5 questions for STK players....

[bovineuniversity]

This is kind of long, but I've wondered about how everyone else plays STK. Hopefully you can take the time to respond.

1. What is your favorite Kart? Least Favorite?
Fav: Tux, then Mozilla/Nolok/Puffy.
Least: Others just don't seem quite as stable to me. Adiumy?! oh boy. Octopus/Beagle.

2. What is your favorite track? Least favorite? Hardest/Easiest?
Favs: Coyote Canyon, Oliver's Math Class.
Least: Old Mine, XR591, Secret Garden, Shiny Suburbs
Hardet: the above.. all very frustrating about getting stuck/off-track by those (*&^*&%# AI karts.
Easiest: Shifting Sands, Star Track, Amazonian Journey, Fort Magma, Hacienda

3. What do you normally play? What difficulty level, number of karts/laps, etc?
My kids like to pick the kart/map/laps/AI karts... but I always play on expert level. I solved all of the challenges, some were pretty tough.
Sometimes I play a Grand Prix. I don't really do Time Trials or Follow the Leader. Haven't tried multi-player yet, but would like to if enabled on the 'net.

4. Craziest thing you've tried?
19 AI karts, expert level on Oliver's Math Class for 13 laps. It was wild. (I won) Someday I want to do an enduro, like 50 laps of some map.

5. Do you play with a keyboard or other device? If keyboard, what is your setup?
Keyboard.
Left hand typing position... E - nitro, F - sharp turn, TAB - reset, C - look behind, SPACE - fire
Right hand on arrows .... UP - accelerate, DOWN - brakes, LEFT/RIGHT - turn

[1210phil1210]

.

[Crendgrim]

1. Favorite karts
Fav: Nolok. I nearly always drive with him.
Least: Adiumy

2. Favorite track, hardest track
Favs: Math Class (multiple karts; between 10 and 100 ), Old Mine, Secret Garden (esp. for its graphics)
Least: Euh.. well... Crescent Crossing graphic-wise, else I don't know. Somehow I like all.
Hardest: Old Mine, definitely
Easiest: Don't know. Maybe Shifting sands and Amazonian Journey as well

3. gameplay
I always play on the hardest difficulty with as many karts as possible. Or I create challenges for myself (e.g. winning all tracks against a certain amount of enemy karts; steadily increasing )
Normally, I play in standard arcade mode, though I also like sometimes to drive without bonus items.
What I used to like to play in 0.6 was multiplayer mode. I don't now why I stopped that...

4. Craziest thing?
Euh... I do many crazy things. The most recent was a 5-lap-race on Shifting Sands with 124 enemy karts (making a total of 125 karts on the track) which I won.

5. Keyboard setup
I'm still using the old (0.6) controls, so arrow keys for steering, SPACE to fire, R or H to reset (don't know; I don't use it often), K for sharp turn, L for looking back and J for nitro.


Crend

[asciimonster]

1. What is your favorite Kart? Least Favorite?
   Favorite: Emule - He's cool. Least: Audumy - He's uncontrollable.
2. What is your favorite track? Least favorite? Hardest/Easiest?
   Favorite: Zen garden (not released yet). Secret Garden was already at the top of my list, but zen is a class of it's own.
   Least: Crescent Crossing - The track is ugly and the AI's keep bashing me off the track...
   Hardest: My track called "the Cube" - It may not look the part, by it's one roller-coaster ride!
   Easiest: Amazonian Journey, Star Track - Yawn! Anybody got a pillow?
3. What do you normally play? What difficulty level, number of karts/laps, etc?
   At maximum difficulty with 10 AI for 2 to 3 laps. 10 is about the maximum my CU can take and even then the audio gets choppy the framerate becomes very uneven
4. Craziest thing you've tried?
   In STK 0.6: Start XR591 with 7 AI's. At GO, drive backwards and do a 180 degree turn. Then do 1 lap IN REVERSE avoiding the oncoming traffic. Then cross the starting line, turn around and do the track now in NORMAL DIRECTION, do 7 laps in at a mindblowing speed and WIN!!!
   
   Then I wanted to spice up this challenge, so I added another rule: Nitro may not be used before the nitro bar is full and NO FILLING nitro the reverse lap.
   Crazy 'nough for ya?
5. Do you play with a keyboard or other device? If keyboard, what is your setup?
   Keyboard.
   Normal Left, Right, Up, Down for the right hand.
   Left hand: A - nitro, S - skid, D - fire, F recover, W - Look back
   It was the only way I could keep the buttons from conflicting with each other.

