Vaporware: Difference between revisions
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{{trope}}{{outdated}}
{{quote|''Then Indonesia claimed that they
''Were gonna get [[Atomic Hate|one]], any day.''
|'''[[Tom Lehrer]]''' on Indonesia's nuclear ambitions, ''[[South Africans With Surface to Air Missiles|Who's Next?]]''.}}
Computer or video game software or hardware with revolutionary or next-generation capabilities that is continuously hyped to the public, but doesn't seem to be coming any closer to store shelves. Note that long development cycles do not, by themselves, qualify a product as Vaporware; the game must be repeatedly postponed and put off, all the while being promoted as "Coming soon!"
Sometimes this is intentional, done by various promoters and stockholders solely to drive up the company's share prices, lure in new investors, or create a buzz in the marketplace that will keep their name on top. In the most [[TV Tropes Drinking Game|egregious]] cases, the developing company itself may be a total fraud. That said, the vast majority of vaporware isn't malicious. Most of the time there is legitimate product being produced, but internal problems simply result in it falling behind schedule and being passed in the marketplace by competitors. The developers simply promised more than their programmers could possibly deliver in too short a time frame.
Often, when a big goal is for the product to be up with the current technology, it becomes a self-reinforcing feedback loop of sorts when work has to be scrapped to keep up with the times. Combine this with people leaving the project out of frustration with the lack of forward progress and it gets harder to finish with every delay. More than a few games have also fallen victim to runaway ego and perfectionism, where the designers get distracted by their own artistic visions or desire to create something revolutionary and genre-shattering and won't be satisfied until it's "perfect", cost, publishers, and release dates be damned! (With predictable results).
Whatever the cause, it annoys consumers to no end. If and when the product finally is released, [[Hype Backlash|its quality and abilities are often lower than what was expected,]] to further the disappointment of users.
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Compare [[Development Hell]], [[Stillborn Serial]]. Contrast [[Dead Fic]] and [[Orphaned Series]], which actually manage to release more than a teaser (thanks to serialization) before eventually being abandoned incomplete. See also [[Saved From Development Hell]] for a few who managed to get completed.
Subtrope of [[Release Date Change]].
Should not be confused with [[Vapor Wear]]. Or "[[Valve]] [[Schedule Slip|Time]]." Or Vaporwave, the genre of music.
{{examples}}▼
▲{{examples}}
== [[Video Games]] ==
* The all-time king of vaporware in gaming is certainly ''[[
*
** If there's any consolation, what appears to be [[Full Motion Video]] snippets of the game [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L9ACU0fm3S8 did surface] on a fan-run channel, a few years after the game was supposed to be released and shortly before Data Design Interactive went bankrupt. Though given how DDI has been viewed as a third-rate [[Shovelware]] house of dubious merit, it wasn't such a bad idea after all for the game to be quietly canned, perhaps much to Connie's benefit who was initially being criticised for being an infantile novelty act with "no nuance or depth" by the time the game was announced.
** A final pre-release build of the game did surface on eBay and was subsequently purchased by video game preservationist Forest of Illusion who uploaded pictures of the disc on [[Twitter]]. This was in addition to [https://lostmediawiki.com/Connie_Talbot:_Over_the_Rainbow_(lost_build_of_cancelled_Wii_karaoke_tie-in_game;_2009) two videos] taken by a DDI employee which showed Talbot herself demonstrating the game at their E3 2009 booth.
* The entirety of the ''Fabula Nova Crystallis: Final Fantasy XIII'' franchise appears to be suffering this at large:
** ''[[
** Then there is ''[[Final Fantasy
*** ''
** Finally, the portable title, ''Final Fantasy Agito XIII''; again, it was announced alongside the other two games as a mobile phone game, but little was said or shown of it (save for some concept art and a logo). This persisted until an announcement at a Square Enix expo in late 2008, where it was said the mobile phone version had been cancelled in favour of a PSP version. After a name change, the game was finally released in late 2011.
*** Square Enix has stated that the PSP version was in the works from the start and was always planned to be announced later. They also stated they scrapped the phone version because they didn't want to wait for phone technology to catch up to a point they liked.
*** A more literal form of vaporware is "Final Fantasy Haeresis XIII" which never existed as more than a trademark, but still stirred tons of rumors amongst information-starved fans. Considering how difficult and long the development of the other three games has been, its very much doubtful that this game will ever exist in any form - if it ever did in the first place.
*** It's now at a point where Square Enix held a press conference in January 2011 to ''re-introduce'' the remaining two games in the franchise.
*** Also worth mentioning is the infamous case of "Chrono Break", another rumored title that only existed as a trademark. It was thought to be a third game in the ''[[
*** [[
* ''Crimsonland 2'' is certainly taking its sweet time to appear.
* ''[[
** Given a [[Shout
** Blizzard never actually canceled it (despite what some people may say) and keep saying they have plans to MAYBE finish the game (hence its "Postponed Indefinitely" status). Whether or not this can be taken as a glimmer of hope is up to you. Given the fact that Diablo 3 was in development for 11 years before release and survived the closing of Blizzard North in 2005, it's not beyond the realm of possibility.
* ''[[
* ''[[Sonic the Hedgehog|Sonic X-Treme]]'' is a notorious example of Vaporware meets [[Finagle's Law]]: thanks to an overdose of [[Executive Meddling]], a massive drop in employees, the director's failing health, and the failing popularity of the Sega Saturn (which the game was to be released on), ''X-Treme'' never made it out. Since then, music and level designs for the game have been released publicly, which means outside of a homebrew (which is [https://web.archive.org/web/20150718063502/http://www.senntient.com/cgi-local/forumdisplay.cgi?action=topics&forum=Xtreme&number=13 actually being made]), it's highly unlikely the game will ever be released.
** ''[[
* ''[[STALKER|S.T.A.L.K.E.R: Shadow of Chernobyl]]'' was a clear victim of both this trope ''and'' rushing the game to stores in a [[Obvious Beta|messy half-finished state]] that makes the [[What Could Have Been|unrealized potential]] all the more obvious.
* ''[[Neverwinter Nights]]''; originally announced with a 1998 release date, delayed until mid-2002. Along the way, production company Bioware broke off its collaboration with publisher Black Isle, an entirely new engine was written for the game, and the Third Edition of ''[[Dungeons
** The Mac and Linux versions were originally going to ship in the same box as the Windows version, as full versions with development tools. About a week before release, Bioware announced that the Mac version was going to be a separate SKU after [[Mac Soft]] ported it, which they were going to start doing [[Real Soon Now]], the Linux version would be available for download eventually, and neither would include the development tools. Mac and Linux users were a bit upset.
* ''[[Fallout]] 3'' spent five years in development at Black Isle studios, and was almost at a releasable stage in development, when Interplay went belly-up in 2003 and closed Black Isle down. [[Bethesda Softworks]] eventually acquired the rights to develop the game for a late 2008 release, but opted to begin entirely from scratch, meaning that Black Isle's "Van Buren" version of the game will likely never see the light of day, outside of the leaked tech demo that the ''Fallout'' community began distributing in 2007.
** Black Isle Studios [[Too Good to Last|is a goldmine for this kind of thing]]. ''[[
** Other ''Fallout'' vaporware included ''Fallout: Brotherhood of Steel 2'', ''Fallout Tactics 2'', and ''Fallout Extreme''.
