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 since 1999.

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

Latest News and Posts

Ash and Dave assets

Ashley Routledge recently in 2015 loaned his C64 disks for GTW64 to do a large preservation job. Mostly to try and see if we could recover Daffy Duck, but also to preserve any potentially lost demos, artwork and just Ash’s work in general before the disks deteriorated. A massive thank you to Ashley Routledge allowing us to preserve his disks with the hope that we could find some lost works by the famous duo.

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Lotus Esprit Turbo Challenge early proto

Ok, so we’re not talking about a majorly different conversion that was in the works, but some fairly significant differences compared to the final edition that eventually ended up on the C64.

Many of you may remember the rolling demo of Lotus Esprit Turbo Challenge on the C64 and being wowed by it. Did you spot the differences between that and the final version? No? Well, here we go…

lotus-demo
The Commodore Format demo from Power Pack 4

Of course, very often when a preview is released – there can still be some significant amount of work left to do or changes which are requested. Seems like Lotus was no different, and there were some visible changes made just before release.

The final release
The final release

Firstly, there are two cosmetic changes which stand out. One where the score panel has been improved and bulked out a little – nothing too special. The other is significantly the removal of the red and white road banding that appears at the side. It’s a shame, as it looks great in the demo – but we are guessing that it was removed to compensate for speed – which does seem a lot quicker in the final release.

There also is the inclusion of a white counter in the top right corner of both screens, but the final different is a bit more subtle…

If you check the top cars in both of the above screenshots, you’ll notice that the demo features an extra frame of animation where the car turns inwards more. It’s been cut out for some reason on the final game, which we’re not entirely sure why. Maybe it was to squeeze more road objects into the game?

Looking into the game a bit more – it seems that the cars were entirely drawn via character blocks in the demo version, with the red/white bands being handled by expanded sprites which were overlaid onto the sides of the road. When the banding was dropped in the final game, it seems those sprite frames were replaced by the main car in its largest state – with the smaller state (where the car is in the distance) handled by characters still.

In early 2016, this was spotted in an old issue of Zzap 64 …

lotus-early2

Sadly no colour screenshot, but here you can see the status panels being different yet again, a familiar red/white road effect (using expanded sprites like in the rolling demo), but it seems very different looking cars and darker shading effects on the mountains in the distance. There may not have been any raster bars either at this point – so a very early version!

But then here is a colour shot thanks to Martin/Stadium 64! …

lotusespritturbochallenge_cvg_10_1990

And to conclude, here are some more images relating to the earlier edition and the programmer. Click each to view full version.

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

Soul Gem remains found and more!

Another big finding for 2015!….

Soul Gem Of Martek recovered

Unfortunately not the full game (which may not have existed), but GTW is proud to present remains of a title that has been missing for over 30 years.

soul1

Amazingly, not just remains of the game were found – but the actual inlays and tape were present and have been preserved via scans:

Soul Gem of Martek

1 new entry added

Tobor

9 updates added

C64GS cartridge titles, 3-2-1 Quiz game, Captain Stark, Haunted, Knuckles, Laser Cycle, Last Ninja V1, Myth 2, Twister, Your Computer Software Exchange

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Three full games recovered and released!

We’re back after a short break with some more C64 recovery work with the following new findings and updates:

Quadrofender full game found and released

A complete 1990 budget title from Clockwize has been recovered from disk and released for the first time, including unheard Sonic Graffiti tunes.

quadro2

Quadrofender

Quadrant 4 full game found and released

And yet another full budget game from Clockwize – this time a simple 1989 Uridium clone which never saw the light of day until now!

quandrant4-2

Quadrant 4

Urban Warrior full game found and released

And to complete a hat trick – here is a commercial SEUCK title from 1988 that was due for release by Video Images, but never made it due to a design bug which made it unplayable in places. Who fancies fixing it? ;-)

urban-warrior3

Urban Warrior

4 other new entries added

Day Of The Pharaoh, Fight Night V1, Rob’n Run, Time Fighter

And also 13 updates have been made:

Alien Vs Predator, Chess, DDT: Dynamic Debugger, Daffy Duck, Go Ape!, Heavy Barrel, International Karate Deluxe, Murder!, Psyclapse, Rhyme Land, Speed Fighter, Twilight Beyond, World Cup Carnival V1

More to come soon! Watch this space!

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Tarzan Goes Ape V1 remains recovered!

Another surprise finding, this time of an aborted early conversion of Codemasters’ Tarzan Goes Ape game, which looks very different to the final released version, with far better graphics.

tarzan1

It isn’t sadly too playable, but you can sort of move the character around and use Q and A to scroll the map. Download the preview and checkout the story behind its finding here:

Tarzan Goes Ape V1

Posted in: Commodore 64 (C64), GTW64 news | Leave a comment

Shutdown recovered and released!

Yet another PAL developments game has been fully recovered and released, and its another full game.

shutdown2

Thanks to sterling work by Dean Hickingbottom to recover the game from his C64 disks and recompile it after 26 years, we are proud to present this conversion of a Spectrum/Amstrad game that should have been released across all formats by PAL developments, but for reasons unknown, never got out the door. Enjoy!

Shutdown game

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A quick September GTW64 update

A short GTW64 update to keep things moving and show some quick updates that have been going on.

Nuclear Nick recovered and released

After 30 years of being missing, a preview build of Nuclear Nick has been recovered by Peepo and the guys at Triad. Check it out!…

Nuclear Nick

1 new entry added

Fatman

5 updates added

Cycleburner, Enforcer 2, Lethal Xcess, Zorakk, Zwei Bereten

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Daffy Duck – recovered and released!

Something I was beginning to think I would never get to say!

Just over 18 years worth of searching for Games That Weren’t – we are very proud to to present the fully recovered “Daffy Duck – And The Great Paint Caper”. It’s been some journey for us, but the full game was recovered in PDS source form and carefully constructed over the past month or so. Full details can be read in the main entry about how the game was found, and of course how we ever got to this stage.

daffy7

Finally, you can now play the game as Hi-tec intended – and it certainly lives up to its glowing review from Zzap 64. Seasoned gamers will have no problem getting through it, but it is an important piece of C64 history now digitally preserved for posterity and which could well have been lost forever. Enjoy! :)

Daffy Duck – And The Great Paint Caper

Posted in: Commodore 64 (C64), GTW64 news | 8 Comments