World's Scariest Police Chases: Deadly Pursuit, the Unreleased Dreamcast/PC game that broke cover
World’s Scariest Police Chases: Deadly Pursuit, developed by the English studio Teeny Weeny Games, was based on the American TV show World’s Scariest Police Chases (later renamed World’s Wildest Police Videos), a reality series of 56 episodes (1998-2001) broadcast on Fox featuring in-car and helicopter footage of insane pursuits between desperate criminals and law enforcement.
Chris Bateman (Game Designer and Writter): « It was indeed a completely different game! »
John Bunnel one of the presenters of the American Reality Show
As detailed throughout this article documenting Scariest Police Chases: Deadly Pursuit on Dreamcast as thoroughly as possible, the game had great potential and would have delighted fans of White Queen with a title similar to Grand Theft Auto 3 long before Rockstar Games’ global smash hit arrived.
Leon Walters (Producer): « Initially it was a game called ' deadly pursuit ', Fox took it over, added the intellectual property and made it a game for police officers. »
Dominic Jackson (Senior Programmer): « I’m pretty sure that for the duration of the game that the company developing the game was Perfect Entertainment Ltd.. I don’t know the actual structural details, but there was a stage where Teeny Weeny Games was re-branded and probably reformed as Perfect Entertainment Ltd.. TWG were the original developer of Discworld. »
Halted at around 40% of its development, Deadly Pursuit (DP) on Dreamcast was “playable”—though “explorable” would be a more accurate term. Fox, the game’s publisher, shut down the project, seeing no bright future for SEGA’s final console and no longer wishing to continue funding it. The development team at Teeny Weeny Games/Perfect Entertainment, which initially consisted of around 20 people but gradually shrank as the game’s design progressed, had integrated the cars, physics, and most of the city into their latest prototype. However, no missions had yet been implemented at the time the game was abandoned.
Leon Walters: « It's a shame, it was a magnificent game. They pretty much canceled everything because it was clear that the DC was doomed. It was also a very specific IP with an America centric audience. »
Perfect, or Teeny Weeny, did not have the necessary budget to purchase music licenses or collaborate with artists with high-profile, hard-hitting sounds. Perhaps the American film production company would have helped them, but that is far from certain. Rob Lord, Audio Director on DP and now a film music composer, would likely have handled the game’s soundtrack, though it is unclear whether this aspect of Deadly Pursuit’s development had already begun—he does not remember. Among other projects, he has composed soundtracks for games such as Fuzion Frenzy (Microsoft), Discworld (Psygnosis/Sony), and Just Cause (Eidos), to name a few.
Chris Bateman: « He once filled in on keyboard for Michael Jackson's tour because the regular keyboard player wasn't available for some reason. »
Mark Bandola, likely in collaboration with Rob Lord, had already composed the game’s main theme. It was a very rock-driven piece featuring live guitar. He is known for his work on Primal Rage, Pocahontas, Discworld Noir, and Screamball.
One of Perfect's logos
One of Teeny's logos
Dominic Jackson: « They were both previous employees but by then I expect that they would have done the work freelance due to the state of the company and redundancies due to the company losing other projects.»
This police simulation kept a low profile. Few people were talking about it. Some specialized websites and magazines had received a handful of screenshots to show their readers—but sadly, they could be counted on one hand.
Leon Walters: « We would have had to wait another year before its release, it was not really covered. »
The Dreamcast version of Deadly Pursuit made use of the “Tantalus” engine. It was programmed by the Australian development studio Tantalus Entertainment, based in Melbourne, which was partly owned by Perfect Entertainment.
