Crazy Frog Collectables Faces (lost build of cancelled Nintendo DS puzzle game; 2008)

The box art for the game, found on the archived Cypron Studios website.

Status: Lost

Crazy Frog Collectables Faces was a cancelled Nintendo DS puzzle game developed by Cypron Studios (now known as Cypronia) starring Crazy Frog/The Annoying Thing, a CGI-animated character known for music videos featuring him from the mid-2000s. It was allegedly published by the now-defunct Mercury Games, publishers of several other Crazy Frog titles, including one named Crazy Frog Collectables Art School, meaning that Collectables Faces was a sequel. Very little information about this game remains online.

Gameplay

A short description of the game is available on the archived Cypron Studios website, which calls it a "funny puzzle game for the Nintendo DS which supports Single-Card Multiplayer."^[1] Nothing else about the gameplay is known. A possible description describes a matching game, where one selects a face and has to select all the matching ones, akin to the "Wanted!" minigame from Super Mario 64 DS/New Super Mario Bros.

History

Besides the mention on the archived Cypron Studios website, little info on the game remains online. It is unknown whether the Mercury Games website contained anything about the game, as it's no longer available and the only archive is from 2007, a year before the game was even set to release.^[2] Two Spanish forum posts have been found claiming that Crazy Frog Collectables Faces (among other games) would be released for €19.99 by Koch Media in 2008, which might have been the game's publisher in Spain.^[3]^[4] A few French websites also mention the game, but with no concrete new information.^[5]

It is uncertain whether the game was released in any form. Judging by the fact that the game was listed under "finished games" on Cypron Studios’ website, and that it was fully rated by PEGI (and not listed as “rating pending” on the cover), one would think it's highly likely that the game was in fact released, However it would be confirmed that it was reworked into a another game by Cypronia, Crazy Cheebo Puzzle Party, released on the DSiWare, the icon of Collectables Faces can be found in the game files.^[6]

On May 27th, 2019, LMW Forum user SpongeBot678 tried starting a search on the game by contacting a Cypronia developer via email. The developer replied with a vague message, telling that Mercury Games went bankrupt in 2008 and the Cypron Studios developers were not paid, implying that the game was cancelled, along with another related game published by Mercury Games named Jamster Allstars. No further updates came from the forum user.^[7]

In 2021, an image was found by a Reddit user, it came from the manual of Art School. ^[8]

Gallery

A possible description of the game, courtesy of the LMW Discord (Note that the website is no longer available and has not been archived).
The email received by SpongeBot678.
Screenshot of the gameplay.
Icon for the game.