The Year of Sonic is upon us! run for your lives!

[Kyanbu The Legend]

http://www.sonicstadium.org/2014/02/sega-2014-is-the-renaissance-year-of-sonic/#comment-216809



The text on that image reads as follows…

2014 will mark a renaissance for Sonic the Hedgehog. Please join us to be the first to hear about SEGA’s exclusive announcements and plans for the Sonic brand”
“2014 is the Year of Sonic,” “Renaissance of the brand” and the image of the Sonic Boom promotional image. For those who don’t know, in it’s most basic term, renaissance means ‘rebirth.’ Now you understand why I said remain calm…

If you are doubting the authenticity of this image, to back it up, Segas entire community team, the head of marketing and several producers at Sega have recently made public that they are in New York City on a business trip. Given the huge numbers of staff in New York right now, and their roles, this is a potentially huge announcement which will have an impact over Sonic as a brand.

I can only begin to speculate what might be getting shown, but following so soon after hedgehog day which saw no announcements or even a Blog entry from Sega, the timing makes this more significant for Sonic fans.

As always, we will keep you upto date with news as and when we get it.

Thanks to SSMB member SweeCrew for the tip & screen cap.


This will either...

A. Be the breath of freash air sonic needed with a new good game to follow.

or

B. The most god awful thing Sega has ever done.

You know Sega... I'm actually in the camp of players that just wants you to drop the blue blur entirely. He had a good run, but it's clear you have no idea what your doing anymore. Sonic Generations and colors was a sign of hope... but then Lost World happened... Ehh maybe it's time to just accept that the brand will never be what it once was. Time to find his successor. And maybe focus on old brands that have potential. Like a new Jet Set game or Shenmue 3 or hell even Vector-man and virtual-On (especially Virtual-On).

Either way, it's looking like Crash all over again. -_- This is not a good year for old Sonic fans like myself.


Also good god Sega, WHAT DID YOU DO TO KNUCKLES! ;_; (you'll see what I mean in the link above)

[phil_]

And maybe focus on old brands that have potential. Like a new Jet Set game or Shenmue 3 or hell even Vector-man and virtual-On (especially Virtual-On).Vector-man doesn't really have a place anymore, given that we live in a post-Halo world. The transforming is a thing, yes, but that's just a small gimmick to keep him afloat in the most over-saturated genre on the market for the past ten years.

Now, virtual-On, if they could figure out a way to put it on tablets, that could make cash. Make it so you have to wait for your robot to repair after fighting, or spend money to repair it immediately, and Sega stays a company for another fiscal quarter.

[Flarecobra]

So we just ended the "Year of Luigi", and now this...

Sorry if I don't get excited.

[Bum Bill Bee]

Ohhhhh, yes, I had heard about this like 2 or 3 months ago. I thought thye were just launching some new cartoon series?

Oh day-mn, it was back in October when I first heard it! (http://kyrtuck.deviantart.com/favourites/55111628?offset=72#/art/Boom-the-Shenanigans-404839843?_sid=465f8401)

Well anyway Kyanbu, yes my initial reaction to the new Knuckles was identical to yours, but I'm pretty open minded and receptive when I want to be, and I say if Mario can keep active for so long on mostly party games then Sonic can still exist through bunches of hit or miss expiriments.

[Bells]

Remember the ''fairy tails project'' that gave us Arabian nights sonic and King Arthurs Sonic and the proceeded to the Colors-Generations-Unleashed trifecta of ''meh'' ?

So... what i think this is, is Sega picking a bunch of darts and shooting them anywhere to see what sticks. Specially now that Nintendo is going mobile and Mario seems to be in a lower point of a curve that still hangs miles up high above Sonic's head...

[Doc ock rokc]

Yeah I'll just hold my opinions for when it comes out.

I will say this however Sonic has lost all his charm on me. Now i don't mind some innovation every once and a while but to push sonic back up to the top you'll need a game above the quality of those around. Possibly harking back to the "classical" aspects that popularized sonic along side cutting out all the "Fuzzy friends" that keep contaminating all the games.

I don't know what to do to make sonic right but I know damn well Sega is fighting an up hill battle to win it's fans back.

[Bells]

0_1iwwR8sHU

There, you get the idea... cue in the ''Guile go Fast'' memes!


NRprvD5J-YA

Ladies and gentlemen, the new sonic game and franchise reboot... exclusive to WiiU and 3DS

because that's not an announced death sentence....

[Grandmaster_Skweeb]

I just noticed that sonic and tails' shoes are all taped up. Perhaps if the franchise wasn't so pants-on-head stupid now they could afford proper shoes.

[Kyanbu The Legend]

So far Amy isn't completely useless and the gameplay is going in a good direction. It all comes down to the execution. And rather or not they'll mess up like they did with Lost World.


What I'm saying is, it's not the train wreak I feared it be in concept. now it comes down to controls, level design, and music. And we already know Egg head's gonna be pretty damn fugly... but I can live with that. Also apparently this new designed sonic is similar to the riders Sonic. In that he's not replacing modern sonic. Just a tie in game for the CG cartoon and it's universe.

[synkr0nized]

The artwork in the announcement seemed to suggest Boom, the game and television series whose trailers were revealed today, so I just merged the two threads.

Fortunately y'all posted in them in such a way the conversation paths didn't interrupt each other.


I don't know what this means for Sonic fans. A game+show release suggests that Sega is quite serious about this, but I can't help but feel the time for video game cartoons has long passed.

[Kyanbu The Legend]

I can't sit through Sonic SATam...

I can sit through Sonic X 4kids dub, and the Adventures of Sonic the hedgehog. But Satam? Can't do it, I just can't do it.


Which is strange considering I use to love that show as a kid.

