Inspiration
Initially I wanted to see what a side-view version of the old windows game "Ski Free" would look like. I asked GPT 5.4 to mock it up in canvas mode-- it was not very good looking or performant, but the gameplay loop was compelling. It had a smooth feel to it, and a rush of speeding up down a hill.
What it does
It is a Reddit-embedded browser game where users can compete on daily procedurally generated tracks. Players have a certain amount of hit points, which they lose when they crash into obstacles. When they run out of HP, the game ends. Players can post a full replay of their run, and they can also post a comment with a gif of the last few seconds of their run-- where they met their doom on the slope!
How we built it
First I decided to convert the engine to Phaser, since the hackathon had started and it seemed worth a try. This gave a lot of extra options for rendering UI and even things like sound. Then the last couple of weeks were refining the gameplay loop, sharing, and meeting advanced Devvit requirements (for instance, there is a fancy hat for sale for a bit of Reddit gold!)
Challenges we ran into
Generating the gif was a bit difficult and took some iterating. Also, using a Phaser-based layout meant that we had to take special care for the size and orientation to make the game more stable. This was different than my other games which are mostly purely javascript and canvas rendering.
Accomplishments that we're proud of
The audio is pure synthesizer using browser audio, there are no recorded sound effects!
If you land on top of a hot air balloon, you can jump back off it and reset your double jump as well!
What we learned
What's next for Ski Hard
I hope to allow "Challenge courses" that are shorter and more about getting to the end or reaching a certain objective. This will allow users to create their own levels as well.
Built With
- cursor
- devvit
- phaser.js
- typescript
Log in or sign up for Devpost to join the conversation.