For the past year I've been working on Geo Racers, a free to play web game where you have to race from one side of the world to another just using public transport. It's inspired by the BBC show "Race across the world".
It's early stages but any feedback on the game it's greatly recieved.
Really like the game so far. Here's what I noticed and what I'd like to see after my first play though:
1. There should be an 'easy mode' where your money goes into the red, but you're still allowed to spend whatever to get to the end. It would be nice to see I'm $-14,952 in the hole, but I made it (with the ultimate objective to get to the destination while in the black).
2. The bottom overlays overlap. I was taking a ferry from Dublin, and tried to queue up walking to the hotel. The hotel overlay popped up under the "Skip this Ride" message. I don't really care if I can queue up actions, but the stacked overlays were unsightly.
3. I would say LEAVE THE SURPRISES. It was enjoyable to get blind-sighted by having to change my currency in the UK and the fact I lost an hour due to time zone changes.
I do wish I could do some in-game research—like show just train/bus stations that have international lines. Perhaps identify hotels with general affordability (€, vs. €€€).
I love this, but I'm thwarted. Apparently there are no trains from London Waterloo (one of the UKs busiest railway stations) at 1902. I've been stuck there waiting for trains for so many years I can tell you that's not the case :)
Hi! I got stuck in London. I walked around to a bunch of train stations at around 10PM on Monday night and there was nothing showing up in the timetables. Same for the next morning. I then walked to Portsmouth and the Portsmouth harbor also showed no boats. The API call was https://geo-racers.com/api/boats?from_id=43128&time=07:02&da... seems odd to me?
I had a lot of fun :) . Cleaning up the leader board would be appreciated though. Seeing adolf hilter everywhere is ... something.
There also seem to be a bug where the game doesn't always spawn you where it should. Selected Galeway to Roma and was put in scotland with only euros and no banks around. Probably how some people manage to get was seems to be impossible score
So cool! Couple of minor bugs - I can click banks / hotels and use them without being near them, also many hotels in ex Paris do not show up as usable, neither does the Paris metro. Still, super fun to play.
Yeah I didn't implement that as in the show they don't let you look anything up but quite a few people have mentioned it would be useful. I think I will add
- A minimap to all the timetables that show visibly where the transport goes
- A tourist information center in town and city centers you can use to find out other information
How do I ride public transport on mobile? I've managed to get the timetable to pop up a few times by clicking around randomly, but there's no obvious button or action for this. I take it you have to actually be at the station to be able to see them?
* At Dublin ferry port, only port 5 was clickable.
* Card payments should be an option. Nobody would use cash like this.
* Banks aren't open at 10PM. In fact, banks are hardly open at all.
* You can change money at a Post Office or supermarket.
Just remove the work part man. It's incredibly frustrating when you run out of money. Add some credit card loan or something and your final score is the amount of money you have left. Also, add teleport button—I clicked the big red button thinking it would transport me instantly. Only to be dropped off to in the middle of nowhere. And when you select a departure from train station, it should auto-select the end-stop, so you don't have to scroll down and click it (which is non-obvious btw that you have to)
The reason you have to work is because the game is based on a BBC show called "Race across the world" where you have to race from point A to point B with the money equivalent of an air fare for the journey.
If you run out of money in the show or your funds are running low you can work to earn more money. So that's why I added that feature. I do think it adds a extra layer to the game as it's something you always have to think about
I love the game thus far! I will say it is difficult to find work. I nearly went bankrupt cause I travelled to a large city thinking I could find work, but it didn't pay enough for a hotel room. Knowing how much it costs to get to a city via train/bus/taxi would help a lot.
When I select a destination at a bus stop or train station the listings only show the specifics but not the city itself. This kind of defeats the whole purpose as its essentially randomly clicking around
Neat game! I would like the map to have a scale bar though. It would also be useful to see train station timetables while somewhere else to plan ahead.
