David Bowie almost made it into the original Amplitude on PS2

David Bowie's experimentation as an artist extended into the video game world with a starring role in Quantic Dream's Omikron: The Nomad Soul, and he almost appeared in another game of the same era: Harmonix's Amplitude.

The original Amplitude, which Sony Computer Entertainment published for the PlayStation 2 in 2003, featured one track by Bowie: "Everyone Says 'Hi' (Metro Remix)." The original version of that song appeared on Bowie's 2002 album, Heathen.

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Members of the development team for Harmonix's just-released Amplitude reboot ran an Ask Me Anything session on Reddit today. Harmonix's Ryan Lesser, who was the art director on the original Amplitude, is still at the studio and served as the creative lead on the new Amplitude.

Asked about Bowie's role in the PS2 game, Lesser characterized Bowie as "a fan of Amplitude." Lesser added that Harmonix made a FreQ (one of the game's customizable characters) for Bowie, but didn't include it in the final game because "our tech did not allow us to prevent players from 'customizing' David Bowie's avatar." The studio was able to unearth a never-before-seen image of an unfinished version of Bowie's FreQ; you can check it out above.

Lesser noted that the full FreQ featured Bowie in "a cool suit (as he was seen wearing a bunch back then)"; alas, there is no suit in the image. Harmonix released the new Amplitude earlier this month on PlayStation 4.

Bowie died of cancer on Jan. 10. He had turned 69 — and released a new album, Blackstar, his 26th — two days earlier.