Let's work together to recover the lost 480p trailer for Donkey Kong Racing that IGN once hosted (UPDATE: Success!)

samred · Feb 28, 2020

I would strongly urge the owners of these hard drives to contact Frank Cifaldi and the Video Game History Foundation with download links for ANY contact that's otherwise not publicly available. Tell 'em Sam Machkovech sent you.

Video Game History Foundation (@GameHistoryOrg) | Twitter

The latest Tweets from Video Game History Foundation (@GameHistoryOrg). Nonprofit preserving the history of video games, one byte at a time. Curated by @frankcifaldi and @kelslewin. DMs open. Oakland, CA

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Video Game History Foundation

Video games matter. The Video Game History Foundation is a 501(c)3 non-profit organization dedicated to preserving, celebrating, and teaching the history of video games.

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Hero of Legend · Feb 28, 2020

Here it is on YouTube!

Mission accomplished! Full credit to Peer and Dave and everything is in the description! Thanks everyone! :D

jett · Feb 28, 2020

ErrorJustin said:
Dave Toole and Peer literally tracked down the backup drive this was on and uploaded this for ya'll:

Donkey Kong Racing GameCube Hi-Res Trailer - IGN

At E3 2001, Rare and Nintendo showed off a pre-rendered trailer of its kart-influenced animal racing game, Donkey Kong Racing. The trailer used in-game models and, according to Rare, tried to simulate the look the developer was trying to achieve with the final game running on Nintendo GameCube...

www.ign.com

Wow crazy that you had this 20 year-old crap stored away somewhere.

I hope the OP is satisfied. :P

Hero of Legend · Feb 28, 2020

OP updated and a mod has been contacted to update the title! :D Thanks everyone again, I TRULY appreciate this! Let's keep this going to uncover more stuff if we can! :)

Ramsiege · Feb 28, 2020

Awesome you guys were able to find this! Hope you can find more rare videos!

Fuzzy Pickles! · Feb 28, 2020

Fantastic news to hear that we got the 480p Donkey Kong Racing trailer back. It's a shame that we didn't get this cancelled game in our hands, but let's hope that in the future, we will not only see DK revitalized as a brand with an awesome game that knocks our socks off, but also deliver that decades-awaited Diddy Kong Racing sequel that with DK characters. Imagine how great it would be to ride Animal Buddies for races. It's already one of my favorite parts of the DKC Trilogy. Riding a rhino, a dolphin, an elephant, and even a spider is cool stuff.

Hero of Legend · Feb 28, 2020

Fuzzy Pickles! said:
Fantastic news to hear that we got the 480p Diddy Kong trailer back. It's a shame that we didn't get this cancelled game in our hands, but let's hope that in the future, we will not only see DK revitalized as a brand with an awesome game that knocks our socks off, but also deliver that decades-awaited Diddy Kong Racing sequel that with DK characters. Imagine how great it would be to ride Animal Buddies for races. It's already one of my favorite parts of the DKC Trilogy that allows you to ride a rhino, a dolphin, an elephant, and even a spider.

Hey, with Nintendo and Microsoft getting along, maybe we COULD get Diddy Kong Racing 2 with ALL the characters back! :O

Too bad the director of the original DKR Lee Schuneman is at Lift London. I doubt he'll come back. :( You never know though.

Fuzzy Pickles! · Feb 28, 2020

Hero of Legend said:
Hey, with Nintendo and Microsoft getting along, maybe we COULD get Diddy Kong Racing 2 with ALL the characters back! :O

Too bad the director of the original DKR Lee Schuneman is at Lift London. I doubt he'll come back. :( You never know though.

That would be amazing. We already have Cuphead on the Switch and Banjo & Kazooie as DLC in Super Smash Bros. Ultimate and I don't think their business relationship is over yet. That's why we need a Rare Replay: Nintendo Edition with Donkey Kong games.