[Arthur]

1. What is your favorite Kart? Least Favorite?
Fav: Tux.
Least: Adiumy.

2. What is your favorite track? Least favorite? Hardest/Easiest?
Favs: Around the Lighthouse, Snow Peak (the one found in the latest stable version), Old Mine. The older, narrower version of The Island used to be one of my favorites, so now after the resize I've packaged the older version as an addon.
Least: Crescent Crossing, Star Track, Northern Resort
Hardest: Got to be Old Mine and XR591.
Easiest: Shifting Sands, Star Track, Amazonian Journey, Fort Magma, etc.

3. What do you normally play? What difficulty level, number of karts/laps, etc?
I normally play normal race, with expert difficulty, 19 AI and about three laps.

4. Craziest thing you've tried?
As Crendgrim, I do a lot of crazy things. 159 AI in OMC on my main desktop computer and 79 AI on my weak netbook in Shifting Sands are notable examples. Craziest must be when I did a callgrind memory mapping run in Shiny Suburbs alone for three laps. Those three laps took me nearly 50 minutes, with 1-2 FPS. Oh the horror!

5. Do you play with a keyboard or other device? If keyboard, what is your setup?
Normally with keyboard - I prefer it over my gamepad(s).
Left hand typing position... left Shift - nitro, left Ctrl - fire, Space - sharp turn, Backspace - reset, Z - look behind.
Right hand on arrows .... UP - accelerate, DOWN - brakes, LEFT/RIGHT - turn.

[STKRudy85]

1. What is your favorite Kart? Least Favorite?
Fav: Addon Bambou Basic Mozilla
Least: Hexley, I hate this character , I don't like Konqi I prefer his brother konqo

2. What is your favorite track? Least favorite? Hardest/Easiest?
Fav: City I like windows on building (I'm not able to do it, yet)
Least: Skyline, but it's a good track too

3. What do you normally play? What difficulty level, number of karts/laps, etc?
Testing, and multi with friends

4. Craziest thing you've tried?
Nope

5. Do you play with a keyboard or other device? If keyboard, what is your setup?
A and D (left and right) Arrows : up (accel) down (brake) left (nitro) right (sharp turn) right_ctrl (bonus) right_shift (replace) zero (look back)

[LinuxUser]

1. What is your favorite Kart? Least Favorite?
Fav: Beagle
Least: Adummy

2. What is your favorite track? Least favorite? Hardest/Easiest?
Fav: Don't know
Least: Don't know
Hardest: Old Mine
Easiest: Star Track or whatever it's called

3. What do you normally play? What difficulty level, number of karts/laps, etc?
Grand Prix's, expert AI with around 8-10 karts (slows down too much with more)

4. Craziest thing you've tried?
199 AIs - around 1 frame per second. But I've done some others.

5. Do you play with a keyboard or other device? If keyboard, what is your setup?
Keyboard, AFAIK with default keys.

[Crendgrim]

Hardest: My track called "the Cube" - It may not look the part, by it's one roller-coaster ride!

Ahh... Dumb me, I even forgot about that one! Maybe, because it isn't ported yet to the most recent version
However, The Cube is definitely one of my favorite tracks. It can be quite annoying to drive turn, turn, turn, turn, turn — but also much fun.


Crend

[Turtle]

1.
Favorite Kart: Pidgin & Nolok (their karts look a lot more stylish than the rest)
Least: who likes Adiumy and his uncontrollable kart?

2.
Favorite Track: Fort Magma (reminds me of Bowser's Castle)& Coyote Canon
Least: XR591. I can't believe I am saying this, but it looks out of place in this game (too many themes in 1 track).
Easiest: Math Class, The map is short, so all you need to do is time your sharp turn button and you win.
Hardest: Light House or Secret Garden (you can very easily lose the lead on a sharp curve, unlike Old Mine).

