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  • - A few months ago I got an email from a company called Sparkmate.

  • They build prototypes.

  • If you, or your company, has an idea for a thing and the money to make it,

  • they will build that thing for you.

  • They said to me, "Tom, we've got a bit of spare time and want some publicity,

  • "do you have anything weird that you want built?"

  • So I looked through the long list of impractical projects

  • that are on my ideas board, and I realized that I could answer a question

  • that I've had since I was very young.

  • When I was a kid I watched a show called Captain Scarlet and the Mysterons.

  • It was a tale of good versus evil, the heroic agents of Spectrum

  • fighting against the Mysterons from Mars.

  • It was made with puppets, the hero character was indestructible,

  • which say brave narrative choice,

  • and most people remember one thing about it:

  • the weird decision to do big scene transitions like this.

  • [loud drumbeats, timed with video cuts]

  • Captain Scarlet was made in the '60s, rerun in the '90s,

  • and kids like the young version of me loved it.

  • It turns out decades old shows are still interesting

  • when you only have four TV channels and no internet.

  • Rewatching it as an adult for this video?

  • First, it's now in HD, so you can see the puppet strings,

  • and it is brutally violent for a kid's show.

  • In the first episode there's blood, death by gunshot,

  • and an alien replicant blowing himself up,

  • and the production didn't shy away from that

  • by cutting to a reaction shot of other characters.

  • The special effects team literally put explosives inside a puppet and blew it up.

  • Wholesome family kids' entertainment there.

  • And the plots often make no sense.

  • I try to summarize the alien plan from that first episode for this script,

  • and I just gave up. It makes no sense and it keeps changing.

  • No one in the entire episode, human or alien, acts in any rational way.

  • It's all just an excuse for cool action scenes and explosions.

  • And as a kid, I didn't notice any of the plot holes,

  • because there were cool action scenes and explosions.

  • Plus the futuristic vehicles.

  • The most famous of which was the Spectrum Pursuit Vehicle,

  • the SPV.

  • According to the lore of the show it weighs eight tons,

  • but also somehow floats.

  • Its top speed is 200 miles an hour, and it comes equipped with

  • rocket cannons, ejector seats, and a jet pack.

  • Almost every episode,

  • a Spectrum agent would arrive at some apparently normal location,

  • and an SPV would be revealed in an overdramatic way.

  • The team at Sparkmate have not made me an SPV.

  • I'd love to have one, but unfortunately this is reality,

  • but there's one other bizarre feature of this thing

  • that always stuck with me as a kid.

  • And it's introduced in that first episode by a couple of lines of dialogue

  • that show just how far voice acting in kid shows has improved since the '60s.

  • - I see you have expert ratings on SPVs.

  • [monotone] It must be tricky facing backwards and driving by TV monitor.

  • - Ah, you get used to it.

  • - You drive the SPV facing backwards using a screen.

  • In the show, the explanation for that is that it's safer.

  • If you're in a crash you stand a better chance of survival if you're facing backwards.

  • That's true.

  • There are real world studies that show that,

  • but from a production perspective, why would you do that?

  • It's not required for the plot.

  • It just looks confusing to have the background going the wrong way

  • and surely the characters would get motion sick

  • and confused by how everything's turning.

  • It's such a weird design choice. It even shows up on the toy versions.

  • If you open the doors here,

  • the little action figures are facing backwards.

  • Even as a kid, I thought, surely, that's not a good idea.

  • So Sparkmate have made me a go-kart that's driven backwards using a screen,

  • and that's literally all I know.

  • I gave them that brief, showed them Captain Scarlet episodes.

  • They said, "That sounds fun," and now I'm sitting in their office

  • in an industrial park on the outskirts of Paris

  • about to see the results for the first time,

  • so I can answer the question I've had since I was a kid.

  • You can't actually drive facing backwards. Right?

  • [loud drumbeats matching cuts]

  • Oh, wow.

  • - Hope you like it!

  • - This is the SPV, man!

  • - That's amazing.

  • So you have a whole television monitor there for all the details.

  • Is that a... is that a game controller? -Yes, it is.

  • - Actually the first test that we did was with this steering wheel and pedal,

  • and we decided to switch from a steering wheel to an Xbox game pad.

  • Why?

  • Because the challenge for us was to create a gamified experience

  • of driving a vehicle, just like in a video game somehow.

  • - And this camera... - Is what you're seeing in the front.

  • We even implemented some-- [honks horn]

  • - That is annoyingly loud and I love it.

  • I've got to remember the cart is facing this way.

  • Yes, let's take it out and see...

  • This feels way more dangerous all of a sudden!

  • I also appreciate that this has full harness seat belts.

  • I thought we were going to make a tiny little thing

  • that I'd sit on and it would go at low speed.

  • What's the top speed on this?

  • - In this area, we reached a 40km/h, but with a higher distance, wider field,

  • we could reach 50-something, for sure. - Wait. What's this for?

  • - This is a handbrake, emergency brake, because sometimes things can happen!

  • For example, if we lose control, or we just lose the controller.

  • Brake, and that would be fine. - So, low-speed test in the car park?

