The SEGA Saturn’s Sonic R and the N64’s Diddy Kong Racing have far more in common than both being mascot-led racers. In fact, their development cycles are uncannily similar, both starting as entirely different projects before changing direction and going on to headline the winter line-ups for their respective systems, against all odds. If that wasn’t coincidental enough, both would have been under development in the UK at the same time.
Let’s begin this tale of two Christmas miracles with Sonic R. While it’s true that SEGA of Japan called the shots during the Saturn era, eventually having the final say over greenlighting projects, SEGA of Europe still had a small budget to play around with to secure titles that would appeal to European audiences. This included publishing the likes of UEFA Euro 96 England, Discworld II, and Atlantis: The Lost Tales – three titles that eluded the US.
After Psygnosis’ Formula 1 for the PS1 became a huge success in 1996, selling almost 2m copies, SEGA sought to release their own F1 game on Saturn. Developer Traveller’s Tales, based in the UK, was chosen for this task – a studio known for getting the most out of SEGA’s hardware, as evidenced by the likes of Sonic 3D Blast, Toy Story and Mickey Mania on the Mega Drive.
Upon hearing of the cancellation of Sonic X-treme, SEGA of Europe wondered if it was possible to use the racing engine Traveller’s Tales had created to make a replacement Sonic game. Traveller’s Tales were of course more than familiar with the blue hedgehog, just having brought Sonic 3D Blast to the Saturn – with this upgraded 32-bit version allegedly completed in under two months. SEGA of Europe pitched the concept of a Sonic racing game to Sonic creator Yuji Naka, who gave the project their blessing.
Development began in February 1997, with members of Sonic Team providing feedback and track layout designs. A release date of Christmas 1997 was set. This gave Traveller’s Tales, under the direction of studio head and designer Jon Burton, around nine months to complete development. Work began under the guise of Sonic TT – not just a reference to Traveller’s Tales themselves, but other racing terms such as Time Trial and Tourist Trophy. Incidentally, the ‘R’ in the game’s final name doesn’t actually stand for ‘racing’ but whatever springs to someone’s mind. Following suit, all five racetracks start with the letter ‘R’, being Resort Island, Radical City, Regal Ruin and Reactive Factory.
Sonic R made its first public debut at E3 1997, which was said to be around 20% complete. Jon Burton noticed that many players would simply walk away from the demo due to Sonic’s sluggish speed when moving underwater. This was eventually sped up to give players a chance to catch up. In fact, countless changes were made from press builds to the finished product, including revisions to the HUD, changing the colour of the soles on Sonic’s shoes, removing a flame shield power-up, and changing Resort Island’s backdrop from sunset to midday to better reflect its accompanying music track ‘Can You Feel the Sunshine?’
On that note, Sonic R is well remembered today for its soundtrack, composed by Richard Jacques and featuring a female vocalist. It was proposed that lyrics should be ‘off’ as default, making tracks instrumental only, but soon the conclusion was made that the lyrics improved the experience no-end, helping it to stand out from similar games. We’d have to agree.
When Sonic R arrived in stores in late November 1997 the reception from the press was mostly positive. The visuals were praised for being some of the most technically impressive on the system, using fade in to reduce pop-up. The tracks gained praise for featuring platforming elements and a wealth of secrets, including hidden coins to locate on each track to secure a chaos emerald, and most critics found the unlockable characters a fun way to extend the replay value. As only five tracks featured, most critics held back from awarding it top marks, opting for 8/10s and 4/5s instead – and in some cases scores a tad lower. It seems that European critics took a shine to it more than US critics did, with a few 3/5s dished out across the pond.
In 1998, Sonic R gained a PC version with support for graphics cards, which was later included on Sonic Gems Collection for PS2 and GameCube. A Tiger LCD handheld version also released. “Can Sonic set a new land speed record?” read the blurb on the packaging.
In an ideal world, Sonic R would have helped turn the Saturn’s fortunes around, but it appears to have been only moderately successful, appealing to those who already owned a Saturn but unable to reach outside of that circle. Sources suggest it only managed to shift 80k copies in Japan – the one region where Saturn sales were relatively strong. It fulfilled its goal of giving the Saturn a 3D Sonic game, helping it to secure valuable press coverage in the process – even the multiformat magazines of the era dedicated multipage spreads – but that seems to be about as much as it achieved, aside from being one of the system’s better looking 3D games. It definitely had that ‘wow’ factor; one of a few reasons why it’s fondly remembered by those who choose to back the Saturn rather than the PS1.
