Hello Lemmy!
It’s been more than a year since I last posted here. A lot has happened since - most importantly, we just released player-to-player Trading to the game and we’re looking for some new players to join the game!
We (Not a Cult, the company) have gone from just me as a solo dev to now having a team of five people in total and things are ramping up!
I’ve also been posting all development updates to ([email protected]) for like couple years now if you’re interested to follow us here on Lemmy!
Screenshots
How to start playing
You can start playing the game immediately if you support us through our Patreon page. We currently have 20% and 60% Discounts on Patreon for your first month/year as a way to celebrate the release of Trading. More on the Discounts here.
The game is entirely community funded with no investors or publishers behind it. This way we can ensure that our players are always our #1 priority and the creative vision for this game isn’t compromised.
If you don’t feel like supporting the game or want to try it first for free, you can apply to the Closed Beta. We let new players in who have applied fairly regularly.
Info on how to apply for free access.
Introduction
3 years ago I was wondering of ways how I could motivate myself to walk more. I have ADHD, and sometimes find it hard to motivate myself to exercise. Thought about combining RS as I’ve been addicted to it for more than 10 years and walking, and that’s how the game got started.
WalkScape is a game inspired by RuneScape and other MMOs but with a twist - you progress in it by walking in the real world! It’s designed to be non-intrusive, with no predatory monetization practices. By non-intrusive we mean that it will truly let you enjoy your time outside by not constantly requiring your attention. Everything that needs active involvement (like combat or quests) should be done when you get home.
The main goal of the game is to make people more interested in walking by giving them an amazing gaming experience to motivate them to keep walking. And you can play it while at work, or when you are walking with friends, and while walking your dog. You can truly focus on what you are doing and do more active playing later.
Features & content
- records your steps in the background when the game isn’t even open
- no GPS, no microtransactions, no predatory practises
- smart watch integrations on both iOS and Android
- all of the art assets, writing, content and designs are created by real people. The game has also been translated to multiple different languages by our fans.
- 12 different skills to level up
- a huge world map with 50+ locations
- almost 1000 different items
- 10+ pets
- NPCs, shops, dozens of achievements
- job boards, factions and faction reputations
- leaderboards, Trading, friend system
- and much more!
Gen AI disclosure
Early in the development we used AI generated images as placeholders for some locations. All of those have since been removed and replaced with images created by a real artist.
There is no AI generated content, art or writing in the game and we intend to keep it that way.
Videos
WalkScape Ultimate Beginner Guide video
WalkScape Dev Interview on Trading video
What’s been added since last post
I posted here last time more than a year ago and a ton has happened since. Our team has been busy especially putting together the servers & technical requirements to support real time & asynchronous player interactions. Trading is the first feature coming out that uses this.
In addition we’ve shipped several content updates, QoL, new game mechanics, reworked Bank system, pets, three new skills and a lot more to the game. You can find the full the full version log fron our Wiki.
Thanks for reading
Thank you so much for reading, and I really hope you’d consider joining the game! We have a lot of new stuff coming out and we’re ramping up to get the game fully released as Open Beta.
Thanks again Lemmy for all the support we’ve gained from here. The feedback has also been awesome, and the encouragement we’ve had from your comments have meant a lot to all of us working on the game!
I’ll be answering all comments, feedback and questions here. Stay hydrated and keep walking everyone! <3
I’ve seen dozen of the same core “Gamification of real world activities”.
What makes this one different from the rest?
I’d say most gamification apps are first and foremost an app and they don’t really feel like serious games (or games at all), think of something like Duolingo. And the main difference with WalkScape is that it’s a game first and a fitness app second. There’s a ton of lore, details, an interesting fantasy world and things like that which have been crafted to make a fun and interesting game that has actual depth to it. Not used just as fancy dressing for gamification app which aims to appeal to the casual players.
And in pedometer gaming space WalkScape was the first of this kind. If you think of stuff like Habitica and so forth those depend entirely on you checking off to-dos and whatnot, which you can cheat easily. With pedometer it’s a dfifferent thing and we have a pretty robust anti-cheat here as well.
On our Discord you can find people min-maxing their character builds, doing interesting self-imposed challenges, theorycrafting, and they’ve even built online tools to optimize the crap out of the game mechanics. I think these are positive signs of the game having actual depth through its mechanics, items, designs and so forth. And a lot of these people have been playing the game for couple years now and they’re still not bored of it, and I think that’s what for me is lacking on most gamification apps out there: the mechanics are usually shallow or even superficial and there’s not much actual game to it.
Sorry for a long answer, I couldn’t think of a shorter way to put all this :D but great question anyways, thank you!
