I thought they said somewhere, recently, the item you're getting is not an emerald. Now I'm going to have to try and find it-- I think iizuka said it at comic Con? Edit:Must have imagined it, never mind me
The special stage UFO is carrying a Chaos Emerald. That's been explicitly stated already (I think by Taxman?) and you can see it in the footage they just uploaded. Is it just me, or does the special stage giant ring look really 'off' in a 2D pixel art environment?
Then fuck it, I'm going with Time Stones which allow you to unlock a future power--Werehog-- for the bonus stages
Is it bad that I hope the bonus stage medallions unlock things like Playable Characters? Monkey's Paw wish, but I'd like to have more incentive to do them than just bragging rights and/or points. Though Blue Spheres is my favorite Special Stage bar none, so I don't mind it being here. I just want an excuse to play as Advance-style Amy, someone get PSI on the team
I really like the look of the new special stages, I think that building up speed to catch the emerald is a better take on the CD style. I don't know if I like a Saturn-style polygon for Sonic and co, but maybe that's just from being used to the CD stages. I'm also super excited to see the Blue Spheres return. The first one they showed seems to be exactly the same as Sonic 3's first one (at least the part we saw), but the other two looked new? If they do give medallions I expect they will unlock features similar to Sonic CD 2011, such as a special stage time trial, sound test, maybe even customizable songs like Generations? One can hope.
I do It's a wonderful thing. Though as lovely as blue sphere is, I too am sceptical about them working well as bonus stages. And I'm certainly sceptical about re-using layouts from Sonic 3 because nobody needs that. Still, better than another tube!
This game was made for me. I played so much + - Get Blue Balls Spheres as a kid and always thought the Sonic CD special stages were neat but needed better execution. I love everyone that made this happen.
I'm just hoping the special stages are properly balanced in difficulty. Not Sonic 2 hard, or Sonic 3 easy. Surprisingly, I thought Saturn 3D Blast was pretty good with that, for as much as that game just exists.
Oh hey there Johnny. And honestly I'm trying to keep myself from watching the Special Stages personally, there's gotta be some limit to what I spoil myself on for when the big day comes. Mania's gonna be a binge day for me. :v:
To be fair, I think it'd be pretty hard to deviate too much from the 3&K Layouts. Blue Sphere definitely has a pretty particular way of finding a middle ground between familiar patterns (so the player can manage themselves even at higher speeds and easily deduce where the next batch of spheres is on the map) and new shapes and layouts such as the one way paths in special stage 3 and whatever special stage has you jump over a row of red spheres multiple times. I really don't know for sure, but did Blue Sphere's randomly generated levels feel wildly different from 3&K, or about the same? I never really played Blue Sphere for more than 15 minutes when I was like 10.
LOOOL, SomeCallMeJohnny is still a trial member and he's one of the most popular people in the Sonic community :v: I'm not straight on bashing the membership system here, but it does show how silly and rigid it is :v:
And he's going to stay that way, if I have anything to say about it! If we make special exceptions for people, then arguably the system falls apart even more. Anyway, Sonic Mania.
Basically once Johnny hits 20 posts they'll decide whether to approve him or not. I honestly hope they do but it is not my decision. Also, those Special Stages. And Blue Sphere. Damn. It's really the Saturn game Sonic deserved.
To be fair, I don't frequent these parts nearly as often as I did years ago, but that has nothing to do with Sonic Mania, so I digress. I wants this game. I needs this game. I'm not doing anything else on the 15th except playing this for myself and Platformania.
Johnny, I saw you do a live playthrough of Sonic 3 with Stealth and others. How well do you know Stealth?
It's an honor to be in your presence, Johnny. I've been going through Sonic 1, 2, and 3K in anticipation for the imminent release of Mania, and a balanced difficulty with the special stages is definitely imperative. I can do Blue Sphere no sweat, but fuck are the half pipes in Sonic 2 stingy. It doesn't help I have that yellow fox fucking everything up for me the last second.
It'll be interesting to watch this after my own Mania playing, that's for sure. Spoiler Good luck with whichever Mega Man horror you have to deal with.
