Proto:DuckTales (NES)/May 25, 1989
This is a sub-page of Proto:DuckTales (NES).
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Download DuckTales Prototype (May 25, 1989)
File: Duck Tales (USA) (Beta).zip (128 KB) (info)
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General
Title Screen
| Prototype | Final |
|---|---|
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The prototype has an option to continue at the title screen. This works perfectly fine, but it was removed from the final version anyway. Probably because Capcom thought that given the game's difficulty (or lack thereof), it wasn't really needed. A trademark symbol was added, and the copyright text was adjusted. Strangely, the final version no longer has the copyright year in the text.
Money Matters
| Item | Prototype | Final |
|---|---|---|
| Small Diamond | $200 | $2,000 |
| Large Diamond | $1,000 | $10,000 |
| Red Diamond | $3,000 | $50,000 |
| Hidden Treasure | $10,000 | $1,000,000 |
What would a game about accumulating wealth be without inflation? Between the prototype and final, all values relating to money were massively inflated. These changes made the Red Diamond worth five Large Diamonds instead of three, and the hidden treasures were bumped up to 100 Large Diamonds rather than 10.
Other money differences:
- Refilling life by pressing Select costs $70,000 in the prototype, but $3,000,000 in the final.
- The money required to pay off the statue in the Amazon was raised from $3,000 to $300,000.
- When a level is completed, every 10 seconds remaining add $100 in the prototype and $1,000 in the final.
- The amount needed for the good ending was raised from $400,000 in the prototype to $10,000,000 in the final.
Stage Select
| Prototype | Final |
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All of the generic stage names were changed into real-world locations.
| Prototype | Final |
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Flintheart Glomgold's end-game message was adjusted slightly to take these changes into account.
| Prototype | Final |
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The land money's dollar sign was moved to the left to allow for the adjusted money values. The money here counts down by hundreds in the prototype rather than ten-thousands, meaning that this sequence takes a lot longer to complete.
Dialogue Box
| Prototype | Final |
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The in-stage dialogue in the prototype is confined to the tiny Time box. This was (thankfully) expanded in the final version, and now uses the same dialogue box as the items list.
Music Differences
Two pieces of music are different in the prototype.
Transylvania
| Prototype | |
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| Final |
Transylvania uses a completely different music piece in the prototype!
The Moon
| Prototype | |
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| Final |
The Moon theme in the prototype is about 20% slower than the final's theme.
Graphical Differences
Sometimes graphics are changed. These are those times.
| Prototype | Final |
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The extra health item was changed from a cheeseburger to ice cream, Scrooge's favorite food in the TV series.
| Prototype | Final |
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The cross was removed from the tombstones in Transylvania. Certainly not because of Nintendo's content guidelines. Nope.
| Prototype | Final |
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This xenomorph-like creature was changed to resemble Overlord Bulvan, an alien from the episode "Where No Duck Has Gone Before". His color palette wasn't updated to fit, however (he was green in the show).
Dialogue Changes
All of the game's dialogue was changed, both to take advantage of the game's bigger dialogue boxes, and to fix some odd-sounding text.
General
| Prototype | Final |
|---|---|
UNCLE SCROOGE ARE YOU GOING BACK TO YOUR HOME. YES - A NO - B |
YOU WANT A LIFT BACK TO DUCKBURG MR. MC D. YES - A. NO - B. |
The start of the dialogue fixing. Launchpad incorrectly says "Uncle Scrooge" rather than "Mr. McD." in the prototype. This error made it into the final version of DuckTales 2, interestingly enough.
| Prototype | Final |
|---|---|
I GOT THE HIDDEN TREASURE . |
IT'S A HIDDEN TREASURE. |
A lot of the text changes were done to make the dialogue snappier.
The Amazon
| Prototype | Final |
|---|---|
PAY $3000 IF YOU WANT TO GO THROUGH HERE. YES - A NO - B. |
PAY $300000 TO PASS THROUGH HERE. YES - A. NO - B. |
Dialogue adjusted to account for the new money values. A period was added after the Yes option.
| Prototype | Final |
|---|---|
THE BOSS CAN BE DEFEATED BY LOWERING SCROOGES CANE. |
USE YOUR CANE TO DEFEAT THE TREASURE KEEPERS. |
Dewey's hint was changed from being incomprehensible to just obvious.
Transylvania
| Prototype | Final |
|---|---|
OH NO! HUEY HAS BEEN CAPTURED ! HELP HUEY. |
HELP! HUEY HAS BEEN KIDNAPPED! SAVE HIM PLEASE. |
Webby sounds more panicked about Huey's capture by a dangerous criminal in the prototype.
| Prototype | Final |
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THANKS SCROOGE. BEWARE THIS HOUSE HAS AN ILLU- SION WALL INSIDE OF IT. |
THANKS UNCLE SCROOGE. GUESS WHAT. THIS HOUSE HAS AN ILLUSION WALL. |
Huey, traumatized by the kidnapping, forgets to call the player "Uncle Scrooge" in the prototype. His dialogue was also compressed a bit.
