Unlike Quake it was not a "sandbox environment" and you could not go anywhere. We compensated by filming strictly defined POV areas like the Niagara River, open channels in the Louisiana Bayou and highways in Monument Valley. That was the best part - filming the background assets all over the US in camera cars, speedboats and helicopters.
The idea was for Mario to cross the US. If I recall the sequences were.. New York Skyline from a Helicopter, Niagara Falls upper rapids to Falls, Niagara Gorge to Whirlpool, a Detroit Auto Factory (never completed) , Carlsbad Caverns, Florida Space Shuttle Ride, Fort Knox, Louisiana Bayou from Speedboat,
Vintage Steam Train fight (on top of travelling boxcar),in Texas, Monument Valley Motorcycle Race on Highway, Las Vegas Neon Race (never completed) Los Angeles Car Race on Highway at Night ... all these would end with a final battle at Graumann's Theatre where Mario had to defeat a combination of all the enemies he had met going across the USA. This final sequence was never completed.
When it came time for the programmers to do the game, the background footage took so much memory to run we were left with very little memory to do the game. The very first programmer quit right after he read the specs on the CD-I player... probably within the first 3 weeks.
I remember he said " the whole foundation is built on quicksand"
The Art Department was soon chopping out animation frames left and right the end result looked iffy -- still better than anything else in 1992 but not what I had hoped for. Eventually after two years in development, I guess Phillips got tired of waiting for delivery. The sales of the CDI player were sucking and without Mario - who was supposed to be the "Killer App" -- they were getting even worse.
Mario was rendered as he was in the cartoons. It was 2D Animation but we added shading to match wherever the light source was in the background film footage. I know I have a "Making of" Video somewhere on VHS -- not sure if I have any game footage and if I do would I legally be allowed to post it.
I mentioned that I worked on a Video Game back in the early 1990s to a friend of mine. He has a friend in Vancouver, Canada who currently works in video games and that person wrote me to ask what it was like in "the old days" That reply got me to thinking about Mario Takes America and I did a google search and found you guys.
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As far as the gameplay went, the style of game was driven by the footage that was shot. The New York Skyline was a 2D side scrolling game shot out the left side of a helicopter. Most of the footage was shot moving towards the action, behind Mario. This was true for the Niagara Falls scenes, The Bayou, the Monument Valley Highway and the LA Freeway scenes. There was a fight on the top of a train with the camera pointed forward on one of the passenger cars where you could see the Koopas climbing up the side of the car in front of you. They would reach your position and fight with Mario. Each enemy had a different fighting style.
As far as the gameplay went, the style of game was driven by the footage that was shot. The New York Skyline was a 2D side scrolling game shot out the left side of a helicopter. Most of the footage was shot moving towards the action, behind Mario. This was true for the Niagara Falls scenes, The Bayou, the Monument Valley Highway and the LA Freeway scenes. There was a fight on the top of a train with the camera pointed forward on one of the passenger cars where you could see the Koopas climbing up the side of the car in front of you. They would reach your position and fight with Mario. Each enemy had a different fighting style.
I had a look and all I have from those 2 years are two VHS Tapes... One showing a Making of Promo Video of all the location shooting, full of shots of the Producer as he treated it as pretty much a promo for himself as well as a promo for the game.
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The other video I have is of his "Backup" Video Game. Near the end, things were starting to go bad and he had the art department do a version of Mario Takes America where we replaced all the Mario Sprites with another hero of his own creation called "Metal".
Metal was a Rock & Roll Star who looked like Dee Snider from Twisted Sister. He had a big Roadie Assistant named "Heavy" (I kid you not) who would help out from time to time. As I said we simply renamed all the sprites and had the programming dept plug the new sprites into the code. MRIONY04 became HEVYNY04 and so on.
We also did some sequences with Sonic subbing for Mario. At that point I started sending out resumes again as it sure looked as if the company was grasping at straws.
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I believe I also saw the CD-I Zelda Game and played it. It had collision detection issues and was very boring as the CD-I player could not handle too many sprites on the screeen at once. Phillips would send beta versions of their in production games to us to show what other programmers were doing. I guess they may have sent ours out to other companies as well. I only remember a Phillips guy coming out to see us once. They really did not seem to attempt to manage the project at all from what I saw.
I am reluctant to post any of these tapes as the producer was highly litigious and even though I understand he has passed away I am fairly certain the family is as well.
I do have some photos of the filming, which may be interesting... though they do not of course show any game play."
The other video I have is of his "Backup" Video Game. Near the end, things were starting to go bad and he had the art department do a version of Mario Takes America where we replaced all the Mario Sprites with another hero of his own creation called "Metal".
Metal was a Rock & Roll Star who looked like Dee Snider from Twisted Sister. He had a big Roadie Assistant named "Heavy" (I kid you not) who would help out from time to time. As I said we simply renamed all the sprites and had the programming dept plug the new sprites into the code. MRIONY04 became HEVYNY04 and so on.
We also did some sequences with Sonic subbing for Mario. At that point I started sending out resumes again as it sure looked as if the company was grasping at straws.
I believe I also saw the CD-I Zelda Game and played it. It had collision detection issues and was very boring as the CD-I player could not handle too many sprites on the screeen at once. Phillips would send beta versions of their in production games to us to show what other programmers were doing. I guess they may have sent ours out to other companies as well. I only remember a Phillips guy coming out to see us once. They really did not seem to attempt to manage the project at all from what I saw.
I am reluctant to post any of these tapes as the producer was highly litigious and even though I understand he has passed away I am fairly certain the family is as well.
I do have some photos of the filming, which may be interesting... though they do not of course show any game play."
The screenshots with Mario in it are mock-ups made by Unseen64, to give an impression on how the game would have looked like.
[Thanks, Assembler Games, Unseen64]