I'm delighted to bring you the first English translation of a piece of SEGA history from 1988. This interview with Yu Suzuki and Ryu presents a rare insight into the development of a number of classic AM2 titles.
I'd like to thank Fabrizio Bartoloni for translating the article. I tried to cajole a number of people into helping, and he was the first to agree. I've adjusted some of the wording slightly, but the original translation and Japanese text can be found here.
I'd politely request that other sites link to this article, rather than pasting the contents. This is a non-profit site with no advertising, so please be nice. :)
Interviewees: Yu Suzuki. (Lead Developer) Ryu. (Head of the consumer office)
YU: I'm the one responsible for "YU" as a name entry [on the high score table] when you power up After Burner. I've overseen the software coordination and planning of After Burner. I started my career with Hang On and then went on to create Space Harrier and Out Run.
RYU: I'm RYU and in charge of growing the consumer office. So far I've worked on the Out Run conversion [to the Master System]. This is the second time I've converted a body experience¹ game, but as the hardware is different, recreating the original experience is cumbersome in my opinion. Additionally, I've also created characters for the Anmitsu Hime² series and other titles.
¹ 体感ゲーム is a game genre when your body is used to control the game (and may or may not receive some bodily feedback from it).
² Anmitsu Hime is a Sega Master System game from the eponymous manga. Its Western market release has been adapted with heavy changes and it's better known as Alex Kidd: High-Tech World
RYU: The features of the forthcoming Mark III After Burner conversion are made possible by the new 4 Megabit cartridges. Until now 1-2 Mb cartridges were common; 4 Mb is not an industry first, but with so much more space the graphics and action can be closer to the original.
There aren't the 23 stages of the coin-op, but there are still 18 stages and the refuelling scene. The home version contents will be more or less the same. There will be differences, but I'm making the backgrounds and everything else to be as close as possible.
At first I thought converting After Burner would be easy. After Burner and Space Harrier use a similar system, but they should be better considered different challenges.
I'm sorry I can't show you anything yet; we're already at the stage where something works on screen. Please keep your expectations high as this is the risky phase where I need to be at my best. It's like performing a somersault. I asked Yu to show me source code to help with the conversion and he told me to look at the original (laughs).
The Master System version will feature FM sound and the graphics are also an improvement on Space Harrier.
YU: The After Burner arcade project started around December 1986. Our way of working during the project was quite different from common practice. Usually you start with a plan, but instead we went ahead without having defined one. We started with the things I wanted to do, those that were interesting and already feasible. This approach is like having three possible paths ahead and you have to try all three of them to find the best.
Such an approach is wasteful as you can find two of the choices prove useless. You often have to go back and fix problems and can't find the way forward. Therefore, in our case there was a written plan, albeit a hazy one. Planning continuously changes according to the situation you're facing.
There was a movie called "Top Gun". I'd wanted to make a game with war planes before watching that movie. My initial inspiration was [the anime by Miyazaki] Laputa: Castle in the Sky. I'd thought about capturing that science fiction anime-like feeling.
Anyway, as Sega's 'body experience' game wasn't intended solely for the Japanese market but was due to be exported to Europe, US and the rest of the world, it would need to be understood by an international audience. So I switched my plan and gave it the shape of a F-14. Americans seem to have a preference for realistic graphics on screen rather than Japanese anime-like fantasy worlds. Now Americans are developing a better understanding of Japanese fantasy though.
Development costs are an extremely confidential matter, as might be expected. But if we were to make a comparison with ordinary game hardware which doesn't have to change that much, the costs are incomparably high. This is because there are few common components. You have to change the PCB, mask rom, chassis and so on - all of them. It's a totally new thing, despite using some of the same concepts. It's technological innovation stacking up. When Hang On was made, the background was almost empty, but since we've been using Out Run's new system we can say that games like Space Harrier and Hang On are totally different from a technical point of view.
At first I wanted the scenery to be set between the Mediterranean area and the Soviet Union... but it went wrong (laughs). Although I wanted it to be like that.
