[Level Pack] [V2.3] Aparte Cup 2.3

[Lat']

Here are 8 maps that I feel were worth sharing after keeping them to myself for far too long. There isn't much else to say.

Features:
-7 and a half brand new maps!
-Pretty okay fun gameplay!
-Objectively* great music
-Reverse gravity
-Anime
-Questionnable anime
*if you don't like it you literally have no taste

Spoiler: Changelog

2.3

• All maps:
  • Removed booster lights.
• Dimension Disaster:
  • Removed spring pads on the first ramp.
• Flipgoop Station:
  • Players are now all forced into the same path which is randomly chosen each lap. The same path may be chosen multiple times in a row. This hopefully adresses concerns about the lack of player interaction in the map.
• Scarlet Gardens:
  • Drastic performance improvements
  • Added Fysis Oikein Eidolon (The last word doesn't qualify!?)
• Zoned City:
  • Undrivable areas are now marked as death pits.
• Frozen Production:
  • Updated textures to fix rendering issues in OpenGL shaders branches
• Skyscraper Leaps:
  • Updated wall textures to make the shape of the track easier to identify.
  • Fixed a missing texture near the end of the lap
• Monochrome Rift:
  • Moved to Map Hell due to "popular" demand.

2.2a
Emergency patch to fix compability issues that arose with DPak from changing some skynums around

2.2
Holy shit I released 2.2 before Vanilla did, bow to me mortals

• Removed the experimental Lua, because as if with anything experimental it goes wrong (so slopes in other stages won't break anymore)
• Fixed Scarlet Gardens' sky replacing Grand Metropolis'

2.1

• All Speed Pads are now fullbright and have translucent midtextures around them to make them easily visible, with the exception of Midnight Channel where the colormap makes translucency look quite horrible
• DIMENSION DISASTER:
  • The invisible walls are now also death pits so you can no longer drive on them
  • Fixed a missing texture
• SCARLET GARDENS:
  • The 2nd item set now has more item boxes.
• FROZEN PRODUCTION:
  • EXPERIMENTAL: Added a script that should prevent Players from getting stuck inside the last slope should they bump a wall at high speeds. This does not only apply to Frozen Production, but was made for it
  • Removed the Boost Pads in the first shortcut so it can't be cheesed anymore
  • Fixed some leftover back midtextures from a billboard having the wrong offsets
  • Fixed a minor slimetrail
• SKYSCRAPER LEAPS:
  • Arrows now have more contrasting colours to be more easily noticeable
  • Removed the last shortcut as it was too strong this late into the map
• MONOCHROME RIFT:
  • Fixed the last set of Boost Pads sometimes not triggering because of slope jank

2.0

• Sloped all Spring Pads to make them easier to see
• Patched numerous unintentional shortcuts (notably in Dimension Disaster)
• Added Scarlet Gardens, Zoned City, Frozen Production, Skyscrapper Leaps and Monochrome Rift

1.3

• FLIPGOOP STATION
  • Actually fixed GBJ near the start. For real this time. Now leave me alone

1.2

• MAYONAKA MK. II
  • The last shortcut no longer misses an item set.
  • Some arrows were moved for better directionning.
• DIMENSION DISASTER:
  • Removed the spring pad and the first shortcut it leads to.
  • To compensate, the Bumper fence was made shorter to allow cutting through offroad with sneakers.
• FLIPGOOP STATION
  • Added death pits to out of bound areas in case players somehow get stuck there.
  • The goop and the nets are now way closer to each other in many spots which should prevent GBJ scenarios.

1.1

• Mayonaka MK.II now replaces Midnight Channel
• Midnight Channel has been moved to Map Hell under the name "Midnight Channel Classic"

1.0
Initial release

And here are the maps:

Spoiler: the maps. wow.

Mayonaka: Mark 2

My 2nd take at Midnight Channel. This version features quite a lot of improvements alongside a layout change for the second half of the track, and a lighter fog in hopes to make it play better. This was done to answer the many complaints I kept getting on the map, hopefully I succeeded in adressing them. This will eventually replace the Midnight Channel currently in the vanilla game.


Dimension Disaster K

A map themed after my special stage KAWAIII entry. A pretty simplistic layout with hopefully visuals that stand up for it! I wanted to give this thing some credit because I really liked how good the special stage variant turned out visually.

