Made a ton of progress and I am really excited to share it. The initial race animation this game had was always a bit of a placeholder, I could not get the new animation done at launch but I wasn't too far behind. Very excited to share these updates.
New: Real Track Oval, Real Race Animation
The straight lines and predictable finishes are gone! They are replaced with a nice looking oval and some dynamic racing.
Every event now also has start and finish behavior that matches the real world.
200m / 400m / 400m hurdles — properly staggered starts on the curve, so outside lanes start further forward to make up for the longer bend
800m — staggered for the first turn, then a real break line where the field cuts in to lane 1
1600m / 3200m — a waterfall start line, no lanes
The pacing is the real fix here. Every runner used to move with the same generic speed curve. Now each athlete's own stats are read against the event's demands to give them a real pacing shape.
On top of that a live leaderboard overlay now tracks the field in real time as the race unfolds. You can watch the order shift and see the time gap as they go.
Reworked: The Offseason
The old offseason was just a draw of 3 training cards and one button click. I've replaced that with a multiple beat sequence that adds a little more color to the game.
A rival check-in. If you've built up a rivalry over the season, you'll hear about where things stand, including your head-to-head record, your streak, and a look back at your last few meetings.
A location choice. You can go to Elite Camp, you can cross-train, etc.
A training focus, presented as a narrative vs. a pure stat choice
This will get updated again as I get the story right, but I want to move in this direction.
Also in This Update
Expanded world event pools with more variety
More rivalry content that is context-aware
New epilogue content across every career-tier ending
Fixed a problem where certain achievement unlocks weren't triggering their narrative beat
Thanks for playing, and let us know what you think.