“People Only Love the Underdogs That Win.”
“At least you can start from pole!”
North American Dreamcast release, front cover.
Extry, extry, read all about it: The automobiles are off to the races! Why, it feels just like yesterday when I would have to hoof it on just my two hocks to get across the apple. And by the time I finally wound up at the hop, I reckon I’d be too joed to cut a rug — let alone put the moves on any of the sweetie patooties. Talk about gumming the works for this old pip! That’s why I tell you, these new-fangled “tin cans?” Well, they’re just the bee’s knees, I tells ya’: They get me from the cave to the clip joint while keeping my uprights feeling like eggs in coffee, you dig? And believe me when I tell you that the dolls out there blow their wigs when I show ‘em my motor vehicle, boy howdy! Now I’ve got the flames on me all hours of the day, and I couldn’t be more jazzed!
… You know, I originally had the idea that I would try to write this whole article in mock 1930s American vernacular, but I’m honestly exhausted after just one paragraph of it. Goofy bits aside, there are folk out there who genuinely romanticize the so-called “good ol’ days,” and who wouldn’t mind seeing the clock set back something like nine decades. Oh, what a time it must have been back then: You had flapper gals, classic cinema, the advent of jazz music… white people quickly co-opting jazz music, institutionalized racism, crippling economic depression — nothin’ but good times all around, yessiree. But perhaps no aspect of that bygone era is more romanticized than its vintage cars, from back in the day before motor vehicles were held to any of those pesky “safety standards” manufacturers abide by nowadays. Boy howdy, am I sure glad that the latest and greatest in vehicular tech is so much more safe and reliable!
Of course, classic cars nowadays make for particularly expensive investments, reserved mostly for the inexplicably rich and famous. We don’t exactly get to see them out on the racetracks anymore, either — being made to square off against (and undoubtedly getting smoked by) the latest in automotive engineering. Hell, these hoopties of days long gone rarely even get to feature virtually in video games, because who would wanna drive around in some janky old jalopy when you can hit the nitrous at 300 miles per hour in some fancy Italian supercar? As such, classic car enthusiasts looking to so much as simulate the experience of driving their beloved Jenkins Model K or whatever have never really had much in the way of options… Save for one. With their dying breath, the infamous LJN emerged from the depths to spit out one final title in the year 2000: Spirit of Speed 1937 on the Sega Dreamcast. So, let’s give it the ol’ looksie-doo, and see for ourselves whether it’s the bee’s knees or a load of bushwa!
EDITOR’S NOTE: This article represents an effort years in the making. By which I mean, it has taken over four years for me to actually get around to tidying up a draft which I began writing way back in February 2018 (which I left at a point of roughly 40% estimated completion) and bring it to fruition in the form of this finished article. As an unexpected perk of this perpetual delaying, an opportunity emerged around the time I picked writing it back up: The chance to gain previously unavailable insight into Spirit of Speed’s development courtesy of one James Harvey (@AgileHarvey), who had conducted an interview with the game’s lead designer (one John Jones-Steele) as part of the upcoming book Dreamcast: Year Two. James was kind enough to provide us an advance preview of this interview, which proved essential in our own detailing the history of the troubled racing simulator. I’ll also take this opportunity to thank The Dreamcast Junkyard, who are responsible for arranging this collaboration and for their own exhaustive documentations of Dreamcast history.
This isn’t a joke. I legitimately considered writing this entire article while trying to keep up that obnoxious gimmick. As my editor / roommate was quick to inform me when I first pitched the idea to her: “That would get old after one paragraph.” She wasn’t wrong back in 2018, and she’s not wrong now in 2022.