  • - Yes, that's fine. - High-speed test on the track later.

  • - Yes, go for that. - Let's do it.

  • - We thought about different positions, we even thought of driving

  • laid at the bottom of the cart, that was obviously a dangerous position,

  • so we went back to a backward seated position.

  • I would say it's just after some tests with our team trying

  • what's the most comfortable...

  • I would say we tried and we ended up here in this average position.

  • - There we go. Avoid... no, that's going for some cars.

  • I'm 100% aiming for some cars. Let's not do that.

  • I'm aiming for the trucks which are this way, here we go.

  • - It's a bit confusing at the beginning.

  • -Oh, it's really confusing, I don't like this!

  • -Try to be a bit slower at the beginning,

  • because that's a bit messing with your mind at first.

  • - Agreed! It really is.

  • - We actually used a very powerful motor,

  • a powerful servo motor to control the direction system.

  • We went through a lot of iterations and trials and error to configure the system.

  • Also on the mechanical part, how do we install it,

  • how do we control it so that it's smooth?

  • That was a tricky part, I would say, but once we had the propulsion system,

  • the direction system, then we were good to go to have fun.

  • - All right, let's go down the road. I got-- oh, that's too fast.

  • That's way too fast. I nearly went the wrong way.

  • I need to steer away from the van. I nearly steered into the van.

  • Got to remember the monitor-- - Keep your focus on the monitor.

  • - Whoa, that was a drain, I went straight over it!

  • Keep your focus on the monitor, the monitor is all that counts.

  • The minute I start thinking about the real world outside the monitor,

  • my brain misfires, I get left and right- oh, that was a speed bump-

  • I get left from right mixed up. - You're driving pretty well.

  • I'm very impressed. - Let's bring it to a stop just here.

  • It's possible, but for someone who hasn't played video games in 15, 20 years,

  • I can do a lap around here, it's just confusing to get used to it.

  • It's just confusing that the world is going one way,

  • but I have to focus everything on the screen.

  • - The visualization part, we did a lot of iterations,

  • we did a lot of tests, a lot of coding,

  • and as you can imagine, the main problem was latency.

  • We tried different things, but we always had to fight latency.

  • We thought about drones, VR, we ended up, I think the version that

  • we have right now is using WebRTC, from a web browser communicating

  • through sockets to Unreal Engine.

  • That's the most, I would say, advanced we went on the VR part.

  • - I asked the team for a steering wheel

  • and we have a hastily jerry-rigged steering wheel here,

  • because it's just a different type of controller.

  • I've spent way more time with one of these than I have with a game controller.

  • You all ready? All right, let's see how this...

  • Oh, that's nicer. Here we go. That's it. Yep, okay, focus on screen. Anyone coming?

  • No one coming.

  • We turn left out of here. Slowly here, slow. That's good.

  • You've got the sensitivity right now. That's it. Here we go. A bit of speed.

  • - Focus on the screen. - Oh!

  • - What I did there was I turned right when I should've turned left.

  • You're okay?

  • -Wow! We're just fine, man. We just avoided this steel thing.

  • - The good news is that the car works and it goes at speed.

  • -What happened? You were not focused on the screen, no?

  • - I was very focused on the screen, and all I needed to do was turn left,

  • and my brain turned right.

  • Wow, that's confusing.

  • Well, I hate to say "let's go to the track" on that,

  • but we should probably go to the track,

  • because I don't like the fact that we're doing this around cars now.

  • I've got lead foot. I was so confident.

  • - Fortunately, nothing bad happened. - You built a strong kart there.

  • - We just bumped, we got scared, and that's it.

  • That's life. - You built a strong kart, we're fine.

  • Let's go to the track.

  • [loud drumbeats, matching cuts]

  • Power on, lights on, little bit of acceleration.

  • There we go. That is twitchy. We're fine.

  • Concentrate on the screen, Tom, concentrate on the screen.

  • Make it around the track. There we go, there we go.

  • Good.

  • Little bit of straight here, line it up there.

  • This is working.

  • That's a little bit off course. We're okay, we're good.

  • Now we're on the straight.

  • Floor it, let's see what this thing can do.

  • Whoa! Okay. That's fine, that's fine, that's fine.

  • Brake.

  • Yes, and right around here.

  • Brake into the corner.

  • Wow, that's a strong left turn.

  • That was a strong left turn, but I went the right way.

  • The correct way.

  • I didn't go the right way, I went the correct way.

  • Nearly.

  • I can't believe I'm saying this, but it works!

  • I was expecting to get motion sick. I was expecting to fall over.

  • I was expecting it to be like "this old puppet show was terrible".

  • Yes, you can absolutely drive like that.

  • My problems were sight lines and not being used to the controls,

  • and this being a quickly jerry-rigged wheel.

  • - Are you saying that cars should be like this?

  • - I'm not saying it's an improvement on driving forwards,

  • but if I'd crashed, I would've been safer!

  • [laughs] It works. Thank you, folks.

  • We've answered a question I had for 25 years!

  • Thank you.

- A few months ago I got an email from a company called Sparkmate.

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