Preserving Cancelled & Unreleased Video Game History Since 1999
Welcome to Games That Weren't!
We are an 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.
A short entry for a series of titles by The Steam Powered Computer Company which were highlighted by contributor Dan Warren.
At present, the only game by the company in the archives is The Inheritance, which was released in 1985 by the company. The advert shown here was from August 1984, which suggests that these games were released and it wasn’t a case of the company disappearing before they could sneak out.
It seems the games were only sold by mail-order, so they may have sold very limited numbers overall. The titles in the advert were as follows:
42 Camelot Close – Graphic text adventure
Trolls Cavern – Animated adventure
Holocaust – War game
Tycoon – Strategy game
Copter Run / Zaphon Attack – Double pack arcade action.
Mouse Muddle / Nine Lives – Double pack educational games.
All the games were listed as having “Rocket” express loading, and other games listed as coming soon were:
The Cure – 1000 location text adventure
Siege – Battle simulation
Neptunes Lair – Underwater adventure
How many of these games actually made it out, and can you help us preserve them?
An interesting looking title which looks a lot like Dicky’s Diamonds, but was a US based release that was going to be on cartridge back in early 1984.
The game was reviewed by Electronic Fun with Computers and Games magazine, January 1984 and you must free jewels from a series of progressively harder spider webs.
We know at least that the game was complete due to the review, so was it actually ever released at all? Maybe in limited numbers?
Early days, but we hope to find something of this game soon!
A short entry for what was an Italian graphic text adventure which is currently at large. The same developer has a number of other creations already in Gamebase, but this this title and one other has yet to be found.
Interestingly both were credited as being published by Arscom, so did the company go under before the games were released?
A short entry for what was an Italian graphic text adventure which is currently at large. The same developer has a number of other creations already in Gamebase, but this this title and one other has yet to be found.
Interestingly both were credited as being published by Arscom, so did the company go under before the games were released?
A short entry for a title which may well have been actually released, but is currently missing from the archives.
Bailiff was an educational game and was described as follows in an advert in Commodore User magazine:
Age guide 14 to adult
Content: 1300+ words with difficult and confusing beginnings and endings. These prefixes and suffixes cause great problems, and the only way to learn them is practice. Before you begin, you are tested to assess your level, and you are scored on the basis of this. You have to work at the spelling until you reach 100% on every round. The game – every time you spell a word right, a guest arrives at your hotel. A mistake, and you lose a guest. If you lose too many, the bank calls in the bailiffs. If you do well, you move up to a better hotel. Bailiff also has a practice option (you select the words you want to study, and work through them without playing the game); an analysis of mistakes; and a survey of words in each section.
The game was advertised alongside a number of other Sulis titles, all of which are currently in Gamebase64.
So what of Bailiff? Was it actually released, or was it perhaps cancelled for reasons currently unknown? Thanks to Stone Oakvalley, the game was found on an archived disk – but seems to be currently broken. Can anyone help get it running properly?
Hopefully we will find out more soon and get this title preserved with any luck.
The game it seems was due to have a Commodore 64 conversion, but was cancelled before it could be complete. We are not sure why at this stage, but the demo disk was within the collection of former developed Chris Oberth, who sadly passed away back in 2012.
The game was up for auction and finished at $203.50 overall – sadly too much for us to try and make a bid to preserve it. It is hoped that the demo will be won by someone who will digitally preserve the disk contents and make available for posterity, otherwise we will need to research more into Mirror Images software and try and trace the demo via other means.
So far we have learnt thanks to Linda Richter that Mirror Images Software was part of a start up from something called the RPI Incubator program in New York. There was also Mirror Images Business Systems that specialised in business software. The only current known C64 work that was done was this game called Boppie’s Great Word Chase. Interestingly this was done in 1985, suggesting that maybe Freddy Fish (done in 1984) may have been cancelled for other reasons than the company closing its doors.
Linda didn’t know about the C64 conversion of Freddy Fish, but passed on some very useful information which will hopefully lead us to more details about the conversion. It seems that Mirror Images Software didn’t last long, and focus was moved to the business operation that was a more profitable overall. This therefore is the likely reason that Freddy Fish wasn’t completed and converted across.
A short entry for a Grolier Electronic Publishing game spotted by Peter Weighill in an issue of Family Computing magazine October 1984.
Secrets of Science was described in the advert as follows:
“Secrets of Science Island guides you on a race against time to build a shelter before a hurricane strikes. This also includes a book called Science Facts You Won’t Believe to help you with the game.”‹”‹”
Along with Treasure Hunter, both games were published on the Apple II, though the advert says they are coming soon for the Commodore 64. Unfortunately both seem to still be missing, so we are uncertain if they ever got released or were just released in limited numbers.
A short entry for a Grolier Electronic Publishing game spotted by Peter Weighill in an issue of Family Computing magazine October 1984.
Treasure Hunter was described in the advert as follows:
“Treasure Hunter which takes the whole family on an educational treasure-finding adventure with help from the Explorers and Discovery book.”‹”
Along with Secrets of Science, both games were published on the Apple II, though the advert says they are coming soon for the Commodore 64. Unfortunately both seem to still be missing, so we are uncertain if they ever got released or were just released in limited numbers.
Underland was to be a RPG trading game by the looks of it, being developed by Marcus Wagner back in 2007.
On the website (which is still currently active here) details the game as having the following special features:
5 dungeons with 9 levels each
approx. 100 objects
36 monsters
3 different classes
22 animated spells
Unfortunately the game seems to have been abandoned, but Laxity released a preview of the game showing how it was shaping up. We’ve added a number of screenshots here as well, showing some of the character concepts that would have featured.
We currently don’t know why the game was cancelled or how much further it got, but hope to find out more soon. For now, check out what looked to be a promising title.
Catch’em was a pretty good Amiga/DOS platformer which came out in 1992 and had you having to return escaped animals to a zoo. He does this by tempting them with bananas and then hitting them with a baseball bat for example. More details can be found here on the Amiga version.
Thanks to contributor Riemann80, we learn that a C64 version was on the cards as well, as the manual states C64 loading instructions, but crucially the credits!
The game was apparently being done by none other than Hannes Sommer, who later went on to do the Fred’s Back series and Lions of the Universe. We hope to get hold of Hannes again soon to find out more about the conversion and what happened.
DISCLAIMER: We are a non-profit digitisation project, aiming to digitally preserve software and history 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.
Games That Weren't® is the registered trademark of Frank Gasking.