When I saw the name of the game the first thing that popped into my head is this… A blast from the past. x_x
Hiya, Shampuu! I found out about this 2 years ago on Lemmy. I applied for the free beta and got in around January 2025. I then convinced all my friends to join in May when the Patreon members getting access immediately was added. I then started my first side project since college working on an optimizer. I’ve met so many great people through this game’s community. Everyone is so positive. Thank you for creating this game and fostering its community. I can’t wait to see what this game becomes, but I’m in it for the long haul!
Here’s my optimizer if anyone wants to check it out! I added trading and even federate with the other main web based optimizer so that no one loses out on potential trades! https://walkscape.flamesandvoltiply.com/
Thank you so much, I’ve been using your tools quite a bit too and love the work you do!
Looks interesting, hope i gwt in so i can tty it out
Linking patreon to walkscape account seems to be broken on mobile firefox.
I tried it, seems like there’s some issue. To fix this:
- Link using the button, follow the normal procedure.
- You will get a cannot load page eventually.
- Go back to the previous tab where it says “walkscape would like to etc.”.
- Refresh the page.
With this it seemed to work even right now, we’ll investigate this.
Didn’t read your wall of text but I immediatly thought “why normal ass boots give me merfolk dancing?” Maybe the joke was in the flavor text or whatever but come on. Maybe art be a boot on a fishing line? Or like, flippers?
Again first thought not looking at anything else but like… come on.
The shoes are the symbol of Agility skill which that activity is categorized as :D but it’s a fun idea to switch them to something else while you’re in an underwater world.
That looks neat! I just subscribed on Patreon. Thanks for sharing on the threadiverse! ✨
I thoroughly enjoyed it, the only thing I needed was synchronizing with watch for when I exercise without my phone. Reading the above, looks like that is fixed now?
Yes, indeed smart watches work! We have the list of supported smart watches here: https://wiki.walkscape.app/wiki/System_Requirements
What’s the monetization plan? I don’t do subscriptions but would consider a buy-once or old fashioned “buy expansions every year or so”
Directly from our FAQ:
Offline mode - One time purchase. You’ll be able to pay once to download the offline mode of the game. You’ll receive future content updates, not have a requirement to be online to open the game, and have a slider that multiplies your steps to reach the game experience that you wish. No multiplayer features.
Online mode - affordable monthly subscription. You’ll need to be online to play the game, but you’ll receive future content updates and all multiplayer features that the game has to offer.
Free to play area - both forms of the game will have a free to play area that can be enjoyed for free.
I would look into how Final Fantasy does free to play. They can party up, but they can’t be in a guild. They can’t trade or use the market board and get limited inventory. They can only do the first few expansions for free. It’s a great trial period with no playtime restrictions. I think it would be very beneficial to have something like this to hook into. I think that’s exactly what you’re describing with the free to play area!
I fell off, but it would be great if there was more to do when you aren’t actively walking. (I haven’t played in a year though so there can be more now)
I like the model of walk walk walk to improve and maybe like a bunch of combat or something is not walking. So you are incentivized to walk and move on when you cant beat bad guys anymore etc.
Another cool idea would be dungeons. Maps with multiple decision points that are smaller in scale.
Like walk 500 steps and theres a junction and you decide which way etc.
Really love this concept and cant wait until combat is implemented in whatever form that will be
Combat and Farming are both things that are planned to address having something to do while taking a break from walking but both will be fuelled by your steps! They’ll be the type of thing where you spend your steps but don’t actively walk while doing them.
Dungeons are also something we’ve been throwing around as an idea for the future, but that’s still quite far off.
Thank you so much for the comment!
It’s a good game, but one that I fizzled out on. I was playing it every day, excitedly getting my steps in, but when it came time to grind for an item, it fell off my radar.
Last I recall I was doing a crafting activity grinding chests for a shot at winning the candle hat. Given how rare legendary items in chests are, we’re talking potentially millions of steps to grind.
After a few days of grinding, there was less and less motivation to check in daily, which turned into checking in weekly, which turned into checking in never.
The game could seriously benefit from having something else to do while grinding. Minigames to improve your success rate, or rewards for grinding that provide growing step multipliers. Literally anything other than “just do nothing else for the next year+ of your life”. Especially since there’s clearly a limit to how far back in your history it’ll pull steps since last checkin. I opened after a month and only gained like 2 days of steps.
There was a new coin system to make up for bad luck grinding, but that benefit kicks in 2x slower than the expected grind, so it provides a backstop, but when were talking about ~5 million steps on average to unlock a legendary, that means the backstop is ~10 million steps, or 1,000 days averaging 10,000 steps/day
I like the game, but the grind was over the top. RNG grind should not be measured in years.
