[Solid SOAP]

Hear me out, this isn't a "suck Taxman's dick" topic or Sonic 4 bashfest, but I just have wondered what Sonic 4 may have been like had SEGA gotten their hands on Taxman's 'Retro Engine' even so much as a year or less earlier. Do you think if SEGA knew that they had a great engine capable of playing classic Sonic games flawlessly, that they would have used it to their advantage by making it the engine that Sonic 4 runs on, as opposed to Dimps'? Hell, do you think that it's even possible that Christian Whitehead would have had even more involvement in the Sonic 4 project at all, had they discovered his engine sooner? This is a completely hypothetical topic, I'm not trying to say that this will/could have happened, just questioned whether it could have in the first place and see what possibilities it would have opened up in the first place is interesting.


What do you all think?

This post has been edited by Solid SOAP: 24 December 2011 - 09:58 PM

[Dark Sonic]

Well correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't Taxman present his Sonic CD retro engine iphone test before Sonic 4 existed?

EDIT: Ok so at least one Youtube video dates that back to December 2009. Sonic 4 came out in October of 2010? Ok I guess by then it was too late, but not late enough for them to scrap what they were doing and start over if they were that confident in this engine, however I'm not sure if the engine can handle 3D graphics or not. Sonic 4 is an odd game. It uses 3D graphics for somethings and then pre rendered level chunks, along with attempted retro style music. The game really has an identity crisis.

I guess if Sega got a hold of the engine a year earlier they might have decided to use the engine, but at that point there were two problems. They already had a team working on Sonic 4, and more importantly, I didn't think they realized how important accurate retro style gameplay really was to the classic era fans. By the time there was outlash they were too deep into the game's production to change that much. We'll have to see what Episode 2 has in store though.

This post has been edited by Dark Sonic: 24 December 2011 - 09:53 PM

[Solid SOAP]

Dark Sonic, on 24 December 2011 - 09:46 PM, said:

I guess if Sega got a hold of the engine a year earlier they might have decided to use the engine, but at that point there were two problems. They already had a team working on Sonic 4, and more importantly, I didn't think they realized how important accurate retro style gameplay really was to the classic era fans. By the time there was outlash they were too deep into the game's production to change that much. We'll have to see what Episode 2 has in store though.

That's what I mean. What likely happened is that they showed Dimps the classic games, and simply said "Make a game like these" and called it a day. However, if Sonic 4 were merely a thought at best, and Taxman's engine was approved by SEGA for Sonic CD and whatever uses they may have in store for it, would that have any effect on Sonic 4 as we know it? That's precisely what I was asking. Obviously after they assigned a team to make Sonic 4, they wouldn't have just told them to fuck off because they found a good engine to run the game on.

[FlashTHD]

And welcome, one and all, to The Clusterfuck Before Christmas™! Tell your friends!

[Dark Sonic]

It's really hard to say. I just don't think they realized how important accurate physics in Sonic 4 are. A remake is one thing. If it doesn't play like it did, that causes problems. A new game though can be designed around the shitty gameplay and be made playable, thus Sonic 4.

[Sik]

Dark Sonic, on 24 December 2011 - 09:46 PM, said:

however I'm not sure if the engine can handle 3D graphics or not.

They could have easily just gotten rid of the graphics code and used their own if they wanted.

[Icewarrior]

I doubt that because Sega of Japan always seemed to be particularly proud and stubborn they wouldn't care the least bit about an engine made by an external programmer.
I think we owe that Sonic CD port more to Sega of America than Sega of Japan (feel free to correct me if I'm wrong though)

[Skyler]

I believe Taxman has said multiple times that the Retro Engine is fully capable of 3D.

[Spanner]

Yes, it would have been better, but at the end of the day, SEGA would rather have their beloved Dimps ruin another game with their horrible engine. Sure, they fixed it up slightly for Generations 3DS, and you'll probably get that for Episode II, but the damage was still caused. They could have used the same engine used for Generations (console version) and it would have worked well.

However, the engine wasn't the only complaint, remember that. The level design was the usual typical Dimps shit, the music was atrocious and the concept of Sonic 4 done in that way was simply unacceptable. Plus, remember that as well as making this a downloadable, episodic title, they wanted to accommodate for the Wii, which has a ridiculous storage limit for WiiWare titles.

This post has been edited by SOTI: 25 December 2011 - 08:27 AM

[Felik]

Honestly I think you guys are overglorifying Tax's engine. It's just yet another multiplatform 2D engine + classic physics and nothing more. Sonic 4's is pretty much the same only in 3D but they just didn't bother to make proper physics.

[SpeedStarTMQ]

Yet another assumptious DIMPS post...

It doesn't matter that they brought us Sonic Pocket Adventure, Sonic Advance 1 2 and 3, and Rush and Rush Adventure. Purely because Sonic 4 has different physics it means DIMPS decided that Classic Sonic was a dick, and that to piss him and his followers off they'd completely rebuild the physics of a game which actually work less well than their previous iterations just for the sake of it.

I don't think so. There's evidently a whole lot more to it than that which we'll never know. I swear to god that if I was Scarred Sun I would ban this DIMPs shit so hard, like that Sonic Cycle bullcrap and that pin-ball physics toss.

To answer the question to the thread- I don't think it would have made much difference. Until recently Sonic Team/SEGA/whatever have been bloody stubborn and have tried to enforce their own skeward and misguided direction of Sonic on the player, with 2006 and those silly Riders games being a prime example. The change of the physics has been well documented and was forseen with the slight change of bounci-ness in Sonic Advance 3, and the overhaul in Rush and Rush Adventure. The 3D physics have also constantly changed.

Edit; I don't even know is assumptious is a word, actually.

This post has been edited by SpeedStarTMQ: 25 December 2011 - 10:45 AM

[Overlord]

This topic is going to do nothing but cause yet another Dimps-bashing-bandwagon fest. Don't post obvious - and purely speculatory - flamebait.