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Vaporware is a term to refer to products that are never released but never cancelled. It can also refer to products that are released far behind schedules, and also heavily promoted products that do not actually exist. This list documents products which have been labelled as vaporware.

Hardware

  • Phantom – a console gaming system developed by Infinium Labs. A prototype was demonstrated in 2004, but its release was continually delayed and the company never announced that the product was cancelled. The company was accused of a pump and dump scam. It received the first place in "Vaporwares 2004" in Wired News.[1]
  • Lockitron - a device to allow a door deadbolt to be remotely controlled via Bluetooth or over the Internet. After a successful crowdfunding effort that raised over $1.5 million dollars worth of pre-orders, Apigy has (as of February 2014) failed to deliver a product in substantial numbers.[2]

Software

  • Ovation was a highly promoted office suite. After demonstrations that were well received, it was later revealed that the product never existed. It is "widely considered the mother of all vaporware," according to Laurie Flynn of The New York Times.[3]
  • Xenix is a discontinued version of the Unix operating system for various microcomputer platforms, licensed by Microsoft from AT&T Corporation in the late 1970s. The Santa Cruz Operation (SCO) later acquired exclusive rights to the software, and eventually superseded it with SCO UNIX (now known as SCO OpenServer). After the breakup of the Bell System AT&T started selling Unix. Microsoft, believing that it could not compete with Unix's developer, decided to abandon Xenix. The decision was not immediately transparent, and so Xenix gave birth to the term vaporware.[26] An agreement was signed with IBM to develop OS/2,[3] and the Xenix team (together with the best MS DOS developers) was assigned to that project. In 1987 Microsoft transferred ownership of Xenix to SCO in an agreement that left Microsoft owning 25% of SCO. When Microsoft eventually lost interest in OS/2 as well, it based its further high-end strategy on Windows NT.

Video games

  • Half-Life 2: Episode Three.[4] The trilogy of episodes following Half-Life 2 was intended to be concluded by the end of 2007. Although the first two episodes were released in a relatively timely fashion, the final installment never surfaced. Despite sporadic assurances from the developer Valve that the sequel is in development, there has been no information about the game or when it may see a release.
  • Spore Creature Keeper[5] - In 2008, Maxis released a promotional video on Youtube for an expansion pack for the then-popular PC game Spore. This was, however, the only mention of the expansion pack, and it was never referred to again, and therefore, never saw a release.

Surfaced vaporware

Products which once were considered to be vaporware which eventually surfaced after a prolonged time:

  • 3G[6]
  • Bluetooth[7]
  • Duke Nukem Forever[7] - Initial game development was announced in April 1997 with a scheduled launch of 1998, however the game experienced many delays and was not released until June 10, 2011, 15 years after initial development. See also Development of Duke Nukem Forever.
  • Daikatana[8]
  • Windows Vista (then, "Windows Code Name 'Longhorn'")[8]
  • Mac OS X, the long-awaited "next generation Mac OS" that finally shipped replacing the announced and later abandoned Copland, Gershwin and Taligent operating system attempts.[9]
  • Warcraft III[7][10]
  • S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Shadow of Chernobyl – Originally announced in 2001, the game experienced numerous delays.[11] Beta builds of the final product have been distributed to numerous game review sites.[12] On 3 March 2007, THQ announced that the game had gone gold and was released on 20 March 2007, though it was leaked three days earlier.
  • Team Fortress 2[8] was announced in 1999 and took 8 years to be released. With a complete change in gameplay and art direction, the North American release took place on 9 October 2007.
  • Pikmin 3 - Pikmin 3 was released 9 years after its predecessor, Pikmin 2. Shigeru Miyamoto stated in 2007 that he desired to continue the Pikmin franchise, which hadn't seen a new entry since 2004, on the Wii console. Little to no word on development took place between then and 2011, until during E3 2011, where Miyamoto revealed that the next Pikmin title would be released on their next console, the Wii U. The game was finally shown to the public during E3 2012 and E3 2013, and then was finally released in America on August 4th, 2013.
  • In addition to this, Nintendo announced in 2009 that they would be re-releasing several select Gamecube titles on the Wii console under the label "New Play Control!", including the first two entries in the Pikmin franchise. Despite this, only the first Pikmin game saw a re-release world-wide, while Pikmin 2 was released in every region except the Americas. Despite Nintendo's reassurances that the game would make it to the Americas, it never did, but eventually saw a re-release in America as a part of the Nintendo Selects series in 2012.

See also

References

  1. ^ Kahney, Leander (7 January 2005). "Vaporware Phantom Haunts Us All". Wired News. Archived from the original on 31 January 2006. Retrieved 2006-05-17.
  2. ^ http://techcrunch.com/2014/01/16/lockitrons-long-march/ - first graf labels it "vaporware".
  3. ^ Flynn, Laurie (24 April 1995). "The Executive Computer". The New York Times. The New York Times Company. ISSN 0362–4331. Retrieved 2010-04-14. {{cite journal}}: Check |issn= value (help)
  4. ^ "Vaporware 2010: The Great White Duke". Wired.com. Retrieved 30 July 2013.
  5. ^ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LMNE3Z_xFaU
  6. ^ The Real Reason 3G is Vaporware. Wired.com.
  7. ^ a b c "Vaporware 2000: Missing Inaction". Wired. 2001. Retrieved 2007-10-31. The bona fide beginning of the new millennium is almost upon us, but some things never change: The tech industry continues to whip up excitement by promising amazing new technologies, only to crush our spirits by delaying, postponing, pushing back or otherwise derailing the arrival of said goods – sometimes indefinitely.
  8. ^ a b c "Vaporware '99: The 'Winners'". Wired. 3 January 2000. Retrieved 2007-10-31. The last year of the last decade before 2000 has come and gone, but the Vaporware 1999 "winners" are still a dream to some, and a nightmare to others.
  9. ^ Vaporware: Why Apple Doesn't Blog. Roughlydrafted.com (7 December 2006).
  10. ^ "Vaporware 2001: Empty Promises". Wired. 7 January 2002. Retrieved 2007-10-31. Whatever you like to call it – the New Economy, the Dot-Com Economy, the Clinton Years – one thing is now clear about the period of prosperity that began in the mid-'90s and was snuffed out early last year.
  11. ^ Top 10 Tuesday: Modern Vaporware. Pc.ign.com (11 April 2006).
  12. ^ First impressions – S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Shadow of Chernobyl. Eurogamer
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