Sonic Origins Collection - General Thread

Stealth saying they were able to "supply a few additional updates and enchancements and SEGA's openess to their feedback" sounds promising. Fingers crossed they've been allowed to make improvements to all four games.

 

So I gave the thread another read, and noticed a few things. He says "Sega have placed a lot of trust in us in by allowing this", and thanks SEGA for accepting their feedback. This suggests they were given access to more of the game than before, and worked their magic in more places. That's an exciting prospect on its own, but I saw something else.

Has anyone else noticed how enthusiastic Stealth is? He's using very positive language when referring to the game. "Look forward to it", "we're very proud". This is in stark contrast to his attitude after the game first came out, where he was disappointed and basically called out SEGA for a poor implementation of their product. He's changed his tune completely.

I don't know how much of that is damage control for when he went on his rant, but this is really striking to me. This alone has immediately got me more interested. I'm still on the fence about the price, but I'm paying attention now.

 

If there was damage to be controlled, I doubt they'd have bothered letting him on in the first place.

 

I don't know if there's anything more behind it than it looks. Thomley and Whitehead clearly love the series and want it to do well, and I don't think they like being frustrated by it. That's what makes them developers and us fans. Whatever they did or didn't fix, I'm sure they were just glad to be able to bring it that much closer to perfection. And Stealth was probably some amount relieved that SEGA still wanted to work with him after he's publicly criticized their management of projects he was involved in two separate times now.

On the pipe-dream end of things though, maybe they got a chance to suggest changes to the 8-bit games and the footage we've seen isn't final, like with the initial reveal. Probably not, but man those things could use some updating even if they were all at master system resolution.

 

I'm cautiously optimistic, but I'll wait for the final product to come out and hear what people think before plopping down money.

The low fidelity music is still quite concerning, however. I don't mind the MJ/Buxer tracks not coming back (and personally do not even want them to), but they really should use the 1103 mixes that are far more refined. They really screwed the pooch on using those early demo-based mixes. In all fairness, they're not the worst, but when there's a far superior later revision just sitting right in front of you, it's quite foolish not to use it.

Well, if they fix the bugs, the bad scaling, and hopefully bring back the lives system as an option in widescreen, then I suppose I could just mod in better music. Still would be nice to not have to jump through hoops to get what the product should be.

 

Wasn’t he also promoting the game positively before the base version’s release and only after release did he speak out about his disappointment about the bugs despite knowing about them beforehand? I’m sure he’s under NDA and stuff, and probably isn’t allowed to say before release “btw there’s a bunch of bugs lol”, but just as with last time I’m going to wait and see until after release before making the decision to buy it or not. (I never bought the base release)

 

I am so thrilled that Heacannon is back. They have the passion and skill to make this the collection shine and worthy of everything it should be (not to mention the price Sega is charging!)

Of course, I won’t get my hopes too much up. At the end of the day, Sega has final say, and we’ve seen them nix excellent ideas from Stealth/Taxman in the past. It could very well be that Heacannon proposes everything we want and Sega has other ideas.

But this is the news I've been deeply hoping for. Hyped!

100% this.

Back when Origins was first revealed, Taxman said that he updated the engines to allow for split-screen.

So it sounds like they could do more games in split screen. Most Sonic 1 and Sonic CD levels would probably work fine (they’d have to nix the time plates from SCD, but they could just let you pick the time period when selecting a stage). Sonic 3 is probably more of an issue because of the level transitions (unless they split the levels up into smaller chunks).

 

Glad to hear Headcannon are involved - will definitely grab the physical copy now that's been confirmed. I know whatever they fix or implement will be at SEGA's behest, and that might mean they can't go as far as they perhaps might want to in tightening up the collection, but I'm now hopeful that the games will receive the bugfixes they deserve and that Amy (and Knuckles in CD) will be well implemented.

Here's hoping they've been allowed to fix things like giving us some sort of post-game level select for Sonic 1, CD and 2, and changing the Drop Dash implementation in those games to properly match how Sonic 3 & Knuckles and Mania handle it, including the additional animations and SFX.

(...and also that my save file from the digital version will carry over - best will in the world, I don't really want to be forced to run through everything again as every single character in order to have a 'complete' save file...! Was saving Mirror Mode for any future runs for a bit of variety, so providing my saves carry over I might give that a go after checking out the new stuff.)

 

So APlusStart made the Amy sprites and new Knuckles sprites for CD?

So ya they are in fact a “real” artist so some of you people should apologize for being dicks. It was made by a person who cares, even if it’s not 100% Genesis accurate. Anyways, great to hear headcannon is involved in bringing this collection up to code (not too shocked since I never expected Sega to code a new character when they could barely code in a drop dash). I’m now expecting those metropolis zone screws to properly work now, and if anyone would reactivate post save level selects, it’s this group (pleaseeeeee do this, please. I know CD would require extra work but the other games that’s just a menu redirect.)

Also what are the chances they were able to go in and properly implement the drop dash in the other games rather than Sonic Teams mediocre implementation? And maybe story mode will have a universal score now.

That being said y’all couldn’t go in and make the HUD in a universal position across all 4 games? I know this is some reallll fan nitpicking but idk, Mania’s/S3K HUD positions grant more screen space.

