
	Platform PC Genre Stunt Making? Developer / Publisher Dynamix Released 1992
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Stunt Island

stunt island

Have you ever wanted to fly a jet inverted through a slalom of skyscrapers then attack an alien mothership? Or send a flying pig to perform a daring break out of Alcatraz? Or direct, produce, and act in your own movie? Stunt Island is the answer.

Stunt Island is part game, part movie simulator. As a game, Stunt Island is average. As a movie simulation it has no equal.

The game component consists of a series of stunt assignments, part of an overall competition, which can be taken in any order when not in career mode. The stunts range from parachuting onto a hot air balloon to the classic barnstorming to landing a Cessna on the Golden Gate Bridge. There are very strict conditions to completing a stunt successfully. Veer a little off course or go too fast and the director will yell "Cut!" A few of the stunts verge on impossible. Flying a Fulcrum inverted through a city canyon at 500 mph is a lot easier said than done. Winning the stunt competition is difficult but it is very satisfying once completed.

When a stunt is completed, a replay film is automatically created, showing the action from a variety of angles. Or you can take the raw footage and combine the shots the way you want, adding sound effects, titles, and music in the editing room. This is the part where Stunt Island shines. There are a total of eight cameras to choose from and the footage from these can be combined in ways limited only by the users imagination. The editing tools are very good, allowing slow motion, double time, fade, black and white, music and sound effects, and titles to be easily implemented.

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The learning curve is not steep. There is also a utility included that allows the user to record their own sound effects, music and voice files. These files then show up in the sound options. The sound itself is on the scratchy side, especially when using the default sound device. Using Soundblaster as an option gives crisper music audio but the sound effects in turn seem scratchier. There are large libraries of both music and sound effects.

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The steep learning curve occurs when you try to construct your own stunts. Those that are adept at manipulating objects in 3D and understanding vectors and motion will have no problem. For the remaining people, getting things to happen can be a frustrating experience.

To construct a stunt or film a scene for a movie a location must be selected. Stunt Island is a big place and has many locations (canyon, baseball stadium, small town, railroad tracks, hydro dam, military installation, big city, and many more. Stunt Island comes with a fold-out map to keep track of all of them). Once a location is selected the user must choose a prop to drive, be it plane, car, horse, building, or sign post. Then the user can place up to six other cameras (one is permanently in chase cam) which can be attached or positioned anywhere. But having a static scene is boring. Motion is what brings things to life. Each prop selected (there can be 100) has many attributes that can be edited, such as speed, pitch, altitude, and yaw. In practical terms this means you can have prop #1 (a car) race by a grandstand full of people. These people are all props and can be commanded to "watch" prop #1. The result is that when the car goes by the grandstand, the crowd will turn to watch the car scream past. And maybe you want the race to happen at dawn. You can specify the time of day. The applications are limitless.

There are also more complex methods of getting that perfect take which involves setting up trigger events. This means you can specify that if "A" happens then "B" will pitch 90 degrees, or if "X" happens "A" will explode. It’s handled with an easy to navigate (and set up) flag system. The user can decided how complex or simple they want the instructions. Once again, those that can master the system will produce fantastic films. The manual is thick with instruction but experience is the best teacher to see what works and what looks crappy on film.

Once you’ve got the perfect movie filmed, edited, and ready to watch, you’ll ache for praise, the thumbs-up of others. SI will let you do that, too. The program compiles the default film file (*.flm) into a "playone" file (*.all) that can be played on any computer, complete with user created sound effects, provided that the computer has a few of the necessary files to run it. The web has a few sites that are dedicated to SI, providing the necessary "playone" files and a host of user created movies to download.

Compared with today’s games, Stunt Island is graphically anemic. Everything is blocky and flat. The shading and polygons are dated but in its time was eye-candy of the highest order. SI has a huge database of props to fly and drive, and each is modeled in a realistic and consistent fashion. There are also a great variety of props. (There are five different kinds of mailboxes and UFOs.) The physics model isn’t great but the emphasis is on the filming rather than the flying so who really cares? Besides, SI lets the user control the physics. There are also user created tools (available on the web) that allow for creation of new props, which adds even more playability to SI. If you have the drive and desire you can create anything with Stunt Island!

The save system is great. After placing your props and proceeding to the filming stage the program prompts you to save the set. Films are easily saved as well.

- Omni


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