Controversial FMV game Night Trap is getting a 25th anniversary remaster, but the game won't be appearing on the Switch - despite the best efforts of the developers.
The game - which involves trying to protect a household full of excitable young women from the clutches of some rather unconvincing vampire-like monsters - caused a stir when it was originally released on the Mega CD at the height of the console war between Sega and Nintendo.
When hearings were held in Congress in 1993 regarding the growing problem of video game violence, Night Trap was cited by Nintendo of America's Howard Lincoln, who went as far as to say that it "will never appear on a Nintendo console.”

Looks like Lincoln's words are ringing true even after all this time:
Would you have liked to have played Night Trap on your Switch? Let us know with a comment.
[source gonintendo.com]
Comments 109
No big loss in my opinion, the game has always looked like cheesy crap to me!
Not sure how the Switch is going to get thru these tough times.. it's gems like these that can save a console!
On one hand, ohhh, what a shame. eye roll
On the other hand, aww, what a shame. sincere frown
This game is a notorious, ironic cult classic, but I... kinda want to play it.
I'm not bothered.
Edit: I had a look at the cast to see if any of them went on to win an Oscar. Surprisingly they didn't. The only recognisable name was Dana Plato who played Kimberley Drummond in Different Strokes. She had personal problems and tragically died young(34).
@Rika_Yoshitake save from what?
Still generating column inches after all these years.
(Groans of increasing discomfort)
There are absolutely no excuses for lo-fi games like this not coming to Switch.
Don't quote DrTre, it's trashy. He's the worst Nintendo fanboy there is. Still hasn't finished Zelda either.
Two word review.
Night Crap.
I find I barely have time to give proper retro classics, so not sure where I'd find time to play a game that wasn't considered any good at the time and is probably only worse now.
That's because there is no Nintendo CD.
There isn't much of a game in this, it's mainly switching cameras and pressing a button (and making notes of times on a notepad)... still, it's interesting to see early uses of FMV. I think it's a shame that many will attack this game without even considering its importance. Because developers like these tried new things we actually were able to get outside the box and create different games. It's risky (and, in this particular case, I don't think paid off much), but they had the balls to do it. It's trash and cringy (and aged horribly), yes, but it's an interesting piece of gaming history and it has a lot of nostalgia value to a lot of people.
I'm not sad about this.
Ah yes. I do remember playing this on the Sega CD. It was crapy indeed, cheesy and with very bad acting. But once you started playing you simply couldn't stop. It's a shame most of you here do not understand how important this game was at the time.
Sewer Shark anybody???
Animate their bodies into Mario's body. Woo hoooo
@renato_racfr Yeah, I played most of the weird games they had on there. I couldn't get enough of the odd stuff. Man, I played everything back then.....
The video speaks for itself, really.
@ZeldaToThePast I get what you mean. Still it offered a few good games. The best Sonic to date (Sonic CD) and the incredible (at the time) Silpheed and the best version of Final Fight ever.
Then there are precious gems like Road avenger... and the amazing Tom Cat Alley and Bug Blasters and... I'm going to stop now.
@Ichiban I played it 25 years ago and can confirm...it IS indeed cheesy crap
I'd be far more interested in Ground Zero Texas or Sewer Shark...but even then probably end up not buying them.
How's this a bad thing?
That's one bad game not coming to the Switch!
It's what I call quality control.
No Nintendo seal of quality for you. That's saved for good horror games like Resident Evil.
Grandfather's clause at work!
But man, this doesn't bode well for other things that would "never appear on a Nintendo console".
I bought this for my Mega CD the day it came out.
I returned it the next day.
@renato_racfr Loved Silpheed. Blew my mind that game. Starfox on SNES was just a poor mans Silpheed in my mind. Final Fight was superb too. It was the most "arcade perfect" game I ever owned up to that point.
That's ridiculous Nintendo!! Let it go already!! Nintendo fans deserve a chance to play the game!!
I played this on Sega CD when i rented it.
it was horrible,they all were.
Prize Fighter was pretty good. It was in black and white but it actually had some gameplay
When he said the game would never appear on a Nintendo console, wasn't he referring to Mortal Kombat? Which was then released on the SNES the next year.
