An interesting early preview of a cute Creatures style beat-em-up, or at least I think it is.
It’s a bit unclear what you’re meant to do, but it seems to be a 2-player game where you have to attack your opponent. There are some creatures of a smaller size wandering about (one with an arrow above its head), which I guess you would pick up and throw or something like that. So maybe it was a sort of Bounces clone or inspired game?
Abandoned way back in 1991, it is likely that this was as far as it ever got and this was released to the world as a result.
What the exact plans were for it and why it was cancelled was unknown. With a full credits list, it was hoped that we’d get to learn some day about what happened.
Well, in September 2023 – artist Raymond Zachariasse got in touch to confirm that development was stopped as the team decided to create other projects instead. Mainly though it was down to technical difficulties, and that they wanted to produce something much more than the C64 was capable of.
As a result – this seems to be as far as the game ever got, which is a shame – but we think now a case closed!
Supporting content
Available downloads
- Preview_CrittersCompany (zip)
Gallery
Update history
23/09/23 – Confirmation about what happened to the game.
So fun to see this blast from my past. I totally forgot about this game. I never released this demo, so it might be one of the programmers. We stopped because we created other projects, also abandoned them, but mainly because of technical difficulties. We wanted more than the C64 was capable of.
Ah thank you for confirming Raymond! I’ll get the page updated quickly!
We went on to create a platformer called TJ. It was all hires, and we had the D010 problem. Same with a shooter. The shooter has a simple demo. Someday we’ll be finishing it. I still know Serge, but he moved on to be a Microsoft developer. I still draw and I am a book and screenwriter now.
Thanks Raymond – i’ll make a note to add an entry for TJ. I’m guessing the shooter was this title? https://www.gamesthatwerent.com/gtw64/ze-iii/