[Yeow]

Pretty much confirmed what we already knew once the Epi. III stinger was found to be dummied out of the Epi. II Beta 8 version. To say I won't miss it would be an understatement; yet at the same time I'm not happy that Epi. II will be the note Sega is going to leave the classic gameplay on.

Vangar, on 05 January 2015 - 01:01 AM, said:

Lets hope this doesn't get taken as "New 2D Sonic is not profitable", and more like "Putting low budgets on big franchises is a bad idea".

Knowing Sega, they will undeniably draw the former conclusion. It's almost ten years since Sonic 06 and the mainstream/handheld games are still restricted to Sonic, Tails, and Eggman in terms of storyline and just Sonic as a playable character.

I won't be surprised if the next Sonic game (almost) eliminates 2D gameplay completely, which I'm sure is likely given how the prototypes Endri saw don't follow on either the Lost World or Generations gameplay.

This post has been edited by Yeow: 05 January 2015 - 08:50 AM

[The Taxman]

I've always assumed Sonic 4 Episode 3 fizzled out as things evolved with SOA, Sega Networks & F2P etc.

I guess it's been long enough that it's not relevant any more, but I was briefly asked if I would be interested in collaborating with Sega Studios Australia (Who did the Castle of Illusion remake) as a potential dev team to work on the third one. Sadly though, SSA were shut down, and Stealth and I worked on the Sonic 1 & 2 remasters in late 2012-2013.

Of course, you never know, Sonic Team could one day decide Ep3 should happen, but Ken pretty much confirms my personal thoughts.

This post has been edited by The Taxman: 05 January 2015 - 07:37 AM

[Dark Sonic]

The Taxman, on 05 January 2015 - 07:34 AM, said:

I've always assumed Sonic 4 Episode 3 fizzled out as things evolved with SOA, Sega Networks & F2P etc.

I guess it's been long enough that it's not relevant any more, but I was briefly asked if I would be interested in collaborating with Sega Studios Australia (Who did the Castle of Illusion remake) as a potential dev team to work on the third one. Sadly though, SSA were shut down, and Stealth and I worked on the Sonic 1 & 2 remasters in late 2012-2013.

Of course, you never know, Sonic Team could one day decide Ep3 should happen, but Ken pretty much confirms my personal thoughts.

Well fuck, Episode 3 might have been good if you were given the chance to work on it.

[Yeow]

Dark Sonic, on 05 January 2015 - 07:42 AM, said:

The Taxman, on 05 January 2015 - 07:34 AM, said:

I've always assumed Sonic 4 Episode 3 fizzled out as things evolved with SOA, Sega Networks & F2P etc.

I guess it's been long enough that it's not relevant any more, but I was briefly asked if I would be interested in collaborating with Sega Studios Australia (Who did the Castle of Illusion remake) as a potential dev team to work on the third one. Sadly though, SSA were shut down, and Stealth and I worked on the Sonic 1 & 2 remasters in late 2012-2013.

Of course, you never know, Sonic Team could one day decide Ep3 should happen, but Ken pretty much confirms my personal thoughts.

Well fuck, Episode 3 might have been good if you were given the chance to work on it.

That and while the majority of Sega Studios Australia's work wasn't very good (following the well-received Medieval II: Total War, they worked on Stormrise, London Olympics 2012: The Official Video Game, and the piss-poor Sonic Classic Collection compilation) their swan song that was the Castle of Illusion remake was well-liked by fans of the original and received a relatively positive reception.

Ugh, what could have been. Even if Episode III likely wouldn't have entirely redeemed the Sonic 4 name because you still have the first two episodes dragging it down, we likely could had gotten a genuine reform to form had you and SSA (with Stealth on board as well, I assume) were given the chance. And by extension, maybe a potential good future (pun not intended) for classic 2D Sonic in general.

This post has been edited by Yeow: 05 January 2015 - 08:16 AM

[MartiusR]

Yes, I know, it wasn't nothing (too) surprising, as other users already mentioned (especially after all this time which has passed after Sth4 Ep2)... But what a shame (still). I liked both episodes of Sonic 4 (despite their differences, both gave me some pleasant and casual/disobliging [eh, don't know which word is more appropiate in english] gameplay, I didn't even bother too much about their relatively low difficulty level), and EP III would have for sure some decent place on my "to buy" list (of course after it would be relased on PC). Oh well..

