Yop! Today I’m going to present an interview with LInsoDeTeh, the masteradmin of ET-generation, the biggest league operator of Trackmania. You can find more infomation about the project here. Gogogo!
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1. Could you tell us something about yourself?
First of all, thanks a lot for your interest. I'm Chris, 26 years old, and in my life outside of Trackmania I am IT Consultant, operating Germany-wide, for multiple clients of diverse fields of activity, from software development to database/application management in different sections of industry and economy. I love inline skating, hockey, swimming, squash, and badminton, such as board games and movies.
2. How and when did you find TrackMania?
In 2004 I finished secondary school (Abitur) and for the cover CD of our newspaper, I developed a racing game, in which the player could race with all cars of the people who finished the grade with me. That time a class mate discovered a game, which - as he told me - was optical similar to the one I developed, and he showed me Trackmania. And I somehow needed to have this, as it was a new unique concept with the puzzle mode and great track editor. That time I had a 56k modem and never played multiplayer (except on LAN partys), and if someone had told me, I'd lead the largest tournament site for that game one day, I'd have considered him as crazy and stupid. Things got running during LE5 then, when I got into team TP and into ET, the logical step after my activities at TM Mag and TM Live Broadcast.
3. ET is one of the biggest league sites in Trackmania. How did it all start?
It all started with an Unreal Tournament magazine called "The FragMag". People from there, namely Mazzyfred and Benz launched the first LE (Ligue Europe) tournament for TM PowerUp at the end of 2003. It was a rather unorganized site with a few subpages, on which the leagues were centralised, but far away from what we have now. Mostly french teams played in it. As far as I know, the first german team, HAL, took part in the LE3 for the first time. When I joined the crew, it was close to the date, in which they renamed from FragMag to ET for political and copyright reasons. It was approximately between LE4 and LE5 (which I think were end 2004 and beginning 2005). I started with a small forum job and stayed administrator from then, got more and more into league administration and later I began to develop our own ET portal websites and new league sites. Until then we already had a crew of 16 admins and were ready to launch early and well-planned leagues for all newcoming Trackmanias, such as TM Sunrise, TM Original, TM Nations, TM United, TM Forever. We've always been the first with a league on those games, mostly in 3vs3 mode, but sometimes something different. And that's what we still have now.
4. As a masteradmin of such an awesome league operator, do you feel proud?
In some meanings yes, in others not. For example I learned a lot for myself, when developing the several ET websites, such as portals, ET bets, forum customizations, map upload/feedback modules, and last but not least the new league website with approximately 10x the count of functions compared to the one by Milky, which we used before. That's a part I'm truely proud of, I learned a lot of coding technologies, which also look nice in my portfolio and helped me to get the good job in real life I have now. The leagues are not as much work as developing a site. Either you have a nice idea for a cool cup or league, or you don't, but then, it's more or less the same scheme to work, announcement, map testing, league site installation, registrations, execution. And even if the cup runs perfectly, it does not create a feeling of proudness. Rather satisfaction or something like that. And happyness, when you invent a new cup and it's successful (as FET for example).
5. What's the most exciting league type to your mind? Why?
I think the most awesome cup we ever had was the Crazy World Cup on TMU. It was sooooo much fun, with the puzzle for the players before the cup, in which they guessed their tasks on the environments, and then play a full fun cup, with a completely different game mode or task on each single environment (beach, capture the flag, trial, maze, stunt, micro machines, monstertrucks). This cup was so much fun, seriously. Players also sent awesome feedback, but I'm really sad, noone sent maps for a 2nd edition, I'd really love to have one.
6. Will CWC2 come if people send enough maps?
Yes of course it will. (A day after this question Linso posted an announcement about CWC2!)
7. You have driven many many leagues yourself, too. Which your best memory from leagues?
As player, I think the most intense time was during LE5. My first ever league, with team TP and insanely close matches against YS, KO, HAL, and UTM, our german rivals of that time. I learned so much during that time and improved a lot in driving skill. As teamleader (and more or less spectator) the moment, which will always stay in my mind, is the UL1 final of YS-TP vs LM. When we were down by 0-3 maps and 2-6 on the Bay, then turned around Bay into 7-6, won Island 7-0 to make the final a 4-2 result, after our aim was just to win one map against the uberstrong LM... that was just so amazing... and is still often quoted in team YS-TP Skype conferences. And finally, as ET admin, I'll never forget the Crazy World Cup, as I explained above.
