Whatever happened to Mario's Arena?

[dartman]

It's an old map from back before 2.0.0 was even released, but I'm sure some of you still remember it. I was just thinking about it today and just how much fun I had there. I wish it was back on the serverlist. I understand zaphod picked it up eventually and then made Ultimate Arena (which I've never played on), but I haven't seen it around at all in a while.

[Green Manalishi]

it was a very good ffa map. zaphod had hosted it for ages. it would be nice to have it back.

[mahem1]

If you really want it, pm me the map or post it here.
Hopefully nobody would mind if I put it up.

[dartman]

If only I knew where the map was. If someone could track it down, that would be awesome.

[mahem1]

The map(and all of it's greatness) is currently up at hosting.bzaddict.net:5217 . I hope nobody minds me putting it up, but just for the record, all rights and credit and cookies and whatnot goes to Mario.
I noticed there was no config for it and so I put in this one:
options
-set _wingsJumpCount 3
+f good{2}
-sl G 5
-sl L 15
-sl GM 15
-sl MG 100
-sl F 30
-ms 5
+r
-j
-fb
-sb
-s 20
-mp 5,4,4,4,3,50
end

If anyone has the original config feel free to post it here or pm it too me.
Also currently the shot limit is 5, if that is wrong you can also pm me or post here.
I hope everyone enjoys it!

[dartman]

Thanks man!

[dartman]

Just got a game started there and it was tons of fun--again, thanks for bringing this map back! There were only two problems: 1) it had permanent bad flags, which I don't think the original map had and which aren't fun anyway, and 2) some people like ducatiwannabe were getting spam-kicked for practically no reason. It would be greatly appreciated if those issues were fixed.

[mahem1]

Done and done. Still looking for the map config though! If anyone has it, you know what to do.
Any other suggestions would be nice to.

[dartman]

Apologies for the absolutely insane 12-year necro-bump.

Got back into bz a few weeks ago and realized this great old map is no longer hosted. Does anyone still have it? Would love to see its return, I can still vividly picture myself just exploring around it in the back of the mind, so many great memories with this one dating back to my bzflag origins.

[Zehra]

Found this post in: ULTIMATE ARENA by Zaphod

Here's an older version...I don't know if it's the version you're looking for. Map by Mario.

Thread has attachment. (Quotes don't include them.)

[Green Manalishi]

again, after 12 years, it would be highly legit if someone could host it. it was one of the best ffa maps from the 2000's.

[dartman]

Found this post in: ULTIMATE ARENA by Zaphod

Here's an older version...I don't know if it's the version you're looking for. Map by Mario.

Thread has attachment. (Quotes don't include them.)

I notice it's a .map file, doesn't current BZFlag normally use .bzw? Would there be compatibility issues? Downloaded it myself anyway just for posterity even though I have no experience hosting maps myself, not even with little private servers.

[blast]

Both extensions have been used over the years, but the contents is the same format.

[dartman]

OK cool. Would love to start up a private server just to test it out and run around the map a bit, but not quite sure how to do that. I went to Start Server in-game which seems straightforward enough except it won't actually let me select a map, it just seems to be stuck on "random map". Do I have to put the map file in a specific folder? I tried to open up bzfs to change the config (if that's even how you do it) but as far as I could tell it wouldn't let me do anything in bzfs anyway. Is there some specific documentation or guide to help with this? Most of what I've found so far hasn't really helped. I saw this in the bzfs readme:

By default, bzfs uses randomly generated world unless you specify the -world command line or configuration file option.

but I don't know which config file it's talking about or where/how to access/edit it.

EDIT: nvm, think I figured out that bit. Added the -world line to bzfs.conf and now I can at least select it in game.

[blast]

The Start Server menu expect the files to be named ending in .bzw and looks in a few places, one of which is the worlds directory under the configuration directory.
Windows: C:\Users\YourUsernameHere\AppData\Local\BZFlag\worlds\
Linux: ~/.bzf/worlds/
macOS: ~/Library/Application Support/BZFlag/worlds/

Running bzfs directly won't give you any prompts or UI to change anything. You would need to pass all the options as command line arguments when running bzfs. You can check the available options in the bzfs manual page. On Windows we ship HTML versions of the pages available from the start menu. On linux you can run 'man bzfs'. On macOS I'm not sure what we do.

A basic example that loads a world file, enables jumping and ricochet, adds 2 of each good flag, and sets the shot count to 10:
bzfs -world whatever.bzw -j +r +f good{2} -ms 10

[dartman]

Well I was able to switch the extension to .bzw and run it through Start Server after messing with bzfs.conf (but thanks for the tip about the worlds directory, will start using that). And I was able to run around the map just fine...smaller than I remember haha, but not a bad thing at all really. One of the teles made a crazy stuttering sound when I ran through it and there's still the funny little pyramid-moving-through-the-ground glitch that I totally forgot about but yeah, seems totally playable in BZFlag 2.x and would love to see someone host it publicly again if possible. (I understand licensing/permission can be an issue with these things)