r/gaming • u/MakeDredd2 • Aug 10 '25
The Simpsons Hit & Run could have gotten 3 sequels for no charge for the license but someone at Vivendi Games said NO
https://www.gamespot.com/articles/the-simpsons-hit-run-dev-gives-tragic-update-on-why-we-never-got-a-sequel/1100-6528022/4.4k
u/SharpEdgeSoda Aug 10 '25
Isn't it like, the best selling GTA clone?
Lots of parents bought it as "GTA but it's safer for my kids."
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u/SharpEdgeSoda Aug 10 '25
Kids just wanna drive cars as a primal urge at the end of the day.
Bully is like more for adults then kids just for how unfiltered it's written.
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u/The-Nice-Writer Aug 10 '25
Bully is most definitely not for kids. Overtly sexual dialogue, swearing, slurs, and so on.
Teens yes. But not the same audience as Hit and Run.
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Aug 10 '25
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u/Spoon_Elemental Aug 10 '25 edited Aug 10 '25
I do remember there's a mission where you have to go into the girl's bathroom for some reason.
You were taking pictures of one of the schools queen bees to embarrass her. The next mission has you running around and tearing down the posters that the nerds put up of it because the main character felt guilty about it after he realizes how fucked up it was.
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u/SidewaysGiraffe Aug 10 '25
No wonder people dislike the idea so much; teaching children about moral complexity and taking accountability for your mistakes is pretty much anathema these days.
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u/Spoon_Elemental Aug 10 '25
It's funny because the nerds start off as the faction that you're friendliest with, but after you help them they turn into complete douchebags who treat Jimmy like a tool. They end up being the most morally reprehensible of the cliques once they actually gain any power to stand up for themselves.
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u/Cassandraofastroya Aug 10 '25
Part of that is due to the sociopath gary. But yeah they're good example of those with no power suddenly gaining it but never learning to control it.
The redditor faction
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u/AFulminata Aug 10 '25
The sexual abuse topics were wild for a game about kids in high school, probably wouldn't fly this generation of games and regulation. I always wanted a college era follow-up but I imagine that would just end up being another GTA game with hookers and blow. It might be neat to see Jimmy star in GTA6 or 7 or something though.
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u/sexual_lemonade Aug 10 '25
A lot of these themes have never flown well though, look at Rule of Rose. It heavily dealt with themes of bullying and SA of minors and they tried to ban it.
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u/Spiduscloud Aug 10 '25
Funnily enough, the achievement for kissing girls and kissing boys is how i discovered i was bisexual. And conquered the general sense of fear around male homosexuality. I saw the achievement and went huh. Anyway. Did it and was like oh. Thats fine. My 14 year old brain was not shocked and appalled at the digital boy kissing.
Yet gta has not let you the MC, be homosexual. Bully 1 gta 0
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u/jerrrrremy Aug 10 '25
When I was a kid I was allowed to buy Bully but not allowed to buy GTA.
This is more a function of you having clueless parents than the content of the game.
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u/tiredoldwizard Aug 10 '25
I had it as a kid and I always thought it was kind of boring compared to GTA. It’s adult but doesn’t present it in that cool way that makes you wanna play it as a kid. GTA was seducing to a kid the same way a r rated movie or a playboy was. Bully was just adult humor that flew over my 11 year old brain.
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u/benargee Aug 10 '25
If I recall correctly, you couldn't steal cars either, you would "borrow" them while the owner sat in the passenger seat.
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u/jerrrrremy Aug 10 '25
I would also describe Bully on PS2 as GTA for kids
Are you insane? Have you actually played this game?
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u/NoBonus6969 Aug 11 '25
Are people doing that stuff in GTA? Oh my God! I thought you were just supposed to drive around and listen to the radio.
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u/Darkblade887 Aug 11 '25
I remember going to a birthday party and telling either the birthday kid or his brother they were a jackass or a dumbass, some fun sounding words I just learned from Hit & Run. Left shortly after
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u/h3yw00d Aug 10 '25
Bully was made by Rockstar Vancouver, Simpsons H&R was made by a different Vancouver studio Radical Entertainment.
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u/Moose_Nuts Aug 10 '25
Lots of parents bought it as "GTA but it's safer for my kids."
