STOPX | September 2023 News and Views

Introduction
Each month that STOPX goes through has kept getting better and better! STOPX is being discovered more than ever, and the data really shows it. With recent comments saying that this is a very fun modification to play, there are always ways we can improve. With positive comments and recent constructive feedback, we have been able to uphold our commitment to improve. What's more is that we're now being recognized as an "essential mod" from the Marble Blast web site, from members of the community, prominent and casual!
This tells us that STOPX has been getting more reception, and I encourage more prominent members of this community to give this extremely fun project a try. Tell us what you like or don't like about it - in other words, feel free to rate the game and suggest any improvements, I'm open to all. We're always updating and improving, and we want to help you enjoy STOPX.

Summary
We just concluded an awesome August with prizes from the July Jewels event going to our winners, which were Xeinox, BellMatt38, and Kecel. For those of you who weren't able to catch up on our recent article, check it out here. It lists the amount of Jewels that were collected, along with the recent major shakeup to the Marble Shop.
We also announced our next STOPX Event, which is called the Ultra Unlock Event. In this event, you will follow, join and subscribe to our media outlets in order to unlock a very big October event. For instance, if Jiquor's Twitch reaches 200 followers, if the Tekannabrand YouTube reaches 400 subscribers, or if the STOPX Discord reaches 150 members, development of DLC 6 will begin, with one new stage of DLC 6 releasing every week for the entirety of October. That means new Stages and awesome concepts like you've never seen before!
We had our recent Activity, the Mega Circuit Qualifying Construction Zone. Replacing "Not This Again...," which is Beginner Construction Zone 4, users were challenged to beat Stop Sign Circuit with a mega marble, under a 25 second time limit. We had a total of eleven submissions, which resulted in the requirements for the Ultra Unlock being greatly reduced. We are pleased to announce that Jean won the $10 Amazon Gift Card from the event, with a final time of 00:17.026. Congratulations! Our next activity will be happening in late September.
Speaking of the Marble Shop, STOP DeluXe 1.7uX (1.2) released on August 9, 2023. This major update included the Marble Catalog, which is a revamped version of our Marble Shop. We also added server-sided maintenance to limit how many updates we push, greatly reducing the amount of times anyone needs to update the game. World Record reporting was added, which allows users to report times that are considered illegitimate/game-breaking, and the STOPX Discord Server now has World Record messages. Many bugs were fixed, files were cut to downsize the game by 40 to 50 megabytes, and more. This recent update proved to be really positive amongst the STOPX Community, which includes outstanding reception for the Marble Catalog and the Maintenance Screen (which has gotten some laughs!)
We also received some awesome feedback from prominent members of this community, indicating that the rate of completion for STOPX is more of a "side game" to them, and that there's still a fair amount of stages that are considered "filler." This has allowed us to plan for our next major release, which we will be announcing in the coming months. Stay tuned, and thanks to all for your wonderful feedback!
Finally, we were able to recover a handful of old Constructor files from the STOP I era, but we're not giving up on finding them all. Our recent STOP I poll suggests that all the STOP I Stages will return, but they will all receive corrections, if possible. We're looking everywhere - drive after drive, backup after backup, and disk after disk - enough to hopefully find what is missing so we can make the necessary hotfixes to STOP I before we release it on STOPX. Stay tuned for more news on STOP I's port to STOPX. It's going to be really exciting.



Playing STOPX
We also had the opportunity to ask the same community (the Marble Blast Community) about why they haven't tried this awesome project yet. We got a lot of amazing results, particularly from Mazik and Weather. Take a look at some of their responses below.

A large reason why I haven't played STOPX is simply because I lack the time to really sit down and play it...I still have goals I want to achieve in both MBG/PQ, and Marble it Up... For me personally, if I am going to be touching a marble blast mod, I evidently will want to speedrun it... If I am going to put that much effort into something, I might as well do it for the things that matter most to me.

- Mazik, 02 Aug 2023 at 19:31.

The only reason I played a substantial amount of any game this year is community... STOPX looks like one of the best mods because of all the effort put into it and its community, and that may be what sustains the community in the future.

