With the influx of new pilots since the Steam release, there's been a lot of questions repeatedly asked in the Main Chatroom. In this guide I'd like to cover some of the questions that are asked repeatedly, regarding the menus, customisation and leveling present in QR.

There is an official Game Guide on the Quantum Rush website that covers some of this info, but I feel it's lacking in some places, and I'd like to cover the parts I feel it missed, as well as some parts it didn't, just for good measure.
Official Game Guide[www.quantum-rush.net]

Prior to each race, you will have the choice of 3 voting options. Replay the last track, random selection from all the available tracks, depending on your Tier, or a randomly recommended track.


If you own multiple Racers for the Tier you are playing, you can change between them before the race begins.
You can also change your Configuration. Configurations are saved upgrade choices you've made. So, you may have 1 Configuration that has a faster engine, useful for speed-based tracks, or another Configuration with a slower engine with better handling for more technical tracks.
Configuration slots need to be purchased with Qoins.



Before the race starts, you can also see some additional information about the other players, or your own stats.
The Kills to Deaths stat isn't displayed as a KDR figure, but rather just the total number of kills on the left, and the total number of deaths on the right.

Human players have light blue boxes behind their names and Racers, while the AI racers have a darker blue.
It's misleading as the AI Racers have names that resemble those of players.

1. Heat Meter
   This Meter increases every time you fire most weapons or boost. If it reaches max. heat, you will lose your ability to fire or boost until your ship completely cools.
   
2. Inventory
   Pilots can hold three weapons at any time, and toggle between the three with 1, 2 and 3 on the keyboard, or Left, Up and Right with a controller.
   
3. Energy Meter
   This meter is required for both your shield and your boost. If you get hit or run into an obstacle while you have no energy, your ship will take damage. Energy management is the key to victory. Boost enough to keep up, but don't risk being caught with no shields.
   You can refill this meter by driving across blue 'Energy Pads' on the tracks. The energy refill rate varies on each track, and each pad. This is something the developers may change at a later date.
   
4. Armour Meter
   This green bar depletes as you take damage. It starts fully green, and it depletes from the top, downwards.
   Your ship will become noticeably damaged over time, and will catch fire when you have very little armour left.
   There is no way to regain Armour during a race.
   
5. Lap Counter
   
6. Position Counter
   
7. Speedometer
   The Speedometers maximum value always reflects your ships max speed.
   
8. Previous, Current and Best Lap Timers

Quantum Rush uses 3 forms of currency. Credits, Research Points and Qoins.
Research Points are often abbreviated to RP.

Credits are won in races, depending on how well you place.
You can also earn extra Credits in Death Races by scoring damage against the other Racers.
Credits can also be purchased with Qoins from the in-game store.


Credits can be used to purchase the following -

• New Racer Components
  
• New Racers
  
• A Small Selection of Paint Colours

RP is awarded in almost equal measure to Credits. Being won from races and damaging opponents.
However, unlike Credits, RP cannot be purchased. RP is used to research new components and Racers, so that they become available for purchase with Credits.



This currency is how Quantum Rush creates revenue for the developers.
1 Qoin is estimated to be around £0.13 or €0.16.




Qoins can be used to purchase the following -

• Credit Packs (6000 Credits for 3 Qoins.)
  
• 150% Credit/RP Boost (Earn 150% C&RP per race.)
  
• Tier 'Buy in' (Unlock a different Racer, from a Tier you have already reached)
  
• Extra Garage Slots
  
• Extra Racer Configuration Slots
  
• Skip Research Wait Times
  
• Paintjobs
  
• A Large Selection of Paint Colours

No, Sir! Credits and Research are independent for this reason.
Research Points are the only way to go up the Tiers or unlock new Components. While it is possible to buy a Boost and gain a slightly faster earn rate, it still means that paying players have to advance through the Tiers and Research Trees just like everyone else, because RP cannot be immediately purchased.

As it stands, the game contains 3 Ship Manufacturers, each with their own strengths and weaknesses, as well as a few perks such as special weapons or unique functions.
Because most new players are not familiar with how the Tier system works, I want to stress to you, that your first choice in ship is important, and will have an impact on the ships you'll be using later as you move up the speed classes.

The 3 Manufacturers are 'Nitroid Racing', 'Ion Energy Systems' and 'Nanofabric Motorworks'.
Each manufacturer produces 1 Racer per tier. The T1 ships are 'Kite', 'Auriga' and 'Clipper', respectively.