** ''[[
* Vaporware is not a new phenomenon. Way back in the 8-bit days of 1984, ''Psyclapse'' and ''Bandersnatch'' (for the [[Commodore 64]] and the [[ZX Spectrum]], respectively, although practically the same game) were in development for Imagine Software. Advertising promised much - hardware dongles to support new features Never Seen Before on either system, and promoting the achievements of its outrageously large development team (of nine - nearly nine times the average for the time). Despite the hype, it eventually became clear that ''Psyclapse'' never got past the design stage, ''Bandersnatch'' would need to sell for a ridiculous amount of money just to break even, and by the time [[The BBC]] arrived to film the spectacular successes of a Liverpool-based firm at the forefront of the then-upstart computer games industry, Imagine were absolutely in the toilet, and BBC found themselves making a cautionary tale about corporate excess that finished with the bailiffs arriving to repossess everything Imagine ever owned (and very nearly the BBC cameras, too). A couple of splinter companies later, ''Bandersnatch'' was released as ''Brataccas'' for the [[Amiga]], [[Atari ST]] and [[Apple Macintosh]], as the first title of [[Psygnosis]].
** Another notorious ZX Spectrum example was ''Street Hawk'', a spin-off from a barely-noticed American action TV show that suffered such severe delays that the software company had to give a completely different game with the same title to a magazine that they'd promised copies to for a subscription gift offer.
** Yet another notorious Spectrum effort was Spirit Software's ''Formula One'', which promised greatest ever realism because it included a ''steering wheel'' peripheral (at a time when joysticks were not standardised but were an expensive add-on which were at least usable for many games). Adverts ran for literally years until the game eventually dribbled out onto the market to poor reviews and annoyance that the "peripheral" wasn't something you plugged into the computer, it was a cardboard ring that you rolled across the keyboard.
* Will Wright's ''[[Spore]]'' was once considered by many to be vaporware, as it was announced in 2000 under the title "Sim Everything" and wasn't released until September 2008.
* Closely related to the 64DD (see next section) is ''[[
* The Nintendo 64's path through history was littered by the emaciated bodies of partially developed games. Some, like ''[[Robotech]]: Crystal Dreams'', ''[[Fire Emblem]] 64'', ''[[Nintendo Wars
** Remember ''Freak Boy''? No? Didn't think so.
** The ''[[Panel
* [[Rare]] picked up quite a few of these in the hey day of the N64 and Gamecube era, each of which deserves its own entry:
** One of the ''first'' platformers announced for the [[Nintendo 64]] was a game called ''Conker's Quest.'' The cute platformer starring a child-friendly squirrel was intended to be a counterpart to the more complicated platformers of the time. This incarnation of Conker even made a cameo (along with future Rare star [[Banjo-Kazooie|Banjo]]) in ''[[Diddy Kong Racing]]'' later the same year, intended to pave the way for his future franchise. Though initially shown at E3 in 1997, ''Conker's Quest'' disappeared for awhile before resurfacing in 1998 as ''Conker's Twelve Tales''. Footage of this incarnation can found floating the net. Another game based on this version of the character came out in 1999 for the Game Boy Color, ''Conker's Pocket Tales'', but there was still no sign of the N64 version. In 2000, in what many at first assumed to be an April Fool's prank, Rare unveiled that they'd completely tossed out all work on the child-friendly ''Conker's Quest'', retooling it into ''[[
*** Conker would ''once again'' have trouble with this as an Xbox remake was announced then vanished for some time. Eventually, it became ''Conker: Live and Reloaded'', altered from ''Conker: Live and Uncut'' due to the game actually getting ''more'' censorship from Microsoft than it had from Nintendo.
** ''[[
** Throughout the Nintendo 64's lifespan, Rare had worked on a title called ''Dinosaur Planet''. Nintendo eventually repurposed the title from an original IP into a ''[[Star Fox (
** ''[[Perfect Dark]]'', the [[Spiritual Successor]] to Rare's hit ''[[
*** Its sequel, ''[[Perfect Dark|Perfect Dark Zero]]'', was originally announced for the Gamecube, with art of an anime-styled Joanna leaking around but few details. After the sale of Rare to Microsoft, the game was announced again for the Xbox. Like fellow refugee ''Kameo'', however, ''[[Perfect Dark|Perfect Dark Zero]]'' got pushed back long enough that it turned into a launch title for the Xbox 360 instead.
** ''[[Banjo
*** ''[[Banjo
** ''Banjo-Tooie'' launched several years late in 2000, without the "Stop n' Swop" feature that would interact with ''Banjo-Kazooie'' which ''Banjo-Kazooie'' itself had promoted, even showing images of these sequences being activated. For years, people speculated as to the loss of the feature, leading people to eventually uncover a patent that appeared to mirror the process by using a feature of the N64 that involved storing data for roughly 60 seconds after shutdown. Speculation led to many fans concluding that, because later models of the system could not hold data this long, the feature had to be dropped due to it no longer being technically feasible. "Stop n' Swop" eventually returned - on the Xbox 360 Live Arcade releases almost a decade later.
* In a curious twist, many people believed ''[[
* ''[[Ultima IX]]'' was stuck in development for five years, as conflicts between Richard Garriott and [[Electronic Arts|EA]] hampered production, much of its staff was diverted to ''[[Ultima Online]]'', and [[Polygon Ceiling|the advent of 3D graphics]] caused the original ''Ultima Online''-like version of game to be scrapped for a new 3D one. Upon its release in 1999, it was poorly received and is generally considered one of the worst games in the series, and ''certainly'' not the grand finale that long-time fans were expecting. Many fans [[Fanon Discontinuity|prefer to ignore its existence,]] and one group of fans is currently developing their own ''Ultima IX'' as a mod for ''[[The Elder Scrolls]] [[The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion
** ''Ultima X'', on the other hand, never saw the light of day at all.
* ''[[X-COM]]'' games ''Genesis'' and ''Alliance'' were eagerly expected after years of development, but given the various studio shifts that Microprose suffered at the time, they were permanently delayed/cancelled.
* ''[[Freelancer]]'' was announced in 1999, and the first demo was shown at E3 in 2000; back then, Digital Anvil promised entire worlds with moving transports, changing weather, dynamic economies, lots and lots of side quests and a non-linear story, you could buy and set up your own base, and the NPCs had their own personalities. However, Digital Anvil soon ran out of money, the owners had to sell the company to Microsoft Games, and while they were gathering up the needed money, they had to stop and scale down the goals of the project. Four years later, in 2003, the game was finally released: the economy was now static, the NPCs had a painfully generic personality, the worlds were reduced to pretty-looking menus, the storyline was made 100% linear (and oddly ends fairly early in the game before 80% of the content is even unlocked), and the side quests were removed. However, the final product ''did not suck'', and still stands today as an example of excellent game design. The graphics ''were'' extremely outdated however.
* The [[Survival Horror]] game ''
* [[Working Designs]] initially announced a United States release of the [[Sega Saturn]] version of ''[[Magic Knight Rayearth]]'' in 1995. It was delayed for three years before finally being released after the console itself was officially dead in America (for six months). The first year of delay was for mostly unknown reasons (most likely relating to the vast amount of voice work involved), but the other two years were no doubt due to Bernie Stolar (head of Sega of America at the time) and his draconian policy towards third party developers. The game was actually finished for a good amount of time, but due to Stolar's involvement, it took a large amount of time before it was finally released - so long that it ended up the last Saturn game ever to come out in the United States.
** Another part of the problem was a hard drive crash that deleted sections of the source code for that game (and several other Working Designs projects), forcing the developers to replace the lost sections from scratch.
