Welcome to Games That Weren't 64!
We cover Cancelled & Unreleased Video games for the Commodore 64 computer. A non-profit large archive dedicated to preserving lost games that were never released to the public, as well as prototypes and the odd preservation of released titles. Our aim to share history and stories from the developers, assets and more before it is too late. GTW has been preserving lost video game history since 1999.
Please Browse our archive and discover the many entries that we host and have saved over the years.
Latest News and Posts
Kayleth unused title screen?
We had a recent submission from Baracuda of a screen which is potentially related to the game Kayleth by U.S. Gold on the C64 in 1987. The question is whether it was intended for the game, or just a tribute image?
We personally think its just a tribute image done for somewhere like Compunet (by a DRR) in 1986, and based off the book (as it was a year before the U.S. Gold release). Thanks to BugJam, it seems DRR might be this person.
If anyone knows – please do get in touch or leave a comment.
GTW64 Christmas update 2023
Only feels like yesterday when I was doing the last Christmas update for GTW64, but here we are and we have a bumper update as always for you, including some very special prototypes from the disks of the late Archer Maclean, who sadly passed away last December.
We also have a series of commercial titles that have been preserved thanks to the efforts of Allan Pinkerton and a series of lost Hungarian titles dug out by Csaba Virag. This and a number of new entries added to the archive and a load of updates too for pre-existing entries. We hope you enjoy! Continue reading
Archer Maclean materials
1984-198? Archer Maclean
Platforms: Commodore 64
Whilst going through Archer’s work disks, we found a few bits and pieces lurking on the disks, which might be unseen artwork or work that Archer has done. We’ll add to this page over time as more comes to light.
First up we have a series of Doodle pictures found on Quicksilver’s Doodle disk that were saved, including oddly work stages for New Generation Software’s Escape. But also a set of train images, which we are wondering if they are linked to 3D Tunnel at all. There’s an unfinished Sceptre picture too. Did Archer know the artist, and was he given the disk?
According to correspondence from Archer – Quicksilva were in talks with Archer about potentially publishing Dropzone (before U.S. Gold took it on). Maybe they provided Archer with a copy during the time he was speaking with them? Continue reading
International Karate prototypes
1986 Archer Maclean / System 3
Platform: Commodore 64 (Atari to come)
In late 2023, Games That Weren’t was tasked with trying to preserve all of the late Archer Maclean’s work disks – including Atari and C64 formatted disks. At the time of writing, work is still ongoing, though we have been given permission by Chris Wilkins (Fusion Retro Books) to add any executable/early prototypes to show you that we find along the way.
First up are a small selection of prototypes from the first International Karate game, including a non-playable demo with two fighters interacting, and with no score panels or sound. There is a more advanced second prototype with the same kind of thing, with music and no sound effects.
IK+ prototypes
1987 Archer Maclean / System 3 / Activision
Platform: Commodore 64
In late 2023, Games That Weren’t was tasked with trying to preserve all of the late Archer Maclean’s work disks – including Atari and C64 formatted disks. At the time of writing, work is still ongoing, though we have been given permission by Chris Wilkins (Fusion Retro Books) to add any executable/early prototypes to show you that we find along the way.
Next up are a selection of prototypes from International Karate + (aka IK+), which show how Archer’s early idea for creating a 3rd fighter would start to blossom and build up into the IK+ game that we all know and love. If you haven’t already, we recommend checking out this great documentary on how both IK and IK+ were created: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zRFZS9wzt7s
Polar Bear in Space prototypes
2023 Silvan Reinhold / Psytronik Software
Platform: Commodore 64
If you haven’t seen Polar Bear in Space already, then you are missing out on a wonderful shooter/platformer which has elements of Wizball, Retrograde and even Dropzone with the explosion of the main protagonist.
At the time of writing, a new Black Edition of the game is immiment, which features new music by Jon Wells and a specially produced loading screen by Robin Levy. Silvan has also written a brilliant book that details how the game was all put together, which we recommend you keeping an eye out for. Continue reading
Penguin Tower source code released!
Various C64 educational titles preserved
A huge thank you to Allan Pinkerton, who has preserved several educational titles from Micro Labs and Cymbal Software for the Commodore 64.
As they are not unreleased game entries, we have just made this post to make them available to all, and hopefully over time they will get integrated into various other digital archives, including Gamebase64.
Here are the links below and a huge thanks once more to Allan for all his hard work!
Downloads
Wizard of Wor (C64) early build
A small post on an earlier build of Wizard of Wor that has been highlighted to us by Roberto Nicoletti.
Some years ago, Jeff Bruette released all of the source code to the game, which was then very carefully compiled up by Commodore International Historical Society. Continue reading
Linkword German (C64) preserved
Just a quick post to share some preservation work by our friend Allan Pinkerton, with Linkword German by Artworx on the Commodore 64.
As it was released, it doesn’t warrant creating a GTW64 entry, so we’ve done a post with it instead for people to grab.
With thanks to Allan Pinkerton for preserving and passing on.