Dominic Jackson: « For me the experience included two 3 month trips – one to Melbourne to go to pick up the Saturn engine we were using from a company called Tantalus who were a very tight technical team and the other to go to work on the World Cup 98 front end to assist EA in getting that game to release – both were interesting trips getting to experience a bit of culture in and around both cities. »
This article, which I hope is as comprehensive as possible about this Dreamcast exclusive, was not easy to write. Since the IP belongs to Fox—a film publisher rather than a company specifically focused on video games—researching it proved more difficult than for other Unreleased titles. As a result, the images used to illustrate this page are included under the “fair use doctrine”. If a DP prototype were to surface in the future, it would be complicated to handle and offer it for free download for copyright reasons, as Fox’s reaction would be unknown. Let’s be clear: this practice in the preservation scene is illegal. Fortunately, some publishers and manufacturers tolerate it—but for how long?
Home-made cover created by Dreamcast Me That
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Dominic Jackson: « I don’t remember much about Fox other than they hosted us once at E3 and we got to go to some of the industry parties out in LA which was quite a fun trip. »
The Teeny/Perfect title is one of the last Unreleased Dreamcast exclusives from SEGA’s 128-bit era still to be unearthed and dug up from the graveyard of abandoned Dreamcast projects—or perhaps not…
The storyline borrows the conventions of classic “buddy cop” movies such as Tango & Cash, Lethal Weapon, and 48 Hrs., to name a few. A woman—Officer Jeanette Deveraux, a firearms enthusiast with a sharp sense of humor—teams up with a man, Agent Don Sefcik, who is more experienced and calmer than she is. The story revolves around drugs, arms trafficking, and turf wars between gangs and cartels, ultimately leading to corruption cases involving the police and the DEA (a U.S. federal agency that combats drug trafficking and distribution in the United States). The news events are relayed by local media in the form of in-engine cutscenes, much like Headhunter Dreamcast would do two years later.
Leon Walters: « We recorded the script in Los Angeles with Ice-T as the main antagonist and a lot of supporting actors. »
No one can shake the police
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Progression through Deadly Pursuit on Dreamcast depends on the player’s actions. Regardless of how Teeny Weeny Games’ title is approached, all missions will be completed, though the emphasis on specific actions may change depending on past events and how they were played. The game offers strong replay value, with each new playthrough being different.
Dominic Jackson: « TWG / Perfect entertainment was quite an experience for a first job. Certain member of the management team could be somewhat volatile. It was lots of fun, but there was a certain amount of crunch at times. Overall, a great experience that I don’t regret but there were some tough moments. »
The game’s plot takes place in the fictional city of the “Oceanside–Fort Nor Metroplex”, which is divided into nine districts: Oceanside (Beach district) - Summer Beach (Beach district, by the seafront) - Ashland Hills (Beach district, southern hills) - Bellevue (Castiron & Café district) - Downtown (Highrise, Red Light & Tower district) - Chinatown (Chinatown district) - East Town Mall (Mall) - Salem Bay (Docks and Prison) - Meridian Airport (Airport).
Chris Bateman: « It's important to note that I left the project before it was cancelled, so most of my perspective comes earlier in the process - pre-production especially. I worked for about 7-8 months on the project, but wasn't there in the last days. I do not recall ever seeing a build I would call 'playable'. I saw the city coming to life, but I never got to live in it. »
The city’s two main sports teams—the Oceanside Surfers (baseball) and the Metro City Swine (American football)—compete at Channel 23 Park in Shlabotnik Point, the stadium located near Chinatown. Two major hospitals serve the injured and the sick: Fort Nord General and Saint Elegius.
Chris Bateman: « I'd say the road network was comparable to Toyko Highway Challenge/Shutokō Battle though.»
A view of the city from the top
A city you must know by heart if you hope to get out of increasingly perilous situations. Racing flat out through the Oceanside–Fort Nor Metroplex to restore order—that’s the goal!