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* ''Mythri'' was an indie RPG by Team XKalibur initially announced for the Gameboy Color in 2000 that first received press when news site RPGamer began covering it and started a campaign to get a publisher for it. Variant Interactive eventually signed on board and the project jumped from the outdated (by 2003) GBC to the then-viable GBA, complete with comparison screenshots of improved graphical engine updates. After two years with absolutely no updates, news eventually trickled out that Variant had dropped the game and Team XKalibur was once more seeking a publisher. The game was finally quietly cancelled. Not long after, the developer was disbanded and the staff scattered across the industry.
* While vaporware comes up occasionally in the commercial games industry, it's practically standard operating procedure among amateur authors (sorry guys, I got midterms coming soon!). Case in point: Work began on ''Return to [[Dark Castle]]'', a modern sequel to the beloved classic from the monochrome Macintosh era, by a two-man team in 1996 (a decade after the first game's release.) First announced with a late 2000 release date, development and occasional beta releases dragged on for years while news petered down to nothing, causing most fans to write the game off. It ultimately made a surprise reemergence in 2007 as "nearly done" and was then delayed again until march next year due to legal issues, when it was finally finished. The level editor ''still'' isn't out.
* Valve has a habit of this. What makes them notorious for their extremely long delays is their demand for perfection in their games, as they stated in the commentary for ''[[
** ''[[Half-Life
** For several years, ''[[
*** The ''[[
** ''[[
** Valve somehow promised that ''[[Left 4 Dead]]'' would receive frequent updates like Team Fortress 2. After seeing all the problems in the gameplay that Left 4 Dead had and what needed to be fixed, Valve most likely would have to change and patch so many things that they believed it would be better to release a sequel that addresses all the issues. Fans naturally reminded Valve daily about the promise that was broken.
*** ''[[Left 4 Dead 2]]'' is an inversion of this trope for Valve because it was literally released one year after the first game was published. This was Valve's response to everyone that made fun of Valve for their infamous Valve Time and Valve wanted to prove that they ''can'' release on a fixed schedule. However, the game came with many problems that are still around years later and many fans are starting to say Valve Time is a good thing now.
* Following in Valve's footsteps are the makers of the ''[[Half Life]] 2'' mod ''[http://www.blackmesasource.com/ Black Mesa]'' (formerly ''[[Artifact Title|Black Mesa: Source]]''). Announced in 2004, the ''Black Mesa'' team has made steady and well-documented progress chipping away at no small task: recreating the entirety of the original ''[[Half Life]]'' on ''[[Half Life]] 2'''s Source Engine. It usually wins the "Top Unreleased Mod of 200X", but lately the accolades have begun to turn into dubious honors, as it racked up its first [http://www.wired.com/epicenter/2009/12/vaporware-2009-inhale-the-fail/ Vaporware Award] at the end of 2009. The team tried to settle on a late 2009 release, but were ultimately unable to meet it. Since then they have undergone a total media blackout, only publishing updates on their progress every once in a blue moon. The currently release date is "[[Duke Nukem Forever
* Speaking of ''[[Half Life]]'', the fan film [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ixFf4ljuCg Escape From City 17] has seen an update (which just stripped away some of the unnecessary dialogue) and a teaser for the second part, those were in October 2009 and nothing has yet been seen since.
** [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4lyUNs7eNhs&feature=channel_video_title Part two has been released], so now we need to wait and see what they do with the rest of the series.
* This is [[Older Than the NES]]: the numerous never-released games for the [[
* ''[[League of Legends]]'' champions Evelynn and Twitch were severely nerfed by Riot in late 2010. By Riot's own admission, this was to get people to stop playing them - they intentionally broke the characters beyond all reasonable viability. This was so they could retool the characters' mechanics, and an overall stealth mechanic for the whole game. It was said that the rework would arrive very soon. [[Lampshade Hanging|After all, they wouldn't intentionally destroy two characters for over a year, right?]] Almost 2012, place your bets.
** As of June 2012, this still hasn't happened yet.
* ''[[
* ''[[The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess]]'' for the Gamecube came close to being called Vaporware and even picked up one of Wired's Vaporware Awards, but eventually hit the shelves... as a launch title for the ''Wii'' with added motion sensing controls, and a bit after for the console it was originally made for. While the official announcement was "only" three years prior, only Nintendo knows for how long the title had been in development.
** As of 2008, Nintendo announced they won't talk about new games until they are far enough in development it's clear they will be released to stores. This is done mostly to prevent Vaporware and [[Hype Backlash]] (but [[Rule of Perception]] means the [[Fan Dumb]] thinks games aren't being developed at all).
** Keep in mind that Miyamoto often pushes the releases for games back because of his philosophy "A late game can eventually be good, but a bad game is bad forever."
* After its cancellation, [[Joss Whedon]] expressed interest in further exploring the universe of ''[[Firefly]]'' as an MMORPG, and there was even evidence that it was in the works; Penny Arcade even remarked on it ("Everyone just rolls shaman"). There's been little word on the game since 2006, and while developer Dark-Cryo has picked up the pieces of what was developed, they seem to be doing so without authorization from 20th Century Fox or Mutant Enemy.
* ''[[Battlecruiser 3000AD]]'' spent over seven years in development before [[Take Two Interactive]] released it to stores as-is in one of the video game industry's most infamous [[Executive Meddling]] moments. The sequel, ''Universal Combat'', had a half-dozen different release dates, eventually resulting in a publisher switch ''after'' initial release.
** Along the same creator, there was supposed to be some episodic game by him coming out exclusively on Gametap. It was on the Coming Soon list without much info for a while. It then quietly disappeared.
* ''[[Harvest Moon]]'' games, and indeed most anything localized by Natsume, are notorious for being delayed months or even years at a time before finally being released. Most fans know that any release date is tentative at best and could be pushed back at any time right up to the day before release (''A Wonderful Life'', anyone?). You're probably safe if you assume that "release date" means "will likely be released within a year of this date."
** Of particular note is the long promised, but still missing Harvest Moon [[Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game|MMORPG]]. Online connectivity (read: the ability to buy, sell, and trade items between other players) has also been long promised since ''Save The Homeland'' debuted. It finally appeared in limited form in ''Island Of Happiness'' via the [[Nintendo DS]]' WiFi.
*** A true online ''Harvest Moon'' game is in beta (as of June 2010)... [[Tainted
** The American release of ''Tree Of Tranquility'' was pushed back numerous times, finally being released more than a year after the Japanese version and still shipped with a [[Game Breaking Bug]], which they took their sweet time fixing as well in a very quiet recall.
** Just how slow Natsume is was further emphasized when Marvelous let [[XSEED Games]], which it has partnered with on other games, handle localization of ''[[Rune Factory: Frontier]]''. The result? The game came out mere months after the Japanese release with ''zero'' delays.
* A game based on the comic series ''[[The Red Star]]'' was originally to be released by [[
* There was supposed to be a 2.5D ''[[Kirby]]'' game for the GameCube, but it never materialized on that system and has yet to show up on the Wii. The best guess to where it went? It became the Adventure mode of ''[[Super Smash Bros.]]. Brawl'', which also got its share of delays (including the company President saying there was already a development team working on the game when it hadn't even been formed yet).
** An official trailer was released for a Wii Kirby game and is believed to be a the one originally planned for Gamecube. Nothing else has been said, aside from Nintendo stating on July
*** When an entirely different game (''[[
* When the gamer completed ''[[Max Payne 2 The Fall of Max Payne]]'' at the end of the credits the encouraging message received was that "Max's journey through the night will continue." The third game in the series was announced by Jeffrey L. Lapin, the CEO of Take-Two Interactive (whom Remedy Entertainment sold the series to), in 2004. Thanks to drama in the background from former publisher 3D Realms, the third game went several years without any substantive news. The game was later announced for winter 2009, though that passed with no further news. Actual previews of the game surfaced, proving its existence but also showing a drastic change in the character and setting.
