Sonic Superstars: A New 2D Sonic Game (Fall 2023)

You gotta love Taxman. Even though he's not developing Superstars he's still helped in a very important way because getting the physics spot-on is a crucial foundation for making a good/fun 2d classic game. The physics looked on point in all the footage we've seen and now we know why.

I kinda feel like Superstars is Mania 2 now

Well, consider me excited! I hope the level design can give 3K's a run for it's money and the soundtrack can get close to the brilliance of Mania.

 

Let me make it easier for us, because it's not exactly the easiest thing to figure out what "GEMS" even is, especially since there's something called "Sonic Gems Collection", that muddies searches a bit. But a wiki dive turned out to be really interesting indeed!

• GEMS
• This video explains how it worked and where this sound we've been talking about comes from.

Nice to know! So thanks, @Aerosol!

 

I thought he looked like Charmy, and since he's actually such an old character (appeared in '92 mangas before Chaotix iirc) I was under the impression Ohshima had designed him and thought he was reusing the same base design.

 

Well...

...I guess they have similar proportions, but no, they look nothing alike.

Actually, Bokkun was always super-weird to me. Undoubtedly follows the design language of early-2000s Sonic (unlike most robots in Sonic X), but looks nothing like an Eggman robot, or indeed much of a robot at all.

 

The hilarious irony of this is Sonic 3&K Remastered in Origins had wonky physics and some nasty glitches BECAUSE it used the retro engine. It royally pissed me off as a speedrunner, and Stealth later confirmed that getting around the differences required some wild hacks to make it work. Fortunately, that problem is being addressed and is relative only to a very specific challenge of recreating a classic game in a new engine.

So people need to realize that accurate physics was always going to be a bit relative anyway. Whatever this game will be, it won't be Sonic 4.

 

Since the media blitz of this game being announced and showcased, I've been very torn. Before I read this tweet, I was very much on the fence at $60. $40, maybe. But $60 seemed like too much. With Whitehead's approval, I am now all in at $60. Probably on both Switch and Steam.

I love the aesthetics of the game, how the characters look and move, the title and Results cards, and how visually distinct it is from Sonic Team plus Third Party attempts (bar Mania) at the 2D formula in the past. It really feels to me that they've finally "gotten it right" in regards to that pre-1998 Sonic aesthetic in 3D. A 2.5D Sonic game that looks how a 2.5D Sonic game SHOULD look.

Would I have preferred a Mania 2 will all new levels? Sure. I think most of us would have, but this is a very very promising consolation prize. And something I would never have predicted.

My only worry is the music. I hope in the coming months we get some tracks uploaded to the YouTube channel to allay those worries somewhat.

Quite excited now.

 

As a kid I thought he was some mutant dark chao or something which visually would at least make more sense but Sonic X badniks generally have an odd horned humanoid theme fwr

Spoiler

It's probably just because it's a generic bad guy design that's easy to animate but like she even has skin what the fuck

Trip's armor is goofy and I hope you get to break it and reveal their identity Meta Knight style.

 

So although they've not made a big song and dance about it, it's clear from the newsletter bonus that there's some sort of cosmetic skin functionality for the playable characters, presumably unlockable. Here's hoping we hear a little more about this feature before release - I'm interested to see what they've come up with, and hope there's a good amount of them to unlock similar to Crash Bandicoot 4.

Personally, I'd love to see a Knuckles skin with his iconic OVA hat! Depending on how far they're willing to go with them, having the Metal/Doll counterparts for each characters as alternate skins could be cool too, though they would admittedly require a few custom animations too to be done properly. Would be great to see Sonic R's Metal Knuckles design appear again, along with a new counterpart for Amy - I'm thinking an "Amy Doll" based on the little exploding Tails-Doll-like ones from the Metallic Madness boss in Sonic Mania.

 

To be honest, there's one thing I'll still complain regarding this game...
Sonic's model keeps having short legs. I'd like him to have them just a little bit longer... ^^"

 

I wouldn't get my hopes up, it'll probably be like Frontiers' cosmetics, if if there's anything at all, I'd welcome it.

 

That’s what she… never mind.

Yeah, I thought the model looked a bit too chibified at first, but look at the game in motion, it’s almost a perfect translation of the sprite. I quite like it now, even if I still wish the lighting and shaders were redone.

 

low poly character skins would be cool, probably not gonna happen though

 

Personally, "Mania 2" simply means a new 2D classic Sonic game. I think that's what a lot of people mean when they say that, as opposed to a literal "Mania 2" as a direct sequel. That being said, I'd still consider this a proper follow-up to Sonic Mania, considering it was first conceived with the same people working on it (and still has, to some degree). And the more news we get, the more it's seeming like this will knock it out of the park.

Taxman's tweet settled it - this game will be good. Not Sonic Frontiers good with five asterisks, but just good. Knowing the people behind this game, watching the footage, and hearing people's impressions, I am confident it will be able to punch above "good" and become the new classic Sonic game people have been clamoring for since Sonic Mania.

 

It's at such moments that I wish this forum had a LOL rating... xD

 

I did a long writeup about it a while back; but I think the main thing that's integral to a co-op platformer. The overall broader playthrough has to be tailored so that all participating players are involved for the one experience; and in order to (consistently) achieve that you'd have to do some pretty major tradeoffs that would normally come with a single-player experience.

