WHAT'S NEW?

The team premise was that the driving mode, launched with the Hot Wheels level, was the beginning of an exciting path for the game and level creation. We knew players liked the previous mode, but it was too simple as a first iteration. Our main goal was to expand this driving experience to make it significantly more profound, compelling, and engaging.

But, of course, there are tons of ways to do that. So after an intense ideation and brainstorming process, we decided to start by making a physics-based game mode, reworking the base controls, and adding a few more mechanics as the jump and nitro boost.

To reinforce the new mechanics, we needed a new level that enhanced our players' competitive nature with thrilling races through an exciting environment, overtaking opportunities, and shortcut paths accessible only by jumping (to name a few), and that's how Turbo Temple layout and theming came up.

GETTING LOST AT THE JUNGLE TEMPLE

The theme and level exploration process was enjoyable; after some conceptualization meetings, we liked bringing the lost jungle temple feeling to the racing mode. To accomplish this, our Concept Artist used as inspiration some of our beloved arcade games and movies and even made a small recall to our Stumble Lost Temple level. Ensuring to conserve Stumble Guys' iconic rebellious look before passing it over to the Art 3D team to create the models and start set dressing.

The level features recognizable thematic surroundings and gives a feeling of driving through a jungle with ancient ruins. Each map zone presents different assets in the Stumble style, such as:

• Gold Stumbler's statues start and finish line;
• Palm trees, bushes, rocks, and mountains, really greenish views;
• Ancient ruins remains and columns with mysterious symbols on the walls;
• Elevated wooden bridge players drive across;
• A giant creature's mouth will welcome you into the temple;
• Beautiful jade temple interior and golden exit stairs;
• Moving logs, swinging axes, and water hole traps on the way;

All these assets were also part of a vast topic: preserving the speed sensation of getting behind the wheel not only on the vehicle balancing but also on the level itself. On a mutual effort between design and art, we added on the trackside a variety of size and distance elements to create a parallax effect and peripheral vision when driving, like palm trees, rocks, mountains, arches that forecast shadows on the track, different track textures, set dressing, boost FOV (zoom out camera effect)… Altogether increases the feeling of speed because you're gaining the illusion of seeing the landscape fly by as you drive fast.

A DEEP JUMP ON NITRO BOOST

One of the most significant features of Turbo Temple is the Nitro Boost.

If you still need to play Turbo Temple, you must first hit the Nitro Button to activate it. This gives a significant acceleration boost on both ground and mid-air that slowly burns through your bottle tank, decreasing til emptied and refilling back over time.

Nitro is useful when you need to overtake other players in front of you, get out of curves after crashing or respawning, and reach your max straight-line speed. The Nitro effect lasts for a few seconds, so strategically use your nitro when you need that extra short burst. Our developers love to use this extra boost just before jumping and hitting the air to get a higher mid-air speed over other players.

**Pro tip: **Nitro usage can be combined with a booster pad or/and a ramp to multiply its effect. When these elements are used separately, you'll notice that each provides a different intensity of speed boost. So, combine as many boost elements as possible with driving through the level like a pro.

Ready, Set, Go!

Buggy, Convertible, and Monster are instantly recognizable icons of different racing competitions, making them the perfect choice for our base vehicle archetypes. Currently, the three share the same balancing behavior: engine force, weight mass, jumping, steering, and nitro. Although the feeling might be perceived as different.

For our car models, we wanted to create the base for our archetypes. Buggy: lightweight, meaning sparse bodywork with a light "cage" frame. Convertible: rounded shapes, pointy end, and spoiler. Monster: boxy shape, height feeling, bigger wheels, frontal and back bumper. So you'll find yourself driving the track with a different car, feeling a unique experience every time you play.

Final thoughts and comments.

We wanted players to try out all new improvements, controls, nitro, jump, and our new map with shortcuts, sharp curves, wallride, and much more. So, as you can imagine creating new gameplay is an iterative process; we have more ideas on the backlog, so driving mode it's intended to continue evolving and improving.

Thanks for sharing your feedback about your experience playing Turbo Temple. We want to let you know we listened! Based on the feedback we have heard in the Discord community, we will have base speed boosted to make your playing experience even better!

This will come as fast as possible, so please bear with us while we work on it!

And that's it! Turbo Temple level and the new driving mode await you to play! Check out our social channels and join our Discord server to follow the discussion with our community of players!

See you at the racetrack!

Blog by Baker, Lead Game Designer.