[Aldurin]

The biggest thing that throws me off is that the environments look like something out of a Ratchet and Clank game . . . then I see the Sonic characters and remember the WiiU/3DS logos and my hopes are crushed.

I have mixed feelings on this, since the CEO of Big Red Button Entertainment did work on each of Naughty Dog's franchises (a good sign) but "a senior team of proven and passionate industry veterans looking to contribute to our independent culture" (quoted from their about (http://brbent.com/about/) page) could really do with a better franchise or even a brand new IP to start off with. Trying to be "the company that fixed Sonic" is like trying to be the company that has an idea they think can make into something that competes with Blizzard right off the bat.

[Grandmaster_Skweeb]

I don't know what this means for Sonic fans. A game+show release suggests that Sega is quite serious about this, but I can't help but feel the time for video game cartoons has long passed.

Sega has been serious about Sonic for as far as I can remember. Not that it has gotten them anywhere beyond a constant stream of jokes and disappointment.

The time has long since passed for it to fade away gracefully. It just needs to end.

[Doc ock rokc]

Looking at the TV clip it seems rather...Robotic in it's animation. I mean I understand it is a TV show budget but tails and sonic seemed to be so robotic for a few scenes...The weird thing is the "Burnbot", Sonic and Eggman moved rather realistically and fluidly at times making me think that maybe the animation was rushed to present...I don't know but they'll have to work on that.

I don't know how I feel about the game though. 3d sonic platformers haven't been anything of quality....Hopefuly the Ex insomniac crew knows what to do.

[Bells]

i still feel that the only path proper for a sonic game is that of a Rhythm Platformer with multiple paths on each stage. Keep the speed, keep the cinematic cameras, keep the flow, but get gameplay.

Unfortunately that sounds much more like a tablet game than a console game... but there you go.

[rpgdemon]

I hate those shoes.

Why is there tape all over them? Why are there a few random sticks taped on top of them?

Aside from that, I'm still mulling over what I think of this.

[Bells]

http://i60.tinypic.com/4gggfn.jpg

The exact point of the trailer where i went ''that ain't looking right...''

Gotta Nitpick fast!!!

[Grandmaster_Skweeb]

I hate those shoes.

Why is there tape all over them? Why are there a few random sticks taped on top of them?

Aside from that, I'm still mulling over what I think of this.

tape is the new zipper.

[Marc v4.0]

He's a hedgehog that can run at super-sonic speeds. The only problem I have with the design is that it highlights that talking, strange-colored giant animals don't have a proper fashion sense, which should surprise no one at all.

[Locke cole]

...Why is anyone surprised that it's exclusive to Nintendo systems?

Have we forgotten the three-game exclusive deal that was announced when Lost World was announced? Lost World, Sochi, and this make three.

I'm a bit miffed that the gameplay looks nothing like Lost World. Lost World had issues in excecution, and in boss difficulty, but it had some potential for the future. That said, this is a spin-off, so whatever.

Excited to have more playable characters again. And for Tails's ray gun.

[Kyanbu The Legend]

I think it's more that the WiiU's reputation is so bad some people just want Nintendo and/or the WiiU to die already.

Which will be a self fulling prophecy if they keep complaining every time the WiiU gets games and must have titles.

[Aerozord]

I saw the trailer for the tie in show. Has potential, writing and voice acting seemed good but the animation was sub-par. The style is also meh. Every animated Sonic series had a great aesthetic that fit with its tone from the surreal look of Adventure to the dark and gritty SatAM. This one is, I mean its consistent but feels so generic.

[Locke cole]

What amuses me is how obsolete the rest of the cast makes Sonic look.

Knuckles can punch stuff and burrow underground.
Tails can fly and now packs a raygun.
Amy has her hammer, as always, which can now be used to hook onto poles and stuff.
Sonic... can grab rails with his hand to slide down.

Oi, Sonic! That's just grinding again, but with a different limb! Get some new material, man.

[Grandmaster_Skweeb]

I think it's more that the WiiU's reputation is so bad some people just want Nintendo and/or the WiiU to die already.

The wii-u really isn't the problem 'cause it's a pretty solid piece of machinery. The big problem is that the wii-u is subjected to nintendo being a bunch of colossal fucking idiots every chance they get. They could've turned things around with the wii-u if it..y'know..wasn't called the wii-u and was marketed properly. And if nintendo wasn't so gung-ho on snubbing third party support.

Nintendo seems to want to bake an idiot cake and have the whole thing to themselves. There's only so many times the head honcho can cut his paycheck as a good faith publicity stunt. The quirky glue eating cabbage scented but loveable moron shtick ain't workin well with them much anymore.

I don't regret buying a wii-u, but goddamn nintendo needs to get its shit together.

[Locke cole]

I agree specifically that it needs to be marketed much better.

[rpgdemon]

I saw the trailer for the tie in show. Has potential, writing and voice acting seemed good but the animation was sub-par. The style is also meh. Every animated Sonic series had a great aesthetic that fit with its tone from the surreal look of Adventure to the dark and gritty SatAM. This one is, I mean its consistent but feels so generic.

What stood out to me the most was the animation of Sonic jumping up to knock the big boulders down. That little animation there looked so terrible, between the oddly floaty jump, and then the way that the boulders fell felt very wrong.

[Aerozord]

I was mostly bugged by the running animation. He's supposed to be moving at hundreds of miles and hour but it looks more like a brisk jog

[Kyanbu The Legend]

I was mostly bugged by the running animation. He's supposed to be moving at hundreds of miles and hour but it looks more like a brisk jog

I noticed it too and will admit it looks jarring. But on the other hand hundreds of miles per hour would be Sonic's idea of a relaxing jog. lol