Games That Weren't^®

Yet another lost SEUCK title, by Asif A Bhagwandin for Commodore Force magazine.

This was an awesome Forgotten Worlds clone just like TAB, and featured very colourful graphics similiar to Creatures (but totally original graphics). According to Asif, this was a pretty darn fine effort and considered to be his best.

Commodore Force were sent a tape containing both Blue Encounter and Alien Realms, and they wished to publish both. Blue Encounter was seen as the poorer game, but good enough for the tape. They were to save Alien Realms to later do a write up on and launch on their covermount. Asif was told that the game was far better than most commercial games out there.

Sadly, the game was due for an issue beyond the last issue of Commodore Force, and no doubt was penned for issue 17/18 of the magazine. The game remained unreleased and Asif later lost all his disks sadly due to flood damage. Last chances of finding the game now remain with his friends having a copy of the game, or possibly someone from the Commodore Force days still having all the tapes and disks from back then. Its unlikely… Asif was however paid for his efforts, but would desperately like to see his work again.

Check out the Creator Speaks page to hear in Asif’s own words…

More needed, but the search begins….

Already GTW pays host to a number of Ultimate games which never saw the light of day, and we bring yet another title which seems to have been considered for the C64 at some point.

Where we had Lunar Jetman being done by Martin Galway, we also had Atic Atac being developed by Stuart Fotheringham and possibly Marc Dawson.

Upon discovery of the Megatree disks by Retro Gamer magazine, there was found to be a rather interesting file called Atic, which turned out to be a charset of all the game’s graphics.

When questioned, Stuart recalled that they ported the graphics but could not remember anything about a conversion.

It is therefore possible that ideas were put down to convert the game to the C64, and the charset was ported down as a result. We need to find out more, but there could be some code out there. We just need to find someone who knows more than we do about this.

However, in 2020 Ste Day, Saul Cross and Tomcat/Nostalgia joined forces to create the conversion the Commodore 64 has longed for. It is a stunning conversion with a lot of enhancements to make it stand apart from its original ZX Spectrum incarnation – but with plenty of respect given to the original.  We highly recommend you check it out: https://csdb.dk/release/?id=188753

As for the potential original Ultimate conversion – a lot more research needed, but check out the charset at least for now…

A very short entry for now for a game that was one of many that never quite made it from Crystal Software back in the later end of the 90’s.

This game was an adventure game (We assume text adventure) about a cat called Fritz. It apparently was based on a comic book character by Robert Crumb. The 9 Lives of Fritz the Cat was an unauthorized sequel to the original Ralph Bakshi animated movie.

We know little more about the game, but ex-CEO Alex de Vries of Crystal Software had the following to say which explains why all of these titles never made it:

“I used to be the CEO of Crystal Software back when it was developing and publishing games for the C64 and Amiga platforms before making the transition to PC only. The Legend of Kyril was actually an Austrian project we signed up as a last effort to see if we could sell decent volume on the C64 if the quality was there for the title. Our involvement was purely in sales and marketing and we were never involved in the creative side of things. I wish I could remember the names of the developers but it’s just too long ago.

Code exists for some but I have moved halfway across the world since those days so I don’t know whether anything survived. I don’t have a copy anymore in any case.

We packed it in after 1996 and cancelled all projects for the C64 in Q1 1997. Titles we did (re-)publish were McRat, The Zinj Complex, Target, It’s Magic, Colorzone, Riddles and Stones and a few others. Not the greatest stuff but it was fun while it lasted.”

Then we found these snippets of info about the game in two fanzines. Commodore Bi Monthly said:

“A platform jump and run game with several characters from the classic cartoon. 9 lives make sure that you’ll be hooked throughout 9 worlds and won’t abandon your joystick. The main character has been drawn by the infamous Martin Speelman. Available late August 1997 if the project is to be continued at all.”

Then Zine 64 (Issue 9) reported:

“It is questionable whether this game will be released or not due to copyright reasons (the game bears a striking resemblance to the classic cartoon… We’ll keep you posted.”

Do you know any more about this game?…

Crystal Software and Electronics were an ambitious software house trying to save the C64 gaming market back in 1997 with a large range of planned releases. Sadly it wasn’t to be, and as with other companies – it was found not to be a financially viable proposition to try and make money out of the C64.

Out of the newly planned titles was "6 Kingdoms of Babylon", which was described in adverts as:

"Another big strategy game we will try to develop. No particulars have shown up at our marketing department but we will definately see a sequel to the The Legend of Kyril with this production"

"Secure economic growth and conquer kingdoms to get your place in the history books for the Babylonians in this good looking strategy game."

So it sounds like this was to be a sequel to Legend of Kyril, and as that game didn’t get particularly far – we can assume that maybe this one may not have even got past the planning stage.

Still, its early days and we hope to find out more soon about this one!

A bit of an unknown title this time for the archives, and not one we can write too much about at the moment. More research required and hopefully some scans.

It seems that the game was some kind of Army RPG game with the "General" link in the name, but that is purely speculation. It is unknown who was behind the game, what it was about, how far it got or why it was cancelled.

We need your help on this one, do you know anything about it?

Yet another early version of a released game which has never seen the light of day.

4 Soccer Simulators was previously in production by none other than Simon Nicol, working with Said Hassan of Rigels Revenge fame.

According to Said who recently spoke to GTW, him and Simon were assigned the game (A port of a crappy Z80 game) and the conversion was a real "hack and slash" job. Simon apparently was more for living the life than working, and so the game was a pile of crap.

The Darling’s were apparently not very amused with their Codemaster GOLD title, so they scrapped what Simon and Said produced, and brought other people in quickly put together a better game. Not that the released one was any good anyway…

So now it remains to be seen if a piece of Simon Nicol’s long lost work could be uncovered one day. Even if its a pile of tripe, many fans of Simon’s work would probably be curious to see what his conversion was like.

Said has confirmed that he has nothing of the game, so really it is down only to Simon if he still has the game. Said suggests that Simon may wish to forget this game.

A pile of tripe, but we still want to see it… mad :-) …