I suppose I'll get right to it... Noxcrew is planning work on a new map: Grid Runners Pro!
We have a load of ideas we're already working off from which I won't share yet, but I wanted to post here to ask a question: What's on your wishlist for Grid Runners Pro? Pop your hopes and dreams into this thread, and we'll see if we can incorporate some of the better suggestions into the project! I'll be monitoring this thread for a few weeks, so feel free to post multiple times!
Also, as a thank you to this community for continuing to run and support this map years after it's release, we've given some Minecoin codes to the moderator team of the Discord for this speedrun board, and they're going to do a giveaway for them on the Discord server! Head over there (by following the link in the bar on the left) if you'd like a chance at them!
A little about me: I'm one of the owners of the Noxcrew, and my current job is to oversee our Marketplace team, and also run the Mechanics team which works on Marketplace content. Back when we made the original Grid Runners, I was the only Mechanic on the team! I concepted the map as an iteration on a game from one of our older projects, the Noxcrew Gameshow, then pitched it to the team and Mojang, who coordinated the deal which brought the map to the store for free.
Lastly, a quick mandatory legal thing! Any ideas suggested here may be used in a Noxcrew Bedrock product without credit to you. That means that if you don't want us to use your idea, you shouldn't post it! Full terms of service: https://noxcrew.com/terms-of-service/
I think on GR Pro it might be interesting to see difficult shortcut routes deliberately left in to help out the earlier days of speedruns, before we discover all sorts of tricks and break the courses a part. It might not work (maybe the tricks are too easy and everyone spots and does them immediately, or too hard and nobody bothers) but that's just an idea
The original GR map didn't have anything timing based, and I thought that would be cool to see. Maybe limit it to the first room or two, though. Would be painful to have a great run killed by missing the timing by 0.2
If you need beta testers, most of us would to happy to do so. Also, add a speedrun mode/timer for all courses? The easier the timer/requirements is, the more speed runners will come to the game (people get turned off when they see more external stuff to setup before/during runs, speaking as mod experience it different game)
@mooing_cowmilk - We'll definitely have one in-game, it'll work very similarly to the one in Terra Swoop Force. Obviously there will be timing discrepancies which the mods here will have to handle. This wasn't possible in the original, as it was made before the release of scoreboards.
@AK_DJ This is a good point, and something that's been on my mind quite a bit. The struggle in the first one is that the course had to reset, and because of the wide variety of devices which run Minecraft Bedrock, you never know how long that's going to take. We always need to set the course at the beginning before you run it, so there's always going to be a delay here, but we'll try to cut down on it as much as we're able.
Reset on finish line instead of start line so by the time you get to the startline again, it is ready?
that would work no matter what, if you finish a course and don't play it again, it remains reset (and ready to go) for any length of time, the last time you played (days, week, etc). The only way it won't work is if it is your first time playing the course, ever. (of which the map making should have them playable when you download the world)
Other ideas worth mentioning but can be debated :
Have a reset item that the player drops to stop/end/reset the course part way through. For speedrunners, if you have a bad start, you have to play through the rest of the course anyways, with a reset item, they can retry faster (aka more runs/min)
Timer stuff: -Have spilts for the stages (like each room in a course) (kind of like all tunnels in terra swoop force) -Compare your current paste to one of the following (player can choose which one): Best run Player's (or map) Best segments Custom segments (aka, the player can input custom segments to align with the current WR pace or to some one else who you want to compare against)
Gameplay Ideas: Simon says, Speed bridge (build across a gap), some sort of puzzle, something to do with redstone.
(Far fetched idea): The team that has fallen behind can sabotage/annoy the team ahead. Create a balance of should I help the team advance or should I try to slow the other side down to give my team to catch up. This idea would be the hardest one to add/get right.
@mooing_cowmilk Yeah, while resetting at the end sounds like it makes sense, there's a lot of danger involved in the mechanical back-end when people can quit the game at any time. Especially back then, the room resetting was incredibly slow and very vulnerable, so we had to take as many precautions as possible. People are much less likely to quit out between hitting the start button and the course resetting than they are to rage quit immediately upon finishing the course, which is the main reason we tried to go that way.
Good news and bad news for Grid Runners Pro: there is much better tech available nowadays so room resets will take much less time, but (for a reason I can't talk about yet) the course will have to be reset BEFORE each run and there's really no way around it.
Reset item: Absolutely on my list. Was essentially impossible to do back then, but is now much easier.
Room Splits: Yeah, we should be able to do something here. The relevance of it is going to be variable so we probably won't be storing the information for comparison, but I see how it could be useful mid-run so we'll look at what we can put in.
Time Comparisons: This one would be tough to do for multiple reasons, and would also be tough to get an input system which is player friendly. While I like the idea, I think we're probably not quite at a tech point yet where this would be user-friendly enough to be worth it.
Gameplay Ideas: I may be able to sneak a couple of these in. I want to explore a puzzle room of some sort, but I would want to keep it interesting every time (which is the hard part)
The sabotage idea is cool! It reminds me of how the battle mode works in Tetris, I can imagine dropping a few zombies into the other team's grids when you complete a room behind them. Would be an interesting way to help even the score in multiplayer matches. I'll bring this one by the team!
Point of discussion: How do you guys feel about the player being able to take damage vs. being invincible?
I would say that the player should be invincible but it really depends on what you guys have in store.
Hopefully in the Grid Runners Pro we have more than 4 levels and practice parts just for parkour and stuff.
Maybe a command to restart or something so that if you mess up the start you dont have to complete the whole course
My suggestion is for a room where a randomly generated sequence of something appears in one part of the room, and you have to create the opposite sequence in another part of the room. (Maybe bad idea, I don't really have much experience making maps.)
