All Loading Screen Messages
I dug through the game files and found all of the loading screen text. I has a lot of interesting background to the development of PlatinumQuest, as well as game and level tips. Take a look!
If you're using a Controller, head to the Options menu to configure its layout!
When you play Online, beating every Gold or Platinum time in every official level in all four games will earn you a colored username!
Always have a Powerup on you in Multiplayer Gem Hunt games!
Practice using diagonal movement! You'll need to use it at times in the Advanced and Expert levels.
Unlock levels in the Bonus category by completing levels, challenges, and achievements.
If the game crashes, send us your game's console.log, crash.log (if available) and a bug report before restarting it so we can pinpoint the crash and fix it.
Watch out for white flames shooting from the ground. They signal PhysMod triggers, which affect how your marble controls!
If you're stuck on a difficult level, most of the time you can skip to the next one.
If you're stuck on a difficult level, try practising on some of the easier ones until you're able to complete it.
Use the Hints button at the bottom of the screen on the level select to check out tips and trivia about the current level. It also will give you a tip for beating the level's Ultimate time if you've beaten the Platinum Time.
Nest Eggs are hidden around in several levels -- and they're not easy to find. Collecting them can unlock new Bonus levels!
Your spin in the air affects how the marble will bounce when it lands. This can be both a help, and a hindrance.
The longer you wait to Super Jump after jumping first, the lower you'll fly.
Restarting until you have several high-point value Gem spawns in Gem Hunt mode can go a long way towards the Ultimate Score.
The Gyrocopter is a versatile Powerup. Combine it with different powerups to get a more extreme-version of them..
The Mega Marble Powerup can wreck havoc against your opponents, while the Blast Powerup will throw them away from you. Combining the two produces interesting results.
The Fireball Powerup has many uses -- you can use it to destroy ice shards by simply rolling into them, or use its blast power to get height while destroying some ice shards in the process.
Nest Eggs in PlatinumQuest are generally much more difficult to find and collect over their Easter Egg counterparts in Platinum and Ultra.
You can use a Super Speed to slow down, too. Just activate it while facing away from where you're going!
In PlatinumQuest, respawning on a Checkpoint will cancel a currently-active Time Travel's effects.
If you're new, the recommended order to play the games is: Gold, Ultra, PlatinumQuest and Platinum. Gold will teach you the basics, while Platinum is the hardest and requires the most varied skillset in order to beat.
Watching others play may give you tips on how to solve certain challenges.
Cannons with a green band have the lowest power strength, followed by blue and red. Orange-band cannons will fire the marble instantly in the direction they're pointing. White cannons have a custom power level.
The Fireball Powerup fizzles out when you touch water or collect a Bubble Powerup. Likewise, the Bubble Powerup pops away when you pick up a Fireball Powerup.
The Bubble Powerup stays with you at all times until it is used up or you pick up a Fireball Powerup.
The Sundial Item acts the same way as the Time Travel -- it's just a bit fancier.
PlatinumQuest Time Travel Items have identifiable bands; gold bands freeze the clock and red bands add time.
In Multiplayer, if you activate a Mega Marble and hit an Ice Shard, your marble becomes small again, but you don't get frozen.
By activating a Mega Marble Powerup right before hitting a high-friction floor, you can get a crazy speed boost.
Easter Eggs and Nest Eggs in custom Online levels net you an additional 10,000 rating points per egg.
Official and Bonus PlatinumQuest levels give you 25,000 rating points on every Nest Egg you catch.
If you collect all the gems in a Gem Madness level before the time limit runs out, you will be scored based on how much time remains on the clock.
Buttons do useful things, such as activate moving platforms. If you want, you could create an elaborate puzzle with them.
You can start the level at near full speed by jumping during the Ready-Set-Go sequence. Time a jump so you hit the start pad on 'Go!' for the best result.
Moving diagonally is faster than moving straight forward. Jumping repeatedly while moving will further increase the marble's speed.