Don Sefcik: Aged 30, this handsome man with a classic appearance shows remarkable tenacity in the face of adversity. Despite a fondness for drinking, his tolerance for alcohol is unusually high, and his intelligence, self-esteem, and honesty make him a respectable person. A bit of a loose cannon and, although he may be slightly unstable beneath the surface, he never cracks under life’s trials. He lives in the present, refusing to talk about his past—such as the time when, in his youth, he sang in a band. Passionate about sports, he is extremely knowledgeable, a true living encyclopedia. He lives alone with his dog, a Labrador–Retriever mix. Since being transferred to the Oceanside–Fort Nor Metroplex from another state, he has never taken the time to unpack his belongings. His new coworkers suspect that Don was investigated by Internal Affairs in a serious incident during his previous assignment, which forced him to relocate.
Jeanette Deveraux: She is a naïve young woman in her early twenties and considered attractive by many men. Although she holds a cynical, almost nihilistic view of life and police work, she remains ambitious. Her reckless behaviour has unfortunately held back her chances of promotion. Despite her cynicism, she is committed to her job — above all, arresting criminals. Her sense of humour is often misunderstood as mockery, even insult. A firearms enthusiast, she believes everyone should own a gun for self-defence and sees the Second Amendment as a cornerstone of American strength. She has little patience for pets, dismissing them as unintelligent. In contrast to her partner, she is an excellent cook. Raised in the Deep South, she joined law enforcement as soon as she was old enough to attend the police academy. Now living in a large city, she finds herself longing for the bayous and the hunting trips of her youth.
Jeanette Deveraux ?
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Secondary characters: Other personalities, relegated to the background but essential to the progression of Deadly Pursuit on Dreamcast or to the way its story is told, appear throughout the adventure. Li Tang, a woman of color as beautiful as she is determined, and her street gang, the Fallen Angels/Wing Kong, sow chaos in the alleys of the “Oceanside–Fort Nor Metroplex”. Some frightened residents, in response, have banded together into a pro-gun private militia, the CDM (Civil Defense Militia)—more of a heavily armed self-defense gang—led by wealthy businessman David Searl. The city’s mayor, Mayor Jackson, hopes to stem this wave of crime with the help of the police department to which Jeanette and Don are assigned. Karen, the dispatcher, regularly contacts the dynamic police duo over the radio to warn them of ongoing crimes. Missions are sometimes introduced or punctuated by cutscenes depicting TV reports from Channel 23 News, covering the city’s current events on the famous show Deadly Pursuit, hosted by Scott Haring and produced by the company’s CEO, Monica Stephens.
The characters, stereotypical and caricatured, draw their inspiration from late–20th-century action movies. Don Sefcik undoubtedly resembles Martin Riggs as portrayed by Mel Gibson in Lethal Weapon!
Jeanette Deveraux and Don Sefcik begin their investigation equipped with only a sidearm, the Desert Eagle .50. As their case progresses, their arsenal expands with the acquisition of a shotgun, an M16 assault rifle / H&K MP5, grenades, a rifle-mounted grenade launcher (RP grenades), and an anti-tank weapon. The equipment evolves and becomes increasingly devastating. The trick to firing behind you using the controller’s “A” button is to switch to a view specifically designed for this purpose—the camera then swings to face backward from the front of the car.
Chris Bateman: « To my knowledge, there was no plan for a romantic subplot, and I certainly hadn't planned on one. Maybe for a sequel! »
With third-person views, interior perspectives (from the front or the rear) identical to cameras mounted on the dashboard or back seat of real police cars, and even occasional aerial angles as if a helicopter were filming the chase live, the player can drive a selection of around ten vehicles, each with its own unique characteristics—even a tank. Most of them are equipped with a portable spotlight to illuminate the downtown districts of Mayor Jackson’s city. To maximize the realism of this police simulation, buttons on the Dreamcast controller activate the blue and red sirens of the light bar and also allow you to honk the horn—everything you need to step into the shoes of a true law enforcement officer!
The view from the emergency lights
Unlike Grand Theft Auto III, Deadly Pursuit on Dreamcast does not allow the player to exit their vehicle and freely explore the environment on foot. Teeny/Perfect’s title is essentially a chase-driving game enhanced with gunfight sequences conducted from behind the wheel of a car. It stands out from other productions in the genre through the addition of modular missions, the fact that players take on the role of police officers, and a carefully crafted storyline.
