One of the perennial movie stars and creative figures in Hollywood history, Clint Eastwood’s screen iconography is larger than the big screen itself. Few have captivated audiences across various genres and decades with the same passion. While he possesses more depth than this image, Eastwood will be widely remembered by general audiences as a masculine icon. Naturally, it is fitting that his most recognizable role would be the tough, no-nonsense, boundary-pushing Inspector Harry Callahan, a.k.a., Dirty Harry. Did you know that the world was close to experiencing the power and charm of the character, first introduced in the 1971 film, Dirty Harry, through a video game controller?
Clint Eastwood Used His Movie Star Clout to Develop a ‘Dirty Harry’ Video Game
Clint Eastwood was set to announce himself as a seismic movie star after making the jump from television to the big screen with performances in Sergio Leone’s Dollars Trilogy and war films like Where Eagles Dare and Kelly’s Heroes, and transcended to a whole new level in 1971. The original film by Don Siegel spawned an additional four sequels with Eastwood as the detective who viewed due process as nothing more than a suggestion. The film was certainly feeling lucky upon release, finishing as the sixth highest-grossing film of the year. Many critics were appalled by the film’s deemed fascist ideology, but Siegel’s impeccable action filmmaking and Eastwood’s dazzling charisma are undeniable. Across the four future installments, none lived up to the magnitude of the original film. With the final film, The Dead Pool, released in 1988, it appeared as though the series had assuredly wrapped up.
Dirty Harry’s day was made in the mid-2000s with the announcement of the continuation of the character’s lore. In 2007, the fictional police inspector would be the face of a brand new video game produced by Warner Bros and created by the game developer, The Collective. Set to release for the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3, the game would follow the same premise as the original Siegel film, with Callahan hunting down a serial killer named Scorpio in San Francisco. This would not be the character’s video game debut, as the Nintendo Entertainment System in 1990 beat this 21st-century adaptation to the punch. This game was your basic and ubiquitous side-scrolling action shoot-em-up. Overall, the game is a forgotten product today.
Beyond the advancements in gameplay and graphics from 1990 to 2007, the alluring selling point of The Collective’s game would be the participation of none other than Clint Eastwood himself. Not only would the star lend his voice and likeness to the game, he, along with his production company, Malpaso Productions, would even act as a creative consultant for the game’s development. Operating in an entirely new medium, this effectively demonstrates Eastwood’s versatility and curiosity as an artist. He upended audience expectations by directing a biopic of Charlie “Bird” Parker and took a daring risk in directing The 15:17 to Paris with the real-life subjects of the story as his stars. If Eastwood ever graced his presence for the enjoyment and engagement of video game players across the world, we would never question his career choices ever again.
Why Was the ‘Dirty Harry’ Game Cancelled?
Unfortunately, envisioning the final product of Dirty Harry is all speculative, as the game was cancelled before it ever reach consumers’ hands. According to Unseen64, an independent archive website detailing abandoned and unreleased video games, executives at Warner Bros were dissatisfied with the results of the product, which was believed to be “70%” complete. With their contract terminated with the studio, The Collective was forced to lay off their Dirty Harry development team. After futile efforts from another developer, TimeGate, to overhaul production, the definitive game experience of Harry Callahan fizzled out with no conclusion, as Warner Bros never released a statement regarding its cancelation.
As for The Collective, coinciding with Dirty Harry being 86’d, they merged with another developer, Shiny Entertainment — both of which were under the parent company, Foundation 9. What is most unfortunate for the developer is that what their legacy leaves behind is a plethora of licensed video games based on movies and television shows. A genre that has been lost to time, The Collective previously made games based on properties such as Men in Black, Indiana Jones, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, The X-Files, Star Wars: Episode III – Revenge of the Sith, and The Da Vinci Code. Their incomplete 2007 game could not be more in The Collective’s wheelhouse. A game adaptation of Dirty Harry had the makings of an elevation of the company’s craft, not only by taking a swing at 30-year-old source material but as a result of the unfinished game’s ambitious scope.
What Could the ‘Dirty Harry’ Video Game Have Been?
When Clint Eastwood signed on to the project in 2005, this was shaping up to be a monumental event not just for the gaming world, but for the film community as well. Prominent stars and former Eastwood collaborators Laurence Fishburne and Gene Hackman, who is understood to have been retired since 2004, were reportedly planned to star as voice actors. The interest in a Dirty Harry game was no accident. Tying in with the release of the film series on DVD, a video game was intended to reinvigorate the franchise. Revealing his trendiness with the kids, Eastwood stated “Creating Dirty Harry video games will also introduce this memorable film character to new generations on a medium they appreciate.” The enthusiasm from Warner Bros was through the roof – announcing the game before production began, as Eastwood and The Collective workshopped the script and set pieces.
At E3, a prominent video game conference, in 2006, a trailer for Dirty Harry was unveiled. It was unclear whether the trailer comprised of was pre-rendered software or actual gameplay footage, but it checked the boxes of what audiences expected from a game based on the inspector who shoots first and asks questions later. The design of Callahan resembled Eastwood, although the dialogue was pulled from the original film. The highest praise that a tent-pole video game can receive is that it evokes a cinematic sense. It is hard to argue that this trailer is short on the same thrills as the iconic film series. Of course, it helps that the trailer digitally recreates the indelible “Do I feel lucky?” scene from the 1971 film.
The style of gameplay evolved into various permutations throughout development. Sources at Unseen64 claim that the game initially followed a mission-based point-A-to-point-B structure. Later, this evolved into a more primitive “duck and cover” third-person shooter. The most intriguing aspect of the game involved a “reputation system,” which entails a user-dynamic system in the apprehension of enemy combatants. Based on how ruthless or lenient the player, controlling Harry Callahan, is on criminals, the game’s NPCs (non-player characters) would react to these respective behaviors. From game functioning sensibilities, this system would be complementary to an open-world, sandbox environment popularized in Grand Theft Auto.
While it is a shame that Clint Eastwood never got to reprise his role as Dirty Harry Callahan, as it was likely a more fruitful endeavor than rehashing tired formulas on the big screen, the fact that he expressed any remote interest in participating in the game’s development is remarkable. The actor-director’s curiosity and experimentation manifested itself in this unfortunate case of lost media.