Free Rider Series: A Brief History

Line Rider: An inspiration

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Line Rider is a browser game/software toy originally created in September 2006 by Boštjan Čadež, a Slovenian student. Soon after its initial appearance on DeviantArt, Line Rider became an internet phenomenon.

Čadež was a student at the Academy of Fine Arts and Design in Slovenia and was assigned to do an art project by the school's illustration class in 2005. He planned the project to be coded animation software as he had previous programming experience. Čadež noticed a program by Anderas Gysin named Cronodraw that partially matched this frame-by-frame animation concept and later placed the drawing and mouse control mechanics of Gysin's program into the final product of Line Rider. Čadež then found a page in his sketchbook that consisted only of a small man sledding on a tilted line; this brought back memories of when he was a child doodling the man sledding on various "path lines", and he decided this would be the basis of the project.

Line Rider was completed in non-consecutive periods for more than a year, the amount of work totalling four months; the development process involved Čadež learning physics and vector mathematics through tutorials. The basic concept is to draw one or more lines with the mouse on which a boy (referred to as "Bosh" by the creator) on a sled can ride after the player presses the "Play" button. The game includes simulated physics, which means the track must be sufficiently smooth to prevent the character from falling off the sled.

This game inspired the creation of other games, most notably Free Rider. We owe the Free Rider Series' existence to Boštjan Čadež.

Line Rider created by Boštjan Čadež

Free Rider 1: Where it all started

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In 2006, Pete Shadbolt of Parroe Games began working on a bike game being developed by OneMoreLevel, a flash-game website created by Ira Willey (Ira). By the 10th of February 2007, OneMoreLevel forums opened where Ira posted a sneak peek of the game with a link to the Free Rider Trailer. On the 17th, Ira announces Free Rider will be released the upcoming Monday, and Pete posts a link to a gameplay video and shares the code for the first-ever Free Rider track. On the 19th of February, Free Rider is officially released on OneMoreLevel.com, thus beginning the Free Rider series.

People can create tracks for a character (affectionately named Pete) who rides a bike by using lines to draw a path, similar to Line Rider. Tracks can be saved into a map code and sent to other people so they can play it. A lot of people wanted a way to play other people's tracks online without having to copy the map code. So on the 24th of June 2007, Maxime Simon released the first Free Rider Tracks Database where the track code is automatically loaded into the game. The Database has specific searches depending on the track name, author, track ID or difficulty.

The 25th of September 2007 saw Radio F Software Headquarters (RFSHQ), co-created by Dan Gusak (goose), create a Free Rider page and by the 16th of October, the website had a working Database. On the 3rd of December 2007, Free Rider became the most-played game on OneMoreLevel.com, with nearly 6.5 million plays.

Official Releases
Free Rider (on onemorelevel.com, now closed)
Free Rider (on Freerider-1.net, accessible on Wayback Machine)
Free Rider (on TrackMill.com, accessible on Wayback Machine)

Parroe Games Website
Parroe Games (accessible on Wayback Machine)

Forums
Free Rider Forum
The Unofficial Free Rider Forum

Unofficial Releases
Free Rider 1 editor by Ness and Calculus

Free Rider 2: One of the greatest Flash Games ever made

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On the 21st of October 2007, Pete posted a topic on OneMoreLevel Forums called "Free Rider 2 Game Footage" with a link to a gameplay video for Free Rider 2. On the 7th of December, Free Rider 2 is released on OneMoreLevel.com with improved graphics and editor. By the end of the year, Maxime created the Free Rider 2 Database (commonly referred to as fr2db).

OneMoreLevel and fr2db go through many issues throughout the year with the OML forums going down twice and fr2db becoming too big for free hosting. On the new fr2db forum on the 24th of May 2008, Maxime posted the topic “The FR2 DB is back online!”, marking the return of the DB and the beginning of the forum. The 30th of November in the same year saw RFSHQ be renamed to TrackMill and the forums open to all members now.

The FR2 era saw a massive influx of new Forum Communities which began the introduction of track contests. The first recognised Free Rider contest was the Track No. 1 Contest where on the 18th of August 2008, moose_man's track was made the first of the fr2db. Other notable contests include the Art Contest, Valentine Contest, $100 Contest, Track in a Circle Contest and Story Mode Contest. The tracks of these contests are visible on Canvas Rider.

Most FRHD veterans began their FR journey with FR2 on websites like TrackMill.com and OneMoreLevel.com. This era of Free Rider saw unparalleled popularity compared to other games in the series that followed, accumulating 500 million plays worldwide and over 1.5 million player-created tracks in just a couple years over an endless amount of websites hosting FR2. It produced extremely talented trackmakers with revolutionary ride concepts and detail that not only carried onto Canvas Rider but also some who still play FRHD and create tracks to this day.

