New Cancelled Games & Their Lost Media Added to the Archive

Butcher [Xbox 360 – Prototype]

The Butcher was one of many character prototypes created by Rare Ltd. in 2008. When the company’s direction shifted to Kinect software, all work on this prototype was abandoned. Currently we don’t know what kind of game Rare planned to use the Butcher into, or even if it would ever be used in some commercial project. As far as we know, this could have been a character study, without any gameplay connected at all. Only a few images and animations remain, to preserve the existence of this project.

Thanks to Moren for the contribution!

Images:

Videos (please note that parts of the video contain animations that do not directly relate to the original prototype) :

Super Mario 64 2 [N64 – Cancelled]

As we can read on Super Mario Wiki, Super Mario 64 2 is a cancelled sequel to Mario 64 for the Nintendo 64, that was planned for the 64 DD expansion by Nintendo but never finished. The game was talked many times in interviews with Miyamoto but it seems that only a early prototype (with a multiplayer mode starring Luigi) was created before they decided to stop the development and just start a new Mario for the GameCube.

It is possible that some concepts of this game were later included in Super Mario 64 DS, Super Mario Sunshine or Super Mario Galaxy. Nintendo never shown any screens from the Mario 64 2 prototype, but we can still hope that they could release some images in one of the “Iwata Talks” articles in the future.

Some old interviews with Miyamoto that talks about Mario 64 2:

We’re in the middle of preparing Mario 64-2 for release on the 64DD. I’d like to take advantage of the 64DD’s ability to store information. As of now, Luigi’s also a full part of the game, but we haven’t started thinking about 2-player gameplay with Mario and Luigi yet. We’ll tackle that once we’ve got the system ironed out—we’ve figured out the processing power issues, so we could do it if we tried. How many Luigi fans do you suppose there are? (Editing department replies: “Quite a lot.”) If Luigi’s really that popular, maybe I’ll made a green box for Mario 64-2. (laughs)

Thanks to Parker for the contribution!

Videos:

Pop’n Land [Sega Mega CD – Cancelled]

Pop’n Land is a cancelled side scrolling action game for the Sega Mega CD probably developed by Takeru ( as you can read on GDRI ) and to be published by Takeru’s publishing label Sur De Wave. The game added a RPG flavour to its gameplay by letting players to costumize their hero. In fact you could have assigned 16 different choices for the head, body and weapon allowing 4,096 different combinations, some useful others totally worthless. Pop’n Land had 15 cute and colorful stages, each with a unique Boss. The game was never released for unknown reasons.

Not everything was lost, because a Pop’n Land music track (“Pleasant Companions”) composed by Yoshitsugu Yokoyama and arranged by Issei Asaoka is included in Super Mega Drive Fan – Mega-CD Super Music Collection Vol.1.

Scan from EGM issue 51 and Joypad issue 27.

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[U64 Italian Podcast] Episodio 1.9 – Perfect Dark Zero Beta e Perfect Dark Core

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The Unseen 64 Podcast is only in Italian, sorry!

U64 Podcast: Episodio 1.9 – Perfect Dark Zero Beta e Perfect Dark Core [58:34]In questa puntata della podcast finiremo il discorso sulla saga di Perfect Dark, assieme a mono, Yota, Infrid, John Doom e Mr Gamer: parleremo del tech demo di Perfect Dark su GameCube, la versione in Cell Shading, la scoperta delle foto di Perfect Dark Zero per Xbox, l’originale Mai-hem e i suoi capelli killer, le dubbie scelte degli sceneggiatori e la trama random, i livelli cancellati dalla versione finale, i misteriosi fratelli messicani, le origini scozzesi di Mr. Carrington, il design spastico di Joanna Dark, lo sviluppo accellerato per rilasciare il gioco al lancio dell’Xbox 360, lunghi tentativi per finire le missioni nell’originale PD, Otacon in PDZ, i cloni di Joanna, i collegamenti con PD per GameBoy Color, Joanna pelata, i DLC mai rilasciati, ingorghi automobilistici, il prototipo di Perfect Dark Core, le drammatiche pronunce in inglese, le animazioni di ricarica, la verità sulla morte di Elvis, i possibili modelli inutilizzati nascosti nel codice, la fine di Rare in casa per casual gamers, i segreti di Mr Pants. >> U64 Episodio 1.9 – Download Versione in MP3

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Wicked Surfing [GBC – Cancelled]

Wicked Surfing is a cancelled sport game that was in development in 1999 / 2000 by RUNANDGUN! / Cave Barn and it would have been published by Interplay for the GameBoy Color. As we can read from a short preview on IGN, in the game you would have been able to use 5 playable characters to do various surf-tricks in 2 different modes: Thrash Mode (timed competition for points) and Contest Mode (tournament against other surfers). The team that was working on Wicked Surfing was small (1 programmer, 1 artist and 1 musician), but the graphic was really good for a GameBoy Color, with an isometric view and a nice palette. Sadly Interplay was in some economic issues at the time (in 2001 it was acquired by Titus Interactive) and they decided to never pay Runandgun! to finish the game, even if it was almost complete.

Thanks a lot to Jeremy for his help to preserve more screens of their lost game!

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