Nicely spotted... although it concerns me that those unused sprites aren't documented on our wiki. We really need more volunteers. There's far too much content on these boards that has yet to be migrated across, and in some cases, it's been lost to time. The mentality seems to be "someone else will do it", but nobody ever does. It's the most frustrating thing.
This topic is one of them. Here's one I came across yesterday. There are also scans of things that people have put on Google Drives or on their own personal servers or whatever - some of it is genuinely too big to deal with at this time of wiki flux but these boards are littered with little discoveries that haven't made it into the wiki for one reason or another.
So many lost images... that's why I keep things with me (my pc, and some external hard drives)... we can't trust in those image hosting sites...
Where they came from? ... I can't find any info about that brand/company... they even have a Donald Trump figure ...
Interesting they mention rotation effects, as outside of the Special Stages Sonic 1 didn't really utilize rotation effects right? It was all just done by sprites.
Which perhaps brings us back to the "Merry Christmas" rotation demo. It looks like it might have been a general SEGA/Mega Drive demo rather than just a Sonic thing. EDIT: The interview with Naka at Denfaminicogamer also mentions that it was shown at a toy show. EDIT 2: Also, did anyone save those hand drawn maps from Sonic 3D Xtreme's development, which I think were posted at Chris Senn's old site? 'Cause those may have been part of the original Sonic 3 plans:
Ah, found them! I was looking for Sonic 3D when I should have been looking for Sonic Xtreme... "SEGA MK 5", eh? Hmm...
I've never seen that interview before, that's very interesting. So, development of SVP Sonic 3 ended in June of 1993, and the final ROM date is November 20th 1993. That is an extraordinary amount of work required in that short time span. There's already 6 zones in Sonic 3 alone, we know Flying Battery Zone was nearing completion, and development had at least reached Lava Reef Zone before the eventually split and final build. Not to mention 5 competition zones as well.
This? I vaguely remember this screencap being mentioned in association with rotation effects when I was lurking here back in college.
Ahh, that source also has the pic of Alisa from that same demo, including a reproduction gif of the rotation.
WHAAAAAT, the Alisa scene was the rotation demo? I guess it might not be related to the Christmas demo, in that case...
I keep forgetting to make this post but looking through Sonic CD concept art and prototype sprites and screenshots, I discovered a few curious things. It appears that in one of the earliest prototypes, time travelling process in-gameplay showed the sparks and stars that were shown in a piece of concept art; Screenshot; Whilst the mysterious "Sinking into floor" sprites that were in the area Sonic's special stage sprites go has an extremely similar concept art; Corresponding scrapped sprites; If this observation has already been made, my apologies ^^;;