A tech demo has been uncovered for a previously never before heard of game based on The Simpsons for the ahead of its time Sega Dreamcast.
The tech demo is rather shallow, and appears to be more of a proof of concept for developer Red Lemon Studios and its “Toon Render” engine. The player finds themselves as a bipedal fly with a backpack in the Simpson family’s kitchen. The only controls are to run around, jump and glide through the kitchen and living room, which features the family’s TV with its perpetually bent antenna playing an episode of “Itchy and Scratchy.”
The tech demo was part of a dev kit that was dumped onto the Dreamcast-talk forums by user sreak, and then showcased in a video by the DreamcasticChannel on YouTube. No one seemed to know any details about the origins of the demo, until one of Red Lemon Studio’s founders, Andy Campbell, wrote a response to the video, saying:
“Oh my! Not seen that for 20 years! We had a great coder who had developed an amazing cell shading engine for DC. I knew Fox pretty well, so this was a demo we created and I pitched to them. We were never commissioned, so this was technically never an official title in development.
This was a trip down memory lane. The tech was great, developed by a guy call Rich Evans, great coder. Bug Squad concept came from Jamie Grant if I remember. A great art team built the models. The tech was also pitched as a production tool for the show itself. No game made though.”
What is perhaps most impressive about the demo is the Toon Render engine it runs on, which actually presents the look of The Simpsons cartoon better than most of the Simpsons games that have come out. What is even more remarkable is that the shader was developed by just one coder.
Perhaps if the Dreamcast wasn’t destined to be cancelled in 2001, one year after this tech demo was created, the game could have become one of the legendary games that are still remembered fondly from Sega’s short lived system.
The Simpsons airs Sundays on Fox, and is available for streaming on Disney+.
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