When the final version of Carmageddon was released in February 1997 it was so much greater than I could have anticipated. I brought the box purchased from CompUSA (ask your parents) into the computer lab early on a Saturday. I didn’t normally work weekends, thankfully we were only open for a half day. After we rushed the last student out we locked the lab doors, and fired it up, sitting through the opening cinema and getting hyped. The intro animation was burned into the memories of a generation. So much so that a fan recreated the opening using the in game camera of the latest version of the game. You can watch the original intro below, be forewarned, it mirrors the dark violence of the series.
Max, and Die Anna were seen on the “Prat Cam” it was supposed to be the drivers in the cockpit reacting to the race. The two would laugh like maniacs as they ran over people, whip their head around after getting in a wreck, scream as they fell off of a building, and even swear under their breath. It gave a lot of personality to the characters, and added another layer of dark humor to an already absurd premise. At the start of the game the cars were nowhere near as fast, or as powerful as they were in the demo. They were easy to wreck, and could be pushed around by opponents, and police cars alike. Earning enough credits to power up the vehicles, and unlock opponents would test my patience. It turned out that the demo stage, and cars were approximately where the cars would have been at about 90% through the game. Their armor, their offense, and their engines had been heavily upgraded by that point. There were many miles of virtual racing to actually get to this point in the full release.
The game began with you ranked 99th in a tournament. Your goal was to finish every race in the series, and become #1. There were almost 40 levels in the game in which to accomplish your goal. Players could skip ranks depending on how many points were earned during each level. It was not uncommon to jump 7 ranks or more for a particularly violent contest. The specific how, and why the Carmageddon tournament was created was never fully explained. This was perfectly fine, as audiences were left to fill in the blanks. Between the opening cinema, and clues picked up from the races we could gather all the information we needed. The tournament was held all around the world, and only the most dangerous racers were invited. These included murderers, celebrities, gang members, cops, and even robots. When races took place in a city, the outskirts, and main roads were walled off. Anyone that remained inside was left to fend for themselves. Other stages were set on an island, or enclosed circuit. This was also not a post-apocalyptic race for survival. You could never mistake the locations for the wastelands of the Mad Max universe. The Carma world was set in living, breathing factories, towns, and vacation resorts. The tournament was a violent satire of the real world. Take it as a futuristic gladiator battle, broadcast to the masses to appease their blood lust.
The rules for the tournament were simple. Each race could be won in three ways, you could complete the required laps, destroy all of the opponents, or kill every pedestrian on the map. The third was the most difficult, but also potentially worth the most points, and prestige. The opponents themselves were a cross section of archetypes, and stereotypes from pop culture. You can imagine that the Black community did not like the representation in the game. There was the pimp-coded Otis P. Jivefunk, and his leopard print top “Caddy Fat Cat.” To be fair the Caddy Fat Cat was the car I used most often in the game. It was fast, heavy, and could take a lot of damage. Then there was the former football star-turned-murderer OK Stimpson, driving a “Fraud Broko.” For those that don’t know the story he was based on; former pro football star O.J. Simpson killed his ex-wife, and her boyfriend in 1994. He was caught in a Ford Bronco during a slow speed pursuit as he tried to flee the country. I would argue that Stainless Games wasn’t making fun of one ethnic group as much as every person in the game was an ugly parody. Also Stainless admits that they pre-censored themselves. They had men, women, cops, and elderly people that you could run over in the game. Artist Terry Lane put his foot down when they said pregnant women should be pedestrians too. They were also mindful that if they had Black pedestrians the racists would go out of their way to only run them over. So they made all the pedestrians white in the first game. They wanted audiences to know that all pedestrians were equal targets in their world. Black, and brown pedestrians, as well as better Black driver archetypes would appear in the sequel.
These drivers, as offensive as they were, and their respective vehicles did not all show up right away. As with all great game design, the opponent rides were equal to, or slightly better than the Hawk, and Eagle at the start of the game. Early races were long, drawn out battles. Opponents smothered players at every turn. Throw in the police which were randomly dispersed through each stage, and the car battles became harder. Only by winning races and increasing your stats could you hope to make the later stages any easier. To balance out the game more difficult opponents would join the tournament as players increased in rank, and as their car became faster, and stronger. Every opponent vehicle had its own strengths and weaknesses. Some were blindingly fast, some were heavily armored, but all could potentially be unlocked. In order to do so you had to outrank your opponents, and destroy them in the level. Once acquired you could drive that specific car, and also increase its armor, offense, and engine. Every vehicle in the game was unique with the exception of Halfwit Harry, and his sister Burly Shirley. Harry, and Shirley had a respective green, or pink Hummer-type off roader. In any instance the diversity of vehicle types, the way they controlled, and benefits really gave Carmageddon a lot of replay value. Some of the cars were labeled Cheat, not necessarily because they had an outright advantage, but because unlocking them seemed to be more random than other cars.
