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

Wing Star

Posted: , last updated: by Frank Gasking

1994 TBA Software

Platform: Acorn Archimedes

Wing Star was the start of a new journey for developer Martin Piper, though he didn’t quite know it at the time. As you might well guess, the game was heavily inspired by the recent release of Star Fox (Star Wing in some places) on the Super Nintendo in 1992.

wing star2

Owner of an Archimedes, Martin and his childhood friend Alan Peters, decided to see if they could make something similar on the platform and started to create a tech demo in late 1992. It wasn’t planned to be a full on clone of Star Fox, which of course would have resulted in all kinds of legal issues. Continue reading →

Posted in: Archimedes, Reviews | Tagged: | 1 Comment

Early screens Robocop, Predator, R-Type

Posted: , last updated: by Frank Gasking

A few quick early screens that have been spotted by Martin Inter recently, in particular for the C64 conversions of Robocop, Predator and R-Type in Zzap Italia.

Predator and R-Type are quite small oddities, but for Robocop, in the Zzap Italia review was a factory level with a very different looking background with different colours and also doors not present in the final game:

robocopv1

With Predator, there are some early screens with slightly different graphics and no score panel at all: Continue reading →

Posted in: Commodore 64 (C64), GTW64 news, Prototype, Unused materials | Tagged: | Leave a comment

Thank you!

Posted: by Frank Gasking

Just a quick post to say thank you to the contributor today who passed on some information regarding some C64 titles. They didn’t leave a proper email/name for credit, so hence this post.

Most appreciated, and I’ll update the relevant pages + add new content sometime next week.

Posted in: GTW64 news, News | Leave a comment

Early screens from XCOM

Posted: , last updated: by Frank Gasking
Platforms: Sony PlayStation 3, Microsoft XBOX 360, PC and Mac

Released eventually in 2013 as The Bureau: XCOM Declassified, the game was a long and troubled development overall, having started way back in 2006.

xcom5

GTW staff member Ross Sillifant dug out some screens from a GamesTM magazine article which shows a few screens during the transition phase over from XCOM to The Bureau: XCOM Declassified, where the game moved from a first person shooter to a more tactical-based game. Continue reading →

Posted in: Apple iOS, Microsoft Xbox 360, PC, Prototype, Sony PlayStation 3 | Tagged: | Leave a comment

Platoon early differences (C64)

Posted: , last updated: by Frank Gasking

Platoon was a superb movie tie-in game from Ocean Software back in 1988 with some excellent varied levels that captured the essence of the movie.

Thanks to contributor Martin Inter, here are some slightly earlier Commodore 64 screens which show some differences to the final game.

platv1 1

Firstly we have a very different and early score panel for the tunnel section in the game, followed by another level that shows “Stamina” and “Bullets” as text instead of “Morale” and “Ammo” like in the final game. Continue reading →

Posted in: Commodore 64 (C64), GTW64 news, Prototype | Tagged: | 4 Comments

Thundercats early screens

Posted: , last updated: by Frank Gasking
Platforms: ZX Spectrum and Commodore 64

Over the years we have figured out at GTW64 about the connection between Thundercats and the unreleased Wolf by Gargoyle Games – as well as Bombjack 2 and Beyond the Ice Palace originally intended to be two follow on Thundercats games, which you can read about here and here.

The released game however continues to reveal more mysteries thanks to Martin Inter, who has highlighted that adverts for the game and the main inlay itself show scenes from the game that were not in the final version.

Above for instance are two scenes from the C64 edition showing a level not seemingly present in the final game, and also Lion-O in a stance not present either. Continue reading →

Posted in: Amstrad CPC, Commodore 64 (C64), GTW64 news, Prototype, Unused materials, ZX Spectrum | Tagged: | 2 Comments

GTW64 February 2022 update

Posted: , last updated: by Frank Gasking

Another month, and another GTW64 update with a bunch of new entries, including some new downloads for you to check out that haven’t been previously preserved as far as we can tell.  These are Ladders 2, Ex Simultan and Maerzi 2 (all thanks to Csaba Virag). Also finally the Anirog version of Rhyme Land has been added! Hope you enjoy the update, and see you all in March!

7 new entries added

Enforce, Lifespan, Shoot Out, Top-Hole Golf, Ladders 2, Ex Simultan and Maerzi 2

13 updates added

Balla Balla, Charlie Chaplin, Heebie Jeebies, It’s Rory!, Joust, Knights of Legend Expansion Packs, Mattie Goes Mining, Ooops Up, Pulsator, Rockball, Rhyme Land, Spooky, The Magic Roundabout

Posted in: GTW64 news, News | Leave a comment

Parasol Stars

Posted: , last updated: by Frank Gasking

1990 Taito

Platform: Arcade, Taito WOWOW

What has always been fascinating is how Parasol Stars never seemingly saw a proper release in arcades, and was only released on consoles and home computer platforms (the story of the C64 edition is of course already well known).

According to contributor Daniel, the developers of the PC Engine version were contacted (source: https://unmamed.mameworld.info/non_taito.html#ParasolStars) and asked if the game was converted from an arcade machine that was never released. They confirmed that it was developed from scratch specifically for the console.

parasol stars earlyscreen

However, it was revealed that the game was location tested as an arcade cabinet in one or more sites in Japan. It was essentially a PC-Engine inside an arcade cabinet.

Reports at unmamed.mameworld suggest that around the time of the US launch of the PC-Engine/Turbografx system, there was a local arcade that had Victory Run and Galaga ’90 in a cabinet advertising the Turbografx-16 system – suggesting this could have been the plan for Parasol Stars’ release. Continue reading →

Posted in: Arcade, Reviews, Taito WOWOW | Tagged: | 7 Comments

Body Count

Posted: , last updated: by Frank Gasking

1992 Strangeways

Platform: Commodore Amiga and Super Nintendo

Our next entry is a very early title that was flagged up to us by team member Karl Kuras, who spotted this interesting early Smash TV-looking title that was due for release from Strangeways.

bcount large1

It hadn’t been long at all since Ocean’s official Smash TV conversion, so it was potentially a ballsy move by Strangeways to try and do something similar. The game was also apparently based around a futuristic TV game show and followed almost the exact same style of story line. Continue reading →

Posted in: Commodore Amiga, Reviews, Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES) | Tagged: | Leave a comment

Crazy Cars 3 Amiga early screens

Posted: , last updated: by Frank Gasking

A quick post thanks to team member Grzegorz Antosiewicz, who has found a set of early Crazy Cars 3 screenshots in Generation 4 magazine from June 1991, which show a very different looking game overall to the one that was eventually released:

Clipboard01 1
As you can see, the screenshots show different and bigger sprites for the cars, less detailed roads and a very early HUD.

Clipboard02 2

Essentially a complete redesign occurred. It would be very interesting to see this early prototype in action and see just how much of a different direction the game was going in.

With thanks to Grzegorz Antosiewicz for highlighting and the scans provided.

Posted in: Commodore Amiga, Prototype, Unused materials | Tagged: | 2 Comments