Prototype, Beta, pre-release and cancelled games

[Ian Naxieas]

There's been a lot of disappointing cancelled games over the years, but nothing will ever hurt me more than Silent Hills.

I was indifferent about Norman Reedus being involved. Don't get me wrong, I like him as an actor, but I just don't get hyped about celebrities lending their likeness and voice to video games. He was fine in Death Stranding though and I'm sure he would have done fine in Silent Hills too.

Hideo Kojima was an interesting choice as director. I've enjoyed everything I've played of his and I think he would have done a good job as long as he was reigned in. Maybe he'll do some good horror with OD?

Guillermo del Toro was the most interesting choice. He's made some great films and he has a very good handle on things like atmosphere. I was actually pretty hyped when I heard he was involved and I think he would have helped reign Kojima in. x)

Bleh, now I'm getting sad and irritated thinking about what could have been. If P.T. was anything to go by, I think it would have been a quality experience and a quality experience is exactly what Silent Hill needed after the games post Team Silent. I'm not too confident in what we're going to be getting with SH's revival, but I hope I'm surprised.

TL: DR - Fuck you Konami.

 

[Ligeia]

It's not exactly a cancelled game but I was majorly pissed when the Fire Emblem Path of Radiance sequel was cancelled on Gamecube and moved to the Wii. Radiant Dawn was actually the reason why I bought a Wii and the game turned out to be a disappointment

I'll never understand why they always do this.
Fan projects (fan games, fan movies, etc.) are a love letter from the fans to their favorite series.
It's like slapping someone in the face for offering you your favorite food.

Exactly. Fan projets are just keeping franchises alive, or even resurrecting them in some cases.

 

[Deleted member 1816]

It's not exactly a cancelled game but I was majorly pissed when the Fire Emblem Path of Radiance sequel was cancelled on Gamecube and moved to the Wii. Radiant Dawn was actually the reason why I bought a Wii and the game turned out to be a disappointment


Exactly. Fan projets are just keeping franchises alive, or even resurrecting them in some cases.

Tell me about it

 

[MasterEn]

There's been a lot of disappointing cancelled games over the years, but nothing will ever hurt me more than Silent Hills.

I was indifferent about Norman Reedus being involved. Don't get me wrong, I like him as an actor, but I just don't get hyped about celebrities lending their likeness and voice to video games. He was fine in Death Stranding though and I'm sure he would have done fine in Silent Hills too.

Hideo Kojima was an interesting choice as director. I've enjoyed everything I've played of his and I think he would have done a good job as long as he was reigned in. Maybe he'll do some good horror with OD?

Guillermo del Toro was the most interesting choice. He's made some great films and he has a very good handle on things like atmosphere. I was actually pretty hyped when I heard he was involved and I think he would have helped reign Kojima in. x)

Bleh, now I'm getting sad and irritated thinking about what could have been. If P.T. was anything to go by, I think it would have been a quality experience and a quality experience is exactly what Silent Hill needed after the games post Team Silent. I'm not too confident in what we're going to be getting with SH's revival, but I hope I'm surprised.

TL: DR - Fuck you Konami.

that would have been the one silent hill game that i would own and play.

 

[Dai]

Dragon Quest 4 for PS1, i had 7 and there were images on the back of the manual, at least it was released in japan, so maybe some day we'll see it fan translated.

 

[hazys]

Nothing will ever disappoint me more than the cancellation of Mega Man Legends 3. Deep Down is somewhere up there though.

 

[PrismRed]

P.T. as mentioned before.

Daredevil on PS2, once saw an ad for it on magazine thinking it was gonna be released soon, turns out that's not the case.

Steambot Chronicles 2 was planned for PS3, the first one is one my favorite games of all time, it was cancelled due to 2011 Tohoku earthquake.
Damn you mother nature!!!!!!!!!!

 

[Deleted member 1816]

Nothing will ever disappoint me more than the cancellation of Mega Man Legends 3. Deep Down is somewhere up there though.

