Drifters Don't Brake: Midnight news & patch notes

Changes

• Run timing and ghost data now use a higher-precision internal format

  • The game now stores run times, replay timestamps, checkpoint times, developer runs, and leaderboard replay data with much higher internal precision.

  • This makes best times, ghost playback, developer time comparisons, and leaderboard score calculations more consistent, especially on very close runs.

  • Existing best times and saved replays are migrated automatically when the game updates, so your old data keeps working normally on the new code.

• Leaderboard replays are now version-aware

  • Leaderboard replay metadata now includes the game version it was created on.

  • If a replay comes from a newer unsupported version of the game, it will be ignored instead of being loaded as an incompatible ghost.

• The loading screen now handles leaderboard replay downloads more gracefully

  • When the game is waiting for leaderboard replays before a stage starts, it can now wait longer before giving up.

  • If the download is taking too long, the loading screen will show a message, continue using the ghosts it already has cached, and try to refresh the leaderboard replays again later.

• Finished Stage screen now warns when a run will not be ranked on the leaderboard

  • If you set a new time without getting 3 stars, the results screen now makes it clear that only 3-star clears are added to the leaderboard.

Polish

• Small UI and localization polish

  • This update also includes a few small menu layout adjustments and text fixes across the interface and translations.

Changes

• Global Leaderboard added

  • The game now has a Global Leaderboard page where players are ranked by their total points across all official stages.

  • A stage only counts once it has been beaten with 3 stars. Each ranked stage gives 600,000 minus your best time in milliseconds, with a minimum of 0 points, so faster 3-star clears are worth more.

  • Players are sorted by total points. If two players have the same score, the earlier upload is shown first.

  • Existing players will be added to the Global Leaderboard automatically on login, so you do not need a fresh clear just to appear on it.

  • Your total updates whenever you beat a stage with 3 stars.

  • The Global Leaderboard page can be opened from the main menu or the pause menu, includes Global/Friends and Top/Me views, and has its own music track.

• Analog controller steering added

  • The left stick now supports analog steering strength instead of only full left/right input, making fine steering adjustments easier.

• Leaderboard replay updates don't happen during gameplay anymore

  • Before, leaderboard replays could update in the middle of a run, which sometimes caused lag spikes.

  • Now, the game waits for leaderboard replays to finish downloading before a stage starts, and updated replays are applied when you restart instead of during active gameplay.

  • If leaderboard replay downloads are still in progress, the loading screen will wait for them before showing the Continue button.

Bugfixes

• Opening multiple leaderboard pages on the Stage Selector screen will now load all leaderboards correctly

  • Opening several Stage Selector leaderboards in a row will no longer cause missing or mismatched results.

Changes

• New achievements added

  • Road Starter

    • Beat 25% of all stages

  • Halfway Drifter

    • Beat 50% of all stages

  • Final Stretch

    • Beat 75% of all stages

• New stages added

• Wally's Rage

• Nice Ice Like

• Frozen End

• Last Choice

• Last Option

• Be Colder

• Slide Kick

• Okay Zero

• Simple Star

Changes

• New stage added

• Fat Five Chills

Bugfixes

• Fixed an issue where statistics and leaderboard buttons would show as disabled when returning to the stage selector

• Fixed an issue where statistics and leaderboard pages would stay open when zooming out on the stage selector.

• Fixed and issue where the ball was still bugging on stage restart.

Changes

• Game versions changed from YYMMDD_V (year, month, day, version) to M.M.V (major, minor, version)

  • The old date-based format was useful during development, but it started causing problems as the game grew. In some cases, the game would be compiled on one day and released on another, which made the version date misleading. The new format is cleaner, easier to follow, and better represents actual release progression instead of depending on build dates.

• Improved car bounce on wall hit

  • Most times when hitting a wall the car would be bumped in a way that would make it face the wall, and innevitably hit it again. That has improved a little.

• New terrain type added: Limbo

  • You can't control your car in the Limbo terrain. It just floats forward. You can't drift either, but you can rotate the car to prepare for your landing.

• New game mode: Overdrive

  • Your car's acceleration curve is tripled, making it super fast. Overdrive stages will not trigger the achievements for reaching a high speed (Speed Teaser, Speed Seeker, and Speed Demon).

• New stages added

• Overfrost

• Funneler Drive

• Timeline Traveller

• Unsure Destiny

• Riskitall Saver

• Spacewalk Sandwich

• Heartless Aim

• Backhere Oncemore

• Stratosphere Championship

• Nightcross Color Arena

• Spacetime Penalty

• Lightspeed Goalsniper

• Darkway Wormhole

• Sticky Slide

• Bold Wormhole

• Overreaction

• Stage progression has been reworked, and some stages have moved around in the Level Selector screen

• New car model added

• Fangz

• New achievements added

• Redline Runner - Complete a stage with the Overdrive game mode

• Advanced Tinkerer - Enable the advanced configurations

• No Map, No Problem - Complete any stage with the minimap disabled

• Back on Track - Use a manual checkpoint rewind

• Rules Master - Complete a stage with at least three active rules

• Spiral Drifter - Beat Spiral Swirl using only left turns

• Blind Grip - Beat a developer time on a sticky stage with the minimap disabled

Bugfixes

• Fixed an issue where your own leaderboard replay could be treated as another player's ghost

• Fixed an issue where sometimes no leaderboard replay would get loaded when playing a stage

• Fixed an issue where the music change would sometimes cause the game to freeze for a couple of seconds

• Fixed an issue where the Total Distance Travelled statistic was registering and displaying a wrong value.

