Original Project Discussion Thread

If anything, when it comes to Sonic, Speed is the game of Sonic, thus Time-Attacks are more accepted rather than a Score Attack, which is more within Mario's Realm. If the idea of a Time-Attack is offered for this idea, I'm sure it would be well accepted since its within the concept of Sonic itself. Yes, score attack would added replay ability, but if the point of a Sonic game is to go fast, and you need to seek and combo multiple enemies, then you basically cut out the speed factor since you need to look around for enemies to combo on. Its a concept that isn't for Sonic, which is a speeding platforming character.

 

Yeah, getting top ranks was a lot more difficult than the 50 ring or "X time to complete" challenges. I think that a challenge to destroy as many badniks as possible a la Shadow in Heroes isn't too bad though, but in the newer games since death means "Good bye A-rank" there's a lot of annoying right there (especially because of the occasional cheap death).

 

It's almost like nothing I say sinks in. I'm out of this one.

 

Judging by how no one can even agree on an art style for Sonic 2 HD yet? This ought to be amusing

 

Well, I missed your last post; you might have finished it while I was typing up thoughts on SCD.

 

You seem to forget that 3 people run Sonic 2 HD. None of the people we're considering are any of them.

Don't judge us all based on the actions of a few.

 

Basically, I have now successfully demonstrated TWICE how an idea can be shot down for "Not being Sonic" when (a) it is and (b) in actuality it wouldn't change the core gameplay one bit; it would just be an extra for those who would like that sort of thing.

Whatever.

 

How much leadership do you think any other community project will have? And short of leading it yourself (if I'm not mistaken, you are still working on Megamix revision 4), how do you honestly feel about the current people who are suggesting it running this show?

 

<!--quoteo(post=208056:date=Jul 18 2008, 11:23 AM:name=Phoebius)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Phoebius @ Jul 18 2008, 11:23 AM)
Background originally made in a great hoax from "I don't remember the name sorry".
Everything was from some games.

2:

What I did, in 95% from scratch. It has the same feeling, the sonic spirit, but it is totally original.
[/quote]Reminds me of an old background I did. :P


Anyway, if anything can be done, I'll help.

 

The leadership depends on the community project. The bulk of this project will be split into two main stages—one half will be studying design and laying down concepts, and the other half will be bringing it to life. All it takes is someone willing to be firm and establish those concepts to the point where they're more or less set in stone.

As for people who are suggesting leading, we talked in IRC, and I would be very comfortable with Hivebrain and Jayextee leading the project. Both are knowledgable of Sonic formulas and concepts; one from the technical side, and one from the design side. Their skills would complement each other nicely in determining how things should be laid out. Other suggestions would, of course, be considered from the outside, but for the most part they'd concretely decide what stays and what goes.

As for myself, yes, I'm focusing on Megamix 4, but that won't stop me from being interested in this idea as well.

 

I'm all in favor for this fangame to be created, but there are a few things I'd like to specify on what I believe would have to be done in order to make a game that would follow S3K. First of all, not only are you going to need the basic things like spindash and such, but you will need new things as well. Usually with every fangame, it just takes things from the other games and doesn't create many new things. Jenna has a good idea with the ice sheild. It sort of follows the advancing of the Sonic games.

Also, this game will have to be coded in a much more complex way than I believe people expect. If you notice, for example, the progression of the way bosses are coded. In Sonic 1, the bosses followed simple routines, moving in simple patterns, a lot of the time across the screen. In Sonic 2, things got more complicated, giving the bosses more complicated routines, which made them more difficult, fun, and overall better in my opinion. In Sonic Three and Knuckles, the bosses were very complex. Think about it, in Marble Garden Zone, the boss would fly across the screen (if you were Sonic) and Tails would have to catch you. Right before that, the ground had to disappear, and before that there was a section where the whole level changed, all by changing the chunk mappings on the fly with uncompressed ones. See how it's getting more complicated?