The Marble Blast Forums have an 'Advanced Techniques' thread which lists out every technique known in this game, and how it works.
Head over to the MarbleBlast.com Website to download more mods for Marble Blast, check out the latest community levels, compete in tournaments and more!
You can add your own custom marbles by adding textures to the data/custom_marbles directory.
Completing Online achievements awards you additional rating points, which helps you move up the general rankings.
Frightfest and Winterfest are seasonal events that take the game's Multiplayer levels and spice them up for Halloween, or for the holidays!
The current Radar mode can be changed with <func:bind radarSwitch>: option one has screen-surrounding arrows that point to the Gems, option two is a minimap at the top right of the screen, and option three is a minimap that covers the screen.
Help Bubbles contain useful messages that appear on the bottom of the screen. These messages often tell you how to beat an upcoming challenge, or teach you a game mechanic.
Radar is available by default in PlatinumQuest, Ultra and Multiplayer levels.
Hints are available in PlatinumQuest and Custom levels.
Online, completing a Quota level with all gems collected will award you an additional bonus in general rating points.
Gem point values for Hunt and Gem Madness: Red = 1 point, Yellow = 2 points, Blue = 5 points, Platinum = 10 points.
The level editor has many handy functions, including rounding items to the nearest 0.25 unit, dropping items to the ground and even selecting skins for certain shapes like signs via a skin selector!
The level editor contains a handy particle editor. If you can figure it out you can create some really cool effects, just watch out for the lag.
The level editor allows you to edit the mission info in-game instead of in a text editor.
Need to extend an object's scale in the Level Editor without using the Scale and Position fields? Simply press Ctrl + Alt + Select the face you want. It will become blue-shaded and you can then move it.
The level editor gives you a fantastic Descriptive Inspector Field Names. Enabled, it tells you user-friendly names for additional stuff in datablocks, while disabled it gives you the actual names as will be seen in the mission file.
The level editor, under World Editor Settings, has a Snap to Grid feature. You can then move items on the selected grid size, which really helps moving things around!
The level editor, under World Editor Settings, allows you to create default Gem types: Gold's regular shape, PlatinumQuest's new Gems shape its Fancy Gem Items.
Finished making changes and saving the level in the level editor? Under File, see the Reload Current Mission button to instantly reload the mission and see the saved changes.
If you select an object in the level editor, then press F, the camera will instantly focus on the object. Extremely helpful!
Make sure to play all Tutorial and Beginner levels, as they teach you all the basics you need to know for PlatinumQuest.
The default port for Multiplayer is 28000, but you can use any port you want, as long as you open it through your firewall or router.
Ice Shards can be used to instantly stop you if you're going too fast.
Jumping on surfaces made of ice or space can give you more control.
Grass, Sand and Water friction floors can take out any rebound force, making for a perfect landing place.
Send us a bug report if you wish to see it fixed. If you can also tell us what you did to re-create it, it is even better.
Halloween and Xmas themed level remakes often contain new achievements and flairs for you to attain. Join us for these events!
Craving Mega Marble Wars? A unique Mega Marble mode gives you points based on how hard you Mega Marble your opponents. Can you be the King?
When creating a recording, it will automatically restart itself until you beat the level or exit it. You can always replay the level and a new recording will be made.
If you fall Out of Bounds, press the powerup key to respawn faster! In Hunt levels, if you're carrying a powerup, it will not be consumed.
Besides filling the Blast Bar to its maximum power, the Blast Item gives you a small 3% boost!
The Mega Marble powerup will make your opponents run in fear! However if you find another player with Mega Marble, the one who gets knocked off is the one who comes with less speed into battle.
Mega Marbles are very useful to collect Gems in very close distances.
If you get Fireball powerup in Multiplayer, it activates first even if you have Blast ready. If you immediately activate Blast after using Fire Blast, then your boost will be much bigger.
