New Cancelled Games & Their Lost Media Added to the Archive

At the end of january 2008 i was probably asleep somewhere, while Mato did an interesting translation of the Itoi / Miyamoto / Iwata round-table discussion about the cancellation of Mother 3 / Earthbound 64. Here are some parts:

“Iwata says the game was originally planned to be a Super Famicom game for a very short time (probably before MOTHER 2 was even finished, according to other stuff I’ve read), then for the N64 Disk Drive, then for the regular N64… it spanned 6 years, basically.”

“Miyamoto feels bad, but says it’s more correct to say that the project just couldn’t continue on. The project was taking too much of a toll on progress for the upcoming Dolphin (later called GameCube) system. It wasn’t because the game wasn’t progressing well or that it wouldn’t do well, it was just because of the GameCube development stuff. It just couldn’t continue on.”

You can read more @ MOTHER 3/EarthBound 64 Cancellation Summary (#2)

It’s nice to read their thoughs about the end of the Mother 64 Project, even more now that you can read them in english, or at least the first 2 pages: there are some more pages of that misterious moon language that still need be translated, so check Mato’s blog for the future next updates!

Probably hardcore Panzer Dragoon fans already know about this, but for us it’s a great news: about two months ago, those wonderful geeks at The Will of the Ancients website started to collect donations to buy some old Panzer Dragoon prototypes, with the help of DRX. Now, it seems that the protos are ready to go and they will be soon shared to everyone! In date 11th of May, Solo Wing Dragon has wrote in his update section:

“Have you ever wondered what Panzer Dragoon Saga was like before it was completed? What changes were made prior to its release, what bugs were fixed? Well now this question has partially been answered. I recently had the opportunity to play through disc 1 of a prototype version of Panzer Dragoon Saga dated September the 16th, 1997. The prototype was bought off an unnamed contact of DRX, the owner of video game prototype website Hidden Palace, along with a number of other prototypes (of Saga and Zwei). These prototypes will all be released later in the week on DRX’s website, so stay tuned for another update here when that happens.”

Members of Panzerdragoon.net that have donated to the cause, are already playing one of the proto and have found some interesting differences:

“this screenshot shows the Dermot’s Ranch campsite: I don’t think that camp is used outside of the Box Game in the finished game.”

“ I haven’t played through it, but judging by the headers and the file structure, it seems to be basically Panzer Dragoon Saga on 1 CD, instead of four. It’s 3 months earlier than the Japanese final, which is very early for a Saturn proto.”

“ the world map is different… the village of cainus doesn’t show, it shows some kind of camp.”

“Interesting controls – right trigger moves the dragon forward and he keeps going until you press the left trigger to stop. Down is up and up is down by default (similar to PD1 controls) and there isn’t a way to change them.”

You can read more at tWotA forum: Panzer Dragoon Azel & Zwei Prototypes and look at some screens from the 16/09/1997 PD Saga proto at Panzerdragoon.net