Uncancelled Games - Back from the dead, vidya zombies

[Rotollo 2]

In recent years games in development hell coming back from the grave has become relatively common, Duke Nukem Forever, Mother 3, The Last Guardian, The list goes on. We have a thread on cancelled games, so I was thinking what about their more lucky (or I guess unlucky in some instances for those that turn out like crap) counterparts. Case in point, the game that inspired this thread:

Metroid Dread was a game originally pitched for the Nintendo DS 15 years ago. due to the lack of hardware power at the time Nintendo decided to cancel it. Now on the Nintendo Switch and working with Mercury Steam, the project has been revived and given new blood
Just a single thing to start the thread off because while Metroid Dread did make me want to make this, I really do love stories from the industry of something thought gone suddenly coming back, post any that come to mind if want to.

 

[Marissa Moira]

Does the news of Plumbers Don't Wear Ties getting a re-release count?

There's also Primal Rage 2 that got scrapped and then rescued and people got it working to the point where it could work in an arcade machine.

 

[Buttigieg2020]

Well hopefully Metroid prime 4 ends up in this thread later

 

[Thumb Butler]

Plumbers Don't Wear Ties re-release?! It was one of my favorites back in the day. There will of course be a tranny mode?

 

[The Cunting Death]

Star Fox 2


Can I count games that got leaked instead despite the fact they were cancelled but almost finished?

 

[Rotollo 2]

Star Fox 2


Can I count games that got leaked instead despite the fact they were cancelled but almost finished?

I mean it's been offically released, on SNES online and SNES Classic but I'd still count it

There's also Primal Rage 2 that got scrapped and then rescued and people got it working to the point where it could work in an arcade machine.

The fascinating thing with primal rage 2 was how the hell of a development warped and altered the producers mind into thinking it was a buggy mess unshippable rather than a poor victim of technology not catching up on consoles and poor timing

 

[The Cunting Death]

I mean it's been offically released, on SNES online and SNES Classic but I'd still count it

The fascinating thing with primal rage 2 was how the hell of a development warped and altered the producers mind into thinking it was a buggy mess unshippable rather than a poor victim of technology not catching up on consoles and poor timing

I meant other games because I have a few that I'll share (including a Dreamcast game that might be in my top 5 favorite Dreamcast games had it actually been released)

 

[Rotollo 2]

I meant other games because I have a few that I'll share (including a Dreamcast game that might be in my top 5 favorite Dreamcast games had it actually been released)

Oh interesting share, especially the dreamcast game, anything involving that console just fascinates me

 

[The Cunting Death]

Oh interesting share, especially the dreamcast game, anything involving that console just fascinates me

Anyways here's Propeller Arena
It was a Dreamcast game developed by AM2 (the same division that made Crazy Taxi) and it was made with Online in mind. It's a dogfighting game with a Pop Punk soundtrack with bands like Rise Against on the soundtrack
The game was 98% complete, the only thing that needed to be done was to ship it and turn the online servers on.
Sadly two things happened:

1) the September 11th Attacks (especially since one of the levels takes place in a New York type place)
2) Sega was discontinuing the Dreamcast and felt there was no need to waste resources on the online mode

Game went unreleased until 2004 when one of Sega's American employees leaked it.

You can easily find it online

 

[Chin of Campbell]

Well hopefully Metroid prime 4 ends up in this thread later

I mean, it already belongs in this thread because even if Nintendo has a stroke and doesn't release it, it's technically been cancelled and uncancelled once. just really, really close together.

I wonder if we'll ever see the mystery Metroid Prime 4: Shitshow Edition. Unlikely, but man it must have been a real garbage fire to throw away 2+ years of dev time.

 

[Duncan Hills Coffee]

Six Days in Fallujah immediately springs to my mind. It was announced way back in 2009 and was going to follow the events of the actual battle, but it was cancelled for being too controversial.

Then just recently it was resumed and it's slated for release this very year. The irony is that it was slammed by right-wing media back in 2009 for trying to portray a real, deadly conflict in the form of a video game, and now it's getting slammed by left-wing media because of racism or something.

 

[Dom Cruise]

I'm assuming they wanted Metroid Dread to be 3D and the DS's 3D often looked like shit, so that was why it was canceled?

Why they didn't just make it 2D like the Castlevanias on there were or Nintendo's own Advance Wars I don't know, but at least we get it in decent 3D now.

I'm still pissed about the DS Zeldas being horrible looking 3D instead of like a better version of the already gorgeous Minish Cap, Nintendo should remake Phantom Hourglass and Spirit Tracks.

