*#CopyPasta²*
VOLUME WARNING (Usually my vids are pretty quiet, this one probably isn't)
Disclaimer: I'm aware there are rules against copyrighted music, so I've opened a playlist of explicitly stated non-copyright songs. (see at the start and end of the vid)

Why is this in the reply? I ran out of space in the submission itself :D - and this way you read the warning&disclaimer first :P
*#/CopyPasta²*

Originally Posted by Almighty Dreadlock

The gameplay relevant to this submission incorporates a glitch, so it is unsuitable for TG record setting.

"Unless otherwise specified in the game's leaderboard variation rule set, the use of "glitches" or "glitch tactics" that defeat the generally accepted understanding of the spirit of the game / or reasonable interpretation of the intention of the game's designers are disallowed as a general rule."

this 2nd quote is from the 'General Gameplay Global Rules And Guidelines For All Submissions'.




To start my respond of I just wanna make this clear: I'm not saying you're wrong, I'm just going to state my perspective. We can certainly have an open discussion about this, which is probably necessary and will save a lot of time in the future as I'm sure this will come up more than once when I upload these kind of submissions.

So the rule in general is stated so that a glitch only disallowed if it defeats the spirit of the game (first) or reasonable interpretation of the designers intentions (second).
The first one doesn't apply because this is a cut which can save time and therefore is entirely in the spirit of the game itself, better yet it's all makes this game what it is.
>>Start-CPs(in any order)-Finish, get the best time (consistently for tournaments), Go.<< That's TrackMania
The second one is the part where it's debatable and up to interpretation what exactly the designers intentions were and where Glitches/Bugs start and end.
I do think it's intentional that you 'Bug' through a surface when stuck between two surfaces and being forced into them - otherwise the physics would go wild and create even worse and potentially game breaking bugs. So I think that's actually not even a glitch but intentional in the first place.

In case I'm alone with that view I'm gonna throw something else in here that definetely needs to be clarified aswell. Where is the line for Glitches and Bugs being allowed?

List of things that come to mind:
1. The latest one found, being the nose-boost has the most potential, where you can gain a lot of speed in a very short amount of time. Mostly used by TAS, but actually proven to be RTA viable.
2. Uberbug, where you get launched of from a specific setup with huge amounts of speed and weird angles.
3. The grasslide/bugslide, where you land in ~90° and stay the same speed while having a much, much tighter turning circle. This one is especially interesting because while obviously a bug in the beginning, every good TM driver uses that nowadays and while physics have been changed over the years again and again this one still exists in the newest TM game (TM2020) from Ubisoft/Nadeo. They've been aware of it for more than a decade and never touched that, fully intending it as a feature now. So this started as a bug and became a feature on purpose. And obviously it's in the spirit of the game itself to learn how to do it and use it.
4. 'Bugfinishes', while not really intended Nadeo tended to make hitboxes too big and you can easily hit the trigger of checkpoints or finishes from underneath and even from the sides. It's not even a bug, it's just bad design if it wasn't intentional.
5. Rammstein/Randstein Bugs. These, while definetely not intended and not in the spirit of the game aswell as clearly being bugs obviously cannot count towards being relevant to a submission here, because you basically get them every run. Almost every time you cross a black border on the side of the blocks you get one, the higher your speed the more likely it is. You can also use them to your advantage under certain circumstances but you can't avoid them.
6. Speeddrifts, where your car gains speed by sliding in a very shallow angle, used by everyone, especially in other TrackMania games. Might be intended by now, but unless you talk to people at nadeo it's speculation.

Question now is... what is allowed? Bugslides don't violate any TG rules, Rammstein Bugs are unavoidable, Bugfinishes are just bad design.

Uberbugs are a result of bugslides combined with roadborders and the car having the nose on them and therefore Uberbugs and Bugslides are arguably the same thing. Talking about the nose-boost you could make the same argument, because that comes from the nose-bug which is probably caused by the bugslide (nosebug works when you are 90° upwards, so your nose is looking down)





There are more than a hundred bugs in all of the TM games and it's gonna get really messy, so please help me to define whats allowed and what's not. I don't know how we're gonna get a clear and defined list of what's being allowed and what's not but somehow we have to get there I guess D:

to quote a YT comment I just found: "I find amusing how there's such a massive amount of bugs in this game that practically everybody won't know about all of them"
I might not even be knowing that something I just did was a bug, because there are tons of them, and I'm actively using them whereever I see it's going to be an advantage. Best example is the Speedslide, almost always using it in TM²Canyon if the start makes it work.

For now I'm just gonna leave these 2 videos as a reference, I didn't find what I was looking for (I think there was a video of 90+ Bugs - will post that later if I can find it again)

And just to reiterate, I personally think this glitch in the run is intended and in the spirit of the game, but I don't mind if I have to redrive this one either. But this needs clarification and trying to go just by common sense doesn't work on buglists this long and it never got anyone far in TrackMania. :D