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IGN: 15 Most Heartbreaking Game Cancellations

terrisus said:
Because I was too old at that point to find the kind of juvenile "humor" in that game entertaining (don't think I ever would've found it entertaining, honestly), and instead it detracted massively from the overall look and feel of the game.

Yeah, the outer coating that is put on a game shouldn't matter that much, but, when you're pouring it all over like that, it's hard to get past it.
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It's overplayed by the media really because that was more of what hadn't been seen in a game before. The actual gameplay is solid platforming all around, and it's kind of like following a B-tier Hollywood production. It knows how to poke fun itself and the genre as a whole, it's not just bosses made out of shit and flowers with big tits (which yes, it does have). It truly is a unique gaming experience that hasn't been seen since, which is why I wanted a sequel so badly, but we got the remake instead. :/

Another cancelled game I would kill for - Baten Kaitos DS.
 
Dr. Feel Good said:
It's overplayed by the media really because that was more of what hadn't been seen in a game before. The actual gameplay is solid platforming all around, and it's kind of like following a B-tier Hollywood production. It knows how to poke fun itself and the genre as a whole, it's not just bosses made out of shit and flowers with big tits (which yes, it does have). It truly is a unique gaming experience that hasn't been seen since, which is why I wanted a sequel so badly, but we got the remake instead. :/

Another cancelled game I would kill for - Baten Kaitos DS.
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I'm sure the underlying gameplay is good enough, but, it's just impossible to get past all of that junk they put in there.

Something "poking fun at itself and the genre" isn't compelling on its own to me, and when it's coupled with all of that other stuff that seems like they were put in by a 6-year-old...
Yeah, wasn't even going to consider that game.


Agreed on Baten Kaitos DS as well though.
 
Frame City Killer
Star Wars Darth Maul (action game)
Bourne
Starcraft: Ghost
Perfect Dark 2 (pre-Zero)

That's probably my list so far barring anything I've forgotten.
 
Alex_Mexico said:
Am I the only one that remembers the Level 5 MMORPG OG Xbox exclusive True Fantasy Live Online? It must've been hyped for two years before being canceled.
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Yesss. My friends and I would play Rainbow Six 3 and just talk about that game the whole time. They made promises that they could have never kept.
 
All the hindsight FF64 posts in here are so unbearable. Yes we know all this now, but when I saw these screens in Nintendo Power back in the day the only thought was, fuck yeah there's going to be a FF64. It was heart breaking when FF7 was announced for PS1. That single game forced me onto the PlayStation platform.
 
The ones that hurt me the most were:

Harpoon 4
Warewolf: The Apocalypse
Outcast 2
Fallout: Ven Buren
Troika's canceled post apocalyptic RPG
Baldurs Gate 3: Black Dog
Cyclopean (Lovecraftian RPG)
STALKER 2
Privateer 3
Jagged Alliance 3 (the version on Silent Storm engine)
Desert Fighters (Dynamix' african flight sim)
 
Beerman462 said:
All the hindsight FF64 posts in here are so unbearable. Yes we know all this now, but when I saw these screens in Nintendo Power back in the day the only thought was, fuck yeah there's going to be a FF64. It was heart breaking when FF7 was announced for PS1. That single game forced me onto the PlayStation platform.
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In equal hindsight the PS1 has probably got one of the best and broadest libraries in history. Not a bad deal.
 
Leafhopper said:
That actually was going to happen?

I thought it just never came up.
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Yeah...when Legend of Dragoon came to PSN, Yosp made an offhand comment about how after he had finished up the first game and left the game division, he had heard about a second one in production, but it was apparently canceled for some reason.

FFFFFFFFFF. There's nothing worse than hearing that years after the fact. It would have been better not to say anything
 
Beerman462 said:
All the hindsight FF64 posts in here are so unbearable. Yes we know all this now, but when I saw these screens in Nintendo Power back in the day the only thought was, fuck yeah there's going to be a FF64. It was heart breaking when FF7 was announced for PS1. That single game forced me onto the PlayStation platform.
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I was on compuserve at the time when that demo was being covered in magazines, and people talked about it being an SGI workstation demo even back then. Not all these posts are hindsight posts.
 
The ones that have hurt me the most have definitely been KOTOR 3 and Van Buren. I remember being bummed about Armada of the Damned and the White Council never seeing the light of day too. I'm still holding a torch for Starcraft Ghost though.
 
Krejlooc said:
I was on compuserve at the time when that demo was being covered in magazines, and people talked about it being an SGI workstation demo even back then. Not all these posts are hindsight posts.
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Yeah, I was on the regular internet (and AOL, but there was life outside AOL as well) back then too.

It's always funny to read people talk about the mid-90s as if the internet didn't exist or something.
 
