty much the whole game. It's its own reward,
as far as I'm concerned. Just a bright and sunny day out
in the desert to do some racing. I guess I could end the episode
now, but we'll keep going, especially since you soon realize
these are no ordinary racing tracks. Oops! I'm pretty sure THAT jump
doesn't meet safety standards. And of course, this looks like it
was built inside the Grand Canyon, or maybe Jordan or Italy. If there are any geography experts watching, you can let us know where
you think this takes place. Yeah, congratulations. You
finished the race. Bam! By the time you get to the third level, you get a clearer picture
of what this game is about. Yeah, just pull off this gigantic
jump through this massive arch. This track is also trial-by-fire
for the controls, too. Guess how you jump through that gap. If you go pedal to the metal,
you slam into it too high, so that means you have to hit the ramp
at a slightly slower speed, right? Wrong! You hit the ramp just as fast, but then you have to lay off the
accelerator WHILE YOU'RE IN THE AIR! If you keep spinning your
tires, you get too much lift. Yeah, that's a sign you're
not playing a simulator, when you need to be aware of
your air control in a car game. The last time I saw something like
that was in "Terminal Velocity", but he didn't have a lot
of mid-air car control. In the movie, he's a professional skydiver, and all he managed to do
was get the trunk open. I guess that created some drag, but
didn't seem to do much for the car. Yeah, see? This wasn't a good example. Let's try another one. Okay, well this isn't too bad,
but the picture's kind of blurry. I can't tell how much is his driving,
and how much is the car itself. He keeps taking his hand off
the wheel. Let's try another. Okay, NOW we're talking. Yeah, he's TRYING to drive
it. It's fighting him, but it looks like he might
be getting it under control. Nope. Never mind. Okay, so I guess the verdict's still
out on how accurate the car control is. The physics in this game are weird. I
never really know what's going to happen. It makes me a little nervous, to be honest. So each track is over very quickly,
until they're not, but we'll get to that. For now, these are like little snacks
that you're done with in 30-40 seconds. It's generally a nice experience. See, now it's not. This one isn't the worse--not even close--
but they need you to do five laps. Why? We have this utterly massive
butte-cropped desert to work with, so instead, let's do a bunch
of laps like any other racer. I mean, the sky's the limit in this
game; in more ways than one, you'll see. Normally you drive on circular tracks
due to space and resource constraints. But none of that applies here. We
have the whole desert to work with! Why not just have a track with the curves
you want that's five times as long? What can I say? I guess some people are just born to
go in circles as fast as they can. Ah... Evening light... I have to say
the visuals in this game are so nice. They're SO nice. I normally hate deserts,
but I like this one. The racing infrastructure here
combined with the lighting, it just creates a really nice atmosphere. This game has a mood. It also has a new mechanic here where if you drive over these painted
lines, you get a massive speed boost. I'm pointing that out because
that's the only aspect of this game I think is JUST a game mechanic and
could never exist in the real world. Everything else, well, it feels possible. That's not to say they don't take liberties. Like, I'm no architect, but I'm pretty sure this part of the
track could use a few support columns. Maybe they're using those carbon nanotubes. But yeah, the graphics
REALLY sell this game for me because no racing courses are like this. They're all concerned with being practical and not killing the drivers
and stuff like that, so combining these realistic
looks with unreal courses makes everything surreal,
which is a good place to be. And this is a DirectX 9 game from 2011. I remember when DirectX 10 came out, Microsoft was making these
completely disingenuous comparisons, for showing how much
"better" DirectX 10 was. I love how they even changed the
texture on one of the comparisons. Well, this is the REAL DirectX
9 comparison to beat. Damn. Y'know, real-time ray tracing is being touted
as the big thing in graphics right now, but I have to say, now
that we're getting closer, I kind of don't care anymore. It's not that we can't
make graphics look better, it's just that we have gotten SO GOOD at
cheating with raster graphics like this that the difference is just too subtle
for me now. It ALL looks good to me! For the most part. I mean, these shadows here look bad, and I'm not sure I'll ever live to see
grass stop popping in like that in games. But it has some shortcuts I don't
mind, too, like if you do a quick turn, you see how the clouds look like
they're pinned on a tack board. Same goes for the trees. We have
some floating point sprites, I think. I mean that, or they're just
watching you, but, um... Hey, look! It's night already. Now ironically, I think the night lighting isn't nearly as impressive
as the day lighting, but again, we're coming back to that. It's like I said, this game has layers. The night driving helps gives
us more atmosphere, though, and I'm all about that. I love the thought that the courses
are open day or night, all the time. After all, we need to do our racing. Okay, back to day. I will say what I like the most about
this game are the little details. At its core, the layout of
this game is quite simple, but they've added a lot of small