African Mines
| Prototype | Final |
|---|---|
YOU CAN'T ENTER THIS HOUSE WITHOUT A KEY. THE KEY IS SUPPOSED TO BE INSIDE THE GHOST HOUSE. |
YOU'LL NEED A KEY TO GET IN. IT'S IN TRANSYLVANIA. |
Louie keyblocks Scrooge. He bizarrely refers to the mine as a "house" in the prototype, and the dialogue is less certain as to the location of the key.
| Prototype | Final |
|---|---|
I GOT THE SKELETON KEY FOR UNDER- GROUND. |
EUREKA! IT'S THE SKELETON KEY TO THE MINE. |
The final version rewrites Uncle Scrooge's dialogue so that it's no longer in the first-person.
| Prototype | Final |
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TRY GETTING ON THIS SEESAW. |
USE THE SEESAW UNCLE SCROOGE. |
Do or do not, there is no try.
The Himalayas
| Prototype | Final |
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UNCLE SCROOGE IT LOOKS LIKE BUBBA DUCK IS LOST SOME- WHERE BACK HERE. PLEASE HELP HIM . |
BUBBA'S TRAPPED IN THE ICE! PLEASE HELP HIM. |
In addition to the usual dialogue compression, Bubba's name was corrected from "Bubba Duck" (Though that name did still end up being used in a Nintendo Power preview for the game).
| Prototype | Final |
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THANK YOU SCROOGE. TO SHOW MY APPRE- CIATION I'LL GIVE YOU THIS TREASURE . |
YOU SAVE ME! GOOD! I SHOW YOU SECRET TREASURE. |
Bubba lost most of his brain cells in the final.
The Moon
| Prototype | Final |
|---|---|
THE KEY IS HIDDEN SOME- WHERE INSIDE THIS UFO . IT SEEMS WE CAN'T MOVE FURTHER WITHOUT IT. |
THERE'S A KEY INSIDE THE UFO. WE CAN'T GO ON WITHOUT IT. |
Dialogue compression.
| Prototype | Final |
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UNCLE SCROOGE ROBO- DUCK'S REMOTE CONTROL HAS BEEN STOLEN BY A SPACE MONSTER. IF YOU FIND IT ROBODUCK COULD BREAK DOWN THIS WALL. |
FIND GIZMO DUCK'S REMOTE CONTROL! THEN HE CAN BLAST THE WALL. |
Gizmoduck is referred to as Roboduck, his name from the cartoon's Japanese dub, in the prototype. The remote control goes from being stolen to just lost.
| Prototype | Final |
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I'VE GOT THE KEY FOR THE UFO. |
IT'S THE KEY TO THE UFO. |
Another first-person dialogue rewrite.
| Prototype | Final |
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ALRIGHT I'LL CALL ROBODUCK WITH THIS REMOTE CONTROL AND HAVE HIM BREAK DOWN THE WALL THAT IS IN THE WAY. |
BLESS ME BAGPIPES! NOW GIZMO DUCK CAN BLAST THAT WALL. |
First-person dialogue + "Roboduck" = Bad. One of Scrooge's catchphrases was also snuck in.
Last Level
| Prototype | Final |
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SHOOT I NEVER THOUGHT DRACULA DUCK WOULD BE DE- STROYED. BUT WE WON'T GIVE YOU THE TREA- SURES. IF YOU WANT IT THAT BADLY YOU'LL HAVE TO CATCH UP TO ME. |
YOU MAY HAVE BEATEN DRACULA DUCK BUT NOT ME! IF YOU WANT THE TREASURES BACK YOU'LL HAVE TO CATCH ME. |
The last of the dialogue compression.
| Prototype | Final |
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DARN! GLOMGOLD TOOK THE TREA- SURES. WE'LL HAVE TO START OVER FROM DRACULA DUCK. |
CURSE ME KILTS! GLOMGOLD HAS THE TREASURES. I MUST FIGHT DRACULA DUCK AGAIN. |
Interestingly, the first-person dialogue was retained this time. Another one of Scrooge's catchphrases was also snuck in.
Unused
| Prototype | Final |
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I BROUGHT YOU A PRSENT KING OF TERRA FERMICS |
HERE'S A GIFT FOR YOU OH KING OF THE TERRA FERMIES. |
Even this unused, typo-laden dialogue string was rewritten, changing "prsent" to "a gift", and "Terra Fermics" to "Terra Fermies".
Endings
The different endings were rewritten as well.
| Prototype | Final |
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Scrooge becomes the richest duck in the prototype, but he already is in the final. The misspelling "monney" was also fixed. This applies to the other two endings, as well.
| Prototype | Final |
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The five main treasures get bumped to legendary status in the final.
| Prototype | Final |
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The bad ending. Apparently the five treasures weren't good enough for the world in the final version. Stupid world. The final version actually introduces a typo, "looses".
| Prototype | Final |
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The prototype's ending dialogue was completely rewritten for reasons that should be fairly obvious by now.
Strangely enough, the infamous "DREAM AND FRIENDS" line made its way into the Japanese version of the game, completely unadulterated. WayForward would later include this line in the Extreme difficulty ending of DuckTales Remastered as a silly little Easter egg.
