Slingshot Speeders v0.1.3 — sign in with Google, MapMake, Season Alpha
Slingshot Speeders v0.1.3 is up on https://slingshotspeeders.com/. Play in the browser. No install.
Home
- Home is MENU plus Sign in with Google. Account, standings, FAQ, and the rest live on their own pages.
- Sign in with Google sits on home next to HOW TO PLAY. YOUR RUNS follows that account.
- YOUR RUNS has SIGN OUT when you are signed in.
- Signed-in pilots get a public profile (
/u/…) with rating, Season Alpha points, Trefoil Elo, and Watch links. - Profile links are a short code, not a row number. Gold names like
/u/jamesstay. - Public profile names homemade maps, shows career totals (distance, Δv, time, maps won), and paints an alpha supporter gold name.
- Profile and Usage plot each stat on its own chart — distance, Δv, time, plays, and wins, not stacked on one graph.
- Home ALPHA SUPPORTER COMMUNITY MAPS is open whether you are signed in or not. MapMake stays for signed-in alpha supporters.
- MapMake has one HOME. The ship HUD (speed, Δv, chips) only shows when you PLAY the draft.
- STANDINGS is Season Alpha: championship points from SCORE / TIME / Δv, and a separate Trefoil Elo. It resets when Season 0 starts.
- Home maps are Easy, then Medium, then Hard. Temple is Medium. Rendezvous is last (Hard).
- Prime is the beginner map: two small wells side by side. Start clockwise on the left; capture the green ring on the right.
- Temple no longer has a New! mark.
- MENU closes when you click off it.
- MENU Sign out sits at the bottom when you are signed in. Hover stays inside the panel.
- MENU has Race standard — the Stock ship every public board uses.
- Signed in? PLAY uses your name. No YOUR NAME prompt. Alpha supporter names are gold on SCORE / TIME / Δv.
- SCORE and TIME numbers are white, so gold names stand out.
- SCORE / TIME / Δv headers are white with a border when selected — not gold.
- 1 flying is white, in a small outline next to the map name.
- Profile tabs switch — Maps, History, Trefoil, Share.
- Copy link lives on Share. Sign out is in Menu. Alpha supporter is a gold badge next to the name. The round portrait is the trefoil.
- FAQ answers how Season Alpha ranks work — championship points, the 0–1000 rating, and Trefoil Elo.
Play
- A 3 · 2 · 1 counts you in before the ship moves. The clock and the tape start when it hits zero. Restart is a quick 1.
- Official runs save after the 3-2-1 — Orion and the rest.
- Other pilots flying the same map show up beside you, dimmed. They cannot push you or crash you, and your run is still your own.
- Empty tank is not a lose. You keep coasting. Crash or the 10-minute cap still ends the run. On Trefoil you can burn the last of the tank and glide over the line.
- Trefoil fastest only lists real finishes. A crash is not 0s.
- Trefoil RECENT / FASTEST turn white with a border when selected.
- Every map has a JOIN card now, and home shows how many pilots are on each one.
- Home map names say 1 flying when someone is on that map — not a missing-font box.
- Spectate: SHIP / WORLD / FREE at the bottom, and LOBBY opens the JOIN card so you can fly or watch again without going home.
- Homemade maps capture a closed orbit in the green ring, same as Orion.
- Capture needs a full loop inside the green ring. A nearby well yanking you out the other side does not count.
- A closed orbit inside the green ring is a win even if another well would tug it later.
- A win on a homemade map shows up on that map's SCORE / TIME / Δv so you can watch it.
- Homemade maps with moving wells start those wells in the same place every play.
Ship
- Kill-rot dumps spin faster and stops clean. It no longer crawls at the end.
- RCS and Q/E jets shoot out the way they push, same white exhaust as the main engine.
- The stock ship leaves a white exhaust trail when you burn the main engine.
- Main-engine smoke is left behind the ship and fades, not stuck to the tail.
- Main-engine exhaust is smoke left behind the ship — no tail flame.
- Main-engine smoke is a wider plume and hangs a bit longer.
- Afterburn throws a bigger, faster jet than regular main. Exhaust puffs are finer and shoot out quicker.
- 5 hides the trajectory line. Same control in Watch. 4 is still arrows.
- The trajectory line is back in play. 5 still hides it.
- Every well now draws a faint outer circle: that is how far its gravity reaches before it fades to nothing. The ring is quieter so it does not shout over the well.
Watch
- After rewind hits the start, 1x plays again. You do not have to tap PLAY.
- Afterburn marks on the flown path are twice as long as regular burns.
