Our final update of 2024 for the Commodore 64 archive. This year has gone in a flash as always, as we pass our 25th year of Games That Weren’t. We hope to finish with a bit of a bang, and have some surprise findings for you. We hope you enjoy them – here goes:
Wacky Races V1 recovered!
A surprise recovery for the GTW archives to kick things off, with a completely different and full version of Hi-Tec Software’s game (created by a completely different development team).
Rainbow Art’s Apprentice recovered!
The final prototype of Rainbow Art’s Apprentice on the Commodore 64 has also been saved. An early and promising glimpse of what could have been.
Aladdin’s Cave full game recovered!
The complete conversion of Artic Software’s Alladin’s Cave has finally been recovered in its final and complete form. Check out this neat clone of Tales of the Arabian Nights:
Alternative Software’s 666 – Number of the Beast recovered!
No, we had never heard of it either! A complete surprise and incomplete development by Keith Purkiss of a flick screen arcade adventure, similar in some ways to Feud. Very early, but a very large map for you to explore!
Bundesliga 2 game recovered
Thanks to Csaba Virag, a full football management game has been recovered and which doesn’t seem to have been preserved. Still much to learn about this one, but here it is for now:
Mario Bros hacks added – Insect Kill and Clean All
Thanks to Marcin ‘Tenchi’ Świętoniewski, two strange 1994 Polish hacks of Mario Bros have been saved, which contain different sprites and added music. An interesting set of curiosities!
Keith Purkiss archive page added
Keith has very kindly these past few months allowed us at Games That Weren’t to preserve all of his work disks that he recently found (which has resulted in our first four findings above). We have also preserved his master/work disks for the likes of Tiger Road, Rygar, Little Puff, Dragon Spirit, It’s a Knockout, Kenny Daglish Soccer, Lazer Tag, Last Mission, and Snoball in Hell:
Super Hang On entries added
We take a look at what seems to be an earlier build of Super Hang On which snuck out, and also a lost US edition of the game:
Super Hang-On V1, Super Hang On (US edition)
8 new entries added
We have also added a number of other new entries to the archive, including a strange Football game, a lost Goofy game and more:
Computer Theatre, Footy game, Gee Bee Air Rally – tape release, Goofy’s Word Factory, Grand National, Quest for Truth, Street Football, Test Drive 2 – scenery tapes
46 updates added
Then finally, we have been busy making a lot of updates to various entries already in the archive. Please refer to the “History” tab for each entry to see what has changed and been added:
Alloyrun, Armalyte 2, Back in the USSR, Boxing Champion, Colony, Custodian, Devious Designs, Diabolik, Eye Of The Moon, Fight Night V1, Fire & Forget, Force Of The Vulcan, Galactic Conqueror, Garden Wars, Gargantuan, Gauntlet 3, Giana 2 – Arthur And Martha In Future World, Great Giana Sisters, Illusions, Joan Of Arc: Siege And The Sword, Jonny Quest and the Splinter of Heaven, Judge Death, Katakis, Knight Force, Koshimo, Lasertrain, Mars Cops, Minder, Morgol, Off Shore Warrior, Parasol Stars, Parisian Knights, Picnic Paranoia, Pong Mini, Reach For The Moon, Roadwars V2, Scooby Doo, Sigue Sigue Sputnik, Star Tech Games, , The Flintstones, The Jetsons, The Omnicron Conspiracy, Trojan, Undead, Unicorn Software titles, Virgin Atlantic Challenge
And that is it for 2024 for the Commodore 64 Games That Weren’t archive. Thank you everyone for all your help and support this year, in what has been a tough year for many reasons. I look forward to bringing you a lot more new discoveries in 2025!
