• Hey Guest. Check out your NeoGAF Wrapped 2025 results here!

IGN Sonic Unleashed Blog: Hedgehog Engine

I don't understand why developers are worried about keeping series tied to their roots.

Sonic games became popular because they offered a good combination of speed and exploration, set in worlds that rewarded both. Both the character's transition to 3D has lost sight of this. At this point, I would much prefer a Sonic set on a 2.5D plane, much like the "speed" levels in Unleashed. But allow for exploration and the occasional 3D flourish.

Too many series haven't been able to make the switch to the third dimension. Sonic is at the top of the list (right next to Castlevania) and deserves better.

Unfortunately, I don't have faith Sonic Team can deliver.
 
Gagaman said:
The guys that do the FM<V animation for Sega are insanely talented, I'm glad they're letting them go all out with a short film, as their cut scenes tend to be the highlights of most Sega games now. The intros they did for Sega Superstars Tennis and Mario & Sonic sold the games for me before I had even seen them, and the endings they did for Nights: JOD were beautiful. If there was ever to be a animated sonic feature film, these guys should be the ones to do it.
Click to expand...

VE Animation is a SEGA Studio

the VE Animation Studio logo and SONIC : Night of the werehog are Registered Trade Mark or Trade Mark of SEGA Corporation
Click to expand...
 
I love the style of animation they're using. It's very Disney-like. Nothing about this trailer looks like that Japanese Final Fantasy B.S. that Sonic '06 had. It's all squash and stretch. Reminds me of that Mickey Mouse Jekyll/Hyde cartoon from years back.
 
The footage on "On the spot" the other day actually seemed to semi-confirm real zone names. The Abadat and Spagonia names are just the countries. That african stage apparently is called "Savannah Citadel" which sounds pretty zonish.

His max running speed without boost seemed not overly fast, and Savannah Citadel seemed like it had a decent amount of platforming and pole swinging sections (day time Sonic) after the initial first few seconds of 3d running. Wasnt all hold right either, since you'd miss the other sections in the stage.
 
ShadiWulf said:
VE Animation is a SEGA Studio
Click to expand...
Oh, so this isn't by the same guys that did all that Sega cut scene stuff then? I can't find their link at the moment but they did the animation for Sonic 2006, Shadow, Sega Tennis, Nights 2 etc, but also work for other studios, like a Mickey Christmas DVD movie for Disney.

RobbieNick said:
I love the style of animation they're using. It's very Disney-like. Nothing about this trailer looks like that Japanese Final Fantasy B.S. that Sonic '06 had. It's all squash and stretch. Reminds me of that Mickey Mouse Jekyll/Hyde cartoon from years back.
Click to expand...
Same here, I really like the style they're going for. In some screenshots of the game i noticed the human characters are far more cartoon like this time, compared to the bland humans that populated Sonic 2006. If they must have humans in a sonic game at least they're finally going the right way about it.
 
HUELEN10 said:
Oooh, he seems to have trouble "homing attacking" the poles in Mazuri and he dies...
Click to expand...

EDIT: Nevermind, you can homing attack to other poles, just not straight down when the pole is mostly off screen...and I saw the section where he fell from the outset of that section.

Looks like its all about timing if you do it that way. At least we dont HAVE to use the homing attack all the time for stuff like that right?

Yup, seems like you'll automatically grab hold of the poles as long as you make contact with them. So you dont have to homing attack everytime you see the lock-on crosshair.

If I do get the game, i'll probably do that the old-school, momentum based way...unless I absolutely have to. The player seemed like he dialed it down on homing attacking everything near the end of the segment :lol
 
SonicMegaDrive said:
Should have released the damn game today, in time for Halloween.


Seriously.
Click to expand...

Yes, rushing the game to come out two months early is a great idea
emot-v.gif


(Apparently it's due out in December; Though that's only rumor - here it is practically November and there's still no solid release date for the game yet)
 
"Shadow The Werehog" just standing around in that On the Spot vid is giving me the creeps.

Nevermind I mean Sonic..
Sonic the Werehog.

Forget it Sega just kill off Sonic already.
 
I might be stupid, but I'm considering getting both versions of the game (Next Gen and Wii) . Sadly knowing that each version is different means that I don't want to miss out on what could be the best one....

Loses 20 self respect points.

EDIT: Nevermind I'm retarded, I'll go by reviews.

EDIT 2:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BgFauOj7f2E&fmt=18

Double You Tee Eff, the werehog doesn't look bad, combat wise.
 
