Sonic Superstars: A New 2D Sonic Game (Fall 2023)

All the other images are just "Emerald power - x", unfortunately.

 

Ah, thanks for clarifying - should have guessed that avenue would already have been investigated.

Still, lots of new info to digest! One of the things I'm most interested in is something which had already been leaked through the accidental peek at the dev menu in some earlier footage - the idea of character-specific Acts within Zones. Now we have a bit more info on how that'll work - it sounds like at certain points of the game, you'll have the choice of playing a regular all-characters Act or one specific to the character you're playing as. Depending on how many there are, this has the potential to massively expand the total amount of Acts across the game as a whole, not to mention making repeat playthroughs as different characters more rewarding.

Sonic 3 & Knuckles dabbled with this idea with Knuckles' alternate Sky Sanctuary, but that was only a boss arena really - the idea was only really fully realised in Sonic Mania with Knuckles' unique opening Act for Mirage Saloon, which was very much designed around his unique abilities. So it's exciting to see them taking that idea and expanding it to a wider variety of Zones! I wonder how many there'll be? Hopefully each Zone gets at least one character-specific Act - that'd really help differ repeat playthroughs, as then you'd get three unique Acts per character across the game as a whole.

 

Correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't Knuckles had a few exclusive acts in 3&K? I can think of Ice Cap and I believe Carnival Night...?

 

...I guess he did in some Acts now that I think of it, as for example his route in Angel Island Zone Act 2 is completely separate from any of the paths Sonic takes. I'll admit I wasn't really thinking of those, but for ones that don't cross over at all with Sonic and Tails' routes then you're right - they would totally count, as they're in effect a completely separate level layout from what you experience as the other characters

Are there any other stages where Knuckles' routes are completely separate like that? I know Carnival Night crosses over with Sonic's route at least a bit, not sure about Icecap from memory.

Either way, I guess Sonic 3 & Knuckles did do it first after all, albeit contained within the same level map as the other characters' Act.

 

I guess that's why 3 will always top Mania for me. They really put great thought into making Knuckles experience a unique one. In Mania, it was mostly "here's the same level as Sonic, if Knuckles can get through it too then fuck it, that'll do!".

 

Supreme nitpicking territory here, but does anyone else feel like the Zone names are a bit…boring? It’s a little hard to nail down with previous examples such as Chemical Plant and Leaf Forest, but Bridge Island and Sky Temple seem like such pedestrian level names.

 

They do sort of pale against ~30 years of collective zone naming by fans and SEGA itself, which brought us hardcore names such as Mᴇᴛᴀʟʟɪᴄ Mᴀᴅɴᴇss and Dʀᴇᴀᴍ Dᴀɴᴄᴇ and Sᴛᴜᴅɪᴏᴘᴏʟɪs and Aᴍᴀᴢɪɴɢ Aʀᴇɴᴀ.

However, I kinda like their simplicity too. It bring me back to the 8-bit games and their no-nonsense names like "Bridge Zone" or "Sky High". Although even Sonic Blast had a distinctive naming style too.

 

I mean I don't see what a particularly big difference there is between Speed Jungle and Speed Highway. Just DIMPS alone gave us Secret Base, Ice Mountain, Sky Canyon, Ocean Base, Haunted Ship and Oil Desert. Not a lot of big artistic license there.

 

To be fair, when Sonic 2 first came out I thought 'Chemical Plant' sounded worryingly straightforward and dull as a level name. And it's now among the most well-known and loved Sonic levels.

 

Dimps also gave us Leaf Storm, Machine Labyrinth, Ice Paradise and Chaos Angel. I also won't stand for any Sky Canyon slander. Idk, maybe it's just because they're new and haven't grown on me yet, but it feels to me like they're just rehashing level names, which I want to stress is barely a problem if at all, but it's been on my mind for a bit.

On a more positive note, the Colour Emerald powers all seem pretty dope, perhaps with the exception of Vision. Crash 4 and Mega Man 11 both used time slowing to great effect, and I think Bullet could have a lot of speedrun potential depending on how it functions. Certainly makes the absence of the elemental shields much more reasonable and I'm glad the developers found a way to advance the classic formula without it being swallowed up by the gimmick, since everything is option and seems to just be an extension of regular gameplay, unlike the Colour powers which were segmented in their execution, given that they were effectively mini games with their own control schemes.

