William Shatner's TekWar

In William Shatner's TekWar, you are a cop (named Jake Cardigan) taken out of cryostatis and ordered by William "Walter Bascom" Shatner (shown via FMVs) to kill various drug dealers that have funny names, like "Marty Dollar". To do this, you must find keycards to open up their lairs. You'll end up spending most of your time being lost because Shatner didn't bother to tell you exactly where the bad guys' lairs are nor where the keycards could be.

There are also innocent NPCs that should not be killed, or else Shatner will be mad at you during the end of mission cutscene that plays after killing a drug dealer.

One of the most notable things about this game is that it's one of the first ones (the other being Witchaven) to use the BUILD engine, which would later go on to power Duke Nukem 3D among other games.

Unused Items#

Folding Computer#

First-person graphics for a computer that folds on its side exists. The intended use for this item is unknown.

First-Person Grenade Graphics#

First-person graphics for either the Force Charge or the Stun Grenade, both mentioned as grenade-type weapons in the manual, exist. In-game, throwable items are tossed with the Enter key and do not show an animation when thrown.

The readme does mention that throwable weapons were once given a separate key, so these might be a remnant from that period:

Readme Note

*********************************
6 Force Charge
7 Stun Grenade
8 Flamethrower
9 Rocket Launcher

Note: Force Charge & Stun Grenades have been changed so that they are picked
up with the space bar and then thrown with the Enter key; They are no longer
weapons 6 & 7. Weapons 8 & 9 have now been moved to the 6 & 7 locations
respectively.

Alternate version of the second sprite, but with a black box at the bottom. Appears earlier in the art files than the previous ones.

Unused Graphics#

Demo Leftovers#

Leftover graphics from the demo version of the game exist.

This graphic is overlaid on the screen when killing the drug dealer in the demo.

Player Drawing Weapon Sprites#

Unused sprites for Jake (the player) drawing his gun. In-game, the player will instantly switch to his shooting stance animation when a gun is pulled out.

Oddly, his coat is gray instead of blue (or other colors for multiplayer), suggesting these sprites were never given support for multiple palettes.

Alternate angle for unused draw animation.

Art Grid#

Tile 0 contains an unused grid that would likely be used by artists.

Grave#

A poorly-made image of a gravestone with flowers placed in front. It can be found at tile 310.

Grenade#

A crude image of a grenade that doesn't appear anywhere in the game is at Tile 315.

Editor Leftovers#

A few leftover images that would be used in the editor can be found in the game's files.

Unused Music#

From looking at different videos of TekWar, there seems to be two versions that each use different MIDI music. I can't find anything about this game having patches or differences between releases, so I'll call the version I played V1, and the alternative V2.

To do:
Figure what the differing music is all about, TEKSND.C mentions playing songs based on what MIDI card is in use.

Exporting the MIDIs from the extensionless file SONGS gives 69 files. In these, there are the songs from the two versions, alongside many more unused variations:

(Source: Original TCRF research)

Level Select#

Despite being the simplest, this song is featured a whopping 45 times, though most of them seem to be exactly the same as each other.

File	Song	Notes
01		(Used), repeated in/similar to files 01, 02, 04, 05, 07, 08, 10, 11, 13, 14, 16, 17, 19, 20, 22, 23, 25, 26, 28, 29, 31, 32, 34, 35, 37, 38, 40, 41, 43, 44, 46, 47, 49, 50, 52, 53, 55, 56, 58, 59, 61, 62, 63, 64, and 65.
63		Uses lots of slap-bass.
64		Much deeper tune, different drums, and perhaps slower tempo.

Subway#

File	Song	Notes
67		(Used);
68		A different backing instrument.

Marty Dollar#

File	Song	Notes
00		(Used V1);
03		Very deep bass, and louder waves.
06		(Used V2) Same as above, but instead of cowbells, uses "80's beats".

Dallas Dimarco (V1)#

The only song that doesn't get repeated.

File	Song	Notes
09		(Used).

Dallas Dimarco (V2)#

No differences I could notice, but only one of them is used.

File	Song	Notes
12
15

Carlyle Rossi#

File	Song	Notes
18		(Used V1), completely different instruments, and a guitar that adds a lot.
21
24

Could not notice any difference between file 21 and 24, but only one of them is used in V2.

Conrad Lowell (V1)#

No differences I could notice, but only one of them is used in V1.

File	Song	Notes
27
66

Conrad Lowell (V2)#

No differences I could notice, but only one of them is used in V2.

File	Song	Notes
30
33

Sonny Hokouri#

File	Song	Notes
36		(Used V1), has different drums than the other versions, and most importantly, almost half of the song was cut off.
39		Different instruments in the beginning, the guitars don't go down an octave near the middle.
42		(Used V2), different main instrument.

Miles Connor#

File	Song	Notes
45		(Used V1), just like the one above, has a part that was cut.
48		Different instruments through the whole song, and a more dramatic transition.
51		(Used V2), ditto as file 48, plus much higher-pitched main instrument, and weird harmony between the instruments before the cut part.

Janus#

File	Song	Notes
54		(Used), Different instruments and tuning, different ending, and only plays once.
57		Plays twice. In the first, it has completely different instruments, a few less notes, kicks in different, has different drums, a different ending, and weird harmony altogether. Then in the second, it's a lot more like the used version, but with some guitars after it kicks in.
60		Plays twice. In the first, is just like the one above, but with different instruments. In the second, sounds even more like the used version, but has a a few less notes on some instruments after it kicks in.