Hey everyone!

First, thanks to all new and existing players for playing Horse Runner DX. It's really amazing to see the high scores some people have achieved! :-) This update includes some quality of life improvements and fine-tuning.

Improvements & Fixes

• Adjusted horse prices: The horse prices (beginning of each level) have been adjusted so that the various power-ups are valued slightly differently in higher levels.

• Adjusted sound effects: Many sound effects have now been given some variation so that the same sound effect always sounds slightly different.

• Added biome coloring: The different biomes (meadows, forest, rivers, mountains, uphill, downhill) now have different color schemes. For example, the meadows have a warm, summery color, while the mountain landscape has a slightly cooler color.

• Added foreground landscape: To give the landscape more visual depth, vegetation has been added to the foreground. This can also be disabled in the graphics settings.

• Added bonus horse notification: As soon as new starting horses can be purchased, some buttons in the menus now display a small notification (apple symbol).

• Added anti-cheat protection: To ensure that only honest high scores end up in the leaderboard, some anti-cheat measures have been implemented.

• Fixed special character support: The leaderboard displays players' names. More special characters are now supported in the names (such as or ).

As always, have fun playing and setting new crazy highscores on the leaderboard

Mat

Hey everyone! This quality of life update brings a number of minor improvements and graphical enhancements to make the game better - and cuter :-)

Improvements & Fixes

• Improved graphics settings: The retro filter and the bloom effect can now be adjusted separately if you prefer less bloom and more sharpness. The settings are 0 = off, 1 = low, 2 = high.
• Improved high refresh rate support: The game is generally limited to 60 FPS. If you have a monitor with a high refresh rate (e.g., 240 Hz), you can unlock the FPS in the graphics settings. This will run the game at 240 FPS, for example.
• Added little birds: To make everything even cuter, there are now little birds everywhere, sitting along the path or in trees, happily pecking around.
• Added falling leaves: In areas with many trees, there are now falling leaves floating to the ground. This makes the landscape look more vibrant and natural.
• Added additional animations: The red finish flag and the balloons on the horse box have now been animated, so that, for example, the finish flag flutters in the wind.
• Added new notification: Whenever challenges are completed and new bonus horses are available, there will now be a notification that new horses have been unlocked.
• Improved end of demo: While the full version is unlimited, the demo is limited to 5 levels. The area after level 5 has been improved and made a bit more exciting.
• Improved particle effects: The particle effects (confetti) after selecting an additional horse have been redesigned so that the selected horse card dissolves into confetti.

Hey everyone! This update finally brings an online leaderboard where you can compete with players from all over the world! In addition, there were also some small improvements and optimizations.

Online Leaderboard

• Compete online: Every new high score is added to the online leaderboard. There you can compare yourself directly with other players and gradually climb the ranks.
• Local leaderboard: In addition to the online leaderboard, the local leaderboard remains as a fallback. As before, a high score for each horse will be saved there.
• Offline support: The online leaderboard requires you to be online and logged in to Steam. If you're offline on Steam, only the local leaderboard will be available.

Previous Improvements

• Increased precision when jumping: In previous versions, there was a slight inaccuracy when jumping with the herd. Now, all horses jump with pixel perfect precision. Additionally, several improvements have been implemented to ensure the controls always respond precisely, even in the wildest situations.
• Improved balancing & progression: Based on playtests and feedback, the balance of challenges, bonus horses, and many other aspects has been adjusted. This ensures the game remains challenging without being too difficult or tedious.
• Unlockable bonus horses: In addition to the regular horses that can be found in the levels, there are a whole range of bonus horses. These horses allow you to start a run with one or more power-ups right from the start.
• Improved camera movement: The camera movement was sometimes a bit uneven in previous versions. Several improvements have been made to make the camera smoother while still tracking the herd better.
• Improved background music: Some parts of the music tracks were incorrectly identified by YouTube as other licensed music. Therefore, all tracks were carefully reviewed and replaced where necessary. Now, no Content ID warnings are displayed for any tracks.
• Improved performance: Performance was already very good, but has been further optimized. This keeps your PC cooler and your Steam Deck battery lasts even longer. On my own Steam Deck, the game runs at 60 FPS with a TDP of just 3W.
• Improved settings menu: The settings menu has been completely redesigned to make it easier to navigate between settings. The retro filter and screen resolution are now easier to adjust.
• Improved UI navigation: The in-game controls have been improved so that you can control the entire game with a mouse, keyboard, controller, and touchscreen. You can scroll through lists using the mouse wheel, Page Up/Page Down, L1/R1, or LB/RB, for example.

