Posting for the first time in years ONLY TO SAY: One of the coolest subtle details I have not seen anyone mention yet, when you have too many rings and get hit (over the 20 that you're allowed to pick up), you see a number of Rings in a really cool 3D-ish effect fall off into the foreground and off the sides of the screen as an explanation to why you can't pick them up. It's done so well it's not distracting at all, but if you notice it, it is a REALLY nice touch to the classic Sonic dropping rings mechanic.
I'm super excited about this game. It's pretty much what I wish we got with Sonic 4. :D Also super excited about the redone stages. I'm curious what changes will be made to the S3&K stages.
This is why my favorite Not-GHZ (aesthetically) is Emerald Coast. Its a similar enough feel to GHZ while still looking different enough to have that "Oh boy another Green Hill Zone" vibe to it.
It's been a long time since I played Chaotix, I don't remember that at all. Definitely worth for revisit to me. But I digress, it looks really cool in motion here, running at 60fps and with the few videos out there, how it scales to the amount of rings you're carrying when hit (which, as an additional note, the mini-boss twist on the classic Sonic 1 boss is quite creative, I like it). And his head viewing up animation is quite adorable. Some of the animations definitely seem to be touched-up Sonic 2 sprites going on, but the new ones all look stellar and add a lot of personality. (picture not by me, but I like the looking up sprite too much not to bring some attention to it here.)
Only problem I have. Go to around 38 seconds. When he's going through the loop. He doesn't slow down like he would in the other games.
This is absolutely incredible. I am so unbelievably shocked and excited with these results. I have been part of this online community for 18 years now. I first started on the web back in 1998 or so. I remember the early days of the SFGHQ community and was at the time quite active in it. Stealth was an active member even back then, and I remember playing the very early incomplete Sonic Mettrix demoes, and hoping for the game to one day be complete. (For those who've forgotten) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VBeFoCnV6uQ Stealth was one of the earliest fangame developers to create relatively accurate genesis physics on non-Sega hardware. He built an engine that used 4x4 pixel tiles. It was pretty neat, and I remember trying to fiddle with the stage builder and find it far too complicated to deal with, but impressive none-the-less. At the time I myself was a junior member in that community and only sought to create barely functional Metal Sonic fangames while anticipating then still upcoming Dreamcast US release. Those early fangame days were actually what we did to hold over until the Adventure games finally came out if you can believe it! I also remember many other great early titles I got to work with like the early SRB2 days and the ancient and forgotten PC version of Sonic Epoch (A SATAM styled game also coded from scratch). Many good early web memories remain there for me. Meanwhile, Stealth went on to accomplish other amazing feats like learning to reverse hack the roms and the early days of Retro began when the famed Sonic 2 Beta came about. By the twilight of the dreamcast years, Stealth turned the idea of playing as Knuckles in Sonic 1 into a complete reality! Turns out that would only be his first of many accomplishments. Eventually... yet another budding member started showing off some neat ideas. A fun little event in the fangame community called SAGE had just begun, and one of the most promising titles shown in the first few years was this one, done by the now legendary Taxman... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g8xak3EhyIs I kept this demo on my hard drive for several years. It was always fun to play, and I'd always hoped to see it further developed into a full game. Taxman proved to be the other most talented coder for recreating the classic engine. Then we got more and more fun little rom hacks and projects. Then Megamix. Then silence for a number of years... Then TaxSonicCD. Then TaxStealth Sonic 1 and 2. All 3 of which not only surpassed the previous efforts by these two, but were so filled with love and little improvements to the classics that they are now without question the definitive versions of the game. Tails and Knuckle stage paths. Accurate physics. New stages and bosses. Enhanced soundtracks. Sonic 3 playable movesets and items. Debug mode beta secrets. It was all absolute, seamless perfection. The unexplained demise of Sonic 3 mobile was a disappointment... But today more than makes up for it. I cannot congratulate the entire team of this project enough. You've truly grown into some of the community's finest and most respectable members, and I'm sure you've made your own dreams come true. Making 'the' 25th anniversary game (Generations 2 won't be out until after Sonic turns 26!) is an incredible and well deserved honor for you both. I firmly believe that no one is more qualified, and if your team cannot accomplish making this game a tried and true 'good' Sonic game, there is no one left on this earth who can. Not even the original team members are as ready for this as your team is today, Stealth/Tax. You have my congratulations and well earned respect. I will sing praises of this to all who will listen. Thank you for making this happen.
They really did it. The absolute madmen. This looks completely, truly incredible. I'm so glad Stealth-Tax are getting a chance to create original, new, all-2D content for the series. It looks and sounds absolutely beautiful, to boot. Only thing I'm sad about is that it won't come out til 2017. But if that gives them time to give it even more spit and polish, then that's fine by me. Go for it, you guys!
Main theme, invincibility and Studiopolis music http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NiB2fA6F1iI All the cats from S4 were dead, so unfortunately Tee had to be a bit more creative making his music.
I dislike the Generations color pallete being forced on Sonic, makes him clash with other numerous sources of that shade of light blue. And doesn't match the promotional artwork in the trailer, for that matter. If Sega won't budge on this point, at least consider putting a color pallete toggle. This is probably telling you what you already know, but animations need more polish/consistency, the level assets from Sonic 1 (and whatever other games you're pulling from) especially need to look less like directly-ripped placeholders. GHZ boss is kind of a dick if it just switches the spikes with random timing. Be ambitious. This has to prove itself more than a fangame with a budget to stand on its own merits. I'm not very hopeful, but good luck. ...oh, and the HUD is a little disgusting with recycled font in a bevelled border. Try something else.
I agree, it's a bit disturbing for me that (probable) first level of this game is 1:1 copy of green hill zone. I don't mind if it will be bonus level, but actual first level? Buut maybe this is not a thing, since can't tell basing on the trailer what part of the game is it. Otherwise - it looks really nice. Graphic style kinda resembling me 32X games or lat 90' PC platform games. which is a great thing. It's really surprising (for me) that Sega decided for this type of game - I would rather expect some "borrowings" of ideas and gameplay solutions, like in Sonic Generation, but it's literally getting back to the roots of first Sonic games. Buut, I like the surprises, if they're nice. Finally, someone remembered about PC users, I'm REALLY glad about this thing. REALLY GLAD I'm guessing that this game will also be some sort of probe, which will show to guys from Sega if this gameplay and overall game's style solution is financially profitable. So I'm keeping my fingers crossed and waiting for it's release
judging from the way Megamix was, I wonder if Shadow and Mighty might also be unlockable. It'd be neat to have the Megamix version of Sonic's movelist available, preferably through Mighty. I liked Ring Dashing and Stealth's homing attack.
I remember loving Project Mettrix back in the Area 51 days, except for that really unfair boss, which I hated. But I'm sure the bosses in this one are going to be fair and no-hit-speedrunnable once their patterns are figured out, right guys? ;P EDIT: Please look into this, guys.
I think this is a special stage ring ring: The guy runs through the wall without grabbing it. It starts small and expands out and morphs and spins in 3D, but it looks greyed out like it's not accessible. It's hidden in a wall like classic Sonic 3 style rings. Mettrix came out while everyone else was still fucking with Klik n Play. Remember those days? Of creating HPZ interpretations based off of the garbled data in the final Sonic 2 rom in Klik n Play? LOL awesome The sign has incredible sprite work as it spins. The sprite work in this game is outstanding, who is the pixel artist?