** ''[[Max Payne 3]]'' has since been entrusted to developer Rockstar Vancouver, was slated for a March 2012 release date, and had undergone enough of an advertising blitz that consumers could be forgiven for presuming that the game is actually going to come out.
* Development of ''[[Limbo of the Lost]]'' began in the early '90s on the Atari ST. It was finally released on the PC in 2007, and befell the same fate as ''[[
* ''[[
** Also worth mentioning are the other cancelled Super FX2 chip games: ''Commanche'', ''FX Fighter'' (which saw a PC release), ''Power Slide'', and ''Super Mario FX'' (Became ''[[
* ''[[
* ''Seiken Densetsu: The Emergence of Excalibur'', a Famicom Disk System title that was planned to span five disks. What makes this entry so bizarre is that pre-orders were placed ''before one line of code could be typed'' because of a clever marketing campaign that involved very convincing-looking mock-ups. It was apparently unrelated to the later [[World of Mana]] games except for the title. More info [http://www.lostlevels.org/200311/200311-square.shtml here] on that game and the planned fourth ''[[Final Fantasy]]'' game for the Famicom that was canceled to focus development on the Super Famicom sequel that became ''[[
* ''George A. Romero's City of the Dead''. It showed up at E3 2005 with no playable demo, and was soon canned.
* ''[[Thrill Kill]]''. The game was raked across the coals of [[Development Hell]] for years, its publisher - Virgin Interactive - trying to [[Bowdlerise|tone down the violence]] in it to conform to an M rating before being picked up by EA. While it's now available through filesharing by the game's developers, there will never be an official release of it; EA found the game so [[Gorn|senselessly violent]] that they actually refused to sell the game off to someone else, for fear of it getting out and tarnishing their reputation.
** Although a developer did get the rights to use the [[Game Engine|engine]], which was the basis for ''Wu-Tang: Shaolin Style''.
** The game ''[[Manhunt]] 2'' almost suffered the same fate when it received an AO rating (a de-facto ban). It had to be [[Bowdlerise
*** The controversy it had already stirred up might have been a factor. (The BBFC had refused to give it classification, essentially banning it in the UK).
* ''[[Jet Moto]] 4'' for the [[
* Three games based on ''[[Star Wars]] [[Return of the Jedi]]'' were announced by Parker Bros. for the [[Atari 2600]], but they only released one, ''Death Star Battle'', before abandoning video games due to [[The Great Video Game Crash of 1983]]. A prototype of "Game I" (also known as ''Ewok Adventure'') was discovered, but the second game, whose concept art suggests being based on the Battle of Sarlacc's Pit, appears to have never been programmed. Other unreleased titles announced by Parker Bros. included ''[[The Lord of the Rings]]: Journey to Rivendell'', ''McDonald's'', ''[[The Incredible Hulk]]'', and a [[James Bond]] game based on the [[Traintop Battle]] from ''[[
* ''California Raisins: The Grape Escape'' instantly springs to mind, developed late in the NES' lifespan. That's right, a game based on a marketing ploy to eat more fruit. Despite being finished and reviewed by many magazines, it utterly vanished into the night without being released on the NES. It actually had some cool concepts, like moonwalking... [[Good Bad Bugs|which resulted from a game bug]]. More can be found [https://web.archive.org/web/20110912162742/http://www.progressiveboink.com/archive/grapeescape.html here] and [https://web.archive.org/web/20120116235316/http://www.seanbaby.com/nes/basedoncrap10.htm here].
* The equivalents of ''[[
* Not even [[Game Maker
* ''[[Alan Wake]]'' was originally previewed at E3 2005 alongside the Xbox 360 announcement, and was expected to be released some time in 2006. The game then promptly disappeared and the developers went very quiet, releasing a very vague trailer and a handful of screenshots in the space of 3 years. It was long assumed to be languishing in development hell, until E3 2009, where the game appeared again apparently very far along in development. As of May 2010, it was finally released to mostly positive reviews, although many critics felt that the end product didn't justify its development time. Especially since it ended up with less than what was promised, such as free-roaming and a PC version of the game.
* Freeware developer [[Seiklus|tapeworm]] has been working on ''Velella'' for nearly five years, and ''Avaus'' for three. On his site, he mentioned he wants to have ''Avaus'' done by the end of 2007, then struck it through and appended 2008. Well, it's 2011 now...
* The ''[[Legacy of Kain]]'' series has had a long history of finessing out of development and legal complications. However, its admirable run ended tragically with the cancellation of the sixth installment, to be titled ''Legacy of Kain: Dark Prophecy'', after only three months in development. Only some concept art remains as evidence of its existence before evaporation.
* ''[[
* There was a sequel planned for the Macintosh [[First-Person Shooter]] ''Sensory Overload'' (which came out about the same time as ''[[Doom]]''), but development apparently never commenced.
* ''[[Halo]]'' was, originally, an extremely impressive project with graphics beyond stunning, especially for being developed by such a small team, and expected to come out at the end of the year 2000 or beginning of 2001. Then creator Bungie was bought by Microsoft, who decided to use it as an exclusive title to support the launch of their upcoming [[
** ''[[Halo]]'' was originally supposed to come out exclusively on the Macintosh operating system, as Bungie had been producing games exclusively for Mac for years before (the ''[[Marathon
* One running joke among players of the serial [[Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game|MMORPG]] ''[[A Tale In The Desert]]'' comes from the lead developer's insistence that 'This Telling (iteration) will be shorter'. Of course, that was back in the second Telling, which ran for a year and a half, and led to the third Telling, which ran for over two years. At this stage, there are no predictions for how long the fourth Telling will run, though a [[Tech Tree]] quickly pushed forth light years ahead of its predecessors is a good sign...
* The recent ''[[Gran Turismo]]'' games, particularly ''Gran Turismo'' for the PSP, have their experience in this field. The PSP iteration was announced at E3 2004 as ''Gran Turismo 4 Mobile'', and was scheduled for release in 2005. However, due to the frankly astonishing amount of content that will apparently be in ''
* ''[[Robotech]]: Crystal Dreams'' for the N64 slipped into vaporware oblivion when its developer, Gametek, went belly-up. Only a ROM of the demo version exists.
* ''Warhawk 2'' for the PSX. They did recently revive the franchise on the [[
* ''[[GURPS|GURPS Online]]''. It's still advertised in the text for ''GURPS 4th Edition.''
** For that matter, many of the online tools for Dungeons and Dragons 4th Edition (Especially the online game table app) have still not been released, despite advertising that they would be bundled with 4th edition on release in 2008.
* ''[[Too Human]]'' started development in 1998 for the [[
* The English version of ''Digimon RPG'' ran into some delays after the site that would be hosting it disappeared. It finally came out in 2010 under the title of ''Digimon Battle''.
* ''Sadness'' for the Wii was announced so long ago that Nintendo's machine was still called the Revolution at that point. During "development" of the game, Nibris came under heavy criticism for not producing any evidence of any development, no images, demos, gameplay trailers, etc. All Nibris has to show for it is [http://www.youtube.com/user/NlBRlS some concept artwork] and [
* ''[[Ghostbusters the Video Game|Ghostbusters: The Video Game]]'' oscillated between this and [[Development Hell]]. It was finally complete, and in time for a Halloween 2008 release, when the publisher decided ''not to publish it'' without warning. Frantic searching for a publisher meant that it was finally released June
* The last ''[[
* Another classic that promised a never-to-appear sequel was [[Infocom]]'s take on ''[[The
* A couple of years after ''[[
* Only ''[[Puzzle Quest]]'' players on the [[Xbox 360]] and [[
* Freeware space exploration simulator ''[http://www.anywherebb.com/ Noctis IV]'' saw a good (and justified, given how an entire galaxy was squeezed in 700 kilobytes of data) popularity in the early 2000s; the author announced ''Noctis V'', a version with native Windows support, a renewed engine and many more new features and adjustments, around that time. For a while, it completely fell off the radar, and contributions to the NIV starmap weren't even included in the game anymore. Then, support to NIV resumed and its source code was released, but as of July 2009 (when the author once again assured that he hasn't given up on the project), NV ''still'' hasn't come out, while the older iteration shows more and more the signs of its age (like complete lack of sound and very cumbersome interface).
