News on Cancelled Video Games & Lost Media

HiTech is a cancelled action / stealth game that was planned for Playstation 3, Xbox 360 and PC in 2006 / 2007 by Illusion Softworks (now known as 2K Czech), the team mostly known for the Hidden & Dangerous and Mafia series. The project was still in early development and without a playable prototype when it was canned. Only a concept video was created to pitch the game to publishers, but unfortunately they did not find any company interested and had to cancel it. Instead, they continued working on Mafia II, later released in 2010.

The project was lead by Daniel Vávra, game designer who worked at Illusion Softworks since 1998 on Hidden and Dangerous and Mafia I & II. Vávra shown the HiTech concept footage in 2007 during his presentation titled “How to make a game” and the video was later uploaded on Youtube. From what we can see in this pitch video, HiTech’s gameplay could have been similar to other action / stealth games such as Metal Gear Solid or Splinter Cell, but in a sci-fi setting.

As we can read in the video intro:

“Year 2025. A group of terrorists sabotaged military robot tests inside Adler Group production facility. The robots went out of control and slaughtered AG staff. Terrorists provided media with video footage of this massacre. The facility has been evacuated and the nemesis team has been called in. The objective is to regain control and cover up the incident.”

Thanks to superannuation for the contribution!

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Others, PC / MAC, Playstation, Sony

Durango (Radical Entertainment) [Playstation, PC – Cancelled]

monokoma

12-12-2017

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Durango is a cancelled vehicle based action adventure that was in development by Radical Entertainment in late ‘90s for the original Playstation and PC. At the time Radical was mostly known for their work on such games as the Independence Day tie-in, the NHL Powerplay series, Blood Lines and Grid Runner, being able to create games that sold enough to keep them alive and in good relationships with their publishers.

During those years many companies were developing their first 3D games and original ideas for new titles were welcome: Radical Entertainment pitched a good number of projects to publishers, and Durango was their concept for an interesting sci-fi adventure / shooter.

Not many details remain after the cancellation of the project, but from what we were able to gather it seems Durango would have been a vehicle based shooter divided into different levels, each with a series of missions to complete. Players would have been able to use different sci-fi vehicles, items and weapons to reach their objectives.

If you know someone who worked on this game and could help to preserve more details, please let us know!

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Microsoft, Others, PC / MAC

D4: Dark Dreams Don’t Die Season 2, Episode 3 [Cancelled – PC, Xbox One]

monokoma

05-12-2017

1 Comment

D4: Dark Dreams Don’t Die – Season 1 – was an awesomely weird adventure game by Access Games and Swery65, released after their cult – Twin Peaks inspired – Deadly Premonition. While the game was announced by Microsoft at E3 20013 as a “kinect waggle game for hardcore gamers” in the end D4 can also be played with a traditional controller and the first episode was also released on Steam in June 2015.

Unfortunately D4 was meant to be divided into different “seasons” (with a few episodes each), as a TV series. Only the first two episodes (Season 1) were ever released, while D4: Season 2 was sadly cancelled when Swery65 had to take a break from Access Games in November 2015 to recover from a serious illness and then definitely left the company for internal reasons in October 2016.

We should also consider that D4 did not sold much on Xbox One (and neither on PC) and that’s probably the major reason why Season 2 / Episode 3 was canned. For sure Access Games and Microsoft would have developed other episodes without Swery if the first one would have been a huge success.

Season 1 of D4 is still an original – short – game full of strange characters and it’s worth playing if you love weird games, but it ends with a huge cliffhanger that will probably never be resolved. Swery and Access Games had a few months to work on the sequel, but unfortunately we don’t know how much was ever done on it. Only a single scene of D4: Season 2 was ever shown, thanks to an interview with Swery by Gamasutra:

“D4 sells well on PC, can we expect future episodes?
Swery: It’ll be a little longer until I can start talking about new episodes, but I’m doing my best. The next season will be even better than you’re all expecting, so please keep cheering me on.
…no?
…You can’t accept that answer?
…Uuuh…
Okay, then. Just this once, just for you, I’ll show you a single picture.”

