When the Mega Drive and SNES markets started to slow down, Ocean decided to commit to the Atari Jaguar with two titles – platformer Apeshit and comic book tie-in Lobo for the Atari Jaguar CD. Apeshit was only a working title, incidentally. The simian staring platformer was being put together by the team behind Pugsley’s Scavenger Hunt and was described by Ocean as “a mixture of Mario, Bomberman and Pang”. The colourful backdrops had been hand-drawn by artist Ged Cafferly while up to two players could play cooperatively.
As for Lobo, programmer Bobby Earl claimed to Edge Magazine – scan below – that it was to offer a “very new concept” and that the video sequences would run at 25fps. “We see new machines starting with the Jaguar as a creative challenge rather than a technical challenge,” he then went onto say.
Neither game made it to store shelves, with the mostly likely reason being that the Jaguar failed to perform on both critical and commercial levels.
[Contribute by Matt Gander]
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Both myself and others (who use Facebook) have attempted to contact both Bobby Earl and Ged Cafferly to try and get some further insights on this game (how far along it got, just what aspects of the hardware were being used etc) but none of us ever had any replies from either :-)
I’ve had questions put to Gary Bracey via an RVG interview, on my behalf to see if he can recollect anything (doubtful given how much time has passed), but i’ve not done much more in regards to chasing up sources on the game than this as it really did’nt look that impressive (IMO) and i’d much rather of had a remake of the Lynx or Acade version of Toki than this, so i’m actually rather glad it did’nt make it :-)
The Jaguar bvadly needed a quality exclusive platformer of it’s own to ‘combat’ SMB 4/DKC/Sonic etc etc, but something this unattractive in looks and going off concept…was not what i was hoping for, personally.
No offence to coders involved :-)
Ocean had an advertising magazine doing the rounds..
Apeshit was mentioned, but by name of Apes, it was described as a surreal step into a world of human primates.
Due Winter ’94
Also had working title of Monkey Business.
The full quote from Ocean Power”, Ocean Software’s advertising magazine:
“Always at the cutting edge of games development, Ocean is once again
leading the way in creating games for Atari’s all-new video games system, The Jaguar.
Current work in progress includes two state-of-the-art arcade adventures: Apes, a surreal step into a world of humanoid primates, and
Lobo, a mean ride through the hellish world of the US Comic hero of the same name. Both games are currently on course for a Winter 1994 release”
Lobo soon dissappeared from Oceans website as a Jaguar project. .and as for what Bobby Earl told Edge about it, wow..way to dress up an awful Killer Instinct clone.
Had this made it’s way onto the Jaguar and joined the likes of Double Dragon V, Kasumi Ninja and Dragon:The Bruce Lee Story as finished product, the Jaguar’s reputation in this genre would of suffered more than it already did.
Glad it was canned.
Titles like Lobo and Thea Realm Fighters were not what the Jaguar needed..
MKIII was it’s only real shot at being seen as a credible player in the market.
Seems High Voltage Software knew exactly where this one was headed :-))
I generally don’t have much faith in Ocean
products, but we’ll see…
Ciao!
—
Brian V. McGroarty —
32,000 colour backdrops and the smoothest scrolling ever seen on a computer, said DHGF Magazine.
someone should of told them the Jaguar was a console ????