An unreleased video game based on the animated television series South Park has been discovered for the original Xbox, and details regarding the canceled project have leaked to the public for the first time courtesy of YouTube channel HappyConsoleGamer.
Developed by Buzz Monkey Software, the untitled project is a free-roaming sandbox title that features gameplay similar to the Grand Theft Auto series. Few details regarding the game are known, and the discovered build is in an early state of development.
The game consists of a series of playable test missions that each show off various gameplay modes and storyline scenarios. Players control South Park characters in several on-foot and vehicle-based missions that take place in and around the town of South Park, and many settings and characters from the series are featured throughout.
While many aspects are playable to a limited extent, the discovered build is buggy, and is prone to glitches, crashes, and freezes. Many segments require testers to use an included debug mode in order to bypass unfinished level geometry and event triggers.
The game’s texture work is also incomplete, leaving many environmental details labeled with placeholder text like “PAVEMENT” and “GRASS” instead of their intended texture mapping. One character’s home consists of a block box crudely labeled with the misspelled text “Stans’s House.”
A combat system was also in the works. Combat mechanics are confined to one specific test mission in the discovered build, however, and are otherwise inaccessible. The build additionally includes a selection of pre-rendered cutscenes with voiced dialog.
The unreleased South Park game was found on the hard drive of an original Xbox test station purchased from an unnamed source. Several in-progress games from developer Buzz Monkey Software were discovered on the hard drive, including a 3D platformer titled Cavegirl and a non-playable demo featuring characters from the animated film Happy Feet.
Oregon-based developer Buzz Monkey Software produced console ports of many games throughout the 2000s and early 2010s, including PSP adaptations of several entries in the Tomb Raider franchise and a Wii version of Activision’s peripheral-driven skateboarding game Tony Hawk Ride. The company was acquired by social games developer Zynga in 2012, and was subsequently renamed Zynga Eugene.