The Taxman, on 05 January 2015 - 07:34 AM, said:

Of course, you never know, Sonic Team could one day decide Ep3 should happen, but Ken pretty much confirms my personal thoughts.

You think Taxman that there are any chances (in, well "undefined" future) for it? I'm asking, because as far as I know most (if not every) cancelled Sonic game was rather cancelled permamently, but since I'm quite "fresh" in case of "historical" subject, maybe there is something I don't know about.

This post has been edited by MartiusR: 05 January 2015 - 08:09 AM

[Polish Pete]

I don't really care that much about Sonic the Hedgehog 4, however the fact that Episode II ends on a cliffhanger with the Little Planet still inside the Death Egg mk. II really bothers me. It's kinda like Sonic Underground - it was poorly made on the cheap, the ending is never resolved and frankly, nobody asked for it in the first place. My only question is, will SEGA ever do something about it or are they just gonna pretend it never happened?

[The Taxman]

MartiusR, on 05 January 2015 - 08:06 AM, said:

Yes, I know, it wasn't nothing (too) surprising, as other users already mentioned (especially after all this time which has passed after Sth4 Ep2)... But what a shame (still). I liked both episodes of Sonic 4 (despite their differences, both gave me some pleasant and casual/disobliging [eh, don't know which word is more appropiate in english] gameplay, I didn't even bother too much about their relatively low difficulty level), and EP III would have for sure some decent place on my "to buy" list (of course after it would be relased on PC). Oh well..

The Taxman, on 05 January 2015 - 07:34 AM, said:

Of course, you never know, Sonic Team could one day decide Ep3 should happen, but Ken pretty much confirms my personal thoughts.

You think Taxman that there are any chances (in, well "undefined" future) for it? I'm asking, because as far as I know most (if not every) cancelled Sonic game was rather cancelled permamently, but since I'm quite "fresh" in case of "historical" subject, maybe there is something I don't know about.

Well, my "involvement" was really just a phone call so I don't really feel it's appropriate to make any kind of judgement that could be misconstrued as "official". The only thing that could be said is that while Sega is around and has the Sonic IP, there's nothing stopping them from coming back to it if they felt it was good for the market.

I will leave Sonic 4 with the following words uttered by The Hitcher from The Mighty Boosh

"Elements of the past and future, combining to create something not quite as good as either"

[Falk]

Classic 2D Sonic doesn't need a S4E3. It doesn't need a Sonic 5.

It needs a completely new branch, where sequels get a 2 and 3 and so on all over again (assuming sequels to this are ever made) to both distance itself from the critical trainwrecks S4E1/E2 were, as well as to manage expectations as to how much it takes from the classics.

This is what Sonic Advance did with its modern aesthetic. And it was reasonably successful in its own right. I don't see why something similar can't happen where a new series brands itself to be first and foremost a throwback to what was good about the classic games.

And as much as I am anti "fans do what SEGA don't" (which is a really stupid mindset, really*) the fact that the Taxman CD/1/2, various fangames (LakeFeperd's stuff might be the most prominent but there's so much out there) and Freedom Planet exist in the past few years is pretty telling, in that those got a lot about the classics right but didn't claim to be a continuation of classic Sonic. The complete antithesis of Sonic 4 which claimed to be a continuation of classic Sonic, but didn't get much right at all.

*edit: As clarification, this is stupid because more often than not it's used to put blatantly sub-par fan work up on a pedestal while bashing anything and everything SEGA, with little to no understanding of how game dev actually functions both technically and as a business. A sad showcase of double standards, really.

This post has been edited by Falk: 05 January 2015 - 08:51 AM

[Tiller]

Felik, on 05 January 2015 - 05:35 AM, said:

Well, it's official now. Numbers don't lie, better physics and actual creativity ruined Sonic 4. It's all your fault, fans, for constantly begging for actual effort being put into your Sonic 4.

I'd argue that Episode 1 burned too many people badly enough for them even to consider a shinier looking episode 2. In some respects Episode 2 was a fresh coat of paint over the same shitty level design, same small amount of content, same grating music, and slightly tweaked physics. The only difference is that it at least didn't look nearly as embarrassing.