Hey everyone! This update brings improved balancing, a bit more polish and new music tracks. Update 1.0.7 contains the following improvements:

• Improved balancing & progression: The prices of the horses (in the levels) and some challenge tasks have been adjusted so that the progression in the game feels better. As a result, the difficulty and progression are now more balanced - not too difficult, but not too easy either.
• New background music: Some melodies in the game are incorrectly recognized by YouTube as other licensed music. To be on the safe side on YouTube and when streaming, the music in question has been replaced. The new tracks have been checked on YouTube and can be used without any problems.
• Improved retro filter: If you have a heart for retro games, you can now choose from three settings for the retro filter: 0=off, 1=low, 2=high. The highest level is particularly suitable for small screens such as the Steam Deck. Depending on the level, there is now also a chromatic aberration effect, which further enhances the CRT look.
• Improved particle and sound effects: The particle effects have been further refined and the sound effects have been adjusted in some places. In the leaderboard, your latest high score entry is highlighted with a pop-up effect so that you can see it better.

Hey everyone! As always, I've carefully reviewed all the comments and requests on Steam and YouTube. Therefore, this update addresses virtually all requests regarding jumping accuracy and losing horses. Update 1.0.6 contains the following improvements:

Precision Improvements

• Increased precision when jumping: In higher levels, it could happen that the following horses would jump off with a 1-2 pixel difference compared to the lead horse. This difference has now been reduced to 0 so that all horses jump off at exactly the same location.
• Improved ground contact: When going downhill quickly, horses sometimes slip and fall, briefly losing contact with the ground. To make jumping easier in such hectic situations, ground contact has been improved. Now, contact is only briefly lost on steeper edges.
• Improved jumping off slopes: At very high speeds, when the herd is falling more than running, it was sometimes difficult to make the jump. Now, it's easier for the lead horse to jump from a slope. The following horses can now also more easily make jumps that were otherwise too close. This makes jumping more predictable, and it's less likely to lose horses.

Technical Improvements

• Dynamic animation & sound: Previously, the horse animations were not adjusted to the horse's speed. The animation and sound when galloping now dynamically adapt to the speed of the herd slower and quieter at low speeds and faster at high speeds.
• High refresh rate support: As before, the game runs at 60 FPS by default and should run smoothly on 60 Hz monitors and those with FreeSync or GSync. If you want to use your monitor's full 144, 165, or 240 Hz, you can now use Ctrl+U to toggle uncapped FPS. This will increase the FPS to your monitor's maximum refresh rate.
• Improved camera movement: The vertical camera movement now automatically adjusts to the speed. This means the camera remains steadier at slow speeds and better follows the path at high speeds, even during fast downhill sections.
• Improved landscape generation: When generating the landscape, there were sometimes small edges between different biomes or after bridges. These areas have been fixed to make the landscape look more natural.
• Further performance optimizations: The game's memory usage and CPU load have been further reduced, requiring even fewer resources. This keeps your PC quieter and extends your Steam Deck's battery life.

Hey everyone! This update implements many smaller but equally important points that I've collected as feedback. As always, thank you for your feedback and all the suggestions! Update 1.0.5 contains the following improvements and fixes:

Gameplay Improvements

• Acceleration in the bonus area: After each level, your horses slow down to give you a chance to catch your breath. When you jump in the bonus area, your horses now regain speed more quickly.
• Improved level end: Previously, the horses would slow down before reaching the flag at the end of the level to slow down in the bonus area. The end has now been improved so that the horses pass the flag at full speed and only slow down afterward.
• Fixed speed in higher levels: If you had a lot of horses with the "Slower" power-up, the speed was much too slow in higher levels (15, 20, etc.). The effect of the power-up has now been slightly reduced so that the speed continues to increase in higher levels and the game remains challenging.

Technical Improvements

• Improved Linux / Steam Deck version: The native Linux version of Horse Runner DX has been further optimized. The game's size has been reduced from 117 MB to a tiny 66 MB. The full game download is now just 38 MB.

Usability Improvements

• Improved settings menu: The Settings menu now features improved toggles for changing all settings in both directionse.g., volume up and down. This makes everything easier to control with a mouse, keyboard, and controller.
• Improved resolution settings: The resolution can now be easily adjusted to standard sizes (e.g., 720p, 1080p, full screen) in the settings menu. This feature is very useful when recording a gameplay video. You can still resize the window to any size by dragging a corner.
• Easier scrolling in lists: You can now scroll in all lists (leaderboard, horses, etc.) using the mouse wheel. With the keyboard, you can scroll using the Page Up and Page Down keys. With a controller, you can scroll up and down using the shoulder buttons.
• Leaderboard in title screen: To make it easier for you to view your previous high scores, the leaderboard is now accessible directly from the title screen.
• Leaderboard sample entries: If your leaderboard is still relatively empty, there are now a few sample entries for you to compete with. Your own entries will gradually replace the sample entries.
• Adjusted default settings: To be on the safe side, the "Reduced Motion" setting is enabled by default. Your previous settings will, of course, remain unchanged.
• Updated the demo: The text within the demo has been updated now that the game has been released. The demo will continue to be updated with the full game, but only contains a limited portion of the full game.

