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Sega GC 2006 press kit

Discussion in 'General Sonic Discussion' started by Black Squirrel, Jul 17, 2021.

  1. Black Squirrel

    Black Squirrel

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    Recently uploaded and now mirrored in (almost) its entirity across our wikis: Sega's press kit at the 2006 Leipzig Games Convention (which later became Gamescom):
    https://archive.org/details/sega-ekp-2006.7z

    Sonic
    Category:Artwork from Sega GC 2006 EPK
    Category:Sega GC 2006 EPK files

    Sega
    Category:Artwork from Sega GC 2006 EPK
    Category:Sega GC 2006 EPK files

    What makes this more interesting for Sonic Retro than usual is there's a big batch of Sonic 2006 screenshots. Rendered in 2880p. That's 16 times the resolution of the retail product, and the results are... curious.

    [​IMG]

    The build these were taken from is already known to have plenty of differences to the final game, but you might be able to spot more now. There's also a handful of Sonic Rivals and Sonic Wild Fire (back when it was still called that) screenshots here too. And some very shiny tennis players.
     
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  2. Blue Spikeball

    Blue Spikeball

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    Wait what? The environments were upscaled from 720p, yet Sonic is rendered in 2880p. Looks like a mockup to me, although his shadow is 720p. I would expect it to be 2880p too, assuming they added it along with the Sonic render :psyduck:

    Maybe that pic was intended to be downscaled back to 720p before being included in the press kit, but they forgot? The shadow was probably added first (or it was rendered with the environments) so as to serve as a guide to where to paste Sonic.
     
    Last edited: Jul 17, 2021
  3. Azookara

    Azookara

    yup Member
    Nah, that's just how some games render far away shots. Notice that Sonic's textures are similarly muddy, and how the ground's edge he's on is sharp just like his model. It's def an in-game shot.
     
  4. Blue Spikeball

    Blue Spikeball

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    If you at the full-size pic, the environments look pixelated like they were resized from a lower resolution (720p, going by my calculations), while Sonic looks hi-res:
    [​IMG]
    [​IMG]
     
  5. Azookara

    Azookara

    yup Member
    Despite running at a high resolution, the engine and assets are optimized for 720p. That's why the textures are muddy, shadows are pixelated and objects in the distance look crunchy, because they're set up to do that. Sonic's model is higher quality because being closer to the camera means it has higher priority to render than the other stuff. A lot of 7th gen games look like this; including Unleashed if they rendered those in ludicrous resolutions like these.

    I imagine that it wouldn't look this way if it were on something designed for higher specs, or at the very least not optimized for these. But it is, and there's not anything that could change that.

    Again, look at the part of the ground that lines the grass and water. It is just as sharp as Sonic's model, but continues to blur and get more jaggedy the farther away it gets towards the right. Or take a look at Sonic's own textures; they themselves are muddy, and Sonic's shadow on his left hand is the same crusty seperation between the lightsource and shadow as on the floor underneath him.

    It's in-game. :colbert:
     
  6. Black Squirrel

    Black Squirrel

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    It's "mocked up" in the sense that they paused and manually adjusted the camera to shine the game in the best possible light, but it's absolutely in-engine. Most developers do this when dealing with 3D, although they don't usually render out a screenshot this big.
     
  7. MBeca

    MBeca

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    Yeah, looks like it's in-game. Surprising these were rendered at such high resolution back in the day. In some of the Shadow screenshots you can see how the enemies are also rendered at a high-res
     
  8. JaxTH

    JaxTH

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    Jack shit.
    Not really. Sega's screenshots and art were at insane resolutions even back during Heroes.
     
  9. Azookara

    Azookara

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    I do think an interesting thing about these screenshots is how before a certain point, Sonic's eyes were rendered a much darker hue. Wonder if that was intentional or not? I remember kid me seeing that in the Gamespot preview for 06 / 15th anniversary rollout and thinking "it's like he's going classic again wow!!!".

    Either way, I like it.
     
  10. Antheraea

    Antheraea

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    Are his proportions different? he looks less noodly in the screencap in the OP, and I swear his face looks different too.