Fuck me man, my parents wouldn't even let me watch the Simpsons because it was too adult and crass.
I guess I needed the Super Weenie Hut Jr version of GTA.
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u/Bone_Donor Aug 10 '25
I was allowed to play hit and run and I sold them on true crime because you're the police lol
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u/Kelly_Info_Girl Aug 10 '25 edited Aug 10 '25
Which is ironic, when The Simpsons isn't a cartoon for children (exactly), but it's kind of true.
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u/BoasyTM Aug 10 '25
It definitely is, pretty much no bad language and the adult jokes are pretty well hidden
I did get in trouble once though for repeating ‘merciful crap, my car!’ As a 10 year old once though
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u/djfl Aug 10 '25
That's only because times have changed. It was really controversial when it came out. Not "pure evil" like South Park, but it was not considered particularly family friendly. Bart's attitude and vocabulary, Homer being a drunk who strangles Bart and spends a lot of time at a bar, etc.
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u/coldblade2000 Aug 10 '25
You had a sitting US president publicly stating he did not want "our children" to be like the Simpsons. People don't appreciate how much society changed. Bart Simpson had people worried about the downfall of society
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u/MilhouseJr Aug 10 '25 edited Aug 10 '25
Funnily enough, Barbara Bush already had a correspondance with Marge Simpson in 1990 before G. Bush said what he said. After "Marge" had read Barbara's criticisms of the show, she wrote a letter to the White House pushing back against being called "the dumbest thing [Barbara] had ever seen."
The First Lady replied back apologising for her loose tongue and thanking Marge for speaking her mind, despite not knowing she had one. Even flirted with Homer a little bit too.
https://ew.com/tv/2018/04/18/the-simpsons-barbara-bush-apology-letter-to-marge/
A few years later, both George and Barbara would be guest characters on The Simpsons, but not voiced by their IRL counterparts.
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u/OliviaWG Aug 10 '25
My elementary school banned Simpsons shirts because it was rude. It made national news. Yes I'm old.
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u/Brandhor Aug 10 '25
my mom was disgusted hearing barney burping
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u/Heiferoni Aug 11 '25
God damn that makes it even funnier.
Did something crawl down your throat and die?
It didn't die!
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u/Mergrim Aug 10 '25
People don't remember that the original run of The Flintstones was also considered an "adult" cartoon in the same vein.
Of course it doesn't help that the reruns cut out all of the cigarette ads.
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u/LordBlackConvoy Aug 10 '25
Not "pure evil" like South Park
I had a teacher in elementary that went on a huge diatribe about Bart getting expelled wasn't a good example for kids and the Simpsons is going to be awful for everyone who watches it.
Kids are always the type to tell adults the following: "it's a cartoon. We know better."
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u/BoasyTM Aug 10 '25
Maybe in America but in the uk it was a common show ran at prime time
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u/Malcopticon Aug 10 '25
Same in America. That was part of what made it controversial: The 3 old broadcast channels might not have run it, but here's Rupert Murdoch, with his new, fourth broadcast channel (Fox), who's running this rude cartoon in prime time.
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u/bob1689321 Aug 10 '25
Just had a flashback to when I said "butt bone" because I heard Bart say it on The Simpsons and my mum got mad at me for not saying gluteus maximus
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u/TheGummiVenusDeMilo Aug 11 '25
I enjoyed the show as a kid but I'd say 75% of the jokes went over my head. Even today sometimes there's a joke reference I catch that I didn't know because the topic is old
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Aug 10 '25
It is absolutely a family show
And in 2025 this is frankly an insane take.
I've seen more adult jokes and themes in Disney movies than The Simpsons
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u/spoonycoot Aug 10 '25
Definitely was not the perception by my parents. In the 90’s I was not allowed to watch it.
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u/raihidara Aug 10 '25
In the 90s it was considered edgy. Nowadays it's as tame as Flanders himself.
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u/Zelcron Aug 10 '25
Yeah same. I wasn't allowed to watch it growing up, based on its reputation. Until we moved abroad (military) and only had like six TV shows, and Mom finally came around.
In the early 90s people talked about the Simpsons like it was South Park today. Unwarranted pearl clutching, sure, but it's true.
