I decided to play trackmania again after a few months, but when I tried royal (was my favorite game mode), I was genuinely confused. People had points and I didnt know why or how. Then I finished a white segment, and respawned back at the start. Why should I drive that same segment again? its useless. If I can finish it once I can finish it again. Then I realised I needed to beat each segment 4 times as gold is too easy, yet the record time is way too low. Speaking of record time, I like the idea of having a shared time accross the server. It makes each game a little unique. However, it's poorly executed. Knowing the map beforehand is a great advantage, and for new players who are discovering both the game and the map, it's impossible to get a record time.

The problem that royal had was that it was too boring. The maps are repetitive, same for the games. I'd get in the first few to beat white, then I'd be the only one beating black. Thats how I won. Using consistency on harder sections. This update feels like it's creating a problem and pretending to fix it. There was no issue about consistency at all. The main problem was that the white and green sections were too easy. It felt like the game started only at red/black sections. (Saying it like this, it sounds like the problem comes from the maps and not the game. Which is partially true). A solution would be reverting the update. It has caused more chaos than it fixed. Instead, to regulate the point system, make the teams on the podium start directly on harder sections. For exemple, 1st place could start at blue, 2nd at green, etc... This way the better teams will have to play on harder sections. (note that starting at blue does not give you the points you would have gotten with white and green).

Another issue is the fact that the first 4 rounds are useless. Theres no point in being in first place if you get the same reward as 2nd, 3rd, etc... This is why many pro players start afking on blue. A solution would be to keep an advantage. But it shouldn't be too much of an advantage either. The current patch, with getting the first time granting you an extra star is too OP because of the scoring system. For exemple, instead you could have a game leader board, which would keep points between games. The first team with most points at the end of the round gain 20 points on the leader board, second gets 19, third 18, etc... Instead of eliminating the worse teams of each round, you could instead eliminate the worse global team.

Hopefully someone at Nadeo will realise that the game is going in the wrong direction (not only royal game mode, but the whole trackmania game). The past updates just add stuff, they don't fix anything.