Hey everyone! The time has finally come - the release of Horse Runner DX is here! I am very excited to release the game and would like to thank you for all the lovely feedback and the many good suggestions. Version 1.0.4 contains the following improvements and fixes:

• Improved chance of survival: One much-requested feature was that the whole herd is not lost in the event of a mass crash. Previously, you lost all the horses if you jumped right into an obstacle and the horses could no longer avoid it. This has now been mitigated so that only the first horse is lost and the rest of the herd survives.
• Compatibility with demo: If you have already played the demo, your progress will be carried over automatically. But if you want to start again from scratch (which I recommend), you can reset your progress individually under Settings\Data. You can, for example, keep the leaderboard and only reset the challenges and your apples.
• Improved performance: The game has been further optimized so that it runs very smoothly even on slow PCs. On the Steam Deck, for example, the game still runs smoothly at 60 FPS with 3W TDP. For Steam Deck users, this means even longer battery life.
• New logo and Steam image: The previous logo and image, which were a bit too generic, have been redesigned to better reflect the retro and pixel art character of the game.
• Adjustment of the speed bonus: The speed bonus at the end of the levels is no longer offset against the "Slower" power-up. Now you always get a bonus for every "Faster" power-up, even if you have "Slower" at the same time.

• Unlockable bonus horses: By completing challenges, you can gradually unlock bonus horses. Some of these horses come with several power-ups that you can use right from the start.
• Local leaderboard: Your best high scores are now saved in a local leaderboard so that you can better compare your runs.
• Screenshot mode: To create a nice screenshot, you can go to the new screenshot mode in the pause menu, which hides everything else.
• Tutorial hints: When you play for the first time, you will see short hints that explain the game. You can reset these hints under Settings\Data so that, for example, someone you let play also sees the tutorial.

Hey everyone! Since the last update, development of Horse Runner DX has progressed at a galloping pace. As always, the demo will be kept up to date and will continue to receive regular updates with your suggestions for improvement. Thank you for all the lovely feedback and suggestions Update 1.0.0 includes the following improvements:

New Features

• Unlockable starting horses: From the title screen you can now access the list of unlockable horses. By completing challenges you can unlock more and more horses to start the game with.
• Leaderboard: From now on, your high scores will be saved and displayed in a local leaderboard. Each horse that finishes a run will receive its own entry with its name. You can reset all entries under Settings\Data.
• Tutorial hints: When you play through the game for the first time, you will be shown tutorial hints that explain the game. You can reset the hints under Settings\Data if you want to see them again.
• Screenshot mode: There is now a screenshot button in the bottom left of the pause menu and the game over screen. This allows you to display the game without the UI and take a screenshot at your leisure.

Improvements

• Improved music controls: You can now go back and forth in the music playlist using the F7 and F8 keys. With a controller you can use the shoulder buttons for this: LB/RB on Xbox controllers, L1/R1 on PlayStation controllers.
• Improved background music: A new music track was added and the loudness of the music tracks was adjusted to match each other.
• Automatic pause: If your controller is disconnected or the battery runs out, the game will now automatically pause so you don't run into a rock :-)
• Hiding the mouse: When you play with a keyboard or controller, the mouse cursor is automatically hidden so that it does not disturb you.
• Improved Shaders: The quality of the shaders has been improved, making text more readable and the game looking better overall.
• Improved fonts: The font used to display apples and the score has been improved so that the text no longer jumps back and forth when counting up.
• Improved progress bar: The progress bar now includes the goal flag to make it clear that the bar always refers to a level.
• Improved notifications: The notifications have been given a background to make them easier to read.
• Improved UI layout: The UI layout of all screens has been adjusted to provide more space for text in certain languages.
• Improved UI navigation: Fixed an issue where the game would accidentally quit on the title screen when pressing the wrong controller button. Sorry about that.

