GK GoatKartsComing to a field near you

In development · online multiplayer running now

Goat
Karts

Eight goats, one grid, and a shed full of terrible ideas. A kart racer with something wrong with it: the field is livestock, the circuits have weather in them, and the power-ups include a bale of hay and the actual hand of God.

The server is up. No rooms open - be the first. How online works See the circuits

The game

Go-karting for animals

GoatKarts is a kart racer built around a grid of goats on a farm that has seen better days. It runs on desktop and Android, plays split-screen on one machine, over the local network, and - as of now - over the internet through a server of its own.

Racing that bites back

Loose hay, standing water, a tractor coming the other way and a storm that has opinions about your lap time. Every circuit has a weather and a hazard of its own, and the tarmac is not always the fastest way round.

A shed full of weapons

Twelve items, from a straightforward turbo to a firework, a decoy, and a very large hand descending from the sky. Two of them are animals. One of them is a bale of hay, and it works.

Play together, properly

Four on one keyboard, eight over a network, and the same race on every screen: the whole game runs on the same deterministic lockstep it always has, so a race on the internet is the same race as one in a living room.

Five on the menu, one being tested

Modes

RACE Three laps. First past the post.
GOAT RALLY Sixteen tracks. One trophy. No throwaways.
BATTLE Last goat standing takes it.
FREE ROAM No clock, no laps. Go and look at things.
CAPTURE THE FLAG Take theirs home. Twice.

And a sixth that is not on a menu yet: Close Encounters, a personal saucer chase in which the goats still driving when the light has taken everybody else are the ones who win. It is being shaken out and will be along shortly.

Eighteen in the catalogue

Circuits

Farmyards, a snowfield, a tornado, a flooded lane, and a lap with a tractor coming the other way. These are the twelve that have been drawn so far.

Moo La La Farm Moo La La Farm
Muddy Hoof Muddy Hoof
Snow Baa-rk Snow Baa-rk
Baa-nado Country Baa-nado Country
Tractor Factor Tractor Factor
Baa-ll Aboard Baa-ll Aboard
Goat Forest Goat Forest
Goat Island Goat Island
Mount Baa-more Mount Baa-more
Haywire Haywire
Udder Flood Udder Flood
Foggy Hoof Foggy Hoof

Pick one up, regret it later

Items

Every item is a decision: hold it for the last lap, or spend it now and hope.

Turbo Turbo
Firework Firework
Chicken Chicken
Bale Bale
Thunder Thunder
Deflate Deflate
Stinger Stinger
Ghost Ghost
Poo Poo
Shock Shock
Decoy Decoy
Hand of God Hand of God

Running on this machine, right now

Play online

  1. Open the online rooms The game asks this website what is open. Every room on the list is a real socket on this server, not a lobby somewhere else.
  2. Open one, or join one A room has a name and a password. Whoever opens it owns it: they pick the mode, the circuit and the number of rivals, and they start the race.
  3. Everybody races The room relays every player's controls to everybody else, exactly as a phone does when it hosts on a living-room wifi - same packets, same lockstep.
  4. If somebody's connection dies Their goat is handed to the rivals on a frame every machine agrees on, rather than the race waiting forever for a phone that has gone home.

The server is one small machine and it is honest about it: three rooms at a time, seven players each. A fourth room is refused with a sentence saying so, rather than three races that all run badly.

The online multiplayer menu

Not out yet

The game is coming

GoatKarts is in development and there is no public build to download today. What is finished is the half this page is standing on, which is why it has its own server and its own front door.