Speed Blog: Story Campaign | Boss Fights and Other Teasers

It's time for another Speed Blog! We've already talked about the art style/setting, new modes, and characters in the previous entries. This time around, let's give some love to the story and lore of SpeedRunners since the sequel will continue the single-player campaign from the original game. Here we go!

Speed Blog 4: Story Campaign

I. GAMEPLAY & CONTENT

When it comes to how the story campaign is played, we have a few interesting additions in store for the community. One of them is brand new modes:

1. Classic

2. Lap Race: whoever completes a set number of circuits first wins

3. Skyfall Rush: a classic run, but with projectiles falling from above

4. Boss Battle

The Boss Battle mode is one of the most significant additions of the sequel. This is mostly inspired by classic 2D platformers.

Concept art for one of the bosses ☝️

Steam post image

ㅤ Daniel Winkler, game designer of SR2, says, "We were curious: 'Okay, what can we offer to people in single player to keep things fresh? What are the variations of the gameplay at our disposal?' This led to a new question: 'How would a boss fight look in Speedrunners?' Hopefully, we did a good enough job of figuring out how to make it fun!"

Another interesting gameplay experiment we decided to attempt is escape missions, where you race against the clock and must reach the end of a level.

The campaign will have an act-based structure; you'll be able to adjust the difficulty and replay chapters to rewatch the episodes or improve your score.

The player will take on the role of different runners from chapter to chapter. Earn XP along the way to unlock rewards like skins, banners, player titles, and more. The Campaign will also introduce you to the new characters, such as the poisonous frog Dart, and fresh levels.🌑

II. WELCOME BACK TO NEW RUSH CITY!

The SpeedRunners 2 story takes place after the events of the first game. Moonraker is back! - her fans will be delighted to find out she takes the center stage in King of Speed.

ㅤ"Moonraker's storyline from the original SpeedRunners - the one where she comes back in time to prevent the Falcon from taking over New Rush City - is our favorite SR comic book. Pretty annoying that it's so short,"Francisco Hernandez, SR2's game designer, says with a laugh. "Therefore, we all agreed to base the whole plot on that confrontation, with the Falcon making a comeback as the villain."

In addition to the Queen of the Moon, other beloved runners are making a comeback, like Hothead, Cosmonaut Comrade, Unic, and, of course, SpeedRunner himself. As we already mentioned, you'll get the chance to play as them in the Campaign, too.

Despite the fact that SpeedRunners is a competitive game where gameplay reigns supreme over other aspects, the story and lore have always been inseparable from the experience. When the SR2's development was in its infancy, we asked ourselves as a team: "Okay, what can we do to expand the game's lore and deepen the player's connection to character personalities?"

ㅤ Francisco Hernandez says, "It's just more fun to play any game where you know the character a little better. So, this was a great opportunity to let the runners shine and showcase some of their quirks through dialogue. I feel like you have a lot more fun playing as a certain hero when you have more info about their personality, background, how they communicate with others, and so on."

Humor is the major driving factor of the narrative. We want all of you to go on a light-hearted, reference-rich adventure that doesn't take itself too seriously while, of course, keeping its unique identity in focus. Also, expect to discover surprising details about the nature of some of the runners!

Fun fact: Our team considers the Psychonauts game series as one of our main inspirations when it comes to storytelling and writing.

That should do it for today, speedrunners! Let me know what you think about this Speed Blog in the comments. Also, sign up for the community playtest on our Steam page. It will kick off some time before the launch - we'll notify you all when it does.

Read the previous devblogs: Speed Blog 1: Transition to 3D, Alt Level Layouts Speed Blog 2: Double the Runners! Speed Blog 3: New Runners!.. And a Hint at What's Next?

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