General Information
Please note this is VERY early work in progress - many bugs & missing features, & that's NO good!
Its in active development & was updated every day throughout the SAGExpo '23 - and I'm continuing to regularly update it! Thank you for your patience and understanding, and have fun playing!
You can follow progress and learn more about my Sonic fandom on my YouTube channel. Thank you!
Introduction
Hi everyone! Happy SAGE! This is my first year submitting - its exciting & I'm nervous. I've LOVED Sonic since first playing it at a friends house in 1991 and it suddenly becoming the only thing I was remotely interested in - however my parents couldn't afford a Megadrive/Genesis so instead my dad taught me to program our old Commodore, and I spent months trying to recreate Green Hill Zone on it, buying magazines, comics, players guides, anything that could help me to make it more accurate! So in a way, I've been making Sonic fan games since 1991. Crazy how time has gone.
Please note that this is very much a work in progress demo and nowhere near "finished". I wouldn't usually upload something so bare-bones publicly, but I decided to enter anyway when I saw that the SAGE logo this year was Nights themed - Nights is my #1 favourite game of all time, so I took it as a sign! I took a full week off work and challenged myself to update the project every day, getting a little better bit by bit! It was a fun challenge, I got some wonderful feedback, lots of streamers and youtubers trying it out which was super helpful for bug reports, performance/compatibility checks, and just seeing people have fun with something I made is so motivating. I'll continuing to develop it through the year - hopefully to be 100% finished for SAGE '24!
Quick Pitch!
- "Retro-Engine-Style" Modern remakes of the 8bit games with QOL improvements
- Modern remakes of classic spin-off games - Knuckles Chaotix, Spinball, Mean Bean
- "Story Mode" which takes you through classic zones from Genesis 1/CD/2/3&K
- ALL classic characters playable in ALL games, any combination of partner teamups!
- Detailled "Museum" style content & unlocks celebrating Sega & Sonic history
Super fancy intro sequence!
For me, a big part of my motivation for making this project is paying homage to Sega and Sonic history and my love for those early days - So I went kinda overboard with this intro attract sequence, getting as much representation in there as I could - how many easter eggs and references can you spot from different classic Sega commercials, packaging, region logo differences? The art is all adapted from different Sega games too - everything from the 80s (pre-Sonic!) through to Mania and Origins. Watch it though a second time and you'll start Karaoke mode, and a load more fun changes happen!
As I mentioned above - as a kid I was obsessed with Sonic, but we couldn't afford a Megadrive... but after 2 full years of being Sonic obsessed but console starved, miraculously in 1993 my parents said that if I was willing to combine both Christmas and birthday money, they could stretch to affording a Master System, as the price was reduced that year. So for Christmas 1993 I finally got my very own "Sonic" games - my Master System II had Sonic built in, and the first game I bought with my own money after saving up was Sonic Chaos. As you can imagine, those games are very close to my heart.
All through the 90s I obsessively bought and read Sonic comics and Sega magazines - of course I only had my trusty Master System and lusted after a Megadrive - so when the Mega CD and 32X came out, it seemed like an impossible dream to ever own the full "Tower of Power" and be able to play every Sonic title! I poured over previews and guides for Sonic CD and Knuckles Chaotix dreaming of winning the lottery and being able to play them! In 1995 my dream came true - by then, the public had moved on to the Saturn and Playstation, so prices were down and people were selling their old collections - after saving up and pooling all my resources (and again all birthday and Christmas money from family, doing chores etc!) I managed to afford a second hand Megadrive, Mega CD and 32X! I spent the entire Summer holidays playing through every single Sonic game available, after dreaming about it for years. As Brad Buxor would say... hard times, happiest days of my life! Sonic Heroes Origins is my tribute to that time.
"8bit" Improvements!
- Widescreen, 60fps, crisp nearest neighbour integer pixel scaling
- Multi-layer parallax backgrounds using original 8bit tiles & palettes
- Nine playable characters, CPU partner, any combination of two
- Free animals from badniks, rings scatter when hurt, tvs leave broken debrit
- Upgraded scenery - more variety, animations, multiple layers
- Vastly expanded movesets & animation including peel-out, twirl jump, elemental shields
- Improved badnik AI & expanded attack patterns, and 8 animal friends to be freed
Characters!
For now, those are the characters in the game and the ones I'm working on the most to get them complete. However, I know there will be many people with requests - eventually I'd love to add Cream and Cheese, Blaze, Shadow, Honey... maybe even some non-Sonic characters like Ristar & Nights?
Also, my Hazelnut Café Engine allows for easy skinning of characters, alternative characters, changing separate limbs, adding accessories etc. I'll be adding things like switching between different Sonic sprites (16bit Sonic 2/3, Chaos, Triple Trouble) etc, but also thing like changing skin/eyelid colour... Easter Egg seekers may find how to give Knuckles his hat! Any requests please feel free to drop a comment.
Gotta Go Fast!