The reason Runner Runner came to live was just a big mistake.

Going back a few months, the initial game idea was to create a Couch Coop Puzzle Platformer RPG – I know that sounds a lot, but I’ll explain.

I love RPGs and I love Couch Coop games. So I wanted to combine them with a little twist and focus more on Jump’n’Run and solving Puzzles.

Since I learned from my past I scoped the game down and divided the features into 3 stages:

Stage One
• Single Player
• Platformer (basic jumping and running)

Stage Two
• Couch Coop (2 Players)
• Puzzles (to solve together)

Stage Three
• RPG Elements (like fights, levelling, weapon system, ..)

I started with Stage One and got it running with simple platforms and a stick figure I found online:

This part was pretty easy. Creating a player controller to make the character move and putting in some platforms where he could jump on. So I moved to the next stage really quick. The stage I was looking forward to: Couch Coop 😍

Crafting this feature was a lot of fun, since adding a second player was way easier than I thought – meaning: second camera, second character and gamepad controls.

I created a short level with a puzzle where players need to help each other to get through. All happening on floating platforms with color-highlighted triggers, switches and moving obstacles.

_{Pretty laggy huh? 🤮}

I even created a special event system that triggered every now and then that made solving the puzzles harder for the players. These events included lower/higher gravity, reduced the double jumping or added an additional air jump or slowed down time or sped it up.

I was so happy, I decided to spend some money on getting my character made (I suck at 3D modelling).

_{If you haven’t heard about Fiverr go check it out. You basically outsource your work by telling someone your idea, paying some bucks, and get it made in return.}

I designed different versions of a simple character in Sketch and finally decided on one. I then sent the final design to a guy from Fiverr and got a perfect 3D model after 2 days which was ready to be used in my game.

Importing the 3D model into Unity and getting animations done with Mixamo for the first prototype was fast and easy 🏃‍

I created a simple model of a platform in Blender myself, exported it and used it as well.

Lesson Learned
There’s one thing I really recommend: Don’t create the whole thing until you have tested the first bits! Why? I created a full level with hundreds of platforms without even testing if it works or not.

After about an hour I played it and it sucked. Platforms were too big, too far from each other, too high or low, and it was just not playable.

But that was not the biggest problem.

One other thing was weird..

My frame rate.

It dropped.

From 60..

. . .

..to 15.

What the dude was happening? 🤨

Let’s analyze what happened:
1 I coded a player controller myself
2 I made my own platform with Blender
3 I created a full level with hundreds of platforms

So we have three potential sources of failure.

I created a new scene and dropped hundreds of regular cubes in it to see if it was the number of platforms.

And guess what? That was not the problem.. _{Ha, tricked you there 🤪}

I killed all my platforms and replaced them with regular cubes. Still didn’t work.. I was close to giving up because I thought it was my player controller and my less-than-mediocre coding skills.

But then I realized, there was another source of failure I completely missed: the 3D character I had outsourced!

So i said let’s just use the first stick figure model I got from Sketchfab. And this time..

It worked! 🎉

So unfortunately it was the 3D model. I just hadn’t thought of it. You don’t start blaming others when your game isn’t working. The guy did a really great job and had created what I asked for. So it was my poor communication and design that is to blame.

So I was frustrated, knowing that I couldn’t solve the problem with my skills and it was too late to contact the guy for a rework.

Close to eventually killing the project and giving up I found myself in a numb state, soullessly staring at the screen, casually jumping through the level without understanding that I was still playing 😶

I slowly faded back to reality.

All of a sudden I realized that this level I was so carelessly hopping through, was so insanely fun, I immediately forgot that I wanted to quit. It gave me the motivation and drive I desperately needed to go on 🤩

I said, fuck it. Replaced the model with the initial stick figure and polished the just created level to test the potential.

I was happy!

Be careful, I said to myself. Don’t overestimate this new idea. Get back to your original path and try to fix what you already have!

No, I’m moving on! 🤔

_{I of course tested my very first idea with some players and got mediocre feedback. People didn’t understand that they had to solve a puzzle together, didn’t know where to go to activate triggers and help the other player or were just confused with camera controls or the events.}

The old concept didn’t win. Runner Runner was born.

I switched the concept from Couch Coop Puzzle Platformer RPG to Competitive 3D Couch Platform Racer and people loved it way more than the initial game idea.

So I sticked with it and still developing it. Stay tuned for more on Runner Runner.

(btw if you have a better name, please let me know 😄 – I hope it will just stay a working title)