Driving Games: Gimmicks and Gadgets

So recently I got to enjoy (and occasionally suffer through) Driver: San Francisco, courtesy of Jimmy Dance- the owner of Loading. The game itself is a glorious example of why driving games are bearable; it came with a cool thingyou could do to make the experience fantastic and not just a standard Thursday evening in Peckham with a stolen Ford Fiesta.

For the full review of Driver: San Francisco click here!

In Driver: SF this was the ability to hop from body to body, but it got me thinking about the gimmicks that have made driving games so much more than driving throughout the history of gaming. Racing and driving have always been a common theme of video games, with early arcade machines often utilising a top-down perspective to (badly) convey the scenes of vehicular mayhem apparently ensuing.

Arguably the first thing that could be done in driving games was showcased in 1983 arcade classic Spy Hunter which deviated from traditional driving game mechanics by mounting machine guns on your car. The objective wasn't to simply beat your opponents in a race but rather to blast your foes off the road in the name of international justice. The game became a classic (spawning a terrible sequel in the Gamecube era) but more importantly inspired developers to think more laterally when it came to their car-games.

Pretty soon it was almost unheard of for driving games to be without gimmicks, the most common of which was the humble power-up- an idea borrowed from other genres of vidya. Mario Kart, Rock and Roll Racing, Road Rash, Crash Team Racing- the list goes on and on as the genre evolved into something more respectable and diverse. It was around this time that advances in technology allowed a whole new idea to come into play- the driving simulator.

Suddenly there were two genres of games that were once one- 'racing games' and 'driving games'. Back in the days of the 1990s console wars you didn't care what you were in control of- you could be rocketing around the future in F-Zero or playing as a crudely rendered motorbike in SUPER FX RACING. You didn't care about configuring your suspension because the conditions are slightly damp. That's boring. And that's Gran Turismo.

Gran Turismo was hugely popular, and spawned a bunch of near-identical clones which, on a yearly basis, try to snatch its crown. We've got Project Gotham Racing, Midnight Club, a whole slew of F1 games and relative newcomer Forza. These games don't suck, and car nerds get off on them which is utterly fine, but even so to try and alleviate the boredom we're beginning to see gimmicks sneaking into our ultra-realistic car simulation games.

PGR4 introduced us to Geometry Wars, a mini-game so popular it spawned its own franchise, Midnight Club now has ridiculous EMP emitters and boost bars, Forza lets you earn 'stars' by driving like a lunatic and then we've got Burnout which gets more retarded and hilarious with every game.

And then there's Gran Turismo, still tuning tire pressure to ensure maximum grip on Alpine roads.

I'm not saying that a game needs a gimmick to set it apart from the rest of the products available on the market, and there are even a few ingame tweaks that are seen as standard now- car customization, custom number plates, 'gripping' police chases, bored girlfriends- but unless you're Gran Turismo it's probably a pretty good idea to. You're never going to have the 'Car Nerd' market as firmly as they do, and unless your game is actually fun to play rather than an ass-boring simulator that appeals only to hardcore car-nuts you'd be hard pressed to hold a candle to GT.

This is why Driver: San Francisco is so smart. It's a driving game with a plot which knows full well that it doesn't have the brand recognition of GTA or the budget of Midnight Club, so it slaps you in the face with its main gimmick:Quantum Leaping. If not for this feature it'd be yet more stock driving-game garbage that'd be £10 in a month. Because it's 'unique' it'll retain its value for far longer and (as charts have indicated) sell more copies to curious players who want more than to drive cars around San Francisco.

It's fun, fluid and proves that gimmick-based gameplay can be more than a selling point- it can be something that people buy the game to experience. Well, maybe that is a selling point, but let's face it- who's gonna play a Driver game given how awful the last one was? I mean really.

Toby Ellis