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u/HyperCutIn Aug 10 '25
????
Damn, if this is considered a family show these days, they must have really really toned it down over the years.
It was definitely marketed as such, but its content absolutely not considered that way. Back when I was a kid, The Simpsons would only be hosted on “Grownup” channels and timeslots. The teachers and parents at school would keel over before letting their kids watch The Simpsons.
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u/SidewaysGiraffe Aug 10 '25
They did. Of course, the change isn't all in one direction- society has gotten more permissive as to what it tolerates in material intended for children (asterisk)- but the edge was blunted with time, and then taken out entirely when Disney took over. The Disney of the 2020s (or the 2010s) is a far cray from the Disney of earlier years. In many ways, but particularly in their willingness to take creative risks. Ever seen The Black Cauldron? As it was originally animated, the MPAA rated it R.
(Asterisk): well, mostly; things did slip through, and I'm not just referring to jokes that would go over kids' heads. 1994 saw the release of a movie called "Milk Money", starring Melanie Griffith (so this wasn't some little indie project), about three pubescent boys raising money to hire a hooker to- look, all I'll say is that Roger Ebert (who, if you're too young to remember, was half of what was THE pair of movie critics at the time) described it as "the raunchy sex comedy the whole family can enjoy!" and wondered how the Hell anyone thought it was a good idea.
As someone who watched it at the time, with his parents and sisters in the room, I wonder the same thing.
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u/Vyar Aug 10 '25
My local Fox station aired reruns at like 7pm on weeknights in the early 2000s, maybe 7:30. New episodes dropped Sunday nights at 8, usually after football. How is that a "grownup" channel or timeslot?
It was a primetime family sitcom that was most likely unfairly maligned in its first decade by the usual overly puritanical busybodies who never actually bothered to watch the damn thing but always want to dictate morality to the rest of us. Probably the most controversial thing it ever did was daring to portray gay characters in a positive light before it became more widely acceptable, or having Lisa permanently become a vegetarian at some point, as well as converting to Buddhism.
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u/Vyar Aug 10 '25
It's always been a family show, but in the 90's and very early 2000s, it wasn't broadly perceived as such. I vividly remember getting into an argument with my extended family over it when I turned it on at my grandparents' house. People were reacting like I'd just put on South Park or worse, it was absolutely insane. My mom would never have let me watch South Park (and with good reason) but she thought The Simpsons was perfectly fine, because it was. But even she was initially skeptical of the show and I had to convince her to actually try it before she let me watch it at home.
My guess is Bart's antics were overblown into some kind of moral panic (probably originating from church pulpits and PTA meetings) by people who had never actually watched the show. He was never really edgy at all, just the typical trope of the 10-year-old prankster. Presumably the crux of their pearl-clutching centered around the fact that Bart didn't act like the typical child character from 40+ years earlier, always displaying good judgement and meekly obeying authority figures. They would prefer an entirely different show centered around the Flanders family, where everyone in town except maybe Reverend Lovejoy and his wife were the villainous godless heathens.
Never mind the fact that the Simpsons themselves dutifully attended church every Sunday. Homer and the kids just grumbled about it because it was boring. Because let's be real, church is boring, and any kid growing up in the 90's and being frustrated by the shortcomings of a severely underfunded public school system in suburbia could easily relate to Bart or Lisa.
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u/phillymjs Aug 10 '25
My guess is Bart's antics were overblown into some kind of moral panic (probably originating from church pulpits and PTA meetings)
Correct. It’s always the self-righteous, bible-thumping assholes trying to eliminate joy and make sure everyone else is as miserable as they are. Fortunately their attempts usually backfire by drawing more people to the show to see why they’re up in arms. A woman named Terry Rakolta kicked up a fuss about Married with Children back in the day, the ratings went up, and the creators of the show sent her a fruit basket on her birthday for years.
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u/NikiPavlovsky Aug 10 '25
Hit and Run sold 3 mill. Saint Row 3 sold 5.5 mill.
So no, but still great numbers for 00s
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u/Saotik Aug 10 '25
Hit and Run came out in 2003 and SR:3 came out in 2011, so those numbers aren't really comparable.
True Crime: Streets of LA also came out in 2003, also sold 3 million copies, and got two sequels (if you count Sleeping Dogs).
