BECKBYTE / GAME IN DEVELOPMENT
One more dash. One way out.
Chain midair dashes, flip gravity, and outrun a glitch that crawls out of the walls. RUNTIME is a pixel-art precision platformer inside a corrupted computer, where a difficult sequence becomes a cleaner run as you learn the route.
Windows · Single player · Keyboard and controller · In development
DASH. REFILL. ESCAPE.
Chain crystal refills, adapt when gravity gates flip your movement, and dash through laser gaps as the glitch gives chase.
Watch the new gameplay trailer, then find your next move.
LEARN THE ROUTE. MAKE IT FLOW.
Catch crystals to refill your dash in the air, time your movement through lasers and temporary platforms, and use the ceiling as a path. Checkpoints let you retry a section and put the sequence together.
Finish the campaign to unlock RUNTIME mode: the full escape against the clock, with checkpoints and a death counter. Return to improve your personal bests or take on the separate Time Trial course.
THE WALL NOTICES YOU.
The glitch starts as a mark on the wall. Get close and it becomes agitated; stay nearby and it follows. Sprint out of its territory or break contact with solid cover, and it returns home.
Learn its warning, keep your route in mind, and use the movement you already know.
DEVELOPMENT JOURNAL / JANUARY–SEPTEMBER 2026
Engineering schoolwork and family have often had to come first. RUNTIME has grown in the time around them. Here’s the path to a build I’m excited to share.
Retrospective written September 10, 2026. January–July dates are approximate checkpoints; September entries follow the recorded development updates.
· RETROSPECTIVE CHECKPOINT
RUNTIME has been a project I care about alongside engineering schoolwork and family. Looking back at the start of this year, the goal was to bring it into a version I could play through, feel good about, and share.
That meant making progress in the time available. This journal follows that uneven path to the build taking shape now.
· RETROSPECTIVE CHECKPOINT
Engineering schoolwork takes time and attention, and family is a big part of my life. Those commitments are a large part of why RUNTIME has taken longer to reach a complete build.
There have been stretches when I could give the game more attention, and stretches when it had to wait. The gaps in development are part of that reality.
· RETROSPECTIVE CHECKPOINT
The part of RUNTIME I want to protect is the feeling of movement: learning a route, getting another dash in the air, and finally connecting the jumps that gave you trouble.
With development fitting around everything else, keeping that focus matters. A finished version should hold onto the parts that already feel good and give the rest of the game the attention it needs.
· RETROSPECTIVE CHECKPOINT
The milestone I wanted was a coherent build: levels that flow, readable obstacles, and menus and presentation that belong to the same game.
Getting there has taken longer than I hoped while balancing school and family. Looking back now, that is what makes this latest stretch of progress feel meaningful.
Playing through the game helped make the priorities clear. I loved how the first level looked and flowed, and the movement, physics, and collisions felt great. The dash-crystal routes were something to preserve as the later levels developed.
The recording also gave us real examples of successful jumps, missed attempts, checkpoint restarts, and gravity-orb use. That made it easier to work from how the game actually plays.
The movement already feels good to me. I want the screens around it to feel just as considered.
I liked where the main menu and pause menu had landed, but Settings still felt like a different part of the project. This pass brings it into the same visual language: dark panels, crisp pixel lettering, restrained color, and a clear place for every option.
The useful changes go beyond appearance. Keyboard focus is visible, controls show their current mappings, and the resolution picker can be cancelled without applying a change. Returning from Settings keeps gameplay paused until you choose to resume.
Controller vibration is now optional, with brief feedback for dashes, refills and death. It stops when the game is paused or loses focus. The feel still needs another physical-controller playtest.
Development combines my design direction and playtesting with coding, art iteration and automated checks assisted by Codex. Screenshots caught two problems that passing interaction tests alone missed: old controls drawing over the new layout, and the home-screen panel being hidden by its draw depth. Both were corrected and replayed in GameMaker.
Controller actions, settings persistence and the pause round trip were exercised in engine. This new presentation still needs a fresh physical-controller session and a wider set of displays. The ending is getting its own performance and sound pass; I’m keeping the reveal out of this post.
Follow RUNTIME on Steam ↗Keep the music I already love. Give the rest of the journey its own character.
Six tracks from Abstraction’s Three Red Hearts collection now carry the later chapters from crystal chains to the final escape. The original first two songs stay: Eric Skiff’s Underclocked and The Whole Other’s 8-Bit Dreamscape.
Retries keep the song moving. Pause brings it down. Chapter changes fade into the next cue. Automated checks ran every track through a complete loop and exercised mute, settings persistence and room transitions. The new control was inspected at 720p and 1440p; musical balance still needs my next listening playtest.
The footage prepared for this entry used normal movement inputs and the game's original speed. I wanted to show the environments and music together while keeping the ending a surprise.
Music: Eric Skiff, The Whole Other and Abstraction. Source terms and credits are retained with the game.
The latest playtest feels like a real step forward: the game plays great and looks substantially better. After fitting development around engineering schoolwork and family, I finally have a build I’m happy to put in front of people.
In RUNTIME, a good stretch of movement can become a chain: jump, dash through a crystal, change direction, and catch the next landing before you run out of room. That moment is the focus of the latest work on the development build.
The challenge should come from choosing and executing the route. You also need to be able to read what your character can do while the world is moving around you. I've been refining the dash indicator and the feedback around crystal refills so that information is easier to pick up during a run.
The dash indicator now uses a small pixel meter. It distinguishes a usable dash from one that is spent or recovering, and a crystal refill sends a bright pulse through its segments. If you immediately dash again, that pulse continues around the casing while the cells show the dash you just spent. Fast inputs stay fast, and the refill remains visible. Gravity changes have also gained a restrained cue when a flip succeeds. The aim is to make those moments easier to notice while keeping your attention on the platforms ahead.
Those details matter most when several decisions arrive together: a crystal over a gap, a platform that only appears briefly, a laser opening, or a glitch breaking out of the wall behind you. The movement is still about learning that sequence and finding a cleaner way through it. Checkpoints let you try the difficult section again, then join the pieces into a run.
That is also why the gameplay clips focus on complete actions. Seeing the player reach a crystal, recover the dash, and use it on the next part of the route explains more than an isolated flash or a fast montage.
RUNTIME is a precision platformer set inside a corrupted computer. The campaign leads into an unlockable timed run with checkpoints and a death counter, alongside a separate Time Trial course. If that sounds like your kind of challenge, you can wishlist RUNTIME on Steam.