People who follow my news have probably noticed that I like to talk about games that were generally found in the last pages of video game magazines. That's how it is, I have sympathy for these titles that unfairly end up in the depths of memories even though they are not lacking in qualities. Among these underestimated works, I have always thought that the racing game Hydro Thunder would have deserved a different reception, even if I readily admit that the era was that of single-player games with a strong narrative. Released in February 1999 and then adapted to several platforms (Dreamcast, Nintendo 64 and PlayStation), it was really excellent and distilled a rather great atmosphere with its spectacular settings, its dizzying jumps and its impression of speed rather well rendered. For a long time, I tried to find out more about the genesis of the game and I had the chance, a few months ago, to get in touch with Eric Browning. Lead designer on the game, he gave me the gift of answering a long interview, while offering totally exclusive development documents! Wishing you a good read, I wanted to thank him once again for his incredible accessibility.
Can you tell us how the Hydro Thunder project came about? Midway has always been a publisher that liked to vary its games, but what led you to create a racing boat game? Was it a personal desire or inspiration from other games, such as Hydra on Lynx or Rapid Racer on PlayStation?
The concept for the game was Steve Rank’s idea- he was vacationing on Lake Powell and admiring the calm, placid waters and thought it would be amazing to tear through it with a speedboat. He wanted a throttle like in a powerboat from the start.
"Superboat Fury" was an alternate name when we thought we found another game called Thunder Boats- ultimately legal backed down.
How did you balance the gameplay? Have you taken part in any boat races or demonstrations of this type of vehicle?
We worked on the feel of racing from the very start, making sure you always felt like you were moving by keeping the tracks tight like the trench battle in Star Wars.
Boost and jumps (Hydro Jump...) are essential for finishing first in the most difficult races. How did you come up with the idea for this system?
Again, Steve had this in his head from the start- what he didn’t have was “mighty hull”. That was a hilarious accident where a physics setting was a cranked too high. He hit a boat and the boat was flung clear out of the race. He turned it into a feature.
What can you tell us about the physics of water? Have you developed any tools to render the water surfaces realistically?
Part of the early pitch was to show a water rendering engine, we made a portion of “Ship Graveyard” with an old submarine and a speedboat next to it, that probably got us the green light.
How did you design the tracks? Did you design them like classic racing tracks and add water, or did you have another way of doing things?
We started on paper, wanting to emulate a Disney style them park ride with a visual story. Once the game engine was up and running we started blocking tracks in and drove them relentlessly. It was a lot of iteration. Since it was for the arcade we knew it had to deliver a lot of fun immediately or no one would play it.
Let's talk about the artistic direction. The boats are incredibly stylish, they look great! Were you inspired by real racing boats or did you use your imagination to give them a futuristic look? Some of them look like flying saucers.
We based them first on different types of real world boat classes- tunnel boats, offshore racers, hydroplanes etc. Then we added some fun ones like Rad Hazard. “Tiny Tanic” came about because we had recently visited the set of Jame’s Cameron’s Titanic which was shooting at the time. Steve’s mom knew James Cameron from when he was a struggling artist, so we got a set tour- incredible experience. So we added the titanic as an easter egg.
Can you tell us about the graphic themes? Each race takes us on a journey through sumptuous environments: the jungle with its majestic volcano, the Arctic with its ice floe, a devastated New York City, China or ancient Greece, etc.
Like every game we needed each area to stand out on it’s own- every track had to be worth putting quarters in the machine to get to. We also loved disaster movies and adventure movies, and then there’s just the fantasy of “what if you could race there?”.
Were you inspired by games like Mario Kart to create the shortcuts? In the most difficult levels, you have to go through these shortcuts to get to the best places, and some of them are really well hidden (requiring you to break barriers, for example).
Absolutely.
The Nile is the longest track and the one where the most happens. Is there a particular reason for this? It's like being in a disaster film, a bit like New York Disaster.
Yes, Indiana Jones + Armageddon. I think Nile was meant to be the final boss in a sense, we wanted to put everything we had into it.
Can you talk about the different adaptations? Whatever the platform, I think the conversions are great, and I personally spent an incredible amount of time on Eurocom's Dreamcast version. It's really impressive and very close to the arcade version. In fact, the game was selected for the Sega All Stars list in the United States, a collection released at low prices.
The ports were always a little frustrating because they just weren’t the original (and not done by us) but Dreamcast was the best for sure.
Hydro Thunder is a difficult game, and you really have to get the race just right to make it to the final races. Was this an intention during development?
Yes, we wanted to have it ramp up and reward players who really wanted the challenge but still be playable by “grandma”- so the beginner tracks are not hard. In fact, the game will almost play itself in those beginner tracks- just throw the throttle forward and let physics do the rest.
It seems that a sequel was planned? Can you confirm this and tell us about it? Or was it just a rumour?
Yes, we were working on Hydro 2 but Midway canceled it when Steve left to start his own company. Here’s a sketch from Hydro 2:
An amusing question. A colleague of mine, who works on the preservation of Dreamcast games and their history, came across some strange data. Digging through the game's files, he came across the phrase "James Cameron Rules Fuck You", a sort of in-house code name. And according to him, analysing the data from the arcade version, there's just the term 'James Cameron Rules'. Did you know about this? That's funny.
Steve and I met because I was playing the soundtrack to “Aliens” in my office, his favorite movie. We bonded over a shared love of Cameron’s movies. I’ll have to ask Steve who put that phrase in, I can’t remember.
Looking back, what do you remember about your experience on Hydro Thunder?
I went to Disneyworld right after launch and found a whole row of brand-new Hydro machines at the Pizza Planet arcade. I was blown away- the guy working there asked for my autograph. I knew we succeeded, it felt incredible.
Thank you so much.
BONUS
One sketch is from the cabinet art, the other is a concept for the "Hendershack", which was named after Dale Hendersheid, a 3D artist on the project. If you drive up close to the Hendershack (Ship Graveyard) you can hear a loop from "Sanford and Sons" a TV show from the 70s about a father and son wrecking business. We had made up an entire alternate reality for Dale and decided this was his life. We also had the Dale head board- our big dry erase board where we drew pictures of Dale's head.
HYDRO THUNDER 2
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