things to make it feel more real. Like, hey, notice how there was
another road here that we never go on? Where does it go? Or did you miss that road up there? Well, usually you can't drive
on them, but sometimes you can. Aha! Ah, it goes nowhere, but it sure
FELT like it could've gone somewhere. Plus, you can always cheat with
the camera and see where they go. Look at this! This is a
whole separate raceway! And look! There's a speed strip here. Why? Or hey, what if we just decided we wanted
to see the rest of the Grand Canyon? Well, you can! Bye, course! Bye! Yeah, there's no invisible walls here. You're as free as a bird in this game. You can keep going, too. ...and going! Now of course the
texture fidelity gets worse because this was just
meant to be a backdrop, but the point is the game doesn't stop you. Yeah! Over the ridgeline. Hey, look! Another ridgeline. Let's keep going! And ANOTHER ridgeline! On we go! Yeah, eventually you may
regret going this far because you'll come into the
edge of all known reality, and head off into the void, and the sheer sunlight that
was in your old existence kind of makes the world look
like an atomic bomb is going off, but we're getting off track now. The point is,
I love all these little details. Like hey, what is this? A guard station? What's in there? A phone and first-aid kit? What are all these tanks for? More fuel? And hey, look. There's a small
lit road inside this arch thing that looks like it could be a
dam, but I don't think it is. Where do these doors go?
To mystery, that's where! Now at its core, all this game is is just racing a car down a track
and getting the fastest time, but there is SO MUCH POLISH on
this; my brain keeps drifting and trying to fill in gaps as I play it. One thing I think is lost
on a lot of modern games is in old ones,
the games would be so abstract that your imagination would just start
to kick in and imagine what the world is. Well it's not the same, but I'm finding this game keeps
provoking that feeling with me. I'm wondering what's down the road? What's over the next canyon? What IS all this? How did it get here? Now I'm pretty sure I'm looking
for meaning where there is none, but I found something anyway. If this was truly meaningless, then everything would just be
semi-random and have no pattern. But no. Through the course of playing this, my brain is filling in a fairly consistent
picture of what's going on here. I wasn't even trying to; it just happened. So here is the "story" of TrackMania 2: This is a post-apocalyptic game. Something
happened to humanity; they're all gone. We'll dive into that a little more later. It happened rather recently, too, because
the tracks look relatively fresh-- aren't covered in dust--but
everything is abandoned. You never see any sign of
human life in this game. Now you might be saying,
"What about the drivers?" What drivers? Nobody's driving these cars. Look. Do you see anybody
inside? This is all automated. But what's the purpose of all this? Why do we have all these elaborate courses? Well, I think it's simpler
than you might think. I've heard people talk
before about billionaires saying they have more money
than they could ever spend. Well, as a kid, I thought that was
silly; I had all kinds of ideas. Now as I grew older, I developed
a better grasp of concepts like responsibility, shame, and just an
understanding we have finite resources, so the more of them you have, the more
you influence the direction of humanity. So, as an adult, if I was a billionaire... Well, I think I could still spend all of it. In fact, I'm pretty sure I would, to
try and give us a fighting chance, change the flow of history a little bit. So I wouldn't STAY a billionaire. There
would just be too much to accomplish. But I see now, I couldn't spend
nearly all that on MYSELF. Squandering THAT level of resources would
just come at too high a cost collectively. I mean, assuming we're not in
a simulation. Then I could. But you know what? Scientists checked for
that and couldn't find any evidence for it, so you can rest easy tonight
knowing that you're real. But anyway, all that's the adult speaking. What if a six- or seven-year-old
me was a billionaire, with no guidance at all, and
was just acting on pure impulse? Well then, yeah! This is exactly the
sort of thing I could come up with. I wouldn't just buy a
racetrack. That's boring. I would make the ULTIMATE racetrack,
where you do flips, jumps, rocket down canyons like it's
geological pinball. It would be awesome! Everything about these tracks is consistent with this being
a billionaire's dream project. Somebody loaded was thinking
like six-year-old me, and we're looking at the
fruits of their vision. It probably would take a
billionaire to pull this off, too. This is either at or
around the Grand Canyon, so you would have to
pay a bunch of lobbyists to get the government to sell it to you. Then of course there's
the construction costs. I'm pretty sure these lights are
running off of hydro-electric power and use buried lines, so the
costs of this WOULD add up, but if you're a billionaire, you
can move mountains. Literally. Plus, we can cut corners. We don't
have to worry about safety regulations because this is all for unmanned cars. We just need a crapton of
concrete, supports and labor. But hey, who's to say a lot of the
labor couldn't be automated, too? This could've been built
by robots FOR robots. And hey, notice how we treat
the cars with utter disdain? Some courses you NEED to trash the
cars in order to get the best times. Some have the finish line
