I don't think they had any reason to be concerned until the late 2000s/early 2010s, when the story began to pick up mainstream attention. The same year they released Sonic & Knuckles Collection, they also released Sonic Jam, which was a full port of the original source code to the Sega Saturn and used the final soundtrack. (I'm almost certain they only changed the soundtrack for S&KC because the prototype MIDIs were the only ones they had readily available.)
It is hard to get the original sonic 3 tracks to sound good in an opl3-midi arrangement. Believe me, I have tried.
Agreed. If that was a concern than the S3 Credits would have been removed from the sound test in S3K.
Here's an experiment I did using the AMPS sound driver. I took the prototype CNZ act 1 track and adjusted some stuff to be closer in style to the PC and Origins versions. Specifically, the key has been changed to C major, the tempo has been sped up, and two of the backing tracks have been pitched up an octave. I kinda like it better than the slower version to be honest, sounds more frantic and fun.
The issue I take with the faster tempo is that it just doesn't feel natural to me, for some reason? It just sounds like the music under Speed Shoes. And the lower pitch just makes the track sound more dull, when the higher pitch of the original captures the sort of bright, twinkling quality of the carnival. It's definitely better here than it was in Origins/S&KC though, for sure lol.
I think there's something being kinda overlooked here (though everyone's brought up most of the major beats; bravo for compiling the extra info): MJ had a licensing deal to make music and games for Sega. There was a old magazine scan (I think it was Electronic Gaming Monthly, but not sure) that mentioned Jackson had signed a new deal with Sega to make more games and music for them right before he got temporarily blacklisted. During this deal, only Scramble Training got released, which ended up getting pulled pretty quick after the allegations came out, A Moonwalker sequel was in development, but got axed for the same reason, and he also had a cameo in Megalopolis: Tokyo City Battle (Incidentally, this was where he first crossed paths with Tetsuya Mizuguchi, pre-Space Channel 5). Obviously, as far as we can tell, Sonic 3 didn't fall under this deal, but it definitely would've been easier for them to bring him in, since he had a very active working relationship with Sega at that time. And it's also a possibility why the music eventually came back to bite them, because they didn't take care of things properly on the legal side, not to mention neglecting to clear the samples MJ and his team used.
That isn't being overlooked. Jackson had a good working relationship with Sega in Japan. Moonwalker, Scramble Training - all of that was done through Japan. Sonic 3 was Sega of America's project at STI, and everything involving Jackson and Sonic 3 went through STI (as far as the evidence indicates). The problem is that practically all of the people at SOA/STI who should know claim that there was never an official deal with Jackson. So I don't think we can make conclusions about what was signed or official or anything else at this point. I tend to believe this. If anything had officially been decided, SOA would have immediately publicized the hell out of it. I still think the intention was to make it official, but the idea was dropped after the allegations. The mystery is how the music ended up in the game, and how Buxer and team were credited.
But that was part of my point. MJ had a deal, and there was enough info out there back then for American gaming magazines to report on it. If SoA somehow didn't know about it, then somebody at Sega dropped the ball badly at communicating that (which wouldn't be a surprise, all things considered). Either way, Sonic 3 still didn't fall under that deal.
I don't quite follow the connection here. Jackson signed a contract with Sega in Japan for Scramble Training and also had a brief appearance in Megalopolis: Tokyo City Battle (is there any evidence of a Moonwalker 2, or is that just a rumor I'm not familiar with?). How does that connect to Sonic 3? SOA/STI would still have to get him to sign a separate contract. Contracts would be on a per-project basis, so it didn't really matter what he did in Japan. I mean, his work in Japan showed he was willing to work with Sega, and it looks like STI was able to capitalize on that and get him in the office in the first place. But I don't see how SOA knowing or not knowing he signed a contract in Japan to do Scramble Training would have any effect on the situation at STI.
Yes! Michael visited SEGA during a break of the Tokyo shows of the "Dangerous World Tour" on December 15th & 21st, 1992. The meeting specifically discussed "an arcade game making full use of high quality CG in a virtual reality system" (which became AS-1 Scramble Training) & "an innovative home console game". It seems as though there was a successful meeting between the two, but the home console game never materialized, though I doubt it would've been Moonwalker 2. It doesn't make sense for that to exist, maybe it was an original idea? based on one of his short films? It would've been cool for a game to "expand" on the world of his short films, seeing how a lot of them tried to tell some sort of story. I'm just saying, we could've gotten the Michael Jordan Basketball minigame.
The extent to which Scramble Training was "pulled" should probably be called into question. Here it is running late 1996 after the opening of SegaWorld London, one minute into this video: And again at Centre Sega Paris (15:30): Also worth noting that, as briefly mentioned in this early Beep MD interview with Tetsuya Mizuguchi, there was a version of it without Jackson. This wasn't made to airbrush him out, but because Scramble Training was effectively already complete by the time he visited Sega and attached himself to the title in December 1992. Jackson experienced it for the first time on that visit, all he needed to do after that was record and insert his parts. It's possible that some locations instead chose to run this original version post-allegations, but as those two videos show, there was no real concerted effort to get rid of it altogether. I'd be surprised if Jackson even was entirely "blacklisted" from Sega in the first place, considering the timeline of events here and his further involvement with the company shortly afterward (by late 1996 he was visiting their headquarters again).
Theory: Is it possible that some of the Sonic Team or Cube compositions of Sonic 3 inspired or derived from the Jackson Sound Team compositions? It's been speculated that Final Boss and Sonic 3 Credits have a similar melody which would suggest that Final Boss derived some inspiration from Sonic 3 Credits. Factually, Sonic 3 Credits was composed by Brad Buxer. Could that explain why Buxer and the rest of the Jackson Sound Team are still credited in Origins despite the replacement of the 9 themes?
What part of Final Boss uses portions of S3 credits? I'm really curious now. I recall seeing an analysis that showed that Doomsday, Final Boss (Big Arms), and one of the S3 beta tracks share a very unique riff (though I forgot which beta track), same with Flying Battery + Death Egg Zone + SK Miniboss, which lead me to believe Tomonori Sawada did the lions share of the S3/SK soundtrack. And you could very well be right, but I think it's more of the music at the time. Marble Garden and Hydrocity have that strong rhythmic New Jack Swing style of the early 90s, I had always thought they were MJ compositions but apparently not!
I've had a difficult time finding a source in writing either on retro or somewhere else but compare Final Boss ~44 seconds in To Sonic 3 Credits ~48 seconds in:
Not a chance. If the connection was strong enough that they needed to still credit Buxer because of that, then the final boss track would be in legal trouble. They probably kept their names in the credits in order to avoid confirming or deconfirming which were the composers of the removed tracks. Again, while the info is easily found out there, SEGA never mentioned MJ or Buxer officially. And again, let's remember the MJ tracks are the replacements. The Nov. proto has no TRACE from the Jackson songs, not even a sound ID for any of the MJ team exclusive samples in the driver. It's clear they were never in the code at that point.
For what it’s worth, Buxer and co. are still credited in the PC version, even though that, like Origins, uses the prototype tracks.
I’ve always wondered why those composers were still credited in S&KC and in Origins even though their music was removed.. Is it that much of a risk to take by removing them from the credits? It doesn’t make sense to credit someone for music that they had no involvement with. We have already done the work in figuring out which team worked on which tracks, so I don’t see how even removing Buxer’s team would still cause a stir behind the scenes.
I doubt that the names being kept in the credits really means anything serious - I think it’s possible Sega just didn’t bother because they didn’t think they needed to.
