Preserving Cancelled & Unreleased Video Game History Since 1999
Green Lantern
1991-1995 Ocean Software
Platforms: Atari ST, Commodore Amiga, SEGA Mega Drive and Super Nintendo
As part of the launch and release of The Games That Weren’t book, we are gradually adding assets and content that didn’t make it to print as bonus content to share with you. The book contains a detailed 14-page full story about the game’s various developments, talking to many people involved in the different iterations undertaken. Check out our growing Bonus Content page for more materials added over time.
Below are a selection of character concept sketches, sprites and screenshots, most never seen until now, which have been kindly provided thanks to artists Mike Marshall, Ray Coffey, John Lomax and John Reitze to share with you.
We have also recently added saved SPC files for the music (just 2 segments seem to be present) from the recovered prototype, which you can download below.
Character concept sketch by Mike Marshall, who was on work experience briefly at Ocean. This was produced not long after the first Amiga/ST development was canned, where Ocean were still looking to resurrect the licence at a later date. Mike did produce Amiga based artwork as well, which he is yet to find – indicating that Ocean were still contemplating a conversion on both Amiga and ST.
Early “Bat warrior” character concept by Ray Coffey in preparation for the SNES development, which didn’t fit within the Green Lantern universe, and hence was dropped early on.
Early “Lion Warrior” character concept by Ray Coffey in preparation for the SNES development, which didn’t fit within the Green Lantern universe.
Early “Rhino Warrior” character concept by Ray Coffey in preparation for the SNES development, which didn’t fit within the Green Lantern universe.
Early “Tortoise Warrior” character concept by Ray Coffey in preparation for the SNES development, which didn’t fit within the Green Lantern universe.
SNES screenshots from 3rd and final iteration
Emulation screens from the brief final iteration by Bobby Earl. Please note, even though we are getting regular requests, at this moment in time we are not allowed to release the ROM recovered. The key thing is that it is safe and preserved, and it is hoped the situation will change in time.
Temporary title screen with rotating ring graphic, believed to have been rendered by Steve Wahid.
Start of game, with cut scene sequence telling the story. Background manually coloured, as incorrect in prototype.
These same level assets were present in the previous iteration too.
Further on in Level 1.
Enemies from above throwing objects. Feels reminiscent of Robocop on the 8-bits.
Part of level 2 and King Kong Kars.
Now screens from level 3 in and industrially themed level.
Large drop to nowhere.
Same enemies from the first level at this stage.
Same background issues with bright orange background – no doubt would have been replaced with some kind of gradient or parallax layer eventually.
More of level 3
More of level 3
More of level 3
More of level 3
Next three screens have the background manually changed do a more subtle colour.
More of level 3
More of level 3
Remnants of Jurassic Park 2 found within the prototype.
SNES sprite assets
Click some of the screens to see the animations running converted from .ANN files.
Early sprites from Ray Coffey. (Static image)
Various other extracted enemy sprites (Static)
Second iteration sprites, including Mode-7 view Green Lantern sprites and SEU level sprites. This and the next set were supplied from John Reitze.
More top down vertical scrolling SEU Green Lantern sprites.
Various ring bullet and object shapes.
Enemy from the second iteration and later space levels.
One of the second iteration bosses.
Test animations for Green Lantern character.
Gun asset.
One of the second iteration bosses.
One of the second iteration bosses or larger game characters who would smash out of a window.
Animations from one of the enemies on the City level.
Believed to be another enemy
Other assets and related images
Green Lantern cut scene character image from 2nd iteration.
Helicopter asset from 2nd iteration.
Background mockup assets for the 3rd iteration. May have been used in the 2nd as well.
Boss assets.
Another boss asset.
Various weapons and explosions.
Industrial level test objects and background blocks.
Industrial level test objects and background blocks.
Industrial level test objects and background blocks.
Industrial level test objects and background blocks.
Various background assets
Various background assets
Various background assets
3rd Iteration prototype cartridge.
Various SNES related magazine scans
During our book write-up research, we purchased issues of Edge, Super Gamer and Games World to try and carry out as hi-res scanning of some screenshots as we could to potentially print in the book (but never did in the end). Other scans were found via other online magazine archives such as archive.org and Abandonware Magazines.
08/08/20 – Additional scans added thanks to Daniel Nicaise, which show one of the other Mode 7 levels. Some scans give details about the second iteration itself.
GTW scanned clipping from Games World magazine, showing title and a level from second iteration.