end with a head-on collision, or just dump the cars
over a cliff afterwards. Why should we care? This is for
billionaires. We have thousands of cars. Now we'll probably never know WHY some billionaire built a gigantic
Eighth Wonder of the World racecourse, but I think it's as simple as he wanted to. You may have heard the stereotype of
some guys having a midlife crisis, so they buy a sports car to feel
young again or fulfill that fantasy. Well, if you're a billionaire,
why stop there? Don't just buy a sports
car, buy a sports car WORLD! And of course,
the other half of this is that shortly after the construction of
this marvel, the apocalypse happened. So all we have left is automated
cars running on tracks. There are no crowds,
no cameras, no witnesses, no signs of human activity whatsoever. And you know what? The music supports this,
too. I don't like the music to this game. [music] Oh sure, it has the right
tempo for a racing game, but all of it has this slightly
dark depressing tone to it. [music] Yeah, that does NOT put it in a mood
for a fun or exciting race. I mute it. But, you know what? I
can't say it's not fitting if we're talking about the apocalypse,
and all of humanity is extinct, and we're just witnessing the last
remnant of our mark on this world. I'm sure a lot of you have
heard of Easter Island, where we don't know exactly what happened, but the society that used
to live there is long gone, and all we have left are these
awesome giant head statues. Well, one leading theory is that they
spent too much time and resources making these statues, and
deforested the island, causing part of the ecosystem to collapse,
leading to them starving themselves out. If you've played "Minecraft" on Island
Survival mode, and don't do a good job, it's basically the same
thing, just on a larger scale. But not long ago, I was seeing
articles on how that's not the case; their society didn't collapse. But I read through some of
these and all I got from it was that there were signs that the
natives were cooperating with each other. I don't see that as being mutually
exclusive from wiping yourselves out. The point is that a billionaire expending
countless resources on some vanity project the same time civilization is
ending is hardly a fantasy scenario. It may have some historical equivalents. Except for those painted speed boost strips, I see nothing implausible
about this scenario at all. In fact, the more I play, I can't
shake the idea from my head. I think TrackMania Canyon is still well within the realm of
hard science-fiction here. There's a million stories
about the apocalypse, but some are more believable than others. I mean, c'mon. If we're talking about
apocalyptic racing in the desert, we have to acknowledge the "Mad Max" series. But Mad Max is a little
more on the fantasy side. I mean, it's possible. Don't let ANYONE
tell you you can't have a Mad Max reality. In fact, while TrackMania here takes
billions, with enough planning, you can pull off a Mad Max experience
on a just a middle-class income. Less if you have the right connections. But the thing is there is SUCH a small
window where something like that can happen. You know what's largely missing
from the Mad Max movies? Food. Water. Oh sure, we see him eating a can of dog
food, but what about everybody else? Now in the new one, we at least see the
EXISTENCE of water, so that's something. But they're rationing it big time. I mean they show, what, at least 10,000
people and they're all desperate for water? That's not going to last long. Oh sure, they show hydroponic gardens
and some greenery on the mesas, but we're going to
need a lot more than that. Plus, you can't tell me
those guys don't eat meat, so that's probably going
to triple the requirements. In "Thunderdome", we have pigs.
Okay, what are they eating? How are you getting that food? You
can't keep feeding them people forever. So roaming punk rock gangs
taking over the desert? Plausible. Them keeping that up for
more than a couple weeks without a reliable water source
and an agricultural pipeline? Fantasy. The desert is no place to
be in the apocalypse, guys. But that is not a concern
for our robot cars here. All they need is more track to drive on. Now you've probably noticed by now after
each race, if your time is good enough, you can get a bronze, silver, or gold medal. This is a nice little bonus,
but these medals matter because you need them to unlock tracks. Again, I can't show you this,
because no backwards progress, but imagine these tracks locked off until
you get a medal in what came before them. Actually, I lied. I CAN show you this, because the black tracks, I'm locked out of. I need to get a gold medal in
every single track prior to this. And I almost did it. Look: 56 out of 60. But those last four tracks might take me
as much time as all the others to master. TrackMania pulls out the
knives on the later levels. Oh yeah, I should've seen that coming. Oops. Oops... Ooops... The tracks turn merciless. Although to their credit,
I feel like they handled the loop-de-loop highways pretty
accurately. Yeah, see? There's one. "Sonic the Hedgehog" makes it
look easy, but the reality is you need a lot of speed and careful
steering to get over one of these. They just don't teach
this stuff in driver's ed. See look. I can't even
pull this off reliably. This game takes place out west, I think, but in mountainous regions like
Tennessee or West Virginia, they like to throw speed traps in front
of these as a way to boost local income, and it's just not safe.
