MXLC - you and me in my own head

hey again ManiaExchange and mxlc players! its been almost a whole year since you last saw me upload a map but i havent forgotton about you.

i started working on this map about june of '23 and as in the style of my usual workflow i built the first 10 seconds and then lost inspiration. fall and winter went by and suddenly im back in the swing of trackmania playing the smurfs canyon league.

for any of those that played the smurfs canyon league they would know that the maps in that competition are hard. they are tight, they are technical, and they are punishing. if i want to perform on those maps i have to spend hours each week learning the lines and grinding them into my muscle memory.

after 4 weeks of that kind of punishment, i needed an outlet for that pain and it channeled right into this map.

this map is tight. its jerky. its complex. but i think its fun as all heck. just be know that you might need some time with it to ingrain the nooks and crannies, the swerves and doges.

more backstory on the map, this started out its life under the name "lagoon_25" and that is how it spent about the first 8 months. when i built my new PC a few months ago i copied over the map files and renamed it to "lagoon_25_1" as i continued to build. during this time i was toying around with several different names. the runner up map name was "creative captivity" after one of my favorite songs and i think the name really embodies my slow mapping workflow but some of the other lyrics didnt really fit.

the name that i went with, "you and me in my own head" is about me sitting in the editor for so many hours on this map tweaking this and that to the point where i started to lose faith in the map a little and started to get in my own head about it. its about this map being the creation from my head which i am now letting you catch a glimpse into.

i hope you enjoy your stay in my head and know that mxlc is always in the back of my mind and my heart.

special thanks to eyebo for doing a quick check on the shadows and the custom magnets!