Infogrames

Others, PC / MAC, Playstation, Sony

Hogs Of War [PSX PC – Beta / Unused]

U64 Staff & Contributors
31-05-2011
No Comments

Hogs Of War is a great turn-based tactics game developed and released in 2000 by Infogrames for Playstation and PC. Below you can see an old trailer of this game with some beta stuff in it (thanks to HigherPlainGames for the video):

  • 0.41 the hud in top right of the corner is different than the final version also Frost Fight is different than the final version.
  • 0.48/0.53/1.34 Cratermass has different textures.
  • 1.21 Different viewfinder.
  • 1.41 FR feature (Cancelled)
  • 1.56 Beta pig animation.

Also (Thanks to VADIM567) Herman07 found 2 unused items:

An binocular (Removed because was useless due for the viewfinder on certain weapons) and a Retire Feature (like in Worms series).

Thanks to Herman07 for the contribution! 

Playstation, Sony

Test Drive Cycles [PSX – Cancelled]

monokoma
08-06-2010
5 Comments

Test Drive Cycles is a cancelled motorcycle racing game that was in development in 1998 / 1999 by Accolade’s San Jose studios, the same studio responsible for Test Drive Off-Road 2 and 3.  Infogrames wanted to expand their Test Drive series (Test Drive, Test Drive Off-Road, Test Drive Rally and Test Drive Le Mans) to focus solely on motorcycles with licensed manufacturers such as Harley Davidson, BMW, Moto Guzzi, and Bimota, but in the end the project was never released.

As we can read on IGN:

Up to two players can go head-to-head on 12 tracks from locations all over the world, including the streets of Washington DC, the beaches of Bali, the canyons of Utah, the Alps, Amsterdam, Hong Kong, the French Riviera and even the historic site of Mount Rushmore in South Dakota.

Players choose from three game modes: Quick Race, Championship and Head-to-Head (two players). In addition to five opponents racing to win the cup, players must also deal with traffic, oil slicks and unpredictable weather conditions. Smashing through certain obstacles will open up new track paths and shortcuts, while trophies, new bikes and upgrades are won along the way. Infogrames even went the extra mile to get the licenses for real manufacturer upgrades, giving each bike its own upgrade pack.

As we can read on the Playstation Museum:

According to some sources within the studio, a major setback occurred when the lead programmer left the team. Coupled with Infogrames’ desire to close the studio, TDC was forever cancelled.

A Dreamcast version of Test Drive Cycles was cancelled too, while GameBoy Color and PC versions  were released in 2000.

Thanks to Father PSX for the contribution!

Images:

Videos:
 

Playstation, Sony

Valerian [PSX – Prototype]

monokoma
25-01-2010
5 Comments

Valerian is a cancelled Playstation game that was in development in 1998 by Virtual Studio, a french team owned (?) by Infogrames. There are not many info on the project but thanks to Daydi we found out that the game was based on a french comic, “Valérian and Laureline”. The character model that can be seen in one of the images, it’s identical to the comic’s male protagonist. As we can read on Wikipedia:

The series centres around the adventures of the spatio-temporal agent, the dark-haired Valérian, and his redheaded female companion, Laureline, as they travel the universe through space and time. Valérian is a classical anti-hero, strong and brave but with a tendency to follow the orders of his superiors even if he feels, deep down, that it is the wrong thing to do. […] Influenced by classic literary science fiction, the series combines elements of space opera and time travel.

The game was probably going to follow the comic’s plot, and the player would have been able to explore levels in different spaces and times. We can speculate that Virtual Studio tried to pitch a game based on the comic to some french publishers, but without any success. In the end  a game based on the Valerian comic was never relased and only few target renders remain, saved in the gallery below to preserve its existence.

Thanks to Daydi for the contribution!

Images: 

Dreamcast, Playstation 2 (PS2), Sega, Sony

La Femme Nikita [DC/PS2 – Cancelled]

monokoma
04-10-2009
2 Comments

La Femme Nikita is a cancelled action game that was in development in 2000 / 2001 at Infogrames Lyon House: the project originally started in 1999 as “Mission Impossible 2”, a sequel to the original Nintendo 64 game. It seems that Infogrames soon decided to stop the development for the N64 and port MI2  to the new-released Dreamcast.

Fabien Lacaf, a professional story boarder, worked on MI2 and created different level environment (for 3D artists) and some parallel action designs  for the missions. The first concept to MI2 was based on levels that would have been completed following the progress of the main protagonists that worked in parallel at the same time.  The player was going to use different characters to complete the missions divided in different parts: in every single part the actions would have affected the next parts of the mission with the following characters.

After some months of work, the studio did not have the “Mission Impossible” license anymore and so they had to change the game into “La Femme Nikita”, based on the film / TV series with the same name. The project was then moved to the Playstation 2 but after 2 years of development, the publisher (Atari) decided to cancel “La Femme Nikita” for economic reasons.

That was the end of “Mission Impossible 2” for the Nintendo 64.

Thanks to Hey Hey for the contribution and to Rodolphe for his help to preserve more images from the project!