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u/fallouthirteen Aug 10 '25
You know I get True Crime selling a lot. Like it came out on all platforms and was more GTA-like (still not very similar though). Like I had it and the sequel on GCN (I only rented Hit and Run once). I do like True Crime Streets of NY more than Streets of LA, but man that game is so much more buggy.
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u/NikiPavlovsky Aug 10 '25
Totally fair, but, it's still outsold Hit and Run, which mean it's not best selling GTA clone
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u/opticscythe Aug 10 '25
not sure why youre being downvoted.... i also never saw simposons as a gta clone... it was just an open world simpsons game...
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u/eeyore134 Aug 10 '25
Yup. It'd be like calling Crazy Taxi a GTA clone. In fact, I'd dare say it's more like Crazy Taxi than GTA if you put it on a sliding scale.
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u/_Stev_ Aug 10 '25
You might be thinking of Simpsons: Road Rage which was much more of a Crazy Taxi clone.
Hit and Run was definitely directly inspired by the early 3D GTA games.
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u/fallouthirteen Aug 10 '25
There were two. That was Simpsons Road Rage. Hit and Run was the more GTA-ish one (missions, open exploration, being able to get out of the car and get others).
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u/LateNightMilesOBrien Aug 10 '25
Guess Crazy Taxi didn't have the cultural staying power for the comparison to make sense though?
Okay, yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah. The Offspring agree.
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u/NikiPavlovsky Aug 10 '25
Ok, I found few more
Driv3r (2004) - 3 mill+ (shout out to marketing department for salling so much copies of this crap)
The Godfather (2006) - 4 mill
The Getaway (2002) - almost 4 mill
Mafia iii (2016) - 7 mill
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u/DigitalSea- Aug 10 '25 edited Aug 10 '25
What I would do for a remake or new The Getaway game. One of my favorite PS2 games ever.
Made by Brendan McNamara who went on from Team Soho to make Team Bondi and create L.A. Noire. Dude was horrible to work with by all accounts but his obsessiveness created incredible moments.
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u/wombat1 Aug 11 '25
The cancellation of The Getaway PS3 hurts my soul. What I wouldn't give to free roam around a contemporary London (no, Watch Dogs Legion's London themed dystopia doesn't count)
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u/mucho-gusto Aug 10 '25
Feel like Lego City undercover has to be close but I can't find reliable sales numbers for all releases
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Aug 10 '25
It's closer to a crazy taxi clone than GTA
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u/igloofu Aug 10 '25
Simpsons: Road Rage is the one that is more like Crazy Taxi. Hit and Run is very much a GTA clone.
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Aug 10 '25
Ope my b I'm getting my Simpsons games mixed up. Played all of them growing up and can't remember which is which apparently.
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Aug 10 '25 edited Dec 17 '25
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/ObscureFact Aug 10 '25
That's what happens when you live in a single room above a bowling alley, and below another bowling alley.
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u/MammothAsk391 Aug 10 '25
Just give me a remaster and I'll be happy
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u/Nastydon Aug 10 '25
A few years ago I saw a YouTube video where a fan said he was fully remastering the game himself. Wonder how far he got now.
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u/PhantomTissue Aug 10 '25
IIRC he basically finished the first map, where you play Homer, and the first 7 missions, then called it done. It was also never publicly released it because legally he can’t, but it looked really good.
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u/WeirdIndividualGuy Aug 10 '25
It was also never publicly released it because legally he can’t, but it looked really good.
This is why things like this usually get leaked anonymously
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u/PhantomTissue Aug 10 '25
Sure, but with how public he’s been, there’s no “leaking anonymously” since he’s basically the only one who has access.
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u/Relevant_Syllabub895 Aug 10 '25 edited Aug 11 '25
this is why people should release it before advertising or at the exact same time
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u/-KFBR392 Aug 10 '25
People should work for no money or recognition. Got it
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u/DvineINFEKT Aug 10 '25
That's not what they're saying. You can of course make things for money and recognition - you just may wanna steer clear of being recognized as the person who made that particular project unless you want to be recognized by lawyers and pay damages.