If you enter a Cannon as a Mega Marble, it will force your marble to become normal-sized again.$Loading::TipsChance1
Always stay up until 5am writing silly tips.
Never assume that Batman eats nachos.
Don't forget to brush your teeth.
Don't forget to floss!
Never Eat Shredded Wheat.
We're going to make Marble Blast great again, believe me.
Pablo Vasquez is an anagram of Bosque Lav Zap.
After eight years of development on PlatinumQuest, we can in fact confirm that yes, marbles do roll.
This is not a tip.
Threefolder didn't create Three-Fold Maze.
Eat a banana every day.
Sometimes, light speed is too slow.
About 20% if you're American.
Say Challenge one more time, I dare you!
A crash is imminent. Prepare to send your console.log file.
This tip is as dank as the memes about PlatinumQuestTip? Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Sed ullamcorper blandit justo, id ornare mi venenatis consectetur. Aliquam eget quam ante. In maximus condimentum odio.
If you're bad at this game, the Out of Bounds special taunt messages will make fun of you.
Matan needs to stop watching How It's Made food videos and work on this game.
IT'S TIME TO D-D-D-D-D-DUEL!!
MEGA MARBLE KIDS!!
Playing against Threefolder in Multiplayer may result in the spamming of the 'Blue Steal' taunt.
STOOL PARTY YEEEAAAHHH!!
It's 2:50am. Do you know where your programmer is?
JOHN CENA!!
Hi, Mom!
Puns make everything punstatic!
c() , d()
Fetch, Stash, Pull with Rebase, Pop, Resolve Conflicts
Type 'party' on the main menu to have a party.
Writing these tips crashed the game.
IT WAS COLD, BRO!
up, up, down, down, left, right, left, right, B, A
We gave up on the changelog. Stuff got added, stuff got fixed, stuff was deleted, and we probably crashed the game a thousand times, give or take.
HIGUY BUG CRASH
GO MARBLE DUDE!!
This still isn't cannon.cs2
Scrapped Powerups in development include the Wings, which would have granted some form of flight, and Marbledude, which increased the effects of other Powerups and negated hazards.
Most levels were originally going to be locked, and the goal was to make your own way through the levels. This was scrapped.
One of the original ideas was to create an overworld with a map consisting of the level images, and lines that drew paths between these levels. Beat levels that lead to others, and thus unlock the later ones.
The Mega Marble was originally going to appear in PlatinumQuest levels as a standard powerup.
PlatinumQuest levels don't have any rug, carpet, tarmac, random force, or magnets. You're welcome.
PlatinumQuest started as an update to Marble Blast Platinum, then turned into a standalone mod, and then returned to being an update to Platinum.
It's easier to make broken new features than to fix bugs. We learned this the hard way.
In older versions of the game, a buffer overflow caused missions with long help texts to eat up your entire hard drive with an insanely huge mission file.
PlatinumQuest was designed to be easier than Marble Blast Platinum, but there are still a few levels that will cause you to scratch your head.
Alex Swanson, the creator of most of Marble Blast Gold's levels, donated two never-before-seen levels to PlatinumQuest -- Gravity Tower, and an old version of Skate Battle Royale.
PlatinumQuest was designed to not use edge-hitting or trap-launching in any way in the level design, save for one level. Can you guess which one?
Almost every one of Matan's levels uses level-specific code. A huge headache to HiGuy, at the very least.
PlatinumQuest had no development between 2012 and 2014, and Matan is the only developer that hasn't left the mod, from start to finish.
Tilo is the only Multiplayer level not from Gold, Platinum, PlatinumQuest or Ultra... It's from a different mod called Marble Blast Advanced and was re-created by Kwill on request.
If you say 'Marble Blast PlatinumQuest', Matan will be thrown into a raging fit. PlatinumQuest does not have 'Marble Blast' in front of it.
Checkpoints were coded and added to Marble Blast Platinum two weeks before its first full release to the public.
The original error message noise was in fact Matan screaming 'Spy', referring to Spy47 who originally coded the Online section.