3.
Well, usually a random track with 13 Ai and 3 laps.

4.
Light House with 13 Ai and 3 laps. What a mess of cars going everywhere.

5. This is what I used for all my racing games, so I just made STK the same.
A = Left; D = Right; W = Accelerate; S = Brake; Space = Use Item; L-Shift = Nitro; L-Ctrl = Sharp Curve; Q = Look Back

[Crendgrim]

Okay, let's revive this old thread and hope some more players are giving their opinions — personally, I always find it interesting how different people think about this.
To not only post nonsense here just to push the thread up, I had a project for the last two days: I tried to win a 3-lap-race on all tracks (also including add-on tracks, but excluding The Old Island (thanks to daBascht ) and What A Mesh (sorry, A. ) with 9 enemy AI karts, so I would see how hard the tracks really are.
Here are my results, extended by my personal opinion:

Easiest Tracks
1. Star Track (just watch the AI dropping down and pass by ...)
2. Math Class (as long as you hit the zippers, it should be no problem)
3. Shifting Sands (yes, what to say? Just drive ...)
4. Coyote Canyon (the same ...)
5. Hacienda (hurray! collecting nitro for free!)

Hardest Tracks
0. The Old Island / What A Mesh (don't count here For these, I'm too bad. )
1. Lighthouse ("wohooo... ou, there I was *not* supposed to drive along.")
2. The Island (easier than the old version, but still quite hard)
3. Old Mine (there's nothing to explain, is it?)
4. Zen Garden (can be really challenging with many AIs)
5. Secret Garden (IMO a bit easier than Zen Garden, but still not easy if many AIs are present)

Funniest Tracks
1. The Cube (Goin' 'round in circles...)
2. Math Class (high-speed action!)
3. XR591 (fast, many turns, awesome once you know how to drive)
4. Secret Garden (driving through the plants, not seeing anything ... yeah, poor Zen Garden, you didn't convince me yet totally )
5. Fort Magma (hey, I'm driving Nolok, what do you expect?)

Most Annoying
1. What A Mesh (sorry again )
2. Classic Volcano (aaargh... that downhill part -.- )
3. Star Track (zzz....zzZ.... Zzz... boring)
4. Doing the Dishes (boing, boing, boing — where is the "road"?)
5. The Cube (this one IS funny, but still ... I always become dizzy. )

Best Looking
1. On an Iceberg (wow...)
2. Zen Garden (wow again...)
3. Secret Garden (still looking great)
4. Old Mine (those new moving karts .. those lamps ... really a nice track)
5. Scotland (I really like how that track looks — if only the bonuses were placed better ...)
(I did not list Rudy's new SubSea track here, because it's not ready yet, but if I had to rank it in its *current* state, it already would be > Secret Garden.)

Worst Looking
1. What A Mesh (and again sorry )
2. Horizon (hey, are those thingys *buildings*? And is that supposed to be a *zeppelin*?!)
3. Classic Volcano (okay, it's quite old, but I'll mention it nevertheless ...)
4. Classic Subsea (... as I mention this one ...)
5. Classic Tollway (... and this one, but this one looks okay!)

Generally Favorites
1. Math Class (high-speed action *repeat*)
2. The Cube (aaand round and round and round and round and... )
3. Fort Magma (for relaxed driving ... Nolok likes his home)
4. On an Iceberg (yay! Great looking, nice to drive — if there would not be this one undrivable turn...)
5. Old Mine (yohoooo! oh, shit, crashed.)

Least Favorites
1. The Old Island (urghs.)
2. Classic Volcano (urghs again.)
3. The Island (I don't like this narrow street... neither in the old version, nor in the new one)
4. Star Track (what? Still not finished? Looks the same all track long... only the graphics outside the track are really nice, too bad that the track itself is so tiring )
5. Horizon (hm. ugly. not very funny.)

[Iridium]

Cool, I'll do this too.

1. What is your favorite Kart? Least Favorite?
Fav: Pidgin I usually play with, along with the new Beastie, Nolok, and Puffy.
Least: Adiumy (Even though I use the program itself )

2. What is your favorite track? Least favorite? Hardest/Easiest?
Favs: I love a good challenge, so the Hardcore Fort Magma Addon I am Playing a Ton! I also love XR591, THE CUUBE(Great track BTW) and
Least: Shifting Sands - HUGE amount of track and NOTHING GOING ON! Grrr. (Comparable to N64 Sherbet Land if you have played Mario Kart Wii)
Hardest: Hardcore Fort Magma and The Cube. "What A Mesh" is just downright Evil.
Easiest: Shifting Sands, Amazonian Journey, and Subsea.