But now I’m actually excited and now I’m especially glad I imported the Japanese version for the coveted box art lol

 

Oooh, yes - universal score in Story Mode is a good shout; gives more of a reason to replay it if you've already done it once before. Here's hoping they add that in, along with some way of checking your highest score.

Weren't there leftovers found from some sort of planned Story Mode sprite-swap feature, allowing you to swap between sprites from Sonic 1/CD, 2, 3&K and Mania? Would be great if they've revisited that idea in the new version, though I'd imagine if they had they would probably have shown it in the trailer. Would be great to be able to run through the story with a consistent sprite/HUD style all the way through - again, giving another reason to check out Story Mode over just playing the individual games.

 

Ironically at this point every character besides Sonic has universal sprites. Amy uses the same set, Knuckles always uses 3 sprites, and Tails differences in 3 vs 2 are negligible. Sonic’s all over the place, this would be the perfect opportunity to add either new sprites to each set (APlusStart’s already doing the work) or make one unified set more based off Manias sprites.

I’ll be a happy girl if I never have to see Sonic’s Sonic 3 sprites again. I really don’t like em

 

Just a small thought - I doubt they would as even the physical release of Mania is 5 years old at this point, but if Origins Plus sells well it'd be great if they'd go back and develop a small extra DLC pack for Mania to add in Amy Rose there too. Advertising the DLC could be a good way of directing folks who've enjoyed Origins to check out Mania too, and I have to admit I'd shell out a small fee for the extra character as a good excuse to run through Mania again, haha!

Of course, she'd need a whole new sprite set for Mania (even if they could use the Origins sprites as a starting point, they'd need a lot of work to match in with the more colour-rich style and smooth animations of Mania), so they'd likely decide the return wasn't worth the investment needed. Still, a man can dream...

Of course, the real question with such a sprite-swap feature would be: would they remember to change the look of the statues in Hydrocity's Act 2 BG to match the player's chosen sprite style? ; )

 

Yes, 100% this. I'd love a DLC update to play as Amy in Mania (and also have her available in 2P). I'd happily pay for this. And I'd even be happy if she just kept her Origins sprites, which I think are super cute and would work fine in Mania (I get what you are saying about matching, but that wouldn't bother me).

 

I’m pretty sure the person who said that was referring to him or herself as not an “actual artist.”

As in, “I have barely any skills, but I was able to make these tweaks in 5 min so imagine what someone with experience could do.”

I guess it could still be interpreted as insulting APlusStart, but if his intention wasn’t to make a faithful representation of the Mega Drive limitations, I don’t think he’d care someone thought their tweaks improved it. Half this website is pretty much devoted to amateurs “fixing” the work of people whom we’ve adored for decades.

 

We've had code stuff suggest there was sprite swapping with 1/2/3&K/Mania, albeit technically just for S3&K and also potentially swapping out stage elements like signposts and spikes. I'd still love to see that, maybe the character select universally having S2 Sonic was a hint this whole time, but it would be a kinda big spriting effort for variants of 3 characters across 4 games when they're already making new Amy and Knuckles sprites, unless they wanted to keep it S3&K-only. If they had to pick between that and the new playable characters, I couldn't blame them. Maybe it would've been part of the trailer, though would it have been made DLC alongside "bigger" things of new characters and games, or just a fun cheat code addition?

But yeah, very pleased about Headcannon's now furthered involvement with the game. Again, there may still be a few quirks based on Sonic Team's end (Retro Engine scaling that Taxman criticised or of course the music), or oddly a still inconsistent HUD placement, but them re-overlooking the other remasters is all I wanted.

 

No one made that claim. Blackhole was clearly referring to himself and their edit. Everyone else put out valid notes on how to improve or optimize the sprite.

 

All I care about is replacing the shitty S3 tracks with the better ones from the prototype that was released a few years ago. If they had done that at the start, the music complaints would have been reduced.

Sadly we all know that SEGA don't care about this despite the fact that the prototype coming out years ago basically gave them the signal that they could release S3K again without much hassle.

And let's not forget the atrocious Super Sonic theme Jun Senoue threw in for no real reason that had no right being implemented. If you can't do a song correctly, don't do it at all.

 

I am very optimistic about the future of Headcanon and Sonic. I always used to think of Team Mania and Whitehead as the main hopes for Sonic going forwards and thought Evening Star working on a new IP was the sign of that opportunity being closed. But now Headcanon are a clear foundation for future Classic Sonic. I'm especially impressed with AStarts new sprites. I had no idea he was a talented artist.

Who knows if SEGA will contract them again. But I sure hope so.

 

Sega would be stupid to not work with Headcanon again. If Frontiers 2 takes 5 years to develop and they don’t start until next year then it wouldn’t be out until 2029. A Mania 2 by headcanon could bridge the gap while appealing to fans and critics. Additionally Iizuka has said that he wants to work with Headcanon again (before the release of vanilla origins) and that the 2D games are more accessible to new comers/kids. Sega has made plenty of stupid decisions so this ain’t a done deal… but now I’m enthusiastic again. I’ll def be buying Plus to increase the likelihood of Stealth and co staying with sonic