Due to a programming oversight, Marble Blast Platinum used to be able to delete any file or folder from a user's computer, including system files and folders.
Hypercube was a level that appeared exclusively on Marble Blast Gold for the XBOX. It can be found on Ultra levels as Advanced 21 and retains the Gold marble size and no-radar use.
The Sundial Item was originally created as a replacement to the Time Travel item, but was dropped after MadMarioSkills created the new Time Travel item. Nonetheless, a few levels still use the Sundial.
Negative (red-banded) Time Travels are actually called Time Penalty Items.
PlatinumQuest has three main themes to its levels: regular, garden and construction, all with textures, scenery items and more to go along with them.
PlatinumQuest has almost 4 times as many lines of code as Marble Blast Gold. In numbers, there are more than 60,000 new lines of code, and many more which were rewritten or removed over the years.
You can create a level that uses all of these modes at the same time: 2D, Quota, Laps, Haste and Consistency.
A Pinball gamemode was in the works along with levels to go with it, but was dropped. Multi-ball, Extra Ball and other Powerups were actually possible.
Some of the standard features in PlatinumQuest started as one-time custom codes for Matan.
Thanks to Torque's terrible time storage, if a server had an uptime of 24 days, the time would become negative.
One of the dropped gamemodes was called 'Distance', where you had to travel a certain distance before being allowed to finish the level. No end pad required.
Most of PlatinumQuest's code was rewritten starting in 2014 to support Multiplayer.
In rare cases, Moving Objects may magically disappear.
The current version of Multiplayer is actually the 8th version of a protocol that started in Marble Blast Emerald.
The shader model in PlatinumQuest uses Flat Shading with Blinn-Phong specular highlights.
The joystick remapping tip is hard-coded to show up when you first plug in a joystick.
PlatinumQuest's scripts contain over 115,000 lines of code. The extender adds another 50,000 lines.
It's been over 10 years and we still don't have a better version of map2dif.
PlatinumQuest was coded almost entirely in Sublime Text.
Over the course of development, PlatinumQuest has used two different gits and one subversion repository.
Most of Matan's levels have a lot of shapes and triggers data in the interior, as he didn't want to use the Level Editor for alignment purposes. That worked somewhat, but not as well as he wanted.
Marble Blast Platinum originally started as a mini-mod that was supposed to include only 30 levels and be based within Marble Blast Gold. Matan caused it to become bigger, much to Phil's displeasure.
Alex Swanson helped create the original code for the Ultimate Time.
The Help Bubble was originally created as a replacement for the Help Trigger, but later on in development, the Bubble's features were added to the Help Trigger.
Two friction floors that were never added to Platinum or PlatinumQuest are the frictionless floor from Oaky (0 in friction) and a super-bouncy one, with 500 units put into force.
Throughout the years, the fonts that were mainly used in the game had changed from Arial to DomCasualD to Marker Felt to Whitney. Next stop: Wingdings.
Challenges and Super Challenges appeared in Marble Blast Platinum 1.50, but were removed with PlatinumQuest's release. They were very buggy and crashed really badly.
The Out of Bounds taunt messages used to purposely crash your game whenever you reached a certain multiple of OOBs.
The community, historically, views the unseen Marblaxia as the Marble's arch-enemy. The planet where the Marble 'lives' is Marblius.
A feature that was cut was a Random Initial Position for Moving Platforms, so that they started in different spots on their path when the level was loaded (and restarted). Unsurprisingly it was requested by Matan for a laps level of his that never materialised.
Additional collectibles that were cut are Coins and Stars. Coins helped you unlock marble skins and levels, while collecting all Stars would unlock special levels that use a new Powerup, called Wings. Both had shapes and were collectible before their removal in 2015.
Cannon.cs caused more issues than we'd like to admit in just about every stage of development.
Due to how the rating system works, Arctic Inferno can technically award the player 31.88 Million points for destroying all Ice Shards. Thanks to the time limit, that's not possible.