It’s worth noting that Sony commissioned Running Wild – a similar racer with a roster of bipedal animals – around the time of Sonic R’s reveal, suggesting they either thought SEGA was onto a winner, or believed it was good business practice to give PS1 owners an alternative. It isn’t too well remembered nowadays.
While Traveller’s Tales wrestled with turning a Formula 1 game into a 3D Sonic title, Rare was mulling over what direction a then floundering 3D racer should take.
Infamously, Rare was formed of a handful of teams, each working and experimenting with different projects while trying to outdo one another. Friendly rivalry, if you will. After finishing Killer Instinct Gold in 1996, a group of developers began experimenting with a 3D racer for the N64, presumably aiming to fill a gap in its catalogue. Crusin’ USA, for all its arcade gusto, didn’t fare well on the N64.
The project that would later become Diddy Kong Racing began life as Wild Cartoon Kingdom, inspired by theme parks such as Disney Land, and featuring a prehistoric theme. A few renders from Wild Cartoon Kingdom can be found online, such as a woolly mammoth riding a moped, and a buck-toothed donkey. This eventually changed into Adventure Racers, and then into Pro-Am 64 – a sequel to Rare’s moderately successful isometric NES racer. Timber the Tiger was planned as the frontman, who went on to form part of Diddy Kong Racing’s roster, alongside future platformer stars Banjo and Conker.
Upon showing Pro-Am 64 to Nintendo, it was believed that the brand wasn’t recognisable enough. This led to Shigeru Miyamoto suggesting it should become a Donkey Kong game instead, allowing Rare to choose a character from Donkey Kong Country to headline. They ended up choosing Diddy, a character they had created themselves, which reportedly pleased Nintendo. The only other character present from the DK universe ended up being Krunch the Kremling – who was at one point known as Krash, and believed to be too similar sounding to a certain bandicoot.
Now that the project had a direction, changes had to be made. It has been said that most of these relate simply to its aesthetic, altering the game’s look to better fit the simian star. The team also knew that comparisons with Mario Kart 64 would be made and so set about ensuring it offered a different experience, incorporating more adventure style-elements – including the notorious final one-on-one race against Wizpig – and giving players aeroplanes and hovercrafts to steer around the colourful tracks. Much to Nintendo’s chagrin, Diddy Kong Racing featured 3D character models, whereas Mario Kart 64 used flat 2D sprites for its racers. Rare wanted to match Mario Kart 64’s frame rate (speed) and had to resort to graphical tricks to achieve this, using 2D sprites for the vehicle’s wheels to keep the polygon count down.
Once Rare caught wind that Nintendo had no first-party titles lined up for Christmas 1997 aside from Mischief Makers (with this being the console’s first Christmas in Europe), they made it their priority to ship Diddy Kong Racing in time for the lucrative holiday season. The game’s reveal and release were just months apart, showcased at The Gamer’s Summit in late August and released on 21st November in Europe – the very same day as Sonic R – and on 24th November in the US. This meant that most magazines previewed and reviewed Diddy Kong Racing just an issue or two apart.
Critical reception to Diddy Kong Racing was nothing short of glowing, even garnering a lofty 9/10 from EDGE magazine. It broke 1m sales in three weeks and went on to sell 4.5m copies worldwide – a figure SEGA could only dream of at the time. The reception to the 2007 Nintendo DS re-release wasn’t as positive, with complaints of gimmicky touch screen controls. Between these two, Rare tried to bring a new Diddy Kong racer to the GBA with Diddy Kong Pilot – a project that became caught in the Microsoft buyout, eventually becoming Banjo Pilot.
While the gaming industry is known to chase trends, Sonic R and Diddy Kong Racing having uncannily similar developments is nothing short of fascinating, with both managing to make it onto store shelves in time for Christmas – even on the same day in Europe. As whimsical as it is to chalk this up as a Christmas miracle, it was purely down to hard graft from the talented teams at Rare and Traveller’s Tales, insistent on giving Saturn and N64 owners something special to play over the festive period. Time off over Christmas was well deserved for the developers of both in that year.