It was crap back when it first came out, it will still be crap today. Switch needs third party games but it shouldn't just grab any thing that comes around. Game quality should be considered.
@renato_racfr
I understand how important it was, I played it back in 1993. It's still utter rubbish though. The Mega CD had some really good games but this isn't one of them.
To me this is good news, because I'm just happy switch was even considered, not just that but they made a fair attempt.
Wii U wouldn't have been part of the discussion, neither would Wii, so this is good progress and shows the Switch's different, more favourable position in the industry.
@renato_racfr Sewer Shark was a game I really enjoyed. I would take a remaster of it, but then again, maybe I should just remember it for what it was. 😁
Actually their absence from Nintendo platforms is a blessing! pooooooooooooopy game!!
I just remember being blown away when I first booted it up- like this was even possible?!? And I personally had a good time with the game! Bring on Prize Fighter, Sewer Shark, Ground Zero Texas, Mad Dog McRae, Tom Cat Alley, etc etc
This should have been on Switch
@w00dm4n reminded me of Raging Bull!!
You can watch this game on YouTube and it will give you the same gratification, not a big deal it's not coming.
However, there's no real reason why this couldn't come, "Time Frame" issues don't seem to bother anyone else, Switch is getting games months/years after other releases.
It's funny looking back on this today... Most likely, Lincoln was opportunistically using this occasion to take advantage of the useful political idiots of the time who were ignorantly railing against gaming (like Hillary Clinton), so they would conveniently forget Nintendo's previous egregiously monopolizing actions. Nintendo never did face any major repercussions from the U.S. government. Instead, they weakened themselves in their own sphere of influence.
As for Night Trap itself... It's obviously a POS as a game, but more notably, it's questioned content is rather tame in hindsight. Phantasmagoria didn't get any attention in these hearings since it only applied to PC gaming (which few people had access to back then), even though it much more directly referenced rape, stalking, and PTSD from domestic abuse. No one brought up Nightshade for the NES either, where you witness a thug repeatedly beating an elderly lady over the side of her head on the side of the street... And you can just sit there and watch it happen.
The greatest irony of all this was that violent crime rates were going down as gaming was surging... And the conclusion of studies like those shown in the book Grant Theft Childhood lean towards "violent gaming itself does not cause violence, but can bring to light psychological problems that exist from elsewhere." Blasting away demons gives us more insight into our psyche than we may care to notice...
I'm glad Nintendo never brought this trash to their system. I play both the Sega CD and 3DO versions and it was so bad, cheesy, and not entertaining at all. All I want was to see the invaders kill the girls and I didn't even get that, instead all I get to see are some piss off officers who kept mocking me through terrible FMV.
What about 'Man Enough'? Is it coming to Switch?
Guess I'll be getting on my PS4 & One...
@zumbertinho Titles like Wing Commander 3/4 and the Tex Murphy series were infinitely better excursions into FMV. Night Trap and it's like, on the other hand, are only marginally better than the travesty that is Plumbers Don't Wear Ties. So yeah, Night Trap and the like deserve all the criticism they can get for eroding then killing the FMV cinematic gaming genre.
Never played it. But I remember being intrigued by it and the possibilities of FMV gaming. I wonder if I go back and look at that stuff with adult eyes would I just SMH and chalk it up to nostalgia.
@Alikan That's never what the seal meant.
@PlywoodStick wouldn't FMV be what Telltale makes today?
my Sega CD days were clouded with gems like Vay,Lunar and Sonic CD but i enjoyed stuff like Space Ace, Dragon's lair and Prize Fighter.
stuff like Sewer Shark makes it feel like a lost art form.
@renato_racfr Yessir, I know exactly what you mean. A lot of great stuff. Wish I kept a lot of it. I loved my CD collection in those giant cases, ha ha.
It's a fascinating game... that it ever got made! I remember playing it as a kid with my cousins and we had a blast trying to figure it out. It was new, exciting technology on the Sega CD... but it wasn't meant to be the industry standard. I do have a soft spot for FMV gaming
And nothing of value was lost...