There's a lot of information regarding the ships and their pros and cons. So to simplify it, here's a rundown -

The Nitroid Racers favour top speed at the cost of handling.
Their special perk is being able to Boost past the Maximum Heat limit. With the risk of exploding if the pilot continues beyond an unknown point. It's a useful ability, with a huge risk.








The Ion Energy Racers favour armour/energy, at the cost of acceleration.
Their special perk is, once their Energy Meter is depleted, the Racer emits a radial attack that disables nearby enemy weapons and does minor damage.








The Nano Racers favour handling and defence at the cost of top speed.
These Racers are harder to lock on to with missiles, and also have a longer Smokescreen.

The Research Tree is where you can obtain and purchase various components for your Racer, aswell as new Racers for the higher Tiers.

On the far right of each Research Tree, is a new Racer for the next Tier. In the above screenshot it's called 'NMW02', which is QRs shorthand for 'Nanofabric Motorworks T2'.
You do not need to research everything to unlock the next tier, just research what you need to follow the arrows across the tree.

Each Racers Tech Tree can only lead to the next Racer up, from the same manufacturer. This is why it's important to pick a Tier 1 ship that fits your playstyle.
Should you reach a tier and decide you want to unlock a Racer from another manufacturer, without going back to Tier 1, you can use Qoins to immediately gain access to any Racer of your choice.
You cannot, however, buy into a Tier higher than the Tier you have already reached. This is one of the ways GameArt Studio have avoided creating a Pay2Win Game.

Each Racer has it's own unique Research Tree. Components from Kites Tree, cannot be equipped on an Auriga Racer.
In addition to this, not all components are available for each Racer. This is particularly apparent with Primary Weapons.
For example, on Tier 1, there are no Laser Weapons for Auriga, and Clipper can only use Ballistic Weapons. However, this is not true for later tiers.

Something to note about the Research Tree -
The new components are considered 'Sidegrades'. The idea is that a fully researched and customised Racer is still balanced with a new Racer of the same Tier. The only true 'upgrade' as such is moving from Tier to Tier.
The sidegrades are more for allowing players to customise their Racers in a way that is more specific to their playstyle.



Engine
These components effect your Top Speed, Acceleration, and Turning Speed.
Engines also come with various Energy Reserve and Absorption Efficiency.
As a general rule, Engines either tend to favour a higher top speed, or everything else. There are exceptions to this, but very few.

Booster
Boosters allow Racers to use their Energy reserve in exchange for a temporary speed increase.
They vary in Boost Power (The Km/H speed increase), Heat Generation and Energy Consumption. Some will give a larger speed increase, but will devour your Energy much quicker.

Cooler
These components effect your Heat Gauge in the top left corner of the screen.
They vary in 3 factors - Max Heat, Cooling per Second and Cooling Delay.

Shield
Shields use Energy to prevent your Racer from taking damage.
This component is a strange one - It's the only component with no trade-off. Other components involve some sort of compromise, such as lower acceleration in exchange for a higher top speed. Not here. The only stat that Shields vary in is how much Energy is required to stop weapons from harming you. Which in turn allows you to save more Energy for your Booster to use. The stat is measured in how many Megajoules of Energy, are required to stop 1 HP of damage.

Armour
This component effects the total number of hitpoints your Racer can take, while it has no Shields.
The other stats are Mass (Weight), Steering Delay, Acceleration Delay and Drifting. So the greater your Armour, the heavier your Racer becomes.

Secondary Weapons
I'll be talking about Secondary Weapons in a later section of this guide.

New Racer
This is an entirely new ship for you to use on the next Tier. You don't need to Research every other component from the tree, just the Racer itself.



There are 5 states for components on the Research Tree.

Locked
This component is not yet available. It will unlock after you research another component that leads into it. Follow the arrows from the left of the tree.

Unlocked
This component can now be researched.


Research in Progress
The blue bar slowly fills up from the left. Once the blue bar is full, the research is complete.
The timer continues to progress, even if you're not playing.

Research Completed
The component can now be purchased. At this point, any components that come after this one, should be available for researching.

Purchased
Congrats! You are now the proud owner of a new Racer component!
No refunds!!
Once purchased, new components are automatically equiped to your Racer. You can switch back to the older component at any time by going to the Racer Config screen.



