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Product description:
The setting is 2125 A.D. Jet Moto
2124, like its predecessors, is a futuristic racing
game where the participants compete against each
other on highly maneuverable, all-terrain
hovercraft, similar in appearance and greatly
inspired by the late 20th century motocross
motorcycles. These contests take place not simply on
maintained tracks, but in various locations
throughout the occupied solar system. The
extraordinary capabilities of these vehicles, which
combine the versatility of a hovercraft, the
maneuverability and handling of a stunt bike, and
the power and aerodynamics of a jet aircraft, allow
for track configurations unlike anything seen in any
other racing circuit.
There are two different types of competition offered
in Jet Moto. The main event is a typical, high-speed
race to the finish line, if hopping across the
rooftops of a futuristic, downtown megalopolis or
screaming through a massive space station at near
zero-G can be called typical. The second is a stunt
competition, where riders vie for the attentions -
and perfect 10’s - of the judges, pulling tricks,
catching air, and generally risking life and limb in
one of several arenas, all for the highest score
When they start the game, players have the option of
playing in Arcade, Touring or Stunt mode. Each mode
offers different options, challenges and goals.
Extreme Futuristic Racing!
All-new 3-D racing engine delivers smooth,
unparalleled racing action
Race any of 16 sleek jet hover bikes through the
22nd century
Speed through 10 huge futuristic worlds or trick out
in stunt mode
Experience enhanced Jet Moto gameplay, including
turbo power-ups and slingshot & racer grapples.
Jet Moto 2124 is deep, fast, beautiful, and most
important, fun. It was certain to be one of the
biggest selling games on the PlayStation and easily
lives up to the standards set by previous versions.
Developer Insight:
What were some of the challenges that the team
encountered with Jet Moto 2124?
“The problems with JM4 as I remember was that the
tracks were graphically impressive but short and
confusing, requiring the player to go over the same
terrain on a different part of the track. We were
trying to do some things with water tracks that
didn't work well. I think we got to the point that
it was becoming a startover and we decided to put
the JM franchise to rest for awhile.”
-Kelly Flock, former President 989 Studios
"We tried to stay true to the game design of Jet
Moto 1 and 2. The games were challenging -
especially challenging and we wanted to try and stay
true to the core design philosophy of the first 2
games. Jet Moto featured figure 8 tracks and
"suicide" tracks that, once you got to the end, you
would turn around and go back the same way you came.
This was established in JM 1.
Midway through development when a lot of the tracks
were very nearly complete the studio director
suggested that we widen the tracks by 50% which
would have wrecked our poly count, texturing and AI.
It would have been a massive undertaking. The
influence of Wipeout on this vision of what Jet Moto
2124 should have been was not in line with what we
had been designing. Although both games are
futuristic racers, the game play of these games are
drastically different. If we had received this
direction a lot sooner, the outcome of the game
could have been different. Looking back, I think
that some of director’s comments had merit. It just
went away from what JM 1 and 2 had been."
-Christopher Tritt, former Associate Producer Sony
Interactive Studios America
“A large problem that we had was that management
appeared to have very different expectations of the
game than did the development team. They seemed to
think that someone should be able to plop themselves
down in front of the game and within a matter of
minutes be an expert. They would watch with
considerable excitement as I demoed the game for
them (I played it non-stop) and, when it came their
turn to play, they would quickly get frustrated when
they couldn’t play it as well as I could. They were
of the opinion that if you couldn’t immediately see
where to go and easily navigate the track, that the
game was poorly designed and therefore a disaster.
I, myself literally spent weeks playing the
Nightmare level on Jet Moto I before I could
complete all three laps without falling off the
track. For me and the rest of the team, half of the
fun was learning to find the best way through the
tracks and learning the split-timing required to
make it through some of the terrain.”
-Paul Willman, former Producer Sony Interactive
Studios America
What were some of the influences to the design of
the game?
"We drew our inspiration from a number of different
areas. For game play, we obviously played heavily
off of the original 2 entries in the franchise. We
were also attracted to the extreme sport of
motocross and the insane stunts that the X-Games
riders would perform. For the bike designs, we were
inspired by the rugged performance of off-road bikes
and the sleek, speedy look of supersonic aircraft.
