I mean, SEGA (or whoever SEGA hires for trailers) kinda suck at trailers. This had no information and no gameplay of the games (and the only indication that the footage we were being shown wasn't of the collection was the words "Original Footage" in a corner). The Sonic Colours trailer was edited terribly - they had mismatched sounds, what seemed like gameplay audio overlaying the trailer at the start, the laser charge up sound placed randomly throughout, the same audio clip of "Let's do it" coming up multiple times (come on), sound effects seemingly randomly placed, and it overall felt sloppy.
Don't forget the graphical changes looking even worse in the Colors trailer than the already-controversial look it has currently. I think at this point we can say that "original gameplay" just means "isn't from this collection" and does not inherently determine anything more or less. I would say the widescreen Sonic 3 confirmation is a bigger sign of TaxStealth involvement than their versions being used in the reveal, since all evidence points to that reveal not being trustworthy. The point is, there's nothing in that footage that can be reliably analyzed. We should only be looking at the things actually being said about the game. And the best we have is "A large collection of games from the Genesis era including 1, 2, 3K and CD", which could imply they're not the only four games, and "Sonic 3 will also be in widescreen", which implies the other three games will be as well, and is the best evidence we have of it being the retro engine versions.
Exactly what Shaddy just said. We know only two things about this collection; it will include the 5 mentioned games, and S3 will be in widescreen. Presumably that also means all of the other games will be in widescreen somehow, but technically we don't even know that yet. We don't know if it will be the Retro Engine versions of any of the games, although it's not an unsafe assumption, especially in the case of CD. We don't know who's working on the game. We don't even know if lock-on will be included. The "original gameplay" label means that we're looking at footage captured from sources other than the collection. I just hope that everything is contained in a cohesive package that's consistent across all of the games. That means all of the games sharing the same menu styles (ala S1 and S2 mobile), the same characters playable in all of the games with the same abilities, the same physics, the same extras etc etc. If SEGA decide to include other games that haven't been announced yet (such as Spinball, 3D or any non-Mega Drive games) then I won't expect those too to get the same treatment. But otherwise, I want the main five Classic games to be the definitive way to play them with everything brought up to the same high standard. There are more than enough perfectly faithful ports and emulations out there for the sake of preserving the original games (well, CD not so much but that's never going to appear in its original form again), so I'm all for enhancements and necessary changes to get this collection to be as high quality as possible. For example, the mobile versions of S1 and S2 slightly changed the layouts of some boss arenas to fit the 16:9 screen width instead of the original 4:3 width. That's fine. The SCD special stages were completely remade with different methods used to move the UFOs around the map, which meant that the UFOs didn't behave exactly as they did in the original game. That's fine too. And the S2 special stages were remade entirely in 3D, allowing for a better framerate and smoother scrolling and scaling. Again, that's also fine. In the likely case that S3 doesn't have its original MegaDrive soundtrack, I'll be fine with either the PC/beta versions or a new soundtrack. I'd actually like the option to choose between different soundtracks if possible, ala SCD. All these sorts of changes and adjustments are fine by me. Basically I just don't want the original games in their original state yet again. I've got no reason to buy any of those.
I'm someone who really likes playing games in their original format, but I think in many instances updating the game just makes it better. Like the way you can fast forward animations in the Final Fantasy re-releases. It just makes the games play better, so I don't see the point in not using it. Similarly, I think Sonic in widescreen, more responsive controls (CD), better framerate, etc, just makes the game play better. So I don't really want to see the exact originals going forwards.
Someone I was chatting with on the 3 AIR Discord stated that Hunter Bridges mentioned that whatever projects Evening Star are currently working on have not been revealed yet.. This has me worried but at the same time I can’t find where this was mentioned so take it with a grain of salt
It's still possible that Taxman could've been hired independently, I still find it weird how he hasn't confirmed whether or not he's involved yet. In the Retro Engine Modding Server, where Hunter Bridges said that Origins wasn't an Evening Star project, Taxman has remained silent about Origins.
I think we can safely rule out Evening Star working on Sonic at this point. It's been almost three years since Sonic Mania Plus and if they were to be contracted for a similar project it probably would have been at least announced by now. The most likely scenario is that they are working on a yet unannounced project (which I of course am curious to check out). If they were working on the Origins collection I would assure you that it would be mentioned because of how popular they are in the fanbase and how much prestige they have critically. God knows why SEGA thought it was a good idea not to hire them as a development team but it's probably the situation.
Maybe Stealth is involved (he's not part of Evening Star). Has Stealth made any comment about Origins? Perhaps an entirely different group of fans are working on the collection.
From what I’ve seen, Stealth has made no comment either on the situation. Zippo (who else) did say that fans would be involved in this collection so it remains to be seen who is actually given the reigns here.. hopefully whoever is chosen is more than credible to provide us with widescreen remasters as good as Christian’s (speaking in the case of 3&K) I wasn’t aware Christian can still work independently even though he’s part of Evening Star.. if that is possible then I’ll stay optimistic but we will see
Perhaps the collection is so early in its conception that no studio has been contacted about it, and SEGA themselves aren't even sure who will make the game yet. Perhaps, 15 minutes before the Sonic Central, some new intern slapped a bunch of footage together into a "trailer" and snuck it into the presentation, and now SEGA has been hardballed into making this game. Checkmate. I'm joking I guess, but with how much they "showed" in the reveal, those are both technically possibilities.
Yeah, saying "if Evening Star made the game they would've obviously announced it in the trailer" makes a lot of sense, but let's not forget this is Sega we're talking about. Saying "if Sonic 3&K was running in widescreen they've would obviously announced it in the trailer" also made a lot of sense, didn't it ?
It does seem like a reasonable assumption that the collection just hasn't been made yet. My guess is that it was only given the green light maybe a week or two (or a month) before the presentation. We'll have to wait and see if there will be any more info about it this summer.
Oh, you can adjust the HUD so the lives are in the bottom corner like the originals? I was unaware, my apologies.
The versions used in the Origins trailer were likely from the Apple TV or Amazon Fire versions of the remasters (for S1 and S2 at least) since those have the lives counter at the traditional bottom left corner
On the topic of Stealth working on this compilation, I haven't seen this noted here, but the Headcanon website has a TBA box under the "games" page.
Beat you to it last week lol although you have a much better screenshot than what I posted.. on a serious note, if he’s confirmed, then that will most certainly be updated.. until then, it’s another wait and see situation
I really do think their radio silence is suspect at least can’t really think of a reason they’d be prevented from saying theyre not involved the last time Sega could have had them under NDA was Mania, and for that to still claim to have any effect seems like it would be blatant overreach on sega’s part
