interactive movie
Across the many fields concerned with interactivity, including information science, computer science, human-computer interaction, communication, and industrial design, there is little agreement over the meaning of the term "interactivity", but mo ...
video game
Video games, also known as computer games, are electronic games that involves interaction with a user interface or input device such as a joystick, controller, keyboard, or motion sensing device to generate visual feedback. This fee ...
developed by 3Vision Gamers and published by
Capcom
is a Japanese video game developer and video game publisher, publisher. It has created a number of List of best-selling video game franchises, multi-million-selling game franchises, with its most commercially successful being ''Resident Evil' ...
for
Microsoft Windows
Windows is a group of several proprietary graphical operating system families developed and marketed by Microsoft. Each family caters to a certain sector of the computing industry. For example, Windows NT for consumers, Windows Server for serv ...
and
PlayStation
is a video gaming brand that consists of five home video game consoles, two handhelds, a media center, and a smartphone, as well as an online service and multiple magazines. The brand is produced by Sony Interactive Entertainment, a divisi ...
. It is an
interactive movie
Across the many fields concerned with interactivity, including information science, computer science, human-computer interaction, communication, and industrial design, there is little agreement over the meaning of the term "interactivity", but mo ...
title with
live action
Live action (or live-action) is a form of cinematography or videography that uses photography instead of animation. Some works combine live-action with animation to create a live-action animated film. Live-action is used to define film, video ga ...
visuals in the vein of a
spy film
The spy film, also known as the spy thriller, is a genre of film that deals with the subject of fictional espionage, either in a realistic way (such as the adaptations of John le Carré) or as a basis for fantasy (such as many James Bond films) ...
.
After its release on Windows, the game's creators acquired additional funds, shot more footage, and released ''Fox Hunt'' as a
direct-to-video
Direct-to-video or straight-to-video refers to the release of a film, TV series, short or special to the public immediately on home video formats rather than an initial theatrical release or television premiere. This distribution strategy was p ...
film in several countries.
Plot
Jack Fremont is known for his knowledge of TV shows; it turns out life is rough right now. He is about to get kicked out of his house. However, when bragging about his knowledge he is confronted by
CIA
The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA ), known informally as the Agency and historically as the Company, is a civilian intelligence agency, foreign intelligence service of the federal government of the United States, officially tasked with gat ...
agents. They tell him that there is a former Soviet TV Producer on the loose who is angry that he is uncredited in the TV shows he produced in the 1970's and is threatening to wipe
Los Angeles
Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the world' ...
off the map with a cache of hidden Soviet nuclear missiles and now it's up to Jack to stop him.
Gameplay
The gameplay of this game is varied. In some places the player character explores rooms and finds objects, and in others he enters fighting and action sequences. There is a time limit in many of these sequences. A red box in the corner of the screen informs the player when they need to take action during a
quick time event
In video games, a quick time event (QTE) is a method of context-sensitive gameplay in which the player performs actions on the control device shortly after the appearance of an on-screen instruction/prompt. It allows for limited control of the ...
.
Development and release
''Fox Hunt'' was developed by movie studio 3Vision Gamers with funding provided by publisher
Capcom
is a Japanese video game developer and video game publisher, publisher. It has created a number of List of best-selling video game franchises, multi-million-selling game franchises, with its most commercially successful being ''Resident Evil' ...
. It was the first project greenlit by former Capcom USA president Greg Ballard, who had recently joined the company soon after he left the developer
Digital Pictures
Digital Pictures was an American video game developer founded in 1991 by Lode Coen, Mark Klein, Ken Melville, Anne Flaut-Reed, Kevin Welsh and Tom Zito.
The company originated from an attempt to produce a game for the failed VHS-based NEMO (vid ...
and witnessed the production of ''
Resident Evil
''Resident Evil'', known in Japan as is a Japanese horror game series and media franchise created by Capcom. It consists of survival horror, third-person shooter and first-person shooter games, with players typically surviving in environments ...