Especially for truckers. You just need speed on loop-de-loop
roads. That's all there is to it. Back to the game, the difficulty required to actually access
the black tracks is insane. Okay, now I'm not the world's best player, but we can actually where
in the world I stack up. See? There we go. I'm in the top
19% or so, and I can't do it. I cannot get to those black tracks. Oh and remember how I said
there's bronze, silver and gold? Well, there's actually a secret
green medal. I don't know. Emerald? Apparently this means you beat
the track designer's time. I managed to get ONE of these. So I guess that means this is
the easiest track to do it on. But I like the concept of
completely hidden awards like this. But this game is balanced for psychopaths
is what I'm trying to say here. I'm not proud of my score. In fact,
I feel tricked I played the game trying to boost it as much as I did. It puts you in this
maddening repetitive loop, where you're literally trying to
shave milliseconds off your time, and the slightest mistake means
you may as well start over. Oh look. I'm a millisecond behind
already. Better start over. Some people enjoy this sort of
thing. I HATE this! I hate this crap! But I got suckered into
doing some of it anyway. I watched a video not long ago
about this guy trying to beat the world record of level 1 from "DOOM",
and...well... Just hear it for yourself. ["It took 50,000 attempts over the
course of more than a year to achieve, ["and embodies the thing that
I love most about speedrunning: ["The pursuit of perfection."] THAT is who TrackMania is
balanced for. People like THAT. Just the concept of doing the EXACT
same thing THAT many times in a game feels like some sort of
existential horror to me. Sure, you may have your world
record, but at what cost? ["For me, there is nothing sweeter
than spending hundreds of hours ["trying to beat a single level one
second faster than anyone else before."] Okay...well... I can think of a lot of
sweeter things myself, but...uh... Enjoy your game? See, when I see a game requiring me to
do the EXACT SAME THING over and over, it starts to wake me up, because my brain starts sending me a
signal like, "Hey, this isn't fun anymore. "If you want to memorize
something over and over again, "maybe you should learn an ACTUAL skill, "like a different language, or
how to play guitar, or karate, "or just anything with long-term value?" Now that's not to say
I don't like challenge, but for me, a good challenge
is a little unpredictable, so you have to rely on your skill
more than your memorization. And hey, remember how I
said this game has layers? Well, apparently a lot of tracks have
these one-in-a-thousand-chance shortcuts to cut that time even lower. So yeah, better line up the physics engine
just right for that one! Go to hell! In "The Matrix", Agent Smith talks about how they initially tried to make
reality a living paradise for people, but their brains kept trying to wake up. No. That's not how it works. Paradise keeps me playing the game. THIS right here, THIS is what wakes me up. Well, the good news is, TrackMania
has a built-in escape route, too. I'm never going to see
these tracks legitimately, but I can download copies of
them and play them anyway! Yeah! Better yet, I can download
THOUSANDS OF OTHER TRACKS, TOO! Yeah, the developer has embraced
modding to a large degree, and includes a map editor and just
endless custom tracks that people create. This is the real meat
of the game right here. Though I recommend going
to the website to get them, since doing it through the game itself feels kind of like browsing the
Internet in the early 90s Prodigy-style. [dial-up modem sounds] This adds a LOT of replay value to the game, and I honestly prefer many of
these maps to the originals. In fact, I really should've
just filmed the episode playing nothing but these
and left everyone confused. And I would be remiss
to not at least mention that TrackMania has a long tradition
of merging demos from different players so you can watch the cars flow through
the level like a torrent of water. I see this and I feel like this is the
purpose of just computers in general. The history of computer development was
just building towards this right here. We did it. And that WOULD about wrap things
up, but WAIT! There's more! Remember how said there's
a scandal? Well here it is! I've been showing you the OLD version of
TrackMania Canyon. Now why would I do that? Well, I like it better, mostly. Now, I'm not sure of the dates, but I
stopped playing this around 2016, I think, but I just found myself coming
back to this game each summer. I mean, this game NAILS just how hot
and sunny it gets out in the desert. I've heard how you can bake cookies
on your car's dashboard out west. They look a little doughy to me, but I
imagine it'll get hotter in the coming years, so this game is perfect for that kind
of weather. It's going to age well. The evenings are GORGEOUS. I love them. I
could drive for hours in lighting like this. And it's even better than real life because
