[Mercury]

Ayla, on 28 February 2012 - 06:03 PM, said:

I honestly thought that was a ghost image of sonic this whole time until seeing the scan. It's bizarre getting new footage from magazines twenty years after the fact. Gets me all nostalgic =)

I thought that at first, too, but then I realised that a) Sonic is most likely centred on screen, so any ghosting would be in roughly the same position, b) a double exposure would have ghosted everything, and c) I've never seen ghosted screenshots in a magazine before.

The scan confirming it, though, is truly awesome. The most exciting discovery in quite a while.

[Master Emerald]

I think bothering the devs is bad, but if someone at least emailed those to scans Naka he would be happy! Seeing the demo again in so HQ would bring back memories!

[MattManAGES]

Black Squirrel, on 29 February 2012 - 12:40 PM, said:

The lesser of the three images

Sonic's face seems to have been completely re-modelled. In fact, the whole thing might be a size bigger than in the final - the lettering is slightly more spaced out too.

Shame that its some crappy photo taken in the 90's. That could've made it all narrow like it appears compared to the final.

Oh and just out of curiosity, going back to my earlier comment, if Virgin was involved with SEGA at this stage in the game, then is it possible that they might still have this old Beta/Alpha version?
It's a longshot, but I just thought I'd throw that out there.

Edit: Alright after searching the web for a bit, I did manage to find some interesting stuff on Wikipedia(Which of course doesn't mean it's true). It seems that Virgin Games Ltd. actually got quite involved with SEGA and many other famous names( Nintendo? oh yes indeed) after taking over half of the company Mastertronic in 1987. It also explains that there was a Developer who worked for the company named David perry, the creator of the ever popular earthworm Jim, whom in the year 1984 headed to London to start working with Microsoft and Virgin games to create tons of games for the new Sega Genisis. He worked there until he moved to the U.S.A in 1991 and continued Developing Mega drive games until of course in 1993 he created his own company. If this is the case, and Virgin games was partnered up with SEGA during the time that Sonic 1 was being heavly worked on, then maybe David Perry might be able to help us out? Once again all of this is just guessing, but sadly guessing is all we have right now. Also, not sure how to contact David, so theres that issue as well.

This post has been edited by MattManAGES: 29 February 2012 - 11:49 PM

[Friend of Sonic]

Yeah I do think someone should tweet Naka-san. That's hardly bothersome, even if a few zealous people from Retro wind up doing it without checking to see if someone else has already done it. A tweet is a lot less invasive than a paragraph of questions sent via e-mail.

He'll probably love seeing that cute little blue thing.

[SonicGenesis89]

I kind of like the early prototype version of Sonic and the logo a little bit more than the final for some reason. I think the Sonic emblem looks nicer when it was smaller. For all I know though, the differences could be because of the magazine so it's hard to judge. The differences are also so small to really notice significant differences but yeah. XD I feel more compelled to the earlier version for some odd, inexplicable reason.

[Sik]

Friend of Sonic, on 01 March 2012 - 01:05 AM, said:

Yeah I do think someone should tweet Naka-san. That's hardly bothersome, even if a few zealous people from Retro wind up doing it without checking to see if someone else has already done it. A tweet is a lot less invasive than a paragraph of questions sent via e-mail.

*sigh* Not again...

Though I doubt we have burned out Naka like some people here think. I mean, those who contacted Naka were equally as confused as him after all. Though flooding his Tweeter account still isn't a good idea =P

[Lanzer]

Friend of Sonic, on 01 March 2012 - 01:05 AM, said:

Yeah I do think someone should tweet Naka-san. That's hardly bothersome, even if a few zealous people from Retro wind up doing it without checking to see if someone else has already done it. A tweet is a lot less invasive than a paragraph of questions sent via e-mail.

He'll probably love seeing that cute little blue thing.

I don't know, the only reason why I felt suggesting someone else is because we already bugged him over that stupid hoax. but if you guys feel its the best thing to do when trying to get infomation on Monster Guy here...

[Friend of Sonic]

Of course not. =P We need to have one person tweet him, assuming no one in this thread has posted the same, and that's that. With his interest in a Sonic proto, you know he'd love to see the scan. This shit CAN be done right...

[Dan Lioneye]

MattManAGES, on 29 February 2012 - 11:06 PM, said:

Black Squirrel, on 29 February 2012 - 12:40 PM, said:

The lesser of the three images

Sonic's face seems to have been completely re-modelled. In fact, the whole thing might be a size bigger than in the final - the lettering is slightly more spaced out too.

Shame that its some crappy photo taken in the 90's. That could've made it all narrow like it appears compared to the final.