Floating points for currencies :/
"You only have 306.99999999999994 GBP, you can't exchange 307. "
Bought a ferry ticket, it told me I am close enough to board. The usual popup for advancing time to leaving time didn't show up. Decided to speed up time and wait it manually it just kept going without getting in until 2am when out of hotel triggered game over.
One of the 2 terminals in Cherbourg France, the city you reach by traveling from Dublin to France, but not the one I arrived in. It only had routes to England.
idea is absolutely lovely, but it is really hard to plan ahead without consulting with google maps about possible directions from your next stop - I understand this is part of the challenge, however some QoL changes like visualizing 1st or 2nd tier connections could be super helpful
Its all the same to me. An airport is probably the last place i want to be at and driving in a foreign country is something i find more stressfull than utilising the public transport there.
Similar thing here. Was in a ferry from Ireland to France and got a penalty for not being in a hotel. How is 20 hour ferry not considered an overnight transport.
Just did Galway-Rome and enjoyed it! I'll check back in a while when you've had time to implement the minimap and tourist center, as you wrote elsewhere.
What was weird: Paris did not seem to have any public transport - I had to walk from one train station to another for 70 minutes, and the only bus I could find was an overland bus, not an inner city one.
Also, it's a bit unintuitive that the "Journey Details" at the end start at nine hours — to me, when I begin my journey at 9 'o clock, that is hour zero.
You can see several problems : I've deselected bus stations, boat stations, etc but they're still displayed. Time is frozen, my bus isn't coming, I'm stuck in Almeria, too bad !
Here's what's in the console:
Uncaught TypeError: can't access property "geometry", xe is undefined
lr App.vue:984
callback App.vue:2183
rr App.vue:894
App.vue:984:25
* If there's a time limit, there's no way to know. I'm currently on my 3rd day travelling :)
* I was waiting for my bus and I had forgotten the exact time. There is no way to know until it starts :)
* While riding the bus I can't seem to be able to push speed over 100x. A Paris-Barcelona bus ride is long, even at 100x :) Later on a second bus, I could. Weird...
* You should explain that "banks", "bus stations" etc are special game icons, not actual banks and bus stops on the map :) I was in Paris trying to change money in the "money exchange" at Gare du Nord, and I tried a while to do something until I understood that you can only use the special "Bank" icons.
* In Almeria, the busses look like the regular city network. I tried taking one, but the game is now frozen... It's time for my bus, but nothing happens.
Hello I'm Chris the creator!
For the past year I've been working on Geo Racers, a free to play web game where you have to race from one side of the world to another just using public transport. It's inspired by the BBC show "Race across the world".
It's early stages but any feedback on the game it's greatly recieved.
Really like the game so far. Here's what I noticed and what I'd like to see after my first play though:
1. There should be an 'easy mode' where your money goes into the red, but you're still allowed to spend whatever to get to the end. It would be nice to see I'm $-14,952 in the hole, but I made it (with the ultimate objective to get to the destination while in the black).
2. The bottom overlays overlap. I was taking a ferry from Dublin, and tried to queue up walking to the hotel. The hotel overlay popped up under the "Skip this Ride" message. I don't really care if I can queue up actions, but the stacked overlays were unsightly.
3. I would say LEAVE THE SURPRISES. It was enjoyable to get blind-sighted by having to change my currency in the UK and the fact I lost an hour due to time zone changes.
Good work. Keep it up.
I think the "limited budget" mechanic should be scrapped - instead make the budget unlimited but rank the submissions based on the lowest budget.
Well, my run-through had no banks in the UK that I could find, so that was tough.
I do wish I could do some in-game research—like show just train/bus stations that have international lines. Perhaps identify hotels with general affordability (€, vs. €€€).
I love this, but I'm thwarted. Apparently there are no trains from London Waterloo (one of the UKs busiest railway stations) at 1902. I've been stuck there waiting for trains for so many years I can tell you that's not the case :)
Hi! I got stuck in London. I walked around to a bunch of train stations at around 10PM on Monday night and there was nothing showing up in the timetables. Same for the next morning. I then walked to Portsmouth and the Portsmouth harbor also showed no boats. The API call was https://geo-racers.com/api/boats?from_id=43128&time=07:02&da... seems odd to me?