here, I don't go blind from the sun. So when I fired up the game a year later-- Okay, a new HUD. Whatever. But something felt wrong. I remembered
this game being so gorgeous. It still looks about the same but just
doesn't jump out at me the way it used to. Was I remembering it as
being better than it was? Because I just wasn't finding the magic. Sometimes your memory tricks you on games. Well, no. My brain knew something
had changed, and it did. Now despite having an offline mode, this is a game that's always
updating when you DO connect. And my paranoia about these
kinds of games is significant. And thankfully, I'm not the only one since somebody cracked the
OLD version of this game which I backed up and
have been showing to you. So thanks to the magic of just being
able to back up your damned game, let's compare the differences. Okay, now this is subtle, but
the old version is just brighter and feels more authentic to me. I mean, if you've been out in the
desert in the middle of the day, yeah, it is sunny and it is HOT. It looks more like the old version to me. The new one is okay, but instead of
noon, it feels more like 2 or 3 o'clock. And even then, it's just not as
bright. Look at how much darker it is. Now I can't do a
completely neutral comparison because the clouds shift in the game
and cause the sun to wax and wane, but even if you time lapse things and try
and normalize it, it's just different. Now I'm not a lighting expert,
so if you are, you can weigh in on which
version is more accurate. I certainly PREFER the old version more. I mean, if I had to choose where I'm
going to go and get heat exhaustion, I would want this one for sure. They also changed the
barricades from red to blue. Why? But let's check more scenarios. The tunnel lighting DOES look a little
more accurate on the new version, but the old one looks nicer...which
is kind of what I care about more. And look at the exit. Remember, this
is a hot, sunny day we're racing in. The old version's a little exaggerated,
but c'mon, we're inside a cave. Now morning light is a mixed bag. It was never great on the original,
but they shifted the time again so I honestly can't tell which is better. I can tell they're both
morning, so that's good. They seem to be pushing that yellow bloom
a little too much on the new one, though. But evening is where I get upset. I think they changed the time of day again, and the old version just feels like it has a brightness and energy to
it that the new one doesn't. I mean, I like all evening light, but
man, I just like the old one better. But night is where things get conclusive. Now again, if I'm going to be fair, overall, the lighting direction on
the new one looks a little better. Parts of this look more like what I would
expect a lit track at night to look like. But again, they can't stop themselves
on this bloom. This looks WAY overkill. We're definitely losing that
almost-real look the game sometimes has. But HERE'S where we set the record straight. Look at the shadows. Yeah, what shadows? We have these bright spotlights and
it seems to have no impact at all. In fact, I think the only
shadow is from the moon. So now let's compare this
to the OLD version. OH! Look at that! We have multiple fading
shadows from every light source behaving exactly as you'd expect! This isn't some option I forgot
to turn on in the new version. In both cases, I'm using the default
graphics settings for "Very Nice". In fact, look at this. If I try to
customize it in the new launcher, they removed the freakin'
option for "Very High"! Nice! But let's keep going! Even if I manually set shadows
to "High" on the 2014 version, I STILL have multiple shadows in game! Looks like "High" isn't
as high as it used to be! Don't you love updates that remove
features? Aren't those just the best? I mean, this is an objective downgrade, SIX YEARS AFTER RELEASE! That is damned weird. I'm not sure I've seen
something like this before. I've heard of games getting
downgrades from prereleased footage; that happens all the time. And I've heard of remakes or ports
being worse than the original, but I don't think I've seen a game you
bought and own get an irreversible update that objectively makes
some of the graphics worse. I can believe it's happened, as
I'm sure some of you will tell me, but this was new for me. Actually, "The Crew" had
something like this going on, too, but that will have to wait for a follow-up. Now I'm the first to admit,
this is very nitpicky, and I appreciate games with way
more primitive graphics than this. All I have to say to that is, when I fired up this game again, I
wasn't TRYING to make a comparison. I was just expecting another
good time in Canyonland. And instead, my brain kept
screaming something was wrong, and this was a bad dream. So nitpicky or not, these
changes were noticeable enough to make me doubt everything I remembered. And once again,
I get to prove I'm not crazy. I really don't like how many times I need
to keep doing that when making this show. It happens way more often
than I would've thought. And that's the game. It's simple in a way, but has a nice
