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BAJA Q&A - THQ Gamers Day 08 Feature
Jon Wilcox
11/04/2008
TVG chats to the man behind the steering wheel of THQ's upcoming off-road answer to Gran Turismo...
After the development of six instalments in the MX vs ATV series for THQ, several members of Rainbow Studios departed to form their own outfit in 2005, 2XL Games. Signing on the dotted line with THQ for their first title, BAJA, the team is racing full-steam ahead to get the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 off-roader out before the end of the year.
At THQ's recently held Gamers Day 2008 in California, THQ managed to chat to BAJA Lead Game Designer, Robb Rinard to speak about the studio's motives behind their debutant, and why this will be very different from past offerings...
TVG: First of all Robb, some of the top tier of guys at 2XL previously worked on the MX vs ATV series, also for THQ. So what prompted you to produce another off-roader as your first title?
Well, I've made six ATV games in the last ten years, and I've really been craving to make a more simulation orientated game that's for four-wheeled vehicles only. Our original pitch video we showed three years ago opened by saying, 'The Gran Turismo of Off-Road!" That's really what this game represents; we have a complete broad range of vehicles. We have nine classes of vehicles from Volkswagen Beetles all the way up to 1000 horse power Trophy Trucks, and everything in between: mini-trucks, Ford F-150s, Chevy Silverados, and then you have the full-size race trucks.
They're [the full-size BAJA trucks] really built like NASCARs, only they have forty inches of suspension travel and not six. So it's the same engine technology and frame technology as NASCAR, but they're designed to deal with ridiculously rough off-road terrain at crazy speeds north of 120mph.
TVG: The BAJA is actually a licensed race, isn't it?
Yeah, it is. The real BAJA 1000 is a 1,000 mile race that takes about 27 hours in the fastest vehicles, and about 35 hours in the slower vehicles. Our simulation of the BAJA 1000 is about a four hour drive, and the biggest technical achievement we've done in the whole game is that it's about a 300 mile drive - and you'll never see the same terrain twice in 300 miles. You'll never see the same bump; it's literally a 300 mile drive through the desert.
TVG: And that endurance race is available in the multiplayer too?
Yeah, you can do it both yourself or with up to ten players online. In multiplayer, you obviously can't pause the game; the world is going on with or without you. So if you have to answer the phone, go to the bathroom, make a sandwich, you can bring up the in-game menu and hand off the truck to an AI, which will carry on driving for you as your co-driver.
You can then go off and make your sandwich, come back five minutes later, take back over and nobody else ever will be none the better.
TVG: So when you're away, you're just going to have to hope the AI doesn't crash...
Oh, he'll crash. We've actually tuned the AI to race fairly poorer on purpose, because I don't want you to start a race, hand it off to the AI so you can go off to watch Pulp Fiction - leaving the AI to kick someone else's ass.
TVG: When you're racing in the single-player campaign, can you see your opponents too?
Oh yeah, you absolutely do. That was one of my big criticisms of the previous rally games. I love RallySport, it's my favourite rally game of all time, but it's always bugged me that in rally racers, I'm out there by myself. During the BAJA 1000, there are hundreds of vehicles on the course all at the same time. We're just running the build here [at THQ Gamers Day] in Time Trial mode because we have a bug with our AI in the multiscreen (BAJA was demonstrated with a custom-built rig on three TV screens in a similar manner to Forza 2 - TVG Team), we just programmed this build about three weeks ago. In the final version, you'll be able to run the BAJA 1000 with dozens and dozens of other vehicles out there.
What's neat about that, is that regardless of what class you pick, you're only competing with the vehicles in the same class that are on the track. So there'll be Volkswagen Beetles in your way, with 80 horse power, they're chugging away doing 50 miles per hour - so you're constantly overtaking other vehicles. But if you're racing the BAJA in the Beetle, then you have these giant machines ripping past you, and you're getting out of everybody's way constantly, and checking your six.
So it's great that this broad range of vehicles can be out there. I think European rally fans are going to really enjoy being able to run a rally and see other guys out there. But when you go through a split-time, then the stack of everybody's times come up - but only for the same class that you're racing in.
TVG: You've already mentioned one or two other rally franchises out there; would you say that BAJA is in direct competition with the likes of Codemasters' DIRT series?
Oh yeah, this game will go head to head with both DIRT and MotorStorm 2.
TVG: I notice that you have tyre tread marks on the surface, are you implementing physical terrain deformation in a similar way to SEGA Rally?
No, we engineered that technology, but concluded that letting the player deform the track actually degraded the quality of the gameplay experience. When we started, we had the bumps at this end and our physics at this end. We kept on tuning the bumps and tuning the physics, and they met in the middle. So I had our artists adjust the bumps until we had the perfect combination of our suspension, tyre model, and bumps - and anything beyond that just degrades the experience. So we threw away our terrain deformation. I know it's a buzz word that people get excited about, but in my humble opinion, it makes for a worse game, not a better game in actuality.