In the context of Sonic gameplay I think these are the major things you'd have to alter to get it to work:
- The core movement speed and mechanics would have to be slowed down. It's not just reducing speed/momentum, you'd also have to nerf or even restrict into situational scenarios the primary and secondary mechanics that lend themselves towards quick speed (rolling, the spindash, drop dash) and exploration (Tails flight, Knuckles' climb, Ray's glide). I've said it before but I imagine that something like Sonic 1/CD, with (the stronger emphasis on) speedcaps, would be a good starting point.
- Level geometry would have to be reigned in to some extent so that players can't easily be left behind (and to a lesser extent get stuck). So you'd still be able to have stuff like slopes, loops, quarterpipes, and halfpipes, but on the whole, they've have to be fairly soft implementations; while the more extreme/standard would have to be uncommon or be altered with the co-op aspect in mind. (I think stages that actually fairly absent with loops, and encourage more careful platforming, like Mystic Cave; are a good blueprint towards a MD Sonic level tailored more towards co-op.) and Stuff that really encourages if not outright gives speed, like steep slopes, likely would be a no-go except in certain scenarios, one of which I'll go into below.
- One of the big things I've noticed and appreciate about the certain Nintendo games with co-op, is the use of "transition" mechanics that transport all of the players together from one section of the stage to another. The pipes and "warp boxes" in NSMB and Mario 3D World, as well as the barrels in (Retro's) DKC games. They also work in a sense of incorporating the more visual/cinematic setpieces of the games during these transitions (the clear pipes from 3D World and barrels especially). I think in the right circumstances, you could have certain level structures and gimmicks do the same for a co-op Sonic game (this is where I think something like the use of steep slopes would be fine). I think these would also work as something of a "sponge" property where the more automated/scripted mechanics of Sonic games can be put to use here. If we really go far back in time, Sonic 3D actually used its loops and chutes in a similar fashion, where they were mainly there to transport Sonic from one area of the map to another.



- While linearity is by all accounts a given (except in some co-op examples I'll get into later), I do think you still have some scale of the level terrain that you can work with to have some soft "higher paths" and "lower paths" as common elements of the stage design. They likely just wouldn't be to truly diverge into separate routes. If it's not clear, I'm mainly talking about sections/platforms like these:



Though it is worth noting that despite the linear level structures, the aforementioned Nintendo co-op platformers (among others like the Rayman games) do work in alternate routes and bonus rooms in certain areas and with certain gimmicks; and the design approach there is that when one player successfully triggers it, everybody else is taken along. IMO it's not hard to envision being able to work in character-specific routes or areas for Sonic characters in this way; though some extra design work will have to be done to keep all of them from being lock-key affairs (at least when designing more difficult levels). I also think this is where you could present some meaningful co-op platforming challenges, where you need the collective involvement of two or more players to get some additional bonus perks (rings, shields, score points, etc.).

With all that said--the Sonic Stadium preview posted some days ago came away with the impression that from what they played, the game didn't really seem that tailor-made for co-op/multiple players; and that there weren't any demos featuring it. Which I guess for those not wanting a watered down single player campaign is a good thing (this is a big reason why some people prefer 3D Land over 3D World, which I understand despite the latter being my overall favorite Mario game). But this does underwhelm me a bit personally, given it's been a selling point and something I've wanted to see Sonic meaningfully tackle for ages. I imagine the co-op element for Superstars would on the whole be akin to past games, where it's mainly just an extra layer onto a single player campaign that's occasionally useful (though I think three/four players would be the point where the seams of the "co-op layer" really start to tear).

I'll close out in that I think on paper; Sonic Colors had a good idea in having a "co-op" gameplay campaign with the Sonic Simulator as a secondary game mode to the main single-player campaign, and how your progression in both campaigns were important to the overall progression of the entire game (collecting Red Rings in the single player levels unlocked more levels/worlds in the Simulator; and completing each world in the simulator in turn unlocked Chaos Emeralds/Super Sonic for single player). The execution of the Simulator left a lot to be desired; but I think it's an approach to multiplayer that should be revisited for a future title.

 

Yes The original 2D games each have very interesting distinct tradeoffs in terms of level design, and Mania does too. Whatever limits there might be in this one will be complemented by the next game in the series!!

 

That's the opposite of reassurance to me lol, those physics are NOT as accurate as people like to say they are. I'd rather them be inaccurate in this context than in the revisionist 2d remake context they've been subjected to for quite the decade, but it seems like people might still try to pass them off as 100% perfect even if it ends up they're not.

 

Who cares how accurate they are? What they need to do is feel good and properly fit the game and level design. Mania can be inaccurate if it wants to be so long as it hit those two criteria, which is why it works there, but might feel a little off in Origins 3&K and so forth. This is the one hill that Sonic 4 and everything since has made everyone so upset that they can't stop festering on it like a never-healing wound.

 

I don't think anybody has ever touted the RSDK physics as "100% accurate". They never were. They're just accurate enough to the point where most people will not be able to distinguish it from the classics.