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Footage of NES prototype for SimCity appears

7

7DollarHagane

Banned
I remember seeing this in Nintendo power and since wondering when if ever this version would get out in the public.
I don't know the origin of the video or if the rom will ever be released. I really want to play around with it though.

Shame all we have is a 2 minute portrait cell phone video with very little details.

https://youtu.be/V7-M_LcqJsc
 
Sojiro

Sojiro

Member
Pathfinder said:
Someone needs to put a muzzle on that kid.
Click to expand...

Agreed, 30 seconds in, and I couldn't stand to hear him anymore lol.

Really cool SimCity NES was in the works at one point. Working the controls around only 4 inputs with the dpad must have been really interesting lol.
 
Robin64

Robin64

Member
Interesting how close to the SNES one it is. It even has Dr Wright already. I guess most work was done here, then it was an easy decision to port it to SNES and become a launch title for that instead.
 
RAIDEN1

RAIDEN1

Member
There is a brief article on Unseen 64....apparently one version of the game the actual ROM of it is nestled on the back of a gold "zelda the adventure of link" cartridge, which is apparently one of a kind...bad timing scuppered the launch of the NES version..Come 1991 the NES was on the way out and the future of gaming was in the 16 bit land...
 
T

Talladega Knight

Member
Holy shit!!! I've been waiting years for something like this. I LOVE Simcity on the SNES. The soundtrack is godly, as is the whole general atmosphere of the game. I was always curious as to what the NES version sounded like.
 
Q

Quadraphonic

Member
RAIDEN1 said:
There is a brief article on Unseen 64....apparently one version of the game the actual ROM of it is nestled on the back of a gold "zelda the adventure of link" cartridge, which is apparently one of a kind...bad timing scuppered the launch of the NES version..Come 1991 the NES was on the way out and the future of gaming was in the 16 bit land...
Click to expand...

If it was that late in the system's life, it totally could have been using the MMC5, right? Because I was just thinking a lot of the processing needed for this would be bogging down the system.
 
B

BocoDragon

or, How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Realize This Assgrab is Delicious
RAIDEN1 said:
There is a brief article on Unseen 64....apparently one version of the game the actual ROM of it is nestled on the back of a gold "zelda the adventure of link" cartridge, which is apparently one of a kind...bad timing scuppered the launch of the NES version..Come 1991 the NES was on the way out and the future of gaming was in the 16 bit land...
Click to expand...
Nintendo was still releasing NES games until 1994. Though yeah I'm sure they wanted to position this as a SNES killer app instead.
 
Chittagong

Chittagong

Gold Member
Wow. I knew this was being worked on, but that Nintendo vault of unreleased, nearly completed games is just nuts
 
RAIDEN1

RAIDEN1

Member
..It's like how Starfox 2 came out at the wrong time, (in terms of it's launch window literally) so that version got canned in some respects and then all eyes were on the N64 come 1996...
 
1

120v

Member
oh yeah. i remember this in nintendo power back in the day

it could've been pretty big if released before '91 or so. considering the install base
 
M

magnetic

Member
Very cool! Though Sim City will always be 10% about the actual game and 90% about that delightful Soyo Oka soundtrack.
 
S

stan423321

Member
Robin64 said:
Interesting how close to the SNES one it is. It even has Dr Wright already. I guess most work was done here, then it was an easy decision to port it to SNES and become a launch title for that instead.
Click to expand...

It was probably intended as a cross-gen title. NES version must have required loads of RAM in the cartridge to work though. NES had 2 KiB of regular RAM, loads of games added its own 8 KiB - I imagine it needed 32 KiB or something.
 
S

Starwolf_UK

Member
This looks like that Super Nintendo game...the one that got delisted from the Virtual Console (probably for an eErily simiAr reason) with that dude form Link's Awakening in it; Dr.Wright.

A TAS for the SNES sim City popped up in the related box.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2g6uPk-A1HY
Kind of funny how well a city with no roads just plays itself once set up (via the money underflow glitch) but it was on Easy difficulty and the I suppose the mayor only has a 61% approval rating.

stan423321 said:
It was probably intended as a cross-gen title. NES version must have required loads of RAM in the cartridge to work though. NES had 2 KiB of regular RAM, loads of games added its own 8 KiB - I imagine it needed 32 KiB or something.
Click to expand...
As far as first party goes when I think cross gen Wario's Woods is all that comes to mind re:NES/SNES. I can see this NES one being shelved because Sim City was an launch window look at what my Shiny SNES can do it can play games like on PC so an NES doing the same would rise questions but I am also curious how much adding all those cart chips would have upped the production cost on the NES version.
 
woopWOOP

woopWOOP

Member
Figured most of the YT comments would be about the commentator instead of the prototype, lol

Looks similar to the SNES version. I'd like to know if this version already had some of the music done. Hearing NES versions of that Sim City soundtrack would be pretty rad
 
nicoga3000

nicoga3000

Saint Nic
I've never played Sim City on SNES....But all these videos with that OST are getting me hyped. I feel like I should give it a go.
 
N

Ninja Dom

Member
Starwolf_UK said:
As far as first party goes when I think cross gen Wario's Woods is all that comes to mind re:NES/SNES. I can see this NES one being shelved because Sim City was an launch window look at what my Shiny SNES can do it can play games like on PC so an NES doing the same would rise questions but I am also curious how much adding all those cart chips would have upped the production cost on the NES version.
Click to expand...

Nintendo's first cross gen release, if it counts, was Dr. Mario. NES & Gameboy versions came out the same day in Japan in July 1990.
 
P

pete_clarf

Member
They stopped the video mid-eeeerily similar.

"Rob, if you want to stay in the room, you're going to have to shut the fuck up".
 
S

Starwolf_UK

Member
This video has a couple of extra details. Someone walked into a store in Seattle (where else?) with these and the store in question is exhibiting at Portland retro gaming expo so that should be a chance to play it.

As for one of them being on a gold cart. I'm sure I saw some other prototype on one of these (maybe another recent Earthbound one?). I suppose it is one way of being able to see prototypes at a glance or are these an artifact from NOA running out of cart shells so having to gut a few Zelda carts.
 
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