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New Cancelled Games & Their Lost Media Added to the Archive

BioShock Infinite is a first person adventure game and the third entry in the BioShock series. Previously known as “Project Icarus”, it is being developed by Irrational Games for a February 2013 worldwide release on PC, PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360. In August of 2012, several high-level developers from Irrational that had been working on Infinite announced their departure from the company; these included art director Nate Wells, who began working with Naughty Dog, and director of product development Tim Gerritsen. At the same time, Irrational announced the addition of Rod Fergusson from Epic Games as their product director while Scott Sinclair, art director from the original Bioshock, replaced Wells.

There are some features that were removed or not implemented from BioShock Infinite beta version. For example Ken Levine revealed in an interview with Gamasutra that the plot’s conflict would have been originally about tech geeks against luddites, those who resist the proliferation of technology. Some more rumors about the problems with the development of the game tell that various multiplayer modes were tested in a prototype form, but later removed. Even if Levine told Kotaku that multiplayer wasn’t guaranteed to be in the game, but in May of 2012, job listings at Irrational hinted that the studio was in fact working on a multiplayer component. Also, the 2011 E3 demo, seems to have been much different from what we’ll be able to play in the final game. For more beta differences and unused characters / items / models from BioShock Infinite will have to wait for when the game will be finally published.. in the meantime, here are some early screens and videos!

Chris Henzler noticed some more beta differences:

HUD is different from final game
various voice actors changed from final version of booker and Elizabeth
story has changed alot
atmosphere of the game has changed
some of the vigors seem different in the final game
the twins seem absent in the beta versions of the game

There are also some unused content that you can check at the Bioshock Wikia! If you played the final game and see more differences, please leave a message below! :D

Thanks to Inspector for the contribution!

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Microsoft, Others, PC / MAC, Xbox 360

Bastion [Beta – PC / Xbox 360 / iOS]

yota

14-01-2013

No Comments

Bastion is an action rpg developed by Supergiant Games and published by Warner Bros. for Xbox 360 XBLA and PC in 2011. An iOS version was later released in 2012. A four-week prototype of this title, made in 2009, was playable at PAX est 2012. It’s so early that the bad guys are just placeholders from Dungeons and Dragons, but the basic concepts of the game, minus of course the dynamic narration, are already there.

In the beta the player can use an hammer or a sword and pick up and throw various objects at enemies, a feature that didn’t make it in the final build.

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Microsoft, Playstation 2 (PS2), Sony, Xbox

Darkwatch [PS2 / XBOX – Prototype]

monokoma

10-01-2013

2 Comments

Darkwatch is an “horror” FPS about an outlaw who is turned into a vampire. The game was published by Capcom and developed by High Moon Studios (formerly Sammy Studios) in the USA, while in Europe it was published by Ubisoft. The game follows the exploits of Jericho Cross, an outlaw-turned-vampire, and his employment in the titular organization, an ancient vampire-hunting order known as The Darkwatch. [Info from Wikipedia]

In the video below you can see an early prototype scene demo, in wich (other than the incomplete graphic and animations) we can notice how the main character (Jericho) had a different design than the one used in the final game. If you find more differences, please let us know!

Here’s the final Jericho model to compare it with the proto video:

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Playstation 3 (PS3), Sony

Simian [PS3 – Cancelled Prototype]

U64 Staff & Contributors

06-01-2013

No Comments

In 2004, Sony Cambridge started to work on a prototype called Simian for PlayStation 3. Using the PlayStation Eye camera, players would interact with a number of small alien monkey creatures and play through an adventure game set on an alien jungle planet. The team at Sony Cambridge created a demo in which the player could communicate with one of the simians by gesture recognition and a limited verbal communication palette. However, the project was cancelled early in pre-production, with the former art director at Sony Cambridge speculating that this was due to the fact that the game was too ambitious for the actual technology capabilities. As he said, the central concept was scaled down and the tech morphed into Sony London Studio’s EyePet game, which would eventually feature a similar simian-like creature.

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Nintendo, SNES + Super Famicom

Green Lantern [SNES – Cancelled]

Liam Robertson

02-01-2013

6 Comments

Green Lantern is a cancelled platformer / adventure game based on the DC comic of the same name that was in development for the Super Nintendo at Ocean Software in 1994.

A small preview of the game was feature in the French publication, Super Power Magazine issue 29. Their write-up reveals that the game was a side-scrolling platformer with shooter elements. The story featured Hal Jordan’s Green Lantern hunting down the queen of Xaos, who is planning to conquer the universe with an army of invisible alien soldiers, once she collects a set of all-powerful crystals.

Seven levels in total were planned, each taking place on a different world in the DC universe. It all culminated with a final stage using mode 7, where the player would have flown the Lantern through space in a shoot ’em up style endgame.

A contributor from SNES Central was able to get in touch with some former members of Ocean to learn more about the project, as well as its demise. According to these sources, the game’s original programmer was Andrew Deacin. Unsatisfied with his efforts, the company’s management later replaced him with Bobby Earl, who rewrote its code from the ground up. This is just one of a number of restructuring moves made during Green Lantern’s development, says John Lomax, who was an artist on the team:

“Green lantern was an interesting one as I was only on the game for the first few weeks before moving of to work on Jurassic park 2. It kinda went through development hell (new programmers coming on to finish it as the original guys were fired).”

Bobby Earl, the coder who succeeded Deacin, revealed the circumstances of the project’s eventual cancellation:

“Green Lantern was a project I worked on quite a few years ago, for the Super Nintendo. The project was infact finished, but DC Comics wanted some very difficult and arduous changes to the product, thus considering the budget already spent, Ocean Software deemed it was not worth continuing with the project.”

Given the apparent pressure the license holders were placing on Ocean, it is likely that they were also to some extent responsible for the changes in the team’s staff throughout its development.

Dean Evans, the composer of the game’s soundtrack has since come forward about his experience with the title, even releasing some of the music he created for it on YouTube. According to Evans, a number of his songs from Green Lantern were re-used in Ocean’s Waterworld tie-in game.

Thanks to Celine, Ace, RetroGameFan9000 and Rod_Wod for the contributions! (Scans from Super Power magazine #29, CD Consoles #7, Joypad #39, Edge #8)

Also thanks to Ash The Dragon and Pipoumantis for translation assistance.

More information can be found here and on The Games That Weren’t book.

Scans provided by Gil B. for Frank Gasking and sprites assets from Senior Artist Ray Coffey provided by Dylan Mansfield from Gaming Alexandria.

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