It’s such a welcome treat when a new or previously unpublished games gets put on a cartridge and released for retro consoles.
Just recently while browsing Sega-16.com I found out about a game called ‘It came from the Desert’ which was once slated for release on the Genesis/Mega Drive but was subsequently canceled. And now 24 years later it’s threatening to arrive!

We’ve had this treatment before with the Genesis and it’s very exciting every time.

Retail Release coming soon.

I rushed over to cinemaware.com to purchase a copy. …but they’re not ready yet to take pre-orders. The good news is (if you caught this post recently) we’re all in time to get a copy. From the link above you can sign-up to be notified when Cinemaware is ready to take your pre-order.
The release date is set for the 2014 Holiday season; which is not that far off. In fact it’s close enough that I’m surprised that they’re not taking pre-orders now. Fingers crossed that they can hit their release date!

Looks very promising!

For me personally I was extra excited about this release when I found out that Watermelon will be involved. I don’t have many details about the extent of their involvement but I believe they are helping with the physical packaging of ‘It came from the Desert’. Through my experience with Pier Solar I know that Watermelon puts a lot of effort into making a quality product and I’m hoping this will extend to Cinemaware’s effort.

Below are some cool details about the Genesis version that we might finally get our hands on:

Source Wikipedia

“A Sega Genesis/Mega Drive version was to be released in 1990, but was canceled. It is an overhead shooter with the main protagonist running around on foot, although it features more free roaming gameplay than traditional scrolling shooters. Among the differences in play mechanics, the Sega version allowed the player to create powerups that were fashioned by collecting machinery pieces and joining them together in different combinations. The storyline also differs from the game, instead casting the player not as the scientist from the original but as a teenage pest control worker known as Buzz who makes a variety of improvisational weapons with various materials combined with his pest control equipment.

Although the Sega version was never actually offered for sale, it was distributed as a ROM image (for use with console emulators) from the Cinemaware website after the turn of the 21st century. Despite the similarity of camera perspective, the Sega version did not appear to reuse any of the graphical elements created for use in the computer-based versions.”