Also, each game finds a better way to code the objects and their routines. For example, in the bosses of S3K, there is a test to check if the boss was hit in it's main and primary routine. Just another way of advancing everything.

I'm posting this just to let you know you're going to have to be, not only extremely smart with the sonic coding, but very original as well.

 

If you say so Tweaker, but suffice to say I'll believe it when I see it.

 

Ouch! Guess I'm falling out of favor around here (If I'm one of those three people implied).

 

I first suggest that we have a leader as well as a few "creative minds" underneath them to shuffle through the shitstorm of ideas we'll no doubt accumulate to sift out the gold.

 

Well I would be up to the challenge, despite being vocal about my opting out on IRC.

My main point of contestation though, is the fact that everybody who wishes to become involved in such a project are all coming at it as Sonic fans, many of which entered the series at different points. Ergo, there are a lot of different perceptions as to what a Sonic game "is" and these should be left right at the door from the outset; this has to be approached with an open mind, and to look at the entire series (Or, if it is agreed upon, just the 16-bit era or whatever; though I would advise against this narrow view as a fair few subsequent Sonic games have done things well) from "outside the box".

As a result, research must be done; understanding the key themes which define Sonic is one of the most important things. After all, what good is a car without an engine learning how to combust a fuel source? The principals of videogame aerodynamics are what we are essentially having to learn here, since we are not endowed with Sega's years of experience.

Of course, I fully anticipate some wag piping up: "We don't have to re-invent the wheel..." -- Oh, but we do. Sonic isn't merely about a cartoon rodent who runs fast, otherwise the formula would have been easy as fuck to imitate, and you can't tell me how Speedy Gonzales or Plok! rocked the gaming scene and knocked Sonic off the top spot, because they didn't (Although Plok! was a decent game, it simply wasn't Sonic).

If this is to be done properly, it is to be done properly.

 

Err...if you make a game called "Sonic 4" I don't think Sega's legal department would be too happy about that. Something about it being copyright infringement. Mods might be able to slip through or homemade games but saying its a game that doesn't exist? That might bring some interesting consequences. I doubt it'd be smart to start a project that might literally destroy the community.

That said, it'll probably never happen, and is probably a bad idea for more reasons. We'll let Yuji Naka tell us what's an official game, no?

 

They already addressed that issue. The only real issue remaining here is starting the project and setting it on whatever path it will end up taking.

 

For me the gameplay highlight of Sonic CD was how the stages were designed for, no, tailored to time attacking. Yet at the same time still allowed for tons of exploration.
I didn't read futher than page 4 btw. A Sonic 4 sounds like a sequel to Sonic 3 & Knuckles, so I'm not interested.
That, and I fully agree with JXT's points. Taking me as example (though I'm weird anyway), I'd probably soon start bitching that noone but Sonic should be playabl, Super Sonic was always a retarded concept, the levels are too long etc.

 

I perfectly agree with this statement,

And be warned, when we started Sonic 2HD it was quite easy to foresee the final result based on an Hoax, but going on to real development and choosing how everything would take the right steps it's been proved quite long and difficult. (It took me more than a month to work out a satisfying Sonic's standing pose!)

So if you are going for the ALL NEW art-music-programming, first of all seriously consider the real work needed to be done.
Then, consider if you have enough motivated people doing the required stuff and try setting examples just to see how "Sonic 4" will be looking.


Said that, I would love to see a Sonic 4!
Good luck guys!

Sonic 2HD requires a mass frame restyling, new conceptual artwork and added details and shades.
If we didn't experiment like we had, especially in the beginning, it would have been impossible to have achieved such pleasing results you'll be seeing soon.

 

Suuure. And in the meantime I'm also not seeing the majority of level artwork being done on Hidden Palace Zone when the topic explicitly says that Emerald Hill is priority number one.

To be blunt, the amount of control you guys have seems weak. Whether thats because of ineffectual leadership or a workforce that is unruly and does whatever the hell they want, I can't say. But its definitely an issue and one I seriously doubt is going to be resolved in short notice.