Thank you so much for the feedback!
We have multiple systems coming out that will provide something else to do in the game actively. Practically mini-games but more than that. Main ones are Combat and Farming.
RNG is a divisive subject, we’ve found that many people love how “hardcore” it is (akin to the inspiration RuneScape), so it’s very much a subjective thing if people love or hate it. Now that Trading is out that works as RNG mitigation: you can just buy the item you need from another player who has it. And the game has plenty of ways to reliably grind money so you can afford to buy whatever you need.
When it comes to grinding some of the rarest items in the game - these aren’t something we really recommend unless you really want to. Most things in the game can be grinded with way less than 100K steps and there are only very few things that require million (or more) steps or anything close to that.
There will be more coming to the game to smoothen some of these things you mentioned and to make the overall experience better for people who want more interaction with the game. But a lot of people also love that they don’t need to interact with it much, so it’s a balance to have there. And this game is designed to be something that respects your time!
I appreciate your response and I know I am but one of many opinions out there and you have your own priorities in how the game is designed and paced!
I certainly enjoyed it and I love the art, just sharing one anecdote on how it can get burned out.
Me personally, I don’t mind RNG as a concept, and I like your approach of having the coins as a backstop for really bad luck, I just think there should 1) be something to do while grinding, and 2) be a sincere assessment (and hopefully rebalance) of how long is practical to grind for top-tier items. Years of grinding on average per item feels like… A bit much.
Another popular way to balance the RNG is to have RNG stats for the items, that way you can have legendary items be more common, but perfect legendary items still take time. IIRC I was going for the candle hat partially for its stats and partially because there was a perk or location unlock for having multiple light sources equipped. I could satisfy the latter with a lesser-tier hat.
Looking forward to seeing how things develop, maybe I’ll pick it up again soon, especially now that the weather is cooler again and I can use my walking desk while I work without getting cooked.
Oh hey this looks interesting.
We currently have 20% and 60% Discounts on Patreon for your first month/year as a way to celebrate the release of Trading.
*spits,
Ah subscription based bullshit, my behated.
God forbid we pay devs for their time and continued development effort. Everything should be free!
I think I bought the Dev a coffee two years back and have poked at it on and off since for free. You seem to be misunderstanding how this works.
That’s to support the development through Patreon. If you don’t want to support the game you can also join the Closed Beta for free with the link I listed there.
And if you decide to support you keep access to the game if you cancel the Patreon support. Our Buy Me a Coffee also has a one time support option if you don’t want to deal with any subscriptions.
Ah wait, I think that I misunderstood what the discount was for. I thought that the game was subscription based.
My bad and good luck with the game.
Any plans for an iOS app?
It’s already out on iOS through TestFlight! You get the link once you get invited to the Closed Beta. You get it immediately if you support the development or you can join the Closed Beta for free through the link in the post.
I remember this! I believe I got invited some 2 years ago when it was in TestFlight. Liked it!
Back then if I remember correctly, it was a little skinny in features which didn’t motivate me to go for walks so I didn’t end up testing much im afraid. Maybe it’s time to try again!
When you say smart watch integrations, does that mean the specific ones? I use apple devices for a phone, but I don’t really want a smart watch. I would however be in the market for a garmin descent, as I need a new dive computer. Would this be a functional replacement? It is a smart watch after all.
Otherwise glad to see you still rocking, your app is a fun one, and a good idea!
Thank you! There’s a ton of new features, content, improvements and whatnot! The full changelogs of all the versions are available here on WalkScape wiki.
Smart watch integrations mean that a bunch of devices work. On Apple at least Garmin and Apple Watches work. But of course your phone works just fine too but if you don’t want to be carrying one with you then smart watches are pretty great!
Thanks for the reply! I guess I can’t hide the fact that I’m not exactly well-versed in smart watches. Appreciate you taking the time, wishing continued good luck on you and your project!
Odd question, but is there a way to ‘boost’ walking multiplier for people with disabilities? I was a closed-beta tester for Ingress way back when, and a pretty heavy player for several years after, until I suffered a stroke that nearly killed me. Now I will play ingress when in the car traveling to doctors appointments, but beyond that, I’m stuck at home just withering away, barely passing 1k steps most days.
Something to think about, I guess?
Offline mode that is coming after Open Beta release will have a multiplier for your steps and it’s aimed as an accessibility feature exactly for cases like yours! In the MMO version it wouldn’t work due to how people would be abusing it.