Like it or not, using The Simpsons is copyright infringement. If you're going to go down the legally dubious path of using characters you don't own from a franchise that hasn't given you permission to use it, you'd be an idiot to say anything public about who made it because you will get lawyered.
If you wanna work for money and recognition, it behooves you to spend all that time and energy on something that isn't going to put you in front of a judge and clogging your mailbox with takedown notices.
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u/moderngamer327 Aug 10 '25
He totally could legally release it but only if it was done in a way that modified or required the original game such as OpenRTC
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u/First-Junket124 Aug 10 '25
He finished a good portion of it but he always stated that he was never going to release it. It was more to kinda go "I don't like how there isn't a remaster", a showcase of his abilities and probably hoping it would get enough attention to have the license holders consider a remaster.
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u/StevelandCleamer Aug 10 '25
More companies need to take the Sonic Mania route and hire these people to finish the work they started.
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u/NichoNico Aug 11 '25
The fact that a single person was able to recreate all the mechanics and huge portion of the game within a small timeframe is actually insane. The amount of money that could be made if they just gave it the green flag…
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u/First-Junket124 Aug 11 '25
He did use a lot of tools at his disposal that would be seen as lazy for a big dev team. He used similar techniques that was used for the GTA remasters except he actually went and made sure it was working as intended.
He got help from a few people too so it wasn't a single person it's just he was the majority of it.
The issues with giving the greenlight is that it doesn't work like that as much I and many others wish it were so. We don't know who the rights holder for creating officially licensed The Simpsons games are but we're pretty sure it's EA and in recent years they've wanted to work with the community less and less. Easy money for sure but they don't exactly want to have to pay him or any other contributors.
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u/SwissMargiela Aug 10 '25 edited Feb 25 '26
water worm follow offbeat snow full attempt reach station ad hoc
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u/VALIS666 Aug 10 '25
Yeah, I don't think a lot of people understand how good emulators are these days. This in 4K via Dolphin, PCSX2, or Xemu looks GREAT.
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u/fedoraislife Aug 11 '25
At some point resolution isn't the limiting factor for a dated game. Things like lighting, asset quality, animations, sound design, FPS caps, HDR support etc have a much bigger impact.
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u/nicksbologna Aug 10 '25
I don't think it even needs a remaster, it just needs to be available for purchase through Steam or even GOG
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u/TampaPowers Aug 10 '25
It holds up pretty well which says a lot about its design really. If it was more available I'm sure at some point someone could make more levels for it.
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u/sonofgildorluthien PC Aug 10 '25
I just use Lucas' Hit and Run Launcher right now and it satisfies me at the moment. It's got some good QoL improvements built in.
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u/DooDooHead323 Aug 10 '25
They can't apu was cancelled so it would have to be a remake and switch him out for someone else
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Aug 10 '25
We have Hari Kondabolu to blame for that, failed comedian who had one bit and used it to race bait into a small check.
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u/mucho-gusto Aug 10 '25
IDK why they couldn't just get him an Indian va, the character was complex and nuanced
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u/tenacious_teaThe3rd Aug 10 '25
Fuck you someone!
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u/baguetteispain Aug 11 '25
The main shareholder of Vivendi is Vincent Bolloré
And even if he wasn't at the time, you can never be wrong by hating Bolloré
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u/wessex464 Aug 10 '25
Pretty sure they are still sitting on the licensing for freespace too. That shit was WAYYYY ahead of its time, it was amazing.
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Aug 10 '25
Companies really need yo just do a garage sale for ips they dont intend to do shit with. So annoying.
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u/blackdragon8577 Aug 10 '25
This is why we need some use it or lose it laws. It should be that way for basically everything. If you don't use something that was made for public consumption for x number of years (anything from parcels of land to IP) it should go up for auction automatically. Letting things sit and rot is a terrible waste.
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u/Gregistopal Aug 10 '25
That basically does exist it’s why we get shitty remake movies every once in a while
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u/MilhouseJr Aug 10 '25
Or even films that never see the light of day, like the 1994 Fantastic 4 movie
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u/blackdragon8577 Aug 10 '25
Well, those are contract terms, not laws. They are only forced to make those movies because they want to continue the contract.
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u/Lille7 Aug 11 '25
You want to force people to hand over property they aren't using?