** Note that Noctis V is taking awhile primarily because its sole developer (who works on it without pay) is currently focusing on writing an entirely new ''programming language'' on which to build the game.
* ''Line's End'', the sequel to the freeware RPG, ''A Blurred Line'', has been eluding expectations of a conclusion to A Blurred Line's engrossing story for several years. The creator seems to have abandoned it in favor of a career in law.
** As of August 2010, though, the creator has announced that he's [http://rpgmaker.net/games/93/?p=3#comments going to finish it after all.]{{Dead link}}
* Most ''[[Virtual Boy]]'' games. It was actually going to have a ''[[Star Fox (
* ''[[
* The developer Zoonami is infamous for this. The studio was founded in 2000, and hyped up to be a major third-party publisher for Nintendo, but its two major projects (A FPS for the Gamecube called ''Game Zero'' and the rhythm game ''Funkydilla'') were announced but never released.
* ''[[Twisted Metal]] Black 2: Harbor City'' was supposedly cancelled due to several developers dying in a plane crash, though that's now widely believed to be a hoax as there is no actual proof that anything like that ever happened and Jaffe himself more or less admitted it was false, it's more likely that Jaffe was too busy working on [[God of War (
* ''[[Dwarf Fortress]]'''s interface ('It's not coming in your lifetime, but it's coming.') will supposedly get a revamp when it gets closer to the fabled v1.0. Understandable, since it's an alpha product. Tarn Adams jokingly estimated in one interview that at his current rate of progress 1.0 will come out sometime in the ''early 2020s''.
** Which isn't to say that it's not being worked on. The Toady One releases progress reports on a fairly regular basis, but given the type of game that Dwarf Fortress is, it will be a very, ''very'' long time before it's near completion.
* ''Tiberium'', a strategy/FPS hybrid in the ''[[Command
** The team developing the game said it was cancelled for very different reasons, simply put there were [[Creative Differences|rampant disagreements amongst the dev team]], as several people wanted to take control of the project and all had they're own ideas for the game, with so many people competing for control of the project, the game development severely slowed down to the point where EA decided it was cheaper to cancel the game outright, rather then risk any more delays.
* This appears to what has happened to ''[[Rock Band]] Japan''. In June 2008, Harmonix said they were codeveloping the game with Q Entertainment for Japanese release, featuring popular Japanese artists. There has yet to be word of it since.
* The fifth ''[[Ace Attorney]]'' game (known as ''Gyakuten Saiban 5'' in Japan) looks to be barrelling into this territory; it was announced in May 2007, and there has been no mention of it since. Since then, ''[[Gaiden Game|Ace Attorney Investigations: Miles Edgeworth]]'' was announced and released in Japan in May 2009 (''two years'' after the announcement of GS5!) and in early 2010 for all major Western regions, and a ''second'' ''[[Ace Attorney Investigations]]'' game was released in Japan in February 2011.
** The Court-Records.net Forums have recently started calling the game ''"[[Fan Nickname|The fabled GS5]]"'' (usually written this exact way, including italics) and some pessimistic fans there use the term in a simmilar way [[
** And the odds of ever seeing it just got a little lower, with Capcom announcing the series' 10th anniversary project is a live action movie... starring Phoenix, not Apollo.
** An 10th anniversary event in late January 2012 has reconfirmed ''Gyakuten Saiban 5'', although no new info besides a logo.
* ''[[
* ''[[Mega Man (
* ''[[Action 52|Cheetahmen]] 2'', except for the few [[Obvious Beta|very unfinished]] prototype cartridges.
* Quantic Dream had originally planned on making a sequel to ''[[
* The now-defunct ''[[Tabula Rasa]]'', an MMO by gaming legend Richard "[[Ultima|Lord British]]" Garriott, spent ten years in [[Development Hell]], cost $100 million, and, according to the hype, was going to do to MMOs what ''Ultima'' did to RPGs. The game was canned about a year after release. Ultimately, Garriott sued the publisher, with each claiming the other was responsible for one of the game industry's most spectacular failures to date. It turns out it was NCSoft's fault, through what can only be called a real life example of [[Corrupt Corporate Executive]]
* ''[[Maple Story]] DS'' was an example of this for a while. It was announced at E3 2006, and received multiple previews and release dates. The date got pushed from September 2007, to 2009, to January 2010, and was finally released in South Korea on April 15, 2010.
* ''[[
* ''Metroid: Dread'' was hinted at in the ''[[
** ''[[
* The originally-in-English dating simulation ''[[Shira Oka: Second Chances]]'' began development around 2005. Demos were shown at conventions, but no demo was released to the public until July 2010, and the full Windows version was released through Impulse Driven in December 2010. ([[Romance Game|Several similar indie games]] such as ''Summer Session'' and ''Spirited Heart'' were created, completed, and released during that time.)
* ''[[Knights of the Old Republic (
** Fortunately, another team of modders known as Zbyl2 and [[Darth Stoney]] decided to attempt to restore much of the same content that Team Gizka was working on after progress on the Sith Lords Restoration Project seemed to slow to a trickle. They finished their mod, which can be downloaded [https://web.archive.org/web/20120529200249/http://deadlystream.com/forum/files/file/13-tslrcm/ here].
* ''[[Freedom Fighters (
* ''[[Super Robot Wars]]'' [[Fan Translation|fan translations]] are pretty notorious for this. The team doing ''[[Super Robot Wars Judgement]]'' has recently gone on record saying it's unlikely to be done before the equally notorious ''[[SPT Layzner]]'' fansub, which, if it keeps going at its current rate, is expected to be finished sometime around 2016.
** Scratch that. The patch is finally out.
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* ''[[Castlevania]]: Resurrection'' was announced as a [[Sega Dreamcast]] launch title. Late in development, it was canceled for reasons that remain mysterious.
** There was also a ''Castlevania'' title in development for the Sega 32X that also got canned when it was obvious that the system was not selling; some of its spritework was recycled for ''[[Symphony of the Night]]'' and ''[[Portrait of Ruin]]''.
* A very meta example: ''[[Makai Kingdom]]'' included a preview of the next game's protagonist, Asagi, as a bonus character. Her game, ''Makai Wars'', has never surfaced so she's become a running gag who [[Hostile Show Takeover|attempts to take over other games for her own]]. In-universe, ''Makai Wars'' was being worked on as a movie for well over a hundred years and ''[[Disgaea 2: Cursed Memories]]'''s Remake's Axel Mode, tells us that it was scrapped during or after the game, and they skipped directly to ''Makai Wars 2''.
