NES port of classic sim game Populous discovered after 33 years

Many older gamers have fond memories of Populous, considered by many to be the first "God Game" (or life simulation game), and for good reason: the title was ported to over a dozen platforms. You can add another to that list; a port of Populous for one of the most popular retro consoles was recently discovered.

Populous was apparently ported to the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES), Nintendo's plucky 8-bit console. The port began life in 1992 under Imagineer, the Japanese publisher perhaps better known for the Super Famicom (known as the Super Nintendo, or SNES) ports of SimEarth and Populous 2, the sequel to this lost port. 

According to Games That Weren't, the organization that discovered the port, the NES version of Populous was completed, but Imagineer decided the console was "past its prime." Considering the NES was 7 years old and the 16-bit SNES was two years into its life cycle at the time the port was created, there is some foundation for this claim. 

Games That Weren't found the files of the game while doing "disk recovery work" for a client. The organization managed to recompile the files into a working ROM that apparently works in a few NES emulators, including Nestopia and MESEN. However, the game is unplayable in FCEUX, a popular NES emulator.

You can download the ROM of Populous for the NES at the website for Games That Weren't and play it on something like the Anbernic RG35XX (curr. $79.99 on Amazon).

Populous was developed by Bullfrog Productions in 1989 for the Amiga. It was later ported to the Acorn Archimedes, Atari ST, FM Towns, MS-DOS, Game Boy, Mac computers, Sega Master System, PC-98, PC Engine, Sega Genesis, Sharp X68000, and SNES. It sold a total of four million copies.