Side Track, Rip Cord and Spectar - why where they vaporware?

[Tornadoboy]

I've always been curious about this ever since I saw them on the console's box - Why were the Exidy games Side Track, Rip Cord and Spectar never released during Colecovision's run?

 

I ask this for a few reasons:

1 - They were ideally suited for Colecovision's hardware, there was nothing about them that it couldn't handle and handle well.

2 - With the possible exception of Spectar they didn't appear to have been very successful in the arcade, I've been a coin operated video game enthusiast for quite some time and I've only seen Side Track PCBs turn up on Ebay twice (both I bought ) and Rip Cord once (had to pass  ) over perhaps the past 15 or 20 years, and I've NEVER seen either in any arcade in my entire life, and I've been to a few. My point being is I get the impression they didn't make Exidy a whole lot of money during their arcade releases and for that reason they shouldn't have been asking too much for the rights to port them to Colecovision.

3 - I think they would have been good sellers, particularly Side Trak which had a bit of a puzzle element to it too, and while the arcade game is extremely hard due to its speed like Looping having it slowed down a bit for the port would have actually made it better than the original. 

 

Does anyone know the story behind this? Exidy ask too much for the rights? Did Coleco decide they probably wouldn't be good sellers? 

 

Oh and the homebrew ports that have fortunately come about look AWESOME! Glad pretty much all the vaporware games on the box have finally gotten released! Someone needs to now do the 1st person POV version of Skiing shown, it's probably quite doable now with the SGM. 

Edited October 17, 2019 by Tornadoboy

[Supergun]

I kept searching in vain for those titles (before the internet came about) not aware that they were vapor ware. I really don’t know why they didn’t see release, but with regards to side track, it did look quite similar to pepper II in the screenshots so maybe that would explain that one.

 

I agree that the Homebrew versions are great, but I am surprised that not a single original proto of any of those 3 has ever turned up.

[H.E.R.O.]

All I know is the Collectorvision versions are vastly superior to their arcade counterparts. 

 

Far as vaporware, I always wanted Tunnels & Trolls. 

[Tornadoboy]

4 minutes ago, H.E.R.O. said:

All I know is the Collectorvision versions are vastly superior to their arcade counterparts. 

 

Far as vaporware, I always wanted Tunnels & Trolls. 

I suspect the big reason we're not seeing an actual "Tunnel & Trolls" homebrew is that name is copyrighted and perhaps they're not willing to lease the rights or want too much for it, otherwise I'd have to believe it would have been one of the first vaporwares to have been tackled.  

Edited October 23, 2019 by Tornadoboy

[Swami]

On 10/23/2019 at 5:17 AM, Tornadoboy said:

I suspect the big reason we're not seeing an actual "Tunnel & Trolls" homebrew is that name is copyrighted and perhaps they're not willing to lease the rights or want too much for it, otherwise I'd have to believe it would have been one of the first vaporwares to have been tackled.  

Isn’t dungeon and trolls homebrew supposed to be tunnels and trolls? I think they had almost nothing to go on except the start screen and the table RPG.  

[Atari_Bill]

I was always bummed that Horse Racing was never released.  I thought that would be really fun. 

[digress]