Top Gun Devs Upgraded Jets, Added Cole Trickle
While making the world’s latest video game about the Tom Cruise classic, the Top Gun iPhone development team took a few liberties — in the name of both fun and air supremacy.
There’s a man called Maverick and a guy nicknamed Iceman giving you orders as you fly missions under their tutelage.
There are fighter jets.
There is the song Danger Zone playing in the background.
The essential ingredients appear to be in last week’s iPhone release of Top Gun, a game developed by Freeverse and published by Paramount Digital Entertainment.
But some tweaks to the formula established in the 1986 Tom Cruise blockbuster had to be applied.
1) Players are required not to fly into the danger zone, but out of it. Ignoring the key lesson from Top Gun’s most famous song, gamers are supposed to tilt their plane so that it is never overlapping with any of the flashing Danger Zone icons that can appear in any of nine sectors of the iPhone screen. If your plane is in the Danger Zone, you need to get out of it. This was done because, well, development studio Freeverse needed to put a game mechanic in their game. Flying out of the danger zone is just that. It’s what you do to win at this game.
2) F-14s are gone. The signature plane of the Top Gun series is not in this game. Why? Freeverse senior producer Bruce Morrison told Kotaku: “We wanted to show that the Top Gun program has progressed but is still at the pinnacle of aviation.” So, no F14s. Instead, the player flies the modern F-22. (We failed to find out why Tom Cruise isn’t in the game, but it’s not surprising. The actor has not been featured in several games based on his movies).
3) There’s a Days of Thunder cross-over. What Tom Cruise did with fighter jets in Top Gun he did later with stock cars in Days of Thunder. Well, if you can’t have Cruise play Maverick, then you can have Cole Trickle, Cruise’s character in Days of Thunder, sub for Maverick. Paramount showed Kotaku that exclusive: punch in your player name as Cole Trickle, and you’ll be Trickle in the briefing room and you’ll fly Trickle’s car in the sky. Armed with guns and a cannon, of course.
Our Top Gun demo, it should be noted, occurred in a Paramount meeting room in Times Square. On the wall were posters showing scenes from other movies from the studio, including Titanic and Forrest Gump. They wouldn’t have put characters from those games in there too, would they?
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Comments (AU Comments | US Comments)
If the let Nascar drivers install guns and missles on the cars, I might actually watch it.
Mal-Content
@Kang81:
However, playing Top Gun really makes me wish Ubisoft/Gameloft would make a version of Hawx for the iPhone. If they put in the same amount of effort that they did in making Assassin's Creed for the iPhone I'd be pretty happy with it.
Assassin's Creed: Altair Chronicles is a pretty impressive game by the way. For a phone game anyway, although I was still hesitant to pay $10 for it. I don't feel as though I've been burned on it at that's a good feeling. I also here it is pretty long.
Kang81
@SeattleTed: I did once... the first time i played it as a kid. And my friend bragged about it at school, like a town crier. The next weekend, and from that point onward, i was never able to do it again... so my elementary school class thought i lied.
But I swear... one shining day in my prepubescence... i landed the plane.
I SWEAR!
@Stephen Totilo:
I bought it and it's fun, for what it is. My biggest problem with the game is that you can't shut off the horrendous music in the game. I only play it for a few minutes at a time and I'd be just fine hearing the main theme and the danger zone song over and over.
Granted I could just rip the Top Gun soundtrack to iTunes and put it on my iPhone. Who am I kidding, that would require work and I can't be bothered with something as trivial as that. :)
Kang81
@Salen: Look at all dat juice.
twinturbo2
I guess rubbin's shooting fighter jets out of the sky, or something... damn, I need to watch Days of Thunder again...
twinturbo2
@stevienicks: I hadn't noticed until you mentioned it, but you're right, they have the exact same creepy smile. On whether or not that means they'd like to get naked together the jury is still out.
