Yes, it’s just my meager opinion, but I believe that the Indiana Jones truck scene from “Raiders Of The Lost Ark” is the best Hollywood action scene not wildly imitated in video games.

And I believe that is unfortunate.

Thankfully I’ve found a game development team determined to bring the greatness of that Indiana Jones scene to the games we play: the makers of “Pursuit Force: Extreme Justice” on the PSP.

Earlier this week, I shared with you the favorite video game car chases of “Pursuit Force” lead designer Chris Whiteside of Big Big Studios. Today, I’m providing more of my e-mail exchange with Whiteside, particularly the parts that the detail the art of making a great gaming chase scene and “Pursuit Force”’s significant Indy influence.

If you care about the proper way to make a video game character cling to the hood of a speeding car, then this interview is for you…

Multiplayer: I don’t think there are that many memorable car chases — certainly not ones where you’re doing the chasing. Do you agree? If so, why do you think that is? After all, racing games are popular….

Chris Whiteside, lead designer, Big Big Studios: Good question. I think (and this is just a personal opinion) that it probably boils down to cost and time. Doing sequences like those mentioned above and in “Pursuit Force” are time consuming and costly. A lot of technology has to be created for specific “One Shot” sequences that don’t last very long (unless your whole game revolves around them) such as dynamic camera systems, specific behavioural AI, triggered events etc. Not to mention the time required to set up the level, tweak and balance it. So for a game [with a] main focus [that] lies elsewhere, this can be an extremely daunting and not cost-effective task.

Multiplayer: The first “Pursuit Force” had car chases that were clear homage’s to movie ones such as the “Speed” bus chase. This new one has some wonderfully ridiculous ones, like a chase through a golf course and another that has you racing away from water pollution using a speedboat. Can you tell me how you go about designing a good video game car (or boat) chase? Does it help if the chase is absurd?

Whiteside: We try not to do anything too absurd; we are firm believers in players being able to relate to situations that they face in a game. This doesn’t mean that things can’t be over the top or fantastical, but we like to keep a good balance of exciting and fresh gameplay coupled with experiences that the player hasn’t had before. So before any brainstorm meeting we re-iterate this as one of our golden rules.

When designing a new chase sequence or set piece our mantra is that it needs to be original, “Kick Ass” and exciting. So this relates to the environment that the action takes place in, the vehicles, the music, cameras, premise and weapons. In the original “Pursuit Force” we looked at a lot of films specifically relating to vehicular chases and we learned a lot from movies like the “Indiana Jones trilogy” (they introduced some seriously clever stuff), for “PF:EJ” we already had a foundation to build on and we wanted to spread our wings more. So we referenced specific film sequences less for this title and instead introduced mostly original sequences in the game.

Most of the ideas came from brainstorm meetings. “Wouldn’t it be cool if we did this….” We would throw ideas up and then bit by bit analyze them: “How cool is it?,” “Is it feasible?,” “Does it fit into our game world?,” “Can it stand up to movie set pieces?” We wanted to be as high concept as Hollywood with our set pieces without borrowing from ones they have already created. We wanted to offer our fans something not only original in games but in regard to Hollywood’s action movie output as well.

Multiplayer: In the “Pursuit Force” games you don’t just have vehicles involved in the chases, but you have that essential extra ingredient: men and women hanging on for dear life to the exterior of vehicles involved in high-speed chases. How did you design that aspect of your gameplay, balancing it so that it was fun, exciting but still consistent with everything else?

Whiteside: We knew we wanted to do a brand new type of action game, one in which the player is part of all the action and not just watching it in a cut scene. So we started looking toward Hollywood to try to de-construct how they do things. As you say, one of the biggest ingredients was the on-vehicle combat and it goes without saying that our biggest reference point was the sequence on the truck in “Raiders of the Lost Ark.” This sequence was simply amazing, one of the first examples of using a vehicle as stage for character based action.

We extracted key elements of this sequence and then went about re-engineering these elements for our game: for example the way in which the camera is always close to the action, such as when Indy is on the grill the camera is low to the ground and close to him, the way the camera shook, the fact that Harrison Ford looks scared and that he was struggling. These elements made the sequence easy to empathize with whilst retaining realism; this attention to detail is integral to “Pursuit Force” series. We wanted it to be fun, realistic and yet over the top. Something that could be done in real life if you were mad enough. In terms of movement around the vehicle we wanted the player to be the center of the action; therefore the cameras would dynamically change to film him in the best position. We wanted the cop to look like he was one second away from death at all time and we wanted the action to be very physical. The cop wasn’t designed to be a traditional superhero like Superman; he was designed to be a modern action hero.

Balancing wasn’t easy. We wanted to give the player the feeling that he was in constant danger and close to the road below him. Therefore, we made a decision that avoiding gun fire would have to be integral and that if the player avoided for too long he would become weak, lose his grip and be dragged along the floor.
We are really proud of our on-vehicle mechanics and people seem to like them a lot too as it is starting to appear in other games now.

Multiplayer: To me, the best car chase in any medium is the “Raiders of The Lost Ark” scene that culminates with Indiana Jones jumping over, then being dragged under the bad guys’ truck. Did you ever consider paying homage to this scene? And have you considered — or seen anyone else attempt — to get a playable moment out of being dragged under a vehicle? It seems like an untapped aspect of game development.

Whiteside: Yeah, as we mentioned above this sequence was integral to the development of “Pursuit Force.” It is my favourite action sequence, and to be honest it is a core element of our game and therefore permeates through the whole experience. In terms of homage you might notice that when the cop is on the front of a truck the avoid animation and camera positioning is pretty much the same as in the movie.

Multiplayer: Is there anything else you’d like to also tell the MTV gaming blog readership about the art of designing video game car chases?

Whiteside: Well, we’ve talked a lot about the technical aspects of the action, and not much about how much we actually love making games like this. It’s complicated and a lot of hard work, but the results are so exciting and there’s nothing more amazing than seeing someone playing the game or reading fans comments about the game.

Finally, thanks for taking the time to listen to us, and we hope you all love the game.