Creatures never-released game, anybody knows what happened?

Ivanzx · October 2012

Also fro the pages of Retro Gamer I came to this game and remembered it was previewed back in the day for the Spectrum, even in Microhobby...
It was released for the C-64, but why not for the Spectrum? Why was it cancelled in the end? Is it that good in the C-64?

Maybe we spoke about this game here on WoS before, but cant find any thread...

na_th_an · October 2012

Ivanzx wrote: »

Is it that good in the C-64?

Oh, god, YES. You should try it NOW.

Ralf · October 2012

The game developer Thalamus actually promised us quite a lot of games but kept almost none of the promises:

http://www.worldofspectrum.org/infoseekpub.cgi?regexp=^Thalamus+Ltd$

From Wikipedia:

Thalamus entered the 1990s with a few more strong C64 titles, including Creatures and Creatures II: Torture Trouble from the Rowlands brothers, which have been lauded by several computer magazines for the strength of their gameplay and graphics on the aging machine. Cartoon-style platformers Summer Camp and Winter Camp were also released. But a multitude of problems began to overcome the company, threatening their demise. In 1991, Newsfield ran into serious financial trouble. Newsfield were forced to halt publication of their popular gaming magazines. Europress stepped in to save the magazines, but they slowly died out over the next year or two as their respective markets dwindled.

Thalamus managed to survive the liquidation of Newsfield, but funds were running low. With 8-bit gaming being superseded by 16-bit gaming, production costs were rising, forcing hundreds of independent publishers, such as Thalamus, to either close down or allow themselves to be consumed by a publishing giant. Thalamus released their final C64 game, Nobby the Aardvark in 1993, but it was too little too late. With their various Amiga projects spiralling out of budget and no further income, Thalamus had no choice but to close down their operation

That explains a lot, I guess.

Ivanzx · October 2012

Ralf wrote: »

The game developer Thalamus actually promised us quite a lot of games but kept almost none of the promises:

http://www.worldofspectrum.org/infoseekpub.cgi?regexp=^Thalamus+Ltd$

From Wikipedia:

Thalamus entered the 1990s with a few more strong C64 titles, including Creatures and Creatures II: Torture Trouble from the Rowlands brothers, which have been lauded by several computer magazines for the strength of their gameplay and graphics on the aging machine. Cartoon-style platformers Summer Camp and Winter Camp were also released. But a multitude of problems began to overcome the company, threatening their demise. In 1991, Newsfield ran into serious financial trouble. Newsfield were forced to halt publication of their popular gaming magazines. Europress stepped in to save the magazines, but they slowly died out over the next year or two as their respective markets dwindled.

Thalamus managed to survive the liquidation of Newsfield, but funds were running low. With 8-bit gaming being superseded by 16-bit gaming, production costs were rising, forcing hundreds of independent publishers, such as Thalamus, to either close down or allow themselves to be consumed by a publishing giant. Thalamus released their final C64 game, Nobby the Aardvark in 1993, but it was too little too late. With their various Amiga projects spiralling out of budget and no further income, Thalamus had no choice but to close down their operation

That explains a lot, I guess.

True, and the 2 games available were done by other development teams, with some known Spectrum people on them. Also, the BinMaN from WoS forums worked in the graphics from Sanxion, so maybe he has more info about it...

Anyways, I dont know if the Spectrum screen was a mock up:

http://www.worldofspectrum.org/showmag.cgi?mag=MicroHobby/Issue210/Pages/MicroHobby21000013.jpg

but I have been watching the game on youtube for the C-64 and as na_th_an said, it looks like an interesting game :)

BiNMaN · October 2012

only a minor contribution from me I'm afraid and tbh the loader was poo, did it on my plus2 in those days i used the cursor keys, didn't start using a mouse until i had an st years later. Dennis Mulliner, Dave Thompson and Mark Wallace were the ones in contact Thalamus. I'm sure Den was working on some gfx for armalyte, I'd started to look at hawkeye as far as I know nothing happened at all after sanxion

Ivanzx · October 2012

BiNMaN wrote: »

only a minor contribution from me I'm afraid and tbh the loader was poo, did it on my plus2 in those days i used the cursor keys, didn't start using a mouse until i had an st years later. Dennis Mulliner, Dave Thompson and Mark Wallace were the ones in contact Thalamus. I'm sure Den was working on some gfx for armalyte, I'd started to look at hawkeye as far as I know nothing happened at all after sanxion

Well, I dont think that the loading screen of Sanxion is bad at all, not the best ever, but better than average, for sure. The graphics in Armalyte, though, look really raw and from kind of an early stage (also its fair to mention that the game is only available as a demo, so that could explain it!). Do you remember other Spectrum work going on there? I mean if they were really interested in the Spectrum stuff or any of the games was more than a mock up?? :)
Its nice to have a infiltrated from those years here in WoS ;)

joefish · October 2012

I thought that preview screen showed some excellent scenic graphics and seems to have fairly credible attributes. I still think it's a mock-up though. The sprites show two different styles of design (outlined and not) and are clearly placed to avoid attribute clash (how would they walk down an incline or cross that bridge without clashing?).

Nevertheless, Turrican could have benefitted from that lovely yellow/red/black/green landscaping.

Creatures never-released game, anybody knows what happened?

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