One YouTuber has managed to recreate the first mission of The Simpsons Hit and Run in Unreal Engine 5 in just one week.
YouTuber reubs posted a video called "How I Remade The Simpsons Hit and Run in a week", which showcases him rebuilding the first mission of Hit and Run within Unreal Engine 5. Reubs started by importing the map into Unreal Engine, activating RTX, and then using AI to upscale the textures in the game.
That's already impressive enough, but then Reubs goes to the effort of having a playable character model for Homer made, scripting the first mission of the game, adding the UI in, and even sprinkling reactive collectibles into the game, like the coins and Buzz Cola cards. Reubs even put in voice lines and had to code certain interactable objects, such as the barbeque in Homer's backyard. It's a seriously impressive effort in just one week.
Although most of the video has reubs walking viewers through the process, it ends by having him play through the whole of the first mission, The Cola Caper, and it's an almost flawless recreation of the original game. Reubs originally let viewers download a demo of the project, but it's now been removed due to copyright concerns.
It's not just the fans that are impressed with this effort, as the original lead designer on Hit and Run, Joe McGinn, commented on the video, saying, "Hi, I'm the lead designer on the original game. Amazing what you accomplished! Really gives a taste of what a full modern remaster could be. Impressive work!"
A remake of The Simpsons Hit and Run is one of the most highly-requested in the gaming community, although it looks like it's not very likely to happen. The Simpsons producer Matt Selman said that getting the game remastered and on shelves would be a "complicated corporate octopus" due to all of the licensing issues surrounding the game. Let's hope that Disney reconsiders after seeing the positive reception to just one level being remade.