To compliment the obviously air-born motos we came
up with, we wanted to place them in a futuristic
environment where such clearly-advanced vehicles
looked at home and natural. This was in stark
contrast to the bike designs of the first two games
that more closely resembled jet skis. In an effort
to make the motos seem real to the design team, I
came up with an artificial technology around which
the hover bikes were designed. Original moto design
concepts such as the Primary Vectored Thrust System,
Rear Auxiliary Booster Rockets and Audiomagnetic
Grappling Units explained the basic performance
characteristics of our motos. Once we described
these fictional systems, additional game play
concepts logically followed, such as the ability to
kick the bike up in the air, grapple off of other
players and performance-enhancing power-ups. These
new game play elements also led to the
implementation of new track design components that
had not been available to the previous three games,
such as the split loop, grapple slingshot and
stepping stones."
-Paul Willman, former Producer Sony Interactive
Studios America
Explain why Syd Mead was important to the game.
Chris Tritt was the magic man on this project – he
got us all sorts of amazing things. Why was Syd
important? He is a visionary. He did amazing things
on Blade Runner, Aliens and the other Hollywood
productions he was involved in. His artwork is
distinctive and unlike anything else out there. He
created the universe in which Jet Moto 2124 took
place and brought a consistent look and feel to the
game. Having a big name like Syd Mead gave our
project a level of respect that I don’t think it
would have received had we done our own conceptual
work. However, I must admit that a number of the
artists on the team were somewhat disappointed that
they didn’t get to do the concept art for the game.
But they were all excited to get to work with him. -
Paul Willman, former Producer Sony Interactive
Studios America
Development History:
There was a project, with the working title “Prince”
that we were starting to mock up on paper to get a
green light from Kelly Flock. The premise of Prince
was that you were a covert agent that infiltrates
embassies and top secret military bases, taking out
sentries and avoiding security cameras. Sound
familiar?
At E3 that year, Syphon Filter (which was published
by Sony but we knew nothing about) and Metal Gear
Solid were both announced. So, we had to start all
over.
[It was called “Prince” so when we changed the name,
it would be “the game formerly known as Prince.”
Still one of the stupidest things I’ve ever
heard...]
Paul Willman suggested that we take a week and put
design treatments together to pitch as a new
project. We all worked diligently to create
something new. On the day of the design meeting,
after each of us had all talked about what new game
we might make, Paul casually asks us if we would
like to work on Jet Moto. Of course, we all leapt at
the chance.
There was some concern internally that JM3 was not
going to ship on time. We were the sequel to that
game but also, a sort of insurance policy so that
SCEA would have something if JM3 was unable to
overcome problems.
The JM 4 team was exceptionally well-balanced. We
had great programming and art. I was very proud to
be a part of that team, I learned a good deal from
each of them.
I felt that the physics were especially good. Our
lead programmer, Tim Monk was taking flying lessons
at the time. He turned what he was learning in the
cock-pit into a great handling game. We had to make
adjustments to the physics because the first version
of the game’s motos had too much lift and wanted to
fly – which makes sense. If you had a real moto, you
probably would want it to fly – it just didn’t
translate to the game.
As Assistant Producer, my responsibilities weren’t
really defined. So I looked at the things that no
one had the time to do, and focused on that. Paul
was managing the team. I jumped on everything else.
Another team within the studio was using an outside
conceptual artist to give their game a more cohesive
look. We thought that was a great idea. I went
around the studio and asked artists I admired to
suggest a list of names for possible concept
artists. Lots of the artists mentioned by our
in-house art staff were featured in Spectrum and did
covers for Heavy Metal. Donato Giancola, Stephan
Martiniere, Luis Royo to name a few. I started
making calls to their agents to meet with them.
[It was an interesting meeting with Luis Royo. For
one thing, he only speaks Spanish. For another
thing, he brought something like 20 original art
pieces with him in a carrier. I recognized about
half of them from Heavy Metal covers…]
In the end, we decided that Syd Mead was the best
fit for our game. We were going for a bright, clean
future: Star Trek, not Star Wars and
post-Apocalyptic concepts had been done to death. We
wanted an optimistic future. Also, Syd’s angular
style worked well in using a limited number of polys,
something that he seemed to understand well- he
should since he designed Tron.
