Do you listen to the Insert Credit podcast? If not, you should. Insert Credit features some of the most consistently compelling conversations concerning videogames.  How does this relate to Wave Race 64? I’m getting there. You see, the hosts on that show often discuss the concept of evaluating games by how much you would like to hang out in that game’s world.  I have never heard their criteria described fully, but the hosts seem to be looking for games where the art, the animation, the music inspire one stop and appreciate the world apart from any goal they are trying to achieve within the game world. 

The biggest surprise for me when revisiting Wave Race is how much it inspires a person to hang out in its world.  In fact, Owl City’s frontman Adam Young (performer of the radio hit “Fireflies“) has taken the concept of “hangout-ability” one step further.  Young has identified Wave Race 64 as his original inspiration for going into music.  Specifically, in a 2009 interview Young is quoted as saying “It’s the nerdiest thing imaginable but I REALLY wish I lived in this level called Dolphin Park featured in Wave Race 64. The aesthetic/mood/feel looks like the way I want Owl City to sound. Tasty.”

If you are unfamiliar with the game, Wave Race 64 was a jet ski racing videogame for the Nintendo 64.  It was a fairly straight forward game and featured a racing mode, a stunt mode, and time trials.  The main draw of the game were the impressive physics of the waves that provided turbulance for the racers as they made their way around the track.  If you are completely unfamiliar to the game, you can jump around a bit in this video to get a sense of the game (as seen in the racing mode):

Young’s admiration for Wave Race 64 appears to go deep.  Searching Youtube you can find videos of Owl City performing “The Theme From Wave Race” during their live shows.  Wikipedia claims that Young even has a side band called “Port Blue”, which is another race track from Wave Race.

It strikes me as strange that someone would want to live in Dolphin Park.  It is the training stage of Wave Race.  A circular track, scattered with obstacles and ramps, surrounding a kidney-shaped island.  The stage doesn’t even have music playing while you practice on it.  There is a Dolphin swimming in the water with you, but if you follow him he only leads you in small circles.

The one awesome thing about the stage is that if you do follow the Dolphin in just the right way, it unlocks the ability to ride dolphins instead of jet skis in the game, which is undeniably sweet.  Take a look:

The idea of living in a stage of a Nintendo 64 game is an interesting one.  3D games provide a sense of a world outside of the player that 2D games largely fail to deliver on.  With Wave Race, there are structures and details in every stage desgined to suggest that these are physical locations that happen to be used for jet ski racing rather than obstacle courses specifically designed for the sake of gameplay.  You can look at the Gameboy version of Wave Race to see the sharp contrast with what the concept felt like with 2D graphics.  

Granted there were many earlier games, mainly in the RPG genre that featured full worlds and opportunities for non-linear exploration (as opposed to the left -> right “exploration” of games like Super Mario Bros.).  But the Nintendo 64 gave developers 3D worlds and a greater ability to hide little details in these new game worlds.  I discussed this idea briefly in my Pilot Wings article, that it is the little details that game designers began hiding with greater frequency in 64-bit worlds that gave these game worlds a sense of having a life unto themselves apart from gameplay objectives.  I find this attribute extremely appealing in games, which might be due to having grown up with 64-bit games, but it is definitely a topic I look forward to exploring further with future games.

It is hard to see what details make Dolphin Park a place where Young would like to grab a piece of ocean front property.  Until he shares some more insight, I think it is time to begin thinking about what game worlds you would like to live in.  I will keep thinking about this as I play through the rest of the N64 library and will let you know if I find my little piece of virtual heaven.

In closing, I would like to provide you with some choice tweets.  The best part of writing this blog has been seeing how fondly people remember each and every N64 game, even those I wrote off long ago as being uninspired.  With that in mind, here are people discussing Wave Race 64 and intimacy/relationships!

• “Girl, I’m gonna lay you down and we’re gonna play Waverace 64” -@FrightShark
• “When ur girl calls and is like “my dad is missing” and ur playing wave race 64 w/ her dad like “yeah idk what coulda happend”” -@ChillestBoy

And one weird detail you probably missed!

• “Its so awesome that in there is a love hotel right in the middle of the Twilight City course in Waverace 64.” -@FarmboyinJapan

And hope for the future of gaming!

• “Grand Theft Auto Online features a spiritual successor to Wave Race 64. Confirmed.” -@lowellbell