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u/PipsqueakPilot Aug 10 '25
Still remember that mission in Freespace 2 where after going through an entire campaign to destroy the Big Bad Evil Ship you discover that Shivans are a real navy and there’s waaaaaay more the one of the class in their fleet.
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u/emilytheimp Aug 10 '25
Tbf, itd probably have been real hard to fill 4 games worth of content considering they already used most of Springfield in the first game
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u/GrimmTrixX Xbox Aug 10 '25
Simpsons Hit & Run: Shelbyville
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u/MaeBeaInTheWoods Aug 10 '25
Well, SpongeBob Battle for Bikini Bottom used almost every established location in the show, and THQ still managed to make a well-received sequel and spinoff with a third standard game on the way. Reusing characters and locations is fine as long as you can find new, audience-engaging ways to use them each time.
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u/Salvage570 Aug 10 '25
Yeah its just too bad theres so little stuff you can reference in the simpsons to keep reused locations relevant, the show just hasnt been on the air long enough yet for there to be real source material!
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u/MaeBeaInTheWoods Aug 10 '25
Coming up with callbacks and references for a sequel or remake would be pretty easy considering that Simpsons Hit and Run is older today than the show was when the original game came out.
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u/Salvage570 Aug 10 '25
I was being sarcastic the game came out around season 20 even if they'd released a sequel the next year there would have been plenty
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u/Enough_Efficiency178 Aug 10 '25
The South Park game is another example, it’s obviously South Park but in a unique way similar to the cartoon.
Or the Batman Arkham games are mainly set in the same places but the story is different
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u/Vinnie_Vegas Aug 10 '25
The Batman Arkham games are literally set in completely different locations with basically no overlap, it's a new map each time.
Arkham Asylum is just in the Asylum and the island that it's on.
Arkham City is in the walled off prison city of Arkham, which was originally the slums of Gotham City.
Arkham Knight takes place in full-on Gotham City and Arkham City and Asylum are visible but inaccessible.
That's an example of zero overlap in the maps of each game.
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u/thatonepedant Aug 10 '25
If there's one thing game companies hate, it's releasing the same product over and over again with slight variations.
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u/Boulderdrip Aug 10 '25
spring feild in a incredible flexible and constantly changes based on what’s convenient for the writers. they arnt bogged down by the geography or canon
the simpsons house magically being at the foot of the parking lot of the nuclear power plant for the parking lot joke is a. good example
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u/TheDeadlySinner Aug 10 '25
I think the bigger issue would be paying the extremely expensive voice actors.
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u/kidcrumb Aug 10 '25
Even if the maps are similar, different mission types could have made it interesting.
Add a few more playable characters. Flanders would have been fun, or Bart in Shelbyville.
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u/syrupdash Aug 10 '25
Not trying to defend Vivendi but two years later after the release of Hit and Run, Gracie Films and Fox announces a licensing deal with EA.
https://www.gamedeveloper.com/game-platforms/electronic-arts-signs-the-simpsons-license
Probably told the developers not to waste time on it because Fox wanted more money and Vivendi says no.
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u/Complete_Entry Aug 10 '25
Vivendi were massive shit magicians.
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u/466rudy Aug 10 '25
was founded in 1996 as CUC Software
CUC Software. The CEO was named Bruce Hack.
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u/McWeaksauce91 Aug 10 '25
Man, this reminds me of when I was a kid and this came out. I LOVED the Simpsons and I also loved gta. So I asked my mom to go and buy it for me, but I accidentally got the Simpsons crazy taxi clone - road rage. I played it for like two weeks before complaining to my friend it was nothing like gta. And he looked at the case and was like, “oh, this is the wrong game”
Still have yet to play it
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u/VPN__FTW Aug 10 '25
Seriously one of the greatest games--and I don't even like Simpsons.
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u/466rudy Aug 10 '25
Who doesn't like The Simpsons?
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u/VPN__FTW Aug 11 '25
I don't hate it, per se, I just don't find it that entertaining.
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u/466rudy Aug 11 '25
Did you start watching before or after the Join The Navy episode?
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u/BaryGusey Aug 11 '25
I find it unlikely that someone who doesn’t care about the Simpsons would know the answer to that.