Some players have expressed confusion over the Stat displays and their meanings.


This is the default Engine for Clipper.


This is an Engine upgrade. The green bars indicate the areas in which the new Engine is better than the older one, while the red shows us where we will be losing performance attributes.
We gain a higher Top Speed and Energy Absorption Rate, at the cost of Acceleration, Turn Speed and Energy Capacity.

Something important to keep in mind, is that a stat bar that has a larger orange area, is not always the best - This becomes confusing when we look at Coolers, for instance. A stat bar for Cooling Delay will have more orange, signifying a longer delay. But a shorter delay is more beneficial.
There is also an issue when comparing Secondary Weapons - For instance, the Damage value of Shotguns, tells you how much damage each 'pellet' does. There are several pellets, and overall the total damage is roughly equal to that of the other weapon types. However, according to the stat comparisons, the Shotgun appears to be underpowered.
This is an issue the handsome people at GameArt Studio are aware of, and we might see this issue addressed in a future patch.

There are three types of ammunition available for the mounted cannons.

Ballistics (Yellow) do more damage to Racers bodywork than to their Shields.
Ion (Blue) do more damage to Racers Shields than to their bodywork.
Lasers (Red) do a moderate amount of damage to both Shields and bodywork.

So, with this in mind, Ion weapons are most useful for taking away a competitors Energy. Energy that they could have used to Boost away from you.
However, Ballistic weapons are more effective against a player who is usually running on an empty Energy reserve.







In addition to the 3 ammo types, mounted cannons also vary in their fire type.
Single Shot cannons fire a single bullet each time you press the fire button.
Shotguns fire several pellets each time you press the fire button.
Machine Guns fire a continuous stream of bullets as long as you hold the button.
Beam Weapons fire a continuous beam of Laser or Ion as long as you hold the button.

All Ammo types come in all variations of cannon types, with the exception of Beam Cannons, which do not support Ballistic Ammo.

Lastly, I'd like to talk about the collectable weapons in the game.


Charge Bolt
A straight-shot Ion weapon. Just like the Ion ammo for the mounted Cannons, this weapon does more damage to shields than to bodywork.
This weapon comes in sets of 4 or 5.


Homing Missile
This weapon fires immediately and will move along the track until it spots another Racer. It will then home-in, automatically.



Lock-On Missile
Similar to the Homing Missile but this variant requires a time-consuming lock-on. Other Racers can hear you targeting them, and if they have a Shield Pickup, they'll use it.
Alternatively, they may use the warning tone as an opportunity to boost ahead until they are out of range.

Mine
A small explosive weapon that can be used to litter the track. They do moderate damage and normally by the time an enemy spots the mine, it will be too late.
Mines exert a knock-back effect on Racers, sometimes pushing them to the side or upwards.
Mines come in sets of between 2 and 4.
Unless hit, they will remain on the track for 60 seconds.

Electrostorm
Similar to the Mine, this weapon sits stationary on the track until someone hits it.
However, instead of damaging an opponent, this weapon takes approximately 30% of their Energy.


Room Maker
The Room Maker is used for clearing a space around your Racer by emitting a small sonic wave. Use it for shoving other Racers into hazards or away from points of interest.


Area of Defect
This pickup is a radial attack that follows the Racer for around 5 seconds. Anyone caught within the radius will quickly overheat and eventually begin taking heavy damage.
You can hear when other Racers are using this, so pay attention and try not to let them get close.

Body Slam
This weapon follows the track for a certain distance and will disable the Anti-Grav of any Racer that gets too close. There's very little warning that it is approaching, so most Racers won't be able to protect themselves.
It does moderate damage, as well as slowing down the opponents.

Stasis Sphere
This weapon generates large spheres ahead of the race leader. Anyone who touches them will have their speed drastically reduced before escaping.




Firewall
This pickup protects the user from other weapons. It lasts around 5 seconds.




Smokescreen
This pickup allows the user to emit a long plume of smoke from behind their Racer, obscuring visibility.
Nanofabric Motorworks Racers have an extended Smoke Screen.




Energy Cell
Unlimited Boost Energy for a duration of around 5 seconds.
Using the Boost during this period will have no effect on the Energy Meter, but the Boost will still generate heat.


Nitrogen Tank
Unlimited heat generation for a period of around 5 seconds.






Flashbang
Obscures other Racers visibility for a period of time.
Requires a lock-on. May cause eye bleeding.