If you’re not familiar with Syd Mead, he designed
Johnny Five, Blade Runner and the marine’s tech in
Aliens. Syd refers to himself as a “futurist” which
is a very apt description.
We sent Syd a written description of the level and
some art done in-house and Syd would send back two
renderings per level that we would use to guide the
direction of the look of the game. It was awesome. I
definitely learned a lot from looking through his
perspective.
The next step I tackled was in-game sponsors. Having
real sponsors within the game really helps build an
“authentic” feel to a game. But they have to be the
right sponsors. While movies and TV shows have
ironed out the wrinkles in advertising, video games
were still trying to figure it out. Do you charge or
not? What is an equitable exchange? Is it more
important to have the right sponsor, or is it more
important to get revenue from the sponsor?
I must admit, that this caused a problem with our
marketing dept. Marketing wanted to get advertising
co-ops. We wanted the right sponsors… In the end, we
got a little bit of both. I think you can tell where
the split is when looking at the actual sponsors:
Doritos vs. SMP and Slim Jim vs. Body Glove.
Personally, I wanted to see the same sponsors I was
seeing at motocross and extreme sports events. Since
the game didn’t release, it was all for nothing
anyway.
[SMP technologies were in San Diego at the time.
They were great. They even put together some suit
designs for our riders to wear.]
I attended a lot of motocross and Superbike events
to take pictures and video. It made the most sense
that I go since I didn’t have kids to worry about
and the artists and programmers had work to do. I
got a lot of resource material from the paddocks and
racetracks. It was a lot of fun, definitely
something I enjoyed doing.
Music was the next item on the list. To go with our
futuristic utopia, electronic music was our choice.
I definitely was taking cues from Wipeout. Wipeout
and Jet Moto are close in some ways and very
different in others. I was a little concerned in
going so close in direction but it worked for us on
several levels.
First of all, it is easy to manipulate electronic
music, in terms of length and looping. Also,
electronic music was very popular at the time. I’d
like to think that we chose the right music -music
that kids into the rave scene would recognize and
respect. I was hoping that we would get some
attention from the music press if we did it right.
Lastly, techno music is perfect for driving fast.
[The way I test music… I get in my car and play the
music loud. If I start speeding – then I know it’s
good for games.]
At one point, we were in discussions to publish a
video game soundtrack CD.
We spent $150,000 on the music alone…
We drew inspiration from other games and media. The
trailing lights effects in Akira gave us the idea to
include light trails when you used turbos. We had
arcing electricity effects to show the bike was
suffering damage.
We had story lines and victory cinematics for each
of the riders like they have in Tekken or Street
Fighter. I wanted to give the player a reason to
play as each character. This would give the game
some replay value. Also, each character had a
personality, which gamers would hopefully identify
with and adopt. (I still haven’t really seen this in
a race game…Maybe Mario Kart.)
Besides barrel rolls and forward/back flips like
they have in JM 1, 2 and 3, each of the riders had a
signature move and each of the riders could also do
conventional freestyle motocross tricks like
can-cans and heel clickers. You could even combine
them and do a can-can barrel roll if you wanted…
Special areas with long air-times were added in the
levels to do tricks. Tricks added to your turbo
meter.
Lastly, we devised several game play features that
weren’t in any of the previous JM’s. Slingshot
grapples, trampolines and teleporters were just a
few of the types of features we added to the game.
Andy Jarros was the game’s primary designer. He came
up with most of the new game play ideas.
The game was hard. Really hard. We were in the
process of tweaking the difficulty when progress was
halted. We were taking cues from JM 1 and 2 and
trying to decide whether to focus more on speed or
technical riding. We wanted to give it the “Jet
Moto” feel but with “Wipeout” speed.
So, why was it cancelled? It’s hard to say. JM3 was
panned by the critics and sales weren't stellar. We
got a new president that questioned the need for a
4th version of the franchise. The studio director
wanted to widen the tracks by 50%, which would have
cost us 6 months as we would need to rebuild
everything, including AI. It was probably a
combination of all three…
I will say, however that it was pretty tragic. It is
tragic because I believe it would have changed mine
and my team-mates careers in the video game
industry. I think a lot of people would have enjoyed
playing it. I would have loved to have carried the
franchise to the PS2 and the PS3. Could you imagine
JM for PS3?!?
