Games That Weren't^®

Yet another magazine showing screenshots of one of our favourite titles, but with graphics not ever gracing the final game.

Take a look at the screenshots in November 1987’s edition of Commodore User magazine below (scans thanks to Mort!) and in particular at the shots which have no clouds, a different wooden structure and a different tree on the opposite side. There are the words “On” next to the Player one status area instead of a fist – suggesting that Commodore User cheated and used some early screens to fill their review page.

Even the screens with clouds in have a slight difference, where there is a purple haze around the sun setting.

Probably not much difference to the final version – but who knows if Archer may dig out some different builds of his work in the future…

A quick post relating to what seems to be a rather different (and missing) section from Epyx’s G.I. Joe licensed game from 1985. Thanks to Karl “Trantornator” Kuras for the heads up! Click onto the image for the full version.

Looking at the 1984 Epyx brochure, it seems that originally the game was due to have a equipment/dressing up scene which seems to have been crucial to kitting out your guy for doing battle. Pretty much looking like the same system that was used in Barbie (also on the same page).

For whatever reason, the idea it seems was dropped and never quite made it. Was this merely a scene that was dropped from the game, or does it suggest that a rather different game was in production? Considering the game was produced by the same team as Barbie anyway, we doubt there was a different coding team… suggesting the final game was just tweaked. Maybe the game had the feature dropped to meet a Christmas deadline for big sales?

It is hoped that maybe we can get to see this unused feature in proper form.