Beta + Cancelled Sony Video Games

Allison Road [Cancelled – PC/PS4/Xbox One]

After the tragic cancellation of Kojima Productions’ Silent Hills, many were taken aback by the sudden announcement. The concept felt new and fresh. Horror enthusiasts were ready to savour it as soon as it launched, but in the end, it didn’t. Only a playable teaser was made and a couple of trailers here and there.

The community wasn’t content to let go of the idea of a first-person Silent Hill iteration. Thus, a fan-made spiritual successor in the name of Alison Road was born. Developed by Lilith Ltd, Alison Road was originally shown as a tech demo on July 1st, 2015 via YouTube. After the positive reception from the audience, development began shortly after. To help fund the project, Lilith Ltd launched a Kickstarter campaign around September 2015. The goal was to reach its $322,974 target before the October 21st deadline. While the Kickstarter campaign did receive funds from 4482 backers, earning Lilith over $188,564, the Kickstarter campaign was later cancelled on October 12, 2015. Just a few days before the original deadline.

The campaign was cancelled after Lilith Ltd signed a deal with Team17 to publish the game. At this point, with Lilith Ltd having the support of a publisher, things were proceeding smoothly, and a release for the quarter of 2016 was on the cards. However, on June 4th, 2016, the game’s development came to an ultimate halt when Alison Road’s official Twitter account announced the news.

Shortly after the game’s cancellation, Lilith wrote this statement on Facebook:

After a long consideration between Team17 and ourselves, we have reached a mutual agreement to end our collaboration on publishing Allison Road under Team17’s Games label. Sometime things pan out differently than expected as game development and publishing have so many layers of complexity… We’d like to especially thank everyone for their support through-out, it has and will always be appreciated!

Then Team17 followed with another statement after speaking to VG24/7:

After a long consideration between Lilith owner Chris Kesler and ourselves, we have reached a mutual agreement to end our collaboration on publishing Allison Road under Team17’s Games label. We love the concept and value Chris’ talent highly, but sometime things pan out differently than expected as game development and publishing have so many layers of complexity. The whole team here wish all the best to Chris on his current and future projects for which, before being a business partner, we are also a fan.

Neither Lilith Ltd nor Team 17 explained the circumstances that led to the cancellation of the game. However, on 22 August 2016, the game’s creator Christian Kesler, told IGN that he would resume development on the game, alone. This time around, Lilith Ltd was disbanded and development would be transitioned to the auspices of Far From Home, a new studio he had co-founded with his wife.

At this point, there was still a glimmer of hope that Alison Road would come to fruition. However, that hope was shattered when no new announcements about the project were forthcoming. Eventually, both the Facebook and Twitter accounts of Alison Road were silently shut down around September 2019. Time has passed, and Alison Road was forgotten. The game now lives in the spirit of Supernormal, a spiritual successor to Alison Road.

Prototype Gameplay:

Official Gameplay Trailer:

Images:

More images can be found on the Kickstarter link and Chris Kesler’s official ArtStation profile.

Playstation 2 (PS2), Sony

Legend of Kay 2 [PS2 – Cancelled]

FreeckyCake

27-06-2024

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Legend of Kay is a fun hack-and-slash 3D platformer developed by the German-based developer Neon Studios and published by Jowood in Europe and by Capcom in North America in 2005. The game was released to mixed reviews, but major critics were pretty positive about the game.

There is no data on how Legend of Kay performed sales-wise, but after deep research, it turns out that there were plans to make a Legend of Kay 2. Unfortunately, Jowood ran through financial troubles back then, which led to their demise. As a result, the sequel was cancelled in 2006.

Actual development on a prototype build began shortly after the original game’s release, and a few concept artworks were made. Unfortunately, that’s everything there is to see. There were plans to port the PS2 game to the PSP, but that never happened as well.

A history video was made, detailing the inception of Neon Studios, the cancelled sequel, the PSP port and information on the remastered release. Please, Enjoy.

Images:

PSP, Sony

Brave: A Warrior’s Tale [Cancelled PSP Port]

FreeckyCake

23-06-2024

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Brave: The Search for Spirit Dancer is a hidden gem platformer on the PS2. It stars a young native American boy who seeks the legendary spirit dancer in order to stop an entity known as the Wendigo. Most of the game sees Brave fighting wolves, dabbling in the art of platforming and channelling his native American powers. (like summoning an eagle spirit!)

The game didn’t do well back then, considering the timeframe in which it was launched saw the emergence of heavy hitters like Resident Evil 4, God of War and Call of Duty. Consequently, the game was deemed a failure. The story didn’t end there. Two years after Brave’s launch on the PS2 and the closure of Vis Entertainment, SouthPeak Games snagged the IP from Bam Entertainment (owner of Vis Entertainment at the time) and attempted to revive it.