You can still support Swery65‘s new games (such as The Good Life) by following him on Twitter and wait for his next project with White Owls!

Status, Unseen News

Unseen Xmas Gifts 2017 (AKA presents for your friends while you help the site)

U64 Staff & Contributors

05-12-2017

No Comments

In about 20 days Christmas will be upon us, if you still don’t know what to gift to your nerd friend, maybe these could help you and the Unseen64 archive! We have a book about cancelled videogames and random t-shirts & merch: by buying these you support the archive and help us to keep the site online (and in return you get a gift for someone you love, or hate).

Here you can download the table of content for our book, check our Unseen64 book page to know where you can find it!

T-shirts with the Unseen64 logo are available in different colors and sizes on Amazon.com (Shipping to USA only)

For international shipping you can order these items from Redbubble, they have more options (wall art! mugs! stickers!), but price for T-shirts is more expensive (but at least you can order them even if you don’t live in USA):

All the earnings gathered by selling these will be added to the fund we use to keep the site online (pay the server, technical support, emergency expenses, etc.) and alive (work a bit less on freelancing jobs and a bit more on researches and updates for Unseen64).

If you buy one of these, let us know what you think and send us a photo when you’ll get it :)

As always, thanks a lot for your support in these 16+ years of unseen gaming on Unseen64.

Nintendo, Playstation 2 (PS2), Sony, Wii

Deadline (Kando Games) [PS2, Wii – Cancelled]

monokoma

27-11-2017

4 Comments

Deadline is a cancelled game that was in development by Kando Games, initially for Playstation 2 as an action game inspired by Metal Gear Solid and later for Wii as a FPS inspired by Half Life 2. The team was founded in 2003 by former Darkworks developers, and in about 5 years of existence they released Rebel Raiders: Operation Nighthawk (Wii, PS2, PC) and Touch Mechanic (DS).

Deadline was one of the first projects they ever pitched to publishers in 2003 / 2004, by looking at the few screenshots available you can see how it was heavily inspired by MGS. It’s unclear if they ever found a publisher interested in the game (translated from French using Google Translator):

“Kando Games, a small french developer founded notably by former figures Darkworks (Alone in the Dark – The New Nightmare), simultaneously produces two titles for PlayStation 2. Deadline, which its authors hope to make one of the big surprises of E3 2004, is the largest project under construction. What’s wrong tunes Metal Gear Solid do not cheat, Deadline will be a very different kind. Based on the staging increasingly cinematic games today Kando Games hopes to offer players a relatively unique experience in organizing the handling of the title with a script and a set of modular cameras, which would not yet not threaten maneuverability, through a process they jealously kept secret for the moment. Basically, the game is truly a film (by virtue of its scenes and framing) playable. Hopefully they will take their goals and to come back in that capacity in a few months for a more successful and practical concept so special.”

As far as we know Deadline for PS2 was never shown at E3 2004 and was later cancelled. Kando Game’s first released game was then Rebel Raiders in 2006 and only in late 2007 Deadline reappeared again, this time as a first person shooter announced for Wii.

Unfortunately Kando Games only released a few tiny screenshots for the Wii version of Deadline, but by looking at those gamers noticed it was quite similar to Half Life 2. Deadline Wii also vanished soon after its initial announcement and was never shown again before its cancellation.

As of November 2017 Kando Games’ website is still online, listing Deadline, another cancelled Wii project titled “Symphonic Orchestra” and an unreleased flying combat sim for PS2 and PC titled “Les Chevaliers du Ciel”. Their latest game was published almost 9 years ago, so we can assume the studio doesn’t exist anymore or they only work as support for other companies. We tried to get in contact with former Kando Games developers but without luck.

If you know someone who worked on Deadline and could help to preserve more screenshots or videos, please let us know!

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