How to play
SLOPE RUSH is an endless downhill run. You steer a glowing ball down a twisting neon-grid track that hangs in the air in front of a striped synthwave sun and wireframe mountains. The ball rolls by itself and keeps getting faster. All you do is steer.
Steer with A and D or the Left and Right arrows. P or Esc pauses, M mutes, and Space, Enter, a click or a tap starts a new run after you crash.
The run ends when you roll off the edge or hit a red block. Your score is the distance in metres plus bonuses: +10 for every gold shard you collect and +5 for every close pass by a block.
Tips and strategy
- Steer early and small. At high speed, a big late swerve throws the ball across the track and off the other side. Little taps keep it under control. Your sideways speed builds up the longer you hold a key, and dies away quickly when you let go, so letting go is how you stop a slide.
- Look ahead, not at the ball. Holes, drop-offs and bridges come up fast. Keep your eyes a little way down the track so you are already lined up when they arrive.
- There is always a way through a row of blocks. A row of red blocks always leaves at least two lanes side by side open. Look for the gap, not the blocks.
- Do not fear the full-width gaps. When the whole track breaks off, the next piece starts a little lower. At your speed you sail across and land on it. Just keep the ball straight while you are in the air, because you cannot land on nothing.
- Close passes only count on the ground. Brushing past a red block earns +5 if you roll by close without touching it. A pass made while you are in the air does not count. Take the easy ones and leave the risky ones.
- Shards are a bonus, not the goal. A shard is worth ten points and also counts towards new balls, but distance is what builds a big score. Shards come in short lines of four down one lane, so if a line is on your path, ride it for +40.
- Expect a change every 400 m. Each new sector narrows the track and adds more holes and blocks, so the first few seconds after the colours change are the most dangerous.
What's in it
One endless slope, laid out fresh for every run, so you can never learn it by heart. It is split into 400 m sectors, and each sector brings a new colour palette. There are six, in this order, and they loop round after the sixth: NEON DRIVE, ULTRAVIOLET, MIAMI DUSK, ICE GRID, ACID LINE and CRIMSON.
The hazards are:
- Holes: a patch of missing track one to four lanes wide.
- Gaps: the whole track breaks off, and the next section continues a little lower.
- Red blocks: wireframe blocks of different heights sitting in a row across the track.
- Narrow bridges: everything but a two-lane strip falls away, and the strip shifts sideways as it goes. These start appearing at around the 400 m mark.
Gold shards you collect are added to a running total that is never spent, and that total unlocks six ball skins on the title menu: PLASMA (free), HOTLINE at 40 shards, SOLAR at 120, VOID at 250, TOXIC at 450 and PRISM at 800. The results screen after each run tells you how many more you need for the next one.
Behind the game
The ball starts at about 61 km/h and gains a little speed for every metre it travels, topping out at about 166 km/h after roughly four and a half kilometres. The track starts out straight and gently widens its bends over the first 700 metres or so. It is about 6.6 metres wide at first, loses a little width in every sector and stops narrowing at about 3.7 metres. The hazards get denser and harsher as well, reaching their worst after about 3.2 km.
Spacing scales with speed. The gap between one hazard and the next is worked out from how fast the ball will be going when it gets there, so the game always leaves you a moment to react, even at top speed.
The neon look is all drawn with hand-written effects: an anti-aliased grid with sweeping pulses of light and a pool of light under the ball, blocks with glowing wire edges, mountains made by pushing a far-off grid up into peaks, and a screen pass with bloom, a slight colour split that grows with speed, scanlines and grain. The music and sounds are made live in the browser and build up the further you get.
Questions
Do I need an account?
No. Your best score, shard total and chosen ball are saved in your browser.
Can I play on a phone?
Yes, held upright. Hold the left or right half of the screen to steer that way, and tap to start again after a crash.
How do I change my ball?
Pick it on the title menu. Locked balls show how many shards they need. Shards from every run count, so you unlock them just by playing.
Is it violent?
No. You are a ball.
Does it flash?
Yes. The screen flashes when you crash into a block and briefly when the colours change at each new sector, and there is glow, scanlines and screen shake.