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Time trials and chiptunes are back in a big way, thanks to the power of crowdfunding.
Back in the late '80s and early '90s, amusement arcades were unquestionably the only place to go if you wanted cutting-edge video game entertainment, and the genre which seemed to dominate those locations was the driving game.
Titles like Out Run, Super Monaco GP, Daytona USA, Ridge Racer, Rad Mobile and Virtua Racing all supplied an experience which remains hypnotic even by today's standards. Granted, much of the impact was down to the expensive custom-made cabinets which housed these titles, but the demands of the arcade setting – which required immediate gratification and intense challenge to keep people hooked – generated an appeal all its own.
"That was half the fun of going to the movies as a kid – dumping quarters into those machines and racing against your friends," say James Greb, the man behind MegaCom Games, which has just successfully funded the arcade racer Power Drive 2000 on Kickstarter. "Arcade machines back then were far superior to home gaming consoles, so it was only an experience that could be had in places like amusement parks and arcades." Even so, the experience filtered down to home consoles, which played host to many ports of these racers as well as unique offerings such as Top Gear on the SNES and Lotus Turbo Challenge on the Commodore Amiga, creating a whole new legion of fans.
As the years rolled by however, arcades slowly died out and domestic hardware became powerful enough to offer semi-realistic portrayals of proper racing. "I think things such as online gameplay, the search for realism and pop culture's modern portrayal of racing, all made the genre evolve the ways it did," says Felipe Dal Molin, designer on Aquiris Game Studio's forthcoming Horizon Chase. "The 'old racer' didn't vanish as much as it mutated along the way. Had the cars stayed in the arcade cabinets, we could be playing a very different breed of racing game today." Gran Turismo arguably started a trend to verisimilitude which has continued to this day – Sony's simulation remains popular, and has been joined by the likes of Forza, DriveClub, Assetto Corsa and even Real Racing on mobile. Pure arcade racers on the other hand have become relatively niche, with the likes of Namco's Ridge Racer – once a staple of console gaming – now relegated to little more than a bit-player in a genre it did so much to popularise.
Of course, trends have a habit of coming, going and coming back again, and that's precisely what appears to be happening with the humble arcade racing game. There's been a real resurgence of interest in this style of late, with existing fans looking to reconnect with the quick thrills of the past and a whole host of younger players keen to expand their driving experiences beyond the hyper-realistic offerings that populate home consoles and PCs these days.
"I think people already realised that you don't need top-notch, lifelike graphics to have great fun with a video game," says Dal Molin. "The racing genre evolved to a point where you have a high fidelity experience of driving a car at high speed on one end, and intense, exaggerated arcade games on the other, based on new conventions like drifting and taking adversaries down. Those first 3D – or faux 3D – arcade racers, they were trying to be realistic to some extent, but they were still tied to some of the design constraints from the 8 and 16-bit era. They had a sort of cool naivety in them, with a very straightforward gameplay and a simpler approach to challenges and progression, which we think can still make for a very rewarding experience and catch people's hearts in this age of hyper-realism."
Greb concurs, and feels that the simplicity of the arcade racing genre is what has allowed it to be revived so comprehensively. "They're simple and accessible to everybody," he says. "There's no need to be a car buff and a gamer to enjoy an arcade racer. In a racing simulation game, a player has to worry about all the real world problems a car might have; in an arcade racer, you can just have fun. I don't know about everybody else, but I play games to relax and take a vacation from reality."
Horizon Chase, Power Drive 2000 and Drift Stage are leading the vanguard of this arcade racing revolution, and all owe a big debt to the classics of yesteryear. Like the gamers who are providing a receptive audience for these new titles, the developers behind them are massive fans of vintage arcade racers. "We played a lot of Lotus Turbo Challenge, F-Zero, Out Run, Super Monaco GP, Daytona USA and Cruis'n World back then," explains Dal Molin. "But our main reference is the Top Gear series from Kemco, which we just recently discovered was kind of an underdog title in most of the world, although most Brazilian kids born in the '80s played it back when it launched. So we're trying to deliver something like we experienced the first time around – the sense of travelling around the world and racing against the odds in all sorts of different locations, the electronic music with a catchy melody that deliver a great sense of speed and fun, the insidious road signs trying to stop your run every other turn, and the list goes on."
