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

gonna have to keep a notepad and write your score down manually as you play

 

I like how Amy's running animation is her just flailing her arms everywhere and struggling to keep up.

 

I think my thoughts line up with most others’ here.. the more footage that I see, the better the game is looking so I am eager to find out what else will be brought to the table.

The graphics look super clean, physics seem like they’re accurate (can’t say yet if it’s 1:1 with the Genesis games until I play for myself) and Tyson’s opening animation looks really good. Add in the original level aesthetics and new gameplay mechanics and this absolutely has the potential to be the best Sonic game since Mania. The ball is in SEGA’s court now.

Also I like this timeline as well

Sonic 1 -> Sonic CD -> Sonic 2 -> Sonic 3&K -> Sonic Mania -> Sonic Superstars

EDIT: I saw somewhere that the game might have 8 zones but idk if that is true or not.. I’m just hoping the game’s length is as long as Mania and 3&K

 

It appears the score is shown at the end of the level like in the classics. Hopefully the game will record and display the scores of completed play throughs

 

Might just end up being the new villain character being a member of the crew at the end of the story.

 

Right now we are here... *points to cycle*

 

Honestly my guess for the new character is mostly an optimistic idea of

Spoiler

That new character is probably begrudgingly on Eggman's side or something, since Eggman and Fang have been stated to be the primary villains and they seem rather clumsy in the intro, and once you hit a certain point in the game they get freed and formally added to the team as a fifth character, maybe even added to that empty spot above Knuckles on the title screen.

 

THAT SURE IS THE ARZEST LOGO PLAYING ON LAUNCH.
My 100% completion all trophies run of Balan Wonderworld truly trained me for this moment.

The other deduction that I could have said at the same time of my Arzest one, is that the game might be running off Unreal Engine, either 4 or 5, because part of what makes it look so similar to me is how the assets and lighting interact, it's how Balan Wonderworld looks running on lower than max settings, like its PS4 version, which is the one I played it on.

See that sort of glow around the edges of surfaces? That's what I'm referring to. And I've already pointed out the grass. I probably should have dug that other image out before, but I was lazy.
Unsure if there will be better quality options than they're presenting in the trailer, because my previous Balan screenshot was a press picture that had everything cranked up.

Edit: tiny additional note: I was playing Fortnite earlier today, also on the PS4, and I noticed similar quirks with the lighting. Currently, Fortnite runs on Unreal Engine 5. Just a little bit more clarity.

 

With all the Balan comparisons it's becoming increasingly obvious to me that the mythical fifth playable character will be NiGHTS.

If only...

 

Yeah, something loosely in that range is what I put my guess on. There's also the Avatar/clone ability with the Emerald and Eggman possibly making a robo version(s) to deal with any contradictions on replay.

 

Honey’s been included in recent media featuring the classic cast so I think it’s a real possibility. So is Nack or the new character. I’m wondering if Ray would be brought back without Mighty. I could see them thinking that Mighty’s moveset was too similar to Sonic’s but that Ray’s glide was unique enough

Arzest has a mixed reputation but I think their involvement is good for this project. It means that Ohshima had a larger role than just designing characters and environments. While the Headcanon and evening star logos weren’t displayed I do wonder if Taxman or Stealth consulted on this game. If Arzest really did make this in unity I could see Taxman and Stealth having useful insights that’d help them replicate the physics of classic sonic.

In an unrelated note, it appears when playing solo you can see the other characters interacting with animals in the background of levels:

 

Just wait until you meet the secret boss once you get all the emeralds...

Spoiler

 

Hmm... There's a sort of ability wheel for choosing your emerald power. I wonder how intuitive that implementation will feel in practice. There also seem to be playful character background elements if you aren't playing them. I saw Sonic doing something in the background while Amy runs through on the foreground in one instance and another instance where Amy is playing with a large creature.

 

I don't think the physics are up to that standard of excellence yet. If anything, they feel more like a refinement of the physics we had in Generations and Forces (playing as classic sonic) than anything out of Mania.

Thus far, I've been noticing the same kind of "drag" to the acceleration we saw in the aforementioned games, and the jumps look "heavy". Booster pads also seem to have an effect way closer to generations than to Mania.

Also, in here:
https://www.youtube.com/shorts/Fe7K7B4hwUs
...when Amy jumps on top of enemies, there's a bounce back effect that has everything to do with Generations and nothing to do with Mania

At this point in time, I hope they'll continue refining it to get it closer and closer to proper Mania-like/Genesis-like physics. But the solid ground SEGA is coming from is stems from what they already had in Forces and Generations. Not in Mania.

 

Not everyone here is a fan of Sonic CD and honestly knowing the last thing he worked on alone was Sonic CD makes me more nervous than excited.

I'm still hoping for the best though.

 

If you look here, it looks more consistent with the classic framework than anything else:

 

Good to see Robotnik has reverted to the old school Sonic 1 eggpod - the baddest of them all!

 

https://xcancel.com/Sigilynk/status/1667273470936248320?t=eJ66FVSyUZ4eHCudFz1iHg&s=19
Man this is really cool, not the end of this clip.

 

Regardless of how you feel about Sonic CD, it's idiotic to assume that somebody's design philosophies haven't changed a single iota in literally 30 years. People acting like they're going to turn on Superstars and they're going to be playing Wacky Workbench for 6 hours.

This is what you should be worried about. Mediocrity is the worst fate of all for a video game. At least people remember Sonic '06, and fun can be derived from its numerous flaws. When was the last time somebody brought up Sonic Rivals or Rush Adventure?

 

The sad thing about Arzest is that they don't make crappy games, they just make pretty standard but functional ones. Balan Wonderworld was a mismanaged mess but when I actually look at it in-depth compared to how most people just saw the cursory reviews scratching the surface, there was interesting ideas and concepts there interwoven with dumb ideas like the Box Fox and the QTE special stages. People hated New Yoshi's Island because the story rendered a classic game meaningless to retread it again and it had an awful soundtrack, but gameplay-wise it was perfectly fine.

They have a bad rep mostly because of fandom controversies with decisions and titles done that would be outside of the developer's control mostly.