Cinematech Episode 309: “Summer Fun”
Timecode: 0:08: What says summer fun more than a trailer for a canceled next-gen game? The E3 2006
trailer for Dirty Harry. The game was supposed to be released in 2007 for the PS3 and Xbox 360, but was canceled due to "trouble" within developer The Collective. The trailer was not even made by them; it was actually made by an animation house to visualize what the game and its gameplay could have looked like.
In this trailer, the titular cop deals with a big, grumpy guy who got pissed that he turned off the TV in the restaurant. When the guy gets in his face, Harry turns around and socks him in the nose.
- Punk: You broke my nose! Call the police!Harry: I am the police.
The trailer calls Harry Callahan a good cop with a bad attitude, and shows some clips of Harry putting a punk's head in a vise. Ouch. The trailer ends with Harry reciting the famous line from the movie.
- Harry: I know what you're thinking. Did he fire six shots, or five? Do you feel lucky? Well, do ya, punk?!
Cinematech Episode 311: “Red Undies”
4:50: The intro and some gameplay from Kid Chameleon, an interesting platformer for the SEGA Genesis. The intro is pure, post-'80s Totally Radical.
- ”There was a new machine in the arcade that one could walk into and play. It used holograms to create a reality not our own. Everybody played it. This is the story of someone too tough to beat.
An arcade game that threatens the lives of those that play it? It's almost a bit like Five Nights at Freddy's. Brr.
KC is a tough platformer that features long levels with a lot of secrets to discover, such as warps that advance you forward in the game. There's even a warp in the first stage that takes you right to the final boss' stage. The titular Kid enters the game as his normal self, but can uncover masks that give him powers, such as a Friday the 13th-style hockey mask that lets him throw axes, and a samurai helmet that lets him use a katana.
KC was later included in Sonic's Ultimate Genesis Collection on the PS3 and Xbox 360.
8:14: A teaser trailer for a canceled Hellboy game by Konami on the PS3. The trailer shows dark, high-quality (perhaps too high-quality) graphics, but no gameplay.
There were some other Hellboy games. This PC Gamer Saturday Crapshoot tells the long and convoluted tale of one such game, originally made for the PC, and later dropped onto the PS1 in its waning days as a budget title.
14:21: An early and flat-out creepy trailer for Silent Hill: Origins. This trailer implies a greater connection to the overall series than the final game actually had. Or maybe having references to Silent Hill 2, 3, and 4 were just Shout-Outs? Anyway, at the time, I was quite thrilled to see a trailer for a new Silent Hill game. It was about time, since it was the first game since 3 and 4's releases in back-to-back years.
Ultimately, Origins only tied into the first game, and not even very well, at that. It was mainly about tracking the traumatized backstory of lead character Travis Grady, and tying it into the plot of Silent Hill. Despite this, Origins is easily my favorite of the Western-developed SH games due to its atmosphere being faithful to that of the original game, its excellent puzzles, some of the excellent music tracks, and its creepy bosses that tied into the game's story... except for the final one. Then again, it is Silent Hill. Origins is a minor classic, IMO.
The story behind the game's development is rather interesting. The original North American team was losing focus on the project, and so it was handed over to a United Kingdom team instead. What they received was apparently a dark comedy influenced by the hospital sitcom Scrubs! Designer and writer Sam Barlow rewrote the script and redid the monster and level design in a week.
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