I had a lot of fun :) . Cleaning up the leader board would be appreciated though. Seeing adolf hilter everywhere is ... something.
There also seem to be a bug where the game doesn't always spawn you where it should. Selected Galeway to Roma and was put in scotland with only euros and no banks around. Probably how some people manage to get was seems to be impossible score
My wife thinks it looks like stress.
– Checking/unchecking some items does not appear to toggle their visibility. (Safari, MacOS).
— As another pointed out, walked to a hotel, could not enter hotel (too far off road?).
This rules! What a fun idea.
I couldn't get the "Walk Here"/"Taxi Here" tooltip pop-up to stay open on Firefox when clicking on a train station, but it's working in Chrome.
So cool! Couple of minor bugs - I can click banks / hotels and use them without being near them, also many hotels in ex Paris do not show up as usable, neither does the Paris metro. Still, super fun to play.
Some other features I'd love to see: - Ability to check transit timetables without going there - Metros / Tubes / Subways for in-city transit
Hit a wall going to Plymouth when I should have gone to Portsmouth, but had no way to check which one had the ferry I needed.
In BBC's "Race across the world" you aren't allowed a mobile phone to check timetables, so I guess this is in the spirit of that game.
Yeah I didn't implement that as in the show they don't let you look anything up but quite a few people have mentioned it would be useful. I think I will add
- A minimap to all the timetables that show visibly where the transport goes - A tourist information center in town and city centers you can use to find out other information
That'd be cool! Or maybe just going to any train/bus station gives you the timetables for all of them, so you don't have to add another thing.
Def ran into issues on my second play - there were no trains from Waterloo, nor any boats from Plymouth or Portsmouth.
Shows a lot of promise. Can't wait for it to improve some of the core systems just a little, will be very addictive.
No hotel accepts cash nowadays, there is absolutely no need to exchange currency basically ever. I would remove that part of the game.
Too bad apparently you can't ride bus and metro in London, Paris, etc.
I highlighted a train station, clicked "walk here," and nothing happened. I sped up time and I did not move.
I gave up.
Also, an introduction explaining what the game is would be good rather than just asking for a player name and dropping the user into the game.
How do I ride public transport on mobile? I've managed to get the timetable to pop up a few times by clicking around randomly, but there's no obvious button or action for this. I take it you have to actually be at the station to be able to see them?
A few feedback bits:
* At Dublin ferry port, only port 5 was clickable. * Card payments should be an option. Nobody would use cash like this. * Banks aren't open at 10PM. In fact, banks are hardly open at all. * You can change money at a Post Office or supermarket.
The game has increased my appreciation of the airplane as a mode of transport, unfortunately
I'm surprised how walkable Galway is, tbh
Just remove the work part man. It's incredibly frustrating when you run out of money. Add some credit card loan or something and your final score is the amount of money you have left. Also, add teleport button—I clicked the big red button thinking it would transport me instantly. Only to be dropped off to in the middle of nowhere. And when you select a departure from train station, it should auto-select the end-stop, so you don't have to scroll down and click it (which is non-obvious btw that you have to)
The reason you have to work is because the game is based on a BBC show called "Race across the world" where you have to race from point A to point B with the money equivalent of an air fare for the journey.
If you run out of money in the show or your funds are running low you can work to earn more money. So that's why I added that feature. I do think it adds a extra layer to the game as it's something you always have to think about
I love the game thus far! I will say it is difficult to find work. I nearly went bankrupt cause I travelled to a large city thinking I could find work, but it didn't pay enough for a hotel room. Knowing how much it costs to get to a city via train/bus/taxi would help a lot.
I love the idea, but the whole interface is very twitchy for me. Tried Safari & Firefox on my MacBook Air M1.
