Jun Senoue talks about Super Smash Bros. Ultimate's music: http://sonic.sega.jp/SonicChannel/soundcolumn/senoue/20181220_001770/ (He mentions the Sonic/Mega Man crossover comic.)
Huh. Y'know, I have this very vague memory of getting Knuckles' final Super Emerald by what seemed to be getting to the top of the Glowing Spheres bonus stage for the first time. I'd never done it before and it was REALLY TOUGH, so I figured maybe that nets you a free emerald. Of course this glitch applies to Chaos Emeralds and this would've been Super Emeralds, but I wonder if something similar was what actually happened? It's more likely I was just a dumb kid, but I've always wondered...
Speaking of "dumb kid things", I remember my older brother accidentally triggered debug mode in Sonic 3 (base) and we had no idea what the hell was going on. We rationalized it as "the SEGA overheating" and messing up since we were always taught to turn it off to cool down after prolonged usage.
There was a "world exclusive" Sonic and Knuckles preview broadcast during episode 16 of Australia's The Zone on 13th August 1994 https://retrocdn.net/File:The_Zone_(AU)_s01e16_13-Aug-1994.mp4 (skip to 13:15) I couldn't see any "betah" stuff, but feel free to prove me wrong. Also, a few episode back, the Gamestar "Cheat" of the Week was for Sonic 3 https://retrocdn.net/File:The_Zone_(AU)_s01e13_23-Jul-1994.mp4 (skip to 19:36)
So, Game Development:Sonic the Hedgehog CD: Do we have sources for any of this? Just because while glancing through the Sonic CD US manual, there was something I hadn't clocked onto: http://info.sonicretro.org/index.php?title=File%3ASonicCD_MCD_US_manual.pdf&page=7 The US soundtrack uses QSound. They go out of their way, just a few pages in, to describe how to set up a QSound system (spoilers: the setup is exactly the same as stereo, because the idea behind QSound is it's meant to be "more stereo"). Given that this manual doesn't feel the need to acknowledge that bosses exist in the game, this would suggest to me that Sega of America thought that QSound was important. Almost as if they'd bought into a technology and were keen to shoehorn it into their big products. Could it be then, that the whole reason a second soundtrack exists isn't because of some wacky assumptions about American tastes and hatred of dance, but because they were pushing different audio technology?
That seems like a lot of money to spend just to include such a technology, unless they were contractually obligated to include it. Also, since I don't know anything about it, is there some reason the original soundtrack could not be re-encoded with QSound?
[youtube]http://youtu.be/A5u5QqWzvNI[/youtube] "He chills to reggae!" What is the (repetitive) music used in the background? Anyone recognise it? It sort of sounds sonic-y, like for an options screen or something.
Here's something I just realized today, while working on my Sonic 1 Game Gear disassembly. When you destroy a speed shoes monitor in both versions of the game, the ring sound effect plays. This is quite odd, and it got me thinking and realizing that the checkpoint monitor doesn't play a sound except for the explosion sound and that's just because you destroyed the monitor. I think the ring sound effect was meant to be played when destroying a checkpoint monitor, but mistakenly got placed after the speed shoes monitor logic. There's no need to play a sound effect after getting the speed shoes, because the tempo of the music really is the only thing that should be affected by the power up. Here's a short video demonstrating what I mean: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DUqVpoCAPUw
https://youtu.be/HtASY8KsJEg?t=334 "in the early stages of Sonic Heroes, Fang was also planned to appear as a playable character. He would have been on a team with Bean and Bark." Where in the world did they get this info?
I found some other information in that video to be doubtful. I had never heard that Chaos was supposed to be some sort of mutated Chao. It seems like they came to that conclusion just because there were some Chao making noises when Chaos 0 was on the screen in a flashback sequence. This and the whole "Fang" appearing in Heroes just seem like fan theories. Fang ever being planned to appear in Hereos with Bean and Bark seems especially farfetched.
I agree unless we can be proven wrong. Sonic Heroes was the first major 3D installment after SA2, and I was determined to watch every bit of information that flew across the internet like a hawk when I trawled Sonic CulT. I can't even recall a mention of this back in the day.
Fang, Bean and Bark being planned for Heroes: http://forums.sonicretro.org/index.php?showtopic=8815&view=findpost&p=926174 As for Chaos, his Sonic Channel profile labels him as "チャオ(突然変異体)": http://sonic.sega.jp/SonicChannel/character/chaos.html If copy-paste it to Google Translate, it gives you "Chao (mutant)". Although, I suppose this doesn't necessarily mean that he's mutated Chao, as in a Chao that got mutated into Chaos. It could be that he was born like that due to a genetic mutation. But fans tend to interpret it as him being a normal Chao that got mutated by the Master Emerald. Not sure if there's any basis for that interpretation beyond that profile.
The fact they had to have a meeting on whether or not Shadow was dead continues to be hilarious to me.
Come to think, I'm not 100% on this, but I seem to recall the original Archie Sonic Adventure tie in briefly calling him a mutated Chao via narration at some point. Archie may have based this on some background information they were given by Sega. Or it may be something that they made up and got accepted by the fandom as game-canon, to the point it made its way to the official Sonic Channel profile (I'm thinking a "Sonic likes chili dogs" situation here)
Huh. Thanks for providing a source for the Sonic Heroes stuff. I'm glad Fang didn't end up in the game personally (along with a lot of the other characters they considered including). But Chaos being a mutated Chao still seems weak. Who knows what the original intention was anymore?
It was mentioned in several Japanese Sonic Adventure guide books, predating the Archie comics adaptation. https://pastebin.com/Vu8yNjtz 水の精霊と呼ばれるものはチャオの 突然変異体(=カオス)である。
Always on the look out for really early fan games... even though this doesn't technically qualify as a game. 10 points to whoever finds a copy.
It's CES season, so here's a vague quote that could involve SegaSonic Bros.: https://retrocdn.net/index.php?title=File:SegaForce_UK_03.pdf&page=15 "We will release three versions of new Sonic games this year!" "What he's referring to is Sonic 2 on Mega Drive, Mega-CD and arcade coin-op" This quote would be from January 1992-ish.