Happy Thanksgiving!

While most people enjoyed Thanksgiving by sitting down and eating a large serving of Turkey and watching at least two boring football games, I spent my time gawking at a bunch of screenshots of unreleased PlayStation games. A friend of the museum sent me pictures of:

Dream Team Basketball which looks totally cool. It appears to be developed by Anvil Incorporated, but I never heard of that development studio. There doesn't appear to be any trace of Anvil on the internet. (Digital Anvil is owned by Microsoft and probably isn't the same company)

Global Domination from Psygnosis. The US version seemed to be slightly different from the European version. (It never made it to the US unforunately)

Lone Soldier from Telstar. Killwheel from Apt Productions. Additional pictures of Charlie Brown, of which the museum is still trying to find ANY information about (who was developing it? who was to publish it?)



Then I received pictures of two more games which drove me absolutely nuts. Overhead shooters are my favorite type of game. My second and third favorite are platformers and action shooters. In my email I found Rattlesnake Red and Youngblood. Rattlesnake Red was to be published by Acclaim and developed by Iguana. I always thought this game looked cool and I couldn't wait to play it.



Youngblood, from what I could tell, looked like Skeleton Krew which is an action shooter. Real Time Associates was developing Youngblood. (Hint: stay tuned for some inside information behind this game in the coming months)



I am very appreciative for receiving these screenshots and it was a great Thanksgiving treat. Now if only the museum could get their hands on them for preservation purposes (and because I want to play them so badly).

Off-topic rambling: How long do CD-Rs last? Within the last 3 months I have come across two discs which are laden with errors even though they appear fine (no scratches). One was an original Time Crisis which I was able to replace. Unfortunately, the other was one-of-a-kind and can't be replaced. I have tried my best over the weekend to revive it but it doesn't work. I haven't given up hope, but this only stresses to me that the PlayStation Museum must continue to preserve as much as possible. (From now on, all critical code will have two backups and will be backed up every 5 - 7 years on a regular schedule)

Concept Artwork revealed: Spirit Master for PlayStation

Below are selected scans of conceptual artwork from the unfinished Probe Entertainment game Spirit Master. Spirit Master is a 3D fighter similar to the likes of Toshinden and Tekken. The frames below depict the marsh monster coming alive. A bolt of magical lightning strikes a tree in the Lousiana marsh. The tree starts to come alive like Frankenstein.




The PlayStation Museum has additional artwork for this game on the website as well as exclusive video of three playable characters on YouTube.

I apologize for the crappy scans. I didn't set the scanner for A4 size paper and it cut off the sides. Click on the pictures to view them larger.

If you like these pics, post comments and I'll post more of this game or of other games.

PlayStation Museum - Preserving the history of the original PlayStation

The biggest blunder in Videogame history?

What's the biggest blunder in Videogame history? How about Nintendo backstabbing Sony and not following through with the CD-Rom attachment for the SNES? Stan Lee from Marvel Comics should do a special issue of "What If...Nintendo partnered with Sony for a SNES addon?". Ever since Nintendo turned their back on Sony, Sony backlashed with the PlayStation, PS2, and soon the PS3. Nintendo hasn't been successful with a home console since the SNES (obviously they are somehow winning the portable console battle). The PS3 is almost upon us and chances are no one reading this blog will own a PS3 this year because they will be such a hot commodity. If you are one of those people who are thinking about purchasing a Wii and Xbox 360, please save your money instead. The Wii is not an advanced console by any means. The controller will be cool at first because of it's 'newness', but mark my words: you will grow tired of it. I have already talked to various developers and there's only so much they can do with the controller. Nintendo will have to rely on first party support because third party will dwindle down.
So where can PS3 excel besides graphics? They will have to deliver a top-notch internet game delivery system. For instance, offering downloadable games will be a key win for Sony. Yes, Xbox live offers that stuff I'm sure. But Xbox doesn't have David Jaffe or even Factor 5. I am also trying to talk to Team 17 to port some of their older classics like Project X and Alien Breed to this new system. I'm still under the belief that these simple and less costly games are what gamers want. Epic games like God of War are cool, but give me a quick and dirty shoot-em-up or beat-em-up and I'll be loving life.

A new blog to help facilitate the preservation of PlayStation!

Today marks the first day that the PlayStation Museum (http://www.playstationmuseum.org) creates a blog in order to help assist us with preserving the history of the PlayStation. If you are a programmer or artist involved with the original PlayStation, come give us a shout. We would like to hear from you. In fact, we may list a number candidates that we would like to hear from. These people include:

David Jaffe (formerly from SingleTrac), Thomas Engel (Facotr 5), Jens Petersam (Factor 5), Andrew Seed (Cranberry Source), Ainsley Fernando (Cranberry Source), Jorgen Lundman (Cranberry Source), Matt Taylor (Cranberry Source)...the list will go on! If you don't see your name on here, contact us first before we try to track you down. If you programmed on the original PlayStation, you will be contacted by the PlayStation Museum sooner or later.