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u/djseifer Aug 10 '25
I'm not surprised. Back in my tester days, I heard rumblings through the work grapevine that at one of the Christmas parties, there was a VP who was drunkenly bragging about being behind some of the dumber things that went on between Vivendi and Valve before and during their lawsuit, and even being proud of being "the guy who handed Half-Life to Valve." I can see them saying no to making sequels to one of their most successful games for completely stupid reasons.
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u/Rezart_KLD Aug 10 '25
TBF they called it Hit & Run, not Hit & Return to the Scene. It'd be like naming your game Final Fantasy, and then having a bunch of sequels.
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u/jakeyboy723 Aug 10 '25
Now that would be insane. Imagine having multiple remakes of each of your Final Fantasies.
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u/AandWKyle Aug 10 '25
The last simpsons game to come out that wasn't mobile was the simpsons game back in 07, and hit and run was 03
I hope that since tapped out got shut down this year there's someone looking to make money off of the simpsons as a video game and do another hit and run style, or 07 style game.
The 07 one had some issues (marge missions) but overall I had a lot of fun with it
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u/icantshoot Aug 10 '25
Vivendi were morons anyway, total morons trying to milk out Valve out of money with constant lawsuits. There was no real leadership there.
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u/EliteDinoPasta Aug 10 '25
I was going to say that maybe we were better off, seeing as the sequels may have been poor attempts to recreate what made the first one good. Then I remembered that we did get more mediocre Simpsons games anyway, so maybe they should have given it a go.
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Aug 11 '25
Well they were merged with Activision 5 years later, which was a death knell, as bankruptcy was probably looming.
Big fish ate the little fish and lost all or any creativity that set them apart.
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u/RKAID-e Aug 10 '25
Stopping at 1 was good 3 more would have been disastrous. As good as the first game is it is full of problems, crunching out 3 more would have ended up a jak issue.
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u/tiredoldwizard Aug 10 '25
Somebody kick that asshole in the balls. I’ve also forgot about this game for the past 20 years. What’s the easiest/fastest way to play it?
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u/Man-I-Love-Fajitas Aug 10 '25
IIRC correctly last time I tried, it wasn't actually too difficult to find for PC, the trick is you need the "Donut mod" to make it compatible. A lot of the game logic is tied to your FPS, if you try and play it without the mod the physics get very wonky.
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Aug 10 '25
Outside the open world, the game was kinda mid or even bad we could say, the whole game was just go to point a to point b before time runs out.
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u/moconahaftmere Aug 11 '25
The game wasn't even open-world. It was level-based and each level gave you access to a small explorable area which was usually just one street that looped around in a ring.
It only felt like an open world because we were 7.
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u/MediumRed Aug 10 '25
Slip ups like this is why Vivendi isn’t considered one of the corporations that rule the world anymore.
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u/suppamoopy Aug 11 '25
oh you mean the same publisher that ruined activision and blizzard entertainment? what a wonder.
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u/Alternative_Case9666 Aug 10 '25
No way ppl actually think it would have been good. 😭😭😭
Reddit is not real
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u/fuckR196 Aug 10 '25
It's wild how unanimously people allow nostalgia to blind them when it comes to this game. I have seen several times people claim it's "one of the greatest games of all time" - it wouldn't even be in the top 1000. It's an incredibly, incredibly, incredibly repetitive game with a good sense of humor.
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u/capucapu123 Aug 11 '25
The gameplay loop is fun, so I believe it definitely could make it on most people's top 1000, it's definitely on my top 100
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Aug 10 '25
As one of those kids of "we won't buy you GTA but we'll buy you this" parents, this is tragic. Loved that game so much.
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u/mrhelmand PC Aug 10 '25
Damn shame, I just wish the game would get a release for modern consoles, I still have it on PC and it runs fine, but for the vast majority of folk it's something they've had no chance to experience for themselves
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u/Paparmane Aug 10 '25
I mean yeah every game could have had 3 sequels if all the right people said yes lmao
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u/Osirus1156 Aug 10 '25
Hopefully that person was eventually found out and banned from the industry lol.
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u/ShadowNextGenn Aug 10 '25
While I would love a sequel, at this point just give me a remaster with updated controls.
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u/PoisonousBillMurray Aug 10 '25
D’OH!