YU: You wouldn't have seen the Persian Gulf. Anyway, it would sell if America could beat the enemy side, just like Rocky¹ did.
¹ a reference to Rocky Balboa winning over Russian champion in Rocky IV
It's real scenery, and would tie together well. I have the big picture in my head. It would be set in Europe, including Italy and the pyramids. When we created Out Run I went to see the real thing. We don't have spare time like that now. I'm browsing issues of the oversees travel information magazine AB-Road. It costs just 300 yen (laughs). I'd like to make the backgrounds look as close as possible to the real ones.
When it comes to the Soviet Union, it seems you have to abandon the idea of 16-bit machines. Apparently, it would be a violation of CoCom. [The embargo against Warsaw pact countries by US and some Western countries]. I wanted to depict the Kremlin building but in the end I gave up. This is due to the enormous variation and number of patterns which would be impossible to fit into memory. A spherical shape consists of merely one pattern, but here you must render a large number of cylinders.
The landing scene is indeed big, but it exists on its own, so there is just one pattern in it. There were so many things I wanted to do, but they couldn't be done within the limits of development deadlines. For example, I wanted the pilot to be ejected from the aircraft with a parachute. For the end sequence, I also wanted the protagonist to carry the princess in his arms whilst flying the enemy plane.
I think it's important to make the characters stand out. The protagonists of Space Harrier, Hang On and Out Run all stood out. I'd like the same to happen with After Burner.
RYU: Despite the continuous advancement of console hardware for domestic use, there is still a huge gap compared to professional coin-op hardware. In the future, much will be said about narrowing this gap.
YU: I want to work on body experience games from now onwards. I've been working on Hang On, Space Harrier, Out Run and After Burner, but to say it emphatically, they were all left half done. After Burner is roughly 60% done. I wanted to include a dogfight. Right now it's many versus one, there is no one-on-one. A fight of one versus a few strong enemies represents the real world.
All of this is because of a lack of time and technical problems. The incomplete features will be implemented in upcoming games. Our goal is to make games, from the onset, as close to the real thing as possible. If you look at other driving games when an ordinary car bumps into another you sometimes see an explosion or big accident as a result.
I've tried to make Out Run as close to the real world as possible. Although the game is not the real thing, I've added many ingenious solutions to make it work realistically. As much as you could expect from a game. My plan was to aim at what would have been probable in a realistic setting. I didn't want Out Run to feel ridiculous when compared with reality.
Even if After Burner and Outrun have some way to go before reaching their goals, trying to make them entirely flawless would result in enormous costs. It would be nice to be able to create a game without worrying about the cost though. For this reason, it's an exaggeration to call them simulations. But I'd like to get closer to reality.
Chase HQ is one of my favourite Spectrum games. It is a fantastic conversion, pushing the 3.5Mhz processor to its limit. A racing game boasting tunnels, road forks, destructible scenery, fantastic graphics, sampled speech, and a healthy frame rate. All this on a machine that didn't have a hardware multiply instruction or meaningful graphics hardware.
As an artist for Ocean software, Bill Harbison was part of the Chase HQ team and I'm delighted he agreed to be interviewed for this blog.
Let’s go back to 1988! Thatcher’s still in power, the Berlin wall is about to crumble and computer games are delivered on cassette tape. What encouraged you to join Ocean over the other software houses?
Honestly? Ocean were my last choice. At that time their track record wasn't great: Knight Rider and Street Hawk. After rejections from everywhere else I thought, "why not? They can only say no as well."
Little did I know that Gary Bracey [Ocean's Software Manager] was building a fresh team of people to work in-house just at the time when I decided to apply. It wasn't even a formal application, it was just a handwritten letter with a cassette of my work enclosed. Amazingly I got a call back and I moved to Manchester from Scotland to work on Daley Thompson's Olympic Challenge.
In Retrogamer, you mentioned that you hadn’t played Chase HQ before being offered the conversion. Once you’d tried the original, were you excited about the project, or was it just another job at the time?
