Sorry for bringing back such a dead thread, but I was just googling for more info on James Bond: Countdown to Meltdown myself, and stumbled across this. There were no other mentions of this game in issues 1-3 of EGM.
It's funny, because back when Sega gave free gameplay tips and solicited consumer feedback for new products at their 1-800-USA-SEGA line, I would call in... weekly... and request a James Bond game. Being a young kid whose favorite things in life were his Sega Master System and James Bond, with a toll-free number and not much else to do, I did this for an entire summer. Months later I read the same blurb in EGM, that Absolute had actually put a James Bond game into production but cancelled. It was devastating, but I've always wondered if it was my constant calling that got the game green-lit in the first place.