Leon Walters: « It looked a lot like GTA before GTA. The city was Open-World, with a linear mission structure supported by many side quests. »
To keep the graphics at a necessary minimum, the developers did not want vehicle bodies to be deformed by collisions. However, damage effects such as bullet impacts were applied to the car’s bodywork. Various components of the vehicles would suffer continuous degradation—though not necessarily visual—if they were constantly targeted. Shooting at the windows would shatter them, making it legitimate to aim more precisely at the occupants of the enemy vehicle. Flat tires affected the car’s handling until it came to a complete stop. If the engine took too much damage, the vehicle’s speed would drop, then the hood would deform, fly off, and finally steam would pour out of the engine bay, signaling an imminent explosion. An excellent way to eliminate fugitives was to neutralize them by hitting their vehicle’s gas tank—BOOM!
The playable top-down view in Deadly Pursuit on Dreamcast, cleverly explained as the scene being filmed from a helicopter recording the action, helps draw a parallel with real-life chases broadcast in the media or on the TV show of the same name.
Deadly Pursuit is a story- and mission-driven police driving game. It unfolds much like American car-chase reality shows, drawing inspiration from their camera angles and helicopter views. As a police officer, the player can choose from several vehicles and have many weapons at their disposal to try to complete more than 75 missions designed to test their reflexes and composure.
The action takes place in a real-time 3D environment, with the goal of completing all available missions in order to rid the city of crime. They can be approached in several different ways, transforming the gameplay experience each time.
Chris Bateman: « The term Open World only came into use later. But Driver was on its way at this point, and there was a push towards these larger worlds, and this project was on point in that regard. »
The key word: drive carefully
The developers, imaginative in many respects, were considering—despite the serious tone of Deadly Pursuit on Dreamcast—adding a touch of originality to their game with optional, choreographed sequences worthy of the biggest Hollywood blockbusters. When approaching railroad tracks, for example, a timer might start, prompting the player to perform an incredible swerve over—and perhaps even through—a freight train. Another unlikely stunt involved driving under a semi-truck, ripping the roof off the police car. Why not leap from the roof of a building to land below on the back of a moving car carrier truck? Since DP on SEGA’s final console was still in an early stage at the time of its cancellation—clearly in an Alpha state—it is impossible to say whether these elements were technically feasible or would have been kept in further development. The idea, however, was there…
A multiplayer component, local or online, for up to four players, was planned. Players would have faced off in basic deathmatches, traditional races, or manhunt modes. One multiplayer mode would even have placed them in an extravagant competition within a section of the city closed off for the occasion. Everyone would start with a bomb in their car set to explode in 60 seconds. If they drove below 30 mph (50 km/h), the countdown would decrease more rapidly. To gain time and extend the bomb’s timer—and hope to stay alive as long as possible—the goal was to shoot at or ram opponents’ vehicles. The Dreamcast would also have featured, among other things, a console-exclusive cooperative mode in which Player 1 drove the vehicle while Player 2 handled the weapons.
In single-player mode missions range from simple — such as arresting drunk drivers — to complex — like attempting to quell riots during a citywide power outage, for example. Most of them can be completed in multiple ways, although some paths are more challenging than others.
Dominic Jackson: « Where we were before it was cancelled, it was more of a driving experience than a game – the physics and performance was starting to come together, but we’d only just started to get the missions working. There many have been some instabilities in the physics engines and some performance spikes but we were getting pretty close in that regard. »
Missions were to be branching in nature. Five scenarios would be grouped together, with each grouping tied to a segment of the story. These five scenarios would be able to unfold in multiple combinations depending on how the player completed the previous ones. For example, a criminal encountered in a previous scenario could make the player’s life more difficult in the current one.