Official Releases
Free Rider 2 (on onemorelevel.com, requires Adobe Flash Player)
Free Rider 2 (on Freerider-2.net, accessible on Wayback Machine
Free Rider 2 (on TrackMill.com, accessible on Wayback Machine)
Fr2.me (accessible on Wayback Machine)
Fr2db.fr (accessible on Wayback Machine)

Unofficial Releases
Free Rider 2 editor and TrackMill editor by Ness and Calculus

Forums
Fr2db Forums (accessible on Wayback Machine)
Fr2.me Forums (accessible on Wayback Machine)
Free Rider 2 Forums
TrackMill Forums (accessible on Wayback Machine)

Canvas Rider: Free Rider 2 reimagined

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Canvas Rider is the most popular unofficial Free Rider release. Made by Maxime, it was released on the 13th of September 2010. A new form of Free Rider 2, the game now runs in HTML5 where the best runs on tracks can be saved as ghosts that other players can watch or compete against. A new rendering engine provided a lag-free experience, unstretched fullscreen mode & unrestricted zoom. The new track parser also loaded and saved track codes much faster. These new features paved the way for what every other Free Rider game would like performance and feature-wise.

When you hit a checkpoint, it saved your time and when you go back to it, the timer resets to when you hit it, making perfecting ghosts so much easier. A player named corn_rider (Corn) started using an exploit where you constantly paused the game using the spacebar, allowing players to react faster on tracks whilst doing the inputs for hard tracks more easily. This method has carried onto every Free Rider game since.

The website was expertly laid out, better than the Flash versions of Free Rider 1 and 2. The upgrade from fr2db could see tracks from FR2 uploaded to CR. By the 9th of December 2010, CR was released on the Chrome Webstore and soon gained 900,000 users on the web app. On the 30th of June 2011, too much traffic made the website crash, so CR got a new server. Notable contests during the CR era were the Banner Contest which on the 31st of December 2010, RHINO's track was featured on the homepage of the website. VIP Track #1 Contest saw Kazniti be victorious and his track was made the first on CR on the 5th of January 2011. The Poster Contest also had the top tracks from Ness, Plastic, Leboulanger, and Cake printed on a poster and sent to each winner!

This era of Free Rider's history is arguably the greatest, seeing more polished tracks and the exceptional tracks from Free Rider 2 more accessible and on display on the new website. This is the reason the first tracks in FRHD are the Community Classic tracks, not only to build up the Database before players could upload tracks, but to experience the amazing types of tracks produced by players years before. However, on the 6th of January 2013, Maxime made an announcement on CR Forums that the CR track editor was being discontinued. The site no longer will receive updates and tracks won't be able to be uploaded due to Free Rider 3 being the official release and sequel. Although a confusing, sad and enraging day for the Free Rider Community, CR continued to stay up, and the tracks that have been submitted over the years remain which we are lucky to still access today!

Releases
Canvas Rider by Maxime Simon
Canvas Rider Extension (requires Chrome OS)

Unofficial Releases
Free Rider 2 - Ghostdog created by fantomeblacktree (HTML 5 version replicating Canvas Rider Editor)

Forums
FR2DB and Canvas Rider Forums archived by Maxime Simon

Free Rider 3: A game worth forgetting

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If you've played Free Rider since FR2, you will know how bad FR3 was. It is without question the worst release for the series. Created by OneMoreLevel and Kano Games, it was officially released on the 6th of January 2013, the same day that the CR editor was taken down and the website had restricted access. When the game came out, the whole Community was outraged by how terrible the FR3 was. Despite the game now having a friends list where you can share and challenge friends with your ghosts, it almost felt like a terrible copy of FR2.

Community members began blaming Maxime for the whole situation for not disclosing anything earlier whilst others pointed fingers at Kano Games and OneMoreLevel wanting to make money despite it being the first official game release in the series in almost 5 years. In reality, Maxime (CR creator) and goose (TrackMill creator) never had rights to the game. They started making money from ad revenue and at some point, something was going to happen. But instead of redefining the game officially again, FR3 was almost a step back, exhibiting cool new features but ruining everything CR and TrackMill stood for.

The game claims to have better Flash performance than the other versions but many people complained the game was laggy. Tracks from Free Rider 2 and Canvas Rider were added to FR3 but the gallery of tracks was thousands instead of millions compared to the success of FR2 and CR. Regardless, most players didn't want to move to FR3 and were disgusted that some of their tracks were moved there despite being given the option to add their tracks there initially.

The FR3 Development Team promised new features and updates like making an HTML5 version of the game but it never came. The Free Rider Community started to lose steam and with the CR track editor discontinued, players didn't know where to go next with the game.