Agent Icebeezy · Feb 29, 2020

This made for an awesome read.

antonio · Feb 29, 2020

This is fantastic, thanks for getting the footage. I want this game so much. Racing on animal buddies with all Kongs is a dream. Can we convince Nintendo to make it for Switch? It is so much more exciting than yet another Mario Kart.

I also hope for Rare Replay with DKC games. Please, Rare and Nintendo, give this gift to us.

Dictator · Feb 29, 2020

samred said:
I would strongly urge the owners of these hard drives to contact Frank Cifaldi and the Video Game History Foundation with download links for ANY contact that's otherwise not publicly available. Tell 'em Sam Machkovech sent you.

Video Game History Foundation (@GameHistoryOrg) | Twitter

The latest Tweets from Video Game History Foundation (@GameHistoryOrg). Nonprofit preserving the history of video games, one byte at a time. Curated by @frankcifaldi and @kelslewin. DMs open. Oakland, CA

twitter.com

Video Game History Foundation

Video games matter. The Video Game History Foundation is a 501(c)3 non-profit organization dedicated to preserving, celebrating, and teaching the history of video games.

gamehistory.org

Hey Sam, the War Stories series, who is in production on that?
I just want to say I am such a massive Fan of everything about it!!!!!

Poison Jam · Feb 29, 2020

I'm glad this all worked out! I'm not sure I've seen other than pictures of this before.

Haha, that scene with the wasps is quite something! It's so clearly based on the chase sequence on Endor in Return of The Jedi.

Deleted member 10737 · Feb 29, 2020

awesome job!

xyla · Feb 29, 2020

Was this the last time we saw and heard DK as his SNES let before he got his goofy voice?

I always liked him more animal like in his voice.

Also great work! Haven't seen that trailer in ages!

daTRUballin · Feb 29, 2020

xyla said:
Was this the last time we saw and heard DK as his SNES let before he got his goofy voice?

I always liked him more animal like in his voice.

Also great work! Haven't seen that trailer in ages!

It would've been interesting for them to go back to his "animal-like" voice in this game considering they already made him sound all badass in DK64 lol.

xyla · Feb 29, 2020

daTRUballin said:
It would've been interesting for them to go back to his "animal-like" voice in this game considering they already made him sound all badass in DK64 lol.

Right, I tend to forget about that - I'd just like for them to get back to that style. Will never happen though.

Leo · Feb 29, 2020

OMG Kiddy Kong was in the game! I never knew

Spiderman · Feb 29, 2020

Someone should remake it with dreams!

SpotAnime · Feb 29, 2020

Wow, I totally forgot about this. Too bad it never came to be.

Hey while we're on it, I think it was IGN back in 96-97 I believe had a series of online guides on Japanese for English gamers. I don't remember what it was called but I remember printing out everything and putting it in binders (long gone by now). I can't find it online but it was around the Saturn Grandia release, and had screenshots of common Japanese HUDs and menus translated in English to help import gamers. There was one guide for RPGs, another for Action games, etc.

Anyone remember these?

Pancakes R Us · Feb 29, 2020

What a hit, son. You got the trailer! I was so gutted that this game got cancelled.

P.S.You can just see Kiddy Kong right at the end of the trailer.

antonio · Feb 29, 2020

I love Kiddy Kong so much! I want this game so much that it hurts to think what happened..

Deleted member 5086 · Feb 29, 2020

Reading this thread after the fact was a fun ride. It's really cool that members and IGN staff were able to come together and make this happen.

samred · Feb 29, 2020

Dictator said:
Hey Sam, the War Stories series, who is in production on that?
I just want to say I am such a massive Fan of everything about it!!!!!

Hey man, hi from a proud DF Patreon subscriber.

True story: one of the grandchildren of the Newhouse family (as in, the people who created all of Conde Nast) is in charge of wrangling developers who will talk shop, and his team is based in NYC, though I get to run operations sometimes when it comes to Seattle conversations. We're all super proud of this week's Crash Bandicoot video, it's thick 'n juicy in terms of good technical details told really clearly. And sadly, we're scrambling to shuffle things in the wake of GDC's cancellation. We had cool shoots lined up for that week.

