Red Dwarf the (cancelled) video game.

[Dessie]

http://mediablasphemy.com/2013/gaming/games-features/red-dwarf-the-cancelled-video-game/

Has anyone ever heard anything about this? I would pay crazy money for a Red Dwarf game.

Topic

[si]

Nothing will beat the text game.

[Paul Muller]

Well I bloody never…

[Ridley]

beloved Scutters

<_<

[ori-STUDFARM]

Yeah…fancy not spelling Scutters right! o_O

[Ben Paddon]

Blimey.

I would pay proper, decent money for a Red Dwarf video game. As a kid I sat down mapping out a LucasArts-style adventure game, and I vaguely recall writing a letter to Adventure Soft asking if they’d ever thought about making one (they had the Dwarf connection already, considering Chris was the voice of Simon in the first Simon the Sorcerer game).

These days I don’t see an adventure game happening, though if Telltale got the license I wouldn’t mind something akin to their Walking Dead games.

[Ridley]

My younger self wrote to either Digitiser or GameCentral for reasons I’ve since forgotten saying that I used to think an RD adventure game was a good idea but I’d changed my mind.

I dunno, my feeling is that if a game was to happen it would likely be some bare-boned licenced Thing that wouldn’t have the time, humour or resources to make it worth playing (although I would play it because MOAR RED DWARF obviously).

*imagines Lovett Holly singing Want You Gone*

[Phil]

>I wouldn’t mind something akin to their Walking Dead games.

Will you have sex with the vending machine? (The vending machine will remember your choice.)

[Karnie]

“*imagines Lovett Holly singing Want You Gone*”

I don’t care how bad the game would be, I’d buy it JUST for this.

[Seb Patrick]

I don’t know one way or the other, but it seems to me to be jumping the gun to call this a “cancelled” game. The video description mentions it was “pitched”, but that’s a world away from “commissioned”.

And certainly, from looking at the quality of it in the video (and the fact that the ship interior resembles no version seen on screen before or since), I’d be very surprised if this is footage from something that was genuinely in the works with conjunction with GNP. It sounds more like something someone did off their own back, chanced their arm pitching, and didn’t get anywhere with.

[Paul Muller]

I’ve lost count of the number of times those DVD cover images have cropped up as backgrounds/textures over the years…

[Karnie]

I just received an answer to my query about the game:

“…As for the Red Dwarf prototype game. We approached Grant & Naylor about making a Red Dwarf game back in 2004, we were big fans of the show. I was running my first video games company then, Genuine Games, which I co-founded with a talented games designer friend/colleague of mine Gordon Ross. He was the brains of the company at that time who got us involved in a pitch for a potential Red Dwarf game with another small Scottish developer ran by Dave Sharpe a game industry veteran. We (Genuine Games) created a playable prototype, I actually did most of the design and 3D artwork for it. There was never a script just a small playable 3rd person prototype where you could walk around a section of the ship and primitively interact with the surroundings. We took this to show Doug Naylor and some TV execs who were very keen to make a game. At this stage I think he and Rob Grant had fallen out or gone their separate ways creatively which made it really hard to get the project off the ground even though we had a lot of interest in creating the game. In fact I still get people who see the original artwork from the prototype saying that it would be a great game and there is still a big following for the series. So the main reason the project never went any further was due to the creators falling out with each other so it was hard to do a deal as they were both pulling in different directions. So for us it just stayed on our hard drives never to be taken any further. Lots of games never see the light of day in the games industry and that one unfortunately was one of them.”

So there you go.

[Ian Symes]

So, Seb was right – it was something that someone created off their own back, pitched and that was the end of it. Also, using Rob and Doug’s split as an excuse is a bit weak, considering that happened about a decade beforehand!

[pfm]

“We took this to show Doug Naylor and some TV execs”

I’m not sure why TV execs would have needed to be involved?? Also, could Rob have feasibly stopped a game from happening, and what reason would he even have for doing so?

[peas_and_corn]

He hates receiving royalties.

[Author]

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