At the risk of this piece blowing up like the Jackson one, I'll make a topic for this one. Polygon has posted a series retrospective with some interviews of people who've worked on Sonic at some level. Including our very own Taxman. Here's a good quote from Al Nilson: The article also has some ...interesting artwork.
I like how Iizuka basically said that because Rise of Lyric was such horse shit they might stop with the constant reboots for a bit and actually build off what they have. Thank. God. Please execute this, even if it means a Sonic Generations 2 with additional 1 level Lost World content since nothing really came out in the past 5 years.
Hey as long as they include an Eggman Utopia stage I'm down. We never got the Eggman/Robotnik warped base conglomerate we deserved. Actually though, Fuck Splash Hill. It'd be Green Hill Zone act 4, you know it, they know it. Pick Winter Park if you need a Sonic 4 level (although there's still a need for a Sonic CD, Sonic 3, Shadow, and Secret Rings level)
Wonder how long it'll take until someone mocks it just cause Polygon. That being said: holy shit the art is the Ken Penders kind of bad. But seriously, it's a pretty good article. They certainly interviewed enough people for it. It might have been nice if they contacted us for the article though, then we could have given some perspective from the fans. We're not that bad. :v: Kinda weird seeing Bob Rafei say he hopes Sonic Boom: Rise of Lyric will stand the test of time and says fans are entitled, while Iizuka mentions the game as an example of how they shouldn't handle development of Sonic games multiple times, cause shipping the game was the priority rather than quality. The "quality > getting the game out on time" mentality kinda seems common now with Sega Japan. The Sega Games CEO said the same thing last year, and Sega has been delaying games a lot more lately. See Sonic Boom: Fire & Ice, Total War: Warhammer and Persona 5.
I do hope he has his head in the right place with the recent changes in quality they annouced at SEGA.
The best part is he still thinks we were too hard on the game. I get you spent a long time on the game, but if the developer's "mission" is to release on time, your priorities may be out of order. In an ideal world, it should be the publisher's mission to release a game on time and on budget, while the developer makes the game as best as it can. He makes it out like BRB was too eager to ship rather than make a case for delaying the game to Sega. In case anyone needs a reminder of what level of polish BRB couldn't convince Sega to put on hold.
I feel kinda bad for BRB in them saying they almost closed the studio; nobody should lose their business unless they're really doing everything wrong, but then Rafei goes on to defend RoL like it wasn't a shit game?
To be fair, it can be hard for to call something you put a lot of effort into for three years bad. Can't blame Bob for being human.
As easy to blame SEGA for RoL fiasco as it is you should remember that RoL started with "let's just rip off Ratchet & Clank but not to look like completely talentless uncreative hacks let's also throw some of Sonic Dash in there". At best it could've been a mediocre uninspired action/platformer.
Felik, I kinda doubt that you've played Ratchet & Clank cause outside of it being cartoony it's nothing like Rise of Lyric. RoL is kinda similar to Jak & Daxter, but seeing how people who have worked on that game work at Big Red Button (including Bob Rafei), and the rest of the studio is generally people who come from other studios that made similar games, that wasn't necessarily a bad thing. There's not really much of a problem with making more of what they're good at making.
''we want to build a Sonic title which represents the evolution of the Sonic series over the last 20 years," Iizuka says on what future Sonic games may look like. He continues, saying that "modern Sonic won't be changing his design in games anytime soon." Iizuka wants the character to remain the same five, even 10, years from now.'' With my opinion that the classic Sonic design will always be the best design (cooler/cuter/broader appealing), this quote slightly depresses me.