Flipgoop Station K

Flipgoop Station was originally a map I made for some old, old OLDC and somehow won in spite of its terrible visual appeal. The gimmick, was of course, goop that flipped you upside down. So I wanted to also incorporate this idea in Kart. ...Which led to me having to fix the fact that literally nothing worked properly in reverse gravity. The track was supposed to be more ambitious but I ended up keeping it simple for the sake of my sanity.
I'm really happy how the second U-turn where you can drive ontop of another flipped player turned out, it's got to be the highlight of this map!

Scarlet Gardens

A love letter to .Jazz.'s KAWAIII map, and an attempt at making a 5 lapper. Since the map was small and overall barely took any time to make I tried to focus more on the visual appeal. ...I'm pretty sure the owner of this garden is going to notice the kart races happening every now and then sooner or later and come pay a visit.

Zoned City

Based straight out of Wipeout 2048's Zone mode, Zoned City takes a minimalist visual aproach and a simple layout for what may be the most fluid map of this pack gameplay-wise!

Frozen Production

Race in an old abandonned factory in a cold winter (?) night, but watch out for the Frost Thrusters, getting caught in their breath will freeze you! Mash any button 5 times to break out before you slip to your certain demise... Although sometimes you might find being frozen advantageous.

Skyscrapper Leaps

Jump from a skyscrapper to another at dawn, a sure way to awaken every inhabitant trying to sleep. Remember that drift sparks can be charged in mid-air if you jumped from a Spring Pad!

Monochrome Rift

An old city, partly broken, and its colours sucked out... make for a pretty challenging fun track! Your ability to aim your drifts over gaps will be tested here, so pay attention to which exact way arrows are facing, and look at your minimap to know what your optimal aproach should be if you're unfamiliar with the layout.

I have more map ideas that I may or may not tackle in the future.
Please do leave feedback here or on the Kart Krew Discord, it's always great to have some to help doing better! :)

Supporters / Co-Authors:

• LJ Sonik

 

[D00D64]

Welcome to releases! Though, if this has a better Midnight Channel, why not replace the existing Midnight Channel slot? It'd make it much easier on servers.

 

[Lat']

so everyone was shouting at me to have Mayonaka MK.II replace Midnight Channel so here goes nothing:

1.1

• Actually renamed the pack to 'krl_latpack_v1.1.pk3' because we actually have Lua in there.
• Mayonaka MK.II now replaces Midnight Channel
• Midnight Channel has been moved to Map Hell under the name "Midnight Channel Classic"

 

[MK.exe]

OH BOY 3AM-- i mean another map pack.

Love the aesthetic on Dimension Disaster K and Street Fighter EX2 music?? GODLY.

 

[jameds]

Well this is cool. "Midnight Channel" and Dimension Disaster are very well done. I feel that DD is the most well done here. I think the direction on Flipgoop Station could use some work. Notably the right path has arrows that seem to direct me in the opposite direction of the upcoming turn. I've had trouble with the left side in terms of the momentum of curves. But that's likely owed to me being disorientated by reverse gravity. Flipgoop is also quite dark, especially here.

Really good maps though. The layout is very captivating. And the music choice is spot on! Well done once again Lat'.

 

[fishfish]

disaster K has some insane shortcuts. All 3 are absolutely awesome though and all have a lot of character to them.

 

[Lat']

Have an update, just a small patch I guess.

1.2

• MAYONAKA MK. II
  • The last shortcut no longer misses an item set.
  • Some arrows were moved for better directionning.
• DIMENSION DISASTER:
  • Removed the spring pad and the first shortcut it leads to.
  • To compensate, the Bumper fence was made shorter to allow cutting through offroad with sneakers.
• FLIPGOOP STATION
  • Added death pits to out of bound areas in case players somehow get stuck there.
  • The goop and the nets are now way closer to each other in many spots which should prevent GBJ scenarios.

 

[Lat']

Update 1.3

Breaking news: Homosexual Infant Prison has been removed from Flipgoop Station
(Basically V1.3 is out)

 

[clairebun]

-Objectively* great music

No joke, Yo-Kai Disco makes Dimension Disaster K my favorite track singlehandedly.

 

[Lightsideluc]

Yo-kai is objectively a great song, and I totally added it to my Youtube music playlist (although my foray into the other songs from the game didn't yield stand-out bangers).


I love Flipgoop's gimmick, feels rewarding to be one of the few racers who consistently goes upside down to claim those exclusive boost panels. Glad to hear the GBJ has finally be fixed, too.