Extracted and slightly tidied up title screen from second iteration. Level select seems to be present, with words “Xaos”.
Very grainy image from second iteration (Games World scan), extracted and attempted to tidy up. Showing projected “Hand” from the ring.
GTW scan from Super Gamer magazine, showing a Mode 7 flying level from the second iteration.
Then tidied up and edited slightly (removing SNES logo in top right corner).
Screnshot from CD Consoles, obtained from Abandonware magazines website. Showing one of the later levels from the second iteration.
Part of the R-Type level from CD Consoles magazine. Obtained from Abandonware magazines website.
GameFan magazine (Thanks Dan!) feature on the game, showing a lot of screens from the second iteration.
More screens from GameFan, showing a lot of the SEU levels.
GTW hi-res scan from Edge magazine, showing a mockup of level 1 from Ray Coffey.
GTW hi-res scan from Edge magazine, showing mockup screens by Ray Coffey.
EGM scan from Daniel Nicaise, with some City screens.
Scan from Daniel Nicaise, with some text information on the game. with some City screens.
Scan from Daniel Nicaise, showing more of what Edge magazine showed, this time showing how the object projection was going to work in a series of 3 screens. As well as a sprite sheet, there is an interesting looking bug boss mock up too, which may have been for the Xaos level.
Scan from Daniel Nicaise. These are particularly interesting, as they show another of the Mode 7 levels with what seems to be the Xaos level. There are more parts of the SEU levels shown too.
Scan from Daniel Nicaise. Small piece of info about the conversion.
Scan from Daniel Nicaise. SShowing another screenshot from the Xaos Mode 7 level.
Scan from Daniel Nicaise, with some brief screens from the second iteration.
Scan from Daniel Nicaise. Small piece of info about the conversion and a City screenshot.
Scan showing a bit of the game from Nintendo Magazine System UK (July 1994) – thanks to Daniel Nicaise.
Scan from Daniel Nicaise. These are particularly interesting, as they show another of the Mode 7 levels with what seems to be the Xaos level. There are more parts of the SEU levels shown too.
Scan from Jeff Warren
Scan from Jeff Warren, showing a very clear screenshot of the title screen from the first edition.
Scan from Jeff Warren
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5 Responses to Green Lantern
Hi, i understand that for reasons you cannot release the ROM, but i wanted to ask if it was possible to dump the .spc files? (music files of the game). As the only recordings of it are compressed mp3s on youtube and i would really like to have the original files.
The two SPCs in question are of the same song raw data-wise, just dumped at different points. The sound driver build used is the same one as Jurassic Park 2: The Chaos Continues, and there are even leftover assets found in the SPC file from that game. For whatever reason, there seems to be an outright memory overflow on the sample data, if only barely: the very last sample is missing six bytes due to running into the end of the SPC700 RAM.
The two pages preview are from GameFan magazines Vol. 3 issue 5 from May ’95. I sent long ago others scans from magazines showing others pics from the second iteration to Liam Robertson thanks to Wayback machine. I still have two of them and I could find the rest if you want. Tell me if you are interested.
Hi Dan, feel free to send anything over if you like and I can add them quickly to the gallery. Thanks for that, and thanks for the magazine confirmation – completely forgot to make a note at the time where I found them.
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Hi, i understand that for reasons you cannot release the ROM, but i wanted to ask if it was possible to dump the .spc files? (music files of the game).
As the only recordings of it are compressed mp3s on youtube and i would really like to have the original files.
Hi Michael, I think that should be fine – i’ll see what I can do over the next few days.
Thanks!
Some of the best work of Dean Evans comes from this
The two SPCs in question are of the same song raw data-wise, just dumped at different points. The sound driver build used is the same one as Jurassic Park 2: The Chaos Continues, and there are even leftover assets found in the SPC file from that game. For whatever reason, there seems to be an outright memory overflow on the sample data, if only barely: the very last sample is missing six bytes due to running into the end of the SPC700 RAM.
Please release this prototype. A lot of people(myself included) want to play it.
The two pages preview are from GameFan magazines Vol. 3 issue 5 from May ’95. I sent long ago others scans from magazines showing others pics from the second iteration to Liam Robertson thanks to Wayback machine. I still have two of them and I could find the rest if you want. Tell me if you are interested.
-Dan
Hi Dan, feel free to send anything over if you like and I can add them quickly to the gallery. Thanks for that, and thanks for the magazine confirmation – completely forgot to make a note at the time where I found them.