3. What do you normally play? What difficulty level, number of karts/laps, etc?
Normal Race on Expert, 7 AI Karts.

4. Craziest thing you've tried?
Ooh, Around karts on Oliver's Math Class. Nearly crashed my old Mac

5. Do you play with a keyboard or other device? If keyboard, what is your setup?
Even though I DO own a gamepad, I play with the keyboard anyway -
Arrow Keys - Move (Right Hand)
Z - Drift (Left Hand)
X - Nitro (Left Hand)
C - Look Back (Left Hand)
Space - Use Item (Thumb )

[Static Juice]

Okay here's mine:

Favourite karts:

Wilber is my favourite that I always play as because in my opinion he looks the cutest (he looked way better in 0.6 though).
Tux, since he's the main character of the game.
Elephpant, he also looks pretty cute.
And Gooey. My little brother always played as him when we did multiplayer.

Least favourite karts:

Adiumy, he's so hard to control properly, and he looks like a bit of a freak as well.
And Gnu, he's just a creepy thing on a flying carpet (it's best to just stick with karts in my opinion).

Favourite tracks:

XR591 is my favourite because not only does it look the most stunning, it also has the best music in my opinion.
Secret Garden is another really good track. Nice music and lovely scenery.
Old Mine is a visually appealing track. Love the animations.
Tux Tollway, as it's a nice challenge, with great music and a great theme.

Least favourite tracks:

Probably the farm track as it's too short and the sky just doesn't go with the rest of the environment at all.
Oliver's Math Class, although it's quite funny to play sometimes (especially with lots of AI karts) but I don't like the concept. It's too small.
Shifting Sands is very boring, the track's too wide and there's too much straight road. Not challenging at all.
Skyline is rather visually repulsive. Not a bad track at all, but the textures look so terrible and fake.

Hardest tracks:

Well, I've been playing this game for two years now, and to be honest, I find none of the tracks difficult. However, I do find some of the actual challenges to be rather challenging.

Easiest tracks:

Bovine Barnyard. Just a boring cruise. Even with lots of AI karts this isn't challenging.
Amazonian Journey. Again, too much straight-ahead driving. And the level looks pretty much the same the whole way through.
Shifting Sands. Like I mentioned before, the track's too wide and there's too much straight road.
Star Track. It is indeed a beautiful level, but it's rather easy. I do very much love this track though (the music sets a nice heavenly mood)

Game setup:

Difficulty level: Usually Easy, because the karts go at a ridiculous speed otherwise.
Number of karts: I find that playing with 6-8 karts is the most enjoyable for me.
Number of laps: Depends on the level, but usually between 2-4.

Craziest thing tried:

It was in 0.6, where I edited the config file and boosted the number of karts to 100. I ended up starting at the back in the most bizarre place. The game soon crashed though. Also, the most enjoyable thing I've done in the game is played the 'All Tracks' grand prix with my brother, with 10 AI karts. Good times.

Keyboard configuration:

Up, Down, Left, Right for steering the kart, Spacebar for making sharp turns, Right Ctrl for activating items, Right Alt for nitro and Right Shift for looking back. This is the most comfortable setup for me, and it's also useful since my brother plays with the left side of the keyboard when we do multiplayer.

[Kendo14]

Here are my picks.

Favourite karts:

Suzanne is my favourite. She has the best looking kart.
I also like Beastie and Nolok. They are cool.

Least Favourite karts

Adiumy. He is uncontrollable.
I didn't like Gooey either, but he's gone.

Favourite Tracks

Its between Shiny Suburbs and Fort Magma. They look Stunning, and they have epic music.
I also love the new Subsea, Zen Garden and Hacienda.

Least Favourite Tracks

Star track looks impressive, but It's a mostly straight, bland road.
Shifting Sands is plain and boring. Hopefully the new Sandtrack will be released with the next version.
Old mine is rather insane.

Easiest Tracks

Bovine Barnyard is too plain and the AI don't put up a fight here.
Shifting Sands is so wide and predictable.
Star track is an easy cruise aswell.

Hardest tracks

The Old mine on expert is a challenge, with the added danger of rubber balls.

Craziest Thing tried

In Shiny Suburbs, I do follow the leader with ten AI's, Blow them all up on the hill and stop them from passing. Its funny!