Dimension Disaster is a fun track, but I feel a large part of its identity was lost with the removal of the first cut. I'd much rather see it nerfed a little (slightly wider corner before aligning with the main track again, perhaps, or maybe capped by yellow springs) or the main path shortened so it doesn't take as long to travel than it be removed outright.


New Midnight is just a general all-around improvement while keeping all the aspects that made the original distinct. Great job on it.

 

[Lat']

So like, there's new maps and fixes n' all, go check em out if you have nothing better to do!

 

[Gunla]

Don’t have a whole bunch to say w.r.t Dimension Disaster, Mayonaka MK 2, and Flipgoop Station. I do appreciate the small changes given to them and I think they’re overall solid maps that show their polish.

I will be focusing my feedback for today on your new maps that are on this pack. I played the maps on Normal and Hard speed for this post. (All gifs are shown at Normal speed.)

Spoiler: Scarlet Gardens

Scarlet Gardens
Your maps happen to have some damn good visual styles. I really like what’s on display here with the short map, and while I’m not a big fan of mandatory things like waterbounces, there is more than enough opportunity to drift store and the boosters allow for it to flow pretty well.

Some specific points of insight:

• The first set of items has a fairly large cluster to it so people rarely miss getting an item - however, the second set in this map has significantly less. Though it may be by design, I think the amount here should increase just a little bit. One thing I sort of notice with the map is, potentially due to the small shortcut at the end, one has to really hold down sneakers to attempt to make a steal at first, which is good.
• I’m noticing that I happen to have frequent framedrops near the second mandatory waterbounce for whatever reason and the S turn after the first waterbounce, even with very zoomed in/lower draw distance settings - my computer has more than enough resources behind it to run SRB2K well, so I think it may be something related to how much of the map is loaded or visible.

Though the fps issues are a bit annoying since I’m not sure why they’re an issue, the map is fairly fun (though I imagine I’ll probably be using something like Neptune or Miku here and not a bottom right character)!

Spoiler: Zoned City

Zoned City
I first saw the map on one of the ring previews for 2.0, so I had an idea of what this map was about when I first started playing it. Of your newer maps, I think it has a very unique visual style to it and I don’t really have a ton of gripes, it’s a lot of fun.

Some specific points of insight:

• I think adding light indicators over the sneaker panels may be helpful for this track. Unlike Scarlet Gardens, they don’t stick out as well since the color used for the panels isn’t as sharp of a contrast as that map (SG using red-white, and Zoned City using green-orange)
• Around this part of the track, I’d say maybe add another arrow or move the turn indicator a bit more to the left from playerview (I think globally it’d be north). It’s a bit hard to spot at first glance. Alternatively, perhaps make the arrows that surround the rest of the track go through here as well?

I’m gonna be honest, I think that’s probably all that’s really standing out to me right now. I didn’t find really any big linedef errors or things that stood out to me. The map is very constricted, linear and does what it wants to very well imo.

Spoiler: Frozen Production

Frozen Production

The mechanic here is really interesting. In several cases it’s just something that penalizes you if you don’t play well, but it can be weaponized to increase speed, especially at the end. And of course the music choice here is excellent, xi’s work is always so good.

Some specific points of insight:

• There’s a linedef/texture error here.
• There are several drop points where you descend from a far height, such as the one shown here. I think it may be good to assist players who get hit before the drop by including some sneaker panels right near the start of these, but make them close enough to the start that a player who attempts to use them while frontrunning risks hitting the SPB if it’s chasing them and they try to make use of them.
• It might prove helpful for players to include an audio indicator for when an ice machine is about to activate, or the cycles are changing.
• As a whole, this map is fairly long on normal and hard speed; I think the map might be better suited for 2 laps with how long it is.

This is a pretty fun map as is, so my feedback is much less in terms of “there are x problems here and there” and more in terms of minimal items. This feels like a very well thought out map.

Spoiler: Skyscraper Leaps

Skyscraper Leaps

Compared to Frozen Production, this is a much shorter map, but I enjoy how fast paced it feels. There are frequent areas where you can take cuts with or without sneakers and it generally seems to flow well.

