This feels vaguely familiar, like it was put up by Hisashi Eguchi onto his twitter. I mean, it does look like the intro where Sonic uses a mountain to build momentum to launch himself to Little Planet. The speedometer is a cute touch I kinda wish made it in.
Yes this also is Ohshima sans art, I sadly do not have context but I believe it was used for making of the intro movie
Oshima had shared this on his Twitter a while back and said that it was an early Special Stage concept for Sonic CD.
Just browsed through all his tweeted pics (and Sonic CD dev docs in the wiki) and couldn't find it. Are you sure? EDIT: Found them, see below.
I thought I had seen this one before somewhere that’s why I just wrote rare but I don’t see it on his twitter, could you send a link? Thank you
Found it: https://twitter.com/naotoohshima/status/850707012790833153 Along with another even more interesting one! And here's the pics at ludicrous resolution: https://i.imgur.com/FFSUFwl.jpg https://i.imgur.com/gYNVbP6.jpg He says it's for a "failed idea" but not which game it was for.
Some of this art (Sonic rolling down the hill and leaping forward specifically) looks quite similar to the shots from the opening cutscene, so maybe they could be connected? I don't know.
They both look like "Track & Field" style mini-games. Doesn't seem like there'd be enough "meat" on them to be full Special Stages. Then again, maybe that's why they were abandoned.
Just checking, but have people made the connection between that concept art and these unused sprites? The second sprite has the exact same pose as the leaping pic in that concept art, which I feel makes it clear they were going to be used for that sequence. I think the most likely explanation is that it was going to be a pseudo-3d sequence in one of the levels ala the vertical ramps in PP1. Or perhaps it evolved into said ramps, after they opted to simplify it. Edit: Forgot about this: Come to think of it, these sprites seem to be more in line with the style of the special stage sprites, rather than the in-level sprites.
Why do I get the feeling this will be included in a future Sonic game down the line? Is it just me, or is everyone else getting that feeling too?
I remember seeing a very early preview screenshot where there Special Stage looked like a multi-layered rotating stage, more like Sonic 1's, rather than the UFO game we got. Makes sense there would have been a sprite for him to transition between layers, maybe it was him jumping between them like that. Edit: Bing-bang-bong.
That gauge in the upper right sure looks suspiciously similar to the ones from the Ohshima art. With the multiple layers and possible concept of Sonic flying 'through' them, the Chaotix Bonus Stage immediately comes to mind... a game that has more than few connections to Sonic CD. http://info.sonicretro.org/Bonus_Stage_(Chaotix)
Sorry for being slightly off topic but did anyone back up all the art Ohshima-san posted? He had posted a bunch of early designs for Burning Rangers at one point but I believe they got deleted, and I’ve been searching for them ever since...
Yes, I did, back when it when they were first posted. I also saved the Eguchi Hisashi tweets, which had lots of great Sonic CD art. I also 'printed' each tweet to PDF to save its context. I just threw it up on my server: http://sudden-desu.net/_gomi/sonic_tweet_backup/ Edit: er, sorry, I just saw that you were looking for the Burning Rangers tweets. I didn't save those, only the Sonic related stuff.
So my brain just put 2 and 2 together, and I just realized something about this unused idea: Where have I seen this before... Ohhh yeah! Considering how early the Toei animation was made (namely with the presence of the R2 animation and the opening video existing even in the Yuusei proto), I would consider it pretty likely that this was inspired by Ohshima's concept, either as a planned gameplay mechanic or just a 'cool idea' to animate.
Yeah, I think that curled up Sonic was a placeholder sprite. It was more like that Chaotix bonus stage.