feel, especially the old version. But, whoa! Wait a minute. TrackMania had a bunch of
expansions. What about TrackMania²‚? Yep. It sure does. Canyon was just the first in
line. Next, we had "Stadium". Which, ehh... I don't know. I don't get the same magic from a stadium
as a bunch of open mysterious canyons. It feels limited by design. Plus, lately, it seems like
stadiums...or stadia... are emerging as a secret nemesis for
me. I really didn't see that one coming. So I passed on Stadium, even
though, to their credit, this looks about as impressive
as you can get for one. They like to throw in inflatable
balloon things here and there so the game can't be all bad. And, dammit, those ARE drivers, so that
throws my apocalypse theory out the window. So there ARE people, but there's
still no crowds or cameras. What's going on?! STADIA! After that was "TrackMania Valley". Huh. Ponds and forests,
small European towns, marble cliffs, backwood roads... Oh
HELL yes! There could be anything there! Yeah! I was all-in on this one. Once it became as cheap as
a sandwich, I picked it up. So we're going into overtime! Bonus episode! No, wait, wait. We're not
done yet. They had more. After Valley, I guess the
series had an identity crisis, and released a standalone game as a
sort of sampler pack of all the others. Plus it added a new one:
a tropical environment. Huh. I would've rather just seen
an all-out tropical expansion, but I guess this is good. If I had to guess, this is
the equivalent of a remix sale to boost revenue for the company. But next, "TrackMania Lagoon". ...which I didn't even realize existed
until I started making this video. See, this is exactly what they
should've had BEFORE "TrackMania Turbo". Except, I guess by holding the tropics
hostage, that led to more sales of Turbo. Let's see, tropical beaches, roller coaster
style rails leading up into the sky, classy resort buildings which
are completely abandoned because it's still the apocalypse, majestic jungle-covered peaks...
Yeah, okay. I'm sold on this one. As soon as it goes on sale for
the price of a sandwich, I'm in. But for now, "TrackMania²‚ Valley"! Yeah, okay, okay. Well, this is going to be a
pretty short bonus episode, because it's the same game. Oh sure, we have a totally new
environment and new tracks and all that, but in terms of mechanics, I think it
might be completely identical to Canyon. I do remember thinking
the dirt handling changed, but that could be my imagination also.
I don't know. Don't trust me on that. What you CAN trust me on is this game also
has a great spring or summer feel to it. Or it USED to, anyway. I
can't assume anything now since they keep changing the
graphics, but it APPEARS to be okay. Okay, if we're to trust my blurry memory, which apparently is more stable than this
game, mornings looked a little different; I think they screwed with
the bloom some more. It's almost hard to look at some
of the tracks in the morning because of the contrast. I don't
remember it being THIS bad. Mid-day may look even better on
things like the grass and road, but again, this bloom... I don't know.
It just feels like they're overdoing it. All right, I could swear
evenings used to be brighter. They're still nice, but... ngh, I
think I like the old ones better. Night may be better, but again,
we're missing our shadows. Am I imagining it this time? Nope. I found a video of the old
version. The shadows used to be there. They got rid of them again. I think it's the same thing as Canyon. Some things are better,
some things are worse, but it doesn't matter
because you can't go back. Unlike Canyon, there's no crack for Valley. It's their way or...uh...no-highway. However, I DID back up all
my old files from 2014. They don't work, but maybe
someday we can unlock them to see which version is really better. ...where am I? Oh, that's right. My point was, TrackMania Valley is Games
as Service, except it sort of isn't. You have to connect online the first time, but then if you never connect again,
I think your game is backed up? Unless you have to reinstall Windows
or Steam or something else happens, then I THINK you're screwed if
you want to run the old version. If you connect even once, it's all over. Yeah, look at that. Compulsory download. Now I don't understand what the hell
is happening with these updates, but this whole experience gives
me a thought I can't shake. Games as a Service are becoming
more and more prolific now. Since you can't control
when most of them update, what's to stop companies in the future from releasing their best
graphics for a game at launch, then after a few years have passed,
and they're ready to release a sequel, they go ahead and do subtle
downgrades to the original to make the NEW game look better? I would not put that past modern companies. Now that sounds outrageous,
but we JUST SAW a patch that objectively makes SOME of the
graphics worse, SIX YEARS after the fact. So nothing's off the table now. Anyway, visual crisis aside, I feel like
Valley is half a dream come true for me, because lots of these tracks are gorgeous. I love going on the highway
