The GHZ Forum

This year, 2011, is the anniversary, so we're focusing on the celebration title. But moving forward to 2012, Sonic will still be going, so I'd hope to provide Episode 2 then. It was always the plan. We knew about the anniversary year, and Generations was planned way in advance. It was always our plan to release Episode 2 after Generations.

Originally Posted by Shade Vortex:
Also, he confirmed CD was retrofitted to take place after Sonic 3 & Knuckles and before Sonic 4 Episode 1. He said the original developers of CD never put it in any specific place in the timeline, so they decided to say that it's before Sonic 4.

He also told me that when Sonic CD is released and Sonic 4 Episode 2 is announced, there'll be a trailer where Sonic escapes from his detour. Here's a bit of explanation on that. See, in all the Sonic 4 trailers, Sonic is chasing Eggman from the left of the screen to the right. In the Sonic CD trailer, there's a signpost instead, and when he hits it, he takes a detour and does the story of Sonic CD. Once his CD adventure is over, his detour ends, and he goes onto Sonic 4 Episode 2 (I guess for story sake, E1 is being skipped? He said the next trailer would have his detour end by him going to S4E2).

Also, he confirmed the US soundtrack is not currently planned for use in the full release, due to licensing issues, but they are trying to work around that and come up with a solution for us fans, someone suggested that if it's monetary issues, they could have the US soundtrack as DLC, which sounds like a good idea to me.

He also said that Sonic 4 "will never" use the Retro Engine, because the codebase is incompatible with the Sonic 4 engine, which they are still using for S4E2 (though probably with tweaks, since he says they are working to make it better and resolve complaints).

Patrick Riley was there, and he has a message for you, Taxman.
Shut up.
His words. I asked him about the S2 spindash switching and he said that feature could be taken out before release if it's found to break the game, and explained features get cut all the time during development, so developers shouldn't talk about features during development when they're not supposed to. I think he said something about leaving an email about that.

Neo wrote:Things end up turning a bit complicated when the timeline splits in Sonic Adventure 2, with one timeline having the moon remain intact and the other being a string of crappy Game Boy Advance games.

Farmer wrote:And while we're at it, when abouts are the games actually set? Station Square looks like a standard modern city, whereas Riders had a future city with hoverboards.

-It’s commonly understood that Sonic 2, Sonic 3 and Sonic and Knuckles form what is called “The Death Egg Trilogy” because of the overarching story of Eggman’s Death Egg across the titles. Sonic CD was a self-contained adventure that hovered around that area with the most popular belief to be between Sonic 1 and Sonic 2, despite no true concrete evidence.

- Sonic 4 is trying to bridge all of them together more. It’s not trying to give Sonic CD a concrete place in the timeline, just say that “It happened prior to Sonic 4: Episode 1.” It does not mean Sonic CD is immediately before Sonic 4: Episode 1 and after Sonic 3 and Knuckles.

-The events of Sonic CD are important to Episode 2. You can see Metal Sonic in the ending. The idea is you’ll see how Metal Sonic comes back after his destruction in Sonic CD and his return. (Knuckles Chaotix unavailable for comment.)

-Sega is supportive on Christian “The Taxman” Whitehead’s Retro Engine, calling it “a really good piece of technology.”

-“You’ve got to work within the confines of what a publisher is and what a publisher does in order to get all the benefits as well. We as a publisher will get the benefits from working with really talented developers, and developers on the flip side get the benefits of working with a publisher and all the things and all the exposure they get and they can bring to the table, as well as working on really big brands, like Sonic.”

- On Metal Sonic: “He’s appeared in some of these [games], but we’ve never made him so integral to that continuity. We’ve had him back, but no one ever explained how he comes back after CD. He’s just there. So, we’re going make sure that we fill in some of these really nice… I almost think of it like Star Wars, right? We’re going to go back and explain this really cool era that was the Clone Wars? We’re going to go back and explain this really cool era that was the classic experience, and show you guys some really fun stuff.”

-With regards to Sonic 2 Spindash and the “HD Filter”: “Stay tuned.” He doesn’t want to confirm anything until details are more concrete. However, a filter will be present.

-On Sonic CD not being on 3DS, Vita: “We never really intended to release it yet for the Playstation Vita, or the Playstation Go, or the Nintendo 3DS… those were never really on the table. We were always talking about, ‘It was either digital console or mobile devices.’

- He’s unable to comment on why the game isn’t on WiiWare.

-The U.S. Soundtrack will not be included at this time due to licensing issues. However, there’s a couple of more surprises to be revealed later down the road.

The trailers have nothing to do with the continuity of the games. They’re their own thing designed by Balough. The ‘detour’ talked about previously is Sonic going to the past so players can relive Sonic CD and understand its events and references in Sonic 4: Episode 2.

On Metal Sonic: “He’s appeared in some of these [games], but we’ve never made him so integral to that continuity. We’ve had him back, but no one ever explained how he comes back after CD.

gr4yJ4Y wrote:Sonic 1 is the first of the Genesis games.
Tails isn't around during Sonic 1.
In Sonic 2, Tails is there.
In Sonic CD, Tails isn't around.

Sonic CD takes place between Sonic 1 and 2.

G.Silver wrote:

On Metal Sonic: “He’s appeared in some of these [games], but we’ve never made him so integral to that continuity. We’ve had him back, but no one ever explained how he comes back after CD.

I always just assumed Robotnik fixed him. How hard is that?