Even with all of the racing games and motocross
games, there’s still nothing quite like Jet Moto.
Jet Moto 2124 may well be the best game that no one
will ever see but then again, we all know exactly
what that’s worth.
WRITTEN BY:
CHRISTOPHER TRITT, former Associate Producer Sony
Interactive Studios America
Post Mortem:
WHAT WENT RIGHT
Realistic Development Cycle - This was one of the
only non-sports titles that had been given what I
would consider a reasonable development time table.
The fact that it was started while JM 3 was still
pre-alpha certainly helped and, towards the end,
when JM 3 slipped its schedule, the thought that we
could possibly beat that game to the shelves really
motivated the team.
Appropriate Staffing - We had THE BEST programmers
in the studio working on this game. Tim Monk and
Rich Carp were arguably the best programmers that
SCEA had (with the possible exception of Brandon
Bogle who I would rank up there with those two).
These guys could program circles around anyone in
the industry. Rich was dedicated to in-game effects
and the results were stunning, I think you'll agree.
Fully-animated bikes, light trails, lens flare - he
put the polish on that game that no other had. Tim's
character and animation engines were amazing and
gave an unprecedented realism to the characters.
There was not a single frame of motion capture in
that game, yet his characters behaved more
realistically than any game that had hundreds of
thousands of dollars spent on motion capture.
The art staff was also top-notch. We had enough
artists that we could dedicate one per track, which
allowed a single person to focus on an entire
package. Each track had a consistent look
throughout.
Game Design - We had the Jet Moto franchise! What
else needs to be said? Chris, Tim, Andy Jaros (lead
level designer) and myself were all die-hard fans of
the original Jet Moto and spent the entire time
chomping at the bit, trying to take the original
game into new and exciting areas. We had the
phenomenal talent of Syd Mead at the helm of the
conceptual art, which gave the entire game a unique,
but consistent, look that we would never have
achieved ourselves. Chris scored a major coup
unprecedented at the Studio by getting nearly $100k
in music licenses from big-name artists for a sound
track that I STILL listen to, today.
WHAT WENT WRONG
Moto Physics Model – Although his animation engine
was state-of-the-art, Tim’s physics and collision
models for the environment and the motos had serious
limitations and needed to be tweaked. Granted, at
low speeds, it absolutely rocked – the response,
look and feel of the game was amazing and held great
promise, but, when the motos got up to top speed, we
ran into real problems. The virtual shocks built
into the physics model simply couldn’t handle the
stresses that the game put on it. It bottomed out,
bounced off the collision polys and the nice, smooth
feel of our predecessors was shot. Such track
features as sharp turns and loops were rendered
nearly unplayable. We played with a number of
different methods to patch these problems, but were
never able to come up with a satisfactory solution.
Lack of Marketing Support and Coordination –
Although I listed concurrent development with JM III
as a plus, it also worked against us. Marketing was
focused on JM III and had no time to spend on us.
This was a problem with all the studios – marketing
typically wasn’t even interested in your product
until it was at Beta. Then, they would step in and
make suggestions and requests that should have been
made way back in the early design stages. Many of
the requests they would make were incompatible with
the current design or technology and could not be
addressed.
Camera Perspective and Moto Scale – As all the
pieces started to come together, it became apparent
that something had not quite gone as planned. Levels
that felt nice and roomy in the level editor seemed
tight and cramped when placed into the game engine.
The highest speeds of our motos – speeds that, if
exceeded, would totally break the physics model –
did not feel particularly fast, especially in light
of the recent game play of JM III, which was BLAZING
fast. A few people around the office began calling
it Jet Slo-Mo. This eroded external enthusiasm for
the product and eventually hurt the morale of the
team. We tried several different tricks to address
these issues, such as scaling the motos down,
scaling the levels up, changing the position and
tracking and focal point of the camera, but nothing
seemed to help the problem.
WRITTEN BY:
PAUL WILLMAN, former Producer Sony Interactive
Studios America |
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