In recent months we've had a steady torrent of previously unseen games to marvel at. Titles thought lost to the mists of time have come to the fore in partially complete and fully playable states - just look at
Take The Bullet and
Colin McRae Rally 2.0 for instance. For me though, the real jackpot comes when we find something that was previously unknown (like the unnamed
Tantalus tech demo). Well, it looks like we've got another one to marvel at: Traveller from defunct developer
Fenris Wolf.
Showcased by veteran game developer and graphic artist Mark Jones on his website
The Dragon's Eyrie, Traveller was to be a space-based RPG in the vein of Elite, where players could pilot their own ship in 3D space but also walk around the interior of the vessel in first person. Interestingly, Mark's descriptions of this cancelled adventure hint at first person shooting sections featuring firefights with enemy boarding parties and trading of cargo.
"
Traveller, the space based RPG, was licensed to Fenris Wolf, and we had intended it to be a first person, 'PC-Like' role playing game for the Dreamcast. Unfortunately, it was cancelled by Sega as they wanted to concentrate on more action/sport type games for its launch."
- Mark Jones
Sadly, Fenris Wolf was dissolved in 1999 and Sega cancelled Traveller while it was still in the early stages of development, but Mark kept much of the early artwork and has kindly allowed us to share them here.
That the game never amounted to more than these stills is a massive shame as the Dreamcast has a host of amazing space shooters and RPGs. Traveller could have been the one to rule the roost, but now we'll never know.
Thanks to Mark Jones for the images and to Adrian Brown for alerting me to the existence of Traveller via the
Dreamcast-Talk forums.
