Meantime

created and published by Interplay in 1992, running on Apple II E

This game has not passed the prototype stage.

type: role-play
perspective: bird's-eye
player options: single player

languages: eng

Technical specs

display: raster

Editor note

Set in the same universe as Wasteland and using the same engine. Though gameplay is similar, plot and story have virtually no connection to Wasteland.
The player travels through time getting help from and recruiting famous people. So as not to alter history, these are famous people who met their end under mysterious circumstances, such as Amelia Earhart or Cyrano de Bergerac (yes, he was real, and he did have a rather large nose).
Meantime didn't have a traditional 'big bad' enemy type as most RPGs do. Rather, there is a party vs. party battle with the player's group chasing and fixing history where the evil group has broken it. It was unknown but theorized that the enemy party was made up of historic villains (Jack the Ripper and John Wilkes Booth for examples).

Originally began as an Apple ][ game. It was 75% complete when the project was canceled. However, the existing project was later ported to DOS and close to release. But it was once again canceled after Ultima VII was published and the old project was seen as far graphically inferior.

A map editor was created. This allowed designers at Interplay who didn't know assembly language to create and edit game areas. All Wasteland team members had to know assembly to create and edit.