I just realized something, how many levels are gonna be in the final game?

So far we know of:

Windmill Isle Zone (Apotos)
"High Europe" Zone (Spagonia)
"Oriental" Zone (Chun Nan)
"Jungle" Zone (forgot this one's name)
Savannah Citadel Zone (Mazuri)

Going by regular Sonic standards, there should be two stages left to reveal. Now here comes the speculations. Does this mean that Day & Night are going to be Act 1 & 2 respectively? Also, does that mean that outside of a Final Stage for Robotnik/Eggman, that's all there is? Or will there be multiple acts in the day and night? Or maybe even more levels?

Hmm...
 
AzureJericho said:
I just realized something, how many levels are gonna be in the final game?

So far we know of:

Windmill Isle Zone (Apotos)
"High Europe" Zone (Spagonia)
"Oriental" Zone (Chun Nan)
"Jungle" Zone (forgot this one's name)
Savannah Citadel Zone (Mazuri)

Going by regular Sonic standards, there should be two stages left to reveal. Now here comes the speculations. Does this mean that Day & Night are going to be Act 1 & 2 respectively? Also, does that mean that outside of a Final Stage for Robotnik/Eggman, that's all there is? Or will there be multiple acts in the day and night? Or maybe even more levels?

Hmm...
Click to expand...

Holaska (North Pole) and Empire City (New York) are the last two, plus the Last stage.

As for extra levels...

The talk of unlockable stages (in the Gamespot Werehog vid) might make the sly suggestion of remade old-school levels on the E3 Unleashed interview have some truth to it after all...
 
solid2snake said:
i will get the Wii version, i loved Sonic and the secret Rings :D
we need more impressions of the Wii game.
Click to expand...
What does Sonic and the Secret Rings have to do with this?

Personally, if I get this, I'll get the 360 version. The only good things about this game are the graphics and music so far.
 
AzureJericho said:
I just realized something, how many levels are gonna be in the final game?

So far we know of:

Windmill Isle Zone (Apotos)
"High Europe" Zone (Spagonia)
"Oriental" Zone (Chun Nan)
"Jungle" Zone (forgot this one's name)
Savannah Citadel Zone (Mazuri)

Going by regular Sonic standards, there should be two stages left to reveal. Now here comes the speculations. Does this mean that Day & Night are going to be Act 1 & 2 respectively? Also, does that mean that outside of a Final Stage for Robotnik/Eggman, that's all there is? Or will there be multiple acts in the day and night? Or maybe even more levels?

Hmm...
Click to expand...
There were nine levels, I thought.
 
Gagaman said:
Oh, so this isn't by the same guys that did all that Sega cut scene stuff then? I can't find their link at the moment but they did the animation for Sonic 2006, Shadow, Sega Tennis, Nights 2 etc, but also work for other studios, like a Mickey Christmas DVD movie for Disney.
Click to expand...
You're thinking of Blur Studio. I'm surprised that Sega bothered opening an internal animation studio (and it explains why Google turned up nothing), but they clearly have some excellent talent working there.
 
Sciz said:
You're thinking of Blur Studio. I'm surprised that Sega bothered opening an internal animation studio (and it explains why Google turned up nothing), but they clearly have some excellent talent working there.
Click to expand...

That's the one. This honest to god looks like the same animators work to me though, how odd. Maybe VG Animation is division of Blur Studio specializing in work for Sega, seeing as they have done so much with them already? If that means we could be seeing more animated shorts like this, I'm all for it personally, especially if it gets the bad taste of that Sonic X anime rubbish out of my mouth. As a character Sonic deserves some good animation based on him, and Sega have in recent years started to drop him into just about any situation much like many classic cartoon characters were.
 
Sega Opening CG Studio
Next-generation pushes Sega to expand visual operations.
By David Karlin, 09/22/2005
Next-generation is approaching fast. As we've seen with their Tokyo Game Show announcements, Sega's more than aware, and the opening a new CG studio to help meet their visual needs and demands should help smooth that transition.

The new studio will open in April of next year, focusing CG, but not the traditional rendered introductions or cu scenes. When the Japanese talk about CG, they often mean all of a game's created visuals. As a result, the studio's expected to handle in-game visuals in addition to FMV and the like.

"With the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 expanding the possibilities of how well we can express art on screen, CG will become an even greater element of the gaming experience," says Sega.

