
Lonely Mountains: Snow Riders is a sequel to Lonely Mountains: Downhill brought to you by Megagon Industries which now sets your time challenges within a snowy mountainscape. Bring your skis and your friends and embark on time challenges while you avoid trees, rocks and other hazards racing down the mountain. The bar is set high from their previous success of Downhill and will be hard to meet but let’s see how they did!
Lonely Mountains: Snow Riders is now available on Steam and Xbox. With multiplatform cross-play which is always nice to see in case your friends don’t play on the same platform as you!
Gist of the skiing life
Time to play as a hunched snow rider trembling in fear over the amount of faceplants I’m about to endure in this game.

Gameplay
Lonely Mountains: Snow Riders brings time trails to another level with mountains of challenges. This arcade skiing game will have you sliding through different trails while doing some cool tricks. Or falling on your face. If you’re not up for the time trials and don’t appreciate eating snow frequently, there is always a zen mode you can try. This lets you ski to your heart’s delight without the time trial constraint. You can even set your own checkpoints so you don’t have to restart the trail every time!
Or just want to show off your cool style to others online? You can do that through the multiplayer mode! Race against others or work in teams to compete with those funky flips and tricks or watch others eat your snow dust! The multiplayer is very fun and it’s nice to be joined on the lonely mountain by other players. Guess it make things…less lonely?
The main level up incentive is cosmetics for your rider and skis. Completing challenges and trails will give you this cosmetics currency. Meaning you can unlock that cool hat with goggles you always wanted.

Controls
The gameplay is simple, yet tough to master. Controllers are recommended due to the ease of controls. Lonely Mountains: Snow Riders gives you a nice and fun tutorial. Learn to steer, accelerate and break such as using a crouch to bring up your speed going downhill. HA see what I did there? Anyways, the tutorial is great and gets you ready for the challenges ahead. There are also 2 different steering controls for whichever tickles your fancy! I went for left/right steering myself as it just clicked a lot better as opposed to the screen-based steering.
There isn’t a lot to memorise but taking the time to train your brain on the different trials is where the fun lies as you break and find the optimum route for your downhill descent! No I’m joking, yes I’ll stop now! The game feels very fair and lets you learn from your mistakes, I can’t exactly blame the game for not reacting quick enough to a tree in my way! I mean I could but that wouldn’t be fair now would it?

Graphics & Audio
The low poly design for Lonely Mountains: Snow Riders works really well and the minimalist approach to the game is fantastic. There is no music, just you, your skis and the nice crunch of snow. I love the fact music was skipped out on. I think the vibe wouldn’t be as captivating as it is with additional background noise. The snow crunch is extremely satisfying. Taking the time to concentrate and get better on each run is even more in focus.
Where the graphics shine though, is the snow. The sparkle and shine of the snow is so prominent you’d think it was Edward from Twilight. The light catching the snow in just the right moments as you’d working your way down a mountain is absolutely gorgeous. Really puts the icing and cherry on the already amazing cake.
The game ran solidly on my 7 year old PC at a steady fps and ran great on the Steam Deck for the most part. I can however excuse the fps hiccups on the Steam Deck as the developers quickly released a statement to address the Steam Deck compatibility and will be looking to improve things. The fact they jumped on this so quickly is nice to see and glad they engage and listen to their community. Megagon Industries have always been great at giving people what they want with massive updates and plenty of content for Downhill even years after launch so hopefully they do the same here!

Longevity
Lonely Mountains: Snow Riders currently has 3 areas to conquer. All come with their own set of challenges to beat. Which then in turn unlocks the Black Slope to try on a different challenge route. The game can be beaten fairly quickly if you love your time trials like I do. However, there is plenty for you to explore on your own in zen mode or trying the multiplayer mode. With the positive reception Downhill has gotten over the years I will not be surprised to find many riders on the online mode forming a nice and healthy community again.
The thrill never stops with these games as you are always trying to beat your last time or maybe even beat your friend’s time for bragging rights. Nothing excited me more than sitting on Discord, chatting and skiing some slopes together. That’s my ideal level of fun and Lonely Mountains: Snow Riders really delivers on the fun factor.

Final Thoughts
After the great success of Lonely Mountains: Downhill the bar will have been set very high and let me tell you, the developers have done a great job. Lonely Mountains: Snow Riders has a fun and challenging vibe. It really peaks at the constant supply or thrill just like Downhill did. I spent a solid 4 hours into the late night playing this and was completely frozen in!
The only thing I would add as a slight negative is that the game started with a lower amount of content than I thought. But again with the amount of content Downhill got after release, I am hopeful this will get the same incredible and loving treatment. I will always support a developer that throws their passion into the game. This is definitely one of those!
With everything taken into consideration, I will be awarding Lonely Mountains: Snow Riders with a Platinum Thumb Culture Award. Now I’m back off to the snow! See ya!
Disclaimer: A code was received in order to write this review.
YouTube | Facebook | Twitter | Instagram | Discord | Podcast