Maybe, in an alternate universe, Mega man legends 3 was never canceled, but life never goes the way you want. That's how it is.

 

[MasterEn]

Nothing will ever disappoint me more than the cancellation of Mega Man Legends 3. Deep Down is somewhere up there though.

i read about that on Wikipedia in about 2011.
two sentences.
it was announced.
it was cancelled.
i got hopelash, as dale gribble called it.

 

[Sayo Sayo]

Nothing will ever disappoint me more than the cancellation of Mega Man Legends 3. Deep Down is somewhere up there though.

I'm still waiting

 

[Evaccaneer Doom]

Kirby GCN. I don't care that it was proto RtDL, it looked cool. Like an updated Kirby 64

Castlevania Resurrection also would've been cool because Sonia would be canon and Castlevania on Dreamcast sounds so interesting. Also Sonic Xtreme obviously, it's shrouded in so much mystery and even had a new character and Sega still hasn't considered picking it back up.

 

[Grumpy_Old_Man]

Bumpy Trot 2, the sequel to what the west got as Steambot chronicles. A PS2 game that is part open world, part mecha combat and customization and part rhythm game.

 

[sombreguitar]

The cancelled Killing Bites fighting game

 

[Jotaro]

the ff versus 13 hype kino was something else back there

 

[hazys]

I wasn't really following it as it was being developed, but I will never forgive Capcom for cancelling this and giving us Final Fight Streetwise instead.

 

[MegaHiro91]

Naughty Dog suddenly "grew up" and considered themselves "too mature" for the cartoony style of game that was Jak & Daxter. As such, the concept they had for Jak 4 eventually evolved into something dark and gritty they felt was too removed from the heart of that franchise, which is why Jak 4 morphed into The Last of Us.

While I love The Last of Us, great game, I still cry myself to sleep. I mean if ND aren't gonna do jak with Jak anymore, why not outsource him? Or are they open to outsourcing but no one wants to touch the IP?

It just doesn't seem fair when a franchise like Ratchet just keeps on going and going. Even Sly disappeared off the map after 4 on the PS3.

 

[Dyne]

A new Legacy of Kain game

 

[HexGramarye]

Final Fantasy Versus XIII. I know XV exists and is also pretty good, but the brutalist skyscraper-filled gothic story about star-crossed lovers just wasn't the same as the boy brand road trip in rural Texas we ended up getting.

 

[Ikagura Ikagura]

Duke Nukem Forever. What? No, not the 2011 game, I'm speaking about the 2001 build

Perfect Dark Core (the actual sequel to the original 64 game).

Prey 2

Oni 2

Yeah that's a lot of sequels.

 

[Jotaro]

also this game here had lot of hype back in the 00s, it was supposed to be a trigun game [from the author who also did gungrave], but was sadly cancelled, and it looked so cool, for shame

 

[PhrawzT]

Kingdoms of Amalur 2, I loved the first game and the 38 Studios had been planning on making a sequel. EA started pushing them to turn it into a MMO, but they pushed back and shortly afterwards they went out of business and the project was cancelled completely.

 

[Lena CE]

God, I can't imagine how much space I could fill just whining about all the cancelled projects that have broken my heart over the years. The first one to break my heart was the Command & Conquer spin-off, Tiberium.



I didn't really keep up with games that much as a kid despite loving them so much. I watched G4 sporadically but aside from that my only real source of video game news would be old video game magazines that my grandma would pick up from garage sales. One such issue would be the January 2008 issue of Game Informer that featured Tiberium - an FPS spin-off of the then-relevant Command & Conquer franchise - on the cover.



I was a massive C&C fan, having replayed the campaigns endlessly and getting pretty solid at the multiplayer for Generals and a previous C&C spin-off called Command & Conquer Renegades. Much like Tiberium, Renegades was an FPS that attempted to mimic an RTS by way of letting you control AI companions or call in reinforcements/vehicles via a resource system. A full campaign and multiplayer suite were planned before the game was ultimately cancelled due to not meeting internal quality standards. This issue of Game Informer was the first I had ever heard of the game upon my grandma giving it to me in 2009. I poured over it endlessly and having seen the 2008 release date in the magazine, assuming it was already out. Again, my only real source of games were these older issues of GI, the odd G4 episode of Electric Playground or X-Play that I'd catch or physically seeing it on store shelves.

