Madness: House of Fun (lost build of cancelled Sega Genesis/Mega Drive platformer; 1993-1994)

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Madness House of Fun Mega Drive.png

A flyer for the game.

Status: Lost

Madness: House of Fun is a cancelled Sega Mega Drive/Genesis platformer developed by Gremlin Graphics. It is based on the English ska band, Madness and their 1982 #1 hit "House of Fun" (re-released in 1992). Despite its name, it likely did not feature any of the band members.

Plot

The game stars a character called Mr. Smash (who is based on Carl Smyth from the group). His one task in life is to enter the titular House of Fun in search of all the goodies he can find. Using switches to activate platforms and open doors, the basic aim of each level is to locate the exit, with the entrance to Heaven forming the last level.

However, the House of Fun has been overrun by all manner of strange creatures, with Mr. Smash fending them off by lobbing his collection of silver discs at them.[1]

Preview

The game would have 14 levels. It was going to be a remake of Gremlin Interactive's Amiga game Harlequin (with new graphics, characters, and Madness’ music). It was scheduled to release in June 1994, but it was cancelled for unknown reasons. It was reportedly close to completion before the ax, according to the Mean Machines Sega #17 and Mega Force #17 previews.

On November 22nd, 2016, the source code with no binaries was found by Eleazar Galindo Navarro (a founder of Piko Interactive), who will try to get it compiled.[2]

On January 16th, 2017, 38 minutes of gameplay was uploaded to the Unseen64 YouTube channel.

Gallery

Gameplay.

References