@EVIL-C lol. Yeah, I know. Just channelling the child me that admired that gold sticker in stores. 😉
Sooooooooo.... WHO CARES ??
Correct me if I'm wrong, but it seems like one of those "games" that'd be just as fun to watch someone else play on YouTube..
@w00dm4n FMV in this case means full motion video, so it must use real or green screen sets and real actors throughout, not just CG effects/characters and voice acting. But yeah, Telltale narrative adventures are animated cousins of the FMV gaming genre.
@MegaTen Me neither.
I wasn't born yet
@PlywoodStick Comparing it to Plumbers Don't Wear Ties isn't fair, is it? I'm not disagree completely with you, I think the game is subpar, but you mentioned PC titles, didn't you? Also, Night Trap's focus was solely on FMV, and I wouldn't know about the negative impact it did (or didn't, I think you're exaggerating) make. I'm also not saying that it is worth of a Switch release. What I'm saying is that it was something different (a game that was a continuous FMV, not a point and click adventure), and even if the results weren't the best they deserve kudos for trying. I'm saying that you shouldn't undermine the effort people put in this title, because trying different things is important, but most comments here are simply "It was a POS", "Bought it, returned the next day". This game is at least discussion worthy (I think). Proof is that we're still discussing it 20 years later.
I was just old enough to want to play this game simply because they were trying to ban it. Didn't get a chance until years later... It's not a great game by any means, but I think in many ways it is an important one. I had planned on buying it when I heard it was being rereleased. Switch would have been my first choice for platform, but I'll just pick up the PS4 or XB1 version.
I don't even know what this is, don't care to research it. Doesn't look like it's anything special...so eh.
2017 minus 25 = 1992, and yet it looks so gloriously 1984. In any event, I would not be buying . . . .
Well....the game is apparently awful...
@GrailUK it's important because it's the game Tipper Gore picked to represent the video game industry when she went on her witch hunt against any and every form of media. Everything bad you've ever heard about this game, in terms of content not quality, is mostly a load of lies that were told to demonize the video game industry. They tried empose a government rating system that would have banned a lot of games, and their evidence was mostly lies about what Night Trap contained. The current industry run rating system that we have was the compromise that came out of the Congressional Hearings.
(Mortal Kombat was the other game they used, but that one actually did contain the content they claimed it did. Night Trap was the chance to fight back since most of what they claimed was actually the exact opposite of what the game was about)
@daveh30 Thanks Dave
I'll pass...
I'd be more excited to see Plumbers Don't Wear Ties on the Switch. At least that game is laughably bad.
Other then the draw of playing a "B" movie like video game, this isn't that big of a loss. But, I always say that the more games the better!
@electrolite77 Yes, it really was utter rubbish indeed. It was one of those games that was so bad it was good. You started playing and you just wanted to finish it as soon as possible so you would never touch it again (and to see if it lead to something interesting in the end... it didn't).
That's why I said you started playing and couldn't stop.
I'm never a fan of seeing games or services (EA Access not being on PS4) skipping consoles. If you don't like it, you don't have to buy it, that simple. This is hardly a cause for concern though. I'm more annoyed by the fact that big third parties aren't bringing over their top franchises. The Capcom situation is the most disappointing. That's a bigger issue than Night Trap not being on Switch.
Meh.
@fortius54 Played it a few years ago (2 years ago I think). It was still good but it just didn't feel like back in the day. Then again once I started playing I just had to finish it.
Nintendo probably still feels this game has some kind of controversy attached to it. Even though the GameCube had far worse on it during its life time. Honestly this game is awful to the point that Nintendo is probably doing the fanbase a favor.
I'm torn on these Sega CD games. On one hand I remember all the expense, headache, and disc rot... But at the same time it all feels very dissonant, like living an alternate reality, and even though I was there, playing these game now is like staring through the glass at a zoo of mid-90s culture.
@ACK
I was a big Sega guy back in the day and my parents were nice enough to get me the Sega CD (I begged those poor people like crazy). Thinking back though, I can't remember too many good games that I couldn't have just bought for my Genesis. It seemed Sonic CD was the only must-have.