 

Yes, Sonic has a history with Zone or stage names that are pretty pedestrian when you stop and think about them. In Sonic the Hedgehog about half the stages have names that are simply descriptive, and in its 8-bit counterpart I'd argue all but one fit that bill. Sonic Blast also has pretty simplistic names for each stage, taking the "Green Hill" format to the extreme and giving every stage a simple "colour + descriptor" naming scheme - usually the predominant colour of the stage, with the notable exception of Red Volcano, which is named this for some reason despite being predominantly purple.

Names may have got a little more prosaic as the series went on, but even then those simple names never went away entirely - even in the earlier 3D games we have some basic descriptive stage names such as Metal Harbor, Green Forest, Seaside Hill etc. Later 2D titles also still have them in there, such as Sonic Advance's Secret Base, Ice Mountain and The Moon, or Sonic Rush Adventure's Haunted Ship or Pirates' Island.

Some games do a pretty good job of avoiding them - Sonic Adventure, Sonic Advance 2 and Sonic Rush don't have many between them (though on the flip side they also have some that are actually nonsensical, what the heck is a "Music Plant" when it's at home?).

Don't get me wrong, I'd love to see some more distinctive names here too, but descriptive names have always been a part of the series. I'd argue we don't all remember Chemical Plant so well because it's a particularly distinctive or prosaic name, but because it's a cool stage with great music and we've come to associate the name with that. So I'm just keeping my fingers crossed that some of Superstars' stages are memorable enough to achieve the same effect in future...!

 

Aside from Leaf Storm those are all at least to some extent rehashing level names, too. Machine Labyrinth and Sky Canyon especially sound like they were pulled straight out of a "Sonic Zone Name Generator".

So my money's on "they're just new and haven't grown on you yet".

 

Did I hear someone ask for alliterations for these zone names? No? Well here they are anyway

Bridge Bay Zone
Jungle Jaunt Zone
Sky Summit Zone
Pinball Plaza Zone
Lagoon Lights Zone
Sand Sanctuary Zone
Press Pinnacle Zone
Golden Gateway Zone

 

While I quite like that alliterative names have been the go-to overarching logic gimmick for Sonic zone names for a while (from fans more than anything), I'd much like to see new ones for new games. I like (color) + (ambient) from Sonic Blast, there is a world of naming-styles-that-tickle-the-brain out there.

 

Have to disagree with a lot of these - many of them omit or change things which give some idea of the Zone's setting etc. in the originals. For example, "Sky Summit" sounds more like a mountaintop stage than a floating temple; "Pinball Plaza" gives no hints of the fairground/carnival elements of the stage, "Press Pinnacle" doesn't actually mean anything - if you'd used "Factory" from the original as your basis instead of "Press", you could have done something which would at least have got the mechanical/factory theme across. I'm not saying it's impossible to do alliterative names for these stages, but thinking more about what the official names suggest and trying to preserve that meaning would probably give better results overall.

Of the official names, Golden Capital is the one I like the most so far. It doesn't feel like a mashup of previous Zone names, and has a (possibly unintentional) pun in it to boot - Capital could mean a capital city, but also capital as in money/funding, which fits nicely with the overall golden theme and the ring-spewing piggy-bank miniboss seen in the available screenshots.

 

Oh, I tried. I was already aware of all the issues you've pointed out, in fact -- but sacrifices have to be made if you're going for alliterations. All names on that list did it because I likely would get nowhere if didn't. Bridge Island isn't a bay; A Jaunt gives a different impression from Speed; Sky Sanctuary already exists; A plaza isn't a carnival; Lights doesn't imply it's at a city; Using Factory instead would take the Press part out of it, which could be more important; Gateway doesn't refer to a city as much as one piece of architecture.

 

Yeah I'm not sure where this naming nitpick is coming from, the overwhelming majority of levels in the series have pretty basic names. These just seem meh because unlike something like Green Hill (really creative name indeed), these levels don't have years of memories and experiences tied to them. A few years down the line Superstars' stage names will evoke those same feelings too.

And honestly the zone's name has very little effect on how levels get percieved by players, a cool name can help a very small amount but its almost entirely on the level design, music, and visuals to provide that.

 

The greatest level in the entire franchise is called "Pumpkin Hill"

 

I mean, does Marble Zone or Marble Garden Zone have anything to do with "marbles"?

 

Er, yes. Their terrains are made up of marble stone.

Outside of my name nitpick, the only Zone that truly rubs me the wrong way so far is Press Factory, since we had a newspaper production level in the very previous classic game, and I highly doubt whatever Superstars offers will top it.