KingofHarts, on 14 May 2012 - 07:59 AM, said:
I noticed your avatar... with the two different Tails appearances. When playing in Sonic 3K, he has plenty of animations that use both of these different looks. Now, I know that they aren't THAT different, just the face, really... but do you, or does anyone else... know why this is so...?
I notice this any time Tails enters an animation that features different angles of his face. The most blatent example is his standing-rotating sprite (Cylinders in Hydrocity, rotating platforms in Sky Sanctuary) He has a completely different looking face than he normally does.
Was Tails meant to have a new look in Sonic 3, much like Sonic himself got? What's the deal behind this?
And if so, could it be possible to see different sprite styles with Tails, like we have with Sonic?
Hey, somebody noticed what was going on with it! Good job, you deserve a cookie. Flavors come in chocolate chip, oatmeal raisin, and tracking.
For everyone who can't see, here is a larger image for comparison:
I don't believe there's any concrete proof of it being so, but, based on the fact that these variations exist in the first place, I think that Tails was also meant to get a makeover much like Sonic in Sonic 3. Just look at the flying sprite alone. The artists already had both flying sprites AND tired sprites (from Sonic Crackers), so there was no practical reason to make just a few new sprites, with a completely new style, to replace the currently existing ones.
The main differences are in the head and shoes. Everything else is exactly the same, but that doesn't mean that the leftover "new" sprites were complete. Or they might have been. Sonic's sprites differed greatly between S2 and S3, but you can count the major differences: 1) head and spines, 2) shoes, 3) shading on the stomach, and 4) thickness of limbs. All things considered, perhaps these different sprites
were complete. But this is all just partial speculation and partial proof. I wasn't around to make Sonic 3, so I wouldn't know for certain.
As for making a complete sprite set with this different style, it would require a highly inspired artist to get it done. There are many different animations for Tails for which there isn't much to base things off of. 3/4 of the walking sprites need an original head, the running sprites need something new, the 12-sprite springing animation needs something completely pulled out of thin air, and so on. And that's not even considering the shoes. It isn't impossible, but it would need to be done by someone who can envision EXACTLY what the sprites need to look like. I don't really have an idea as to how I'd want to approach them, and I don't imagine I will in the near future. If anyone wants to step up to the challenge, they're free to do so!
Even if they do get done, a new question comes into play: which sprites will be included in the base build? Sonic 3 Complete is meant to be the ideal Sonic the Hedgehog 3, which includes removing leftovers from past games (new level select/sound test, excision of remaining S2 sprites from Sonic's set, etc.). Technically this would mean that the newly completed Tails set would become the "true" S3 Tails, since the sprites in S3(K) are mostly of S2 Tails with a few changed sprites. And for that matter, what would happen to that specific collection of Tails sprites that consists of mostly S2 sprites and a few new ones? There's a lot of questions that need to be answered in a sensible manner for both Tiddles and everyone playing S3C.
Personally, I just try to avoid this conflict and focus on other things. But maybe that's just me being a wuss.