So, when I walked into Gamestop a month or so later to ask for a copy of Tiberium only to find out it had been canned, I was utterly devastated. I saw it on the cover of a magazine, they had gameplay screenshots! The story was finished, they had all these CG cutscenes finished for the game. How in the world could it just... Disappear? The concept of cancelling games did not exist to 14 year old me, I had somehow remained naive all that time.

Eventually I'd go on to discover that another C&C spin-off shooter, this time one set in the Red Alert universe billed as a Renegade 2, was also cancelled years prior. I'd also find out that a zombie based survival FPS for the Xbox made with the help of George Romero that I had read about in another old issue of GI was also canned. The list has only grown larger since then.

Squad-based shooters, FPS in general and RTS are such important genres to me and it is truly a shame we have had so few attempts to meaningfully meld them together. This game was attempting to go further than almost any game had at combining them all and it is a shame that EA didn't see the product as worthy of being released. Considering how late into development it was cancelled I'm inclined to believe they had plenty of reason to axe the project. Normally if something is axed for pettier reasons it happens before it is *allegedly* 90% finished and is a few months from launch.

 

[Tonberry]

Naughty Dog suddenly "grew up" and considered themselves "too mature" for the cartoony style of game that was Jak & Daxter. As such, the concept they had for Jak 4 eventually evolved into something dark and gritty they felt was too removed from the heart of that franchise, which is why Jak 4 morphed into The Last of Us.

While I love The Last of Us, great game, I still cry myself to sleep. I mean if ND aren't gonna do jak with Jak anymore, why not outsource him? Or are they open to outsourcing but no one wants to touch the IP?

It just doesn't seem fair when a franchise like Ratchet just keeps on going and going. Even Sly disappeared off the map after 4 on the PS3.
View attachment 17374

I remember when these screenshots first appeared everyone ridiculed them.

The thing that makes me think canning this was probably a good move is how it’d likely just be a shooter with climbing elements, like Uncharted. I’m not sure personally how a new JD game would play, but I’m happy with the ones we got.

mean if ND aren't gonna do jak with Jak anymore, why not outsource him?

They already did that with Lost Frontier and it was pretty bad.

 

[MegaHiro91]

I remember when these screenshots first appeared everyone ridiculed them.

The thing that makes me think canning this was probably a good move is how it’d likely just be a shooter with climbing elements, like Uncharted. I’m not sure personally how a new JD game would play, but I’m happy with the ones we got.


They already did that with Lost Frontier and it was pretty bad.

I agree that converting the artwork they had into Last of Us was the best move, I am just sad that they completely abandoned all hopes of a Jak 4 because, again, they felt they had grown out of cartoons.

Yes, Lost Frontier was bad, but then give someone else a shot? One studio messing up shouldn't mean the definitive death of the IP. I mean, how many other franchises screw up and are still going strong? Granted these days games are so expensive to make that no studio would dare start a project they don't know for sure will be a home run... but Lost Frontier was on the PS2, yet no else gave the series a try on PS3 or 4?

 

[Tonberry]

I agree that converting the artwork they had into Last of Us was the best move, I am just sad that they completely abandoned all hopes of a Jak 4 because, again, they felt they had grown out of cartoons.

Yes, Lost Frontier was bad, but then give someone else a shot? One studio messing up shouldn't mean the definitive death of the IP. I mean, how many other franchises screw up and are still going strong? Granted these days games are so expensive to make that no studio would dare start a project they don't know for sure will be a home run... but Lost Frontier was on the PS2, yet no else gave the series a try on PS3 or 4?

Not to be pedantic but it was actually a PS2 port of a PSP game
I agree with your sentiment though, they could give it to someone else, but I guess they don’t want to. Outsourcing in that way is still pretty rare in games I feel.