Saturn

Saturn, Sega

Aqua (Scavenger) [Saturn, PC – Cancelled]

monokoma
06-09-2010
3 Comments

Aqua is a cancelled action adventure that was in development by Scavenger for the Sega Saturn and PC. Players would have been able to explore a sunken Mayan city under the sea, looking at fishes and other aquatic fauna. The gameplay could have probably been similar to Everblue (PS2) / Endless Ocean (Wii) by Arika or the Aquanaut’s Holiday series by Artdink, but sadly Scavenger’s Aqua was never finished. In 1997 the company had to close down for bankruptcy.

Thanks to Rod_Wod for the scan!

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Others, PC / MAC, Playstation, Saturn, Sega, Sony

Terminus [Saturn, Playstation, PC – Cancelled]

monokoma
31-07-2010
6 Comments

Terminus is a cancelled action adventure / shooter game that was in development by Scavenger Inc for the Sega Saturn, Playstation and PC in 1996. As they wrote in their press release, the project was meant “to give Tomb Raider a run for it’s money” but sadly it was already too late, as the company ran out of money and Terminus had to be canned.

The few screenshots preserved in the gallery below show a great graphic engine for its time, that used NURBS / voxel-like system, as we can read in an article from Gamasutra (wrote by a former Scavenger developer):

[…] Soon thereafter we were asked to develop our own game. That provided me with the incentive to figure out how to represent characters in a game better. We knew we wanted at least ten or more characters on the screen simultaneously, but all the low-resolution polygonal characters we had seen just didn’t cut it. So I decided to keep pursuing a solution based on what I had been working on for X-Men (32X), hoping that I’d come up with something that would eventually yield better results.

At first I flirted with a voxel-like solution, and developed a character system which was shown at E3 in 1996 in a game called Terminus. This system allowed a player to see characters from any angle rotating around one axis, which solved a basic problem inherent to sprite-based systems. Still, you couldn’t see the character from any angle, and while everybody liked the look of the “sprite from any angle” solution, many people wanted to get a closer look at the characters’ faces. This caused the whole voxel idea to fall apart.

In 1997 / 1998, Scavenger went bankrupt and all their unfinished projects vanished with them. The team behind Terminus (internally known as Team Fetus) was then hired at Shiny Entertainment and their game was resurrected somehow, evolving into Messiah.

Thanks a lot to Mike Damien for its help in preserving some info and concept arts from this lost project!

Thanks to Celine for the contributions! Scans from GameFan 4-2 and EDGE 34

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Playstation, Saturn, Sega, Sony

Split Realities [PSX SAT – Cancelled]

monokoma
27-06-2010
10 Comments

Split Realities is a cancelled 2D side scrolling action game that was in development by Funcom for the Playstation and Saturn. The game looked a lot like Flashback and it’s possible that the gameplay would have been similar to Delphine Software’s title. Split Realities was canned for some development issues, but its core concept, setting and characters were reused to build “The Longest Journey”, a Point and Click adventure released by Funcom in 1999 for PC.

As we can read in an interview with Funcom’s Ragnar Tornquist on Adventure Gamers:

How did you come up with the concept for TLJ? Were you guys just writing down ideas when someone suddenly cried out “Eureka!” ?

If I remember correctly, I think it was “Geronimo!”. Okay, that’s not really how it happened. The core idea of TLJ—two worlds, one of magic, one of science, and a Guardian to keep watch of the Balance between them—was actually the setting for a platform game (of all things) that Funcom was developing at that time, called Split Realities. I wasn’t involved with that project at all, but when for various reasons the game was canned, the lead artist, Didrik Tollefsen, wanted to take the core concept and build a new game around it. Which is where I entered into the picture. We sat down for quite a while, played around with the setting and the characters and the story, and the end result of that process was the beginning of The Longest Journey. There are only little bits and pieces left of the original idea, but that’s the nature of any good game design; it grows and changes with the people working on it. At this point, it’s difficult to say who came up with what, but it’s really been a cooperative process between me and the lead artist, with constant input from the whole team. So, no, it was never “Eureka!” It was more of an organic process.

Celine and Rod_Wod were able to find few Split Realities screens in CD Consoles magazine issue #11 and other old magazines.

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Saturn, Sega

Airs Adventure [SAT – Tech Demo]

monokoma
21-06-2010
1 Comment

Airs Adventure is a RPG developed by Game Studio in 1995 / 1996 for the Saturn. The game use a mix of pre-rendered characters and polygon backgrounds: even if the game is not that good, it has an interesting look at least. Celine was able to find an old news about this game (from Cd Consoles magazine #8), when it was still called “Sega Adventure”, in which they show a pre-rendered dragon that  probably looks much better than anything in the final game.

We can assume that this shot was took from a tech demo or a target render. You can compare the scan with the video below, from the final version of the game.

Thanks to Celine for the contribution!

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Videos:

 

Mega Drive / Genesis, Nintendo, Playstation, Saturn, Sega, SNES + Super Famicom, Sony

Converse Hardcore Hoops [Cancelled]

monokoma
19-06-2010
4 Comments

Converse Hardcore Hoops  (also know as Converse City Ball Tour) is a cancelled basketball game that was in development by Virgin Interactive Entertainment for the Genesis / Mega Drive, Super Nintendo, Playstation and Saturn. It was based on street basketball and there were 10 cities in which to play in 3vs3 half court matches. Converse Hardcore Hoops was shown at E3 1995 but after a while it vanished from release lists and it was never released on any console.

It’s unknown if the project was somehow connected to the Converse brand of shoes or  why the game was cancelled. Celine was able to find some screens from magazines GamePro #72 and CD Consoles #8.

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