Hero of Legend · Feb 29, 2020

By the way, Peer told me the footage may have originated on a tape, but sadly it was tossed ages ago due to space.

Folks brought up that there may be DVDs from NGC Magazine or something this may also be on, anyone able to dig this up?

Edit:

Stuart Gipp said:
I think this may have been on an old Ngamer DVD. I'll check ASAP, I still have them.

Did you ever find it?

Symphony said:
Might be worth looking at one of the DVDs that NGC Magazine in the UK gave away with some issues in 02/03, they had a lot of trailers on them, unfortunately I got rid of 90% of my magazines in a prior move so I don't have them any more.

It would be these 3 particular issues: 1, 2, 3

Edit: Oh also, Giant Bomb has their Game Tapes series where they showcase (and upload clean rips of) old promo footage, could be worth shooting a message to Jeff to see if the Nintendo E3 2001 footage is in the huge box of tapes they nabbed from the Gamespot vault.

Just sent a tweet to Jeff Gerstmann asking about this. Thanks for the tip! :)

Basically the plan is now to track down the source footage and see if that can be preserved. The IGN vid is our best so far, but we can do even better! :D

Stuart Gipp · Mar 1, 2020

Hero of Legend Apologies, I haven't had a chance to look yet. I just dug out the DVDs, and I'll go through them in a few hours. I already know which one it's likely to be on.

Hero of Legend · Mar 1, 2020

Stuart Gipp said:
Hero of Legend Apologies, I haven't had a chance to look yet. I just dug out the DVDs, and I'll go through them in a few hours. I already know which one it's likely to be on.

Awesome! :D

If you do find it, are you able to just give me a copy of the VOB file it may be on? It's possibly easier if I have the raw file. Unless you have the means to rip it lossless? Also, would you know how to get a DVD to display in progressive scan on PC? I still have no clue how to do this. It's supposed to be the means of getting a true 480p image but all I see in VLC are crummy deinterlacing options which kill the image.

Stuart Gipp · Mar 1, 2020

Hero of Legend said:
Awesome! :D

If you do find it, are you able to just give me a copy of the VOB file it may be on? It's possibly easier if I have the raw file. Unless you have the means to rip it lossless?

Should be fine. I'll be back in about an hour and I'll crack on.

Stuart Gipp · Mar 1, 2020

Ecch, bad news. The trailer's on the disc in... okay quality, but it has commentary from NGamer magazine. Want me to rip it anyway and maybe we can sync it up with the audio if the quality is deemed good enough?

Hero of Legend · Mar 1, 2020

Stuart Gipp said:
Ecch, bad news. The trailer's on the disc in... okay quality, but it has commentary from NGamer magazine. Want me to rip it anyway and maybe we can sync it up with the audio if the quality is deemed good enough?

Hmm, got a quick screencap?

Stuart Gipp · Mar 1, 2020

Hero of Legend said:
Hmm, got a quick screencap?

Edit: yeah, the extant one is way better. Sorry!

Hero of Legend · Mar 1, 2020

Stuart Gipp said:
Edit: yeah, the extant one is way better. Sorry!

Hmm, it's weird, as you may have noticed, all the prior uploads were based on this version with the Rare logo on it, and the contrast is crazy high, like it's too bright compared to the version IGN had.

Again IGN got theirs from some sort of betacam tape. Someone earlier said that GiantBomb may have a copy of that as well. Peer of IGN said they tossed theirs due to space and would've loved to have done a fresh rip of it if they still had it, but this was all they had in the archives.

I tweeted Jeff Gerstmann of GB yesterday asking if he has that tape, but no response so far.

