Hello racers,

Multiplayer, the big missing piece of V-Racer Hoverbike is coming!
We've recently run a few tests with friends and leaderboard superstar LittleBigMan, and it's shaping up very nicely.
Needless to say that combat races in multiplayer take the game to a whole new level!

We will roll out the feature in phases, starting with a first public test on the week-end of october 6th.

Everyone will be able to join, but we need to organize: the VR community is still quite small (and V-Racer's community is of course even smaller).
In order to find other players to compete against, the best way is to schedule play session.
To help you connect with other players, we have set up a discord channel where everyone interested is invited to meet other players and schedule multiplayer races.


Join us on discord

Well, join us on discord! We have an alpha ready, accessible on Steam with a code. We still need to tweak a few things, but we'd be happy to let you in earlier to help test.

In the game itself, it's simple as hell: just press the multiplayer button, and create a room. The room will automatically have your nickname on it so your friends can find it.
You can start to practice immediately in the room, even if you are alone, so there is no waiting. Whenever someone else joins, you will be taken back to the room config screen and can start a race together.
Other players who join while you are racing will be in spectator mode until the end of the race, when they can join the start line. Alternately, racers may choose to pause and quit the race to restart with newcomers.

Multiplayer offers both time trial and combat modes, on all tracks.

We have added a couple of new weapons to the mix: an eye gun that shoots in the direction you are looking at, and a killer drone that will chase the race leader to slow him down.
We also integrated player names on hoverbikes, a sneak preview of what's coming with the livery editor we are working on.



See you soon in discord!
Join us on discord

The VertexBreakers team.

Hello racers,

We wanted to share more info about the stuff we're working on at the moment.

Here is a preview of the livery editor, that will let you customize your bike in VR. The tool itself is great fun to play with already, and can be a great time waster ;-)
You'll be able to select parts paint color, add stickers and decals, choose your number, and even add your nickname, all in VR.



This will all be saved in your profile so that other players can see your cool design in time trials, on your photo mode screenshots andof course in multiplayer. We need to polish it a bit more before we can release it in the game, but it's already pretty powerful and we hope you're excited about this addition. Feel free to comment on this post with further suggestions, it's still time for us to tweak it!

Check out this video showing our artist Sipon customizing a Bike from A to Z:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rRHSWRYSKE0

Enjoy!

Next is... tracks with jumps, bends and loops! Stay tuned!

The Vertexbreakers team.

We added HPG France Circuit for simracers. This new challenging track will shortly be featured in the weekly challenge, so you’d better get trained quick! Next release in september will include tracks for sensation seekers with bends and a sci-fi environment.


We set up and achievement system to keep you challenged. We will regularly add new achievements to the list, and any suggestion on achievement types is welcome.



We worked on the result screen to include medals and a clearer presentation of your score. In combat race we now count hits and kills, and they are reflected in your earned XP. We started creating a ranking system too. Ranks are currently just numbers but we plan to improve them in the future.


Ok, this one we have to admit we are not particularly fond of, as we feel this is not how the game is originally intended to be player, but since several of you asked for it, we listened and added support for XBOX controller. When switching to that mode, the UI is interacted with by gazing and pressing the XBOX buttons, and during a race you don’t have to lean anymore. As mentioned above, we feel this reduces the immersion sensation and may also cause extra motion sickness so if you are happy with the original control scheme stay away from your XBOX controller ;-)

LittleBigMan leads the weekly challenge for the third time in a row! Are you going to let him have his way? Get on the Malaysia HGP circuit and give the man some competition :-)

The vertexbreakers team

We just setup our Twitch channel : http://www.twitch.tv/vertexbreakers/

We'll talk about V-Racer development, share some gameplay, and post Weekly challenge winner replay.

Please follow us to help us become a Twitch affiliate!

Hello racers, here is what we have in this third update:

Starting now, we’ll have some weekly challenges for you! Each week, participate in a worldwide time trial on a selected track with turbos. We’ll post the winner’s race replay on our youtube and twitch channel. On the main game screen, you can access the week’s challenge, or see winners from previous weeks. Later on, we may consolidate the scores into an on-going championship leaderboard.



We added EMP to your weapon arsenal! Coming next is a killer drone, that you can send out to slow down the race leader.
We also added an energy bar to up the tension during combat races. You can now “eat” options with the left controller’s button to regain energy if required.



We added HPG Australia Circuit for simracers, and Kovas Prime Reverse for combat mode fans. You now have ten tracks to choose from. More tracks are in the works, and we are experimenting with bends and jumps for sensation hungry players.



Steam community news are now displayed on the main screen, so you don’t have to go to the site to check out the latest posts about the game.



We tuned the engine sound a little, added distorsion to get something closer to a bike engine, as requested by several of you.
We also added some shake effects to the bike when racing out of the track or getting hit by weapons.
There are also weapon icons on the HUD, providing visual feedback about which option you currently have.

