Lonely Mountain: Snow Riders has a new release date and it's next week

Multiplayer ski 'em up hits fresh powder on January 21st

Lonely Mountain: Snow Riders was one of the best demos I played last year, because it felt so good to gracefully slide down its white-powdered mountains (and clumsily crash into a tree). It might have been one of the best games I played last year, who knows, but it was delayed into 2025. Now it's got a fixed release date again: January 21st.

If you've played the previous game in the series, mountain biking sim Lonely Mountain: Downhill, then you pretty much know what to expect. The aim is to reach the bottom of a hill, at speed, while navigating rocks, trees, and the tempting urge to go faster than you can control. Aside from trading dirt for snow, Snow Riders also adds crossplatform multiplayer for up to 8-players.

I do like the rhythm of these games. Racing games are always about refining your route around corners to save microseconds off your time, but I find that process can be even more satisfying when early failures mean crashing and restarting and later refinements can mean finding entirely new paths down the wide, wilderness courses.

Sliding also just feels more fun than engine-propelled speed, doesn't it? The build of momentum, bending your knees to accelerate, arcing smoothly into turns. Lonely Mountains' camera is up in the sky, with a tilt-shift view of the world, but I found its demo felt as good as any SSX I ever played.

Hopefully the full game follows through when it launches on Steam next week.