Deadline
Platform: PlayStation
Publisher: Psygnosis

The Basics

Deadline was to be a single-player action game in the form of a mystery game. It looked like a cross between Steel Harbringer and Project Overkill.

WHAT HAPPENED?
The game quietly disappeared from Psygnosis' lineup.

Deadly Honor
(aka Steven Seagal: The Final Option for SNES)
Platform: PlayStation/N64
Publisher: TekMagik
Developer: TekMagik

The Basics

Slap an action star's name on a video game and people are bound to pay attention, at least at first. But the problem is that this game went through an SNES incarnation before it wandered into PlayStation and N64 development, and then it never came out for any of the systems. Deadly Honor was TekMagik's upgrade from the SNES game, Steven Seagal: The Final Option, the company was working on. If Deadly Honor was to be somewhat along the lines of The Final Option, it would have placed you as Steven Seagal in a game loosely based on the star's action films, such as Under Siege, Hard to Kill, Marked for Death, and so on. The game was to be an action game where you ran around doing a lot of damage. What's notable about the game is that it was reportedly being created from digitized film footage and was to use AnimaTek's Caviar technology - a surface pixel real-time rendering engine, to create realistic figure and object animations.

WHAT HAPPENED?
The game was in development for the SNES and supposedly had a couple of complete levels, however TekMagik announced Deadly Honor for the N64 and PlayStation, and you can guess where the SNES game went. Ironically, the N64 and PlayStation games never saw the light of day either.

Death Drone
Platform: PlayStation
Publisher: Viacom

The Basics

The Death Drone story was originally something like this: In the over-populated, crime-ridden future, convicted criminals are given their choice: death or possible fame by playing a death-game. Death Drone would have featured two perspectives as you piloted your vehicles through the open 3D environment that would have allowed you to roam freely instead of sticking to pre-designated tracks. Taking all this and mixing in a variety of realistic physics to base the combat on might have produced a well thought-out title. Or another Twisted Metal clone.

WHAT HAPPENED?
Viacom was dissolved when Spelling Entertainment realized it had two video game divisions. Spelling folded Viacom into Virgin, which then canceled all working and planned Viacom titles - Death Drone being one of them.

Down in the Dumps
Platform: PlayStation
Publisher: Philips

The Basics

Down in the Dumps was to be a single-player adult cartoon adventure set on a stinking rubbish dump. The title would've featured a near-seamless transfer from cinematic sequences to interactive sessions. DitD might have been a pretty cool game, with a potentially witty script and well-cast voices. The game would've also allowed you to record the cartoon sequences so you could play them back later.

WHAT HAPPENED?
Philips canceled its console plans, and Down in the Dumps went exactly there.