There's a weird little story revolving around the development of Spy Hunter: Nowhere To Run, Midway's latest chapter in the arcade-based driving/shooting series. It was originally conceived as a tie-in piece with the Universal film project that was supposed to star Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson as the driver of the legendary Interceptor. As part of the deal, The Rock would also play the same role in the game. But somewhere along the way, development on the movie grinded to a halt (it's currently without a director), while the game moved ahead. Although the releases will now be a ways off (at least a year), the game is about complete. It's a chapter in the Spy Hunter saga that will be somewhat different from the previous two releases that have seen release on the Xbox and PlayStation 2, although no stranger to action.

So, what's the big difference? Spy Hunter: Nowhere To Run involves some new on-foot segments that requires The Rock's character, Alex Decker, to get out of the car. He's on a dangerous mission against the evil forces of NOSTRA, who are out to steal government technology to strengthen their numbers. Unfortunately, this shopping list includes the Interceptor, and he must do everything in his power to stop them. The game will mix fast-paced racing segments with sequences where Decker must shoot and fight enemy agents, which is a big step for the series.

However, it's something that hasn't been met with complete confidence. When you mess with a certain formula in a game series, you run a major risk of alienating fans of the original games, and making the game a lesser product than it should be. Remember the Driver series? It got a great start until the driver got out of the car, and many are still trying to forget Driver 3 and the travesty it left in its wake. Fortunately, Midway does have a good development team at Terminal Reality, and if anyone can pull off this change, it's probably them.

Nowhere To Run plays out in a third-person perspective, and the segments between on-foot and driving seem to blend together with little loading time. One mission had us taking to the waters in the Interceptor's boat form, shooting mines and enemy boats as we made our way to a larger vessel. We then parked at the dock and made our way inside with Alex, shooting a few enemy soldiers and getting into a fistfight that showed off a pretty high level of brutality. Not Mortal Kombat-style brutality, but it IS The Rock we're talking about here. He's smacked people down on WWE programs for years.

Midway has stated that the game will feature some additions that are in tune with the previous games, including level designs that will seem familiar to long-time fans. This includes twisting roads through locales scattered around the world and plenty of opportunities for vehicular destruction. There's gun-toting enemies up front and behind, forcing you to use the Interceptor's resources to stay on the road. This includes machine guns, oil slicks, and smoke screens, as well as other weapons provided by the helpful Weapons Van and Boat.

The Rock's presenceshould help push Nowhere To Run along, as he provided both his likeliness and voice. The story should also be pretty intriguing, with the chances of success and failure being very slim.. There's just the question of the "getting out of the car" idea, and if it will really work. The first Spy Hunter game, done by Paradigm, was just fine, and the second game, by Angel Studios, was pretty good in its own right also. And neither of those broke away from the tone of the original arcade hit. We'll have to see if Terminal Reality is really up to task when Nowhere To Run arrives this September. The promise is certainly there, but it's how the finished game will look that matters. Only then will we see what the Rock is cookin'.