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.

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The City of ‘Ehdollah

Yet another game advertised by Goldstar in Your Computer magazine 1984.

This was another text adventure which sadly never was! It is currently missing sadly.

It could be a case that the game just hasn’t turned up yet, or it was cancelled because the developers struggled with it. A lot of research needed – Goldstar doesn’t seem to be a well known company, so did they fold early?

The game was actually released for the 48k Spectrum, but was anything ever started of the BBC and C64 versions. It is believed that neither were started.

More info needed for this one…

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Outside

A short entry for a title which was to be an epic role playing game for the C64.

Graphics and music had already been mostly completed, but the game itself hadn’t been programmed.

Development was started around 1991, and finished around 1992 time. The role playing included characters from medieval, end and science fiction times. The player was a single character who can address other characters and join missions.

The display was interesting, with the screen designed as a mirror – the upper part would contain the character arc of the hero as well as current events in text form. The bottom half would be operatable with joystick – where you can control the main character and explore various scenarios.

We have added some screenshots for now, but hope to hear more from the developer and also maybe add some C64 specific images/downloads.

For more details on the game, please be sure to visit:

http://www.c64-spiele.net/t_outside.aspx

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Tobor

A very quick entry for a title that was being developed for System 3 by LT Software (who were to originally do International Karate and Twister on the C64).

This was a robot shooter called TOBOR, which was ROBOT spelt backwards.

We don’t know much else at this stage, but this game never made it either – and we assume fell by the wayside when LT Software went under.

More soon we hope!

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Urban Warrior

Our next game in the archives is an early title from Video Images, who did Exceleron for Commodore User magazine back in the day.

It was a title that would make use of the SEUCK engine, which some companies back then decided was a good idea to make a quick game to release. The game was created by David Bradley and Dean Hickingbottom in 1988 and was to be released as a budget title.

Although the game was developed fairly rapidly, things hit a snag when the team found that the player would get stuck all the time on the map. It wasn’t the usual bug of appearing on a piece of play area that you were not able to move, but down to the map design leading to dead ends. They decided to put one life in the game to get around it, but it didn’t really work.

Sadly the game was abandoned due to the above issues, and was laid to rest on an old disk. That is – until 2015 anyway, when Dean Hickingbottom made some copies of some disks which included the full final version of this game. On another disk was the loading screen that was never used, which we have included here in Koala format.

In December 2015, Richard Bayliss very kindly took up the project of linking the loading screen in and tidying up the game destroying bugs on the map. Once these were fixed, the lives were increased back to their usual amount. A new title tune and colour bars have been added too. There is also a tape edition, which gives a close indication of how it may have been had it been released by someone like Power House or similar at the time.

So thanks to the great efforts of Richard, here is the game how it should have been!

Case closed!

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Quadrant 4

Our next game comes in the shape of a simple Uridium clone that was developed at Clockwize back in 1989, and according to the hidden messages in the code – was developed in only 2-5 days – and over the Xmas/Boxing day period.

It was coded by Craig Wight, with graphics and sound by someone called Budgie (who I have no idea who that is!). Overall, it isn’t the best game in the world and would have struggled against other strong budget titles of the time, but it is worthy of saving none the less. Graphically it isn’t too bad overall!

We don’t know exactly if the game was ever pitched to anyone in particular, or if it was being set up for a magazine cover – but it never quite happened, whatever the intention for the game. It is believed that the game was actually pitched to Hi-Tec/PAL developments, but turned down. As a result, it has sat dormant for over 25 years on a disk, until Dean Hickingbottom helped to save it by passing on a copy to GTW64 to preserve.

Hopefully in the near future we will get to learn more about the intentions for the game, but for now – here is the complete game for your enjoyment!

 

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Quadrofender

Yet another Clockwize title which has been saved from obscurity thanks to Dean Hickingbottom for passing on what is likely the only remaining copy of the game.

This was a title due for release in 1990, and was coded by Craig Wight, with graphics by Craig and Helen Morley. The concept was devised by Craig and a guy called Pete Morley. Music is previously unheard tracks by Sonic Graffiti (who Craig believes was Gez who wrote the these tunes). The game was written between 5/2/1990 and 14/2/1990

We think it was for Clockwize, as the disk was in the possession of Dean – but there are no actual company credits in the game. We are not sure if it was ever pitched to any companies at the time or not, and hope to find out soon.

The aim of the game is to move around the matrix and kill the attackers that are attempting to drain all the matrix energy. If the attackers energy reaches 100%, then it is game over. If your energy reaches 100%, you will move onto the next level.

Overall, its a neat and simple title which it seems a shame never got seen back in the day. Craig recalls that Helen created the logo by tracing from a drawing using a plastic sheet. Also that he probably spent more time on the raster effects than the actual gameplay. If no company picked it up, then surely a magazine cover would have taken the game?

