New Cancelled Games & Their Lost Media Added to the Archive

Metalocalypse: Dethgame [PS3 X360 – Cancelled]

Metalocalypse: Dethgame is a cancelled action game / beat ’em up that was in development by Frozen Codebase and it would have been published by Konami for the Xbox 360 Live Arcade and the Playstation 3 PSN download service. As we can read on Wikipedia, Metalocalypse is an American animated television series, which was created by Brendon Small and Tommy Blacha, and premiered in 2006 on Adult Swim.

In the game players would have played as one of the band’s roadies, and the game was to be set in Mordhaus, where the player would fight mutant fans. The game would have included music taken from Dethklok’s albums. The game has been canceled, because “the creative direction of the game would not live up to the high standards…set for the project”.

As we can read on IGN:

You play as a nameless Klokateer, a minion of sorts for Metalocalypse, and the game opens with you standing in front of a urinal and peeing. Using the left analog stick, you can aim your pee and urinate to the left and right. This doesn’t actually do anything or even leave yellow puddles on the ground, but that’s how it starts. After you finish and zip up, which happens automatically after a while, you wonder through the barracks and into a training room where you start beating up punkster guys and gals. And that’s pretty much the entire game.

On July 28, 2010 (a year and 8 days after its announcement) announced the cancellation of  Metalocalypse: Dethgame

“Konami has confirmed to IGN it has parted ways with Cartoon Network regarding Metalocalypse: Dethgame, a downloadable title based off the Adult Swim series that was previously set for release this year.

A little while later, Cartoon Network issued this statement:

Cartoon Network Enterprises has indeed ended production on the previously-announced Metalocalypse: The Dethgame. After a lot of time and work, together with Konami, the decision was made that the creative direction of the game would not live up to the high standards we had set for the project and we did not want to release a less than outstanding game.

In other words… “It sucked, we aren’t releasing it.”

Thanks to ForWhomTheBellTolls for the contribution!

Videos from ZAMNman, superbiener and GamingWalktrough Youtube channels!

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Wipeout [Beta – Playstation, PC, Saturn]

Wipeout is the first in a series of futuristic racing games developed and published by Psygnosis in 1995 for Sony PlayStation and PC, in 1996 for the Sega Saturn. Wipeout was designed in part by The Designers Republic, while the game’s vehicle designs were based on Matrix Marauders, a 3D grid-based strategy game whose concept was developed by Psygnosis employee Jim Bowers. Nick Burcombe, the game’s future designer, was inspired to create a racing game using the same types of vehicles from his experience with Powerdrome, F-Zero and Super Mario Kart. [Info from Wikipedia]

In the gallery below you can see a couple fo screens from a beta version and what is seems a FMV / target render.

Beta:


Final:


In an interview on Grumpy Old Gamers with Andy Satterthwaite we can read some memories from the early days of Wipeout:

As for the “Inspiration” the original game was very much “Mario Kart” to techno music. Nick Burcombe and Jim Bowers had designed the game from those beginnings; and an early concept video  was made.

Wipeout Target Render / Concept Video:

Thanks to Rod_Wod and Celine for the scans! Thanks to Ross Sillifant for the interview!

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SWAT: Urban Justice [PC – Cancelled]

SWAT: Urban Justice is a cancelled strategy FPS that would have been the 4th title in the SWAT series of real-time tactical games. Urban Justice was in development by Sierra in 2001 / 2002, but something went wrong, the game was postponed and soon vanished without an explanation. In 2004 Vivendi Universal / Sierra announced a new SWAT project, the official SWAT 4 developed by Irrational Games and published in 2005. As we can read on Gamespot:

According to a carefully parsed statement from a VU spokesperson, work on Urban Justice has been “discontinued” in favor of SWAT 4’s development. However, the same spokesman stressed that SWAT 4 is both a different game and a true sequel, so it will retain the series’ gameplay elements, albeit in a refined form.

In the released SWAT 4, they did leave an ester egg that refers to the unreleased Urban Justice (Info from IMDB):

In the mission “Victory Imports Auto Garage”, there is an arcade game in the waiting room called “SWAT: Urban Justice”. This is a company in-joke; Urban Justice was supposed to be Sierra/Vivendi’s follow up to SWAT 3: Close Quarter Battle (1999), and they began advertising the game as “Coming Soon” in 2002 with a view to releasing later in the year. However, after a spending long time (to the order of years) in development purgatory, Urban Justice was cancelled by Vivendi

Thanks to discworld for the contribution!

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War Monster RTS [GBC – Cancelled]

War Monster is a cancelled Real Time Strategy game that was in development by Wicked Witch Software for the GameBoy Color. The game allowed to feature over 120 units on screen at once with large maps for mining of resources (including trees) and building of towns, complete with town centers, barracks and towers. War Monster played amazingly well for a RTS on the GBC, but sadly the project had to be cancelled because they never found a publisher. A playable prototye of this game was later found on Ebay by UncleBob.

The War Monster IP was later reused to create another RTS released for Cellphones and also a tech demo for the DS (that probably will never be used for a full game).

Thanks to Rodent for the contribution!

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