* The computer game adaptation of ''[[Champions]]'', the pencil-and-paper superhero RPG, provides an epic example of this trope. Cover-featured in [https://web.archive.org/web/20070520222743/http://vu.morrissey-solo.com/moz/perez/info/cgw4-92.htm a 1992 issue of ''Computer Gaming World''], it promised to be an ambitious and groundbreaking game that would be faithful to both the RPG and the superhero genre. It never happened. [https://web.archive.org/web/20110814130622/http://www.gamespot.com/features/pcgraveyard_champions/index.html According to Steve Peterson], designer of the original ''Champions'', the game was about 50% complete when it was canceled. Problems included the game's extremely ambitious design for its day along with the divorce of the game's chief developers, a husband-and-wife team. ''Champions'' would finally become a computer game in 2009 as ''[[
* It is a very common trope in independent game makers to plan out plots or characters and sometimes go as far as produce screenshots or artwork, only for the place updates of the game are posted on to go from frequent to quiet and for the game to eventually (and quietly) be dropped (a common red flag is when the latter updates over-emphasize how close it is to completion or something along the lines of "we're not dead, we're still workin' on it!", yet no real progress is shown otherwise). It is common because the core idea of the game was usually done out of a quick jolt of inspiration or impulse, and, among other reasons, die either because the creator's interest in the game waned, it turned out to be too much work (and if the engine in question isn't freeware or fully freeware, costly) than they expected, conflicting thoughts between the group (especially if the original creator was more dis-organized, inexperienced or [[Small Name, Big Ego|holier than thou]] than the rest of the dev team they hired), personal reasons (school, work, personal life, we've all heard it before), or legal reasons (especially if said work was a fanfic embodied in a game, was a painfully obvious cut-and-paste of another source, or was meant as a fan-remake of another game). It has come to a point now that if there was someone out there that plotted out ideas for a game and was looking for a team, most would more than likely say "screenshots/demo/(privately-transferred-)prototype or it isn't serious." It is especially common in community boards dedicated to freeware game-making programs such as RPG Maker, Game Maker, DS Maker, Ren'py, Blade, Novelty, some ROM hack projects and tools, and so on.
* ''Nexus: The Jupiter Incident'', produced by Mithis and HD Publishing, released way back in 2005, was scedualed to have a Nexus 2 come out later in 2007. Its 2011. Many claim that no ship-to-ship space combat sim produced since has ever rivaled it, yet only a crusty layer of dust-caked die-hards can even remember its name. This is probably past vaporware by now...
* ''[[
* The ''[[Zoo Tycoon]] 2'' User-made extension pack "Cretaceous Calamity" is still being worked on, but the high amount of leaks and the fact that it's been years since the pack was first announced is worrying to say the least. Not to mention that the pack has no release date.
** The UXP has had a history of trouble, having even been accidently reported as cancelled and then worked on in secret for a while to stop the leaks. The leaks continued. One of Mysterious Map Marvels' other packs Awesome Avians, has been cancelled, and the fate of Jurassic Park Pack part 2 is unknown. 9 members have left Mysterious Map Marvels.
** Update: The UXP is now on hold, again.
* The ''Incarna'' expansion pack [[
** Now it's been released - well. It lets you walk around in your ship. That's something!
* ''[[
* ''[[Rosenkreuzstilette]] Freudenstachel'' is developing a reputation as this - it was originally intended to be released Summer 2009. As of August 2011, it still isn't out, and there is not a tentative release date.
* After severing ties with Banpresto, Winky Soft, developers of ''[[Super Robot Wars Gaiden]]'', created a similar game called ''Seireiki Rayblade''. In 2001 they announced a sequel... Which hasn't come out yet, despite the [https://web.archive.org/web/20111117121320/http://www.winky.co.jp/rayblade2/gallery.htm official site] being updated every few years. With the release of Duke Nukem Forever, it now holds the dubious honor of being the oldest unabandoned videogame project.
* ''[[Garou Mark of the Wolves]] 2'' and ''[[Last Blade]] 3'' were apparently in development when [[SNK]] collapsed in 2001.
* ''[[Postal]] III'' was officially announced way back in 2006, with development going even further back, and the first gameplay footage was released in 2008. It was released in 2012 in an [[Obvious Beta]] state and was trashed by most of those who played it.
* For a while, there were rumors about a third ''[[Baten Kaitos]]'' game for the [[Nintendo DS]]. It was later confirmed to have never gotten part the first stage of production; however, rumors about ''[[Baten Kaitos]] 3'' still persist.
* The latest ''[[Mechwarrior]]'' game was announced to [[And the Fandom Rejoiced|much rejoicing from the fans]] along with a spectacular looking trailer. Then, news surfaced of a lawsuit by Harmony Gold, and nothing has been heard since. Fans have already resigned themselves to another [[Mechwarrior]]-less decade.
* Both attempts [http://www.50yearsofkimba.com/videogamestory.html to make a video game for] ''[[Kimba the White Lion]]'' were eventually canceled.
* ''Break Shot'', a billiards game by [[Konami]] for the [[MSX|MSX2]], was [http://bifi.msxnet.org/msxnet/konami/breakshot/ advertised] but never released.
* ''[http://www.nesworld.com/mirror/nrhtml/ultj.htm Ultimate Journey]'' was to have been released by Bandai America for the NES in the early 1990s. Apparently a ''[[Ninja Gaiden]]''-like game with an [[Magical Native American]] warrior who could transform into animals, it must have been at least nearly finished, since [http://www.flickr.com/photos/lostlevels/4158417665/ box art was produced] and ''Electronic Gaming Monthly'' gave it a full-page review, yet little more about it has emerged since.
* ''[http://www.theycamefromhollywood.com/ They Came from Hollywood]'', a [[Real Time Strategy]] that has been in development since ''2001''.
* ''[[Culpa Innata]]'' has a sequel, but it has not been released because [[Screwed
* ''Vic Viper'', a 3D racing game by [[Konami]], was described by EGM as "30-percent finished" when they previewed it in 1995. EGM's suspicions that the game might not be released proved correct.
* After ''[[Conduit 2]]'' flopped, High Voltage Software's Wii games ''The Grinder'' and ''Animales de la Muerte'' are becoming this. While both were close to being finished when last seen in 2010, High Voltage has not been able to find a publisher willing to release them, and now that the Wii is about to be replaced, it'll likely remain that way.
* Ever heard of the (very NSFW) ''[[
* ''[[Tiny Toon Adventures|Tiny Toons]]: Defenders of the Universe'' was being developed by Treasure in the early 2000's under contract from Conspiracy, with screenshots and previews being shown. However, years passed by and there was nothing new on the release of the game. Eventually, the game was confirmed as cancelled, the reason supposedly being that Conspiracy went bankrupt around 2002, and lost the rights to Tiny Toon Adventures before the game was released. Fortunately, the game wasn't completely lost, as a ROM of the beta was leaked, and can be played on a [[
* ''[[Thunder Force]] VI'' was first announced for the [[Sega Dreamcast]], and an intro movie from late 2000 exists. The next year, Sega abandoned the console market, and Technosoft folded. The unreleased game's soundtrack was released. The rights to the series were acquired by [[Sega]], who ended up releasing an all-new ''Thunder Force VI'' for the [[
* ''[[Shadowgate]] Rising'' was fairly close to complete as another Nintendo 64 installment in the franchise, but the GameCube's imminant release coupled with the middling reception ''Shadowgate 64'' had garnered both combined to seal its fate.
* The graphic adventure ''Indiana Jones and the Iron Phoenix'', a sequel to ''[[Indiana Jones and
* ''RPC Genjin'', an advertised but never-released RPG spinoff of the ''[[Bonk]]''/''PC Genjin'' series.
* ''Bio Force Ape'', a fast-moving NES [[Platform Game]] by Seta starring a genetically altered chimpanzee using [[Wrestler in All of Us|pro-wrestling moves]], was previewed in 1991 as an upcoming release, but canceled within a year. Reports in 2005 that a prototype of the game had been discovered turned out to be a hoax, but five years later an actual prototype cartridge of the game was discovered.
