How to play
The rules, the controls and the modes of Retrocycles.
The rules
You ride a light cycle on a large flat grid. Your cycle moves forward all the time and leaves a solid wall behind it. You cannot stop, and you can only turn at right angles.
If you hit a wall, your cycle crashes. The walls are yours, the other riders' and the edge of the grid. When another rider hits your wall, you score. Make the others crash and stay alive yourself.
A cycle that rides close to a wall goes faster. This is the main skill of the game: ride near the walls for speed, then turn away before you hit them.
Start to play
- Open retrocycles.io in a browser on a computer, a phone or a tablet. Nothing to download.
- Press Quick Play. You join an online room at once, as a guest.
- To keep your name, your level and your place on the leaderboards, sign in. An account is optional.
The game needs a browser with WebGL and WebAssembly: a recent Chrome, Edge, Firefox or Safari.
Keyboard controls
These are the default keys. To change them, open Settings and then Controls.
- Turn left
- Left arrow, D or F
- Turn right
- Right arrow, J or K
- Brake
- Space or the down arrow, held
- Glance left, right, back
- A, S and ;
- Change the camera
- V
- Chat
- Enter
- Scoreboard
- Tab
- Menu
- Escape
Two keys for each turn let you turn twice very quickly: for a U-turn, press D and F, or J and K, one after the other.
The brake slows you down and then runs out. It fills again slowly when you do not use it.
Touch controls
On a phone or a tablet, the arrow buttons are at each side of the screen, under your thumbs. The single arrow turns once and the double arrow turns twice. Hold the brake key in the middle to brake. The two cells at the top right open the chat and the menu.
Settings has two more layouts, with all the keys in one row at the bottom of the screen. Turn the phone sideways for the widest view.
Game modes
- Quick Play
- An online room with other players. You join at once, on a server near you. After a crash, you ride again. The scoreboard keeps your points.
- Challenge a Friend
- A private 1v1 Sumo match against a friend: you send a link, and your friend opens it. The first to 12 points wins. See Play with friends.
- Leaderboards
- Where you rank against everyone who plays Quick Play.
- Server Browser
- The Armagetron Advanced community servers that a browser can join, with their players. You can also connect to a server by its address.
- Training
- You against the AI, alone. Learn the keys here before you play online.
Tips for your first rounds
- Look ahead, not at your cycle. Turn early, before a wall is close.
- Do not ride into a small space. If walls close it, you have nowhere to go.
- Ride along a wall to go faster, but leave room to turn away.
- Use your wall. Turn in front of another rider, and make them hit it.
- Use the brake to let a rider pass you, then turn behind them.
- Play Training first, then Quick Play. The other players are fast.
More
Retrocycles runs Armagetron Advanced, the open-source lightcycle game, so the desktop game's guides apply here too. Read About for the game's history and source code. Read the code of conduct before you chat in the official rooms.