- Weather, 03 Aug 2023 at 02:18.

What does this tell us? It tells us that the de-facto fan made modification, PlatinumQuest (PQ) has tasks and features which prominent members of the Marble Blast Community seem to prioritize more. And with PQ being the de-facto modification, this makes a ton of sense, since there are awards, colored names, and a sandbox network to support the game and its Marble Blast Forums. Part of what makes up PlatinumQuest's average rate of 100 users a day is partially because of this, but we're catching up. With thoughts of a new domain for Tekannabrand on the rise and a major overhaul to how you finish the STOPX Story, we can only hope this will bring more players together as this successful project continues to move forward. One month at a time.


Statistics
Speaking of us catching up to the de-facto fan mod PlatinumQuest, we're doing a lot better every month. Below is a graph from August 1 to September 1, containing how many users have logged into STOPX daily, weekly, and monthly. There is also a chart that contains how many times the game has been downloaded each day.

We are averaging 22 users a day, 38 users a week, 43 users a month (July-August), with an average of 8 downloads a day. This is strikingly major compared to other modifications found on the rest of the site, which, in terms of Marble Blast traffic, is exceptional. We will continue to monitor these numbers and create awesome content for everybody as best as possible.
This is great, because like I said, PQ only gets around 100 average users a day, and while we still have a long way to go, STOPX is getting recognized enough to even be considered a "big dog" project by casual members and prominent members alike. When asked what games are recommended on-site, many people point PQ, GLC4, MBPU, and STOPX as popular choices, with some members considering PQ and STOPX as the two big ones. This reassures us, because for many years, many people would pay attention to/majorly consider one project (PQ) and not pay close enough attention/talk about other projects. But that scope seems to be changing, which is simply amazing. This reception helps us know that we can accomplish anything!

The Ultra Unlock Event
Just recently, we announced the Ultra Unlock Event, which is (you guessed it!) unlocked by the amount of followers we have on Jiquor's Twitch. Not only that, but we are expanding our count to YouTube and the STOPX Discord Server. Take a look below for what numbers you need to unlock what, which will also be updated in the STOPX Discord Server:

200 TWITCH FOLLOWERS | 400 YOUTUBE SUBSCRIPTIONS | 150 DISCORD MEMBERS
NEW BONUS STAGES: DLC 6 (ONE PER WEEK, OCTOBER!)

150 TWITCH FOLLOWERS | 360 YOUTUBE SUBSCRIPTIONS | 130 DISCORD MEMBERS
New DLC 5 activity during the Halloween Event! New Elite Marble, $30 Gift Card to 1st Place Winner!

130 TWITCH FOLLOWERS | 350 YOUTUBE SUBSCRIPTIONS | 120 DISCORD MEMBERS
Cost to skip Stages reduced by 50%!

125 TWITCH FOLLOWERS | 340 YOUTUBE SUBSCRIPTIONS | 125 DISCORD MEMBERS
3x Pentagon Earnings for completing Stages for the first time! (3 TO GO!)

120 TWITCH FOLLOWERS | 320 YOUTUBE SUBSCRIPTIONS | 100 DISCORD MEMBERS
Some off-sale marbles will return! (UNLOCKED!)

If any of these numbers are reached before October 1 at midnight, we will launch those portions of the Ultra Unlock event promptly, and that schedule will be available on the STOPX News and Views post for October.

100 Discord Members
Well done! STOPX has just hit 100 Discord Members. We are going to be making a new marble available on STOP DeluXe to celebrate this milestone. You will be able to sign on and buy it for the next seven days at the time of upload. This news and views post will be updated when the newest Elite Marble and the Happy 100 Day marble is complete.
You can also join the Discord server and list your feedback suggestions in #feedback. There is also a new form coming up which will discuss STOPX's future and I encourage you all to participate in that discussion. For those who have continued to play STOPX, thanks for your support. There will be more to come, especially once we move web sites.

Best Regards,
The STOPX Team
Tekannabrand