Sandbox

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

Saints Row: Money Shot [Cancelled – Xbox 360/PS3]

U64 Staff & Contributors
23-03-2013
9 Comments

Saints Row: Money Shot was an action/adventure game scheduled to be released on the Xbox Live Arcade and Playstation Network sometime in late 2011. It was never officially announced by THQ or Volition, but it was leaked to the web in August 2011. From the existing screenshots and video, we can see that it was going to be some kind of on-rails game where you have to control a bullet in slow-motion through various obstacles before finally hitting your target. Here’s its official description from the leaked XBLA entry.

You are Cypher, a deadly assassin in the world of Saints Row, and you hunt the most elusive targets with the most sophisticated weaponry that Ultor has to offer. How sophisticated? You have the ability to control the path of your bullet to such a degree that you can weave through the hallway of an apartment complex, steer through the legs of a hooker, and even snake your way through a moving train! Avoid striking solid objects and unintended bystanders and make sure you hit your mark!

Within a week of its leaking, Kotaku discovered that the Australian Classification Board had rated Saints Row: Money Shot already, hinting that it was possibly close to release at this point.

In an interview with Worthplaying.com, former THQ boss Danny Bilson stated that Saints Row: Money Shot was still not shelved and that it would possibly be released on the PSN instead as a free game.

On the XBLA, the game would have cost 800 Microsoft Points, and it appears that playing through it would earn you unlockable items for Saints Row: The Third. These items would later be released as a DLC pack called the “Money Shot Pack,” which contained the gun and suit seen in the game as well as a new hover bike, but the “Money Shot” game itself was never included and was officially considered cancelled by this point. Here is some leaked footage of the game from a Czech gaming site.

Article by Tony Lokester

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GameCube, Microsoft, Nintendo, Playstation 2 (PS2), Sony, Xbox

Simpsons: Hit & Run [Beta – PS2 XBOX GameCube]

U64 Staff & Contributors
30-06-2012
1 Comment

As we can read on Wikipedia, The Simpsons Hit & Run is an action-adventure game based on the animated sitcom The Simpsons. It was released for the GameCube, Xbox, PlayStation 2 on September 2003. The game’s developer, Radical Entertainment, received the rights to create games for The Simpsons franchise when they demonstrated a playable prototype. Radical released its first The Simpsons game in 2001 called The Simpsons Road Rage, a parody of the Crazy Taxi series of video games. After Road Rage was released, the development team for Hit & Run decided not to create a direct sequel to Road Rage. Instead, Radical wanted to steer the franchise’s video game series in a different direction by giving the game engine a complete overhaul.

In the game’s booklet, there are some beta images that shows the character mission mugs were in 3D too rather than animated. One has a display mode in options. In Tips & Tricks No. 105 in 2003, some character’s clothes were identified in the wrong episode. For example, Lisa’s “cool” outfit info says that it’s from the episode Little Girl In the Big Ten, but it’s actually from Summer of 4 ft. 2. Lisa didn’t wear that outfit in Little Girl In the Big Ten. Marge’s inmate outfit from Marge in Chains is originally periwinkle and short-sleeved, but the red-orange color may come from another episode. Facts say that Maggie is a playable character in the game, but for unknown reasons, she was replaced with Apu Nahasapeemapetilon in the final game.

Thanks to Luis Morales for the contribution!

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Microsoft, Xbox 360

Crackdown 2 [Beta – Xbox 360]

monokoma
24-06-2012
1 Comment

As we can read from Wikipedia, Crackdown 2 is a sandbox third-person shooter game developed by Ruffian Games and published by Microsoft Game Studios for the Xbox 360 in July 2010. Thanks to a post at Sean Noonan’s blog, we can read some interesting info about the beta and the development of Crackdown 2:

We had these cavernous locations for these monstrosities to roam, but the Goliath’s slow movement pace just couldn’t cut it against our nimble agent characters – no matter how powerful we buffed the Goliaths. Their great size meant any quick movements looked jarring and totally unconvincing, so the speed couldn’t change. […]

We pulled an all nighter or two and redesigned the Goliath. We adopted an approach whereby the Goliath would completely ignore the player. The Goliath would sprint as fast as possible to the beacon at which point he would pummel it until it was destroyed – the player’s job was to kill the Goliath before that could happen. It was simpler, cleaner and had a much more interesting visual impact. […]

The old Shai Gen Car Park in Unity Heights Square is roughly a tenth the size it originally was meant to be with the old Goliath design …in fact the old Shai Gen Car Park was once meant to be a freak infested mall as an homage to Dawn of the Dead but it’s location being on the final island best suited a Goliath encounter. At one point we talked about having a Goliath climb the agency tower as a final, but the idea was scrapped […]

Thanks a lot to Sean for the contribution!

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Microsoft, Xbox 360

Saints Row [Beta – Xbox 360]

U64 Staff & Contributors
16-05-2012
2 Comments

Saints Row is an action-adventure open world video game developed by Volition Inc. and published by THQ. It is the first title in the Saints Row series. The development of the game began at around 2004 or 2005 and was originally named “Bling Bling” which in it’s sequel, it has a certain store with the exact same name. Thanks to a certain person down in the comments who said this, The game was originally for PS2 and PS2 only at the time it was in the making.

So in the video below, you can see many beta differences between the gameplay such as:

  • Saints wearing green
  • Beta Logo
  • Shop Hold-Ups
  • Beta Rim-Jobs

Post by The Monokariba (AKA Monokiba)

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(Will research more on Saints Row’s beta.) 

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

True Crime: Hong Kong (Sleeping Dogs) [Beta – Xbox 360 PS3]

monokoma
14-02-2012
No Comments

True Crime: Hong Kong is a sandbox action game that was in development by United Front Games and was to be published by Activision. It was going to be the third installment and a reboot of the True Crime series, but in February 2011, Activision announced that the game had ceased production along with their Guitar Hero franchise. The game was declared cancelled for being “just not good enough” to compete in the open world genre. Activision didn’t expect it to generate enough profit and stopped development. “True Crime: Hong Kong was playable from start to finish and ‘virtually complete’ in terms of content before Activision canned it,” the developer behind the game told CVG. [Info from Wikipedia] In February 2012, it was announced that True Crime: Hong Kong will go trough some changes and it will be released by Square Enix as a different game, named “Sleeping Dogs”.

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