  • Because of that, we will unfortunately need to wipe those statistics from player's accounts so they can start registering them correctly.

• Fixed an issue where the Global Statistics were always displaying "No" for the "Complete x% of stages" statistics

New music tracks

Changes

• Stages are bigger in the Stage Selector page

  • This makes them look better. It also gives us more space for the Statistics and Leaderboard pages

• There is a new configuration setting to enable advanced configurations.

  • The configurations page started getting pretty busy, so I hid part of the settings behind the "advanced configurations" flag. If you enable that, you will be able to see and modify more settings.

• External ghosts (asynchronous multiplayer)

  • Leaderboard entries can now include ghost replay data. This means other players' runs can appear as ghosts while you play a stage.

  • By default, only friend ghosts are enabled. You can also choose to enable ghosts from the global leaderboard in the Configurations page.

  • Existing leaderboard entries do not already have ghost data attached. Players will need to update the game in order to submit their ghost to their existing entries. From now on, new entries will always include ghost data.

• Leaderboards have been improved

  • The weekly tab has been removed.

  • You can now switch between Global and Friends, and between Top and Me.

    • This lets you view the top entries or the entries around your own position more easily.

Bugfixes

• Leaderboard entries were uploading a wrong car sprite data.

  • This will only fix new leaderboard entries.

• Checkpoint controls text on pause menu didn't have images for N and M keyboard keys

Changes

• You can now run the game while offline

• New achievements added

• Wall Warlord - Hit walls 5000 times

• Relentless Restarter - Restart the car one thousand times in total

• Undying Drifter - Restart the car five thousand times in total

• New stages added

• Origins Back

• Three Fourths

• Longway Tweens

• Lifeless Bipolar

• Level Selector screen has been reorganized, and some stages have been moved around

• Level Selector screen will now show when the player has beaten a Dev time

• New configurations added

• Skid marks duration

• More FPS lock options

• Enable checkpoints

• You can now Enable checkpoints.

• You can set up to 3 checkpoints and rewind to any of them at any time.

• If you finish a run using checkpoints, that won't count as a finished run.

• You have more chances to unlock a car model when rolling for items now

• New songs added

• Karl Casey - Doomed to Survive

• Karl Casey - New Beginnings

• Karl Casey - Patrol Bot

• Karl Casey - Tyrell Corporation

• Karl Casey - Countach

• Karl Casey - Sanity Unravels

• Karl Casey - Anima

• Karl Casey - B.F.G.

• Karl Casey - Casualty

• Karl Casey - Elysium

• Karl Casey - Menace

• Karl Casey - Empty City

• Karl Casey - Night Crawler

• Karl Casey - The Traveler

• Karl Casey - The Witch

• Play Next button will now play a random available stage

Bugfixes

• Fixed an issue where controllers could not select buttons on the Stage Leaderboard screen

• Fixed an issue where the ball would not freeze during the car's teleport, which could sometimes cause it to disappear

• Fixed an issue where the car could keep moving inside walls after crashing

• Fixed an issue where stage times could differ from the times shown on the leaderboard

  • Previously, the game always saved your fastest stage time, regardless of how many stars you earned. However, leaderboard times are only submitted when you earn 3 stars. Because of this, some local stage times could appear faster than the leaderboard times. To fix this, your local stage times will be updated to match your leaderboard times. Stages without leaderboard times will be skipped.

Bundle

We created a new bundle in partnership with F2D - Steer To Persevere. Check it out:

Hey all! Just pushing some changes after first feedbacks.

• Stage selector zoom fixed: Zoom now works reliably while the cursor is over stage selector UI.

• Car timer fixed: Race timing now uses microsecond precision and rounds to milliseconds instead of stepping in 1/60 second increments.

• Leaderboard first load fixed: Steam leaderboard will now load properly on first try.

• Best time added to finish panel: The stage completion panel now shows the player's best time.

Hello everyone!

Drifters Don’t Brake: Midnight is out now!

The full version of my top-down arcade racing game is now available on Steam. It’s a game where your car never stops accelerating and you can’t brake, so every stage is all about steering, drifting, reacting fast, and trying not to crash.

Thank you so much to everyone who played the demo, wishlisted the game, shared feedback, posted comments, or left a review. Your support really helped me improve the game and get it ready for release.

The full version includes much more content than the demo, with more stages, game modes, car customization, leaderboards, and challenges to drift through.

If you find any bugs, issues, or anything that feels wrong, or if you just want to reach out to me, please use the Steam Community Hub. I’ll be checking the posts and feedback there, especially during the launch period.

You can get the game here:

Thank you again for the support. I hope you enjoy the game!

See you on the road!

Hello everyone!

The full version of my top-down arcade racing game is almost here. Drifters Don’t Brake: Midnight is a game where your car never stops accelerating and you can’t brake.

The game launches on May 14!

If you played the demo, thank you! The feedback, comments, and reviews really helped me improve the game and stay motivated. The full release will include much more content than the demo, and I already have more updates planned for after launch.

Wishlist the game to get notified when it launches:

See you on the road!