segments, past the villages, through farmland, up and down cliff roads... I could do stuff like this all day. And I say "half a dream" because it
keeps leaving me hungry for more. I want MORE villages, MORE FARMS! MORE! And these roads in particular make me feel like I'm driving
on a mini-golf course at night. Awesome. The developers have embraced modding, but really I want to see
it taken to the next level, and just open up the floodgates. Hey, maybe somebody thinks they
can make MORE gothic cottages, MORE forests, and maybe BETTER ones! Well, let's get them in the game. TrackMania 2 has its gameplay formula, which possibly hasn't
changed in over 15 years. This game's evolution is ALL about the
environments, which I can't get enough of. I want it even easier for people
to make great courses and BIG ones. I don't actually want an
endless-runner style game because I like having a destination. Like in "Rad Mobile"
when you finish the race, and this giant crowd is cheering for you, and some overweight cop
comes to arrest you, I guess, but instead he explodes into a contestant
for a beauty pageant? Like that. But I DO want endless destinations. We kind of have that now with online
tracks, but it could be even more. Maybe you could have
procedurally-generated courses that could be skewed more towards
highway, farmland, and so on, as just starting points. Then people could use those as a
foundation, then customize them some more. Maybe somebody has a great-looking
commute on their way to the sawmill and wants to share it with the
world. Well, I want to drive it. Or maybe somebody was driving a road in
a dream and they HAVE to show it to you. Fine! I want to see it! At its core, that's not really
what TrackMania is about, but damn, it's getting close, and gives
me that illusion in many satisfying ways. Onto the music. The music in
Valley still isn't my favorite... [music] ...but it doesn't make me hate life the way
Canyon's does, so that counts for something. I think they could do better, but it's okay. Plus, I have to give credit where it's due. The Maniaplanet music where you
browse the games is heavenly. [music] Mmm...
[music] [music] The Valley menu theme is a nice one, too. [music] I sometimes get this theme in my head when
I've finished a monumental amount of work. [music] Holy cow! Look at all those green medals!
It's freakin' Emerald City up in here! I don't even remember DOING that. I mean I think I did one or
two, but... I have no idea. To be fair, I HAVE spent more time playing
Valley, because hey, I like my countryside. There's been so many updates, this
might be a glitch. I don't know. But let's assume the system didn't
glitch out. Let's take a look here. Boom! I'm in the top 9.2% best players
in the WORLD for Trackmania Valley. So, naturally, I've unlocked
the--NOPE! Still not good enough! 56 out of 60, AGAIN! I'm telling you,
these game's are balanced for psychopaths. Oh look. I didn't even ATTEMPT
this track here. I bet I know why. Yep. Ten laps. That is pure garbage. I mean, the map looks nice, but
two laps around would've been fine. But ten laps? No. I think I'd rather take
some piano lessons, something like that. That'd be a better use of my time. And it doesn't matter anyway, because
even if I got a gold medal on this track, I'd still have those others to hack through, which were clearly a nightmare
if I didn't finish them, and this is coming to you from the top 10%! But if you're not convinced this game is
ridiculous yet, here's a bonus for you. I mentioned before how you can
browse for additional content online. Well at the time, there was a
promoted user-made expansion pack called "Endless Valley" that
I think got endorsed by Nadeo. It had an official scoring
system like the normal tracks. Most custom maps don't have that. And of course, I only progressed so far before I got locked out of the rest
of the tracks, but here's the thing: This was years ago and my
memory IS blurry on this, although so far, it seems
more stable than this game is, but I remember it told me
that I was the highest rank for that expansion in the WORLD, #1. Now, of course, that's because most
players didn't try out this expansion, so it was me being a big fish
in a small pond, but still. I was apparently the reigning champion,
and I couldn't even unlock all the tracks. Is that amazing balance or what? No wonder it got approved;
that's what Nadeo wants to see. Of course, NOW due to all the updates,
my score was completely scrubbed. Which is fine, I don't really care about
that, but they updated this game HARD. Oh sure, some of the tracks still work, but look at this one. Huh. This one's tricky. Yeah, gonna have a tough
time beating this track. I see why it's called "Endless Valley". It didn't used to do this.
Nadeo broke this expansion plus God knows how many other
tracks with their updates. Y'know, I appreciate how they're
embracing user-made content, but this is just irresponsible. It's one thing to screw with the graphics, but they're breaking the content, too.