The most interesting element of this revival is that a whole generation of younger gamers – too tender in years to even recall a time when arcades dominated gaming – seem ready to embrace a new style of racing. "We hope the new generation comes to it open-minded, so they get a fun glimpse of how racing games used to play," says Dal Molin. "For now, we're getting amazing feedback from the grown-ups that played them 20 years ago. It's all very refreshing to hear, and makes us confident that there's an audience for that."
Composer Hugh Myrone – who is creating the music for the forthcoming Drift Stage – feels that nostalgia plays a big part in building up hype for this type of game, but also believes that the younger generation is receptive to this faux-retro aesthetic – in fact, in the modern internet age, eye-catching and unique artwork can be a real blessing. "There are definitely people revisiting old memories," he says. "Charles Blanchard – who is doing the art for the game – has a style which does really well with the Tumblr crowd so I think there are vaporwave/aesthetic Tumblr kids who might play the game as well. I hope people's perspectives on the racing genre are broadened. If they aren't then obviously we haven't done enough to make Drift Stage a unique experience."
The big issue with trends is that they rarely endure for long. Could we see this arcade racer resurrection end as quickly as it has started? Not likely, according to Dal Molin. "As long as there's a cool concept out there that the big games aren't covering, there will be someone trying to bring it to light," he states confidently. "Maybe the hivemind got into arcade racers now with games such as Drift Stage, Power Drive 2000 and our own. A couple years ago, people rediscovered and reinvented the roguelike genre; Local multiplayer is on full steam in some communities; Some time from now, there could be a boost of renewed interest in the 'Tycoon' genre or in life simulators... I think it's all positive in the long term. For the developer, it's less a matter of surfing on the current fad, and more of finding the blank spots of good gaming, old and new alike, to build on."
Greb feels exactly the same way, and thinks that the rise of indie gaming and publishing means that genres like this need never fall out of favour again. "Being a fan of the genre myself, I know there are a lot of people out there that want more of these types of games," he says. "I think the only reason they are considered 'niche games' is because there aren't a lot out there, not because they only appeal to a certain type of gamer. Now that indie game developers are becoming more mainstream, I think we will see an incline in many different genres, not just arcade racers."
Of course, mimicking or paying tribute to the past is one thing, but the sudden rise in the number of arcade racers means that these brand-new titles have to offer something different to stand out from one another. Dal Molin is confident that Horizon Chase will do just that.
"We're trying to build a very specific type of racer in light of modern artistic and design sensibilities," he says. "Top Gear, Out Run, Lamborghini American Challenge – they all had this concern of putting the player in a road trip as he advanced through several different places and weather conditions. And we're really doing our best on that, crafting different backgrounds and ambients for each race with a lot of care. All in all, it's a work of homage and improvement, more than of founding new conventions. Of course we'll have some new things going on regarding progression and game feel, but I believe in a sense, it could be a new starting point for this old way of making racers."
In Power Drive 2000's case, Greb is skillfully mixing together two products of the '80s – arcade racing and a talking car, just like KITT from the classic Knight Rider series. That's not all it offers, of course. "The game is combining newer gameplay mechanics with some of the classic mechanics retro gamers are familiar with," he says. "The game features 6 game modes, some of which are unique to Power Drive 2000. The list includes game modes such as Outrun, Gauntlet, Collector, and Vaporizer." The game was recently funded in Kickstarter, raising over $50,000 Canadian dollars.
In Myrone's opinion, Drift Stage's visual appeal is what gives the game its hook – in fact, it was the look of the game which got him involved in the first place. "Honestly I have never seen an art style as unique as Charles's," he explains. "Seeing one of those cars as a GIF on Tumblr is what caused me to immediately reach out to ask to do the soundtrack. [Programmer] Chase [Pettit] is one of the most insanely professional people that I've ever met and understands the art of gaming on a profound level. Both of these guys are geniuses and I'm lucky to work with them. It's rare to be a part of a team where each person is good at what they do and has a clear idea of what they want to do. Drift Stage is incredibly personal to the three people who are working on it, and because of that it's inherently fresh and interesting because we aren't pandering to any outside vision or suggestion."
These three games are merely the beginning of what will hopefully be a sustained genre revival. Anyone who has drifted around a corner in Ridge Racer or weaved in and out of traffic in Out Run will attest that arcade racing – while lacking the realism and complexity of simulations like Project CARS and Gran Turismo – hits a spot that few other genres can reach.
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