I didn't get much of a chance to go to arcades at that time so I lost touch of what new games were out there. I had just finished work on WEC Le Mans so I thought, "oh great, another racing game!" (sarcasm) We got the arcade machine delivered to the studio and it looked a lot more interesting than the usual racing title.
Chase HQ - Arcade Version
How did you team up with John O’Brien [Chase HQ programmer] and what was he like to work with?
That's an easy one. He had just started work there a few weeks earlier and I was told I would be working with him after my previous programmer left.
Chase HQ - Spectrum Version
It was the early days of the games industry, so did either John or yourself effectively assume the role of producer and/or designer? How were design decisions on Chase HQ made?
There were no such things as producers back then. We were just given the game and told to make it work on the Spectrum. Any graphical work was left to me and the game mechanics or gameplay was mainly Jon. It was quite a joint effort, occasionally other people would chip in with suggestions and we could decide to either do them or ditch them.
One of the admirable aspects of your conversion is the attention to detail. This runs throughout the conversion, from the multiple logo animations on the start screen through to the animated end sequence. You clearly went beyond what was expected or necessary. Can you tell us a little about what motivated you to push the boundaries at a time when many arcade conversions were rushed and uninspired?
Jon was such an efficient programmer that when the game was finished he had loads of memory left over and I think he felt a bit guilty about that. We had to think of things we could add to the game, they were mainly graphical additions like the game ending and the bouncing title graphics.
What resources did Taito and Ocean provide in order to convert Chase HQ? Did you receive the original art or source code?
We got the arcade machine that you could sit in to play, it was free to play which was great and very useful.
You worked on both the Spectrum and CPC ports. Did Ocean attempt to coordinate the conversion teams?
The Amstrad version was done afterwards because I think the code could be ported across with adjustments made, the graphics however had to be done from scratch. I had done Amstrad graphics before on Daley Thompson’s Olympic Challenge and I enjoyed working with all those lovely colours.
Chase HQ - Amstrad CPC Version
What hardware and software packages did you use to create the artwork? Can you tell us a little about the process you followed?
We had no means to rip the graphics from the arcade board so I had to sit at the arcade machine and make sketches on paper of the graphics and animation frames. I later drew the sprites and animation on the Atari ST with a remarkably good in-house sprite editor written by John Brandwood. The only thing it couldn’t do was scale graphics up or down which meant that all the smaller frames of the cars and roadside objects had to be drawn from scratch. Any background elements that required colour attributes were drawn on the Spectrum with my own copy of Artist 2, the software with which I did my portfolio work a couple of years previously.
The Artist II - Spectrum Graphics Package
How long did the conversion take and what were the main challenges you faced?
I think the conversion probably took about 6 to 8 months to do both the Spectrum and Amstrad versions. There weren’t really any challenges to overcome in the project, we both knew what we were doing and we managed to get all the gameplay elements completed ahead of schedule. This left us time to show off and add as much extra content as we could think of. We didn’t really have to clear it with anyone, Taito didn’t really seem interested in what we were doing, we never had any contact with them. The only person I suppose we answered to was Gary Bracey [Ocean's Software Director] and if he didn’t like what we were doing he would be quick to tell us. He obviously did like what we were doing because he kept us together to work on a similar driving game in Batman The Movie for the Atari ST and Amiga.
C&VG rightly described Chase HQ as “the best ever Spectrum arcade conversion” and “the most astounding Spectrum game for years”. They were clearly more excited about the Spectrum conversion than the 16-bit conversions. Were you expecting this response and how did you feel when you first read the reviews?
There were a few decent racing titles out already and I knew that our conversion was better than Out Run, I just wanted our game to be better than my favourite, Enduro Racer. We were very pleased with the reaction of the reviewers but I was more touched when we received a hand-written letter from someone who had spent their own money on the game and felt compelled to thank us for doing such a good job. Whoever you were, it was greatly appreciated.
Were any features cut from the final version of the game due to technical or time constraints?
