The PSP and PlayStation Vita were very popular consoles thanks primarily to the overall quality of the consoles themselves and the terrific lineup of games that they offered. They served as major leaps forward in terms of technology and what was possible on handheld consoles, as we were all used to rinky-dink handheld games Tetris and Barbie: Game Girl. What we were seeing on these consoles was unbelievable.

Believe it or not, there were tons of games that never saw the light of day. What can we say, developing video games can be a pain. These are ten canceled PSP and PlayStation Vita games you never knew existed.

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10 Age Of Elements

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Age of Elements was a fighting video game being developed by Steamroll and published by, wait for it... Atari. What is this, 1982?

IGN described the game as a mix between Tekken and Powerstone (everyone's favorite fighting game!), and it was going to contain shifting camera views. For example, when the characters were close, the game would employ a traditional side view. Yet, when the characters went far enough away from each other, the camera would shift to behind-the-shoulder ala RE 4 for better weapon aiming.

While it had a planned "winter 2006" release date, the game was canceled, for whatever reason, in 2007.

9 A Bunch Of Hunting Games

We know you were all excited for Bass Pro Shops Trophy Hunter 2007, but, unfortunately, the PSP port was canceled (along with the Xbox 360, PS2, and Wii ports). However, that is just one in a long line of hunting games that were canceled for the PSP. Others include Cabela's Monster Bass (fishing, but whatever, same idea), Cabela's Trophy Bucks, and Cabela's Outdoor Adventures.

We don't know who or what a Cabela is, but they had some rotten luck when it came to the PSP. Maybe there just wasn't the demand for it, or maybe the behind-the-scenes of these hunting games are more drama-filled than Mean Girls. Perhaps we'll never know.

8 Captain America: Super Soldier

Back in 2011, near the beginning of Disney's rise to world domination, Sega released a video game called Captain America: Super Soldier, which was based off the movie Captain America: The First Avenger. It was released for the DS, PS3, Xbox 360, and Wii, and it saw you performing a whole bunch of cool Captain America stuff, as you'd expect.

The plan was to release the game on PC and PSP as well, but these ports were canceled for an unknown reason. No matter; the game wasn't very good in the first place. Ol' Cap had a bit of a slow start when it came to his video games.

RELATED: The 15 Worst PSP Games (And 15 Worth A Second Look)

7 Clash Of The Titans

Back in 2010, a remake of Clash of the Titans was released. And, even though it was on par with that student film you made that one time in your mom's basement in terms of quality, it still made nearly $500 million at the box office. A video game tie-in was released for the major consoles, and even the freaking Blackberry (FYI, those were phones).

However, the game was somehow even worse than the movie, scoring abysmal ratings from critics and being hailed as one of the worst games of the year. We don't know if that was the reason, or poor sales or what, but further ports for the Wii, DS, and PSP were canceled.

6 Earthworm Jim

Everyone was excited for Earthworm Jim. Well, everyone who had played the originals back in the day. In the meantime, Earthworm Jim 3D and the brilliantly-named Earthworm Jim: Menace 2 the Galaxy were released, both of which absolutely tarnished the once-great name that was Earthworm Jim.

So, not many people were looking forward to it, then. Regardless, the old developers of the classic games were supposedly reuniting for this entry, but money problems eventually led to the game being indefinitely put on hold in June 2007. In other words, canceled.

5 Bloodstained: Ritual Of The Night

As you can probably tell from the gloomy title, Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night is a Metroidvania game released for all the major consoles back in June. The plan was to release the game on the Wii U and PlayStation Vita as well, and developer Armature Studio was set to make those ports.

However, plans for the Vita release were eventually canceled in August of 2018, as Sony announced that they were ending support for the handheld. Five months later, the Vita was officially taken off life support. Rest in peace, Vita. We miss you every day, bro.

RELATED: Independent Publishers Confirm That Sony Isn't Done With The Vita

4 Final Fantasy Agito

Final Fantasy Agito is like that cousin of yours that never visits for Christmas dinners; technically part of the family, but everyone kind of forgets that they exist.

Agito was a mobile game released back in 2014, and, while it initially proved successful, player numbers sharply dropped after everyone realized how terrible the game was, and the servers were shut down after just one and a half years. A planned Vita release called Agito+ was demoed during the 2014 Tokyo Game Show, but this port was eventually canceled due to numerous technical problems.

3 Hyper Light Drifter

Hyper Light Drifter

Hyper Light Drifter is an old school 2D RPG that harkens back to the 8 and 16-bit era, also known as "the good old days." Lead developer Alex Preston called it a blending of A Link to the Past and Diablo, and, when it came out, everyone freaking loved it. It even won industry awards for its unique visual art style.

The game was later ported to home consoles, and releases for the Wii U and Vita were planned, but these were eventually abandoned. Preston has cited technical issues and concerns for his health as the primary reasons behind the cancellation, and we can certainly respect that.

2 Killing Bites

Killing Bites is a Japanese manga created by writer Shinya Murata and illustrator Kazasa Sumita. The manga has been going strong since 2013, and a 12-episode anime aired in the winter of 2018.

Two years after the debut of the manga, Sony did some business finagling and managed to score a video game adaptation for their PS4 and Vita. The game was scheduled to release some time in 2015 and was going to be developed by Nex Entertainment. However, said developer was dissolved the following year, and it's kind of hard to publish a video game when there is no video game to publish, and Killing Bites was quietly taken off the schedule.

1 Nier

Nier

Nier is like a washed-up football dad; no one knows or remembers who they are, but everyone loves their younger, cooler offspring. The original Nier was released back in 2010 for both the PS3 and Xbox 360, but it didn't really gain a lot of traction... because it was kinda bad.

Luckily, PlatinumGames came swooping in like Spider-Man and saved the franchise from extinction with Automata. Plans were put in place to port Nier to the Vita, but the developer was chosen to help create Dragon Quest X, so they abandoned and disowned Nier like a problematic child who has been arrested one too many times.

NEXT: Vita Itself: A Post-Mortem of the PS Vita