Sonic Next Gen 2004 E3 Demo

Think of it like this...

2004 is Naka's vision

Naka leaves

We get '06.

 

Think of it like this...

Shadow the Hedgehog is Naka's vision

Naka leaves

We get Colours.

 

Naka-sama WHY Q_____Q *cries*

 

Are you referring to the video where they show off the day/night cycle?

Here's an off-screen recording of the video your screenshot is from: http://www.gametrailers.com/video/tgs-2k5-sonic-the/7703

 

Completely disregarding that Naka was just the producer for the game and Iizuka was involved within all the development and was the creator of the character itself.

Anyway, back on topic, I think this is the video you were referencing:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cvKKH4mY1aA

 

I'm pretty sure it was 2005 in which that footage was revealed. It says so in every other source.

Also I believe Naka's mission during the conception of Nextgen was to optimize Sonic's environment and immersiveness for the next generation, while simplifying the series as well as bringing it back to it's roots. The whole idea Naka had at the time was "what if Sonic was real?", which kind of passed onward to Sonic Unleashed, except without leaning more on realism.

After Naka left... everything seemed to had fallen apart.

 

I must say that I like Sonic's model in that video a whole lot better than the one used in the final game.

 

And at a far lower polygon count at that! That's certainly saying something.

 

Wasn't there a playable build of this? At least at the ruin section.

I remember hearing some woman go on and on about first person view mode and the ability for Sonic to throw his rings at things.

 

Yeah, I remember that too. However I think that was there just to show that everything was being rendered in realtime and not prerendered junk, which was of course pretty hardcore in 2005.

 

It was playable, in the sense that this demo was shown running real-time on Xbox 360 hardware. The section where she was throwing rings at stuff was included to prove it I guess. Game wise, it was just a tech demo at that stage.

 

Do we know if that demo was only shown behind closed doors? Or did a public demo of it exist at some point, like for the press? I'd love to compare.

 

It's interesting how Sonic 06 went from a pretty faithful throwback to the good old days to a sink full of shit.