@ACK There were a couple of great Sega CD games. The best ones, unfortunately, seemed to be only released in Japan (I'm thinking of most of the RPG's). In those days, they didn't think the US gamers would "get" want to slog through a long game like an RPG, they thought we wanted to ? act out? like in movies, so Sega opened up a studio and we got crap like this (Night Trap), Maddog McCree and a couple others...blech....
It was only because of Working Designs that we got stuff like Lunar The Silver Star (and Eternal Blue), Vay, and Popful Mail. I think Konami put out Snatcher...Lucas games put out Monkey Island, etc.
I would love to play Sega CD games again, especially if remastered means that the loading times are fixed. I remember playing Willy Beamish at a friend's house on computer back in the day and then being excited when I found it for Sega CD. Man, the loading times where HORRENDOUS! You'd move from one room to another and it would take 5 minutes or more!
@rdrunner1178 i remember WWF Rage in the Cage and Spider-man just taking forever.
the WWF game was crazy. It took forever to load followed by a short audio clips of the wrestlers being introduced and they both had an audio taunt followed by another long loading time.
of course the reward after an hour to play ten matches was a maybe minute long black and white FMV.
#glorydays
For the Mega CD? If I had one of those I'd be playing Sonic CD, not some FMV game...
I am fairly sure that if it wasn't for Congress, this game would have been relegated to the dust bin of history a long time ago. It pretty much is only known because of the controversy that surrounds it.
PS4 sales are big, but will skyrocket after this release.
"Despite the best efforts of the developers"
Didn't the original devs say in 2014 that, 20 years after it happened, they were still bitter Nintendo forced them to censor this game that wasn't even on their consoles? So I read that as that they still didn't WANT it to appear on a Nintendo console.
@Giygas_95 Well, if you had a Mega CD at launch, Sonic wouldn't have been an option. It was this, or a few older cart games repackaged on CD.
@KingMike Ew. The Mega CD didn't do great commercially right? No wonder.
If you're having time frame issues on a remaster of a 25-year-old game, then what you're really having are lazy developer issues.
C'mon Nintendo. Stop being so damn cautious, especially now that you are doing well again.
Nah the game was crap and no loss here
@renato_racfr
"That's why I said you started playing and couldn't stop."
Oh I could 😉
There were some great Mega CD games
https://www.retrogamer.net/top_10/top-ten-mega-cd-games/
This isn't one of them IMHO
The Switch will clearly suffer from this loss. Nintendoomed. /s
At least the 3DS got Mad Dog McCree....TRY ANOTHER!
I like Reggie as a person but Howard Lincoln did a much better job for NOA...
C-SPAN? Congress? ROFL
Can't believe this game contributed that much XD But curses will last and Howard's words might ring into those who have (or mostly haven't) heard of this disgrace of a game. This game is hilarious, and I didn't mean it in a good way
I'm surprised somebody wants to celebrate the anniversary of such crap. Youtubers will buy it to show something weird, unusual (and bad enough to make jokes about it and look funny in the eyes of their followers) and nobody else will care. I find it sad that such poor, stupid and bad "games" gets their anniversary celebrated. In those 25 years nobody cared about it except to make fun at how bad it is...
It really belongs in the realm of games "So bad, they're actually fun to play"
I love this game. Still play it on my Raspberry Pi to this day. Would have happily bought this for the Switch.
@renato_racfr Ah Sewer Shark. Fond memories.... not really. Second worst video game induced motion sickness in my life went to Sewer Shark. First place goes to Sanfransico Rush 2049, that lasted 2 hours. Lol, still loved it.
Still, shame that Night Trap isn't coming. Not because it was a great, but because of importance in history. Still woulda been interesting to play.
On a side note, that frickin song is gonna be stuck in my head all day.... oddly catchy in a silly 90s kinda way.... and now I wanna dance the Carlton....
