platform

Playstation, Sony

Pac-Man Ghost Zone [PSX – Cancelled]

monokoma
14-11-2010
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Pac-Man Ghost Zone is a cancelled platform game that was in development in 1996 by Namco Hometek for the original playstation. This would have been the first 3D Pac Man game to be released for home consoles. Ghost Zone was previewed in various old magazines and it seems that it was even shown in some form at E3, but after a while Namco decided to kill the project for quality reasons. As we can read on the Playstation Museum:

We built a playable demo and even though there was some fun gameplay, the game just never felt right. The environments all felt too much the same and it was lacking a sense of grandeur found in other games like the recently released Mario 64. Japan must of felt the same way too – when we flew to Japan and presented it to Namco president Nakamura-San, he was very displeased. As a result, almost the entire team – save 1 designer (myself), 1 programmer (Gil Colgate) and 1 artist (Neil Strudwick) – were fired and we had to start again on what eventually became Pac-Man World.”

Thanks to Celine for the scans! (GamePro #100, Console+ #78, GameInformer #53)

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Nintendo, Wii

Sonic Colors / Colours [Wii – Beta]

U64 Staff & Contributors
13-11-2010
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Sonic Colors or Sonic Colours is a platform game developed by Sonic Team for the Wii. Tehe video below is from the e3 demo of Sonic Colours, there are some minor differences between this and the final.

-The music has much more bass than in the final.
-The announcer shouted “POWER UP” whenever a wisp was collected.
-The announcer shouts “SPIN” when the yellow wisp is used, while in the final he shouts “DRILL”.
-Music doesn’t change when using the green wisp (the laser wisp).
-Some of rings and wisp power-ups are in different locations than in the final.
-The announcer’s “good, great, awesome, outstanding, amazing!” is different in this version. It was re-recorded for the final.

Thanks to Slashy for the contribution!

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Unseen News

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

U64 Staff & Contributors
09-11-2010
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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.

 

Nes / Famicom, Nintendo

Super Dog Booby: Akachan Daibouken no Maki [NES – Cancelled]

monokoma
05-11-2010
1 Comment

Super Dog Booby: Akachan Daibouken no Maki (translated by mrdomino as Super Dog Booby: Baby Adventure Volume), is a cancelled platform / action game that was in development in 1990 / 1991 by Jaleco / Taito for the Famicom / NES. Some scans and info were posted in a japanese website, from which it seems that the game was also shown in a playable form at a gaming event in 1991 and it was also offered as a prize in a contest by a japanese magazine. In the end Super Dog Booby was never released for unknown reasons.

Thanks to Celine for the contribution!

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Mega Drive / Genesis, Nintendo, Sega, SNES + Super Famicom

Aero The Acro-Bat [SNES GEN MD – Beta / Concept]

monokoma
11-10-2010
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Aero the Acro-Bat is a platform game developed by Iguana Entertainment and published by Sunsoft in 1993. Super for the Super Nintendo and Mega Drive / Genesis. At Kombo we can read an interesting article about the game, in which they even shared the original design doc, created by David Siller in 1992. Some of the major differences that we can notice from looking at the design doc are:

in-level missions such as hopping over quicksand and landing in a lion’s mouth that did not make it to the final version of the game.

Not all of these items are in the final version either. The barrel, for instance, appears in a single stage and is presented as a mode of transportation instead of an item worth points.

Unused enemies

The original mission objective screen showed Aero in action as an example on what the player needs to do. While this idea was not included in the original 1993 release, the 2002 Game Boy Advance re-release added a variation of this concept back into the game.

Thanks to Robert Seddon for the contribution!

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