A risky overtaking maneuver
Dominic Jackson: « Additionally a lot of the engine resources were intricately tied to the PC version of the Tantalus engine we were using – it would be very hard to reverse engineer some of these assets without the engine code from that time.»
Once a scenario is completed, the game evaluates it as having been finished either professionally or destructively. If the player has caused a large amount of collateral damage—such as damage to the city’s infrastructure, vehicles, and so on—the game considers it to have been completed in a destructive manner.
The outcome of previously completed missions not only controls the flow of the story, but also affects the characters’ dialogue. Conversations shift in relation to the level of destruction caused.
The player cannot kill innocent bystanders and still complete missions successfully. They may adopt a zero-tolerance approach toward criminals, but the moment they massacre innocents, the mission is automatically doomed to failure.
Dominic Jackson: « I do remember that we had a novel *ragdoll physics system, so you were able to hit pedestrians in the game ( and yes, I’m sure that hitting innocent civilians would have been detrimental to your success in missions ). Having said that, the mission system was still in development when the project was stopped so I don’t know how far the publisher would have allowed that to develop. »
*Ragdoll physics is a type of real-time animation used by physics engines to simulate a character being struck, falling, dying, and so on.
With these gameplay rules, the player feels that their characters’ actions affect the life of the fictional city of the Oceanside–Fort Nor Metroplex.
The game offers several ways to complete a mission, giving the player a certain margin for improvisation. Radio calls and conversations between the characters, as well as introductory cutscenes, lay out the objective of the upcoming police operation. Deadly Pursuit features the following types of missions:
Chases: The goal is to find a way to force a fleeing vehicle to stop.
Solo Races: These missions involve traveling between fixed points within a limited time, such as transporting a pregnant woman to the hospital or crossing the city to defuse bombs.
Competitive Races: A cross between a race and a chase, where the challenge is to beat one or more other vehicles competing in the event.
No time to visit the city
Fights: Any operation that involves destroying other vehicles is classified as a combat mission.
Crimewaves: A “Crimewave” operation, the most difficult to complete, consists of a series of calls from the police dispatch that must be answered within a set time limit. This results in a chain of Fights, Solo Races, and Chases, all combined into a single, perilous mission.
There’s something for everyone, putting each player’s driving skills to the test. Making it out alive will depend on how steady your hands are on the wheel!
Pregnant Woman: While Don is shopping and having coffee with Deveraux, police dispatch reports an emergency — a pregnant woman is about to give birth. He drops his shopping bag and rushes out; there’s no time to waste. The mission opens with sirens blaring, the woman screaming, and the patrol car racing through the streets. The player takes control and must reach one of the city’s two hospitals — either one — before time runs out. As the seconds pass, the woman becomes increasingly hysterical, straight out of a Hollywood movie.
The mission is interspersed with cutscenes and dialogue and concludes outside the chosen hospital. If successful, the police car screeches to a halt and doctors immediately take the woman inside as she cries out in pain. One of the officers, clearly relieved, watches her being wheeled away on a stretcher while leaning against the patrol car with folded arms. If you fail, the baby is delivered in the back seat of the vehicle.
Escort Prison Van: During the transfer of a prisoner, the officers are informed over the radio of a possible attack on the prison convoy. The lines of dialogue reveal more about this dangerous criminal and hint at how the mission’s storyline will develop. Deveraux and Sefcik’s patrol car roars into action to escort the prison van. The cinematic continues with a helicopter view from Channel 23, live-commented by the network’s reporters.
In the first part of the mission, the player must follow the van at a set distance—fall too far behind and you lose sight of it, resulting in failure. Halfway through, a cutscene shows two vehicles appearing out of nowhere to block the police escort’s path. The camera switches to an aerial view as a firefight erupts between law enforcement and a heavily armed commando. During the assault, one of the men attempting to extract the prisoner hijacks the armored van and speeds away.