HJSoulma
@undefined: Sorry, alls I got is Kenny Loggins on the mind.
"(We failed to find out why Tom Cruise isn't in the game, but it's not surprising. The actor has not been featured in several games based on his movies)."
'cause he usually demands to be paid millions for his likeness. Didn't he ask for something like 6mil or 60mil for his culty mug in the Minority Report games?
Oh, and also his face would likely lower sales greatly. Adds a level of "don't know if want" when it looks like the cash fund would be going to pay for more dead people. =/
Did anyone actually land safely on the aircraft carrier in NES version? That godforsaken aircraft carrier was hands down the most difficult boss ever.
is there a mini game where you play volley ball?
Ackers
@The Sad Onion Symbol Thing: Nobody can stop that train, baby! WOOOOOOO!
@Ping5000 IS OUTRAGED BY BLIZZARD'S VOICE CAST: well i know someone who can give you a mach 5 ass slap I'm he can do high fives as well.
Whoah I thought he said "Cole Train" for a second..
The Sad Onion Symbol Thing
@Stephen Totilo: I bought the game for $2, and it's good. If you're not quick enough, enemy jets will fill the screen and you'll have five "danger zones" filling the 9x9 grid.
Think on-rails meets human tetris.
Atomsk88
Give me mach 5 high fives and ass slaps and I will buy this at least a dozen times.
@Antiterra:
hah ahahaha
hahah
oahahoohwow. Its been a while since I've actually laughed out loud for real. The lol just wouldn't have done it justice.
@stevienicks: Well it is a Top Gun movie. Surprised there isn't a butt slapping topless dudes volleyball minigame.
knownspace
@Antiterra: I c wut u did thar
@stevienicks: it looks pretty minimum risky to me.
@Bii Nii Wii Nii Politely Replaces You're Your with Your You...: apparently she just came out in the last month or so. One of Wikipedia's references has the headline "Top Gun star finally comes out: Not Tom!"
Worth a small chuckle.
@Stephen Totilo:
welcome to the internets... It's a sad lonely place. Also, Cole Trickle, lol do they make a creme for that?
Oreot
@Stephen Totilo: Well the game from what i can see has a large amount of green and red on the screen...hmmm what else...oh and lots clear sky too.
@Darkslash: No, they ditched the Tomcat for the Brangelina.
...S-sorry. I'm so sorry, I... I don't know what came over me.
Um, their expressions... am I sensing some risky subtext?
No one has anything nice to say, huh?
@fdisk: I bet you're supposed to aim at being Bottom Gun too. Jerks.
And if you punch in the player name "Oprah Winfrey", you'll fly a couch. Armed with thetan gamma rays, of course.
@SocraticMethod: well at least they won't be that difficult to shoot down.
@SocraticMethod:
You also fly OUT of the Danger Zone; obviously this game is being developed by Bizarros
Speaking of Top Gun, did I hear correctly that the really hot chick from Top Gun, Kelly McGillis maybe, came out as a lesbian? Not that there's anything wrong with that.
The game looks awful. Just sell me the baby shaker app with top gun's theme playing in the background.
MoeB
Tom Cruise isnt in any of the games because Scientology says so...
Ackers
"We wanted to show that the Top Gun program has progressed but is still at the pinnacle of aviation." So, no F14s. Instead, the player flies the modern F-22. "
So they ditch the Valkyrie for the Sturmvogel II? Lol
In non mecha fan terms:
So they ditch the Tomcat for the Raptor? Cool.
So they think having F-14s in the game is a bad idea, but having a stock car in it is a good one?
Idiots.
Uh...what? Stock Car's...not F-14's???
I thought the Navy doesn't use F-22s. If they were trying to be realistic they should have used F/A-18s or F-35s in a Top Gun game.
@SocraticMethod: They also added a gun to the top of each fighter craft so you could shoot with your "top gun" . . .
@Ackers: YES.
[toucharcade.com]
twinturbo2