Have fun!

The VertexBreakers Team

We're preparing a new update and will release it pretty soon! Among other things, we have a new HGP Australia track, based on Albert Park. Here's a first preview :-)

Hello racers, here is what we have in this second update:



One of the top requests was to have more content in the game. So we’re starting to cover that with two brand new tracks: Kovas Prime is set on a desert planet and is great for arcade combat mode. It is more challenging than Vigo and Neopolis, with more slopes. HPG Malaysia Circuit is for simracers, based on the real Sepang track. We also added Vigo and Neopolis reverse tracks for those who are hungry enough. We have more tracks in the works coming in the next release!




Pause the game while racing or on the replay screen and you’ll be able to step into the scene, move around and take shots of the bikes and environment to share on your steam profile. These shots will also appear in the screen captures on the community hub. Remember we need to get the word out about the game, and screenshots help a lot. So let’s see how good you are at making these bikes look great! Share your best screenshots on the hub and vote for other players screenshots! We’ll also post the best ones on our facebook page regularly, with your steam nickname on them.


We’ve upped the game simulation rate from 50FPS to 90FPS. Some players reported that although the rendering rate was 90FPS on their machines, it felt like the game was actually at 50FPS. It may be hard to notice for some, but increasing the simulation rate to match the rendering rate results in a smoother experience.


Some of you want to be able to race for 15 laps instead of 2 in time trial. Or to have turbos. Or not to have turbos in combat mode. We added a “free ride” mode that lets you choose exactly how you want to race: lap count, opponent count, turbos, weapons? You decide!

The game is now available in spanish and chinese. If you want it in yet another language and can help with translation, please contact us!

Next update is planned for end of may.

Have fun!

The VertexBreakers Team

The first update is live on the beta branch! Right click on the game and select properties to switch to that branch if you want to test it, or just wait for a few days and it will be in the main release.

For this release we focused on fixing features based on the initial feedback that you provided, while the artists are hard at work on more tracks to complement existing ones. So here's what we've got in this update for you:


Some die hard drivers requested more sensations and commented that the tracks are too flat. We haven’t changed the tracks, but we added a comfort setting that lets you lean with the bike. By default, at 0%, the game doesn’t change. But the more you increase the setting towards 100%, the more you will lean with the bike as it turns. 100% means your head is “attached” to the bike and you get full leaning. This radically changes the perception and is not for the faint hearted as it increases the risk of motion sickness a lot. If you play with the slider, you will find what the best balance is for you between comfort and sensations. See more here: http://store.steampowered.com


We've gotten our hands on a device and tested it thoroughly to ensure everything works for WMR users. We've integrated WMR controller models with help tips just like the Oculus/Vive. WMR users, if you find any bugs, let us know!


Many of you said we should make the UI work with controllers instead of GearVR style gazing. So we got rid of that, and from now on all the UI works with controllers (point and use the trigger to select, change pointing hand by squeezing the trigger).

Also requested by several users, you can now reset your position when looking at the menus, if you want for instance to change orientation. Look at the tips on the controllers.

One player suggested that in time trial, having too many ghosts could be confusing. You can now choose how many you want in the select track UI. Choose 0 if you want to race alone, and up to 5 opponents at once. These opponents are selected from the leaderboard around you (so if you switch the leaderboard to friends, you will only race against your friend's ghosts).


Besides english and french, this build is localized in german (Thanks Mike, who also translated the store page!). Spanish is coming next. More importantly, we've set up a system to easily localize it in other languages via a google spreadsheet, so if you want the game in your language and feel like helping with the translation, please PM me and I'll set you up for that.


Ok, that feature wasn't requested by anyone, it's just us adding some "rate us" buttons in the UI. If you like the game, let the world know! We're not Electronic Arts, we don't have the required dollars to be in the front page of gaming sites, so let's use good ol' word of mouth on social networks, and that starts with ratings and sharing. If you're not into that, that's fine, just don't look at the bottom of the UI ;-)

Bug fix: music can now be turned off entirely.

Have fun!

The VertexBreakers Team

Hello racers!

First of all we'd like to thank every player that joined the community during the launch this weekend. This has been a thrill for us to hear your first reactions to the game!

In order to deliver updates, we've set up an alpha and beta branch. Alpha is for our own testing, beta is for public testing. Every time we publish an update, we will push it to beta first, and migrate it to the release if you don't report any show stopper bugs in the discussion.

For those willing to play the beta branch, right click on the application in steam, select properties. The last tab on the right is where you select the branch you want to play on (right now you will only see the alpha branch, but the beta will show as soon as we post the first beta).

So the first update is coming in a few moments (need to feed the kids first ;-), stay tuned!