Unreleased NES Dizzy Spin-Off Released

[Hadrian]

Long considered lost to the ages (or to bit rot) Codemasters' unreleased Nintendo Entertainment System game Dreamworld Pogie has at last surfaced as a downloadable prototype ROM image, reconstructed using source code found on a floppy disk by the YolkFolk.com community.

Dreamworld Pogie is a spinoff game in Codemasters' Dizzy series, which saw a handful of titles released for the NES. Though Pogie was teased as a potential candidate for the Game Gear and for the Aladdin Deck Enhancer (an NES cartridge expansion module), development was abandoned prior to completion as Codemasters shifted its efforts toward 16-bit consoles.

It's remarkably solid for an unfinished game, as you can see from the video above, recorded by Lost Levels' Frank Cifaldi. The prototype contains at least 15 levels, though a bug sometimes prevents level exits from appearing. Pogie is also notable for featuring a clever bit of programming trickery, as discussed at NES programmer forum NESdev:

"Notice that there's a big blue area at the bottom of the screen," notes NESdevver tokumaru. "That's because the game disables rendering 23 or so scanlines earlier, so it more than doubles the VBlank time. This is how this game gets away with updating all those tiles even with a fairly slow loop."

The result? Some extra-fast gameplay scrolling, ala Sonic the Hedgehog...or Bio Force Ape, which appears to do something similar. The obvious lesson here is to never cheat for faster scrolling, or else your NES game will never be released.

[youtube]sJLWzJx5y3k[/youtube]

Its quite enjoyable and has that certain Codemasters magic that they lost when they went into the console market. Certainly a must have for all you 8-bit computer game fans. I'd love to see some new Dizzy games from the Oliver Twins one day.

Source
How to make source code into a NES rom

Edit: I love this guy.

 

[indask8]

That's some nice graphics for Nes.

 

[Slyakin]

That's some nice graphics for Nes.

I was about to say the same.

Damn, this looks nice.

 

[clonesniper666]

Looks like it could be fun will have to try it out later today.

 

[Schlupi]

Into my goodrom set this goes.

 

[Ikki]

It does look good.

I might check it out soon enough.

 

[thaddius]

Yikes!

 

[indask8]

Yes the main character detailed picture is kinda scary/creepy.

 

[raulpica]

Looks great! It's great that source-code can be still found nowadays.

It has that fuzzy old-school Codemasters feeling.

I wonder if Mr. Nutz 2 for MegaDrive will ever get released

I do remember that the source code for it was found some years ago?
I _love_ that game, and the only released version is the Amiga version, which is a platform infamously notorious for its difficulty of emulation, and I want it on my handhelds!

Edit: I love this guy.

I love this guy too!

 

[Technik]

That kind of graphics for NES? Whoa.

 

[Hadrian]

Looks great! It's great that source-code can be still found nowadays.

It has that fuzzy old-school Codemasters feeling.

I wonder if Mr. Nutz 2 for MegaDrive will ever get released

I do remember that the source code for it was found some years ago?
I _love_ that game, and the only released version is the Amiga version, which is an infamously notorious for its difficulty of emulation, and I want it on the run!

Edit: I love this guy.

I love this guy too!

Was there even Mr Nutz 2 for the Amiga? I know there was "Mr Nutz: Hoppin' Mad" which originally featured a different character and was so much better but as far as I'm aware there wasn't a sequel actually released as a rom. The sequel for Amiga was meant to be an isometric RPG style game.

 

[raulpica]

Looks great! It's great that source-code can be still found nowadays.

It has that fuzzy old-school Codemasters feeling.

I wonder if Mr. Nutz 2 for MegaDrive will ever get released

I do remember that the source code for it was found some years ago?
I _love_ that game, and the only released version is the Amiga version, which is an infamously notorious for its difficulty of emulation, and I want it on the run!

Edit: I love this guy.

I love this guy too!

Was there even Mr Nutz 2 for the Amiga? I know there was "Mr Nutz: Hoppin' Mad" which originally featured a different character and was so much better but as far as I'm aware there wasn't a sequel actually released as a rom. The sequel for Amiga was meant to be an isometric RPG style game.

Hoppin' Mad is Mr Nutz 2

Here's a nice article on it: http://www.unseen64.net/2008/04/28/mr-nutz...ke-it-was-real/

Didn't know they were doing a sequel to the Amiga one... Got any more infos on it?

 

[Celice]

Yey! Another game surfaces. That's Californian Raisins, Bio Force Ape... and now this. Hopefully more and more of these come out--they're like treasures to all us fans

 

[Hadrian]

Well it wasn't originally a Mr Nutz game so technically not a true sequel. A completely different set of devs made a game called Timet: The Flying Squirrel and then Ocean said they'll release it if they used Mr Nutz instead for the Amiga game. There was a sequel started to Hoppin' Mad (literally Hopin' Mad 2) that was meant to be for the Amiga. There was some screens but I cannot find them now.

I have to say when I played the GBA version of Mr Nutz I was very disappointed to find it wasn't as good as the original only to discover that the one I only played was Hoppin' Mad.

The true sequel to Mr Nutz was meant to be a isometric RPG style game and meant only for consoles as a. Was supposed to be very Zelda-ry.

 

[raulpica]

Well it wasn't originally a Mr Nutz game so technically not a true sequel. A completely different set of devs made a game called Timet: The Flying Squirrel and then Ocean said they'll release it if they used Mr Nutz instead for the Amiga game.

There was a sequel started to Hoppin' Mad (literally Hopin' Mad 2) that was meant to be for the Amiga. There was some screens but I cannot find them now.

Oh I see! You're right: http://www.unseen64.net/2009/05/10/mr-nutz-timet-amiga-beta/ Well, it was an awesome game nonetheless

Can't find anything on here, either

QUOTE(Hadrian @ Jul 5 2011, 08:56 PM) I have to say when I played the GBA version of Mr Nutz I was very disappointed to find it wasn't as good as the original only to discover that the one I only played was Hoppin' Mad.

The true sequel to Mr Nutz was meant to be a isometric RPG style game and meant only for consoles as a. Was supposed to be very Zelda-ry.

Haha, same here, ol' chap. Same here

Duh, what a shame then. I hope it'll be unearthed somewhere, in the future

The good ol' Ocean offices were full of awesome goodies, maybe we'll be able to score another awesome loot after one of the old UK's game offices closes down, who knows.

 

[Sheimi]

This game is weird in so many ways, but the music is catchy to me.

 

[Recorderdude]

I know this has been posted already, but Damn:

What were they thinking?

Pretty cool game though. Seems that holding A+B gives you a "move anywhere" code (probably left in for testers at the time to test different areas) and you have no attacks except finding invincibility, but cool game nonetheless.

 

[dickfour]

This is the type of classic NES game play that I love.

 

[Hadrian]

you have no attacks except finding invincibility

Platformers used to be like that, I actually miss having to work my way round a baddy than just kill it.