Warning: Spoiler!
If you're using a Controller, head to the Options menu to configure its layout!
When you play Online, beating every Gold or Platinum time in every official level in all four games will earn you a colored username!
Always have a Powerup on you in Multiplayer Gem Hunt games!
Practice using diagonal movement! You'll need to use it at times in the Advanced and Expert levels.
Unlock levels in the Bonus category by completing levels, challenges, and achievements.
If the game crashes, send us your game's console.log, crash.log (if available) and a bug report before restarting it so we can pinpoint the crash and fix it.
Watch out for white flames shooting from the ground. They signal PhysMod triggers, which affect how your marble controls!
If you're stuck on a difficult level, most of the time you can skip to the next one.
If you're stuck on a difficult level, try practising on some of the easier ones until you're able to complete it.
Use the Hints button at the bottom of the screen on the level select to check out tips and trivia about the current level. It also will give you a tip for beating the level's Ultimate time if you've beaten the Platinum Time.
Nest Eggs are hidden around in several levels -- and they're not easy to find. Collecting them can unlock new Bonus levels!
Your spin in the air affects how the marble will bounce when it lands. This can be both a help, and a hindrance.
The longer you wait to Super Jump after jumping first, the lower you'll fly.
Restarting until you have several high-point value Gem spawns in Gem Hunt mode can go a long way towards the Ultimate Score.
The Gyrocopter is a versatile Powerup. Combine it with different powerups to get a more extreme-version of them..
The Mega Marble Powerup can wreck havoc against your opponents, while the Blast Powerup will throw them away from you. Combining the two produces interesting results.
The Fireball Powerup has many uses -- you can use it to destroy ice shards by simply rolling into them, or use its blast power to get height while destroying some ice shards in the process.
Nest Eggs in PlatinumQuest are generally much more difficult to find and collect over their Easter Egg counterparts in Platinum and Ultra.
You can use a Super Speed to slow down, too. Just activate it while facing away from where you're going!
In PlatinumQuest, respawning on a Checkpoint will cancel a currently-active Time Travel's effects.
If you're new, the recommended order to play the games is: Gold, Ultra, PlatinumQuest and Platinum. Gold will teach you the basics, while Platinum is the hardest and requires the most varied skillset in order to beat.
Watching others play may give you tips on how to solve certain challenges.
Cannons with a green band have the lowest power strength, followed by blue and red. Orange-band cannons will fire the marble instantly in the direction they're pointing. White cannons have a custom power level.
The Fireball Powerup fizzles out when you touch water or collect a Bubble Powerup. Likewise, the Bubble Powerup pops away when you pick up a Fireball Powerup.
The Bubble Powerup stays with you at all times until it is used up or you pick up a Fireball Powerup.
The Sundial Item acts the same way as the Time Travel -- it's just a bit fancier.
PlatinumQuest Time Travel Items have identifiable bands; gold bands freeze the clock and red bands add time.
In Multiplayer, if you activate a Mega Marble and hit an Ice Shard, your marble becomes small again, but you don't get frozen.
By activating a Mega Marble Powerup right before hitting a high-friction floor, you can get a crazy speed boost.
Easter Eggs and Nest Eggs in custom Online levels net you an additional 10,000 rating points per egg.
Official and Bonus PlatinumQuest levels give you 25,000 rating points on every Nest Egg you catch.
If you collect all the gems in a Gem Madness level before the time limit runs out, you will be scored based on how much time remains on the clock.
Buttons do useful things, such as activate moving platforms. If you want, you could create an elaborate puzzle with them.
You can start the level at near full speed by jumping during the Ready-Set-Go sequence. Time a jump so you hit the start pad on 'Go!' for the best result.
Moving diagonally is faster than moving straight forward. Jumping repeatedly while moving will further increase the marble's speed.
The Marble Blast Forums have an 'Advanced Techniques' thread which lists out every technique known in this game, and how it works.
