Unreleased Sonic X-Treme Footage

Cooljerk · Dec 16, 2008

Also, since I'm sure it's not actual SX music, what is the name of the track in the second video? That song is so mellow...

Kiroziki · Dec 16, 2008

Ok I will back down, but I do have my reasons for doing what I did. I know I broke Chris's trust in me, but he made it seem like I was a glory seeking selfish person, which I'm not. Why should things like this be kept from the Sonic community? thats what I thought so I did it. You guys have a right to know things.

Cooljerk said:

Also, since I'm sure it's not actual SX music, what is the name of the track in the second video? That song is so mellow...
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I only just noticed this now, the music is called Trench. When I asked Chris about this, he said "Trench" has nothing to do with Sonic what so ever. Thats if your talking about the Saturn video.

Cooljerk · Dec 16, 2008

I only just noticed this now, the music is called Trench. When I asked Chris about this, he said "Trench" has nothing to do with Sonic what so ever. Thats if your talking about the Saturn video.
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Yup I am! Thanks a ton! I had suspected it wasn't Sonic Unleashed music due to the fact that it's of a genre that didn't evolve to this point until around 2000.

EDIT: You wouldn't happen to know the author of the track, would you?

Tweaker · Dec 16, 2008

Kiroziki said:

Why should things like this be kept from the Sonic community? thats what I thought so I did it. You guys have a right to know things.
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Not that I don't get where you're coming from, but what right do we have, exactly? As far as we're concerned, the game was canceled, meaning that it was never meant to reach the public domain. Outside of the legally distributed media for the game—which even then we don't have an inherent "right" to see—Chris Senn and any other developers have absolutely no obligation whatsoever to share any of their work with us. The fact he decided to is, in fact, something to be appreciated!

Chris Senn took time out of his life to collect, compile, and provide information about these levels on his own time; he took them from his own personal stash, with the intentions of sharing them with this community. He was never under any obligation to do so, but he decided to regardless. Absolutely nothing gives us the "right" to see it—it's a privilege. When you went and broke Senn's trust like you did, you not only directly disrespected one of the developers of the game, but you bit the hand that feeds you. How does that make sense? How does that benefit the community? This doesn't make sense to me.

The reason it was kept from a public release initially—which he was under no obligation to release, anyway—because of a request by Ofer Alon, the man who designed and coded the levels you see in those videos. It was his work that he didn't want spread for personal reasons, and you decided to post it regardless. I think that's a real dick thing to do just because you somehow deemed yourself fit to break Senn's trust and go against his wishes.

Anyway, I'd appreciate this be the last post on the context surrounding the release, short of Senn's personal explanation of everything. This is going very distant from the main topic.

Jeztac · Dec 16, 2008

http://jeztac.man-ma.de/XTREME/?playflv=1&..._NewPaths_3.mp4

Kiroziki · Dec 16, 2008

Cooljerk said:

I only just noticed this now, the music is called Trench. When I asked Chris about this, he said "Trench" has nothing to do with Sonic what so ever. Thats if your talking about the Saturn video.
Click to expand...

Yup I am! Thanks a ton! I had suspected it wasn't Sonic Unleashed music due to the fact that it's of a genre that didn't evolve to this point until around 2000.

EDIT: You wouldn't happen to know the author of the track, would you?
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The author is Chris Senn,

Sik said:

Kiroziki said:

Ok I will back down, but I do have my reasons for doing what I did. I know I broke Chris's trust in me, but he made it seem like I was a glory seeking selfish person, which I'm not. Why should things like this be kept from the Sonic community? thats what I thought so I did it. You guys have a right to know things.
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Actually you pretty much just broke his trust, it is more Pachuka (and X-CulT in general) who earned the "selfish" title =/

And if I ever hear Shibunoa say anything about this, I'm gonna blow >=[
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I suppose, I don't know myself what the X-cult community did, I haven't payed much attention to what I've done after the email I got from Chris Senn last week, so I thought I'd back away and let this calm itself. I do regret doing what I did now, I really wish now at the time I should have thought about my actions before I did it. But I didn't expect Chris to release them.

P.P.A. · Dec 16, 2008

I always thought X-Treme was a pretty crappy concept. Well, I still kind of do but those paths dancing in the sky are pretty damn impressive.

EDIT: Well after having seen the Saturn video, I further changed my mind. That stage seems a lot more open and free than the ones I've seen thus far. With a nice background image and some other more charming graphical elements, this could have been pretty fun.

Sik · Dec 16, 2008

More than crappy I'd say bizarre. Definitely it isn't the normal Sonic gameplay you would expect... but not exactly crappy.

Ollie · Dec 16, 2008

I'm guessing that YouTube Video was mine of that 15 second clip? Since I took it down at Chris Senn's Request.

Anyway, is there any reason why these videos are different to the ones that were released. I'm not sure if I have understood properly but why would Ofer let the other videos go, but not these ones?

Sik · Dec 16, 2008

.