* ''[[Ys]] IV'' was slated to be released for all three of the main 16-bit platforms in Japan: the [[
* The ''Lufia'' series has a few of these:
** The Sega Genesis version of ''Lufia and the Fortress of Doom'', which was advertised with a delay, but never released.
** ''Lufia: Ruins Chaser'' for the Sony [[
** ''Lufia: Beginning of a Legend'' for the [[Game Boy]] Color, originally in development alongside ''Ruins Chaser''.
* ''[[Doom (
** Doom 4 confirmed released in May 2016, with an Open Beta released prior.
* ''Dead Phoenix'', a [[Rail Shooter]] starring a [[Winged Humanoid]] named Phoenix, was one of the "[[
* ''Agent'' by Rockstar. Revealed at e3 2006 as a Playstation 3 exclusive title, and has been MIA since. As of 2012, nothing has been shown of the title other than the logo.
*
* Cleveland M. Blakemore's ''[[Grimoire]]'' was in development for 25 years, longer than ''[[Duke Nukem Forever]]'' and ''[[The Last Guardian]]''{{'}}s time from announcement to release ''combined'', and so long ''Grimoire''{{'}}s genre had died ''and'' undergone a revival. Cleve continued to post semi-regular updates across the years, even releasing a demo in 2013 that proved the game wasn't an elaborate hoax. Eventually, after issues with Windows 10 caused a 3 day delay, ''Grimoire'' was released on August 4th 2017.
* ''[[w:Star Citizen|Star Citizen]]'', a multiplayer space trading and combat game which has been in development since 2011 and as of 2022 shows no signs of coming out of it. ''Star Citizen'' is unusual compared to most of the other games on this page in that it has undergone multiple rounds of crowdfunding which has raised over ''a quarter of a billion dollars'' to finance its development<ref>That's enough to fund a ''real'' space program.</ref>. This has resulted in some controversy because the dev team continues to raise funds despite regularly failing to meet project deadlines -- and some individuals are known to have sunk thousands or even ''tens of thousands'' of dollars into the game. The dev team has also repeatedly revised their terms of service to increasingly restrict refund requests. (A cynical reader might conclude that the dev team is more in the business of raising money than that of producing a game.) ''Star Citizen'' received one of ''Wired'' magazine's 2016 Vaporware Awards, and the gaming blog ''Massively Overpowered'' awarded the game its "Most Likely to Flop" award for both 2016 and 2017.
* ''[[The Elder Scrolls|The Elder Scrolls VI]]'' was announced in June 2018 with a trailer that didn't actually show anything. The '''only''' updates since that trailer came in June 2021, when Bethesda admitted the game was still in the "design phase", and in November 2021, when Phil Spencer confirmed what everyone suspected after Bethesda's acquisition by Microsoft by stating it would be exclusive to PC and Xbox (conveniently avoiding which generation of Xbox).
== Video Game Systems & Peripherals ==
* The Phantom game console has earned numerous vaporware awards and frequent comments on its auspicious name (as if the entire thing was a practical joke on a massive scale). First announced in 2002 (when its download-only sales model seemed [[It Will Never Catch On|downright insane]]), it was repeatedly delayed and pushed back until being put on infinite hold in 2006. The design company has since been accused of fraud by the SEC, changed names, and decided to focus on releasing the console's couch-keyboard-and-mouse accessory for other platforms. Unlike the Phantom, this one actually ''was'' released, and the reviews for it were quite favorable. The only recurring complaint would be the terrible mouse that had to come along with it. That said, the company is still in dire straits regarding its financial and legal troubles. The other problem with the Phantom was that the [https://web.archive.org/web/20130629224847/http://www.hardocp.com/news.html?news=MTI5NDEsRmVicnVhcnkgLDIwMDUsaGVudGh1c2lhc3Q= CEO was a well-known con artist who specialized in vaporware.]
* Nintendo's CD-ROM add-on for the [[SNES]]
* The 64DD, a disk drive for the Nintendo64. By the time it was released in 1999, everyone had long since lost interest, and it never saw the light of day outside Japan.
* Many of the designs invented by Active Enterprises were doomed to fail from the start, but the most ambitious of these was their planned portable gaming console, the '''Action Gamemaster''': Conceived as a massive, foot-and-a-half wide beast with a 3.2 inch screen, this system would not only be compatible with proprietary game discs (including "killer app" Cheetahmen 3), but it would also house an expansion port that would accommodate cartridges for the [[Nintendo Entertainment System]], the [[Super Nintendo]] and the [[Sega Genesis]], and it could also be used as a portable television set, with a projected price point of '''''500 dollars'''''. It seems as though Active were truly ahead of their time with their idea for a multisystem portable - many of the Gamemaster's features now seem to have manifested in Sony's [[
** Multiplatform support? Bigger than original [[
* The [[wikipedia:Panasonic M2|Panasonic M2]] console was to have been the 64-bit successor to the [[
* The Control-Vision VHS-based console for which the [[Full Motion Video]] games ''[[Night Trap]]'' and ''[[Sewer Shark]]'' were originally developed.
* The Sega Neptune, an integrated [[Sega Genesis|Mega Drive/Genesis and 32X]], which was swiftly canceled when it became apparent how absurd releasing this would be (as indeed releasing the 32X already had been) when the Saturn was just around the corner.
* As buyers were shifting from consoles to computers during [[The Great Video Game Crash of 1983]], [[
* ''Wii Vitality Sensor'' was shown at e3 2009. It has not been shown again or talked about since by Nintendo. Some video game journalists seriously doubt that project was ever real and the sensor itself was just a mock up shown because Nintendo didn't have anything new or interesting to reveal at e3 that year.
* The [[Konix Multisystem]], a british console that definitely got past the prototype stage was looking pretty good before it disappeared.
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== Other ==
* In an ancient example, back to the 1960s, one of IBM's very first operating systems, OS/360 for their System/360 mainframes, was released in 1966 after budget over-runs, excessive hardware requirements and several mismanagements of time. Despite its numerous development problems, however, derivatives of the OS/360 operating system are still in use today.
** The book ''[[wikipedia:The Mythical Man-Month|The Mythical Man-Month]]'' was written based on the experience of developing OS/360 and goes over the errors that led to the project taking longer than expected. Despite being widely read by programmers, similar errors keep being made.
* Talk of a sequel to ''[[His Dark Materials]]'', ''The Book of Dust'', started soon after ''The Amber Spyglass'' was released in 2000. As of May 2011, there isn't even a tentative release date.
* Anti rape condom Rape-aXe from South African doctor Sonnet Ehlers was introduced in August 2005 in South Africa and production was scheduled to begin in April 2007. Nevertheless, up to now (Feb 2011) nothing has come of it.
** It was banned on the grounds that women might forget to take it out...or that they would use it to torture men.
* There are projects in [[Serious Business|application and system software]] that are older still. The most notorious example is Project Xanadu, the first computer hypertext system and intended to catalog all human knowledge: begun in 1960, still arguably in development, although its creator seems to have abandoned it of late.
* ''A Dance With Dragons'', the fifth book in George RR Martin's ''[[
* In an example old enough to predate personal computing, one of the reasons usually given for the failure of the Edsel was that the hype led people to
** The [[wikipedia:Vector Motors|Vector]] must be the ultimate in automotive vaporware. Ten years from concept Vector W2, in 1978, to a production run of seventeen W8s. Then fourteen M12s made in 1996. Then another ten years roll by before the WX-8 prototype turns up at the LA motorshow.