Head over to the MarbleBlast.com Website to download more mods for Marble Blast, check out the latest community levels, compete in tournaments and more!
You can add your own custom marbles by adding textures to the data/custom_marbles directory.
Completing Online achievements awards you additional rating points, which helps you move up the general rankings.
Frightfest and Winterfest are seasonal events that take the game's Multiplayer levels and spice them up for Halloween, or for the holidays!
The current Radar mode can be changed with <func:bind radarSwitch>: option one has screen-surrounding arrows that point to the Gems, option two is a minimap at the top right of the screen, and option three is a minimap that covers the screen.
Help Bubbles contain useful messages that appear on the bottom of the screen. These messages often tell you how to beat an upcoming challenge, or teach you a game mechanic.
Radar is available by default in PlatinumQuest, Ultra and Multiplayer levels.
Hints are available in PlatinumQuest and Custom levels.
Online, completing a Quota level with all gems collected will award you an additional bonus in general rating points.
Gem point values for Hunt and Gem Madness: Red = 1 point, Yellow = 2 points, Blue = 5 points, Platinum = 10 points.
The level editor has many handy functions, including rounding items to the nearest 0.25 unit, dropping items to the ground and even selecting skins for certain shapes like signs via a skin selector!
The level editor contains a handy particle editor. If you can figure it out you can create some really cool effects, just watch out for the lag.
The level editor allows you to edit the mission info in-game instead of in a text editor.
Need to extend an object's scale in the Level Editor without using the Scale and Position fields? Simply press Ctrl + Alt + Select the face you want. It will become blue-shaded and you can then move it.
The level editor gives you a fantastic Descriptive Inspector Field Names. Enabled, it tells you user-friendly names for additional stuff in datablocks, while disabled it gives you the actual names as will be seen in the mission file.
The level editor, under World Editor Settings, has a Snap to Grid feature. You can then move items on the selected grid size, which really helps moving things around!
The level editor, under World Editor Settings, allows you to create default Gem types: Gold's regular shape, PlatinumQuest's new Gems shape its Fancy Gem Items.
Finished making changes and saving the level in the level editor? Under File, see the Reload Current Mission button to instantly reload the mission and see the saved changes.
If you select an object in the level editor, then press F, the camera will instantly focus on the object. Extremely helpful!
Make sure to play all Tutorial and Beginner levels, as they teach you all the basics you need to know for PlatinumQuest.
The default port for Multiplayer is 28000, but you can use any port you want, as long as you open it through your firewall or router.
Ice Shards can be used to instantly stop you if you're going too fast.
Jumping on surfaces made of ice or space can give you more control.
Grass, Sand and Water friction floors can take out any rebound force, making for a perfect landing place.
Send us a bug report if you wish to see it fixed. If you can also tell us what you did to re-create it, it is even better.
Halloween and Xmas themed level remakes often contain new achievements and flairs for you to attain. Join us for these events!
Craving Mega Marble Wars? A unique Mega Marble mode gives you points based on how hard you Mega Marble your opponents. Can you be the King?
When creating a recording, it will automatically restart itself until you beat the level or exit it. You can always replay the level and a new recording will be made.
If you fall Out of Bounds, press the powerup key to respawn faster! In Hunt levels, if you're carrying a powerup, it will not be consumed.
Besides filling the Blast Bar to its maximum power, the Blast Item gives you a small 3% boost!
The Mega Marble powerup will make your opponents run in fear! However if you find another player with Mega Marble, the one who gets knocked off is the one who comes with less speed into battle.
Mega Marbles are very useful to collect Gems in very close distances.
If you get Fireball powerup in Multiplayer, it activates first even if you have Blast ready. If you immediately activate Blast after using Fire Blast, then your boost will be much bigger.
If you enter a Cannon as a Mega Marble, it will force your marble to become normal-sized again.$Loading::TipsChance1
Always stay up until 5am writing silly tips.
