If you were one of the many kids who picked up Battletoads when it launched on NES back in 1991, you might recall gazing at the back of the box and wondering about which stage the bottom-right screenshot was taken from.
While it looks like level 7 (Fire Zone / Volkmire's Inferno), it shows the toads riding bikes (in the final game, they're on planes). For over 30 years, fans have wondered what why this screen is so different from what's in the actual game.
Thanks to Jordi Gutiérrez Hermoso, we now have the answer. Jordi spotted that Chris Bieniek, former editor in chief of Tips & Tricks Magazine, uploaded some footage of a beta version of the game on his VideoGameEphemera channel, taken from a VHS tape.
"Please enjoy pointing out the differences between this beta build of Battletoads and the final released version," says Bieniek in the video's description. "The footage comes from a VHS tape that Tradewest sent to me in 1991, when I was in the process of reviewing the original NES Battletoads game for VideoGames & Computer Entertainment magazine."
As you can see from the footage, stage 7 begins immediately with a vehicle section, and is different from the actual stage 7 in the final game; it has walls of fire hazards, for starters. Here's what level 7 looks like in the retail version of the game.
The original Battletoads launched on NES in 1991, and would also come to the Mega Drive, Game Gear and Amiga. Subsequent Battletoads titles came to the Game Boy, SNES and – more recently – Xbox systems, and there was an arcade release in 1994.