A playable prototype of a cancelled PlayStation 2 game has been found and shared online.
Frank Gaskin of Games That Weren’t has uploaded the prototype for The Last Job (also known as The Heist), a game that was once in development at Acclaim.
The game was being developed at Acclaim’s Cheltenham studio, and was said to be around 40% complete when Acclaim went bankrupt and its projects were cancelled.
According to Gaskin, the game was worked on by around 40 people for roughly a year, and was shown behind closed doors during E3 2004, which resulted in a small amount of press coverage.
Planned for PS2 and Xbox, the game was to have players taking control of four criminals, each with their own special abilities.
Acclaim also reportedly brought in former SAS member John McAleese for a team-building exercise, to teach the development team how special forces units think during operations.
Gaskin says the playable build was provided by one of the game’s level designers, and was a backup of the last known build on PS2 when the game was cancelled.
The prototype features most of the stages from the Old Bank area and some of the storyline, and players can also access a debug menu which lets them see other areas such as a motel, a dockyard, a cadino and a mansion.
Given the early stage of the game, however, there are obviously a lot of bugs and Gaskin warns that falling through the stage can be common.
Games That Weren’t will have a more detailed write-up on the game’s development in the future, but for now the prototype can be downloaded and run on PlayStation 2 emulators or modified hardware.
Retro
PlayStation 2
Chris Scullion