As a result, the game has remained unseen for over 25 years until today – so here it is, and with some previously unheard Sonic Graffiti tunes to boot too! Enjoy!

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Fight Night V1

Thanks to Vinny Mainolfi for the heads up – but it seems that there was a very different looking Fight Night taking shape originally for US Gold back in October 1985.

In their upcoming previews section, Zzap showed screenshots of a game with far more detailed main boxer players – but lacking in the background detail area.

It seems the game never changed developer, so was it a case that the large characters were unworkable?   Maybe the graphics were just mock-ups that were produced for the press?

It’s early days yet, but here are the screenshots and original preview from Zzap to take a look at, as well as more shots from a US Gold article from Your Computer magazine.

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Rob’n Run

Rob’n Run was one of two games that was to be released by a Danish company called “Future Games Development” in the Autumn of 1988.

Sadly it was never to be, but thanks to a search by contributor Mads, we are able to shed some light on them initially to hopefully start off a search for the actual game.

The title itself was almost complete at the time, and was described as an action adventure game set in a pyramid – where you have to complete an amulet scattered around 9 parts of the pyramid. It was praised by the guy who did the article, and a screenshot was also given – which shows a promising looking game.

We don’t know much more than this at the moment, but hope to find out more soon. In the meantime, we have included a rough translation (under Articles) of the original article from IC-RUN 1988. It’s not perfect, but it gives a rough indication of what the game was to be like.

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Time Fighter

Time Fighter was one of two games that was to be released by a Danish company called “Future Games Development” in the Autumn of 1988.

Sadly it was never to be, but thanks to a search by contributor Mads, we are able to shed some light on them initially to hopefully start off a search for the actual game.

The title itself was almost complete at the time, and was described as a pretty poor shoot-em up by the guy who went to see the games running. It was a horizontal scroller that went too fast, and had clumsy graphics. You basically control a man who flies around on a dove and have to shoot witches and other people flying around on a broom. A very simple shooter overall.

We don’t know much more than this at the moment, but hope to find out more soon. In the meantime, we have included a rough translation (under Articles) of the original article from IC-RUN 1988. It’s not perfect, but it gives a rough indication of what the game was to be like.

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Twilight Beyond

Thanks to some excellent contributions recently from a chap called Mads, we are starting to learn about many more titles which are sort of related to Kele Line.

In SOFT 1987 July, there was news that 4 new programmers had joined World Games – Torben Bakager, Casper Gjerris, Bo R. Petersen and Viet Nguyen (who was working on Go Ape). World Games were reported to be creating a budget label called Power Games, with the first title released to be called “Twilight Beyond”.

The game was being developed by Casper Gjerris (Code), Bo Reestrup Petersen (GFX) and Johannes Bjerregaard (Music). The article contains a description of the game and plot, which contributor ‘Anonymous’ (thank you!) has translated for us:

“Power Games’s first game is published in September and belongs in the upper budget end with its 99 kr. The name is Twilight Beyond, which is meant to tell the buyer that he’s facing a fast shoot’em-up game, with lots of action and an ultra-fast side scroll.

Casper Gjerris is the programmer, Bo R. Petersen has done the graphics and Johannes Bjerregård is behind the sound.

The plot will probably be some sentimental stuff or other in the following Star Wars style:
You’re thinking back on that time, when you lived a still and calm life on your parents’ Kryllium Mushroom farm on the idyllic planet of Lorna. But just as often, you wake up screaming and bathing in sweat, when dreaming about that fright night, when Imperial stormtroopers struck like lightning and executed your parents for cooperating with the rebels.

Now, you are one of the rebels, and you are on a dangerous mission to steal the Empire’s latest super space ship, the WWS-14X2 Megablast, which the rebels must have in order to make it through the struggle to follow.

You manage to start the space ship up after several failed attempts, and now it is up to you!
Now is your chance to get your revenge on the Empire…

There will be more than 15 different levels and a piece of music which will increase the atmosphere, as you fight beyond the twilight.”

‘Anonymous’ suggests that the backstory sounds like something the journalist may have made up, but does give a glimpse of what the game was about. Datormagazin briefly mentioned the game too in issue 4-5/1987 (see scans), where they say “It’s going to be a game in proper ‘parallaxdeltauridium’ style”.

Interestingly it seems the music managed to sneak out, but nothing of the game – which you can see a glimpse via a black and white screenshot. Sadly Johannes passed away in recent years, so we will never know his story about the title.

So far, all we know is that it seems that the game was dropped by Casper due to some cooperation problems with the distributor. Therefore, Casper left the C64 and started a new career on the Amiga, where he worked on a new game.

Could anything of this title be saved some day?

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