I’ve been solo developing a parkour game, called Freerunners in my spare time over the last couple of years!
I launched a Demo version of the game back in September (2023). Since then I’ve been busy working away on the rest of the full game and I just released my fourth update to the playable Demo!
Play the demo on Steam for free HERE
Even though I’ve been working on the full game behind the scenes, a by-product is that I end up fixing and improving elements that are in the playable Demo that’s live at the moment. So when I feel like I’ve improved the game enough, I cook off another demo build and update the live builds on Steam and itch for people to play!
For example, the most recent update includes a first pass at localisation into: French, Spanish, Russian and Simplified Chinese! I’m sure some of the translations are a bit wonky at the moment but getting this in was a big step towards me finishing the game.
It’s been great to see people playing the game and I’ve been implementing feedback based on watching people play.
Below is a changelist of updates made to the Demo build since its September launch:
Game now localised in English, French, Spanish, Russian and Simplified Chinese
New UI in character create and options menu to switch between languages
Updated controller icons to be more readable and of a consistent style throughout
The climb-up obstacle prompt now says "Hold" as well as the button icon, to make it clearer that's what you need to do to climb-up
Obstacles/interactable control prompts can now show keyboard keys (before they would only show controller prompt, regardless of if you were using a controller or keyboard)
Updated the start video (re-did the best played with a controller part)
Art improvements (New graffiti, smaller assets added to fill out the look of levels, more background art)
Moved the start position of Teacher Tim in some of the levels to give a better flow to the levels
Misc tweaks to the UI (for example, end screen star rating now has a little extra padding)
Reworked the pause screen keyboard controls image to hopefully be more clear
Optimised some tutorial videos
Optimisations to the level art and some blueprints
Shortened the tutorial texts where possible and tweaked the wording to make more sense hopefully
Added some new tutorial texts in-game to help the player out (e.g. added tutorial billboard to teach players they can climb down onto ledges)
Rounded edges of some gameplay HUD UI to fit the style of the game more
New game launching screen image
New project icon (one in the taskbar)
New button sounds in the character create
Fixed character flicker on climbing down onto ledges
Fixed bugs where the mouse wouldn't show in certain menus if you were using the controller and switched to mouse and keyboard
Fixes to the wrong voices playing with the start and end dialogues
Fixed players feet going into floor in the end sequence on chapter01 level 10
Fixed bug on chapter01 level 10 where you could see the cinematic version of Tim, in the initial camera pan that was for the cutscene, when he should have been invisible
Fixed misc bugs to do with obstacle prompts showing and hiding
Fix for HUD bug where the failed screen could appear while you were in the start area sometimes
Fixed wood balance objects so they now make the correct wood footstep sounds when walking on them
Fixes added for a bug where Ai could sometimes be invisible after they died
Fixed a bug where a stored move wasn't getting cleared, which could cause you to do a wall jump when it shouldn't
Art fixes ( e.g. Less aggressive LODs in places, collision bugs, lighting)
Fixed a bug where ledge grab icons would flicker when you first grab on
Fixed a bug where some of the predictive controls stuff could cause you to double jump off walls even if you hadn't pressed jump
Fixed some misc UI look bugs
Fixed some spelling issues
Like I said I’ve been solo making the game in my spare time for the last couple of years. It’s taken a while to get to this point but I’m super happy with the progress I’ve made.
So give the latest DEMO build a go and let me know what you think!