Beta + Cancelled Pseudo Interactive Video Games

Full Auto, also know as Inertia, was one of the first prototypes in development (in 1997) at Pseudo Interactive and it’s interesting to notice that it had the same name of a game developed by the same company and released in 2006 for the XBOX 360. Inertia was a car combat game too and we can wonder if this proto influenced somehow FA 360. As we can read in one of developers’s site, the game “… suffered from problems such as feature creep, code bloat, and scheduling overruns, and was eventually cancelled shortly after being featured at Microsoft’s Gamestock ’99 press event. However, the publisher was impressed enough with the potential shown by the game to continue their working relationship with Pseudo Interactive, which is how PI came to be one of the first third party developers working on a title for the XBox console…the title that would in the end be known as Cel Damage.

Some more info can be found in an old press-release:

Players maneuver futuristic combat vehicles and battle their way through the rich, alien and interactive world of “Full Auto,” an advanced 3-D vehicular shooter game. As a car-warrior for hire, gamers custom-build their battle cars and prepare for intense combat missions and death-match battles. Players pit their skills against evil corporate mercenaries or sophisticated mechs in either single-player or Internet multiplayer mode via the MSN™ Gaming Zone (http://www.zone.com/). Players succeed by increasing their wealth and improving their car in this intense, nonlinear action game.
Unrestrained gameplay. Players devise unique strategies on the fly, manage their resources carefully, and uncover hidden surprises in 27 interactive, unrestrained and highly replayable missions, battle arenas and racetracks.
Customizable vehicles. Players design their battle vehicles from a large selection of options — cars, weapons, engines and accessories — to meet the challenges of precision driving and intense shooting battles.
Huge interactive environments. Players delve deep into the secrets of a strange alien planet as they progress through 17 challenging missions, including exploration, assassination, demolition and high-speed chases. Skills are honed in one of 10 arenas as users compete in events such as races, death-match combat, “Capture the Flag” and more. While a special tutorial mission makes gameplay easy to learn, “Full Auto” is difficult to master.

Thanks to Hey Hey and Vicente for the contributions!

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Microsoft, Playstation 3 (PS3), Sony, Xbox 360

Crude Awakening [X360/PS3 – Cancelled]

monokoma

17-12-2009

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Crude Awakening (aka The Crib) is a cancelled action / driving game that was in development by Pseudo Interactive in 2007 / 2008, planned to be released for the Xbox 360 and Playstation 3. The project was meant to be a “next gen” Carmageddon with a different graphic approach: the idea behind it was to make it stylized, like Team Fortress 2, with a crazy cast of characters and a weird city to explore.

As in the original Carmageddon, the player had to race a vehicle against a number of other competitors with a certain amount of time to complete each mission. More time may be gained by collecting bonuses, damaging the competitors’ cars or by running over pedestrians.

The Crude Awakening concept was quite funny (in a gruesome way), there would be different objectives and sometimes the objective was to hit only one type of pedestrian and avoid others. Crude awakening was basically Carmagedon HD including some reworks of old characters.

The game was going to be published and funded by SCI / Eidos (the original Carmageddon publisher, now known as Square Enix Europe), but later they changed their mind and canned the development. As Crude Awakening was a major project for Pseudo Interactive, its cancellation became one of the causes for the studio’s economic problems and the following closure. In april 2008, Pseudo was officially shut down and all their WIP projects vanished with them.

As we can read in an old article at Gamespot:

However, whatever plans SCi had were subject to change once investors called for a change in upper management. Longtime CEO Jane Cavanagh resigned shortly thereafter, and the following month the new regime announced some drastic changes, including layoffs of 200 workers and the cancellation of more than a dozen games.

Only some artworks, concepts and few screens remain from Crude Awakening, preserved in the gallery below.

Thanks a lot to Roberto Robert, David Wu, Kay Huang, Heidi Klinck, Albert Alejandro, Bronwen Grimes and all the former Pseudo Interactive artists that helped us to preserve info and media from their lost project!

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Microsoft, Playstation 3 (PS3), Sony, Xbox 360

Prodigal [X360/PS3 – Cancelled]

monokoma

08-12-2009

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Prodigal is a cancelled adventure / action game that was in development at Pseudo Interactive in 2007 / 2008 for Xbox 360 and Playstation 3. The player was going to became Noah Caglionosi, heir of a demon bloodline, whose mission was to kill his brothers and sisters demons, both on foot and while riding on his car.

From the screenshots and concept arts preserved in the gallery below, it looks like we could have been able to freely explore Prodigal’s world jumping on buildings and churches with Noah’s psych powers (as it happens in inFamous and Prototype), to cling to flying demons to reach higher areas and to destroy parts of the city to use the rubbles to kill huge enemies. A friend spirit / demon was going to help Noah in his mission.

The project was promising, but unfortunaly in April 2008 Pseudo Interactive was closed and Prodigal vanished with them. Only an early prototype was completed before the cancellation.

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Microsoft, Playstation 3 (PS3), Sony, Xbox 360

Divided City [X360/PS3 – Cancelled]

monokoma

06-12-2009

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Divided City is a cancelled car combat game that was in development at Pseudo Interactive in 2007 / 2008, for the Playstation 3 and Xbox 360. After Full Auto 2, the team decided to create a new IP to build a different combat game on wheels, this time in a post apocalyptic scenario which involved a plot of “political unrest.” The player would have been able to use various armored vehicles, to fight against huge combat tanks and other mechanical enemies.

The team completed a playable demo of Divided City that looked really good, but sadly in April 2008 it was announced that the company was shutting down. The project was canned with the closure of the studio.

Thanks a lot to Roberto Robert, David Wu, Kay Huang, Heidi Klinck, Albert Alejandro, Bronwen Grimes, Frank Trzcinski and all the former Pseudo Interactive artists that helped us to preserve info and media from their lost project!

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Microsoft, Playstation 2 (PS2), Sony, Xbox

Cel Damage 2 [XBOX/PS2 – Cancelled]

Liam Robertson

12-01-2009

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Cel Damage was a vehicular combat game developed by Pseudo Interactive and published by Electronic Arts for Xbox and Nintendo Gamecube. It was later updated for the PS2 in the European exclusive, Cel Damage: Overdrive. Prior to Overdrive’s development, Pseudo originally intended to produce a sequel to the first game for PS2, Xbox and GC simply titled ‘Cel Damage 2’. It was pitched to EA, SEGA, Midway, Ubisoft and others, although none of them agreed to fund it; resulting in its cancellation. This was due to a number of different factors, including the poor sales performance of the original and concerns with its marketability, as well as a general lack of faith in viability of the car combat genre among publishers.

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