Never assume that Batman eats nachos.
Don't forget to brush your teeth.
Don't forget to floss!
Never Eat Shredded Wheat.
We're going to make Marble Blast great again, believe me.
Pablo Vasquez is an anagram of Bosque Lav Zap.
After eight years of development on PlatinumQuest, we can in fact confirm that yes, marbles do roll.
This is not a tip.
Threefolder didn't create Three-Fold Maze.
Eat a banana every day.
Sometimes, light speed is too slow.
About 20% if you're American.
Say Challenge one more time, I dare you!
A crash is imminent. Prepare to send your console.log file.
This tip is as dank as the memes about PlatinumQuestTip? Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Sed ullamcorper blandit justo, id ornare mi venenatis consectetur. Aliquam eget quam ante. In maximus condimentum odio.
If you're bad at this game, the Out of Bounds special taunt messages will make fun of you.
Matan needs to stop watching How It's Made food videos and work on this game.
IT'S TIME TO D-D-D-D-D-DUEL!!
MEGA MARBLE KIDS!!
Playing against Threefolder in Multiplayer may result in the spamming of the 'Blue Steal' taunt.
STOOL PARTY YEEEAAAHHH!!
It's 2:50am. Do you know where your programmer is?
JOHN CENA!!
Hi, Mom!
Puns make everything punstatic!
c() , d()
Fetch, Stash, Pull with Rebase, Pop, Resolve Conflicts
Type 'party' on the main menu to have a party.
Writing these tips crashed the game.
IT WAS COLD, BRO!
up, up, down, down, left, right, left, right, B, A
We gave up on the changelog. Stuff got added, stuff got fixed, stuff was deleted, and we probably crashed the game a thousand times, give or take.
HIGUY BUG CRASH
GO MARBLE DUDE!!
This still isn't cannon.cs2
Scrapped Powerups in development include the Wings, which would have granted some form of flight, and Marbledude, which increased the effects of other Powerups and negated hazards.
Most levels were originally going to be locked, and the goal was to make your own way through the levels. This was scrapped.
One of the original ideas was to create an overworld with a map consisting of the level images, and lines that drew paths between these levels. Beat levels that lead to others, and thus unlock the later ones.
The Mega Marble was originally going to appear in PlatinumQuest levels as a standard powerup.
PlatinumQuest levels don't have any rug, carpet, tarmac, random force, or magnets. You're welcome.
PlatinumQuest started as an update to Marble Blast Platinum, then turned into a standalone mod, and then returned to being an update to Platinum.
It's easier to make broken new features than to fix bugs. We learned this the hard way.
In older versions of the game, a buffer overflow caused missions with long help texts to eat up your entire hard drive with an insanely huge mission file.
PlatinumQuest was designed to be easier than Marble Blast Platinum, but there are still a few levels that will cause you to scratch your head.
Alex Swanson, the creator of most of Marble Blast Gold's levels, donated two never-before-seen levels to PlatinumQuest -- Gravity Tower, and an old version of Skate Battle Royale.
PlatinumQuest was designed to not use edge-hitting or trap-launching in any way in the level design, save for one level. Can you guess which one?
Almost every one of Matan's levels uses level-specific code. A huge headache to HiGuy, at the very least.
PlatinumQuest had no development between 2012 and 2014, and Matan is the only developer that hasn't left the mod, from start to finish.
Tilo is the only Multiplayer level not from Gold, Platinum, PlatinumQuest or Ultra... It's from a different mod called Marble Blast Advanced and was re-created by Kwill on request.
If you say 'Marble Blast PlatinumQuest', Matan will be thrown into a raging fit. PlatinumQuest does not have 'Marble Blast' in front of it.
Checkpoints were coded and added to Marble Blast Platinum two weeks before its first full release to the public.
The original error message noise was in fact Matan screaming 'Spy', referring to Spy47 who originally coded the Online section.