Some specific points of insight:

• While I think Zoned City is able to get away with it a bit more, I think maybe having a limited-color pattern for the ground + off-road textures might spruce up the already strong visual flair of the map.
• The turn arrows are fairly small as is, but I think it might be easier to spot them if they use two colors instead of the orange + slightly different orange (perhaps a dark purple for the arrows themselves?).
• In some initial playtests, I noticed that this cut in particular (the red springs) is quite strong and near the end of the map, which could result in a situation where a player basically not making a mistake may lose because of a good item pull. The last third of the map contains no set of items, so I’d suggest that maybe an item set could be placed in the right area of this screenshot to balance out the overall strength of the cut.
• There’s an alternate path possible through this section (this gif does the alternate path), but it doesn’t really tend to have much different from the main path other than avoiding a right angle turn. I’d say maybe include some incentive to go to the main path since you’re saving time by taking this alternate path and it doesn’t require a sneaker or speed-increasing item.

It’s a very fun map and I like how it looks, though I think with a small few bits of adjustments it will honestly be a REALLY solid map.

Spoiler: Monochrome Rift

Monochrome Rift
This map has a fairly neat visual gimmick (sadly doesn’t seem to work in replays!), though I’d say there’s a few places I felt the drop offs were rough - I got similar vibes to Sunset Canyon, and not really in the best way, as the drops there are very jarring and seem to create scenarios where an SPB run seems much more difficult on this map.

Some specific points of insight:

• There’s a linedef/texture error here.
• This drop in particular feels fairly jarring from moderate to full speed - I would say include the additional terrain seen at later drops near the end of the map or something similar here.
• While most of the drops can be manageable, the boosters here can make it very difficult to avoid getting bumped. I would say consider removing them as they feel more like a hindrance here.
• I suspect that it’s probably not a large priority, but the sneaker panel colors do not match their encore color counterparts, such as here.

This map is a bit wieldy, but I think it also can be pretty enjoyable (though I suspect this map might be a bit more contested in netgames since it seems to be designed to be fairly difficult).

Overall, this is a great update. I really appreciate the maps you’ve added and all of the changes you’ve been making to your normal maps; they’re definitely some of the most well done maps and I look forward to future updates.

 

[Lightsideluc]

Exclusive Coupe on Skyscraper Leaps is, indeed, an objectively great song. Thanks for introducing me to it~
(Also a fun track)

 

[Lat']

Small update to adress the thoughts gathered since release, should be the last until the next major content update, thanks for your patience.
2.1

• All Speed Pads are now fullbright and have translucent midtextures around them to make them easily visible, with the exception of Midnight Channel where the colormap makes translucency look quite horrible
• DIMENSION DISASTER:
  • The invisible walls are now also death pits so you can no longer drive on them
  • Fixed a missing texture
• SCARLET GARDENS:
  • The 2nd item set now has more item boxes.
• FROZEN PRODUCTION:
  • EXPERIMENTAL: Added a script that should prevent Players from getting stuck inside the last slope should they bump a wall at high speeds. This does not only apply to Frozen Production, but was made for it
  • Removed the Boost Pads in the first shortcut so it can't be cheesed anymore
  • Fixed some leftover back midtextures from a billboard having the wrong offsets
  • Fixed a minor slimetrail
• SKYSCRAPER LEAPS:
  • Arrows now have more contrasting colours to be more easily noticeable
  • Removed the last shortcut as it was too strong this late into the map
• MONOCHROME RIFT:
  • Fixed the last set of Boost Pads sometimes not triggering because of slope jank

 

[Lat']

Holy shit I released 2.2 before Vanilla did, bow to me mortals

• Removed the experimental Lua, because as if with anything experimental it goes wrong (so slopes in other stages won't break anymore)
• Fixed Scarlet Gardens' sky replacing Grand Metropolis'

On a more serious note, I'm terribly sorry for the inconvenience this has caused.

---------- Post added at 08:16 PM ---------- Previous post was at 07:12 PM ----------

2.2a
Emergency patch to fix compability issues that arose with DPak from changing some skynums around

Okay NOW I'm terribly sorry

 

[Lat']

Version two point three

Meet version 2.3 after a few months. No new maps, but much needed QoL improvements. This should probably be the last update for this pack.

Changes include but may or may not be limited to...
2.3

• All maps:
  • Removed booster lights.
• Dimension Disaster:
  • Removed spring pads on the first ramp.
• Flipgoop Station:
  • Players are now all forced into the same path which is randomly chosen each lap. The same path may be chosen multiple times in a row. This hopefully adresses concerns about the lack of player interaction in the map.
• Scarlet Gardens:
  • Drastic performance improvements
  • Added Fysis Oikein Eidolon (The last word doesn't qualify!?)
• Zoned City:
  • Undrivable areas are now marked as death pits.
• Frozen Production:
  • Extended pit at the last ice cube jump to cover the whole room
  • Updated textures to fix rendering issues in OpenGL shaders branches
• Skyscraper Leaps:
  • Updated wall textures to make the shape of the track easier to identify.
  • Fixed a missing texture near the end of the lap
• Monochrome Rift:
  • Moved to Map Hell due to """popular""" demand.

