Whoops - at a glance, I thought the restoration *was* using the red from the shoes. Should have eyedropped it to be sure. Thanks for correcting me!
I meant to post these earlier, but here are some short clips of the Sonic Jam prototype in action. These were taken from the Game.com commercials seen here and here. Sorry about the large gif image size: Spoiler The first two clips are obviously edited to be much faster, but notice how the 3rd one appears to be at the original speed. The most intriguing thing here is Angel Island - they are using the ocean from the tornado intro as the primary level background and those strange "mountains" look to be part of the foreground plane. In the first image we also get to partially see the Super Sonic intro without Knuckles intervening. It's all very strange, where did this art come from? They obviously had access to assets from Sega judging by the sprite work and the ocean backdrop.
I'm always astounded at the timing of prototype discoveries. I mean, these proto-Knuckles sprites come out right after we get the Sonic 3 Prototype. Imagine the weird backwards speculation we'd be doing if these discoveries came out in the reverse order. It's just bizarre. But not as bizarre as SEGA licensing the most legally fraught Sonic game to the friggin' Game.com, of all things. I would love to be a fly on the wall during those meetings.
I had a look into these and found another interesting difference - Sonic's hurt sprite is different. It also happens to match his Competition mode one. I have a hunch that this is another example of a prototype sprite in the game. Here's my "restoration" to Genesis colors along with a comparison: Along with that, I also took the time to draw that odd Knuckles sprite. One can only wonder what in the world it's from and who made it.
Does the Game.com version of Sonic Jam have any credit rolls? EDIT: Also, started digging around in the Sonic Jam ROM file and found this weird nugget. Was this monstrosity of a game just built on top of cobbled together parts from other games? Looks like it's from the Jurassic Park: The Lost World game which came out on Tiger's Game.com and R-Zone systems. Dunno if the two versions are the same though. Yeah, it's Jurassic Park.
That looks like a pretty good go at restoring it - the only thing I'd point out is it looks like you've coloured some pixels tan which should probably be grey/white, where the shading flips just before Sonic's glove. I'm assuming that should be the wrist part of his glove rather than more arm, as otherwise it's completely missing. There's actually a clearer look at the original in the first post of this thread, which may make a better basis for a redraw/restoration: Personally I'd agree with the general consensus so far, that it just seems to be a piece of placeholder art - I'd be surprised if it turned out to date back to the development of the original Mega Drive game.
I doubt it, it just looks off. I don't think we'll ever know for sure. I'm pretty sure it lacks credits. Same here. I actually drew it from that player select screen, I just added the wrong image. I'm not sure what's up with those pixels, I think I slipped up there. Thanks for pointing that out!
I couldn't help but make a GIF of the hurt and falling frames with your restored Jam frame. (All three frames) (Restored + Falling) (All frames - alternate rotation) While I would have thought it was fluid as an extra frame of animation with Sonic's flailing arms, I thought makes his legs look jerky. (Just noticed in his falling frame that he's sticking his wrists out to the player's view.)
I don't think the early falling frame in Jam was really a third frame, but rather just an earlier version of the frame where his arms were lower. I guess they just changed it to match his other arm, which doesn't move as much.
