Unreleased Video Games You Can Play Today

Nobody wins when a video game is canceled. For publishers, cancellation means losing all the money they've invested into the project. For developers, it means hundreds and hundreds of hours of hard work will go unseen—and, more importantly, unplayed. And for fans, it means that they'll never get their hands on some innovative titles, many of which may not have been good in the strictest sense, but most of which are certainly interesting.

But thankfully, in the age of the internet nothing disappears for good, and many copies of officially unreleased video games (often referred to as ROMs) can be found online—assuming you know where to look. While we can't tell you where to find all of the games in question (video game emulation is a tricky and complicated subject, legally speaking), we can tell you they're out there. Happy hunting, and good luck.

Like Resident Evil's zombies, some games just won't stay dead. Take the game that's come to be known as Resident Evil 1.5, for example. As the first stab at a Resident Evil sequel, Resident Evil 1.5 has some things in common with the game that'd ultimately take its place. Like Resident Evil 2, the game has a branching narrative that changes based on which character you choose to play. Characters show injuries through animations, staggering when they're hurt, or running faster when they feel fine. Leon Kennedy, one of Resident Evil 2's heroes, even makes his first appearance in the abandoned title.

But there were many differences, too. Instead of STARS officer Claire Redfield, the game's female protagonist is a college student named Elza Walker. Enemies include baboons and literal spider-men. The levels and puzzles were completely different. Unfortunately, while Resident Evil 1.5 was almost finished, Capcom and the Resident Evil team decided that the game just wasn't up to snuff and decided to start over.

That's not exactly a great endorsement, but it didn't stop fans from wanting to see what Resident Evil 1.5 was all about. Now they can. A few years back, a team of hobbyists and amateur game designers called Team IGAS set out to use old prototypes to restore Resident Evil 1.5 to a playable state. Using a leaked prototype, some stray bits of Resident Evil 2's source code, and previews and screenshots from old gaming magazines, IGNAS has been able to piece together a relatively faithful recreation of the original game. In 2013, IGNAS released an early version of the restoration after someone stole a copy and tried to sell it, while an official demo, Resident Evil 2: Battle Coliseum, arrived in 2016.

You don't have to understand Warcraft's massive backstory to enjoy Warcraft games, but it's there if you want it, and boy, is there a lot of it. Currently, Blizzard and its various partners have published over 23 tie-in novels, a number of comic books, and a complete feature film—and that's not even counting all of the lore revealed in the games themselves.

And, unbelievably, there was almost more. In the mid-'90s, years before World of Warcraft took the game industry by storm, Blizzard started work on a point-and-click adventure game called Warcraft Adventures: Lord of the Clans. According to former Blizzard producer Bill Roper, Warcraft Adventures was going to tell the story of Thrall, an orc adopted by a human who would ultimately unite Azeroth's orc tribes and lead a rebellion against their human oppressors. However, the game took longer than expected to make, and by the time Warcraft Adventures was nearing completion, the market had changed. Blizzard told the story in a novel called Lord of the Clans, canceled the game, and moved on to the next project.

And that's all there was to say about Warcraft Adventures for about 18 years, until a Russian fan posted a copy of the game on a Warcraft fansite. If you're willing to dredge through pop-up laden piracy sites, you can probably find a copy, which gives a peek into a very different world of Warcraft—one that's less epic fantasy, and more just an excuse to make lame dirty jokes. Seriously. We're not kidding.

In the '80s, Sunsoft established a reputation as a purveyor of innovative, high-quality games like Blaster Master, Kangaroo, and a number of titles based on properties like Batman, The Addams Family, and Gremlins. And then the '90s happened. While Sunsoft continued to crank out games, including a number of titles based on Warner Bros.' classic animated properties, the company's parent organization made an ill-advised investment in a Palm Springs golf course, and Sunsoft of America went under, taking a number of in-development games with it.

Some of those titles survive, however, in the form of leaked prototypes. Of these, the most complete is Batman: Revenge of the Joker, but the most interesting is probably Wile E.'s Revenge, the sequel to Sunsoft's Road Runner's Death Valley Rally. According to Wile E. producer Rene Boutin, every part of the game was split into two levels. In the first half, players would control Wile E. Coyote as he scrambled to collect parts for his latest Road Runner-hunting gadget; in the second half, the Coyote had his invention, and used it to hunt down the Road Runner, who—as in the cartoons—he'd never quite catch.

That sounds like an interesting premise, but Boutin admits that it was a half-baked idea, and says the game wasn't really coming together when it was canceled (in the leaked prototype, only the first half of the first level—the collecting portion—works). There are also a few copies of a Sylvester and Tweety game out there, although it's hard to tell exactly what Sunsoft was aiming for—players (controlling Sylvester) can't do much more than meander around the house while Tweety and Granny wander around in the background.

Most unfinished games that leak online come from collectors who somehow manage to get their hands on hard copies of prototypes and decide to share their good fortune with others. Every now and then, one comes from a hacker, who illegally steals code from the game's developers. Very few, however, come directly from the developers themselves.

That's what makes Saints Row Undercover so interesting. After the open world PSP game was canceled by publisher THQ, Deep Silver Volition decided to upload the game, a walkthrough, a feature-length documentary, and a 122-page design document online. Obviously, the game wasn't finished, but Volition was clearly proud of the product, and that shows.

By today's standards, Saints Row Undercover is a pretty basic (and definitely incomplete) open world game. For anyone who's interested in the nitty-gritty specifics of game production, however, Volition's info-dump is a treasure trove of interesting information. The entire game—every single mission, feature, and Easter egg—is outlined in the design document (as are notable omissions—Volition is very clear that the game won't have motorcycles or swords, for example), and playing the Saints Row Undercover prototype shows how the studio was trying to implement its ambitious vision. Game design nerds take note: you don't want to miss this.

It's hardly surprising that a game billed as the next Mortal Kombat caused some controversy—after all, the moral panic sparked by Mortal Kombat's over-the-top violence led directly to the foundation of the Entertainment Software Rating Board. Ostensibly, Thrill Kill's big hook was its four-player battles (which, amazingly, had never happened in a fighting game before), but the gore was what really had fans all hot and bothered. As a soul condemned to hell, Thrill Kill players duked it out for a second chance at life, using weapons like cattle prods and severed limbs. The game's blatant sexual content probably helped, too—one character, Belladonna, wears pixelated dominatrix outfits and relies largely on crotch-based offense, and many of the game's finishing moves had racy, dumb names like "Swallow This" and "Head Muncher."

Of course, that edgy content is also why the game was canceled. Just six weeks before Thrill Kill was supposed to come out, Electronic Arts bought Thrill Kill publisher Virgin Interactive and immediately canceled the brutal BDSM-themed brawler in order to protect its brand and ward off any potential controversy.

But in Thrill Kill's case, cancellation actually helped make the game more famous, and it wasn't long before the game's developers leaked a complete version—as well as a number of prototypes and betas—on the internet for gorehounds of all ages to enjoy. In fact, Thrill Kill is notorious for being one of the easiest "canceled" games to play, and copies are still available online. Thankfully, if diving into piracy sites makes you nervous, there's another solution: the Thrill Kill engine was also used to create Wu-Tang: Shaolin Style, which plays almost exactly the same and isn't completely embarrassing if you're over the age of 13. It's a win-win!