Oh and just out of curiosity, going back to my earlier comment, if Virgin was involved with SEGA at this stage in the game, then is it possible that they might still have this old Beta/Alpha version?
It's a longshot, but I just thought I'd throw that out there.

Edit: Alright after searching the web for a bit, I did manage to find some interesting stuff on Wikipedia(Which of course doesn't mean it's true). It seems that Virgin Games Ltd. actually got quite involved with SEGA and many other famous names( Nintendo? oh yes indeed) after taking over half of the company Mastertronic in 1987. It also explains that there was a Developer who worked for the company named David perry, the creator of the ever popular earthworm Jim, whom in the year 1984 headed to London to start working with Microsoft and Virgin games to create tons of games for the new Sega Genisis. He worked there until he moved to the U.S.A in 1991 and continued Developing Mega drive games until of course in 1993 he created his own company. If this is the case, and Virgin games was partnered up with SEGA during the time that Sonic 1 was being heavly worked on, then maybe David Perry might be able to help us out? Once again all of this is just guessing, but sadly guessing is all we have right now. Also, not sure how to contact David, so theres that issue as well.

I think this is highly unlikely, what with the game being developed by Sonic Team I personally can't really see Virgin getting at all in depth with the development.
But hey, you never know right? They might have been given an alpha build on a cart to distribute for screenshots to press or something like that. Like the screenshots we have ended up with in this very thread.

[SpeedStarTMQ]

So I'm assuming no one took in to account my comment about Virgin having some connection with the music in the game? seeing as Sonic Advance use Sonic 1's music and had Virgin in the credits at that very same point as those songs were shown, is it likely Virgin own some rights to Dreams Come True etc?

This post has been edited by SpeedStarTMQ: 01 March 2012 - 03:02 PM

[ICEknight]

Virgin Mastertronic just made the conversions of some SEGA games for the European computers, back then.

That was the extent of their relationship, as far as I know..

[Black Squirrel]

Mastertronic was the company responsible for distribution of Sega consoles (and games) in the UK in the late 1980s and very early 1990s. And apparently this evolved into supplying France and Germany too.

Virgin acquired it in 1988. Sega bought the division from Virgin in 1991. Probably before Sonic the Hedgehog's release, idk.


They did not influence development.

[Skyler]

As long as nobody has tweeted Naka yet, I could do it if you guys want.

[FinalBeyond]

SpeedStarTMQ, on 01 March 2012 - 03:01 PM, said:

So I'm assuming no one took in to account my comment about Virgin having some connection with the music in the game? seeing as Sonic Advance use Sonic 1's music and had Virgin in the credits at that very same point as those songs were shown, is it likely Virgin own some rights to Dreams Come True etc?

Dreams Come True moved to Virgin Records when they released Sing Or Die in 1997, so I don't think they'd be involved in the game's creation. DCT were with Sony at the time of Sonic 1's release.

[LOst]

David The Lurker, on 29 February 2012 - 12:45 AM, said:

Since I know not all of you bother to look, just thought I'd let people know I made a writeup about all of this on the front page.

http://www.sonicretr...oull-see-today/

You could always read it if you want.

Otherwise, just know that I think these scans are super awesome.

Wow, I never thought I would see other versions of Sonic 1's GHZ styled clouds! Now I have! That's a masterpiece! I wish I knew who the artist where who drew the clouds for GHZ and Special Stage, and now this Tech Demo!
If they only had asked Oshima at that interview >.<;;

Anyway, seeing that monster is kinda funny. But it is the art style quality of the clouds, the stones, Sonic's design, and of course that title screen (that we have had high resolution of before) that really means something to me! It shows that these artists had the skills from the beginning to the end of the devlopment of Sonic 1. I really want to know who it was that got me into Sonic in the first place, and that person is the artist of the tech demo!

Lanzer, on 29 February 2012 - 02:35 AM, said:

I just can't believe that Rika Chou, ICEknight and the rest of you lot guessed how Mr. Monster Guy looked soo fucking accurately based on those 1st blurry shots from before! Bravo on nailing that.

Well, I was also surprised about that. It is a skill that they both have worked on for years, and keep working on today. With training and time, they developed these kind of skill, which is proof that working hard pays off! More people should work towards understanding and improving the things they live for, just like they have

Arique, on 28 February 2012 - 04:58 PM, said:

Hi.
I'll just leave this here.
Ok, bye.

Oh, I don't like how the close ups didn't include more of the scenery (such as the clouds). It is difficult for me to learn the pixel drawing style. But thanks anyway for as much data possible! EDIT: Sorry, I finally saw that the scan was as high as possible, so I should have enough data.

Are the roots of the palm leaves a different design than the final palmtree leaf root design?

This post has been edited by LOst: 02 March 2012 - 04:24 AM