I went from computer lab tech to Instructional Associate II during my time in college. Getting to eventually run a lab, and classroom. The Mac lab was where I started a daily blog on 1UP. It was there where I made many lifelong friendships, and even met the woman that I would marry. The Mac OS had gotten to the point where it would no longer support old games. It had been years since we last played Carmageddon there. Roger, one of our friends in IT, made an image in an emulator for us in case we ever felt like firing it up. It just wasn’t the same without my old coworkers. My time at school was coming to an end, and I needed a better job with benefits. So I would commute to JPL part-time, and eventually work there full-time. There was no game playing at JPL, as you could imagine, but the boss didn’t mind if I updated my blog during my lunch break. That was how I kept my daily posts going. Things had pretty much settled into a routine, until April 2012 when the news dropped. Carmageddon would be getting a reboot, or rather, a Reincarnation. I just about lost my mind.
We all knew that Square Enix would never bring back the title. It turned out that the studio was selling off some old IP that belonged to Eidos at the start of the 2010’s. Stainless Games found out about it, and fought hard to get the rights back. They were in a bidding war against an unknown company. Thankfully they won, but the money they had went into acquiring the rights took a big bite out of the studio. They needed more cash to actually start developing a new game. Stainless Games senior members: Patrick Buckland, Ian Moody, Steven Haggerty, Neil (Nobby) Barnden, Russell (Rusk) Hughes, Kev Martin, and Will McCourt looked at their options. They saw that crowd-funding had been successful for other companies, why not give it a shot here? Most developers asked for a few thousand, but Stainless had an ambitious goal. They wanted to raise $400,000 in a month. They made the announcement, and thankfully just about every gaming site spread the word. The most controversial game of the ‘90s, was coming back! Nobby became the spokesperson for the reboot, and would post video updates on their Kickstarter page. The studio raised additional funds by selling limited edition tees on their store, plus they set up a way to donate on Facebook.
As with other Kickstarter campaigns there were multiple tier levels for audiences. Anywhere from $1, to $10,000 was available for backers. A few of people actually took advantage of the $10,000 level! They also set up stretch goals. If it passed a certain amount Stainless would see to getting a build on Linux, and the Mac. I was pretty sure that my old Mac at home would not run it, but I believed enough in the project that I was in for $150. My future spouse wanted to surprise me for my birthday by also pledging $150. I also ordered a shirt, and made sure that all of my friends online knew about the campaign. I provided updates as they happened on 1UP. They were several of my last blogs before the site closed down. Nobby made all of us believe in the campaign. He did so by appealing to our nostalgia for it. The studio wanted to bring back all of the elements that made their games work. It turned out that no detail was too small, and no callback was too dated. In fact he asked old friends Tony Taylor, and Faye Morey to do a little promo work for the studio. The pair had played Max Damage, and Die Anna in the Prat Cams some 15 years earlier. Seeing their pictures instantly aged me. Tony now had wrinkles, and gray hair. Faye was all grown up. Audiences learned via the Kickstarter blog that she was only 14 when first played the character!
Although the new game would not use Prat Cams, it was the fact that Tony, and Faye were referenced that made fans celebrate. The studio was going deep into their history. Doug Telford the artist who helped with the promo art, and original concept art for Carmageddon returned for the project as well. He created new driver, and car renderings. They kept their look for the most part, with some updated details. His renderings for Max, and Die Anna set the tone for the rest of the cast. They weren’t as cartoony as the driver profiles were in the first game. They were serious, but not dark, or grim like they were in Carmageddon TDR 2000. Max sported a new robotic arm that was made partly of old car parts. Plus he seemed to have a cybernetic red eye. The past decade had taken its toll on him. Die Anna on the other hand looked fantastic. A face texture of the adult Faye actually appears on the new Die Anna model. She has officially been immortalized in 3D form.