 

[SoupBowler]

Quick bug report on the new update:

Had one experience where both of the arrows in Flip Goop were on at once.

As for the change to Flip Goop itself, I have to say it's a strange one. Before taking the upside down path was always better because of the extra boost panel (barely), but now this forces everyone down one corridor causing more player interaction and reliance on items to pull ahead.

However, I did have one race where I barely made it through one door just before it closed. This left me separated from the rest of the group, defeating the purpose of the change. So it definitely has some quirks. I can't decide if the change is a positive one or a negative one, but it sure is a change. Sorry if this wasn't the feedback on Flip Goop you were hoping for.

 

[Lightsideluc]

Can't say I'm a fan of the change on Flipgoop. I liked having both paths available to me (especially when I won by overtaking someone on the regular one). Sometimes it's fine to have players split up for a while when they're otherwise together for the whole track, y'know? Plus, the split never stopped me from eating Orbis on the long U-turn regularly >_>


Monochrome Rift was a cool track, but the jumps did feel a little jank at times. I'd like to see it given a minor update so the ending leaps of faith are more consistent rather than relegated to 'Hell' status.


Scarlet Gardens is pretty much the only track here I don't like. For some reason its Frames-Per-Second performance is notably worse compared to the others despite being small, and using boosts before the water skips is a coinflip on whether you bonk on the opposite shore, especially with Grow. Very frustrating. If you made the opposite shores have some slopes under the water that would hopefully alleviate the issue.

 

[Lat']

Quick bug report on the new update:

Had one experience where both of the arrows in Flip Goop were on at once.

As for the change to Flip Goop itself, I have to say it's a strange one. Before taking the upside down path was always better because of the extra boost panel (barely), but now this forces everyone down one corridor causing more player interaction and reliance on items to pull ahead.

However, I did have one race where I barely made it through one door just before it closed. This left me separated from the rest of the group, defeating the purpose of the change. So it definitely has some quirks. I can't decide if the change is a positive one or a negative one, but it sure is a change. Sorry if this wasn't the feedback on Flip Goop you were hoping for.

Can't say I'm a fan of the change on Flipgoop. I liked having both paths available to me (especially when I won by overtaking someone on the regular one). Sometimes it's fine to have players split up for a while when they're otherwise together for the whole track, y'know? Plus, the split never stopped me from eating Orbis on the long U-turn regularly >_>

The change in Flipgoop was made to address the fact that actual player interaction is rather scarce because that split lasts for literally half of the lap, and that a lot of people didn't ever feel like bothering to take the flipped path to stay in their comfort zone, which goes entierely against the point of the map. This aims to address both of these issues.

Now in practice it does seem to bug out because the Lap trigger seems to run for everyone passing the finish line (?) and I honestly have no clue why the signs sometimes indicate the wrong door because they're literally tied to same tag, so I'm just as confused.

Monochrome Rift was a cool track, but the jumps did feel a little jank at times. I'd like to see it given a minor update so the ending leaps of faith are more consistent rather than relegated to 'Hell' status.

I'll be honest and say I simply didn't want to work on this map and this was the easiest solution that didn't involve its straight out removal. I might try to do something new with the colour changing aesthetic eventually but it would be an entierely new layout. The current layout was built after playing too much BallisticNG and involves unorthodox drop turns / ramps with drift storing, and the general consensus was that people did not like that.

Scarlet Gardens is pretty much the only track here I don't like. For some reason its Frames-Per-Second performance is notably worse compared to the others despite being small, and using boosts before the water skips is a coinflip on whether you bonk on the opposite shore, especially with Grow. Very frustrating. If you made the opposite shores have some slopes under the water that would hopefully alleviate the issue.

There should be little to no frame drops as of V2.3, even in software. I've also rarely had issues with the waterskipping unless I try to cut way too much of the turn, the sweetspot is generally to just drift without holding any direction when taking these.

 

[SeasideDoe]

Hello, just posting another gif showing an element that'd merit a hotfix

The backyards outside of this hairpin in Scarlet Gardens don't have death barriers, making you lose copious amounts of time from a single mistake or bump (which is why I manually respawn here)