HyperShadowDC · Dec 16, 2008

first video mirrored on media fire (no waiting to download and no download throttleing... you guys really need to quit using rapidshare. Only downside is 100M upload limit but you can split archives.)
http://www.mediafire.com/?sharekey=29020cc...4e8882443bbaabc

Also Uploaded on YouTube for people who don't wanna/can't download such a huge file.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ejc-pEaW170

2nd video coming soon

kurisu · Dec 16, 2008

Kiroziki - I took the time to email you and explain why violating someone's trust and disregarding their request was bad. I took the time because you approached me first, showing that you had a conscience and some humility. PACHUKA, on the other hand, has neither. He thrives on any attention he can get, even if it means disregarding developers' wishes who actually created the material.

Folks, the release of these videos was an issue because the person most responsible (by far) for their creation, wished them to not be released. Disregarding this request is a slap in the face of the person who made what you see responsible. That is the issue - nobody was trying to hide things, keep them to themselves, etc. - in fact, all that has become evident here are a few people hungry for attention. That's it. I hope this ends any questions related to this - because it is very simple.

I'll quote the post from my own forums for more information:

kurisu said:

"Quick history: Following a conversation two years ago with Ofer in which he became aware that these videos were created, it was made clear by him that they were to never see the light of day. Out of respect for him and his decision, I made a promise to him and asked the few people who had the videos to delete them, or at least to never share them.

The good news:

Two new videos are online and public containing awesome footage of levels Ofer Alon created using his editor and engine. A testament not only to the power of his technical creation and its capabilities, but to the freedom it provided the user to quickly realize cool ideas, the videos show off some of Ofer's "test" art (which frankly were better than my own) as well. As always, these materials remain the copyright of SEGA.

Visit Sonic Retro if you'd like to comment or ask further questions about this topic:
http://forums.sonicretro.org/index.php?showtopic=13246

The bad news:

Today someone decided to openly disregard and disrespect Ofer Alon's wishes and share his levels publicly. For the community, it's certainly a good thing to see a little bit more of a game that "could have been" cool. But for humanity, this is an example of what not to do. By violating someone's trust and disregarding their wishes, a person demonstrates just how selfish he is. Clearly, this person does not care about anything else other than promoting himself, and is willing to do whatever is convenient to further his own purposes, regardless of how it may affect others.

Q. Why is it a bad thing to share these videos, when others have been shared without incident?

A. The difference between these new videos and the old ones is that someone asked that they not be released. And it wasn't just "someone" - it was the creator of the tool that allowed the levels you see in the videos to be created; it was the creator of those levels and their graphics; it was the person who wished that his work remain private. This was a bond of trust that was broken today, and that trust cannot be regained.

To make matters worse, this person made it clear that he didn't care about what anyone thought. This kind of adolescent narrow-mindedness is exactly what gets people nowhere. You break trust and disrespect others, and it will certainly come back to haunt you. Let this be a lesson for anyone who thinks there is glory in acting like this.

Q. Why did Ofer not want this material shared?

A. Ofer did not want the materials shared - not because he wanted anything hoarded or kept from an interested community, but because he believed it was unethical to share them out of his obligation to SEGA. He also would just assume forget about the whole experience, because for him and for many others of us who worked on Sonic Xtreme, it was a long series of battles that led to defeat with its cancellation.
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Dannyboy · Dec 16, 2008

Hrm.... after reading all of this... it kind of feels unethical for me to consider even watching them.

Even though it was through hardship, the creator did give the okay... so I guess I can't resist now.

Hodgy · Dec 16, 2008

such a shame it wasn't released :v: That new worlds demo had a great art direction it looked really good.

Kiroziki · Dec 16, 2008

The New worlds level would be awesome to play, when I first got hold of the videos, I felt sick watching them. All that twirling and twirling at such speed.

Tweaker · Dec 16, 2008

Personally, I'm impressed with the multitudes of gimmicks in the levels. Flying treadmills, extending corkscrews, river trails—it's all very interactive, and makes up for the lack of solid 2D quick platforming like in the classic games. It takes a different approach to the Sonic formula which, while obscure, somehow manages to capture the spirit just as well. I've found myself confused as to flow of the levels in a lot of cases, but New Worlds felt like the layout had a sense of direction; like it was something you could play and not get lost in.

I agree with the above sentiments—it's a shame that this game was never released. It was one thing to work sleepless nights trying to reach a deadline, but to do all that work and have the game never see the light of day? That's dreadful! I can't even fathom how that must have felt. It really, really sucks.

It's a good thing that we can appreciate it for what it was, though, even if we can't directly play it.

Anthall · Dec 16, 2008

Wow, this game looks fantastic, it is actually what a 3D Sonic game SHOULD look like, It has the same look as the old school Sonic games and has the same speed as them, even though watching the videos make me feel sick due to all of the turning about with the camera.

hxc · Dec 16, 2008

Glad to see these got out without me having to do it sometime

Kiroziki · Dec 16, 2008

Sorry, I apologise. Urmm to move this back to the levels. On New Paths has anyone noticed that Sonic seems to be going back and forth around the same parts of the level over and over?

MathUser · Dec 16, 2008

Boy, that fisheye and the level design make for a strange sonic game. It's like that Sonic in VR world storyline from the Sonic Mars days.

Also, kurisu = Chris Senn, in case anyone is curious.

Unreleased Sonic X-Treme Footage

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