Official Releases
Free Rider 3 (on KanoGames.com, requires Adobe Flash Player)
Free Rider 3 (on OneMoreLevel.com, requires Adobe Flash Player)
Free Rider 3 Extension (requires Chrome OS)

Black Hat Rider: A sense of hope

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Almost immediately after Canvas Rider's closure, there were talks about releasing another Free Rider clone to replace it. Community member haxzerz broke through and released the unique and exclusive Black Hat Rider. This game was really something else, the ghosters would tell you why. The old checkpoint system from CR returned but this time, stars/goals acted as checkpoints. This feature was revolutionary for ghosting, allowing players to perfect ghosts like never before by resetting at each star till a player was satisfied, producing the craziest ghosts ever seen. TO BE FINISHED

Releases currently available
Black Hat Rider reopened by Calculus (access key: 2008, many game features aren't available/don't work)
Black Hat Rider Editor created by Calculus

Forums
Black Hat Rider Forums (now closed, accessible on Wayback Machine)

Free Rider HD: A new era begins

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Developed by Kano/Apps and OneMoreLevel in 2013 and officially released on the 4th of December 2013, it is the last official edition of the Free Rider series but the first with 30 fps when ghosting and unparalleled graphics compared to the other editions. Once again, old FR2 and CR tracks were moved over to FRHD as Community Classic Tracks before the official game release on the 19th of November 2013. 10105 tracks were uploaded, going from track ID 1001 to 11106. Upon the initial release of the game and forums, Community members from CR and BHR didn't know what to expect, especially since FRHD had no editor. Some people continued to rant about the downfall of CR or complained about what Kano did to ruin the game. Others remained optimistic whilst most veterans of the game decided to stick with BHR or draw on CR editor clones for the time being.

The first Free Rider HD Trailer was released on the 9th of January 2014, grabbing the attention of people who were unaware of the Free Rider series. Shortly after this exposure, the track editor was released on the 5th of February as a Beta Version. People were still not able to upload tracks and veterans still insisted on using the BHR editor instead. After a long wait, the 8th of May 2014 marked the beginning of the FRHD era when players were finally able to upload tracks. The Great Volcano by Char (a Community Developer) was the first track released, new tracks beginning from track ID 50001 onwards. Veterans finally decided to stick with FRHD as they realised it was the go-to website to publicise their tracks. Only a few dedicated ghosters played BHR religiously till its closure on the 13th of July 2020.

The Community was expecting big things from FRHD, and that is exactly what they got. Free Rider HD is the next generation of Free Rider available to play on any device including a Mobile Version of the game that can be linked to a person's normal FRHD account. FRHD outdoes the previous versions in almost every way possible. With Campaigns, thousands of top Free Rider tracks online, multiplayer racing, achievements, powerful track editor, leaderboards and more, FRHD is able to keep you entertained for a very long time! The last official update for FRHD was the release of the 11th Campaign Super Free Rider Bros containing one track, Stig's renowned Super Mario Bros. FRHD track.

Although the Community has been through tough times, it is by far the most dedicated in the series, with many still playing since the FR2 days and a plethora of new players creating amazing tracks, producing mind-blowing ghosts, releasing tools for the Community, and offering a wide range of threads topics to keep the Community engaged and connected as one for the years to come. FRHD is currently run by the Community after Kano Apps started to focus on other games and when Char announced he was leaving Kano on the 30th of March 2021.

A group of dedicated Staff Members, Administrators and Forum Moderators kept this game running smoothly and driving into a better future. Staff Members like Eric check in every once in a while to ensure the game and community don't hit any roadblocks. FRHD has been through 9 eras and is currently in "The Next Generation" Era after the release of track editor 1.1 by Ness and Pie42, bringing new light as a new generation of Free Rider players begins to come through.

• Early Days: Dec 5th, 2013 - Feb 5th 2014
• Bronze Era: Feb 5th, 2014 - Dec 23rd, 2014
• Silver Era: Dec 23rd, 2014 - Dec 11th, 2015
• Golden Era: Dec 11th, 2015 - May 18th, 2017
• Dark Era/The Cold Winter: May 18th, 2017 - Sep 23rd, 2018
• New Era: Sep 23rd, 2018 - Jun 29th 2019
• The Revival: Jun 29th, 2019 - Mar 30th, 2021
• Reformative Years: Mar 30th, 2021 - Jul 7th, 2024
• The Next Generation: Jul 7th, 2024 - present

Official Releases
Free Rider HD created by Kano Apps and OneMoreLevel
Free Rider HD Extension (requires Chrome OS)
Free Rider HD Offline Editor (requires Chrome OS)
Free Rider Jumps created by Kano Apps (Char), Stig, mR..A, Max007x and speedy__XD
Free Rider HD Mobile created by Kano Apps

Unofficial Releases
track editor 1.1 created by Ness, Pie42 and others
freerider.app created by Ness
Free Rider Roblox Edition created by Calculus

FRHD Community
Free Rider HD Community
Free Rider HD Discord Server

Other Websites and Social Media
Free Rider HD Instagram
Free Rider HD Facebook
Free Rider HD Twitter
Free Rider HD YouTube Channel
Kano Apps Facebook
Kano Apps Website
OneMoreLevel.com

Sources
FRHD Timeline 2013-2025 by TPlacella
Pssst's History of Free Rider HD by pssst
Free Rider History Before FRHD by Ness
FR2DB/Canvasrider History by Isenki
Wayback Machine

Notes
A brief history of each game is mostly done, just have to add a few more things. Big thanks to those who already had information about other Free Rider games documented down. If you know more about Black Hat Rider, feel free to comment below. Maybe sometime in the future, I can expand on each Free Rider game with the help of others on separate threads

 

who deleted my comment

 

Tplac probably got mad that you managed to ratio him