8. ET has organized some TM2 Canyon leagues already. What do you think about Canyon as a league environment?
I think the environment is a very good one. From a sporty point of view, it's as fair and balanced as Stadium for all types of controllers. It has its advantages and disadvantages, like narrow passages, but well, every environment has those ups and downs. And additionally, it's not ugly. (Come on guys, Stadium is really grey and ugly!) So I like it and from the experience of the first few leagues on Canyon, the environment works very well for our tournaments and also had a cool fun cup on it already.
9. When more TM2 environments come, they will cost money and drivers need to buy a new game to join leagues with the environment. Will the leagues like TWL and TGC expand themselves to new environments or will there be separate leagues on different environments?
In this case, the situation is quite clear for us, as we did the same in the past: The leagues will be filled up with the new environments and then be played on all of them. When TMO came out, the leagues switched to TMO and there were no TM Powerup leagues anymore. When TM United came out, LE and SL leagues switched to TMU and there were no TMO/TMS leagues anymore. So people had the problem of "cost money" too at that time, and as we know now, the core community will always follow us and have all games/environments, so it would be stupid to decide differently this time. Maybe we will have some Canyon cups or Valley cups on a fun base (like we had Island offroad cups, or Stadium monstertruck cups), but TWL, TFET, and TGC will definetly be played on the maximum number of available environments.
10. Will ET organize leagues in Shootmania & Questmania when they are released or is your site only for TM?
Yes, ET will definitely step into Shootmania. We'll start with a light league to see what's possible, and maybe a few fun cups to try out the several game modes (there will be way more than just team deathmatch and capture the flag!) to maybe -if successful- form new leagues. It's a new experience for us, but that's also the most exciting, isn't it? :-) On the oppisite, we know, QuestMania will not be a multiplayer title (just online sharing), so there are obviously no leagues planned.
11. What other games you play with Trackmanias?
At the moment I play Mass Effect 3 and Minecraft. I do not have much time for gaming though, so it's rather a little occupation inbetween. With friends, we often have board game evenings, so I play a lot of board/card games, and sometimes we also play a bit with the XBox. That's mostly fun racers then (Sonic & Sega Allstars Racing, Madagascar Kartz) or group adventures (The Shrek game for example)... basically all games, our girlfriends can play with us too, so without fighting etc. :-) Only with one specific friend, I play Borderlands and Ghost Recon coop mode on the XBox.
12. This question is a must as you have a long TM-experience: which one is your favorite environment? Why?
This question is very hard. I love Island and Desert, but Bay is just very close behind it. With Island, I had the most success feelings after I learned pad driving, as I was a keyboard driver for a long long time before. I like the noslide challenge in there. And Desert, the environment all this world started with, is just cool with the tilting cars.
13. You organize electronic sports but do you watch sports yourself? What kind of?
I'm interested in ice hockey and handball, which I enjoy to watch on TV every now and then.
14. Your top 3 websites, games, songs and movies.
I have no favourite websites. They are all there for a reason and I visit websites just for the reason they were made for. I could give a list of most visited at the moment:
Top 3 most visited websites (besides all the TM/ET sites):
Battleforge forum
Settlers of Catan forum
Spiegel.de
Top 3 games at the moment (besides Trackmania):
Forza Motorsport 4
Mass Effect 3
Minecraft
Top 3 games of all times (besides Trackmania):
Zed (by the Bitmap Brothers)
Heroes of Might and Magic 3
Need for Speed High Stakes
Top 3 songs (besides Trackmania Powerup 8bit main menu music, haha):
Roger Shah & Ralph Fritsch - Black Pearl - Rise
Armin van Buuren - Neon Hero
Coldplay - Paradise
Top 3 movies:
Lucky # Slevin
Star Trek 11
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15. Having seen many many leagues during your life you probably can say who is the best TM-driver ever?
Well, good drivers come and go. We had many drivers who were considered as the best TM-driver during the period he or she played. But this is exactly why we have leagues, to determine the best drivers again and again, no? ;-)
16. What makes a good league track?
The fun. We have plenty of criteria on our upload module which decide, if a track is good for leagues or not. But in my personal opinion - and that's how I play all games - for me the fun to play a map is more important than the challenge in it. And of course there should be no bugs, texture flickering, misplaced checkpoints etc.
16. Describe yourself with four adjectives.
Rational, emotional, fast, precise. With all the positive and negative effects of it.
17. If you have something else to say, please write it here.
Thank you. It's worth keeping an eye on the ET site in future. We still have a few great concepts, which we're going to try out next, such as sequels of successful cups in the past. We will follow our demand to be the number 1 league site for Trackmania, with full engangement and supply the community with great new cups and leagues for the hopefully coming next environments in Trackmania 2 and also Shootmania. Stay tuned!
Thanks you too Linso! And I will, already sent some CWC2 maps too 
See you again with a new guy, but even I don’t know yet who will it be!
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