Due to a programming oversight, Marble Blast Platinum used to be able to delete any file or folder from a user's computer, including system files and folders.
Hypercube was a level that appeared exclusively on Marble Blast Gold for the XBOX. It can be found on Ultra levels as Advanced 21 and retains the Gold marble size and no-radar use.
The Sundial Item was originally created as a replacement to the Time Travel item, but was dropped after MadMarioSkills created the new Time Travel item. Nonetheless, a few levels still use the Sundial.
Negative (red-banded) Time Travels are actually called Time Penalty Items.
PlatinumQuest has three main themes to its levels: regular, garden and construction, all with textures, scenery items and more to go along with them.
PlatinumQuest has almost 4 times as many lines of code as Marble Blast Gold. In numbers, there are more than 60,000 new lines of code, and many more which were rewritten or removed over the years.
You can create a level that uses all of these modes at the same time: 2D, Quota, Laps, Haste and Consistency.
A Pinball gamemode was in the works along with levels to go with it, but was dropped. Multi-ball, Extra Ball and other Powerups were actually possible.
Some of the standard features in PlatinumQuest started as one-time custom codes for Matan.
Thanks to Torque's terrible time storage, if a server had an uptime of 24 days, the time would become negative.
One of the dropped gamemodes was called 'Distance', where you had to travel a certain distance before being allowed to finish the level. No end pad required.
Most of PlatinumQuest's code was rewritten starting in 2014 to support Multiplayer.
In rare cases, Moving Objects may magically disappear.
The current version of Multiplayer is actually the 8th version of a protocol that started in Marble Blast Emerald.
The shader model in PlatinumQuest uses Flat Shading with Blinn-Phong specular highlights.
The joystick remapping tip is hard-coded to show up when you first plug in a joystick.
PlatinumQuest's scripts contain over 115,000 lines of code. The extender adds another 50,000 lines.
It's been over 10 years and we still don't have a better version of map2dif.
PlatinumQuest was coded almost entirely in Sublime Text.
Over the course of development, PlatinumQuest has used two different gits and one subversion repository.
Most of Matan's levels have a lot of shapes and triggers data in the interior, as he didn't want to use the Level Editor for alignment purposes. That worked somewhat, but not as well as he wanted.
Marble Blast Platinum originally started as a mini-mod that was supposed to include only 30 levels and be based within Marble Blast Gold. Matan caused it to become bigger, much to Phil's displeasure.
Alex Swanson helped create the original code for the Ultimate Time.
The Help Bubble was originally created as a replacement for the Help Trigger, but later on in development, the Bubble's features were added to the Help Trigger.
Two friction floors that were never added to Platinum or PlatinumQuest are the frictionless floor from Oaky (0 in friction) and a super-bouncy one, with 500 units put into force.
Throughout the years, the fonts that were mainly used in the game had changed from Arial to DomCasualD to Marker Felt to Whitney. Next stop: Wingdings.
Challenges and Super Challenges appeared in Marble Blast Platinum 1.50, but were removed with PlatinumQuest's release. They were very buggy and crashed really badly.
The Out of Bounds taunt messages used to purposely crash your game whenever you reached a certain multiple of OOBs.
The community, historically, views the unseen Marblaxia as the Marble's arch-enemy. The planet where the Marble 'lives' is Marblius.
A feature that was cut was a Random Initial Position for Moving Platforms, so that they started in different spots on their path when the level was loaded (and restarted). Unsurprisingly it was requested by Matan for a laps level of his that never materialised.
Additional collectibles that were cut are Coins and Stars. Coins helped you unlock marble skins and levels, while collecting all Stars would unlock special levels that use a new Powerup, called Wings. Both had shapes and were collectible before their removal in 2015.
Cannon.cs caused more issues than we'd like to admit in just about every stage of development.
Due to how the rating system works, Arctic Inferno can technically award the player 31.88 Million points for destroying all Ice Shards. Thanks to the time limit, that's not possible.