 

[whatever I feel like]

Dread was also one of the rumored names for the cancelled (never officially announced) N64 Metroid. So this idea might have been kicking around from all the way back in the post-Super Metroid era. Its also not going to be entirely the same game since Mercury Storm is helping out and incorporating parts of Samus Returns' gameplay into it (not the main counter mechanic, fortunately.)

 

[Pissmaster]

1) the September 11th Attacks (especially since one of the levels takes place in a New York type place)

Oh, that reminds me of a game that almost qualifies for this thread:

Released September 10th, 2001. Holy fucking shit, dude.

The Japanese release was cancelled and replaced with a bundle several years later ostensibly because of 9/11, but that doesn't explain why they went through with the European release. Though I'm sure they already had the cartridges and packaging all printed up and ready to ship before 9/11, and didn't just want to keep them in a warehouse for years, knowing that English-speaking Europeans could just import the American version instead.

On another note, the Japanese version of Advance Wars: Days of Ruin/Dark Conflict got canned, and it was later released as a downloadable Club Nintendo exclusive, as a DSiWare game (only on the 3DS, ironically) under the name Famicom Wars DS: The Lost Light.

Yeah, these barely fit this thread, but it's interesting nonetheless.

 

[The Cunting Death]

I'm assuming they wanted Metroid Dread to be 3D and the DS's 3D often looked like shit, so that was why it was canceled?

Why they didn't just make it 2D like the Castlevanias on there were or Nintendo's own Advance Wars I don't know, but at least we get it in decent 3D now.

I'm still pissed about the DS Zeldas being horrible looking 3D instead of like a better version of the already gorgeous Minish Cap, Nintendo should remake Phantom Hourglass and Spirit Tracks.

from what I'm reading, it was in development at two different points, but both times they were canned because of how underpowered the DS was and Sakamoto wanted it to be handheld

 

[Dom Cruise]

from what I'm reading, it was in development at two different points, but both times they were canned because of how underpowered the DS was and Sakamoto wanted it to be handheld

The DS wasn't too underpowered though, if you're talking 2D, it could put out some really nice looking 2D and that was in fact the evolutionary endpoint of pixel art 2D, never since has pixel art tried to be as detailed as it could and not "faux retro"

My point is a 2D DS Metroid would have looked and been awesome, same with a 2D DS Zelda, it's a shame it didn't happen and Nintendo pushed the gimmicky 3D instead.

But hey, here we are in the far flung year of 2021 and a Nintendo handheld can have near console quality 3D, so that's pretty snazzy, now was the perfect time to bring Metroid Dread back.

 

[Pissmaster]

Oh interesting share, especially the dreamcast game, anything involving that console just fascinates me

I'd guess the most famous unreleased Dreamcast game was Half-Life. Everyone knows about that one, right?

It was complete and ready for release, and then pulled because the Dreamcast was discontinued. It even included Blue Shift, which was meant to launch first on the Dreamcast, but just got released on PC as a standalone expansion instead.

IIRC, the build that leaked online is complete and fully playable, though it does have very long loading times. It's not really worth playing today, though, since the Steam release of Half-Life has been updated nicely.

Oh, and the strategy guide actually reached store shelves. It's the only game I know of where the guide somehow managed to get a retail release, but not the game itself.

 

[Zhoban]

Edmund McMillen resurrected his old project called Mew-Genics, after Tommy Refenes refused to continue working on it back in 2013.

 

[Lord of the Large Pants]

Well... STALKER 2 just became available for pre-order. So there's that.

 

[Least Concern]

Anyways here's Propeller Arena

Interesting. I don't remember this one, even though I was really into the Dreamcast at the time. It looks like a distant cousin to Wing War, one of my favorite Sega arcade games from the flat polygon days that never got a console release for whatever reason.

I'm assuming they wanted Metroid Dread to be 3D and the DS's 3D often looked like shit, so that was why it was canceled?

There was a decent enough Prime game on the DS, in full first-person 3D. From what I've seen of Dread so far I don't see why the DS couldn't have done some version of it. Maybe Other M happened and Nintendo decided the world needed a break from Metroid for a while?

Either way, Dread was easily the most exciting game for me from Nintendo's presentation. I'm really looking forward to it. Maybe, once they restarted Prime 4, they decided to look back through their old ideas and see what they could get done to hold fans over in the meantime.

It was complete and ready for release, and then pulled because the Dreamcast was discontinued. It even included Blue Shift, which was meant to launch first on the Dreamcast, but just got released on PC as a standalone expansion instead.

I remember finding and burning a CD-R of it after it leaked. I remember the load times were absolutely atrocious. I got the impression that it still needed a few more rounds of optimization before it could have been released. At any rate, the Dreamcast controller was not well-optimized for PC FPSes.