Days of Thunder

The roar of engines, an oval circuit and a wall of other cars you have to cut through on your way to the front. Days of Thunder brought the world of American NASCAR racing and the same-named film hit with Tom Cruise to the screens of NES owners.

The game is a racing title inspired by the 1990 film Days of Thunder and tries to capture the atmosphere of races on oval circuits, where the point is high speed, overtaking in a dense field of rivals and handling the car on the edge. The player works through a series of races and strives for the best possible placement in the demanding environment of American motorsport.

Film licences were common practice in the NES era, and publishers tried to use the popularity of box-office hits to sell games. Days of Thunder came out in the early 1990s and followed the wave of titles that built on the fame of their film sources, even though the gaming execution of such adaptations was often of varying quality.

Culturally, the game is interesting as evidence of the intertwining of Hollywood and the gaming industry at the turn of the 1980s and 1990s. The film with Tom Cruise in the lead drew broad attention to the theme of NASCAR racing, and the game tried to ride this wave and offer fans the chance to sit behind the wheel themselves.

For players who had seen the film, the chance to experience the races firsthand was an enticing extension of the film experience. The oval circuits and the emphasis on speed captured the essence of the discipline the film popularised.

Days of Thunder thus remains an interesting artefact of a time when film brands were regularly turned into console games.

Why play: A console echo of the famous film with Tom Cruise that puts you behind the wheel of NASCAR racing and recalls the era of film licences on the NES.