Inuhanyou said:
Yeah...when Legend of Dragoon came to PSN, Yosp made an offhand comment about how after he had finished up the first game and left the game division, he had heard about a second one in production, but it was apparently canceled for some reason.

FFFFFFFFFF. There's nothing worse than hearing that years after the fact. It would have been better not to say anything
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If there was ever a sequel in the making it was probably cancelled because it didn't sell enough. Wasn't the budget huge?

It wasn't good anyway. Hated the additions system. Other games did the timed buttons in turn based systems much better. It was too cumbersome.
 
Krejlooc said:
I was on compuserve at the time when that demo was being covered in magazines, and people talked about it being an SGI workstation demo even back then. Not all these posts are hindsight posts.
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Yeah, but N64 was heavily associated with SGI at the time. It wouldn't take a great leap to assume that the tech demo would lead to a N64 Final Fantasy.
 
Cool. Before this list, I didn't know about Pirates of the Caribbean: Armada of the Damned. Now I'm sad that it didn't ever happen...
 
entrydenied said:
If there was ever a sequel in the making it was probably cancelled because it didn't sell enough. Wasn't the budget huge?

It wasn't good anyway. Hated the additions system. Other games did the timed buttons in turn based systems much better. It was too cumbersome.
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If they had a sequel in production obviously they had planned to make another one right? Nobody said they started right after the finished the first one and canceled it. It sold over a million copies, that's not a bomb.

Also, the people who complain about the addition system i'll never understand. DId you guys never play shadow hearts trilogy or lost odyssey or even resonance of fate!?

Its just a matter of memorizing the rythm and timing, i can go 99/99 for all characters with all additions easy even when my eyes are closed at this point.
 
Beerman462 said:
Yeah, but N64 was heavily associated with SGI at the time. It wouldn't take a great leap to assume that the tech demo would lead to a N64 Final Fantasy.
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Brother, that's on you, not me. I was merely responding to your claim that they were hindsight posts.
 
weekev said:
Never realised a streets of rage remake was on the cards. Id day 0 that bad boy.
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The particular one they're showcasing wasn't, it was a pitch video. It was never actually in development.

That said, streets of rage 4/reboot has been in development several times throughout the years. Fighting Force on the Playstation was the original Streets of Rage 4 (back when it was, obviously, a saturn title) but it's also been thrown around a few other times. It's a property which keeps trying to come back to life.
 
Krejlooc said:
Brother, that's on you, not me. I was merely responding to your claim that they were hindsight posts.
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So in 1995 the logical conclusion of a Final Fantasy tech demo on SGI hardware is "It's just a tech demo" and nothing more? The fact that Final Fantasy up to that point had been solely on Nintendo hardware, tech demo was being shown on SGI hardware, which SGI was a partner with Nintendo, and was the basis for their new console, means nothing? Anyone claiming they knew that it was just a tech demo and didn't associate it with Nintendo is delusional.
 
Beerman462 said:
So in 1995 the logical conclusion of a Final Fantasy tech demo on SGI hardware is "It's just a tech demo" and nothing more? The fact that Final Fantasy up to that point had been solely on Nintendo hardware, tech demo was being shown on SGI hardware, which SGI was a partner with Nintendo, and was the basis for their new console, means nothing? Anyone claiming they knew that it was just a tech demo and didn't associate it with Nintendo is delusional.
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Indeed. Seriously, Square, a company which had previously only supported Nintendo, made a techdemo using hardware from the company that designed the N64's graphics chip... and people say that it's just a techdemo, anyone saying that it meant anything beyond that are wrong? Come on! It obviously meant more than that. That techdemo probably would not have existed otherwise, not on SGI hardware. And then Square decided to go with Sony instead because of CDs, licensing fees, arguments with Nintendo over other issues, etc.
 
Beerman462 said:
So in 1995 the logical conclusion of a Final Fantasy tech demo on SGI hardware is "It's just a tech demo" and nothing more? The fact that Final Fantasy up to that point had been solely on Nintendo hardware, tech demo was being shown on SGI hardware, which SGI was a partner with Nintendo, and was the basis for their new console, means nothing? Anyone claiming they knew that it was just a tech demo and didn't associate it with Nintendo is delusional.
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Any conclusion you're coming to is one you came up with on your own. Nobody is berating you for it, but yes, back in 1995, it was known that the tech demo was just that - an experimental SGI tech demo. There was no game announcement. If you didn't know, oh well, but that's not to say everybody was clueless as to the nature of the demo like you imply.
 