- A gold name on Watch opens that alpha supporter's profile.
- That name is a light gold chip with dark gold type — not a green SHARE button.
- Links open the tape without flashing home first.
[at 1x rewinds. Speed goes-1x,-2x, and so on. SHIP / WORLD / FREE sit under play with PATH.- Path rotate marks match live Q/E, and the arrow heads are larger.
- Rotate icons on the flown path follow Q and E.
- Pink and red burn arrows point the way you thrust, not along the flown path.
- Burn arrows are longer, thinner darts, spaced out along a held burn instead of stacking up.
- Time slider: grab the dot.
- Rewind (
|<<) jumps to the start of the tape.<</>>still skip 5 s. - Scrubbing lands on the time you dragged to, and the transport bar is wider so the slider has room.
MapMake
- Drag a well's edge to resize it. Bigger wells pull harder and reach further — twice the radius is four times the pull. Grab the middle to move it, the rim to resize it. Pushers and moving wells work the same way.
- The trajectory line follows a moving N-body the same way it does on Planet & Moon.
- Park a closed orbit in the green ring to win. The circle does not have to sit exactly on the well.
- Drag the start pad to move it. Drag the gold stick to set heading and speed.
- Drag an N-body's gold stick to set its starting speed.
- Deleting a moving well takes it off the map.
Alpha supporter maps
- The community shelf is Alpha Supporter Community Maps. The $10 pack is alpha supporters.
- Supporter Community Maps is the shelf of maps from supporters. Cards say who saved them and when.
- Alpha Supporter Community Maps has NEW MAP.
- SUBMIT a community map asks you to name it (20 characters). Recent runs and profiles show that name, not HOMEMADE.
- SUBMIT locks a community map. You cannot change that version. COPY opens a new draft from it. Three submitted maps max.
- Each supporter community map has its own SCORE / TIME / Δv under PLAY and EDIT. Click a row to watch that tape.
- Community map thumbnails sit on the start pad.
https://slingshotspeeders.com/
PLAY FOR FREE, IN BROWSER, NO ACCOUNT REQUIRED. 2d top down first orbital racing game, competitive speed runs.
4 replies
Nice changes, I hope more eyes find this game!
A fewSeveral bits of feedback from my latest round of playing:I really like the stock ship spec sheet, I learned/confirmed some things reading it that I wasn't sure of. And I still want to get a clean time on trefoil that I can be happy with...
Edit: Rot-kill being stronger makes toggling 3 important for efficiency, which I do like, gives more room for optimization while not being super important
The thrust trails are fancy and nice to look at, but something bothers me... I think the particle velocity isn't being inherited from the ship's velocity, using a standard velocity on the static reference frame instead... i.e. in my opinion, when decelerating, the ship should never be faster than the thrust trail, since it's made of particles being ejected at speed from the ship itself
I was about to make a comment reporting a bug where my orbit line disappeared before I reread the changelog haha, might be nice to have an indicator light or small UI button somewhere to show whether they're disabled or not? (Also, maybe for the arrows too)
Also, I did sign in with Google, but didn't see a place to change my display name, and I may be stuck with "Pilot" (currently #2 on Prime). Is there a place to change my name, or was there somewhere in the google linking process and I didn't notice?
Edit: Also, just as a low-priority QoL feature request, I find myself wanting to use the shift key not to toggle afterburn, but as a modifier key (like, only use afterburn if and while shift is pressed). Some way to change modes would go much appreciated, I was gonna recommend putting it in a settings menu but there isn't one!
I will implement a system that allows you to edit your profile name, as a "soft" username, but it won't reserve the name, rather just making it easier to keep using the same name instead of having to type in your name of choice each time. But this doesn't stop someone else from using the same name on the leaderboard. The biggest benefit of having a link signing in with Google is that you keep all your history on your account and can easily share your profile/rank/runs.
I just would like to not be "Pilot" when I'm signed in with Google, if there's a way... Did I miss a place to set your hard username in that process? I'm this one, it got generated for me as far as I can tellI didn't read your other comment, heh. Perfect, that would be amazing. Thank you! Now to beat all my PBs on an account...
Great feedback, thank you. I will work on making the default thrust trail better visually. I'll add a toggle button for prediction line. Sign in with google should still allow you to type in a name the same way as if not logged in, I'll look in to making sure there's no issues with that. The way profile saved names work is that a reserved official name will be saved for verified supporters in the future, otherwise names will rapidly be squatted on by bot accounts. Your linked google account will still allow you to save progress and share your profile, but not reserve a name. I think eventually yes, there will need to be some type of preference settings. Thanks again for playing!