Now the objective is to force your way through the bullet-riddled vehicles and pursue the fugitives. To complete the mission, the prison van must be neutralized—either by destroying it completely or bringing it to a halt. The ending cutscene reveals Deveraux standing near the smoldering wreck of the van, a rifle in hand, flames blazing in the background. If the van cannot be stopped in time, the police car pulls over. Inside, shaken by how events unfolded and their bitter failure, Don and Jeanette worry about the captain’s reaction when they return to the station…
The missions follow one another at a frenetic pace, alternating between a serious and an offbeat approach.
Part of the development team and acknowledgments
When a video game fails to reach the end of its development, there is often no complete list online of the individuals who worked on the project to credit them for their involvement, as sites like MobyGames (Video Game Database) do for released titles. In rare cases, the credits are already integrated into the game as part of its development before its cancellation.
When information about the people who worked on an unreleased title and their credits cannot be found, it is lost and forgotten. Over the years, establishing the structure of its development team becomes increasingly difficult. Below is a non-exhaustive list of the people who worked on World’s Scariest Police Chases: Deadly Pursuit on Dreamcast:
Martin Clemie: Artist City Team
Julian Hughes-Watts: Artist City Team
Mark Tatham: Artist City Team
Steve Packer: To Be Confirmed
Jim Ellis: To Be Confirmed
Simon Turner: Artist Characters
Ben Wilshir: Artist Characters
Mark Booth: Artist Characters
Darren Hatton: Artist Characters
Chris Bateman: Production/Design
Siobhan Reddy: Production/Design
Luci Black: To Be Confirmed
Jason Bardford: Production/Design
Leon Walter: Producer
Jon Forshaw: Lead Programmer
John Southgate: Lead Artist
Rob Lord: Audio Director
Ian France: Programmer
Matt McGinity: AI Programmer
Gareth White: Junior Programmer
Mark Judge: To Be Confirmed
Mark Jones: Artist Vehicle Team
Martin Issit: Artist Vehicle Team
Warren Hawkes: To Be Confirmed
Chi Chan: Artist City Team
David Gear: Artist City Team
I would like to thank Chris Bateman, Dominic Jackson, Leon Walters, and Rob Lord, with whom I spoke, for their availability, kindness, and for taking the time to answer my questions. Their testimonies allow us to travel back to the time of Deadly Pursuit’s development on Dreamcast and better understand its gameplay mechanics and overall concept!
I would like to thank the entire Teeny Weeny Games/Perfect Entertainment team involved in the project World’s Scariest Police Chases: Deadly Pursuit on Dreamcast (MobyGames – Discworld Noir).
If anyone else who worked on this game is reading this, to better visualize it and imagine what it would be like to play, I am looking for:
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Photos taken from the engine, artwork, and, if possible, character models from the game—at least the two police officers.
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Visuals of the city, whether as artwork, in-engine screenshots, or gameplay footage, and possibly building models.
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Photos, artwork, or models of the vehicles and even the weapons.
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A video of the game.
The idea is to be able to correlate the information contained in this article with visual material from Deadly Pursuit on Dreamcast.
Special thanks to:
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Hicks for proofreading and editing the French texts
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Neil Riddaway for the English correction of the article
In my research focused on unreleased games, I have had the opportunity to interview a number of developers. I took the opportunity I had to create some articles for these cancelled games, complete with previously unpublished information:
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Proof of the existence of the Smurfs (The Smurfs) on Dreamcast and Playstation 2
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World's Scariest Police Chases: Deadly Pursuit, an escaped Dreamcast Unreleased
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Planet of the Apes Dreamcast crashes on an Unreleased planet
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The discovery of Farnation Dreamcast in video: when SEGA wanted to offer MMOs on its latest console
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Frontier Dreamcast, when Turbine's MMO almost arrived on Dreamcast
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The making of Prodigal Xbox 360/PlayStation 3: When Need For Speed met Devil May Cry
