Virtua Hamster is an unreleased racing game that was in development for Sega’s 32x, designed and produced by Eric Quakenbush. The player would have controlled a series of rodents on wheels, to race in 3D mazes, trying to avoid an huge Mechanical Snake. The project was cancelled when Sega discontinued the 32X before production could be completed. Some playable prototypes of the game still exist and they were sold in various auctions on ebay. An early alpha of Virtua Hamster was finally released in August 2009 by SEGASaturno.
The game was later ported to Saturn but cancelled again when the game was almost complete. Sega still owed payments to the developer of Virtua Hamster, David A. Palmer Productions. David A. Palmer revealed to Unseen64 that “the entire intellectual property of this game and code” was signed over to his company as part of a legal settlement.
As we can read from the original pre-production design document:
High Concept: A maze game in which the player assumes the role of a rocket-powered hamster test pilot who must navigate a gigantic habitrail from hell in order to thwart the plans of an evil scientist and regain his rodent freedom.
Hook: The look and fast paced action of Virtua Racing and Virtua Fighter combined with an amusing puzzle strategy game and an unlikely group of heroes and enemies.
Setting: The majority of the game takes place in a mad scientists lab facility. The scientist has assembled a truly humongus habitrail-type maze in order to test his rocket powered rodent experiments.
Characters: Player One is a test pilot hamster from a rival lab and was stolen by the mad scientist. Player One’s goal is to retrieve all of the stolen blue-print pieces and escape from the lab. The hamster pilot has to navigate the complicated maze as well as fend off evil rocket riding rodents, a mechanical snake, and the scientists voracious cat.
Thanks to Ryan Jacques and David A. Palmer for the contribution!
You can read more info on Virtual Hamster at Sega 16.
Disclaimer: We are not responsible for any content of any website we have linked to.
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(2 votes, average: 4.50 out of 5)
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The prototype ROM is now available from SEGA Saturno.
updated :)
This game was a design brief from Sega of America of which Eric Quakenbush was employed as a producer working on the project and my company employed to design and develop the game on 32X and then to Saturn. The game was canned by Sega at 99% complete and my company was owed a large amount of money. As part of a legal settlement with my company the entire intellectual property of this game and code, which we designed and developed was signed over to me in its entirety. Any attempt to breach our intelectual property rights will be countered by legal action most strenuoulsy both in the United States and in Europe and any other parts of the world.
David A. Palmer
Thanks for the info David, we updated the description of the game
The beta version out there is visually crude compared to the photos. However nice to see it in motion
No wonder Mr. Palmer is so sue-happy. If I had such an awesome IP like “Virtua Hamster”, I would be trying to protect my claim to fame as well. Sorry, but if I were you, Mr. Palmer, I would be embarrased to acknowledge my team had anything to do with this turd in the bottom of the cage.
You are not allowed to call yourself Skeletor.
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Too bad that could not have done the game a different way. Make the Virtua Hamster characters looks more real like instead of just like polygons. It had promise. Oh well. Another one bites the dust.
Too bad they could not have done the game a different way. Make the Virtua Hamster characters look more real like instead of just like polygons. It had promise. Oh well. Another one bites the dust.