Have a compatibility mode or something. That, or somebody make a crack for this game so I can run my old files and
prove I'm not making all this up. I don't blame you if I think I am;
I'm making a lot of claims here. But, hey! Top 10% Da-dada-da! Okay, I found this out at the last minute. I was browsing comments and
apparently their latest update not only broke the maps but
removed splitscreen mode. WOW! That is downright HOSTILE to players! This guy's right, too. I
can't find the option now. Yeah. That might be a first. When's the last time
you saw local multiplayer get taken AWAY from a game you already own? Man, that might be lawsuit material. Well, you can still play it on
the old version. Here's the proof. This is me recording it right now. I DID find a video on a mod
claiming to do it, but I didn't test this, and
with these kinds of games you never know if that works now, but won't work in a year after
the next update, or what. Regardless, the company took away
splitscreen. That much is clear. You can only have it from
pirating the old copy, or maybe hacking the new one. I know I shouldn't be surprised by this
sort of thing by now, but I'm still amazed that a company will remove things
they previously SOLD to you on a whim. If they can do that, what's the point
of even having consumer laws, then? I'm sorry, this wasn't planned at all. I had no idea they were doing
this when I made this episode. Well, too late! I'm not redoing
this! The video's almost over! This was supposed to be positive! It's a bright and sunny racer!
What the hell?! Well, that was kind of a bombshell
for me, but what I WAS going to say is TrackMania Valley also advances my
theory that the apocalypse has occurred. Although now we know whatever happened didn't affect all animal
life as we see birds present. It was at least contained to
mammals if not humans only. We get a few more clues about the
nature of the apocalypse also. Canyon didn't give us that because it was some private course
out in the middle of a desert. There's hardly anyone out there
anyway. It felt relatively isolated. But here, no. There were people here. Pretty
sure this takes place in rural France. See? Forêt. The real takeaway though is the abandoned
farms and villages without a soul in sight. Yes, you do hear church bells... [church bells ringing in the distance] ...but come on, a lot of
those are automated now. There aren't any parked cars or churchgoers. This tells us a lot about
what we're dealing with. This was no ordinary collapse. See, if this was a viral outbreak,
there would be bodies or skeletons, but there's none of that here. If it was an event involving radiation or
some imminent threat that hasn't hit yet, well, there would be empty cars,
trash, signs of looting and so on. Evacuations are sloppy,
even if you have notice. People panic or just get rushed
and a lot gets left behind. No. Whatever happened here was very orderly. Now of course, it's POSSIBLE a
billionaire just bought out the land, and ushered people out
after building his raceway, but we still don't have
any planes over head. And yeah, yeah, Stadium throws
a wrench into the works, but let's get real. Something happened here. Look at those flags. This was an international
event yet there are NO spectators. Why is there nobody to cheer their team on? Because they're all gone, that's why! And hey, I'm going out on a limb here, but
I bet there's not a living soul in Lagoon. Just more empty robot cars. It's the apocalypse, guys. I don't have an answer for what
happened to the world of TrackMania, though if I had to guess,
I'm leaning towards aliens. Not only did they abduct us, but
they took a lot of our stuff, too, including our parked cars, trash, pets, probably everything not
nailed down or in storage. So the good news is humanity
may not actually be dead. We're just floating through space right now on the aliens' recreated environment
inside some massive ship, and TrackMania is simply showing what the
billionaire racing enthusiasts left behind. I keep wanting to come back to these games because there's been some magic created here between endless surreal
racing, beautiful environments, and the apocalypse. I would still be happy playing this
if it wasn't the apocalypse, though. Okay, awards time. Best Realistic Surreal Racer. There's something unnatural about TrackMania,
and yet it looks realistic in places. It has a unique vibe to it that I
don't get from other racing games. Games as a Service Gray Zone. This applies more to TrackMania Valley since I'll be able to run the old version of
Canyon to the end of time thanks to pirates. But man, it's weird to see a game that
you sort of own and have control over, but have all these pitfalls
waiting to sabotage that. In fact, in the course of making this video, at one point, the game simply decided it wasn't cool with me playing
in offline mode anymore. Came out of nowhere. I
don't know what's going on. Well, I still have the old Valley files.
Maybe one day we can unlock those. And finally, the Graphics Conspiracy is Real. This game is all about the atmosphere for me. So Nadeo screwing with that leaves me
with really mixed feelings on the series. The moral to this story is if you're going
to upgrade the graphics to your game, be sure you actually UPgrade them,
and not pull this mixed bag crap. And that's the episode! Stay tuned for the REAL follow-up episode. Have a nice rest of the summer
and enjoy the apocalypse. [music] All right, all right, this time...Go! Okay... Oh! Get up there! Get up there! GET UP THERE! GET--!