'' in Japan. ''Fox Hunt'' was developed on a budget of up to $2 million. 3Vision consisted of writer/producer Matt Pyken, producer/lawyer Adam Berns, and director Michael Berns (Adam's brother) at the helm. The trio had previously created the 1994 PC game ''National Lampoon's Blind Date''. Michael Berns and designer/programmer Peter Marx had a singular "cinematic vision" on how ''Fox Hunt'' should play in that it was structured like a three-act feature film. Berns found that FMV games released up to that point focused more on showcasing technology in place of including good gameplay. The director wanted ''Fox Hunt'' to be considered as a full-fledged video game and not simply an interactive movie like those earlier titles. The gameplay engine designed by Marx is based on the one he built for the PC game ''
Johnny Mnemonic
"Johnny Mnemonic" is a science fiction short story by American-Canadian writer William Gibson. It first appeared in '' Omni'' magazine in May 1981, and was subsequently included in ''Burning Chrome'', a 1986 collection of Gibson's short fiction. ...
''. However, he intended ''Fox Hunt'' to have the "compelling time component" of a motion picture that kept the story dynamic rather than the "limited action and choppy movement" found in ''Johnny Mnemonic''.
''Fox Hunt'' was shot on
16 mm film
16 mm film is a historically popular and economical gauge of film. 16 mm refers to the width of the film (about inch); other common film gauges include 8 and 35 mm. It is generally used for non-theatrical (e.g., industrial, educ ...
instead of video for improved
resolution
Resolution(s) may refer to:
Common meanings
* Resolution (debate), the statement which is debated in policy debate
* Resolution (law), a written motion adopted by a deliberative body
* New Year's resolution, a commitment that an individual mak ...
. Casting for the game was conducted in the second quarter of 1995. Chief among the cast were newcomer Andrew Bowen as the game's protagonist, one-time
James Bond
The ''James Bond'' series focuses on a fictional British Secret Service agent created in 1953 by writer Ian Fleming, who featured him in twelve novels and two short-story collections. Since Fleming's death in 1964, eight other authors have ...
star
George Lazenby
George Robert Lazenby (; born 5 September 1939) is an Australian actor. He was the second actor to portray fictional British secret agent James Bond in the Eon Productions film series, playing the character in '' On Her Majesty's Secret Service ...
, and
Timothy Bottoms
Timothy James Bottoms (born August 30, 1951) is an American actor and film producer. He is best known for playing the lead in ''Johnny Got His Gun'' (1971); Sonny Crawford in ''The Last Picture Show'' (1971), where he and his fellow co-stars, Cy ...
(of ''
The Last Picture Show
''The Last Picture Show'' is a 1971 American coming-of-age drama film directed and co-written by Peter Bogdanovich, adapted from the semi-autobiographical 1966 novel ''The Last Picture Show'' by Larry McMurtry. The film's ensemble cast includes T ...
''). Scenes was filmed over 35 days, mostly at the former Ambassador Hotel in
Los Angeles
Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the world' ...
, though four days were set aside for shooting skiing footage in
Aspen, Colorado
Aspen is a home rule municipality that is the county seat and the most populous municipality of Pitkin County, Colorado, United States. The city population was 7,004 at the 2020 United States Census. Aspen is in a remote area of the Rocky Mounta ...
. Lazenby commented on the shooting schedule: "Actors need a lot of flexibility since scenes are shot so quickly and you instantly go from being good to being evil. As Bond On_Her_Majesty's_Secret_Service''.html" ;"title="On Her Majesty's Secret Service (film)">On Her Majesty's Secret Service''">On Her Majesty's Secret Service (film)">On Her Majesty's Secret Service'' I once waited three days while the crew prepared to film a single scene! On ''Fox Hunt'' we do a new scene every hour. It's the way movies should be made." Filming ultimately consisted of about 2,200 camera setups, around 20,000
edits
Editing is the process of selecting and preparing written, photographic, visual, audible, or cinematic material used by a person or an entity to convey a message or information. The editing process can involve correction, condensation, or ...
