New Cancelled Games & Their Lost Media Added to the Archive

Widget [NES – Not Beta, but an arrow!]

Update: as noted by Ian and Yakumo, the “4” is an arrow!

Widget was developed by Atlus in 1992, for the Nintendo Entertainment System. It was based off the short-lived cartoon series of the same name. Upon analyzing the game’s instruction manual, TheActionGameMaster spotted a minor difference in the password screen on the twelfth page, which discusses the game’s extended play features. In the manual, there are seven digits to be inputted. It reads “5,2,5,7,142”. In the final game, you may only input six digits on the password screen. This minor difference suggests that the photograph in the manual was taken from a later build of the game, or that it was some sort of tester’s code.

[Unheard Interview] Retro City Rampage Creator talks about the game and its unseen features

After starting life as Grand Theftendo, an NES de-make of Grand Theft Auto 3, Retro City Rampage has become what the creator calls an “Open World Action Parody”, and all that remains of GTA is the gameplay. In an audio interview for Unseen64, the creator, Brian Provinciano, reveals a new vehicle, the reason behind parodying the TMNT Water Level of legend, and a feature he wanted to include, but plans instead to use it in a hopeful sequel.

Retro City Rampage should be available for download on WiiWare, PSN and XBLA in the next few months! Check www.retrocityrampage.com for more info and news about the game, or listen the video below for our interview with Brian!

Brave Arms [PS3 – Pitch / Cancelled]

Brave Arms is an action game that was in early development stages at Namco’s Project Aces team, planned for the Playstation 3. We dont know how much work went into the game, as the only documents about it’s existence are a couple of scans (?) that shown some target renders and concept arts, probably created to pitch the project. As far as we can get from the japanese translation (@ Wikipedia), Brave Arms took place in Gran Rugido, the capital of the Kingdom of Sapin, an allegory of Spain in the Ace Combat series. The player would had fight alongside the local resistance against an unknown military regime.

There are no more info on Brave Arms and it’s currently unknown why it was never finished.

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Super Star Wars [SNES – Beta]

Super Star Wars is an action game based on the Star Wars series, developed by Sculptured Software and published by LucasArts for the Super Nintendo in 1992. As we can read on Wikipedia,  the project is a remake of Star Wars, a lesser-known game released in 1991 for the Nintendo Entertainment System, Sega Master System, Game Boy and Game Gear.

In the beta version, Super Star Wars’ characters had a dark black outline around their bodies, similar to Ultima VIII: Pagan. However, this idea was abandoned, as it was thought to make the characters too cartoonish-looking. There was also trash compactor level that was deleted from the game due to memory constraints. An image was published in an issue of Electronic Gaming Monthly around the time of the game’s release (does anyone have a scan of this?).

In the gallery below we can also notice an unused Luke’s sprite where he deflects a lazer beam from a training droid, just like in the film.

Thanks to Rod_Wod for the scans!

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Monster Island [XBOX PS2 GC – Cancelled]

Monster Island is a game project that was pitched in 2001 by Irrational Games for the Playstation 2, Xbox and Gamecube, described as “Rampage meets Black and White Creatures in a Fully Destructible Environment”. Monster Island was meant to be a fast paced action / strategy game in which the player would had assumed the role of either a giant monster out to eat a city for dinner or the authorities pledged to protect the innocent citizenry.

In october 2010, the studio revealed this cancelled project from their official blog and shared some concept arts and a short document that explains the main features of the game. The pitch promised some 20 monsters, a living city, heavily destructible environments, and a dynamic civil defense network.

The monster’s goal is to cause as much destruction as possible while simultaneously quelling its own hideous appetite with tasty, human morsels. The monster might also receive unique goals in a particular mission, such as climbing a skyscraper, locating an enemy hidden in the city and destroying him, or defeating a rival monster! […]

Monster Island will also let the player take on the role of the good guys, protecting the city from the horrible creature. The player will have control of five key units: the Scientist (who gathers information on the monster to help defeat the behemoth), the Girl (who can lure the monster away from its intended target), the Engineer (who can direct rebuilding of the city), the General (who can direct the forces of the army fighting the monster), and the Hero (who can personally fight the monster when the going gets desperate).

The description sounds interesting, but sadly the game was never green-lighted.

Thanks to Robert Seddon for the contribution!

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