Sonic and Sega Retro Message Board: Titan - Viewing Profile - Sonic and Sega Retro Message Board

So this is a question for the UK folk here. Did any of you see in a computer magazine like CVG, Gamesmaster, or Sonic the Comic a competition to find a green echidna in Sonic 3 with sphere feet and spikes on them? There was some prize money to be won if you found it. It was meant to be some kind of April fools joke only for it to backfire on them and own up that it was only for a prank when someone sent in a picture of glitched screen shot with a green echidna in there.

There's a heck of a lot of information we can gather from this concept art, as well as see where it's been used since.

Firstly, Ice Cap's concept has been reused a number of times. Most obvious is Sonic Advance's Ice Mountain.




The concept of a snow level actually comes directly from Sonic 1's development, and this concept was used also in Sonic Advance 2 & 3. Note the curtain-like Aurora Borealis and search lights in the background with all the stars.






Furthermore, with the concept art, and with a little knowledge of the Japanese manual stories, perhaps we can figure out generally that SEGA may have had a greater story all along. By reading translations of the Japanese Sonic 3 manual, one can pick out a number of interesting points which not only link with the later series, but to the concept art and also Sonic 3 & Knuckles as a whole.

Knuckles guards the Master Emeralds AND his island's emeralds, which were fractured in to pieces by the crashing of the Death Egg. The fact there are more than one set of emeralds is never again mentioned in the series, though Sonic 3 & Knuckles allows the player to obtain Super Emeralds, and they are much larger than Chaos Emeralds.

Murals on the Angel Island depict possible future events. This idea is re-used in Sonic & Knuckles during the Knuckles fight as well as in Sonic Adventure, when Sonic stumbles upon a secret room at the centre of the Lost World.
There's a mention of a mural foreshadowing a dragon (Chaos), and Knuckles mistakenly believes the Death Egg must be the literal representation of "the dragon in the legend's". This dragon would have likely been a final boss in Sonic 3, had it ever gotten past concept stage.

We can even delve deeper in to the connection of Sonic 3 to other games by actually exploring the Japanese manual's plot to Sonic 2.

In this text, it mentions that once on West Side Island, an ancient society tried to utilize their own magical stones for evil intent, and suddenly the civilization disappeared overnight.

It is known that Angel Island was once part of a greater landmass, but was thrown up in to the air by (later found to be by Tikal sealing herself and Chaos in the Master Emerald) to keep it's treasures safe from harm. This landmass is the Mystic Ruins, which judging by the Sonic 2 manual, seems to be related to West Side Island.

The fact that South Island from Sonic 1 is host to a number of ruins, some very similar to places found in Sonic 3 directly (Labyrinth Zone and Hydrocity, Marble Zone and Marble Gardens) furthers the connection of the games in an obvious and deliberate way. In the Japanese Manual, South Island is always moving in the ocean, which means perhaps that it could also have been part of a whole landmass and split off due to the power of the Chaos Emeralds. This also gives reason as to why the island appears in Sonic Adventure 2 with all emblems collected.

Anyway, I'm going off on a tangent, but it's all pretty fascinating. The team who worked on the classic trilogy and up to Sonic Adventure 1 and 2 created a lot of concepts for the games which were obvious but never explored in full. Fans of the original trilogy will spot intricacies and be able to link them between games, but it's all done so cleverly that the average player won't think too much about them. Whoever lent a hand to the teams who created Sonic Advance 1, 2 and 3 also pushed in a lot of this content that links the games in a thoughtful way (such as the setting of Advance 1's Angel Island, which links to Sonic 3 and Sonic Adventure) which creates a great sense of story and continuity.

I would love to be able to get my hands on full detailed images of the Sonic 3 concept art. There's so much more we can't get a look at in that MTV video and who knows what secrets are being held.

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