, over three hours of live-action footage, 735 shots, and nine different endings.
The game's
background music
Background music (British English: piped music) is a mode of musical performance in which the music is not intended to be a primary focus of potential listeners, but its content, character, and volume level are deliberately chosen to affect behav ...
was composed and co-written by
Mark Mothersbaugh
Mark Allen Mothersbaugh (; born May 18, 1950) is an American composer, singer, and multi-instrumentalist. He came to prominence in the late 1970s as co-founder, lead singer and keyboardist of the new wave band Devo, whose " Whip It" was a top 2 ...
while 3Vision partnered with
Rhino Records
A rhinoceros (; ; ), commonly abbreviated to rhino, is a member of any of the five extant species (or numerous extinct species) of odd-toed ungulates in the family Rhinocerotidae. (It can also refer to a member of any of the extinct species o ...
and Tri-Tone Music to include licensed songs for the remainder of the soundtrack. Tri-Tone's Jennifer Pyken, the sister of the game's producer Matt, was appointed by Capcom as music supervisor and both helped purchase licenses from various artists and sell the soundtrack to Rhino. Pyken chose to include
old-school hip hop
Old-school hip hop (also spelled old skool) is the earliest commercially recorded hip hop music and original style of the genre. It typically refers to the music created around 1979 to 1983, as well as any hip hop that does not adhere to contem ...
,
surf music
Surf music (or surf rock, surf pop, or surf guitar) is a genre of rock music associated with surf culture, particularly as found in Southern California. It was especially popular from 1958 to 1964 in two major forms. The first is instrumental s ...
, and
modern rock
Modern rock is an umbrella term used to describe rock music that is found on college rock radio stations. Some radio stations use this term to distinguish themselves from classic rock, which is based in 1960s–1980s rock music.
Radio format
Mod ...
to serve as clues within the game; additional clues would be present in the soundtrack's liner notes when it was released by Rhino on January 23, 1996. "Our first priority was finding songs that were appropriate for the game," Pyken stated. "In that sense were approached it like we would any film. But we also kept in mind the audience, which is relatively young but wide-ranging taste in new music and old." Among the included artists were
Violent Femmes
Violent Femmes are an American folk punk band from Milwaukee, Wisconsin. The band consists of founding members Gordon Gano (guitar, lead vocals) and Brian Ritchie (bass, backing vocals), joined by multi-instrumentalist Blaise Garza (joined 2004 ...
,
Butthole Surfers
Butthole Surfers are an American rock band formed in San Antonio, Texas, by singer Gibby Haynes and guitarist Paul Leary in 1981. The band has had numerous personnel changes, but its core lineup of Haynes, Leary, and drummer King Coffey has been ...
,
Dick Dale
Richard Anthony Monsour (May 4, 1937 – March 16, 2019), known professionally as Dick Dale, was an American rock guitarist. He was a pioneer of surf music, drawing on Middle Eastern music scale (music), scales and experimenting with reverb eff ...
Faith No More
Faith No More is an American rock band from San Francisco, California, formed in 1979. Before settling on the current name in July 1983, the band performed under the names Sharp Young Men and later Faith No Man. Bassist Billy Gould, keyboardist/r ...
, and
Poster Children
Poster Children is an American indie rock band formed at the University of Illinois at Champaign-Urbana in 1987.
''Fox Hunt'' was released exclusively in North America for
Microsoft Windows
Windows is a group of several proprietary graphical operating system families developed and marketed by Microsoft. Each family caters to a certain sector of the computing industry. For example, Windows NT for consumers, Windows Server for serv ...
on January 31, 1996 and for
PlayStation
is a video gaming brand that consists of five home video game consoles, two handhelds, a media center, and a smartphone, as well as an online service and multiple magazines. The brand is produced by Sony Interactive Entertainment, a divisi ...
on September 30, 1996. Versions of the game were in development for the
Sega Saturn
The is a home video game console developed by Sega and released on November 22, 1994, in Japan, May 11, 1995, in North America, and July 8, 1995, in Europe. Part of the fifth generation of video game consoles, it was the successor to the succ ...
and
Mac OS
Two major famlies of Mac operating systems were developed by Apple Inc.