Falk, on 05 January 2015 - 08:41 AM, said:

Classic 2D Sonic doesn't need a S4E3. It doesn't need a Sonic 5.

It needs a completely new branch, where sequels get a 2 and 3 and so on all over again (assuming sequels to this are ever made) to both distance itself from the critical trainwrecks S4E1/E2 were, as well as to manage expectations as to how much it takes from the classics.

This is what Sonic Advance did with its modern aesthetic. And it was reasonably successful in its own right. I don't see why something similar can't happen where a new series brands itself to be first and foremost a throwback to what was good about the classic games.

I definitely agree here. Sonic seems to be trying out lots of new things anyway. A subline that just pushes 2D.5 further than Classics Generations tried to. Complete with it's own set of new mechanics that work with what the game is trying to add like the advance character abilities/tricks and not slapped on because they were band-aids for unrelated legacy gameplay (homing attack I'm looking at you).

[Jason]

Well, I guess someone will make a fan conclusion to Sonic 4 someday. I still haven't gotten the last emerald in episode 2.

[RenyNoise]

Well atleast I got to kinda play as Knuckles in the past 4 years.

[DigitalDuck]

I don't understand why people say S4E2's physics are a big improvement over E1's. There's only a difference when you're not touching the controller, which is never if you're actually playing the game.

A little disappointed by this news, but I won't lose any sleep over it. I think the best thing to come out of Sonic 4 was the Metal Sonic theme - I hope that gets more use in future games.

[W.A.C.]

The Taxman, on 05 January 2015 - 07:34 AM, said:

I've always assumed Sonic 4 Episode 3 fizzled out as things evolved with SOA, Sega Networks & F2P etc.

I guess it's been long enough that it's not relevant any more, but I was briefly asked if I would be interested in collaborating with Sega Studios Australia (Who did the Castle of Illusion remake) as a potential dev team to work on the third one. Sadly though, SSA were shut down, and Stealth and I worked on the Sonic 1 & 2 remasters in late 2012-2013.

Of course, you never know, Sonic Team could one day decide Ep3 should happen, but Ken pretty much confirms my personal thoughts.

Wow... Now I'm really disappointed Episode 3 never happened. It could've been great.

[TimmiT]

W.A.C., on 05 January 2015 - 12:14 PM, said:

The Taxman, on 05 January 2015 - 07:34 AM, said:

I've always assumed Sonic 4 Episode 3 fizzled out as things evolved with SOA, Sega Networks & F2P etc.

I guess it's been long enough that it's not relevant any more, but I was briefly asked if I would be interested in collaborating with Sega Studios Australia (Who did the Castle of Illusion remake) as a potential dev team to work on the third one. Sadly though, SSA were shut down, and Stealth and I worked on the Sonic 1 & 2 remasters in late 2012-2013.

Of course, you never know, Sonic Team could one day decide Ep3 should happen, but Ken pretty much confirms my personal thoughts.

Wow... Now I'm really disappointed Episode 3 never happened. It could've been great.

Well, like Taxman said in a later reply it wasn't much more than a phonecall, meaning that those plans probably didn't get much further than the planning phase. What does kinda disappoint me is that it sounds like Sega Studios Australia was going to focus more on platformers before they were shut down. Their Castle of Illusion remake was pretty good and I would have liked to have seen more from them.

[360]

TimmiT, on 05 January 2015 - 12:43 PM, said:

Well, like Taxman said in a later reply it wasn't much more than a phonecall, meaning that those plans probably didn't get much further than the planning phase. What does kinda disappoint me is that it sounds like Sega Studios Australia was going to focus more on platformers before they were shut down. Their Castle of Illusion remake was pretty good and I would have liked to have seen more from them.

This right here. The Castle of Illusion remake was wonderful and brilliant and I would have loved to have seen Sega Studios Australia keep going as an active and productive studio. IMO Sega's decision to close them down was one of the most catastrophically terrible decisions they have ever made. Like seriously right after the studio proved themselves by making a truly great game like that? I'm not saying Castle of Illusion was game of the year or anything like that but it was a well produced, charming and colourful sign of positive things to come from the studio.

I love Sega but part of the reason they're in the state they're in is because of a long history of terrible decisions like that.

This post has been edited by 360: 05 January 2015 - 01:15 PM