HASTE: Broken Worlds is a speedrunning Sonic-like platformer from Landfall with a demo up now

Gotta go fast? Landfall, developer of Totally Accurate Battle Simulator and Clustertruck, have released a demo for HASTE: Broken Worlds that's worth a look.

It's a speedrunning platformer, with a feel that I can only describe as being Sonic-like. The main mechanic (apart from running, obviously) is that you need to build up an energy meter by landing as perfectly as possible. As you run you will auto-launch yourself into the air from any little hill, and then it's your job to time your button pressing to send yourself flying downwards to land nicely to build up your energy.

Pictured - HASTE: Broken Worlds Demo on Linux

With your energy built up, you can then use your special ability to jump on a sort-of hover-board to build up more speed and distance while in the air. The game is made up of procedural worlds, so you never quite know what sort of area you're going to be running around, which will keeps you on your toes.

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The progression in it is a bit similar to various roguelites with you speeding through each level, to then pick a path on a map to progress through each shard (shards being their worlds). It also sprinkles in upgrades for you to pick between a few giving you various extras. So with the procedural worlds, the progression and the upgrades it's a highly replayable game even in the demo.

Features:

• Third-person high-speed running gameplay.
• 10 Shards, each featuring a collection of procedurally generated levels that must be completed without fail to advance to the next Shard.
• Items and Challenge levels that let you customize your build for each attempt to clear a Shard.
• Spectacular biomes and different bosses to discover.
• A story to explore and a lovable cast of characters to befriend.

The demo was released as part of Steam Next Fest and there's a Native Linux version available. On Steam, the developer noted they plan to get it Steam Deck Verified too.

Definitely a demo worth trying out. Only one issue on my Desktop is that every time I alt+tab it quits, but apart from that it really runs great and is quite entertaining to run through it. Performance is great though and it has an absolutely banging soundtrack to go with it.