1.5-rc2 released, new Forum, and more !

The SuperTuxKart team is glad to announce that the resources we feared might be lost have now been successfully transferred.

This means in particular a continuity of online services for STK players and access for the team to important tools of outreach.

For the SuperTuxKart project, this is the best outcome possible.

While we wish this could have happened more smoothly, last week’s shakeup unlocked the situation, and the shared interest from all parties in seeing the project thrive has allowed to clear things up and to reach a common understanding.

I want to personally thank Benau, who has shown great character in seeking this positive resolution.

SuperTuxKart 1.5-rc2 released

SuperTuxKart 1.5-rc2 is now available for download.

Compared to the previous release candidate, it essentially features bug fixes : new features are avoided in the RC period.

One small exception is a toggle in the advanced graphics settings allowing users to pick the game’s rendering engine without having to manually edit a configuration file. The game’s default rendering engine remains OpenGL, as it’s currently more feature-complete.

New Forum

We are pleased to announce to the community the official opening of our new forum.

This new forum replaces the previous forum hosted by FreeGameDev, that became read-only in the fall of 2024.

It offers a place for players to have more involved discussions than on instant messaging groups, for contributors to showcase their creations, and for everyone to communicate with the development team.

Improved online server

SuperTuxKart online services — such as creating online accounts, retrieving the list of online servers, and downloading addons — rely on a server provided by the STK team.

On Thursday 4th, they have been successfully migrated to a new, more powerful server. For players, there is nothing to do: the game will automatically connect to the new server when you need to access online services.

This change addresses the issue of sporadic overloads observed in past months, that would occasionally disconnect game servers during races.

It also incidentally make the game snappier in some situations where it waits on an answer from the main server, such as loading the list of servers.

Conclusion

Please report bugs you might find in the rc2 release, and don’t forget to register on our forum to discuss about the game.

Stay tuned for upcoming SuperTuxKart news: 1.5 release, SuperTuxKart Evolution’s roadmap, and more.

Announcing SuperTuxKart Evolution

A new major game version bringing a fresh experience with heaps of new content and plenty of improvements : that’s what many STK players have been waiting for, and it’s what the SuperTuxKart Evolution project aims to bring about.

The STK team has a vision for this next great step in SuperTuxKart’s journey, and we are committed to bring it to life, honoring the legacy of those whose work allowed SuperTuxKart to become an icon of open-source and Linux gaming.

STK Evolution's logo

The SuperTuxKart Evolution project is led by Sven, our lead artist, and by myself, Alayan, our lead game designer.

We have already thought and worked on many of those changes, and a roadmap detailing our plans will be made available in an upcoming update alongside further details.

What about 1.5?

UPDATE 02/09/25: We are happy to announce that over the last few days, we managed to get some misunderstandings cleared and to find common ground with Benau, who became co-leader of STK in 2019. The sections below have been amended to reflect this. A further announcement will follow.

If you have been following the project in recent times, you may be wondering when the promised 1.5 version is coming. The release candidate came out almost 3 months ago.

The code was pretty much ready, but misunderstandings hampered communication and trust, preventing the team from agreeing on a release timeline and freezing progress.

UPDATE 02/09/25: Despite some differences in vision, both sides want SuperTuxKart to go on. As a result of the agreement we reached, much of previous concerns over project resources are not relevant anymore. There will still be a few changes, but on the basis of technical merit.

As indicated in the previous version of this announcement, we aim to release 1.5 soon, but it is now planned to be a joint release with the cooperation of Benau and Devee, as we had long hoped for.

Closing words

This announcement is bittersweet, as the promise of a renewed development effort is mixed with news of trouble within the team. Thankfully, wisdom and understanding appear set to prevail.

SuperTuxKart Evolution is an ambitious project, but we already have demonstrated our capabilities with our past contributions, and we intend to prove our seriousness through hard work, regular updates on the game’s development, and ultimately a great release.

We also wish to renew communication with and between people who enjoy SuperTuxKart. We plan on opening a new forum very soon for this purpose.

If you have further questions, you can direct them in the comments below.

Release Candidate for SuperTuxKart 1.5

The SuperTuxKart team is happy to announce the first release candidate for SuperTuxKart 1.5.

Several months have elapsed since the release of the 1.5 beta version, and more changes than we initially anticipated have delayed the release. Our contributors have been busy with their lives beyond the game, and since 1.5 is the last planned release of the 1.x series, there is always one more bugfix or feature that would be nice to add.

You can download binaries for Linux, Windows, Mac and Android here : https://github.com/supertuxkart/stk-code/releases/tag/1.5-rc1

The final 1.5 release announcement will dwelve more into the improvements since the last major release and I invite interested users to consult the changelog for more details, but since the beta release, the game has received, in addition to many bugfixes and minor features:

• Better display of karts, tracks and game modes, eliminating or reducing the need to scroll to see the available options,
• Improved animations for the parachute and bubblegum shield,
• Graphical enhancements to the overworld as a good-bye to the 1.x Story Mode,
• New egg hunts on three tracks (Black Forest, Gran Paradisio Island and The Old Mine),
• SSAA (render resolution above 100%) and Percentage-Closer Soft Shadows for users with powerful GPUs,
• Spotlight support and significant updates to the Vulkan renderer, bringing it closer to feature parity, although OpenGL remains the default renderer.

Please report any issue you encounter (and that has not already been reported!) on our bug tracker.