New Cancelled Games & Their Lost Media Added to the Archive

GameCube, Microsoft, Nintendo, Playstation 2 (PS2), Sony, Xbox

Splinter Cell: Pandora Tomorrow [XBOX PS2 GC – Beta]

monokoma
09-09-2010
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Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell: Pandora Tomorrow (also know as Shadow Strike during its development) is a third-person stealth game in the Splinter Cell series, developed and published by Ubisoft Shanghai in 2004. Below you can see a video compiled by Silenceofthehills, with lots of early concept arts and beta screens. Text and video annotations in the video help explain the differences between the earlier planned renditions and the final version of various spots in each area.

As seen in the video, a fully missing level map is viewed under the first game‘s HUD. Since the first game had cut a level and used it as an extra in another version of the game, its quite possible that these shots are from a missing level. Its also possible that these are merely early renditions of a previous level, or even simply a test level considering the unaltered HUD.

Secondly, we can also see the previous incarnation of the PS2 and GameCube port before it had be delayed and taken under various graphical tweaks to ensure the artwork was nearer to par with the original versions of the game. This is also available in the GameInformer article scan as well, which also oddly contains a beta HUD akin to that of the online mode’s. This HUD was also apparently shared between all versions of the game.

Below is the direct quote on this from Gamespot itself, posted on February 4, 2004 by Justin Calvert.

“Ubisoft has today announced that while the Xbox, PC, GBA, and cell phone versions of Splinter Cell Pandora Tomorrow are still on track for release next month, the PS2 and GameCube versions will now launch at a later date. The only reason given for the delay is that the development team is committed to making sure that the other two console versions are as good as the Xbox version.”

Thanks to Silenceofthehills for the contribution!

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Nintendo, Wii

Monster Hunter Tri [Wii – Concept / Beta]

monokoma
08-09-2010
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Monster Hunter 3 (Tri) is an action coop game that was developed by Capcom and released for the Wii in 2009 (Japan) and 2010 (USA and Europe). As we can read in Wikipedia, the game was originally planned to be a PlayStation 3 title, but due to high development costs for that console Capcom instead decided to develop it for the Wii. Thanks to Monster Hunter Wikia, we can see many concept artworks from the official Hunter Encyclopedia 3, that show early versions of the MH3 monsters and various unused enemies (that may be revived for a possible MH3G expansion).

Beta Royal Ludroth:

Final Royal Ludroth:

Beta Barioth:


Final Barioth:

Check the gallery below for more concepts!

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Game Boy Advance (GBA), Nintendo

Pokemon Emerald [GBA – Beta / Unused]

monokoma
08-09-2010
3 Comments

Pokémon Emerald is an updated version of Pokemon Ruby and Sapphire, that was released in Japan in September 2004 and in America and Europe in 2005. Even if the game is just an “add-on” to Ruby and Sapphire, it’s possible to find some beta and unused content still hidden in its code. As noted by Bulbapedia:

  • There’s an unused map header into the ROM called “SPECIAL AREA”.It was probably used for the battle frontier back then.
  • All the music tracks found in FireRed and LeafGreen are present in Emerald too, but only few of them are used for special events.

Also, from an early Pokèmon Emerald screenshot by IGN you can clearly see that ROUTE 109 had glitched up tiles!)

In the ROM LucaPM found an unused Prof.B irch sprite, that was probably used for the beta intro sequence. HEX Offset : 557AF0 (varies between ROMS)

Unused sprite:

Final sprite:

Things to notice between the unused and the final sprite:

  • Different stance (of course)
  • Less outlined sprite
  • Shorter shirt
  • Different,bigger belt
  • Different designed and coloured pants
  • Different right leg
  • Slightly different haircut

As noted by Zero7, it’s possible that he was suppose to have his hands in his pockets, go into the now final sprite for throwing out the pokemon, then either stay in the final sprite or back to the unused sprite for the rest of the intro.

Leaked, M2 / 3DO, Others

IMSA Racing [M2 – Cancelled]

monokoma
07-09-2010
3 Comments

IMSA World Championship is a cancelled racing game that was in development by Studio 3DO for the unreleased 3DO / Panasonic / Matsushita M2 console. When 3DO sold their M2 hardware to Panasonic, IMSA was slowly postponed and then canned. The game had a great graphic engine for its time and it was one of the best “tech demos” to show the power of the M2. This project could have been lost forever, but on July 26th 2010 NikeX has released a playable beta version of IMSA Racing in the 3DO Zero Forums.

In the 3DOZ Forum we can also read more info about the game from one of its developers:

A while later, I started working on IMSA World Championship racing, which was 3DO’s main internally developed M2 game. The director of the game was Ed Rotberg, an industry veteran who was responsible for such classic arcade games as Battlezone and Star Wars Arcade. The lead programmer was Chuck Sommerville, who wrote the original Snakebyte (you know, that game where you drive a snake around and try not to crash into your own tail) as well as the cult favorite Chip’s Challenge. […]

The physics and driving engine for IMSA were licensed from the company that made the arcade game Hard Drivin’. The graphics engine was something called “Mercury” that an external developer had written and then sold back to 3DO, at which point it became our official graphics engine which we encouraged other developers to use. […]

Also, NikeX wrote a review of the IMSA beta, that you can read in here.

It’s 1996, IMSA game is shown to the people. No pixels, but texture correction. Something you don’t see on Playstation 1 or Sega Saturn. And, in this quality, not on N64. In fact, you’ve never seen so solid, vivid-plastic car models, when the camera comes close: The tires are round and they turn in the correct direction. Constant 30 frames per second, even with 10 cars on the track. My jaw tumbled when I saw the realtime presentation of the cars, tires, gears or rear spoilers. Great illuminating effects, readable words on car and parts. Even in the race itself. In 1996, 97 you would have thought: Am I watching a FMV?

Huge props to NikeX for sharing this lost game with the community! Thanks to Celine for the magazine scans!

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