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I can’t stop trying to go faster in Neon White, even with a record timeThe speedrunning FPS is a heavenly delight
The speedrunning FPS is a heavenly delight
I am, at present, the world record holder on one level inNeon White. Admittedly, “world record” is less impressive when only developers and media have played, and I expect to be toppled soon after it launches today. Point is: while writing this post about how much I adore the speedrunning FPS, several times I’ve had ideas about how I might make that record time even faster, so I’ve stopped writing, dropped into Neon White for a few minutes, and come back out with a new record. I adore this game, and I might never finish this post.
I’m going to show you two runs. A successful-but-bad run first, then my best time. The difference between them is only 6 seconds but that’s plenty to make my heart pound.
Neon White gameplay: slow, and then fastWatch on YouTube
Neon White gameplay: slow, and then fast
I’m far from finishing the story because I don’t want to move on from a level until I have a solid run. Playing a level at pace with a good route is a wholly different experience, even if the outcome is only six seconds faster. And the timing in medals is perfectly placed, with a gold medal feeling like a good run of the obvious route but an ace medal requiring mastering another route or an exotic trick. Even before the results screen shows me the medal, I can tell what I got from how the run went. Neon White does freely suggests one shortcut to push you past gold to ace on each level but beyond that, you’re on your own.
God, I do not understand how Esposito managed some of those dev records. But I will. While I half-wish Neon White would let me watch other players' replays from the leaderboards (a wonderful feature inDevil Daggers), it’ll be more fun to figure it out all the hard way.
I don’t doubt that my record will be beaten within hours of the game launching—especially given that I’ve just shown you, reader dear, a route. I’ll soon tumble from #1 down into the hundreds or thousands. That’s fine. Even now, I’m thinking about how I can shave fractions of a second off my best time. You see the sloppiness, don’t you? You see the mistakes? How I needn’t stray so near that second pair of pickups? The time wasted basically standing still? How I could airdash farther down the viaduct if I had the snapshot aim of a young person? How maybe I could misuse the second bouncepad demon for an extra boost? You too see the opportunites to go at least 200ms faster, don’t you? I want to be better. I will do better.