Krejlooc said:
Any conclusion you're coming to is one you came up with on your own. Nobody is berating you for it, but yes, back in 1995, it was known that the tech demo was just that - an experimental SGI tech demo. There was no game announcement. If you didn't know, oh well, but that's not to say everybody was clueless as to the nature of the demo like you imply.
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Yes it was a "tech demo" and nothing more. A tech demo on SGI hardware, the basis for the N64, the next console for Nintendo. Nintendo the sole console manufacturer with Final Fantasy games up to that point. Come on man, don't act like that meant nothing. You're trying to hard. If you're saying you saw that demo and drew no conclusions other than it's a demo, then I guess whatever. It seems like you're trying to hard though.
 
I remember back in 2012 there was the 1,2 punch of STALKER 2 getting cancelled and Prey 2 getting taken away from Human Head. Both still hurt :(
 
Krejlooc said:
I'm not the person in this thread going around telling people what they did or didn't know at the time.
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OK you knew it was just a tech demo. That was it. You didn't make any assumptions based on that demo. You didn't make any judgement based on the Final Fantasy tech demo that was called FF64 by many outlets. I guess it wasn't hindsight for you. You're free to claim internet victory.
 
Beerman462 said:
OK you knew it was just a tech demo. That was it. You didn't make any assumptions based on that demo. You didn't make any judgement based on the Final Fantasy tech demo that was called FF64 by many outlets. I guess it wasn't hindsight for you. You're free to claim internet victory.
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This tactic of repeating the premise of your argument, like I missed it, is weird and aggressive. Yes, I get it, the conclusion you came to wasn't the biggest leap in the world. Again, nobody is berating you for that. But not everybody took those same leaps of logic. To your specific point about "many outlets" - being familiar with the internet of the time, I was already aware of the number of times these magazines misreported things. I saw diehard gamefan reporting this in sparse detail as FF64, then I saw much more detailed information on BBSes and Compuserve pages that more accurately explained what the demo was. That's not at all unrealistic like you assume. I have no idea why you'd be so personally offended by this, but whatever.

Framing a discussion in context of winners and losers is lame. What did I win? The right to recall my own experience and past? That's not a prize for competition.
 
Fallout Online is there, but no Van Buren. No Cry On, Milo and Kate, Totems, the rest of the Too Human trilogy, True Fantasy Live Online, the rest of Shenmue... Most heartbreaking my ass.
 
Vibranium said:
PotC: Armada of the Damned still hurts, I get the feeling that there was a great game in there, it just needed more development time. :(
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Yeah. It was turning out really well.

The only saving grace is most of the assets got reused for Disney Infinity's Pirates of the Caribbean playset. (Which is why it had so much more content than the other ones)
 
Zodzilla said:
This list is sorely missing Sam and Max: Freelance Police, which is the only cancelled game I've ever written to a company about.

Absolutely heartbreaking at the time. Even moreso in that it was 95% done already.
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We could have gotten this instead of the shitty Telltale Sam&Max games?

qaoeHK5.gif
 
Krejlooc said:
This tactic of repeating the premise of your argument, like I missed it, is weird and aggressive. Yes, I get it, the conclusion you came to wasn't the biggest leap in the world. Again, nobody is berating you for that. But not everybody took those same leaps of logic. To your specific point about "many outlets" - being familiar with the internet of the time, I was already aware of the number of times these magazines misreported things. I saw diehard gamefan reporting this in sparse detail as FF64, then I saw much more detailed information on BBSes and Compuserve pages that more accurately explained what the demo was. That's not at all unrealistic like you assume. I have no idea why you'd be so personally offended by this, but whatever.

Framing a discussion in context of winners and losers is lame. What did I win? The right to recall my own experience and past? That's not a prize for competition.
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The fact that you keep referring to this as my conclusion is weird and aggressive, as if this wasn't the predominant thinking at the time.You admit you saw this demo referred to as FF64 yourself. In 1995 it was not even a leap of logic to assume this was a precursor to a FF64, it was a logical conclusion. The fact that FF7 was Playstation exclusive was a bombshell. I concede that not everyone assumed that the SGI tech demo meant a FF64 was in the works, but I have to wonder what else could you think? To take a Final Fantasy tech demo on SGI hardware at face value and not make any assumptions based on it is alien to me. If there were rumblings of a Square/Nintendo break up on the internet at the time, then that would make sense. I am curious as to what the "much more detailed information" on the internet was at the time.
 
Starcraft Ghost was a bummer, but looking back now I'm glad it was canned because it would've been bad on those old consoles.

Now if it came out today or even last gen, I think it could've been great especially with western games taking the forefront of game design.
 
Make an article about the most heart-breaking cancellations. I click on the link just to read what they have to say about MML 3. Not even there.

Okay IGN.
 
List sorely lacks Capcom Fighting All-Stars. Got Dead Phoenix on it though.

No Legends 3 makes the list hard to even take seriously. Hell, Starcraft: Ghost wasn't even on it.

To each their own I suppose.
 
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