The newly formed studio will not only work on console games, but even for business software, attraction rides, TV animation, and other various divisions at Sega in need of assistance. Sega even anticipates taking on work from other game studios as well, almost assuredly bringing in new profits to the company.

After all this Sega news lately, one thing is definitely for sure: Sega's certainly ambitious lately. To this I tip my hat and say, best of luck!
Click to expand...

http://www.1up.com/do/newsStory?cId=3144057

old article, but it gets the point across.
 
ShadiWulf said:
http://www.1up.com/do/newsStory?cId=3144057

old article, but it gets the point across.
Click to expand...
Oh hey, I forgot all about that announcement, good find. I guess it was a while and Sega haven't really so much as mentioned that studio up until now, or at least that's the first time I've seen a logo for it. Maybe Blue Studio just did Sonic 08 and Shadow then, and their work just looks a lot alike. *shrug*
 
Gagaman said:
Oh hey, I forgot all about that announcement, good find. I guess it was a while and Sega haven't really so much as mentioned that studio up until now, or at least that's the first time I've seen a logo for it. Maybe Blue Studio just did Sonic 08 and Shadow then, and their work just looks a lot alike. *shrug*
Click to expand...
First time I've seen the VE Animation logo too, I heard from someone that VE stands for Visual Entertainment... would make sense, fits next to Global Entertainment(Sega's videogame branch)

yeah, blur studio did Sonic 06 and below that... probably secret rings stuff too, I think SEGA's CG Studio's first work is Sonic Unleashed (Well, atlest their first wide known work)
 
Downloaded that Night of the Werehog video so I could have a good look at and I noticed this figure lurking at the tail end of it..

dlrgw8.jpg


It might be a long shot, but wasn't there rumors floating about that Sega would be reintroducing Nack the Weasel (Fang the Sniper in Sonic the Fighters) in Unleashed? It looks vaguely like him to me, although if they did bring him back he'd most likely be re-designed a bit.
 
Gagaman said:
It might be a long shot, but wasn't there rumors floating about that Sega would be reintroducing Nack the Weasel (Fang the Sniper in Sonic the Fighters) in Unleashed? It looks vaguely like him to me, although if they did bring him back he'd most likely be re-designed a bit.
Click to expand...
Not that I've heard, nor do I want to see yet another character dragged kicking and screaming out of the vault.
 
Aaron Strife said:
There were nine levels, I thought.
Click to expand...

Something they pointed out in the "On the Spot" video, is the guy in the Werehog mode finds a secret, unmarked area by breaking through a wall, and gets a token which she mentions "unlocks a new daytime stage." Since the goal of the night time stages doesn't seem to be "Find tiny hidden tokens without fanfare," it's possible that there are a handful of unlockable stages. Or they could just be new missions set in the existing levels, like most of the Sonic games prior.
 
Kulock said:
Something they pointed out in the "On the Spot" video, is the guy in the Werehog mode finds a secret, unmarked area by breaking through a wall, and gets a token which she mentions "unlocks a new daytime stage." Since the goal of the night time stages doesn't seem to be "Find tiny hidden tokens without fanfare," it's possible that there are a handful of unlockable stages. Or they could just be new missions set in the existing levels, like most of the Sonic games prior.
Click to expand...
If Sega actually went through the effort of creating new stages for each unlockable or level, then I am going to be ecstatic. The whole "keep the same level but give you a new goal" idea got old a while ago. But honestly, I am going to be ECSTATIC if they actually have individual levels like that.
 
new trailer looks good and fun... but i get confused about how much player control is in the new sonic games(i have played about half an hour of 3d sonic games in my life). To me it looks like your almost on the rails or holding right most of the time... it looks pretty but reminds me of the second sonic game on gba but now in 3d

edit: actually after watching it again i guess its just the editing of the video, you can see where the player would gain a bit more control than running around loops
 
grandjedi6 said:
If Sega actually went through the effort of creating new stages for each unlockable or level, then I am going to be ecstatic. The whole "keep the same level but give you a new goal" idea got old a while ago. But honestly, I am going to be ECSTATIC if they actually have individual levels like that.
Click to expand...
Rush Adventure did it, though they tended to be short and gimmicky. I wouldn't rule it out as a possibility.
 
