I grew up on Trackmania. I own each and every single one, excitedly buying them as soon as they were released. They have a special place in my heart as a gamer, they defined a lot about what I like in games. They taught me that realism and graphics aren’t always the defining factor for a “good” game. They played off my love for Lego, and all that it entails: piecing things together for the experiment of it, imagination, the satisfaction of building something cool.

If you haven’t played any of them before, the above may or may not have made sense. The idea of the games is that they come with a level editor and all the tracks are made of interconnecting pieces. Since everybody can make levels, the online games are virtually infinite. There are several (depending on the game) environments, each with unique characteristics (both the car and the track elements) and so the dynamics of gameplay range a lot from one side to the other.

The sequel isn’t really out yet, but there is the pre-order / beta “Canyon” (one of seven previous environments) that’s been completely redone. It looks gorgeous, first off. The graphics engine seems to have been redone and the bricks themselves are less obviously grid elements, which makes it feel a lot more like the traditional racer, with studio hand made tracks. The cool thing, the exciting thing, is that like always I’ll have the ability to make the tracks as well, using the exact same tools they did.

Here’s the trailer for the most recent one that came out a few years back:

It doesn’t keep track of hours played, but it would be in the hundreds.

I am so excited for the next edition.

Look! More awesome posts:

1. Trackmania 2: Canyon
2. video games: art form?
3. Mirror’s Edge (iPad)