With 2020, the consensus was that big, elaborate April Fools jokes were in poor taste what with the current global situation. Said situation is still going on to this day, as you may have noticed. Thus, we’ve decided to forgo even a throwaway joke and instead do a little info-drop for the upcoming TrotMania VI: Loopback to help make it up to our followers! We can confirm that at launch, the game will come with at least 20 new songs, including the following:

• The Magic of Friendship Grows
• Addict / Silva Hound feat. Michael Kovach & Chi-Chi
• Stop the Bats (Remix) / The Living Tombstone
• Daybreaker / Vylet Pony
• Poison Joke / TAPS feat. Bob E-Quine

We’re also revealing the following little teases:

• Another one of the tunes made for the Japanese dub of the Friendship is Magic series will be making its debut in this mix, it’s rather alliterative!
• Two of the above listed artists have another song in the setlist, in different categories than their confirmed appearance.
• A showtune that previously only appeared in remixed form is debuting in its original form.
• The following brony artists are making their series debut in this mix:
  • Age of Vinyl
  • Brittany Church
  • Coconeru
  • Hay Tea
  • Steven, A.D.
• An original song made for the TrotMania series will be available at launch!

We hope you’ll be discerning of any big pranks this year and hope you look forward to further news on Loopback! Content development is still relatively early on, the current setlist is still mostly in the chart creation phase and the graphic phase is a ways off, so it might be a while before there’s more news on that front.

If you missed the stream earlier, the cat’s out of the bag: TrotMania VI: Loopback is our next installment. We’re still in the planning stages of certain aspects, so I’m not going to reveal everything right off the bat, but there are some things I can talk about.

First and foremost, our theme is basically cyberpunk, and that is definitely not the Sun Beamer you know and love (in fact, that’s not even his name! But more on that at a later date). Secondly, this will be the first TrotMania to be built around the latest StepMania release in development, 5.3; it is only appropriate, given that it really is that much of an improvement in terms of performance and functionality over existing versions.

In terms of content, we’re planning on doing some rather major changes. Some things will remain similar to how we’ve done things before, but we will be trying a few new things for VI:

New challenges

“So they’re taking other worlds, corrupting them, and using the results against us…”

Alongside our standard difficulties (which will remain as they are in terms of style), we are planning to include more themed, alternate charts that, hopefully, will be more more varied and technical than what you’re used to.

We are not just here to dance…

“Another thing apparent is that they have a wider variety of tactics than what your counterparts had to deal with.”

StepMania is primarily known as “the DDR simulator”, but it can do much more. Through community contributions, we will be accepting charts in other game modes are being added or refurbished on 5.3, including 5-panel, guitar, drum, etc. This will apply to both TM VI songs, as well as earlier songs too.

Solidarity

You might have noticed the reference to “community contributions” under the last heading. In comparison to past editions of TrotMania, we are going to be opening up the development process a bit more. We’re a community that’s part of much bigger communities, so it’s only appropriate that you should be able to join in on the fun as well.

There will still be parts that will remain a surprise until we specifically unveil them (including the theme itself, some of the songs, etc.), but we are planning to have a formal process for openly submitting/vetting content — music, charts, etc.

Expect more information on all of these aspects over the next little while as things are ironed out and set up.

I guess you can say this event is going to be Euphorius.

It all begins May 16 at 2:00 p.m. ET; check out Burning Mare on Twitter for more information!

This patch ended up coming later than expected, as it was originally intended to be merely a hotfix for certain elements that were kept obscure at launch, but enough other tweaks and some content additions ended up coming along that it grew into this meaty thing!

Simplified Summary

• PrinceWhateverer’s Solidarity (In This Together) and Lavender’s Tic Tac Toe have been added to the game. The former was one of the final songs to hit #1 on the Equestrian Trot 100, and a truncated version of this simfile was included in the U.P.S. 5 tournament, in which one of our developers, RIME, reached the top 4! The latter was soft-revealed in our April Fools prank this year as a “fake” song from Hooves Coaster; this won’t be the last you see of that “event”, though don’t be so certain what form it will take…
• Lots and lots of lyric fixes abound, with a few songs that missed them now including them, some adjustments to timing and which lyrics get shown, and the color-coding being applied to the first mix’s applicable tracks in particular!
• The original songs made for the Royal Gauntlet boss system no longer use aliases, with their banners reflecting this as well.
• Other fixes for charts, media, and graphics!
• The preferred sort (the default in TrotMania V) has been updated, fixing a few missing songs and misplaced ones, in addition to adding placements for select third-party packs, including works from collaborators like Ben Speirs and the XX project!

Download

You can find the patch in the Downloads section of this site, in the general section. Because all installments are given updates, it’s recommended that you have all the packs loaded (and of course, make sure they are the refreshed versions released with Shrive or else there may be some file misoverlaps).

Full Changelog

TrotMania: Rhythm is Magic
-Updated following lyric files to be color-coded:
Art of the Dress
Becoming Popular (The Pony Everypony Should Know)
Daddy Discord
Diamond Dogs (Euro Dirt Mix)
Discord (Euro-Chaos Mix)
Discord (The Living Tombstone’s Mix)
Find a Pet
Flutter Girl
Good Girl (JoinedTheHerd Remix)
I Am No Hero
I Love Everything
The Land of Equestria
Love Bloom
Love is in Bloom (Remix)
Luna (DREAM Mode)
Make a New Dance Up
Octavia’s Overture
Oh Sweetie Belle
Opportunity
Picture Perfect Pony
Pony Swag
Smile Smile Smile [tweaked]
Spin That Record Vinyl Scratch
Winter Wrap Up [tweaked]
-Added lyric file for Babs Seed (The Living Tombstone’s Mix)

TrotMania Chrystalize
-Lyric files adjusted: Aloe Aloe, Mirai Start!, Nightmare Night, Until the Sun

TrotMania Aeternum Obscurum
-Lyric files adjusted: Beyond Her Tomb, Golden Light, Pony Rock Anthem

TrotMania Euphorius
-Lyrics files adjusted: Ashes, FluttERR, Ponies, Uptown Funk (YourEnigma Remix)
-Added lyric file for Onward

TrotMania Shrive
-Added following songs: Solidarity (In This Together), Tic Tac Toe
-Banners and credits for the Royal Gauntlet songs now list actual artists
-Updated graphics for Memories
-Updated charts and/or ratings for Cerebral Meltdown, The Outdoors (NATUREMiX), Fresh Princess of Friendship (Hybrid RMX), and Beep Beep I’m a Sheep
-Updated audio for Tea & Corruption
-Lyric files adjusted: Faster Than a Lightning, Understatement

General
-Modified Preferred sort to add new songs and tweak placements, in addition to supporting select third party packs.