TVG: What sort of race types are you building into the game, away from the BAJA 1000?
Anything and everything you can do in single-player, you can do in multiplayer. We have sixty circuit races in the track, just regular one to three mile lap-based races. We have Rally modes, which are different to the BAJA. In Rally mode, you have one environment that you can run as a single or multistage. In multistage, you stop every few minutes to see your stage times; in a single stage [rally], you run through the entire rally without stopping. Then there's the BAJA mode, which is really just a collection of rally races that go from environment to environment to environment. We have nine environments in the game, so if you run the BAJA 1000 you go to all nine environments.
TVG: What sort of environments will players end up racing through?
We have Southern Nevada, Lake Powell, Arizona, Canyon Lake, Arizona, together with Cabo San Lucas, Mexico - and more...
TVG: So they're based on real-world locations?
From a photography point of view, they are. From a topography point of view, not at all. We originally went and bought the government's digital elevation model data, but it's at a ten metre resolution. So a point every thirty feet? Not helpful. The terrain resolution in this game is about a foot and half, so every eighteen inches we have a point. This world right here is a million and a half polygons; it's twenty-five square miles, five by five. Anything you see at anytime in the distance, you can drive to. There's never anything you see that you can't drive to. There are no walls and there are no tunnels.
TVG: The racing genre is pretty saturated at the moment, and there seems to be at least one new franchise making an appearance every year. Do you think that the rough and challenging terrain is enough to make BAJA stand out?
Absolutely, it's the strength of this game. In all the road racing games, and even in the games like MotorStorm and DIRT, the terrain is basically smooth like tarmac. In a smooth track environment, any time the car spins out, it's your faults; too much gas, too much over-steer. But as you can see in our terrain there are the endless bumps, camber, and off-camber surfaces, so we have what we call a 'reactive' race engine.
What I mean by that is, when you're on a paved surface racing, or even in those other dirt games where the track is basically smooth , you're 'proactively' steering the car. The course never throws you any "Un ohs!" that you have to react to; so this game is all about reactive racing. You not only have to point in the car where you want to go, you have to keep it pointed there even if you haven't done anything wrong. That's what desert racing is all about; reading all this terrain, and on the fly dealing with it.
I've never played another racing game where you're so busy with the steering wheel, keeping the vehicle pointing in the right direction as you are in this game.
TVG: You're demonstrating BAJA on a panoramic view of multiple screens in a way similar to Forza Motorsport 2. Why implement this when very few people will actually utilise it?
In real-life, it's the guys who have LAN parties that are likely to do this. Each of them brings a TV and an Xbox, and before you know it, they're playing Forza 2 - and I hope that there'll be a bunch of those playing this game [like that] too. And the second reason is, because I can. I've fantasised about 180 degree wraparound views in this racing environment for years, man. So when this project was green-lit, and I got to make the game, I was like "Hell yeah, I'm building a panoramic mode! Because I can, because I want to!"
The sense of speed you get from the peripheral views is just exceptional; you don't get anything but a motion-blur streak out there. Plus, once you get the AI out there, you can really see guys coming up on you; instead of a 100 degree view, you actually a 210 degree view. It just adds to the immersion on so many levels, but the 5.1 sound, it really hits you in the ass.
I've been dreaming about making the Gran Turismo of off-roaders for years.
TVG: Are you implementing the panoramic view on the PlayStation 3 version as well?
Oh yeah, it's feature for feature identical. When I look at the artists playing, the only way I can tell which platform they're playing is by looking at the controller...they look identical.
TVG: Will DualShock 3 functionality also be a feature in the PS3 version?
Yup, that and the Logitech G25 wheel with the four on the floor. So you can go fully automatic, triptronic with the paddles, or fully manual.
TVG: You're pitching BAJA against MotorStorm 2, so I guess the game is scheduled for this year?
Sure.
TVG: What sort of downloadable content are you currently planning?
We're having some downloadable tracks, and downloadable cars, but no new classes.
TVG: So they're all licensed vehicles?
Yeah, we have 168 licensed vehicles and 400 corporate sponsors; those MotorStorm guys definitely have something to worry about. I've been telling guys for years that Motorcross is cool, but I have a vision in my head for taking it to the next step - and this is it!
TVG: And you can also tune the cars too?
Yeah, there are 400 or so parts in the game. You can tune every single aspect of everything from the suspension to the steering, from the springs, the re-bound dampening to the bounce dampening.
TVG: Do you have separate teams working on the two versions of the game, or are you porting it from one platform to the other?
No, we're porting it - well, it's not really a port, it's being developed concurrently. Our PS3 Lead Programmer was the original author of the Gamebryo engine, Dr. Dave Everly. The guy is a genius beyond words, and having him is a blessing that I can't articulate in words.
TVG would like to thank Robb Rinard at 2XL Games for taking the time to answer our questions. BAJA is scheduled to launch on Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 later in 2008...
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