The lost launch title- Donkey Kong Music Education.

[Tupin]

Okay, I remember seeing about this before, but I only recently realized how little info exists about it. All that exist are the following screenshots, no further info is known other than it was meant to be a music-teaching tool.


The title screen, seems like any other early Famicom game.


A shot of gameplay. Anyone know the song?


Same as above....


Maybe a performance?

Don't expect a ROM of it, ever. Rumors exist that it was still in very early alpha at its cancellation. Still very, very interesting.

[nintendodork]

Hmm...the title screen looks pretty similar to the DK JR. Math title screen..I'm not sure if this is real..

Could the NES even have 4 characters plus notes on the screen??

[Tupin]

All the educational games on the Famicom (all two of them, plus this non-released one) had similar title screens.

It technically could, as long as the characters had limited animation and the notes remain static.

[UglyJoe]

Also keep in mind that parts of those sprites could be made up of background tiles.  Like, most of Donkey Kong probably never moves, the drumkit probably never moves, and the piano probably never moves.

[nintendodork]

The cymbal and DK's hands might move...and I can only think of DK JR. Math, what other educational game was there?

[Tupin]

Popeye's English Game.

[mobiusclimber]

Popeye's English Game.

... I truly hope that's a joke considering the level of "english" spoken my Popeye. "nah kid it's YAM not I AM! Say it with me!"

[Tupin]

Yeah, they definitely did not chose the best character to represent proper English grammar.

[Blue Protoman]

It'd be worse if the game was made in the era where voices were easier to do on consoles.

[Tupin]

It's already bad enough that they say that Holland is a country, and not a region of the Netherlands. Maybe "Netherlands" was too much text.

[FamicomFreak]

Yeah, they definitely did not chose the best character to represent proper English grammar.

LOL! you got that right

[Blue Protoman]

Well, it could've been worse.  They could've used the Looney Tunes.

[Rogles]

The song in the first screenshot is called "inunoumawarisan". I think they just used katakana for  regular japanese words in that game due to hardware constraints, as that really is not a loanword. Also, there may be some errors in my romanizations.. Someone correct me please if there are. The second one is called "senrohashijikuyotokomademo ". Note I'm just romanizing the song names, not translating them.

EDIT: The game's romanized name is "Angaku Asobi".

[skyrunner14]

I wonder how this was supposed to be played? Anyway, if someone ever found a prototype of this, they'd probably have the rarest piece of Famicom merchandise ever. 

[JC]

You can only imagine the prototypes they've got sitting under lock and key -- or password, I guess -- at Nintendo. This would no doubt be one of them, along with that strange facemaker "game."