@zumbertinho I do think that only PC native titles ever got FMV right, although Wing Commander 3 was ported to Mega/Sega CD. You're right that Night Trap was trying to step beyond the bounds of what console technology could accomplish at the time, which is noteworthy. The Tex Murphy series just did the real time FMV sequences far better, while Wing Commander 3/4 wisely didn't step beyond the bounds of the tech at that time. Wing Commander 4 in particular, especially with update mods, is probably the crown jewel of FMV gaming. The comparison is inevitable because the difference in quality is so staggering.
By itself, Night Trap didn't significantly affect the downfall of FMV, but it was part of the conglomerate of relatively (and outright) bad FMV titles which shaped the genre's public perception of being a failed 90's experiment. Night Trap was ultimately cannon fodder, only further proven by Howard Lincoln being able to opportunistically use it's existence to Nintendo's advantage.
It should appear just for curiosity's sake. We're well past the time where this is still offensive to anyone.
I owned the Sega-CD and this game too. I still regret having waisted my money on it. The "game" (interactive movie) was a novelty, but no more than that.
The game came out in 1992, but the video footage was recorded in 1987.
No complaints here! Night Trap is a largely forgettable game!
It seems to me, that when he said to congress it will never appear on a nintendo console, those became legally binding words
@electrolite77 Apart from the last four I've got all the other games listed for the mega cd and a few others like night trap sewer shark, tom cat alley, silpheed, road avenger, some formula 1 game - one of the best i've played until now - and two or three more that i don't remember wich ones nor where did I put store them.
Game was terrible. I do not want it sullying Nintendo's library anyway.
Third party support is a double-edged sword.
@Wazeddie22 ... Oh, my Goddess Althena. Your avatar...!
So what?
Good! The last thing the Switch needs is 25-year-old shovelware from a failed hardware add-on.
The people who would've bought this are probably the same ones who were awaiting the arrival of Superman 64 on Virtual Console.
One of the worst games ever made is not coming to my Switch? How will I ever cope?!
@PlywoodStick What was funny was that Nintendo had violent games on their systems, sold a bazooka-like gun in the Super Scope, and even had blood in their games, namely Street Fighter II in the portraits of the defeated fighters.
Yes, Sega had more graphic games, but much of Sega's audience at the time were older gamers. Granted, they could have done more to keep games like Night Trap and Mortal Kombat out of the hands of kids, but it should be noted that they eventually introduced their own rating system.
From the start, Sega was made to look like the bad guy and Nintendo jumped at the chance to kick them in the nuts. To this day, I don't believe that Nintendo went to those hearings because they were concerned about graphic violence in video games. They honestly did not give a damn.
Why do I say that? Because of only a year or two later, the SNES got uncensored ports of Doom and MK2-UMK3, and Nintendo even helped put out a violent fighting game of their own(with blood) in Killer Instinct.
Nintendo went to those hearings with the intent to humiliate Sega and make them look bad to the public. Nintendo kept presenting themselves as some kind of saints, and the senators ate it up, while Sega was made to look like amoral monsters who were peddling porn and graphic violence to kids.
Did kids play Sega? Of course, they did, but the Genesis had a large audience of teenagers and even adults who played it. Nintendo twisted the truth so they could get back at Sega.
I love Nintendo and Sega(Sega more though, I'm a Sega fanboy) but the "hearings" on violence were a sham that turned into a three-ring circus of Nintendo and Sega slinging mud at each other.
The one good thing that did come out of it was the ESRB, but the hearing were brutal.
@MagicEmperor Seems we have great taste in games!Lunar 1 and 2 were what got me into rpgs in the first place and Ghaleon was one of the best all time villains!
@Wazeddie22 Yes! This has been destiny.
@Yasaal Well, Nintendo was sort of humiliated after they demanded Mortal Kombat 1 be censored on SNES (well GB too, but nobody probably cared about that one since it was green anyways).
It seemed even people who didn't really care about MK specifically still argued for the point Nintendo's "all-ages only" rules were growing outdated.
Supposedly they went to these senate hearings to get some appeal from pro-censors like politicians and non-gamers who only gaming as children's toys.
And they chose Night Trap to drag down with them.
@KingMike LOL they look like they're suffering because of that now. Not one mature game yet for Switch (at least for big releases)
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