Mr. Bill's Neighborhood (lost build of cancelled Atari 2600 game; 1983)

Flyer of the game.

Status: Lost

Mr. Bill's Neighborhood is a cancelled 1983 Atari 2600 game based on Mr. Bill, a clay figurine character from Saturday Night Live by Walter Williams. The game would have been developed and published by Data Age and was planned to be released in April 1983. Had it been released, it would have been the first Mr. Bill video game. The game was shown at the 1983 Winter CES.

Plot

In this game, the player would try to save Mr. Bill and his family from the neighborhood and their arch rival, Sluggo. Mr. Bill's travels would have been hampered by speeding traffic, streets with dead-end alleys, and the ever-present Mr. Hands who would grab Mr. Bill and push him towards Sluggo.

Cancellation

Along with another one of Data Age's licensed games, Smokey Bear, both games were finished and ready to be released but were cancelled due to their previous licensed game Journey Escape doing so poorly that they couldn't afford to pay the licensing fees. Even if they could, the following Video Game Crash of 1983 would have likely stopped its release. According to an article in the October 1983 issue of Video Games magazine (page 32), when Data Age folded, the license for the game was sent back to Mr. Bill creator Walter Williams.

After the cancellation of the game, no Mr. Bill games were released until 2010, when two Mr. Bill games were released in the App Store by Capcom.

No prototypes or ROMs of the game have surfaced.

Gallery

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  Original artwork of the game found in a TV Guide scrapbook.

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  Prototype drawings of the sprites from the July 1983 issue of Electronic Fun with Computers & Games (page 83).

See Also

• Birthday Mania (found rare Atari 2600 game; 1984)
• "Block moving game" (partially found builds of cancelled Atari 2600 game from Activision; 1983)
• Circus Charlie (lost build of cancelled Atari 2600 port of arcade action-platformer; 1984)
• The Core (partially lost Atari 2600 game; 1999-2001)
• Cosmic (partially found Atari 2600 game; existence unconfirmed; dates unknown)
• Crazy Cars (lost Atari 2600 port of Amiga game; existence unconfirmed; 1990)
• Edu Games (lost Atari 2600 games; mid 1980s-early 1990s)
• Home Vision (partially found Atari 2600 games from Taiwanese-Belgian game publisher; 1982-1983)
• The Incredible Hulk (lost build of cancelled Atari 2600 game; 1983)
• JimsToy (partially found Atari 2600 games from obscure developer; 1980s)
• Shove It! (lost build of cancelled CBS Atari 2600 game; existence unconfirmed; 1983)
• Smokey Bear (lost build of cancelled Atari 2600 game; 1983)
• Untitled Motorcycle Games (lost Atari 2600 games by David Crane; existence unconfirmed; early 1980s)