In March 2024, person Flimsy-Zebra3775 posted about an eBay itemizing for a PS3 growth package. One of many pictures for the console confirmed a recreation that by no means made it to market and even near the sunshine of day. TimeSplitters 4.

Initially, they checked in with the PS3 neighborhood. In any case, the developer of the TimeSplitters franchise, Free Radical, all however disappeared after its PS3 launch title Haze didn’t impress. It’s since utterly closed because of the Embracer Group layoffs. Nevertheless, it appears as if this growth package managed to make it by way of each occasions comparatively unscathed.

“I requested the vendor a number of probing questions with out giving it away, they certainly had a pal who labored at Free Radical till November 2008 a month earlier than the studio shut down. They will boot the sport up on the weekend to see what it’s and ship me a video, if it’s legit I’ll purchase it and if somebody who is aware of hdd dumping helps me I’ll add the drive.”

Flimsy-Zebra3775 took the danger and bought the console, the place they discovered a working partial construct of TimeSplitters 4. After working onerous to get it operating, they streamed what items of the sport would run and dumped the recordsdata for anybody to make use of on their very own dev kits.

Timesplitters 4 prototype is a bittersweet discovery

Clearly, it is a large win for recreation preservation and one which’s near my coronary heart. I grew up taking part in the TimeSplitters franchise, however that’s why this discovery additionally brings with it a tinge of melancholy.

The TimeSplitters 4 prototype consists of a multiplayer match in a classic-feeling enviornment shooter map the place bots spawn, and the participant hunts them down. Different footage has surfaced on-line displaying that the sport had a third-person digicam and performed rather more like Fortnite, but it surely’s this first-person gameplay that reveals the core expertise followers know and love.

Half of me is comfortable all of us get to see what the passionate staff behind TimeSplitters was cooking up subsequent, however the different half of me is gloomy as a result of there’s nothing like this on the market right this moment, and there in all probability by no means can be once more.

The TimeSplitters sequence consists of three video games that share a core set of values as their DNA. They’re single-player targeted however are constructed to be extremely pleasurable in native or on-line multiplayer. That multiplayer can nonetheless be accessed solo and with out an web connection, and gamers have a plethora of unlockables to work by way of that can take them longer than most JRPG runtimes to gather.

These video games every function campaigns with zany characters that ooze character. Even these which are made up of a pores and skin and taste textual content have extra character than most characters in fashionable free-to-play shooters.

Each marketing campaign mission has three issue ranges, and the aims change throughout all of them. You don’t get the identical expertise taking part in Neo Tokyo in TimeSplitters 2 on straightforward as you do on onerous. That is additionally true for co-op, which means each stage has six variations to finish for six separate unlockables.

Diving into these video games after I was youthful noticed me lose weeks to them. I poured what looks like a thousand hours into the primary trilogy with my finest pal, and we nonetheless had issues to unlock.

chunk of that point was spent within the arcade and problem modes, too. Arcade is a mixture of multiplayer modes, of which there are a number of, with medals to earn based mostly in your efficiency. Challenges are, as you may anticipate, particular mini-missions with powerful aims, like throwing bricks by way of home windows inside a time restrict to earn much more medals.

Seeing a contemporary model of those absolute gems makes me need somebody to remaster the trilogy proper now. I don’t even want remakes, however these could be good. The breadth of content material to dive into rivals each main multiplayer shooter on the market, and these video games have been all launched for the PS2. That’s three console generations in the past, and there’s nonetheless nothing that even comes near beating them.

A brand new Timesplitters makes good sense in right this moment’s gaming scene

Nostalgia is a strong drug, and I’m keen to confess that the graphics and a few gameplay components haven’t aged nicely. However whereas some video games are nice as a result of they hit at simply the appropriate time, these ones may have dropped at any level, they usually’d nonetheless be superb.

I proceed to be genuinely shocked after I hear a TimeSplitters recreation was canceled or forgotten or that somebody hasn’t even heard of the sequence. I’d fortunately join on-line with anybody, any day of the week, and stroll hand in hand with them by way of the TimeSplitters 2 marketing campaign so I may hear the enjoyment of their voice as they snuck round cameras, set the tree dude on hearth, or get pissed off with the ultimate showdown towards UFOs.

This irks me much more after we get remakes and remasters of video games that don’t want that therapy. I’m assured that if TimeSplitters 4 had been accomplished and put up on the market, we’d have seen it smash concurrent participant numbers similar to Helldivers 2 is correct now.

The sport may simply justify a battle go for extra quirky character skins. A TimeSplitters tackle battle royale would nearly actually make it fascinating, similar to how Apex Legends was at launch.

In the end, we win. We’ve seen this recreation towards all odds, and I imply all the percentages. I don’t even know the way this PS3 made it out of the workplace in 2008, however I’m so glad I did. I used to be crushed again then after I realized I’d probably by no means see a brand new recreation for my favourite franchise, and I’m crushed once more now that actuality has come again round.

In case you’re curious as to why I’m so rattling obsessed with these video games and why the existence of a prototype has had such an influence on me, do your self a favor and discover a approach to play TimeSplitters 2 from begin to end with a pal. Play it aspect by aspect, after which play some arcade matches. Revel within the artwork fashion, play as Mr. Underwood, and shock your self with how completely different each mission performs if you up the problem. You received’t remorse it.