When I select a destination at a bus stop or train station the listings only show the specifics but not the city itself. This kind of defeats the whole purpose as its essentially randomly clicking around
Neat game! I would like the map to have a scale bar though. It would also be useful to see train station timetables while somewhere else to plan ahead.
Floating points for currencies :/ "You only have 306.99999999999994 GBP, you can't exchange 307. "
Took a ferry to France, got a screen saying "Welcome to France", then it dumped me in the middle of the channel.
Bought a ferry ticket, it told me I am close enough to board. The usual popup for advancing time to leaving time didn't show up. Decided to speed up time and wait it manually it just kept going without getting in until 2am when out of hotel triggered game over.
Hmm, that's not good. Where was the ferry from and to?
One of the 2 terminals in Cherbourg France, the city you reach by traveling from Dublin to France, but not the one I arrived in. It only had routes to England.
I started Galeway-Rome but when I toogle Bus Stations they don't disappear.
They do disappear together with with the toggle for train station. I.e. I can't view train stations only.
idea is absolutely lovely, but it is really hard to plan ahead without consulting with google maps about possible directions from your next stop - I understand this is part of the challenge, however some QoL changes like visualizing 1st or 2nd tier connections could be super helpful
I'll be keeping an eye on this one!
Really conveys the stress and horror of traveling by public transit.
I think it's kind of fun. It's the sport of it, good chap. I mean, the 1000's of transfers mate.
Transcontinental road/rail/sea transport would probably be a lot better if the airplane didn't exist
Its all the same to me. An airport is probably the last place i want to be at and driving in a foreign country is something i find more stressfull than utilising the public transport there.
It's the 5000 transfers that I am talking about.
This is fantastic fun. Cheers!
What an incredible idea! Love it, will spend some monopoly money on it!!
Huge login form for a landing page without as much of a video of what's going on is a shot in the foot
There's a 'continue as guest' option at the bottom of that form. But yeah that was also my immediate impression.
You can just enter any name to play as a guest
It's like JetLag the Game, but without ever leaving your house!
The login screen overflows my screen, and it won't pinch zoom smaller.
Nice job! It would be helpful when using public transportation to see the names of places overlaid on the map.
Was on an overnight bus and ended with game over
Similar thing here. Was in a ferry from Ireland to France and got a penalty for not being in a hotel. How is 20 hour ferry not considered an overnight transport.
Yeah i was an hour from boarding my overnight bus and it seems i got game over for not being at a hotel.
>There are just 2 rules 1. You can't fly 2. You must be in a hotel by 2am unless you have overnight transport
Guess the "have" doesn't work as i thought.
I loved the idea. Playing around
Just did Galway-Rome and enjoyed it! I'll check back in a while when you've had time to implement the minimap and tourist center, as you wrote elsewhere.
What was weird: Paris did not seem to have any public transport - I had to walk from one train station to another for 70 minutes, and the only bus I could find was an overland bus, not an inner city one.
Also, it's a bit unintuitive that the "Journey Details" at the end start at nine hours — to me, when I begin my journey at 9 'o clock, that is hour zero.
Love the idea!
So here I am, it's frozen there: https://demo.intellique.org/nextcloud/index.php/apps/files_s...
You can see several problems : I've deselected bus stations, boat stations, etc but they're still displayed. Time is frozen, my bus isn't coming, I'm stuck in Almeria, too bad !
Here's what's in the console:
Nitpicks :
* If there's a time limit, there's no way to know. I'm currently on my 3rd day travelling :) * I was waiting for my bus and I had forgotten the exact time. There is no way to know until it starts :) * While riding the bus I can't seem to be able to push speed over 100x. A Paris-Barcelona bus ride is long, even at 100x :) Later on a second bus, I could. Weird... * You should explain that "banks", "bus stations" etc are special game icons, not actual banks and bus stops on the map :) I was in Paris trying to change money in the "money exchange" at Gare du Nord, and I tried a while to do something until I understood that you can only use the special "Bank" icons. * In Almeria, the busses look like the regular city network. I tried taking one, but the game is now frozen... It's time for my bus, but nothing happens.