The full version of the game also meant that we had a soundtrack to play along with. Original music was one one of my elements of great game design. Carma did not disappoint. So what kind of music went well with all of that mayhem? We needed something that could get the adrenaline pumping right away. So it was heavy metal of course! Not just any type of metal, but industrial, and electronic. The tempo, and riffs hit like a punch to the chest. They seemed to go very well to create an aggressive, yet also futuristic atmosphere. The biggest name on the soundtrack was Fear Factory. Three of their songs appeared in the game, including Zero Signal, which was also on the Mortal Kombat movie soundtrack. Composer Lee Groves had several tracks as well, which complimented the themes of the major areas of the games. These included “industrial, coastal, desert, and winter wonderland.” Stainless sound designer, and composer Chris Melchior had a few tracks, including music on the expansion as well. The music, screaming peds, explosions, and collisions all blended perfectly. They audibly brought audiences much deeper into this world.
The sudden increase in car types, and multiplayer game modes went over great at work. The other lab techs also began using their break time to get better at Carma, and learn which cars were most advantageous. We began setting parameters on which vehicles were allowed in certain game modes. Some cars were banned outright because they were simply too powerful, or because they had some other unfair property. Stella Stunna for example, a rubber-clad sadist, drove “Electric Blue.” Her car had a built in Electro-Bastard Ray. This was normally a power up that only lasted for a few seconds in other cars. For Stella it was permanently enabled, and could zap pedestrians with a bolt of lighting from up to 10 meters away. This meant that she could easily rack up points in multiplayer games, and power up her vehicle on the fly. This left no pedestrians for the rest of the players.
The other car that was banned from competition was The Suppressor. In the game, as in real life, the cops had access to the biggest and baddest vehicles. The squad car in Carmageddon weighed almost 3 tons, and could go 150mph. It much closer to a supercharged armored personnel carrier rather than the traditional cop car. A group of them could turn any stage into a nightmare, With about 90% of the game complete players would have earned heavy-hitters that could eventually take out a squad car. However the supreme heavy hitter in the game was called The Suppressor, piloted by Police Chief Biggun. It weighed 5 tons, and could reach 250mph. The first time I saw it was actually on the stage featured in the demo. You can imagine my surprise. I was going through the route that I had raced hundreds of times before. I reached the top of a skyscraper, and it was waiting where no cops were previously. I had a fraction of a second to ask myself “what the hell is that?” Before it ran me off the roof and destroyed me with a couple of hits.
I fought tooth and nail against the Suppressor again, and again with different rides until I was able to unlock it. My favorite heavy-hitter was the Plow, a four wheel drive bulldozer formally piloted by Don Dumpster. I used that to great effect against the cops in the game. In LAN matches when using the Plow I would sign in as El Don. Once the Suppressor was in the garage the rest of the game played relatively easily. Again traditional game design dictated that the best weapons were only accessible near the end of the title, otherwise the experience would have felt cheap. The team at Stainless Games knew what they were doing. They even went so far as to highlight it as the vehicle you were rewarded with in the final game cinema. During the awards ceremony the organizers of the tournament are presenting a trophy to an unknown driver. Then in the dark a six-wheeled beast rides up the podium, and flattens everyone, including the cup. I suppose the lesson for Carma was never was about becoming the best, it was about the enemies killed along the way... We were having an absolute blast at work. With the exception of Stella, and Chief Biggun, all of the cars were fair game in multiplayer modes. Depending on my competition I would choose the car that would be the biggest nightmare for them. This frustrated my coworkers to no end. For every one game they won I would often win the next eight.
The end of the semester tournaments were even more exciting now. Not only that, but as our computer lab expanded, we had more hires that were becoming solid players. The bigger labs also meant that we were getting more attention from other departments looking to create their own computer labs. Carol was our Dean, and would show our labs off to other college admins. This included the VP, and President Carol stopped by for the end of the semester party one year. She was always a bubbly presence, and welcome whenever she visited. She wanted to sit in on our tournament, and see what the fuss was about. The boss lady Alison wasn’t too sure about it, but I insisted. Carol gasped when she found out the game was about racing, and running over pedestrians. After the initial shock wore off she asked, “is it okay if I try it?” We had her sit down, and watched as she drove around the virtual block a few times. She screamed when she began running over pedestrians, “oh no, oh no!” Then she began giggling as she started running into other drivers. After a few minutes she was red in the face from laughing at the mayhem she had participated in. She assured Alison, and even Phyllis our department head, that the game was as much fun as advertised. From that moment on we would be sure to invite her to the tournament each semester. She would decline, but asked that we enjoy ourselves. I can’t imagine that any other college had an administrator that was half as cool. Carol eventually became a Dean at an even bigger college. She retired years ago, but we stay in touch on Facebook.
It turned out that as other departments opened up their own computer labs they were eager to hire our staff. In a few instances they had poached talent from our labs. Carol, Phyllis, and Alison met with the other departments. They said they did not mind sharing talent, or having lab techs train alongside us for a few weeks so they could get up to speed. Poaching our team was not a good look. I remained with our department because as I discovered from my friends in IT that the other labs had far more restrictions than we had. They had their computers on lock down. No games, no demos, no fun. The IT department mostly left us to our own devices because we were good at maintaining our own systems, updates, and security. When I wasn’t playing the game I was researching it. I learned lots about Carma from the game forums, including how it was made. It turned out that there was a huge challenge in trying to get it published. It made me appreciate it that much more. We’re going to look at why nobody was willing to sell Stainless a license in the next entry. If you would like to sponsor me please visit my Patreon page and consider donating each month, even as little as $1 would help make better blogs and even podcasts!
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