February 29, 2008

Emergency Mayhem’s Melissa Scrivin on Bringing a Crisis to Nintendo Wii
By Louis Bedigian

“In Emergency Mayhem the chaos doesn't start and finish behind the wheel!”

Not since Crazy Taxi has an open-world, non-shooter driving game received worldwide attention. The city design, silky-smooth controls (in the arcade and on Dreamcast), and urgent challenges were far from crazy – they were brilliant.

Emergency Mayhem, a new arcade driving game from Codemasters, aims to create that kind of excitement on Nintendo Wii. “When you're making a fun, arcade driving game in an open-world city, Crazy Taxi is obviously an essential reference point – no question,” said Producer Melissa Scrivin. “We're certainly influenced by the bright and breezy, blue-sky aspects of that game.

“But when you're making a game for the Wii there are different challenges and opportunities. If anything, we've probably got a simpler control system, more insane traffic and of course we have a host of mini-games to play through too – in Emergency Mayhem the chaos doesn't start and finish behind the wheel!”

Emergency Mayhem allows you to control an ambulance, fire truck and police car. How do the scenarios/missions differ between these vehicles?

Melissa Scrivin: In Emergency Mayhem, you carry out the roles of the three Emergency Services and each of the various disasters going off around Crisis City is assigned to a Service. You can't put out a fire when you're tanking it around the city in a Police patrol car for instance, so only missions appropriate for the Emergency Service you're in charge of are open to you. We give the gamer a lot of choice about how they choose to play through the main game, so you could unlock all areas of the city playing as a Paramedic - and this will give a reward in itself - but in order to access all of the game's content you'll have to complete the game with all three of the Emergency Services.

In addition, each Service has its own collection of missions with a completely different feel:

• The Fireman faces a bunch of mini-games which are just plain barmy, and all about the muscle – beating out fires and pumping water through the hose. These are the ones that will have your mates on the floor laughing at you!
• The Cop, on the other hand, has mini-games which generally require a little more thought – these are the cerebral ones, take your time and get it right, but don't forget, you're still against the clock here!
• The Paramedic has the toughest job, and these games are pure skill – real precision is required to beat these challenges!

What sparks the crisis that occurs in Crisis City?

MS: Well, it's not really a specific event, it's more the nature of the place that lends itself to chaos really. It's not called Crisis City for no reason, it's a city where if something can go wrong, it will - ranging from traffic lights failing, through to escaped penguins and Minkees running riot… and of course, you're the one who's got to sort it all out!
 

Tell us about the city's eight districts – their design, mission contents, etc.

MS: So, we have four Precincts - Industrial, The Ports, The Boroughs, and finally Crisis Central and every Precinct consists of two different Zones, each with a distinct landscape, for example The Ports is made up of a commercial fishing port and a beach. The Zones also have their own individual soundtracks, which makes them feel truly unique as the player moves between them, racing through the city. All this gives us a large city to explore and a nice varied environment from the fairground down at the beach, to a suburban estate and city skyscrapers, and there's a host of shortcuts and jumps to discover too.

As you drive around the city, there are a huge range of icons indicating various missions for you to take on, from a wide range of driving challenges to the various mini games. Each location is unique, and it's fun to just drive around and explore the city weaving through the traffic and finding secrets.

Monkeys, penguins, trampolines... Anything else we'll be hurling, jumping off of, or throwing things at?

MS: Yeah – loads! You'll be jumping off ramps, shooting down shortcuts, using hoses, firing bananas, performing operations, chasing down criminals, racing patients to hospitals, putting out fires – we have all manner of challenges, from the near-conventional to the completely crazy.

How does the time aspect work? Does the game count down in real-time?

MS: Well, the game isn't set over an actual period of time, but everything in the game is a race against the clock, whether it's using the Wii Remote to practice CPR on a poor Crisis City citizen or disarming a bomb, there's no time to hang about!

We also have the Mayhem Meter that charts, basically, how badly everything is going in the city - as you go about attending incidents you bring the Mayhem under control. Do well and your talents are recognized by the desk-bound, lilly-livered pen-pushers at HQ who assign you to the next (more affluent) Precinct where the Mayhem breaks out again, and your skills are put back to the test!

Describe some of the mini-games for us (other than those already talked about, such as the water hose).

MS: Well, we have a ton of mini-games! There are around 15 completely unique 'out of vehicle' games. Within those different types there are different variants, Wii remote actions and difficulty levels, as well as numerous driving challenges - so there are probably around 50 different missions in career mode alone.

In one of my favorites, a load of Crisis City citizens end up tied to helium balloons and start floating away into the ether - you have to use the Wii Remote as a peashooter to pop the balloons and bring them back down to earth - with a crash!

There's also a special treat for all Chase-HQ fans, like me. The Cops get their own special driving mission where you have to race after the escaping felons and ram their truck!

What's really cool about all the mini-games is that, unlike in most games where they feel totally remote from the gameworld, these are fully integrated into the environment that you're driving around in! You can hear fires and spurting hydrants, coughing citizens and ticking bombs as you explore the city (deal with them and the City suddenly sounds less manic!) You can see Minkees running about, conked out taxis and broken traffic lights causing chaos! Phone booths, again visible as you cruise the streets, provide locations for the bomb-disposal mini-game, and once the game starts you can see the city carrying on in the background! By the way, if you mess it up, you'll see the result in-game too - twisted metal in place of the original!

Everything you do in-game affects the world you're in, and vice-versa, so although the game has two distinct parts, driving and mini-games, they really do feel like two halves of a whole, rather than two disparate ideas cobbled together.

Can you give us an idea of what the controls will be like in the main game, and how they'll differ from the mini-games?

MS: With the driving you can use the remote's d-pad or the nunchuck - both work well but the nunchuck is my preferred method, it feels a little bit more responsive and perhaps a bit more frantic. And don't forget, if the civvies don't get out of your way, you can always turn the sirens on, using the nunchuck button, to clear the way! (Note. Game requires nunchuck for single player mode)

In the mini-games we really take advantage of the Wii remote control system, so you'll be pointing, pumping, splatting, shooting, beating and cranking it - really going through a whole range of motions that make it loads of fun for you - and your friends watching!

Don't forget the two multi-player modes. In Survival up to four players use a single remote to play rapid-fire mini-games and see who's a real Emergency Hero. Using one remote really adds to the madness! If you're feeling mean, just refuse to pass it on!

In Versus, two players go head-to-head (two Wii remotes required, nunchucks not required) playing mini-games from the single player mode on a single screen, one of which has been given a bit of a twist!

Thank you for your time.

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