Kulock said:
Something they pointed out in the "On the Spot" video, is the guy in the Werehog mode finds a secret, unmarked area by breaking through a wall, and gets a token which she mentions "unlocks a new daytime stage." Since the goal of the night time stages doesn't seem to be "Find tiny hidden tokens without fanfare," it's possible that there are a handful of unlockable stages. Or they could just be new missions set in the existing levels, like most of the Sonic games prior.
Click to expand...
Well, I don't recall ever having to unlock missions (other than just beating other missions).

I'd like to think it's new levels, but your explanation seems more likely. Didn't the producer guy say it was more of a 60/40 split between Sonic and the Werehog? 9 speed levels, 7 werehog levels, I'd buy it.
 
Hmm, I was thinking. Since Sonic is moving at super speed already, does anyone really want Super Sonic to be playable in the standard levels? It seems like overkill.
 
TheSonicRetard said:
Sooo... the game is right around the corner and much of "the cycle" still hasn't come to pass...
Click to expand...

Its okay, from a recent interview with IGN apparently theres a hub-world with missions and shit that simply hasnt been shown in any trailer or promotional material. I'm sure that doesnt mean its absolutely shitty and being hidden so as to not dampen the positive vibe Sonic fans have fooled themselves into feeling about the game again?
 
Wurm said:
Its okay, from a recent interview with IGN apparently theres a hub-world with missions and shit that simply hasnt been shown in any trailer or promotional material. I'm sure that doesnt mean its absolutely shitty and being hidden so as to not dampen the positive vibe Sonic fans have fooled themselves into feeling about the game again?
Click to expand...

Everything you've described is optional. The devs have stated that you'll be able to play the levels in succession without doing any minigames.
 
"You dont have to play that bit, its shit though" isnt a compelling argument for a game I consider already 50% shitty via the horrendous looking compulsary Hog of War segments. That dumb chihuahua doesnt factor as a new friend or that all the other idiots were confirmed to show up in some way? This game only managed to avoid the cycle straight out because of the Werehog leak. Had Sega been able to keep it a secret as they so desperately tried afterwards, this game would have been the very DEFINITION of the cycle. "Oh wow, 2d Sonic gameplay, just Sonic oh wow" -> months pass -> "what is... werehog...what...oh god"

Its not so much the cycle not having come to pass but rather the willful ignorance most Sonic fans inject themselves with months before release.
 
I dunno, Chip isnt playable so I dunno if that shitty friend aspect counts. And the hub worlds...well I wasnt really against them in Sonic Adventure 1. We cant really automatically assume the extra missions wont be Sonic Rush Adventure style instead of crappy Sonic 06 style...and people have used that excuse for games like Fable II (the job mini-games). Looking at the latest trailer, the werehog combat doesnt look as atrocious as people thought it would be. The only thing it comes down to now are control issues, loading issues, and all around glitchyness.

Framerate has already been taken care of.

Also yeah Sonic Retard, you probably should go back and edit that. Kinda frowned upon around here. Oh and Wurm, welcome back :D
 
Holoska (nation) does look nice though. I really wish we knew the zone names for the this stage as well as the others. So far its Windmill Isle, Dragon Road, and Savannah Citadel.

Even better is that I just realized in the Savannah Citadel trailer, you dont just fight magic things as the werehog, but the badniks too.

They really do need to get players who dont just rush through the stage, missing everything in the stage AND running into easy obstacles.
 
Wurm said:
Its okay, from a recent interview with IGN apparently theres a hub-world with missions and shit that simply hasnt been shown in any trailer or promotional material. I'm sure that doesnt mean its absolutely shitty and being hidden so as to not dampen the positive vibe Sonic fans have fooled themselves into feeling about the game again?
Click to expand...
To be fair, I think we know what to expect from a hub world. Sega wants to highlight the most action-packed parts of the game and a hub world is basically just "Go to this level." It's boring trailer material.

I kind of want to see the mini-games where you play as Tails, though, so hopefully those will be showcased eventually.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

Sonic the Hedgehog: Memories And Beyond | 35th Anniversary animation short sneak peek
6
268
Fahdis replied
Sonic the Hedgehog - Official 35th Anniversary Trailer
Event Trailer 
18
793
Codes 208 replied
Sonic the Hedgehog 4 | Title Reveal (2027 Movie) - Jim Carrey, Ben Schwartz, Kristen Bell
49
922
KungFucius replied
Unreal Engine 6 - Reveal Overview
2
69
1K
Hudo replied
32 years since Adventures of Sonic The Hedgehog cartoon premiered.
News Retro 
21
877
Fahdis replied
Top Bottom