Welcome to Games That Weren't (Also known as GTW), a site dedicated to unreleased/incomplete/cancelled games and prototypes on both consoles and computers. As well as news, reviews and features, we have platform specific projects with downloads, photos, scans, screenshots, videos, reviews and interviews. Our main platforms consist of the C64 and Amiga, where there is a full digital archive of games being preserved for both machines.
Please note - we are a non-profit digitization project, aiming to digitally preserve history of unreleased/incomplete/cancelled software which would otherwise be lost for good. If for any reason there is anything that you do not wish to be on the website, please contact us for removal.
Thanks to Ross Sillifant for the heads up, this is a new and previously unseen Game Boy game that was due for release back in 1994 and was recently recovered and released by AIR Entertainment.
It is a pretty neat puzzle game that is around 99% complete, just missing some final polish. It’s unsure at present why the game never saw release, but check here for more details about the game and download below:
After 5 years of work (give or take), we’re pleased to announce The Games That Weren’t book coming soon in May 2020 from Bitmap Books, covering unreleased games since the dawn of the industry.
More details coming soon, but very excited to finally share the news after keeping quiet for so long.
Official details from Bitmap Books: https://mailchi.mp/6f0f8bd57e2e/bitmap-books-crpg-1703525?fbclid=IwAR2MjfMZqmIE0GP1Ea6nygOryTX3fDT0UawaoK2VLqF5No9xM_kxeLDWEmU
A short entry for what was to be an educational based title created for the Sony PlayStation by Runecraft around 1999 time, based on the famous childrens series.
Thanks to lead artist David Tolley, we are able to show you a brief glimpse of some of the game assets (and quick photos of the design document) that David recovered recently from an old hard-drive.
The characters and backgrounds were modelled from the children’s books, but according to David, the game never got very far at all. Just a few test demos were made showing the graphics moving about – one of the screens we’re about to show is of the test engine.
Thanks to David Tolley and Ross Sillifant, here are some assets which were intended for use in the unreleased and incomplete Power Crystal for the 3DO M2 platform.
Within the gallery below are a number of assets showing game option screens, game icons, map tiles and sprite billboards. File: 4_ICONS1 in particular show trade items, with the rest being various different weapons,armour and power ups that may or may not have been implemented in the game.
Over time it is hoped that more will be uncovered and added to the archive.
Dave Moore (Aka Arcadian) has informed Games That Weren’t that the long lost BBC Micro version of Knight Orc has been found. In almost a one in a million discovery, the game was located at the Centre of Computer History within their archives – stuffed within an 8-bit Atari copy of the game.
Members of stardot.org.uk successfully archived and preserved the game at a weekend ABug meetup in Cambridge and have now made the game available for all to check out for the first time in over 30 years.
For more details about how it was recovered and to download the game, please go to: https://stardot.org.uk/forums/viewtopic.php?f=32&t=17952
A short post thanks to contributor Daniel Meléndez, who spotted Daley Thompson playing a slightly different looking Daley Thompson’s Decathlon game on the Commodore 64:
Not massive differences it has to be said, apart from the panel boards and the score display section. Here is the released version as a comparison (Screenshot taken from Lemon64)
Often early builds would change their panels/layouts slightly over time. Would be interesting to know if there were any other major differences between what Daley was playing above and what we got to see in the end.
Thanks to Allan Pinkerton, who has very kindly preserved missing copies of Basic Tools, Creators Revenge (Already out there as Metamorphosis III – The Creators Revenge), Math Pack and Math Flash.
They are not strictly ‘Games That Weren’t’, but we want to try and share any preservation work where possible for titles that had been missing – so here we go:
Although not an unreleased game as such, this is an obscure C64 based compilation that was released late in the C64’s life, which featured commercial games as PD games. It’s likely not many sold, and as a result hasn’t really been seen in the wild that often.
Thanks to the kind loan from Steve Green, here it is fully preserved with scans of the inlays + tapes:
https://www.gamesthatwerent.com/wp-content/ODUS.zip
Everything is already in the wild already, but its an interesting curiosity preserved.
Well, 2018 went far too quick! It’s been almost a year since our last update, which wasn’t really the intention and isn’t the norm. I had planned to take a few months break and then continue as usual, but unfortunately various personal challenges got in the way and also there has been the completion/continuation of a project I have been working on for almost 5 years. All will hopefully be revealed on that soon in 2019!
As a result, I have not taken in any donations for hosting costs this year, as I haven’t really offered you anything in return this year.
Overall, our yearly Christmas update this year is not quite the same as previous years. For a start, I have no new findings to offer for the first time in a long time because i’ve not been working on the project. I have been determined to do *something* though, so I have created a number of new entries and made some updates for you. I hope the wonderful influx of new C64 releases this year will have counteracted the lack of input from my side, and I hope to be fully functioning again next year. There is still plenty of work to be done!
Merry Christmas to all and all the best for 2019, as we kick off our update:
4 Games, Abandon Ship S.O.S., Angry Birds Style, Any Craps 64, Babies of the Dirt, Bimz, Cybex Escape, Dynaboys, Flyboy, Galaxy Patrol, Heartlight64, Le Fantome Vert, Lumberjack Deluxe, Magic, Mekka and Symposium 2000 missing 32k games, Murdlok, Pinball Dreams, Push It, R.I.O.T, Roll-Out, Scramble 2010, The Official Everton F.C. Intelligensia, Top 20, Transforming Overland Robot, Zulp, triFACTa
Academy, Am-Cup, American GI, Breaker, Buggy Ranger, Cave Wizard, Champions, Crossfire Canyon, Dark Sceptre, Dominator V1, European SuperLeague, Eye Of The Moon, International Soccer Challenge, Italian pirated games, Katia, Last Ninja V1, Megatanio, Meurtre À Grande Vitesse, Murder!, Opera House and The Pay Off, Outpost, PT-109, Pet Person, Prometheous, Proteus, Rex Hard, Rhyme Land, Sigue Sigue Sputnik, Test Drive 3, Tour De Force, Toyota Rally, Traffico, Turbo Cup Challenge, Unknown shooter by Kernal, Victory Road (UK version)
We have one last surprise update for 2017, including a preview of an extremely promising game which could still hopefully be finished and taken out of GTW64.  The coder still open to help and suggestions for continuing – can you help?  Also, an unknown and very early shooter preview by Roy Fielding has been added and some quick updates.
All the best for 2018 everyone!
Italian pirated games, Monster Maths, Quark, Quark IX, Traffico