In 1984, Apple debuted the operating system that is now known as the "Classic" Mac OS with its release of the original Macintosh System Software. The system, rebranded "M ...
. Despite being officially advertised alongside the other versions, these were never released. The Windows version of ''Fox Hunt'' sold 25,000 copies in its first six months on sale. By mid-1997, both versions of the game had sold about 50,000 copies combined. Ballard regretted the game's production, recalled a substantially higher production budget of $5 million, and exaggerated its commercial performance. He lamented, "I think we sold 132 copies. So somewhere, somebody has a copy of it, and it is a true collector's item, because it is the worst that was ever made. Ever."
Film version
After its debut as a video game, the Berns brothers decided to rework ''Fox Hunt'' into a feature-length film for television and home video. A foreign distributor encouraged 3Vision to cut a trailer after the company showed the game at the
1996 Cannes Film Festival
The 49th Cannes Film Festival was held from 9 to 20 May 1996. The Palme d'Or went to '' Secrets & Lies'' by Mike Leigh.
The festival opened with ''Ridicule'', directed by Patrice Leconte and closed with '' Flirting with Disaster'', directed by ...
. Backed by Los Angeles-based sales agent Redwood Communications, 3Vision managed to sell the rights to the film to several foreign distributors and secure several hundred thousand dollars in funds to hire more talent and shoot additional footage. Adam Berns explained that the company had to negotiate with the
Screen Actors Guild
The Screen Actors Guild (SAG) was an American labor union which represented over 100,000 film and television principal and background performers worldwide. On March 30, 2012, the union leadership announced that the SAG membership voted to m ...
to use the game footage (created under an interactive contract) for a motion picture. Three quarters of the film's footage consisted of the game's cutscenes while new scenes were shot over an eight day period, would include actor
Gary Coleman
Gary Wayne Coleman (February 8, 1968 – May 28, 2010) was an American actor and comedian. Coleman was the highest-paid child actor on television throughout the late 1970s and 1980s. He was rated first on a list of VH1's "100 Greatest Kid S ...
, and required about 900 additional edits. "Essentially what we did is took our best footage from the game and wrote a story around it, using the general plot of the CD-ROM script,” Adam Berns stated. As of mid-1997, the game had not acquired a US distributor.
Reception
Critical reception for ''Fox Hunt'' ranged from poor to average. ''
Computer Game Review
''Computer Game Review'' was a print monthly magazine covering both computer gaming and video gaming. The magazine was started in 1991. Also known as ''Computer Game Review and 16-Bit Entertainment'', and then later as ''Computer Game Review and C ...
'' gave the game a negative review, calling it "just another example of how unplayable interactive movies can be."
GameSpot
''GameSpot'' is an American video gaming website that provides news, reviews, previews, downloads, and other information on video games. The site was launched on May 1, 1996, created by Pete Deemer, Vince Broady and Jon Epstein. In addition ...
said this about the game: "Overlooking some of the childish antics of its hero, Capcom's ''Fox Hunt'' is an interactive movie that merits more than a showing or two. It's silly and amusing but surprisingly well developed and fun to play." and gave it a 6.8.
Ann Kwinn of ''
Boxoffice
''Boxoffice Pro'' is a film industry magazine dedicated to the movie theatre business published by BoxOffice Media LP.
History
It started in 1920 as ''The Reel Journal'', taking the name ''Boxoffice'' in 1931 and still publishes today, with ...
'' gave the film version of ''Fox Hunt'' three out of five stars.