Welcome to Games That Weren't!

We are a Cancelled & Unreleased Video games archive with prototypes, developer history and assets for many computers and consoles of all ages. A non-profit large archive dedicated to preserving lost games that were never released to the public. Sharing history and stories from the developers, assets and more before it is too late. GTW has been preserving lost video game history online since 1999, and long before that offline.

Please Browse our archive and discover the many entries that we host for many different platforms.

Latest News and Posts

Break Show

Posted: by Yassine Bakrim

199X UPL Company Limited

Platform: Unknown

UPL Company Limited was a Japanese game developer best known for titles like Kōtetsu Yōsai Strahl, Vandyke, and Black Heart. These games later received modern re-releases, introducing them to a new generation of players – myself included, as I might never have discovered Vandyke without these ports.

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Shortly after releasing Kōtetsu Yōsai Strahl and Mahjong Haōden: Kaiser’s Quest, UPL went out of business. However, before its closure, the company was secretly developing a shoot-’em-up titled Breakshow. Continue reading →

Posted in: Reviews, Unknown | Tagged: | Leave a comment

GTW64 August 2025 update

Posted: by Frank Gasking

2025 is going past in a flash as we enter into August, and GTW64 is continuing to evolve and grow too. This month we have added 6 new entries, including the great looking Indy 3 adventure game homebrew that sadly was cancelled, an early development of Skateball and lots more.

We then have 9 updates for you, which includes the recent recovery of Bryan Robson’s Super League, not only for the C64, but ZX Spectrum and Amstrad CPC. See you all next month!

5 new entries added

Competition Karate 2, Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (Adventure), Infinite Inferno, Programmerings-Tävling entries, Skateball

9 updates added

Bryan Robson’s Super League, C64GS cartridge titles, Footy game, Gem-X 2, Graham Gooch World Class Cricket, Hollywood Poker, Sword of Sodan, Xtron, Zolo

Posted in: GTW64 news, News | 2 Comments

MBC

Posted: by Frank Gasking

1999 Nick London

Platform: Nintendo Game Boy Color

Our next entry into the GTW archives is a very early Game Boy Color title called MBC that was being created by a developer/artist called Nick London in 1999, before his days of working on Star Wars and Need for Speed games.

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MBC (not sure what it currently stands for!) is a simple platform shooter, sort of like a miniature version of Rolling Thunder, where you have a fun that fires rapidly and needs to be replenished by pressing down on small ammo panels. There is an enemy that paces back and forth, but you cannot harm them in this demo. Continue reading →

Posted in: Game Boy Color, Reviews | Tagged: | Leave a comment

Countdown

Posted: by Frank Gasking

1991 Access/US Gold

Platforms: Commodore Amiga and Atari ST

Countdown was an adventure game consisting of digitized characters and with synthesized speech, eventually released in 1991 for MS-DOS. According to the PC version’s review in The One magazine (February 1991) – Amiga and Atari ST versions were due in autumn of that year.

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Sadly, it was never to be and apart from the mention in The One magazine, there has been no further details about either of the conversions. The question is whether they were ever started and if so, how far did they get? Continue reading →

Posted in: Atari ST, Commodore Amiga, Reviews | Tagged: | Leave a comment

Tip Off Game Boy and GBC Color prototypes

Posted: by Frank Gasking

More Game Boy prototypes added to the Games That Weren’t archives, with a set of Tip Off ones for the Nintendo Game Boy. However, there are also an interesting set of early Game Boy Color versions that we have also included. More on that a bit later.

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The Game Boy prototypes date from the 10th November 1992 to 22nd February 1994. There is a build that had a timestamp of 22-10-99, but we think this was just from a backup, the same as with another from 2021. Continue reading →

Posted in: Game Boy Color, Nintendo Game Boy, Prototype, Unused materials | Tagged: | 2 Comments

X’Treme Roller PlayStation (PS1) Prototypes

Posted: by Frank Gasking

Following on from the discovery of an early PC demo of X’Treme Roller, we now have a set of five prototypes for the Sony PlayStation (PS1) showing very early test builds of the game before it became X’Treme Roller and the game was likely being pitched around to publishers by Neko.

At one stage, it seems DC Studios were working with Neko with a view to using the engine or to get interest to do a joint project.

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The prototypes are dated from the 17th July to the 7th August 2000, with the earlier builds containing a test sea-side route, with ramps, hills and buildings. The main character starts off very slow as they drop onto the course, and then you can kick off to move around. Continue reading →

Posted in: Preservation, Prototype, Sony PlayStation, Unused materials | Tagged: | Leave a comment

X’Treme Roller

Posted: by Frank Gasking

2001 Neko / Microids

Platform: PC

Next into the Games That Weren’t archives is a very rare and early PC demo of X’Treme Roller by Neko, before the name had been decided and when the engine was being put together. The game was eventually released by Microids in 2001, but only on the Sony PlayStation 1 platform.

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An unreleased N64 version was released by Forest of Illusion back in 2021, though nothing of a PC edition has been known about until now. It seems that the PC version was scrapped, along with the N64 edition. Continue reading →

Posted in: PC, Reviews | Tagged: | 2 Comments

Kick Off 3: European Challenge SEGA Mega Drive Prototypes

Posted: by Frank Gasking

Today we’re adding three very early Kick Off 3: European Challenge prototype builds for the SEGA Mega Drive, which are not playable and just showcase part of the main game graphics and unused menus and graphics that never made the final cut.

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These are dated from around February 1994, and long before the final release. The main logo is completely different and the menus also have completely different graphics. Continue reading →

Posted in: Mega Drive / Genesis, Preservation, Prototype, Unused materials | Tagged: | Leave a comment