* GNU HURD operating system kernel. Once meant to replace commercial UNIX, it long ago lost that honor to Linux, which it is now championed to replace Any Day Now. Meanwhile, the constellation of open source software meant to be built around it has been Linux-based for ''decades'' now and will have to be ported ''back'' to its officially "home" system if the thing ever sees release.
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* The [[Flying Car|Moller Skycar]]. In the words of the SEC when they brought a suit against the company for exaggerating the likelihood of it ever working, "As of late 2002, MI's approximately 40 years of development has resulted in a prototype Skycar capable of hovering about fifteen feet above the ground."
* Rumors of a new [[American Girl]] doll, Rebecca, began to surface in the adult collector community as far back as 1998, when Mattel trademarked the name of the character. Eventually details leaked that she'd be the first Jewish historical, and after that, she seemed abandoned, with dolls such as Native American Kaya and '70s girl Julie (and the entire Best Friends line) appearing instead. Rumors of prototypes of Rebecca being seen by company insiders floated the entire time, with various descriptions given of her appearance, but most of the collecting world have given her up as an idea dumped on the drawing room floor. Following the retirement of Samantha in 2008, American Girl finally confirmed they were producing Rebecca, who was released in May of '09.
* Fusion reactors. With a fusion reactor and a glass of water, you could power a city like New York for 3 years. Research has been conducted since the 1950s, at which time they promised the first commercial fusion reactors by the year 2000. For a time, this was a joke on soc.history.what-if: "Kolker's Law: The estimated time until commercial fusion reactors will arrive remains constant." In other words, if an expert believed that fusion was 20 years away 20 years ago, he probably still believes it's 20 years away today. Not to say that progress hasn't been made. The advances in superconducting materials and lasers that modern experimental fusion reactors are built around hadn't been made when fusion research started in the '50s and what is now known as the field of plasma physics hadn't even been recognized fully as a discipline unto itself. Partly the reason why development has been so slow is also ''because'' fusion is always deemed of being too far away and too difficult to get any near-term returns from an accelerated effort. Presently several countries are involved in national and international scale projects in fusion and plasma control, and interest has grown, but given the timeframes of experimental research in the field, several decades of
* Years after the events of 9/11, Ground Zero remained depressingly empty. Plans for a new World Trade Center were approved in 2003, scheduled to finish by the 10th anniversary; a cornerstone was laid in 2004... and all work halted until late 2006 while [[Development Hell|financial and architectural lawsuits raged]]. The actual tower construction didn't start until 2008, and the Port Authority now estimates 2013 before it's ready for move-in.
* Chyoo, an adult create-a-story<ref>
* [[
* Remember all that noise about the "All American Basketball Alliance", that supposed all-white baksetball league that supposedly was supposed to start in 2010, supposedly? Remember Don "Moose" Lewis' inflammatory comments about fundamental basketball and wanting to take the street out of it? No? Well, that's hardly surprising, since that's as far as this stupid idea ever got.
* Wintersun's second studio album ''Time'' was originally slated for release in November 2006, and was pushed back to August 2007. When August 2007 came, it was postponed to 2008. It still has yet to be released and no date has been given. However, if frontman Jari Mäenpää is to be believed it is nearing completion and only 2 songs remain to be recorded.
* [http://immortalshandbook.com Immortal's Handbook], a third-party splatbook for Dungeons & Dragons. Take a look at all the products mentioned, compared to what is actually being sold. The front page, at a glance, seems to be 60% "look at all the cool stuff that I'm making!" and 39%, apologizing for not updating or releasing anything for years.
* In 1973, [[Harlan Ellison]] announced he'd be publishing a collection of others' SF short stories named ''[[Dangerous Visions|The Last Dangerous Visions]]''. He's announced its impending publication several times since then. We're still waiting, but in the interim, [[Christopher Priest]] wrote a scathing [
* ''Castle Greyhawk''. [[Dungeons
* Speaking of D&D, the newest (so far) 4th edition never received a promised Virtual Tabletop app.
* IPv6, the replacement Internet protocol for IPv4. No clue when it's going to see widespread deployment, let alone when it will fully replace IPv4... and now that the last IPv4 block has been given away, the problem is growing more acute by the day. IPv6 will require a wholesale updating of hardware, firmware, and software, along with major networking changes, that most companies are loathe to pay for in a recession, despite the writing being on the wall for a decade.
* [[
* There was a fourth Bard's Tale game in development. Rumor has it that it was about 80% completed before being killed for unknown reasons. Much later, a completely different company announced, via a very nice-looking website, a spinoff game called Bard's Legacy: The Devil's Whiskey. All that ever came of it was a demo and a few song files.
* ''Billboard'' magazine was supposed to have developed a new country music chart in 2011 which would have weighted both airplay and downloads similarly to the Hot 100. Nothing ever came of it.
* Beyond the countless [[
* ''Fearless Photog'' was a character created for a 1986 ''[[He
* The tenth and final book in the ''[[Night World]]'' series. It's been more than a decade since the last book came out, and the publishers even re-released the earlier books in pretty omnibuses in anticipation of Strange Fate. Alas, she is still writing it.
* [http://www.furaffinity.net Furaffinity.net], an art gallery that caters to the [[Furry Fandom]], is notorious for promising new features and updates that never materialize. Shortly after the site launched in 2006, a rewrite of the entire site was announced (dubbed ''Ferrox'') and that it would be in closed beta "[[Real Soon Now|soon]]". A year later, another announcement was made that a ''new'' version of Ferrox was in development. That project was eventually shelved two years later. Another project which would overhaul the UI has seen similar delays, first announced in 2007, having mock-up previews released in 2009, and finally setting a deadline of Summer 2011 for completion, which didn't happen. Dozens of other planned features have gone through similar treatment.
* ''Pottermore,'' an esoteric and unexplained online supplement to the ''[[Harry Potter (
** Pottermore opened to the public on April 14, 2012, so it is Vaporware no more!
* Bruce Coville's ''[[
* Stephenie Meyer began a [[POV Sequel]] for the ''[[Twilight (
* ReactOS, an open-source operating system intended to be a drop-in replacement for [[Windows]] (specifically the NT line; there was a prior effort to clone Windows 95 around that time but that never materialised), has been in development since 1998. Over two decades later and while it did get to the point of having a functional UI based on Windows XP, broad software compatibility thanks to its use of [[WINE]] code for the user-space API side, and frequent nightly builds, not to mention an effort to lobby the Russian government with [[Vladimir Putin]] and [[Dmitry Medvedev]] being given a demo presentation in order for Russia to adopt the OS and thus reduce its dependence on Western technology, it is yet to receive a stable release to par with even a Windows development build. Lack of manpower, allegations of code theft (though they did assert that while source codes to 2000 and XP were indeed leaked in recent years, they would in no way use it in their project, even if it did significantly aid with the project, legally be damned), and Microsoft moving the goalposts around more often than not caused the ReactOS project to slow down to a crawl.
* A Filipino tech company named BiTMICRO Networks [http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20111014005964/en/Philippines%3C!--E2--%3E80%99-Industry-Led-Microelectronics-Institute-Unveiled announced] that they would be developing a microprocessor named in honour of polymath and national hero [[Jose Rizal]]. While it did get some [https://newsinfo.inquirer.net/16081/soon-%3C!--E2--%3E80%98rizal%3C!--E2--%3E80%99-will-run-computers-electronics press] [https://www.sunstar.com.ph/article/230305 coverage] brimming on national pride and with the Philippine government [https://www.senate.gov.ph/press_release/2011/0622_angara2.asp pledging support] for it, little, if any has since surfaced from the Rizal processor project.
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