Top 5 Video Games You'll Never Get to Play

For the hundreds of video games released every year, there are just as many that are announced, hyped, worked on, tested and then never released. To this day, there are some games that were created and almost released, but despite fan demand or intriguing concepts, have never seen the light of day. Here are a look at the 5 greatest games you'll never get to play.

5. Sonic X-Treme

Sonic X-treme is an unreleased Sonic The Hedgehog game that has a rocky development history. Sonic X-Treme was conceived of as the first truly 3-D Sonic the Hedgehog game. It was originally developed by Sega for the Genesis console, but after internal consideration, development members moved the project to the Sega 32X. Sonic X-Treme initially planned to have Sally Acorn and other characters from the Sonic the Hedgehog Saturday morning cartoon fighting alongside Sonic.

Sega decided that Sonic X-Treme needed more powerful hardware than the 32X could provide to make the game, so after the commercial failure of the 32X, Sonic X-Treme was retooled for the upcoming Sega Saturn console. The levels of the game were designed in a "tubular mode" that allowed both level rotation and gravity effects fir a 3-D feel. Also notable was a fish-eye lens camera effect to give Sonic X-Treme a distorted, spherical look and feel. A series of internal company politics and development delays lead to progress on the game slowing, then stalling, even as Sonic The Hedgehog fans were champing at the bit to play a 3-D Sonic game. When a ballooning budget led to a reduction in staff, more and more responsibility was piled on the lead technology director and programmer's plate.

Finally, while working long hours of overtime in order to try and have Sonic X-Treme ready in time for the Christmas shopping season, the lead developer came down with pneumonia. With the loss of an important team member, the Sonic X-Treme team wouldn't be able to have the game ready in time. Sega canceled the project and instead released a Sega Saturn port of the 16-bit Genesis title Sonic 3D Blast.

4. Star Fox 2

When Star Fox 2, a sequel to the breakout hit shoot-em-up game Star Fox for the Super Nintendo, video game magazines of the of the day were buzzing in anticipation. Nintendo provided many screenshots in order to generate interest. The game was said to offer even more advanced 3-D graphics, the debut of new characters and game play modes, and include a more strategic mode of playing as opposed to the first Star Fox game's linear progression. There was a demo readied for US trade shows. The Japanese version Star Fox 2 was essentially completely finished except for the removal of debugging tools.

The reason for the cancellation of Star Fox 2 was the upcoming anticipated release of the Nintendo 64, Nintendo's next-generation console. Nintendo decided that the company should have a clean break between 3D games on the Super Nintendo and 3D games to appear on Nintendo's 64-bit system. Sadly, according to Star Fox 2 programmer Dylan Cuthbert, Nintendo still could have released the nearly complete Star Fox 2 without impacting 3-D games on the Nintendo 64. Cuthbert said in an interview that, "In retrospect, [Nintendo] could have released Star Fox 2 and there would have been over a year and a half before the [Nintendo]64 came out. But hindsight is always 20/20."

3. WarCraft Adventures: Lord of the Clans

WarCraft Adventures: Lord of the Clans was a dark comedy point-and-click adventure computer game under development by Blizzard Entertainment that was set in the Warcraft universe. Blizzard then developed all the character designs, the backgrounds of the game worlds, sound and music recordings and the game's general storyline. An experienced US CD-ROM animation company by the name of Animation Magic was contracted to produce nearly half an hour of fully animated cut scenes, as well as make all of the the game's incidental artwork, the coding of the adventure game engine and implementing sound effects.

Warcraft Adventures: Lord of the Clans was nearly complete. Most of the game features, area puzzles, and the game world were in place. All of the the voice acting had been recorded. Most of the cut-scene animation was complete. Blizzard executives felt that the title still needed improvement. To this end, they hired Steve Meretzky, the legendary adventure game creator responsible for The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy computer games. Meretzky was brought aboard as a design consultant. After two weeks of going through Warcraft Adventures: Lord of the Clans with a fine tooth comb, he determined that puzzle sequences and other parts of the game a rewrite. That meant more more animation had to be created and more voice-overs had to be recorded.

Blizzard felt that making the proposed changes would result in delays that would push the title even farther back. Competing company LucasArts had just announced that the next point and click adventure game schedule, Grim Fandango would utilize a 3D graphics engine. Blizzard felt that Lord of The Clans would look dated by the time it would reach the market, and decided to pull the plug. While the story would eventually live on in a licensed novel written by Star Trek novelist Christie Golden, the game would never see the light of day.

2. Starcraft: Ghost

Blizzard has another game that has been in development for a long time that takes place in the universe of a popular franchise, in the case, part of Blizzard's StarCraft series. Starcraft: Ghost was announced in 2002 for the GameCube, Xbox, and PlayStation 2 video game consoles. The game was going to build on the military science fiction settings in the Starcraft universe while blending stealth action and third-person shooter video game mechanics.

After many internal delays in development, Nihilistic Software stooped work on the game. Swingin' Ape Studios started work in the game in 2004. Blizzard later bought the studio, and plans for the GameCube version of Starcraft: Ghost were officially canceled in 2005. While Blizzard has officially only said the game is on-hold, it is worth noting that much like the post-cancellation release of Lord of the Clans' story via a licensed novel, a novel was published called StarCraft Ghost: Nova which covers the back story of the central character in the game.

1. Duke Nukem Forever

While Duke Nukem Forever may not be the best game that has never been released, one can certainly argue it is the most legendary/ Duke Nukem Forever was been in development for over 12 years. According to the Duke Nukem Forever list, in the time Duke Nukem Forever was developed and re-developed, over 75 games based in the MegaMan universe, and over 50 games based in the Star Wars universe, have been released.

Development on Duke Nukem Forever by 3D Realms was first announced in the spring of 1997, and was to use the Quake 3D graphics engine, which was the most state of the art engine at the time. After a release date in 1998 came and went, 3D Realms announced they were changing 3D engines to Epic's Unreal engine. The Duke Nukem series co-creator and producer said that this change would not delay the game very much and set a release date of 1999 for Duke Nukem Forever. In 1999, Duke Nukem Forever changed engines again to another version of the Unreal engine, hinting at a late 2000 release. 2000 came and went with no game, and the same thing happened in 2001. After repeatedly announcing, and then missing more release dates in 2001, 3D Realms officially announced Duke Nukem Forever's release date would be "when it's done".

After over 12 years in development hell, dozens of missed released dates, 5 different game engine changes, endless industry jokes at the game's expense and millions of dollars in development, as well as a lawsuit from parent company Take-Two Interactive, the entire development staff of Duke Nukem Forever was laid off. And so the winner of Wired Magazine's Lifetime Achievement For Vaporware ended not with a shotgun blast, but a whimper.

Sources:
http://sost.emulationzone.org/sonic_xtreme/interviews/mikewallis/index.htm
http://www.arwinglanding.net/articles.php?page=writeups/dylan
http://www.wowwiki.com/Warcraft_Adventures:_Lord_of_the_Clans
http://uk.gamespot.com/xbox/action/starcraftghost/index.html?tag=result;title;0
http://duke.a-13.net/