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

As I said, I'd rather them be inaccurate in this context, where the medium isn't even the same, and not Sonic 1, 2, CD, and 3k remakes (they feel wrong in all of them, and people only started noticing when it became a major issue in 3's version of Origins.) The problem was always there. Just go play Spring Yard in an emulator and the remake and tell me I'm wrong. But again, by what I said I'm not disagreeing with you.

My beloved Bokkun. This is a somewhat related tangent, but I've been wondering what he might have looked like if his design was handled by the Balan Wonderworld team. The only thing that immediately comes to mind as a possible reference for something like that is Triple Jumper, who we have no full body shots of since it's a hidden costume, and those never show up in gameplay.

 

This is what I was alluding to when pointing out the problems with Origins s3&K port, but you're being stupidly negative about it. Mania's physics don't need to be 1/1 to the genesis to be good (and there is variation between all the classic titles anyway).

I can pull off any trick I care about in Mania's engine while retaining a feel that's still very close to S3&K. It's not seamless, but it's damn close. It only really fell apart in an actual port that was meant to be as close to 1/1 as reasonably possible, but wouldn't be an issue in a new game designed around this engine from the ground up.

 

Ok but

If Sonic Mania is considered the true Sonic 4-

Can we maybe possibly treat Superstars as Sonic 5 please thank you?

 

That would be amazing but I expect the base models to be largely the same. I'm no 3D animator, but I'd expect a model that different would likely need new smears made for the running cycles or it'd look off.

Anyway, regarding the physics, I'm super happy to see the tweet from Taxman. That's a big concern out the window. I can put up with a lot of things in Sonic games as long as the general feel is there. I don't think the differences between the Mega Drive and RSDK ports are substantial enough to impact a brand-new game. I understand getting annoyed when things don't work how they used to when you're playing a port (Sonic 3K was the first time it really bugged me), but for new games like Mania or this, perfectly fine.

 

Oh, I see we've reached the fabled "Mania physics are actually bad" point of the discussion.

Hey, does anybody think the co-op might actually be fun? No online is awful to hear in 2023 (but it's Sonic so I didn't even expect multiplayer tbh), but the idea of constantly warping into checkpoints and playing mini games and those falling challenges where you catch as many rings as possible... that looks like a lot of fun with the right people. You could troll your friends so hard by being the one person who insists on taking the bonus stage warp and everyone is forced to go with you

 

If this game is really made in unity than it would be pretty easy to mod these models in. So one way or another I bet those models will be playable in superstars

I absolutely agree that the taxman tweet has alleviated my fears. I do have two minor disagreements with ur post: 1) I personally think this will be better than Frontiers 2) Until Taxman or Stealth say so, I’m not comfortable assuming that Superstars is similar to the ideas Taxman and Stealth proposed in 2019. That said I suspect that many of the ideas Iizuka proposed during that time were realized here. Honestly tho, I hope that most of taxman and stealth’s ideas weren’t included because I’d still like them to have the option to bring them to fruition. Additionally, with Ohshima here I want this project to be dominated by his ideas. But that’s just me

If that’s how you want to view Mania and Superstar than you have every right to! It’s incredibly unlikely that the fanbase will ever universally agree on what the real “Sonic 4” is. There are just too many options: Adventure 1, Advance 1 (which Yuji Naka viewed as the unofficial Sonic 4),The actual Sonic 4, Sonic Mania…. Heck I’ve heard people say 3D Blast could be sonic 4. Personally speaking I think there are two games that are spiritual sequels to 3K: Advance 1 and Mania.

 

That's what I mean. Sonic Frontiers is "good***", where your enjoyment of it largely depends on high your tolerance is to technical problems and other weird quirks. In contrast, I'm confident Superstars will simply be "good", with no asterisks - just a good game. It's entirely possible it will surpass this as well.

I also mean the second point in the way that it was conceptualized in the same way - due to the success of Sonic Mania, they wanted to make a new 2D classic Sonic game. I don't know how much of the original pitch remains, but it feels like a spiritual follow-up.

 

I love the bones of that game, and the people who made it... but a real Sonic 4 would never start with Green Hill, let alone reuse the number of stages that it did. Superstars COULD be Sonic 4 though, in that it's the first all new Classic Sonic adventure since the 90s.

 

Wishing all the best to the talent at Arzest coming off the heels of Balan Wonderworld, god rest that confused game's soul.

 

If the average Sonic uber fan is considered petty for caring about accurate momentum physics, I wonder how a fan who's annoyed by the molecular differences between the Sonic 1 engine and the Retro Engine would be classified :P

 

Part of the reason it weirds me out people don't get more upset about that. If you want it so close that you "can't tell the difference", why not go all the way and demand perfection? But that's whatever.
I care mostly in the context of trying to pass the game off as THE original, so using all the original assets, game design, music, etc. I'm not super thrilled by the idea that Superstars wasn't just a new attempt to replicate the physics (or a direct translation of the originals in favor of a different attempt at replicating the originals) but it's also just a new game entirely. (Ironically by this logic I would be okay with Origins if the whole thing took the same form as Superstars, because at least it looks as different as it is.)
Mania is its own special case where I think it sucks at replicating or surpassing both the physics and actual design execution of... any of the original games, but I also don't actually care enough about it anymore to be as mad at it. I have better things to look to if I feel like playing something classic-esque like Triple Trouble 16 Bit and hopefully, despite RE physics and anything else that could come back from Mania, Superstars.

 

Sonic CD happens after Sonic 1 so Sonic 3 is the real Sonic 4.

 

The physics in STT16-bit while good are nowhere as near to the originals as Mania is so respectfully I have no idea what you're going on about.

 

To be fair, I never consided Sonic Mania "Sonic 4" (or even 5), it's more of its own thing, I dunno.

 

The faithful physics will mean nothing without solid level design to back it up.

Bridge Island has me hopeful, but the Jungle zone has me worried. I'm not worried every other level will resemble the jungle's linearity per say, I'm more concerned that the game's level design will be inconsistent.

 

I don't think it's possible to consider Mania anything but what it is: the synthesis of years of passion, both from the people who spent most of their life working with the franchise (like Iizuka) and a community that archived, reverse engineered and developed everything Sonic for like 20 years. A game that could only exist in 2017 and because the franchise had tried everything else, including a game called Sonic 4 that was anything but. Sonic Mania not only celebrated the legacy of classic Sonic, but retroactively helped creating it by cementing in official letters what that legacy entails in the first place. Everything about it is very particular. The process that culminated in Sonic Mania wouldn't exist if not for the acknowledgement that there is such thing as a Classic Sonic as opposed to a Modern Sonic, and that more or less started with Generations.

Sonic Mania wouldn't exist without Sonic 4. Not the way it is. So it's not Sonic 4, or 5. Neither is Superstars.

 

The worst part? All of this talk of Sonic 4 makes me want a retro engine physics mod of it even more now. The game was never great, but at least Splash Hill was surprisingly faithful to classic stage design, outside of enemy placement.

 

Sonic 4 is so bland though, I just dont see the merit in any kind of remake or reimagining. One of the few games best left forgotten. Even an 06 remake would be more worthwhile.

 

I would love an official retro remake of Sonic 4 plus including an Episode 3.

 

Funny you mention that. When I first heard that sound I immediately thought of the voice that plays when Joe Musashi performs a Ninjitsu in Revenge of Shinobi. Second thought was Axel from Streets of Rage when you perform a jump kick.