No, as I mentioned earlier we added extra content to the game. The animated title sequence came from Jon’s conversation with some of the other programmers either Paul Hughes or James Higgins. I don’t think Jon had intended to animate the titles letters and I think some gentle teasing and reverse psychology may have been implemented to see if he could do it. He not only did it but did it exceptionally well.
Why did Ocean assign a different team for Chase HQ II? Was the original game engine reused?
We were already working on Batman The Movie which was a massive license for the company and I don’t think it was seen as as important. I was a bit disappointed that I didn’t get to work on the sequel, I’m sure there are things that we could have improved on.
Finally, what are you working on now and is there anything you’d like to plug? :)
I’m working at Devil’s Details in Sheffield and I’ve just finished work on Table Top Tanks for the PSVita which is doing very well. It’s an Augmented Reality game, check it out!
Alan Laird worked on the Sinclair Spectrum and Amstrad CPC conversions of OutRun for Probe Software in 1988. Back in January 2000, I e-mailed him a series of questions about the conversion and he kindly took the time to answer.
I've answered your questions below, its been over 10 years so my memory is a little bit hazy in places.....
Firstly, how large was the team that worked on the Spectrum conversion, and how were the different tasks divided up?
Basically there were two people, Ian Morrison and myself. I've been out of touch with Ian for a number of years now so I don't know what he's doing.
Ian did most of the 3D engine code and I did everything else, but towards the end of the project I was pretty much the only person on the Spectrum version as Ian started working on the ST version.
We also did an Amstrad version based on the Spectrum code and John Bankier helped out with that.
How long did the conversion take?
Don't remember exactly. All I remember was that they wanted a Xmas release and the production house (Probe) got so paranoid about us running late that I ended up spending 2 weeks in their office in London. I think we got it done somewhere around early December after starting in the summer so about 4 or 5 months elapsed, this was whilst attending university, it was a rather stressful time.
Were you initially worried that the Spectrum would not be capable of replicating the original machine, and what were the main difficulties you encountered?
Yes, very worried, but it was too much of an opportunity to pass up. Clearly speed would be a difficulty, Outrun has a lot of graphics on screen so keeping the frame rate up whilst drawing those was difficult. Secondly because we didn't have fancy bitmap scaling hardware like the arcade machine, we had to store each graphic at a range of different sizes. There was a trade off between having enough sizes so that the game looked reasonably smooth and the storage space.
What hardware and software was used to convert the game?
It was developed on a PC based system called PDS that some other game developers had hacked together. This was a pretty decent Z80 assembler/debugger environment and at the time I think we used some flavour of 286 with initially a 10M hard drive. There was a dedicated comms board plugged into the Spectrum and an ISA card in the PC to form a kind of parallel interface between the two. You could squirt the entire assembled code down to the Spectrum in a fraction of a second. Much easier than the previous system using microdrives, multi-part assembles and the interface 1 network.
Were the graphics and sound written from scratch, or were some elements borrowed from the other conversions?
Outrun was really the third in an evolving series of driving games. First we did Nightmare Rally which was an original idea that Ian and I put together and then hawked around games houses before Ocean published it. Off the back of that we got a contract from Activision to convert Enduro Racer. This added the element of a track to the game. And off of that we got the Outrun contract from Probe. At each iteration the graphics engine become more sophisticated. Turbo and Europa were even better, they had much more flexibility in the 3D engine,infinitely variable curves and hills in the road and were getting decent frame rates as well. Sound code always came from third party specialists.
Nightmare Rally
OutRun
Turbo OutRun
Did you see or work on any of the other conversions, and if so, how do you think they compared?
As mentioned above I had a hand in the Amstrad version and Ian worked on the ST and Amiga versions. Amstrad was always difficult because it had the same processor as the Spectrum but twice as much video memory to move around. Amstrad users also hated getting Spectrum rewrites since they didn't take full advantage of the graphics flexibility. We didn't have much time on the Outrun conversion but Turbo and Europa were pretty decent. The ST and Amiga, although they were 16 bit 68000, still weren't terribly fast pieces of hardware and expectations were much higher so invariably they disappointed.