That seems to be our best shot. Someone told me earlier to ask Rare... but I SERIOUSLY doubt they're allowed to provide the clean original vid due to all sorts of legal issues (with MS, Nintendo (especially Nintendo), etc). Press members obviously aren't bound by such limitations.

What's also odd is that the IGN vid has compressed audio (and it's Mono-only to boot), which is weird as the other uploads are better in that regard. And it's slightly cut off in the beginning (missing most of that humming) and the ending (it cuts off during the second shot of the logo and lacks the LET'S RIDE ending). I've considered "fixing" it the best I can by syncing the audio of the Unseen64 upload (I'm assuming that's the best we have audio-wise), extending the beginning with a screencap of the first frame (it is just a black screen after all) and to splice in the logo animation to extend the ending and add a custom LET'S RIDE logo identical to the original. I can't add Taj's animation (actually your rip may suffice if you could attempt it). Your DVD copy is the best of that version we have access to... 🤔

Taco_Human · Mar 1, 2020

I remember my launch gamecube box had that game on the back art. Glad to see the trailer here.

JaseC64 · Mar 1, 2020

Hero of Legend said:
Hmm, it's weird, as you may have noticed, all the prior uploads were based on this version with the Rare logo on it, and the contrast is crazy high, like it's too bright compared to the version IGN had.

Again IGN got theirs from some sort of betacam tape. Someone earlier said that GiantBomb may have a copy of that as well. Peer of IGN said they tossed theirs due to space and would've loved to have done a fresh rip of it if they still had it, but this was all they had in the archives.

I tweeted Jeff Gerstmann of GB yesterday asking if he has that tape, but no response so far.

That seems to be our best shot. Someone told me earlier to ask Rare... but I SERIOUSLY doubt they're allowed to provide the clean original vid due to all sorts of legal issues (with MS, Nintendo (especially Nintendo), etc). Press members obviously aren't bound by such limitations.

What's also odd is that the IGN vid has compressed audio (and it's Mono-only to boot), which is weird as the other uploads are better in that regard. And it's slightly cut off in the beginning (missing most of that humming) and the ending (it cuts off during the second shot of the logo and lacks the LET'S RIDE ending). I've considered "fixing" it the best I can by syncing the audio of the Unseen64 upload (I'm assuming that's the best we have audio-wise), extending the beginning with a screencap of the first frame (it is just a black screen after all) and to splice in the logo animation to extend the ending and add a custom LET'S RIDE logo identical to the original. I can't add Taj's animation (actually your rip may suffice if you could attempt it). Your DVD copy is the best of that version we have access to... 🤔

Can someone do that 4K Hires upscale via AI machine learning technique for this video? Lol.

Anyways I never knew of this game until this thread popped up. Then the twist with the Saberman Stampede gameplay clip I saw. Heck of a story.

Now we need someone to dump the Sabreman Stampede alpha game.

Nostremitus · Mar 1, 2020

Ok, now let's find the old IGN64 Majora's Mask footage.

Hero of Legend · Mar 1, 2020

Nostremitus said:
Ok, now let's find the old IGN64 Majora's Mask footage.

Maybe ErrorJustin can help! :)

Nostremitus · Mar 1, 2020

Hero of Legend said:
Maybe ErrorJustin can help! :)

Thanks, there's some old IGN Beta footage I've found on Youtube, but it's a trailer. I've been trying to find their old gameplay footage on and off for a while now. I look for it every so often to see if it's surfaced, lol.

It's not the one below, but this is a cool video in it's own right.

Crashman · Mar 1, 2020

It's too bad that this was a casualty of Rare being bought out by Microsoft. Looking at the footage of what it would eventually become (even though it never came out) Sabreman Stampede, I guess it would probably have had something like Diddy Kong Racing's overworld, and probably would have been a bit similar, in certain respects, to Jambo Safari, though presumably with a greater focus on racing than either Sabreman Stampede seemed to show.

Let's work together to recover the lost 480p trailer for Donkey Kong Racing that IGN once hosted (UPDATE: Success!)

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