November 24, 2004 - If you were one of those proud owners of a Nintendo 64 in the late 1990s, you would have distinct memories of Midway's San Francisco Rush. Originally am arcade game using PC architecture and later ported to various systems, Midway's arcade-style racer joined steep streets and secret passages with insane jumps and subtly interwoven side tracks, hidden corridors to create a distinct racing experience.

SF Rush was rough in some areas, especially the horrific music and the rather unimaginative car designs, but its excellent gameplay won most folks over. Its success warranted a handful of descendants, none of which fulfilled the original's promise the way the first did, but each one took different steps at expanding the game with greater physics, stunts, and challenges.

That was then, this is now. Time has passed and Midway has resurrected the Rush series with LA Rush. The ambitious game now sports real car licensed, customization, a new city (LA), its open structure, and more. We spoke with Chief Marketing Officer and "acting Associate Producer" Steve Allison in an email interview about the game's potential and the team's goals. Allison is Midway's "point development contact" for LA Rush, and over the years, Allison has been in charge of all licensing for Atari Games back when, so he's more fit than most to discuss the game's new direction.

IGN: LA Rush sounds a little like it's trying to everything -- an import tuner, an arcade game, a sequel to the Rush series, and more. What exactly is it?

Steve Allison: It's an over the top arcade game with real licensed vehicles, aftermarket parts, personalities and music set in an open-world city re-creation of Los Angeles. It IS not a tuner game like say NFS or SRS. Actually, that wouldn't be true to the Rush series. The game has over 30 licensed cars ranging tuners, a deep roster of muscle cars, and SUVs. It also has 20 additional concept cars designed by WCC and RIDES magazine most of which can be unlocked by exploring the world and performing insane stunts.

Our open city is very different than say NFSU2 or even Midnight Club Dub. First off, our game happens at night and during the day. It's much more populated by civilians and more traffic than any of the aforementioned games and features extensive destructible objects everywhere. In addition to the races in the game we also have over 30 missions in the story mode which play out more like Driver than say NFSU. When we finally start showing the game it will be clear this is not intended to be another NFSU we have more in common with games like Burnout than we do with NFSU.

IGN: In re-visiting the Rush series, what were the major elements that characterized the first few games that your team wanted to nail in this revamped sequel?

Steve: While the main goal of the game is to be a high flying, over the top arcade racing game who ever said it can't have real licensed cars, music, and real locations like West Coast Customs for upgrading your cars in it? We think it's a natural evolution to have familiar content with licensed elements and necessary to stay competitive in today's marketplace. Why? Burnout is an amazing game and it hasn't really sold well in the USA because it's completely based on made up cars and locations. We have to bring these things to our reinvented franchise to give it the best chance of big success. Rush games have a history of being inspired by real places like San Francisco and making the re-envisioned Rush set in Los Angeles makes a lot of sense.