[lexx_koto]

1) Nolok handles pretty well. I usually race as Adiumy and my best friend plays as Pidgin. Battle of the IM clients :-)

2) I don't have a least favourite kart to race as, but I don't like playing against Nolok as an AI kart. I don't know if the AI karts have different personalities, but he seems to be the meanest, especially with the cupcakes.

3) Scotland's one of my favourites, because I'm Scottish :-) The Island is great in multiplayer with a lot of AI karts. The mine can be frustrating, but I still like it. XR-591 is pretty difficult. I usually play Scotland on medium against 11 AI karts.

4) Not really tried anything crazy. I like going up the ramp for the big nitro in Hacienda.

5) I use the standard controls.

[RaceAce]

1. My fav karts are Python and X-moto, I rarely play with any others, but Konqo and VLC are really unstable and really easy to knock around.

2. I like longer tracks, some of my favorites are Coyote Canyon, Shiny Suburbs and the old Subsea (knocking down the pillars is so fun ). I also like Industry and Hacienda because they're so visually interesting, as well as fun to play!

3. I usually do 2-3 laps, depending on track length, I ALWAYS do Expert. I like to do Grand Prix's, mostly Follow-The-Leader, which I really like. I usually have 6-9 AI karts. I play a lot of Multi-Player with my younger brothers (I win almost all the time). I like going really fast and blasting AI karts with cupcakes!

4. Craziest thing? I did Secret Garden in Time Trial with 99 laps (so I would get 99 zippers). I used a lot of zippers and did a lot of stunts in the gray pipe, ramping and spinning through the air. It was a blast!

5. I use a joystick (Logitech Attack 3). I really like joysticks because it's a lot more like real driving than the keyboard and it kinda helps you control better and have a better "feel" for your kart and the track. I occasionally use the keyboard, and my brothers use it a lot. My keyboard setup is: right hand on arrows, left hand on keys; UP - accelerate, DOWN - brakes/back up, LEFT/RIGHT - turn, ENTER - fire, SPACE - sharp turn, RIGHT SHIFT - nitro, RIGHT CTRL - look back, / - rescue. Note that with this setup, you can't accelerate, turn left and sharp turn all at the same time.

[jpenguin]

q. I often play as alt Tuxfrom addons, but I like the Pidgen kart & the penny kart from addons

2. Hacienda, the newest subsea, icetrack, XR691(SVN), Green Valley, mystic valley & mines

3. Really depends; I often play STK on easy to unwind at the end of the day

4. Many things, I like to see how far off track I can go without triggering a rescue...

5. Dualshock 3

[bonifarz]

1. Favorite kart:
It's good they all have the same stats
Style: Bamboo, Gimp, Python

2. Favorite tracks:
Depends on the game mode. For time trial definitely "What a Mesh" and "minigolf mischief" (but certainly not with the Boom Boom music theme)
Map design: Secret Garden, Subsea, Fort Magma, Green Valley - there are plenty of nice maps!

3. Favorite AI/ game mode:
Taking a look at maps in artist's debug mode is good to relax a little.
To look for a challenge, plain time trial is fine.
For high speed fun: 7 karts, a wider track and custom settings for double the max speed and double the engine power of expert mode

4. Craziest thing:
See above... what else?
Tried "follow the leader" with 30 karts once... never again.

5. Key bindings:
A simple gamepad is really useful and enhances the fun factor

[jackylman]

Karts
Favorite: Wilber
Least favorite: Adiumy

Tracks
Easiest: Amazonian Journey
Hardest: Old Mines
Favorite: Around the Lighthouse
Least favorite: Shifting Sands

I use an inexpensive Logitech gamepad.

[mollah]

Hi folks.
1. Favourite karts:
Konqi, Suzanne
Least: Adiumy, Hexley.

2. Tracks:
Favourites are Old Island, Tux Tollway, XR591, Vulcano.
Least fav are Sandtrack, Star Track and Scotland. (Scotland is ok, but the music is not )
Easiest: Star Track, Bovine Barnyard
Hardest: What a mesh, Old Mine.

3. Same as Arthur, 2-3 laps at expert, 19 AI, normal mode

4. Craziest: I havent done so much crazy in STK, but 3 zippers and nitro at the same time is a classic. And at Mystery Island, I've played 6 laps, letting them drive almost a round before a start, so I can take much nitro and some zippers, and after 6 laps I just manage to win.

5. Keyboard, S for nitro D for fire, Z for looking back, space for sharp turn and backspace for rescue