Hey everyone! Once again, thank you very much to everyone who played the demo version! After the last update added new horses and new music, this update makes everything a little prettier and more polished. The demo update 0.8.6 includes the following improvements:

Improvements

• Tree and bush shadows: All trees and bushes in the landscape now cast a shadow. This gives the landscape more depth and contrast - and simply looks more beautiful!
• Improved background graphics: The background graphics have been improved to ensure that the colors and lighting are more consistent overall.
• Added new sound effects: When you land on a bale of straw, a rock, a tree trunk or a bridge, there are now additional sound effects. For example, the straw rustles when you land on a bale of straw.
• Cheaper first horses: If you didn't collect enough apples on your very first run, you couldn't buy horses after the first level. The very first horses are now cheaper so you don't have to stay alone :-)
• Explanatory texts for power-ups: The help screen now displays a short text for all power-ups explaining the effect of the power-ups.
• New menu icons: Since some languages have very long translations, some button texts in the menus have been replaced by icons.
• Better challenge info: The challenge info at the end of the level now also shows tasks that have already been completed, so that there is no confusion compared to the pause menu.
• Corrected power-up text: The "Apples +1" power-up had a misleading name and is now called "Apples +50%". This means that for every apple you collect, you have a 50% chance of getting an additional apple.

Hey everyone! Many thanks to all the nice people who tried out the demo! The demo is constantly being developed and updated every few weeks. So it's worth checking back every now and then :-) The demo update 0.8.3 includes the following improvements:

Content Improvements

• New coat colors: There are 4 new coat colors, making 10 different horses in the game. The new colors are Buckskin, light Dapple Grey, dark Dapple Grey and Snowflake Appaloosa (the spotted ones are my favorite).
• New and updated sound effects: All sound effects in the game and the UI have been revised and/or replaced with new ones. The horses now snort and neigh depending on the situation.
• New background music: The game now contains more and new music tracks. Problems with YouTube's Content ID (despite valid licensing) should now be resolved and no longer be incorrectly detected.
• More exciting landscape: The landscape of all biomes has been made a little more varied and now has more topology. There can now also be small rivers in the mountain landscape.

Technical Improvements

• Improved camera: The old camera was sometimes shifted by half a pixel and was therefore blurry for a moment. The camera has been completely redesigned and is now always sharp and buttery smooth.
• Adjusted audio volume: The volume of all sound effects and background music pieces has been normalized and adjusted to common loudness standards. The overall sound is now much more balanced.

Bug Fixes

• Fixed jittery movement of the following horses
• Fixed completion issue of level based challenges
• Fixed the balancing of challenges
• Fixed the bonus for level based challenges
• Fixed flickering dead horses
• Fixed crash when resetting data during run
• Added confirmation before resetting data
• Improved drawing performance of vegatation

Hey everyone! First off, a big thank you to everyone who played the Horse Runner DX demo, shared your thoughts, and posted gameplay videos on YouTube. Your feedback has been incredibly helpful! With Demo Update 0.8.2, there are several improvements based on your suggestions and bug reports:

Gameplay Improvements

• Acceleration at the end of the level: If you don't want to read the bonus information and challenges at the end of the level, you can now jump to accelerate immediately.
• Improved biome variety: Biomes are now alternated more evenly so that each landscape appears with a similar frequency. This means that challenges to reach a certain landscape are now much fairer.
• Adjustment of night brightness: Since the night was a bit too dark for some, the brightness was increased slightly for accessibility.
• Improved controls during gameplay: The pause menu can now be opened and closed with the start/options button. In the game, the X button can now be used in addition to A. On a PlayStation controller, Square can now be used in addition to X.

Technical Improvements

• Improved support for non 16:9 resolutions: At some resolutions, there were black bars on the edges due to the pixel-perfect display. Now the game is displayed as large as possible and (almost) without borders, even at unusual resolutions.
• Improved retro filter: The scanline shader has been reworked to look better even at unusual resolutions.
• New hotkeys for music: There are now a few handy hotkeys to control the background music - mute music (F6), previous song (F7), next song (F8).
• New hotkeys for screenshots and display: Create screenshot (F9, My Pictures folder), hide UI (F10, e.g. in the pause menu), toggle full screen (F11).
• Improved controls in the settings menu: To switch a setting (e.g. English >) you can now also press right (keyboard/controller). Pressing left no longer jumps out of the current setting item.

Bug Fixes

• Fixed notification text that was difficult to read at some resolutions
• Fixed localization issue in the power-ups menu
• Corrected text for the power-up "Points +20" (previously +10)
• Fixed edge case that allowed jumping out of water
• Fixed info at end of level for the power-up "Faster"
• Fixed poor landscape display on narrow screens
• Fixed missing landscape on ultra wide screens

New Input Methods

Steam Deck Support