Hoverboard

A hoverboard (or hover board) is a fictional levitating board used for personal transportation, first described in science-fiction, and made famous by the appearance of a skateboard-like hoverboard in the film Back to the Future Part II (1989). Many attempts have been made to invent a functioning hoverboard.

A hoverboard (or hover board) is a fictional levitating board used for personal transportation, first described in science-fiction, and made famous by the appearance of a skateboard-like hoverboard in the film Back to the Future Part II (1989). Many attempts have been made to invent a functioning hoverboard. ==In fiction== Hoverboards were first described by author M. K. Joseph in a 1967 science fiction novel. In 1984, a hoverboard appeared in the shoot 'em up arcade video game SWAT, developed by Coreland and distributed by Sega in Japan and Bally Midway in North America. The hoverboard was popularized by the Back to the Future film franchise, with its appearance in Back to the Future Part II (1989). During the 1990s there were rumors, fueled by the film's director Robert Zemeckis, that hoverboards were in fact real, but not marketed because they were deemed too dangerous by parents' groups. These rumors have been conclusively debunked. Hoverboards have appeared in various other media since the 1990s. For example, video games such as the beat 'em up arcade game Riding Fight (1992), manufactured by Taito, and the sports video game AirBlade (2001), developed by Criterion Games and distributed by Sony in Europe and Namco in North America. A short film, Flite, designed to showcase the capabilities of the Unreal Engine game design tool was created by writer and director Tim Webber in 2023. The narrative concerns a young hoverboard rider being chased through a near-future London. ==Prototypes== Numerous attempts have been made to create working hoverboards. ==Guinness records== Guinness World Records defines a hoverboard as an autonomously powered personal levitator. In May 2015, the Romanian-born Canadian inventor Cătălin Alexandru Duru set a Guinness World Record by travelling a distance of at heights up to over a lake, on an autonomously powered hoverboard of his own design. On April 30, 2016, Guinness World Records recognized a new record of . The Flyboard Air was powered by jet engine propulsion, and its use allowed Franky Zapata, in Sausset-les-Pins, France to beat the previous record by nearly . ==In popular culture== ===Back to the Future=== Back to the Future franchise: Marty McFly (Michael J. Fox) rides a Mattel hoverboard in Back to the Future Part II (1989), to escape Griff Tannen and his gang in the year 2015. Later on, Marty McFly would revisit 1955 and use the hoverboard to steal the Grays Sports Almanac book back from Biff Tannen, to prevent him from taking over Hill Valley. In Part III (1990), in the year 1885, Doc Brown rides the hoverboard to rescue Clara from falling off the locomotive. In the one-off special Doc Brown Saves the World, Brown reveals that he erased the existence of the hoverboard and other inventions from the 2015 shown in the series as they contributed to a chain of events that culminated in Griff Tannen triggering a nuclear holocaust. In a short film called Hoverboard (2011), a girl watches Part II and makes a hoverboard of her own. In Back to the Future: The Game, Marty uses a hoverboard to help Brown catch Edna Strickland. ===Other=== In the 1986 The Transformers: The Movie, there is a scene where Daniel Witwicky rides a hoverboard. In the 1998 film Futuresport, a hoverboard is used by Dean Cain's character. In the Da Ali G Show episode "Politics" (2003), Ali G presents the hoverboard as his second business idea, displaying the deck of a skateboard. In the Warframe Fortuna Expansion, a new type of vehicle called a K-Drive was released. This vehicle functions exactly as a hoverboard. In the 2002 Disney animated film Treasure Planet, Jim Hawkins rides a hoverboard also known as a solar surfer with a sail doing daredevil stunts in the mines. Later on, he quickly constructs a hoverboard and uses it to reach the portal door controls before the titular planet explodes. In the 2004 CGI animated film Pinocchio 3000, Mayor Scamboli, Marlene, Cab, and Rodo all ride hoverboards at the opening of Scamboland. Several entries in the Sonic the Hedgehog video game series, most prominently Sonic Riders and its sequels, feature modified hoverboards used as racing vehicles. In the 1999 video game TrickStyle, the characters use hoverboards as a racing vehicle. In the 2012 mobile game Subway Surfers, a "hoverboard" is used as the character's vehicle. There are many variations of the hoverboard in-game including "Teleporter", "Hot Rod", "Bouncer" and others. In the 2017 video game Destiny 2, a vehicle called a Skimmer was added in March 2024 during the event Guardian Games. It functions as a hoverboard which players can use to traverse across destinations and it has an ability to grind air. These were previously only seen used by non-player characters in the game's 2023 expansion Lightfall. The 2018-2025 podcast Six Minutes by Gen-Z Media features an AI-powered hoverboard as part of the storyline (named "Hovie"). The spinoff 2020-2021 podcast Remy’s Life… Interrupted also featured similar hoverboards (named "Hovie-2", "Hovie-3", and "Hovie-4"). ==See also== ==References== ==External links==

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