Their first attempt was going to be Brave: Shaman’s Challenge, a spin-off scheduled for a February 11, 2009 release. Alas, that never happened. In an IGN article dated July 10, 2008, we read that SouthPeak Games had plans to remaster the original PS2 game for three platforms; the Wii, Xbox 360 and the PSP. In the end, the PSP release never happened. But the most bizarre situation ever is that box covers of the PSP release were made, complete with an age rating and an art cover different from the original. What adds to the mystery is that an Amazon listing was spotted years after the PSP release was quietly cancelled. The question that needs asking is; was the game released, or was it not? Nobody knows.

Here’s a high-quality image of the supposedly PSP remaster that was quietly cancelled without any prior notice from SouthPeak Games. Nobody knows if the port was finished or if SouthPeak Games just fooled everyone.

Other retail listings of this obscure PSP release were also spotted in various websites like:

Playstation 2 (PS2), Sony

Bujingai 2 [PS2 – Cancelled]

FreeckyCake

28-05-2024

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Taito and Red Entertainment once made one of the best action hack-and-slash games of all time on the PS2. An homage to Hong Kong cinema, with an amalgamation of some incredible ideas tossed in. The game was released exclusively on PS2 for North America, Japan, Europe, South Korea, and Taiwan. While the game had all the ingredients that make a hack and slash fun, it sadly flopped on the commercial side.

Even if the game didn’t meet Taito’s expectations, the developers wanted to make a sequel and push the story forward, but that didn’t happen. This can be explored in an old blog post from Gamasutra where Hiroshi Aoki said the following:

” Well, the company wanted to go in certain directions… (laughs) I did want to make more, but anyway, it didn’t really happen.”

But wait, there’s more. According to an interview from the Untold History of Japanese Game Developers by John Sczepaniak, it was revealed that an actual prototype of a Bujingai sequel existed. However, the game never got past that phase of development. Here’s a short read:

“There are a lot of things I can’t tell you. For various reasons. <nervous laughter> Bujingai 2 was in development and looked really good, but never got released. <nervous laughter> So that game existed”

Playstation 3 (PS3), Xbox 360

Salient (Propaganda Games) [Playstation 3/Xbox 360 – Cancelled Pitch]

Daniel Nicaise

06-04-2024

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Salient is a cancelled action-adventure game that was published by Disney Interactive and developed by Propaganda Games for the Xbox 360 and Playstation 3, around 2005-2006.

Few details are known about Salient, as it seems to this day that this project never reached the prototype phase, let alone playable state. The existence of this title was shared on the personal website of Nathan Cheever, who served as a Level Designer at Propaganda Games from 2005 to 2007, although it is indicated that he never worked on Salient:

When Propaganda Games’ formed in 2005, the project after Turok was going to be Salient, a futuristic game that deals with humanity and injustice. The owners of the studio (Disney) put the project on hold indefinitely a year later, despite the team’s seasoned experience, passion, and talent.

Salient was set in the far future after humanity suffered for centuries of conflicts and global warming. The action take place in a futuristic metropolis that housed surviving masses from around the world, created by a big corporation that also created the Salients, a robotic workforce exhibiting personality traits, emotions and human features, initially designed to serve humanity. But over the years, the Salients integrated throughout the society and become more and more powerful to a point where they took over the corporation and see the humanity as “obsolete”, seizing operations by placing human beings in ghettos. Gamers would have played the role of a hybrid between a human and a Salient, hunted by the corporation and rejected by humans. In his quest, he would eventually flee the metropolis and joined a group of other rejected Salients in the wasteland, before saving humanity.

The art and visual direction was inspired by futuristic science-fiction movies and space opera such as Star Wars, Matrix, Equilibrium and I, Robot, while the gameplay had some platformer elements mainly inspired by the Prince of Persia series and Role-Playing Game mechanics retained from games such as Mass Effect. It also seems that combats would have been similar to the Devil May Cry franchise.

In the end, Disney didn’t take the pitch, and the small team dedicated to Salient joined the one behind Turok as stated by Nathan Cheever:

It was the big main project they wanted to do. There was a small team working on it when they were folded into Turok to help production. Disney didn’t really want to do mature titles like Turok which probably contributed to some of the results.

During their existence, Propaganda Games had more cancelled projects that released ones. Alongside Salient, we can add the well known Turok 2 and Pirates of the Caribbean: Armada of the Damned, but also a mysterious prototype based on Marvel‘s Secret Wars, using the Unreal Engine and let’s not forget that even their Turok game released in 2008 had contents that were cut in the end.

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