I have no idea how many hours I spent on this game growing up. There was just something about it that made it very engaging. Being able to easily make a brand new track and then either go racing or just fool around.
I've long since wished there was a spiritual remake, and thinking about it now I suppose Beam.NG could fit the bill if the editor was even simpler and the damage model was significantly reduced or even disabled. Been a good while since I played Beam.NG, guess I should check it out again.
But not after trying this out. Stunts FTW!
edit: my flashback made me totally forget to say I really enjoyed this writeup. I did a little bit of hacking like this back in the days, so can appreciate the effort.
Thank you! I think also the game Trackmania (which I only enjoy as stream viewer) manages to keep most of the soul, including the friendly competition to create the craziest tracks and acrobatics. The big thing it's missing is Stunts' spirit of the late XX century, with the Lamborghini cars, the rock soundtrack and Skid Vicious.
Yeah, I somehow forgot about Trackmania. I think what I dislike about Trackmania is it's a bit too over the top, both in vehicle physics and the track layouts.
Granted the original Stunts didn't have much in terms of vehicle physics, but I feel for a modern remake Trackmania goes a bit too extreme.
Brøderbund was the publisher of "Stunts", but not the developer. The developer was Distinctive Software Inc. who had previously developed the hit games Test Drive and Test Drive II: The Duel for Accolade. For whatever reason, Accolade developed Test Drive III in-house, and DSI developed Stunts on their own.
After Stunts, DSI got bought by Electronic Arts. They were briefly "Pioneer Productions" (or at least, people from DSI were part of that group within EA) and made the original Need For Speed, but eventually became just a part of EA Canada.
> Brøderbund was the publisher of "Stunts", but not the developer. The developer was Distinctive Software Inc.
This is literally the first thing I write in the article :-) I also link to a video about DSI's story which in my opinion deserves more views.
Test Drive III being developed by a different company explains why that game is visionary but fundamentally broken, while DSI's creations are still fun to play.
I played this game long enough ago that I needed the LOD adjustment to hit 5fps. Nice write-up!
Aside: I would pay real currency for an official Brøderbund t-shirt. Probably not possible now. I always knew I would enjoy whatever game it was I was starting when I saw that ship logo and the 'funny O'.
In college, we went deep into this game. We realized you needed to have a closed circuit track for it to let you play, so we made a small circle track in the corner and the "real" track was off-road.
Then we could have half-completed banked curves, alternating banked curves where you had to thread the needle to not crash, etc. We used all kinds of bugs in our tracks. I remember you could drive over water if you were within 90 degrees of facing the fence, or get a bonus boost by hitting a jump at juat the right angle.
Sadly, we lost all our levels in a HD failure. But what a fun, buggy ass game. The best were the crashes where you'd "shoot the moon".
The game veterans exploit these mechanisms in incredible ways. The best times for most tracks feature cars quantum-tunnelling through solid obstacles, taking off and skidding while flying in the sky, tricking the track limits mechanism in order to cut out large portions of the lap without being penalized, and more.
I have no idea how many hours I spent on this game growing up. There was just something about it that made it very engaging. Being able to easily make a brand new track and then either go racing or just fool around.
I've long since wished there was a spiritual remake, and thinking about it now I suppose Beam.NG could fit the bill if the editor was even simpler and the damage model was significantly reduced or even disabled. Been a good while since I played Beam.NG, guess I should check it out again.
But not after trying this out. Stunts FTW!
edit: my flashback made me totally forget to say I really enjoyed this writeup. I did a little bit of hacking like this back in the days, so can appreciate the effort.
Thank you! I think also the game Trackmania (which I only enjoy as stream viewer) manages to keep most of the soul, including the friendly competition to create the craziest tracks and acrobatics. The big thing it's missing is Stunts' spirit of the late XX century, with the Lamborghini cars, the rock soundtrack and Skid Vicious.
Yeah, I somehow forgot about Trackmania. I think what I dislike about Trackmania is it's a bit too over the top, both in vehicle physics and the track layouts.
Granted the original Stunts didn't have much in terms of vehicle physics, but I feel for a modern remake Trackmania goes a bit too extreme.
Now if Trackmania and Beam.NG had a baby...
Brøderbund was the publisher of "Stunts", but not the developer. The developer was Distinctive Software Inc. who had previously developed the hit games Test Drive and Test Drive II: The Duel for Accolade. For whatever reason, Accolade developed Test Drive III in-house, and DSI developed Stunts on their own.
After Stunts, DSI got bought by Electronic Arts. They were briefly "Pioneer Productions" (or at least, people from DSI were part of that group within EA) and made the original Need For Speed, but eventually became just a part of EA Canada.
> Brøderbund was the publisher of "Stunts", but not the developer. The developer was Distinctive Software Inc.
This is literally the first thing I write in the article :-) I also link to a video about DSI's story which in my opinion deserves more views.
Test Drive III being developed by a different company explains why that game is visionary but fundamentally broken, while DSI's creations are still fun to play.
Interesting! I spent a lot of time on both Test Drive II on the ST and the original Need For Speed on the 3DO — I never knew Pioneer made both.
I played this game long enough ago that I needed the LOD adjustment to hit 5fps. Nice write-up!
Aside: I would pay real currency for an official Brøderbund t-shirt. Probably not possible now. I always knew I would enjoy whatever game it was I was starting when I saw that ship logo and the 'funny O'.
I played this game to death! I still fondly remember sending the purple lamborguinni to the moon :-) with the right combination of travck pieces.
I’m always thrilled when someone posts something new about Stunts. I had such a good time with that game in college. :)
In college, we went deep into this game. We realized you needed to have a closed circuit track for it to let you play, so we made a small circle track in the corner and the "real" track was off-road.
Then we could have half-completed banked curves, alternating banked curves where you had to thread the needle to not crash, etc. We used all kinds of bugs in our tracks. I remember you could drive over water if you were within 90 degrees of facing the fence, or get a bonus boost by hitting a jump at juat the right angle.
Sadly, we lost all our levels in a HD failure. But what a fun, buggy ass game. The best were the crashes where you'd "shoot the moon".
I remember the thrill of hitting a wall at just the wrong angle and being transported into space by the collision "physics"... Wonderful stuff!
The game veterans exploit these mechanisms in incredible ways. The best times for most tracks feature cars quantum-tunnelling through solid obstacles, taking off and skidding while flying in the sky, tricking the track limits mechanism in order to cut out large portions of the lap without being penalized, and more.
I loved this game so much