Amstrad CPC Conversion
How did you decide where to draw the line between graphical accuracy and speed? I ask this because the graphical accuracy on the game is outstanding, but one of the main criticisms at the time was that the speed suffered on certain stages.
There was a constant battle between me and the production house (Probe) over graphic density and speed. I wanted the game to look as realistic as possible and since I had full control over designing the course layouts I could put in lots of graphics to make it look good. Of course this brought the frame rate way down, I think it was averaging about 3fps in the end, but this game was never destined to be lightening fast.
A nerdy question: On the back of the OutRun packaging, the Spectrum screenshot is clearly different from the final game. The lorry is much larger and detailed, the sky is shaded differently, and the on-screen statistics are in different places. Why were these changes made, and does a copy of this early version still exist?
I think the graphic on the packaging was a mock up done by an artist so that it could get to the printers on time.
The large graphics were one of the first victims to storage space. We would generate a series of graphics at different scaling factors from full size down to almost nothing in steps of say 10%. What you find is that the largest graphics are only on screen for a fraction of a second as you zoom by something and they take up the most space, so naturally they got dropped pretty quickly. If we'd had the space they could have been left in since they are on screen for such a small amount of time they hardly affected speed.
The multi-loading system used on OutRun was rather complex, as it would load levels into memory as the game progressed, whilst holding as many as possible at one time. Was it developed specifically for OutRun?
Don't really remember too much about this aspect. I think the 48K version could hold about 4 levels at any one time including the most recently played level. So if you took the same route through the game each time you didn't need to reload but if you took a different route you would need to. Again it was down to the space needed by graphics, they just wouldn't all fit at the same time. We did +3 versions of the later games which made the whole thing a lot easier.
Did Turbo Outrun and / or Outrun Europa use the same engine as OutRun, or were they written from scratch?
As I mentioned, they were evolutions of the Outrun engine. By the last one the engine was actually getting quite good. Rendering speed was much faster both for the 3D landscape and the graphical objects. Not bad for such a primitive machine, remember that the Z80 didn't even have hardware multiply and divide operations so imagine how cumbersome doing 3D graphics was. We did everything in fixed precision arithmetic, 8 bit whole part, 8 bit fractional part and implemented multiply and divide using loops. For anything more complex like trig and log functions, we used pre-computed look up tables. Compare with today's Voodoo chipsets or a Dreamcast console, kids nowadays have it easy....
Can you briefly summarise the work that you have done since Spectrum programming?
I finished off my undergraduate degree (in Comp Sci) and then did a postgrad degree. After that I joined Baring Securities (of Nick Leeson fame) which later became ING Barings, working there for 5 years in London and mostly Tokyo. Now I'm with Merrill Lynch in Tokyo managing a development team doing real-time stock trading systems in C++. Ian set up his own games production house call ICE which did Turbo and Europa amongst others. Last I heard, which was about 6 or 7 years ago, he was headed to the States.
I lost interest in home computers for a long time and didn't really play games at all except for the odd arcade driving game until a couple of years ago when I got a couple of Voodoo cards for my work PC and discovered Quake. I've gotten right back into home computers now, although on a slightly different scale, with a network of Sun Sparcstations, a permanent internet connection and my own web sites. Its interesting to do a speed/memory/storage comparison of then and now. I started out with a 1K ZX81 and now I have 256M in my biggest machine, that's a quarter of a million times more memory amongst many other improvements. I still have all the old kit in my attic in London, maybe someday I'll dig it out and see if I can read those old microdrive catridges and floppy disks.
Hope this was interesting, it has been for me going back to those days and from all the interest on the web I see that the old games still live on. Thanks to everyone who's taken the time to collate information, build emulators and collect games.
Alan Laird - 2/1/2000.
Another article regarding the conversion can be found in the following issue of Sinclair User magazine from 1988:
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