Stainless promised to bring back a lot of the classic opponents as well. They too received new art, and updated vehicles. Of course Stainless made sure that they didn’t stray too far from their original looks. In an early update Mr. Telford created a new rendering of Screwie Lewie that looked on point with his original design, as well as the Twister, a sports car on monster truck wheels. Screwie always looked like a crazed pilot, only now he was legless, and using a four wheeled, drill enabled mobility scooter to get around. Just like Max there were many things that had happened to him since his last appearance. At some point we’d see other changes to the rest of the cast. Concept art was one thing, but the modelers at Stainless were showing off how much more detail the new vehicles had. They recreated The Bear, the Russian off-road car used by Ivan the Bastard. The new rendering was amazing. It captured the look of the original perfectly. It also showed how much more powerful the 3D tools were for this generation. Audiences knew that this was not the final design of the updated Bear, but it was hard to contain our excitement with the news.
It wasn’t the biggest reveal that Stainless dropped on the community. The Eagle would get a complete redo by Terry "Tez" Lane. The new eagle was still red, and had the classic blade running down the center. Only now all of its body angles were much sharper. From the headlights, to the rear bumper, every edge looked just as lethal as the blades up front. When it came to specific references it looked as if Terry had found the sweet spot between the first design, and the bruiser that was in the Splat Pack. It certainly undid the mess that was the Eagle in Total Destruction Racing 2000. Tez actually worked from original concept art from the team, as well as feedback from Nobby. With that said however I would like to think that the new design was heavily influenced by the Spectrum Patrol car. It was featured in the Gerry Anderson show Captain Scarlet and the Mysterons.
Gerry Anderson had tremendous success overseas with his marionette shows including Supercar, Fireball XL5, Stingray Thunderbirds, and Terrahawks. Even his live action shows grew a cult-following. The vehicle designs from his studio were a study in science fiction coolness. Whether it was a spy car, monorail, spaceship, tank, submarine, or rocket jet, there was nobody creating models from the late '50s through the '80s that were half as brilliant as those coming from Anderson. He undoubtedly influenced several generations of artists the world over. The split window, sharp angles, and scoop above the cockpit of the Spectrum Patrol were touches that could be seen in Tez's design. The final version of the new Eagle was not far removed from the concept rendering revealed on the Kickstarter blog.
The studio would refine the model to fit in the game. They would extend the blades up the windshield, and roof as they finalized the body. The game engine allowed blades to work as scissors on the hood. This was a feature on the Shredlight, a sports car driven by Madam Scarlett. The studio made the hood blades oscillate on the Tez Eagle as well. Nobby reached out to his team with a crazy proposal. Something he’d always wanted to see the blades double as a chainsaw. Specifically on the Eagle. Was it possible to get that working in the new game? The staff had always been good at figuring out new ways to get things done with a game engine. Before too long they figured out that they could animate all the blades. They turned this feature into a reward for backers. Donate a certain amount, if I remember correctly it was over $100, and you would get a code that allows you to have the exclusive model in your garage. Imagine how jealous other people online were of this ride. You can bet that my tier included this upgrade!
As a sign that the studio was in it for all the right reasons. Stainless released an HD remaster of the original game for the iOS once they hit their stretch goals. It was actually free to download for 24 hours. It brought back all of the sights, and sounds of the game exactly as I had remembered them. Plus the graphics had a greater fidelity than they did on the Mac 15 years earlier. Who would have ever thought that a mobile game would be better than the PC version? Critics, and fans seemed to agree. Slide to Play gave it a 70, Quarter to Three, and Pocket Gamer UK both gave it an 80, and AppSpy gave it a 100. The aggragate score on Metacritic from fans was 8.4 out of 10. This release was a thank you to the people that believed in the game enough to back it. The Kickstarter campaign ran during the month of May, 2012. Stainless Games was diligent about updating the public each time the developers hit a milestone, whether it was a technical one, or one that revolved around the amount that the backers donating. The updates were sometimes funny, sometimes candid, but always interesting.
At the end of the month they had crushed their goal. They raised $625,143 from 15,736 backers. This was a quarter million dollars over their original target! Stainless Games was back in business. They would keep fans abreast of all the news over the next few years. There was a long way to go in completing the Reincarnation, the technical heights that Stainless was shooting for had never been tried before in vehicle combat. We will look at this in the next blog. 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!
No comments:
Post a Comment