“Every artist has thousands of bad drawings in them and the only way to get rid of them is to draw them out.”

Chuck Jones

Any artistic product will have early drafts or scrapped ideas missing from the final version. In the film industry, The Cutting Room Floor refers to a hypothetical space where all the unused footage for a movie is dumped.

True to the namesake, The Cutting Room Floor is an online community who collect cut or unused content in video games, instead of movies. Assets hidden in inaccessible locations or the code itself, shortcuts used by the developers, unusual easter eggs, incomplete levels — you name it!

What do they do?

The Cutting Room Floor primarily use their MediaWiki as a database to publish and/or document unused, unreleased or incomplete video game content. For a sample of TCRF’s discoveries, just taka a look at their “Did You Know…” section. Did you know that Dragon’s Lair for the Amiga actually has a hidden message to discourage people from cracking the game?

How do they do it?

For one thing data mining hidden content is a skill in its own right. While this is often an individual task it’s not an isolated one, TCRF provide thorough guides on how to get started and best practices for reporting new discoveries.

In cases where content is removed from the final release, TCRF work together with their sibling community The Hidden Palace who collect video game prototypes.

How do I sign up?

Consider registering on the Wiki, there’s plenty of to-dos to fill out! TCRF is spread across a number of platforms, but are currently most active on Discord.

Give the Cutting Room Floor a visit, today! And CUT!

Looking to discover other archiving communities? Just follow Data Horde’s Twitter List and check out our past Community Spotlights.

The Hidden Palace is a group of video game preservationists who hunt down video game prototypes, cut features and other game development media. You could say they are out to find out how games change throughout their development cycle, what elements and mechanics actually make it to the final product.

The name comes from the Hidden Palace Zone from Sonic 2, an unused area in the original release.

What do they do?

For about 15 years, the Hidden Palace has amassed a collection of over 1000 development builds for various games on a multitude of systems. A good portion of these have been mirrored on the Internet Archive, where you can try them out for yourself via MAME.

More than that, the Hidden Palace is about analyzing differences between different game builds, that is to say different stages of development. The Hidden Palace also frequently cooperates with The Cutting Room Floor to document features which have been cut from the final release. Take a look at their recent joint-update on the elusive Sonic 1 Mega Drive Prototype!

How do they do it?

It’s one thing to hunt down an obscure product, but where do you find a game that was never really released? Good candidates are developers or testers who may have had access to earlier versions of the game. Next come hobbyists or other preservationists who may have acquired a prototype from the above options. At this stage it’s likely that a prototype will go up for auction.

In any case, contributors to the Hidden Palace ship prototypes they have come into possession of, so that they may be dumped and/or scanned. If you would be interested in contributing yourself, get in touch with [email protected] and also have a look at their contribution page (they really value your confidentiality).

How do I sign up?

Even if you can’t travel to the Hidden Palace’s preservation studio for yourself, there is a lot you can do to help. Just join the Wiki, there’s plenty of to-dos to fill out!

Or if you would rather prefer talking and meeting with people, perhaps the Hidden Palace Discord Server is for you!

Then what are you waiting for? Go forth, and discover the next Hidden Palace Zone, today!

Looking to discover other archiving communities? Just follow Data Horde’s Twitter List and check out our other Community Spotlights.