The Way to School started life as an ordinary endless runner. Run, pick your tiles, die
eventually, rank by distance. The prototype went that way, but one thing kept nagging while
we built it: if the game only ever ends in dying, no matter how well you play,
nothing is left standing at the end. After "1,847 m this time" the only thing that
follows is "1,900 m next time".
So on August 17 we rebuilt the structure. Give the run a destination, and let arriving end
the round. The distance to school became 3 km.
3 km, knowing it breaks the 3-minute rule
The original target was a round under three minutes — the hyper-casual norm, and it was
written into our own design doc. But a great 3 km run takes 3 minutes 34 seconds, and a
typical one closer to four and a half. We could have shortened it. We didn't. The suggestion
came up more than once, and every time we chose the feeling of actually arriving:
the school gate emerging from the fog, the background washing away, the high-five with the
teacher. Those thirty seconds earn the extra minute.
In exchange, arriving is always something you earn again. Die and you start from the
beginning. No checkpoints. That's what makes "I made it today" an event every time.
Rank by score, not distance
Once there was a destination, the leaderboard had to change. Everyone who finishes has the
same distance, 3,000 m. So rank is decided by score — distance plus tile
bonuses times a combo multiplier — and two people who both ran 3 km are separated by how
cleanly they ran it.
Putting a number on the finish rate
"Reasonably hard" is not something you can tune. So we fixed the finish rate as numbers
per skill level first: someone landing 90% of their steps should finish this often, 95% this
often, a perfect player almost always. Then a simulator that imitates the controls ran 200
rounds per setting, we measured the real finish rate, and adjusted until it matched the
table. Every tweak means another 200 rounds. Measuring with 8 or 20 rounds swings the rate by
25 points and tells you nothing — we relearned this on the second game.
That process taught us what this game's balance actually hinges on.
1. Only the energy ramp caps a perfect player
Energy is speed, and zero energy stops you. A good player simply never steps in a puddle,
so tripling the hazards left the top-tier finish rate at 100%. The only thing that stops
them is energy that drains faster the further you go. Puddle density, by
contrast, only cuts into the middle of the field.
2. For instant-death obstacles, "how many you meet" is the finish rate
Every puddle you meet multiplies your chance of a slip. Meet ten and one mistake becomes
likely. So an obstacle with only one way past must be very rare, and one with
two ways past can be dense. That is why the neighbourhood dog paces across two lanes: read
which lane will be empty and step aside (free), or if you can't tell, jump (costs energy).
Two answers, so we can place plenty of them.
3. Only the distance ramp makes puddles
Tile patterns are hand-made pieces combined by a seed. At first the pieces contained
puddles too, but then the density followed whichever pieces happened to be drawn, and the
finish rate was impossible to steer. Now pieces have no puddles at all — one
probability tied to distance creates them, and "none before 1 km" is part of that
ramp.
"It's too hard, I can't reach the end"
That was the first feedback after Normal matched the table. So we built an Easy mode,
and since exactly two things stop a finish, we loosened only those two — the energy ramp and
puddle density. Tile layout and fairness rules stayed. The round shouldn't get looser; it
should just forgive more mistakes, or it stops feeling like the same game.
Later we heard that older players found even Easy hard, so a Very Easy mode went on top.
This time we invented no unverified numbers: energy and hazards are identical to Easy, and
only the two requested changes were added — good tiles appear more often, and speed is 30%
lower. Speed never enters the judgement, so the finish-rate table is untouched.
The finish rate is still below the target table today — over 200 rounds, the middle skill
band finds it harder than planned. We know and haven't changed it yet; it is tied to why Very
Easy exists, and we want to hear more from real players before touching the numbers.
Play The Way to School →