7 ms·

Sonic Robo Blast 2: a 3D open-source Sonic the Hedgehog fangame built on Doom

150 points by bpierre 5y ago

29athrowaway 5y ago
The problem with projects like these is that once they become popular, they get a cease and desist letter and they're forced to stop. This means that the effort behind this game will be in vain just because they decided to use trademarked elements of the Sonic franchise. An example of what to do instead is this StarFox-inspired game that does not use any elements from the StarFox franchise: https://exzodiac.net/ https://exzodiac.net/ . By respecting intellectual property, they can publish and monetize their game. I am not affiliated with that project.
- yaseer 5y ago
  I agree that's the norm, however, Sega's attitude to Sonic fangames seems to be the exception that proves the rule. They are surprisingly receptive to the community, and in the case of Christian Whitehead, began to contract him for ports, and then eventually a Sega-approved, fan-made game; Sonic Mania. [0] https://kotaku.com/sega-takes-shot-at-nintendo-encourages-fans-to-keep-ma-1786527246 https://kotaku.com/sega-takes-shot-at-nintendo-encourages-fa... [1] https://screenrant.com/sonic-hedgehog-fan-games-sega-response-legal-allowed/ https://screenrant.com/sonic-hedgehog-fan-games-sega-respons... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_Whitehead https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_Whitehead
- hnlmorg 5y ago
  StarFox is Nintendo and they're famously aggressive in protecting their IP. Sonic, however, is owned by Sega who are famously laid back about fans using building stuff like this. In fact the Sega game Sonic Mania (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sonic_Mania https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sonic_Mania) was made by fans after Sega contacted them to work on a Sonic 25th anniversary game based on the quality of those fans work on their hacked ROMs.
  - 29athrowaway 5y ago
    That's a good outcome but Sega can change their stance at any moment. And they still have to like the game to let you publish it.
    - hnlmorg 5y ago
      > That's a good outcome but Sega can change their stance at any moment They could. But they've already had a long history of not doing that. So while the risk is there, it is definitely less risky than doing it with (for example) Nintendo IP. And to be honest I don't consider "Sega might change their minds" as a good enough reason not to do something. Intellectual property laws are already broken enough without suggesting people shouldn't engage with assets from the few companies that are more generous to their fans, just in case those companies change their mind. That feels like a senseless loss to me. > And they still have to like the game to let you publish it. While they are releasing the source, assets and some precompiled binaries for free, I don't think it's fair to say it's being "published" because generally when that term is used with regards to gaming it means something a lot different to releasing a project on GitLab. Semantics aside there's always going to be risk with a fan projects. However suggesting they release with original assets misses the point of these projects. They're exist because of the parent project not in spite of it. Sure they could release an original game with the same mechanics but different assets, however the point of this is a re-imagining of Sonic...specifically Sonic. Releasing this with original assets would undermine the point that this is intended to be a Sonic game (albeit an unofficial one). It's a little like asking a Queen tribute act to play original music. The point that band was formed was to cover Queen's music. I do understand that music royalties solves this problem, somewhat, so the analogy isn't water tight. But I hope you understand the sentiment behind it. To go back to the StarFox example you gave in your original post, the aim of that project was to publish a commercial game rather than something for fan service. So the aims are different between that and this Sonic game (and this is also why I made the distinction about this Sonic game not being "published" even though technically speak it is).
- ArclightMat 5y ago
  Well, this thing has been in development since 1998![0] Furthermore, SEGA has historically been very lenient with the Sonic community, where you can see prototypes of the games out in the wild being discussed [1], a yearly fangaming/ROM hacking contest [2][3] and a lot more. And of course you have 16-bit remakes and Sonic Mania, where former modders ended up being scouted by SEGA to work on official games. While SEGA could change their instance some day, I believe the current situation is beneficial to them, as even their marketing team (i.e the official Sonic twitter) is made up of former fandom members. [0] https://wiki.srb2.org/wiki/Versions https://wiki.srb2.org/wiki/Versions [1] https://hiddenpalace.org/News/Dreams_Come_True:_Sonic_1_(MD)_Prototype https://hiddenpalace.org/News/Dreams_Come_True:_Sonic_1_(MD)... [2] https://sonicretro.org/2021/10/18/shc-2021-the-results-are-in/ https://sonicretro.org/2021/10/18/shc-2021-the-results-are-i... [3] https://sagexpo.org/ https://sagexpo.org/
- leonidasv 5y ago
  I would like to point that SRB2 is already somewhat "popular". It's been in development since at least 1999 and has an enormous community. I remember playing it online around 2006 and, at that time, the game already had a big community: I quickly found non-US/Europe servers filled with human players. Sega may change its mind any time, of course, but it won't be just because the project got popular: for its niche, it's already.
Ghast 5y ago
Great game for a quick LAN party. The licence is interesting, as Sega seem to not have any copyright, but the trademarks, such as Sonic and Tails, are retained. So it mostly operates like free software, but if you wanted to sell it, you'd have to remove the trademarked elements.
VVVExobyte 5y ago
Built on WHAT?
- flatiron 5y ago
  Ha. Give it a try it very good.
- birracerveza 5y ago
  Doom has some pretty crazy stuff built on it. Just the other day I saw Doom Shinobi[1], which is impressive but there's far more impressive stuff by far, SRB2 being one of them, and another one being... Sonic Robo Blast 2 Kart[2]. Pretty insane how far people can take the engine. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ec6FHhHDII https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ec6FHhHDII [2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gAqQ68-Cx0w https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gAqQ68-Cx0w
  - AdmiralAsshat 5y ago
    This is the power of a well-known, well-written, open-source engine. It was best-in-class when it was released ~30 years ago. It still works, and hobbyist gamers don't care if the graphics are a little antiquated.
- qbasic_forever 5y ago
  zdoom/gzdoom are really full-featured 3D engines now. They can scale down to play original Doom content, but they also support full 3D models, colored lighting, sloped surfaces, and even room over room. The reason to use a doom engine like this is that level creation is still a 2D draw out each sector task, which is a lot simpler and easier to pick up vs. modern engine's fully immersive 3D modeled level creation.
Kaze404 5y ago
And let's not forget SRB2Kart, probably the best Mario Kart game :p https://wiki.srb2.org/wiki/SRB2Kart https://wiki.srb2.org/wiki/SRB2Kart
- bennysomething 5y ago
  What is this??? I've never seen it before? Is it running of half life source engine?
  - adamrezich 5y ago
    same (gz)DOOM engine
    - bennysomething 5y ago
      Seriously? The videos make it look like it's running on s proper 3d engine.
      - Kaze404 5y ago
        Yeah, it's hard to believe at first. In case you're curious, here's the source code https://git.do.srb2.org/KartKrew/Kart-Public https://git.do.srb2.org/KartKrew/Kart-Public
- pasquinelli 5y ago
  srb2:kart is the real shit.
- aquova 5y ago
  I like SRB2, but I love SRB2Kart. It has a huge amount of levels and a vibrant modding community (mods for a mod of a Doom mod...)
sirwhinesalot 5y ago
This is the closest thing to a 3D version of classic Sonic gameplay I've ever seen. The 3D games (starting on the Dreamcast) might as well be an unrelated series to the Mega Drive originals. It plays surprisingly well, would have been amazing to have had a game like this in the Saturn days. There's a fan made tech demo called Sonic Z-Treme (a reimagining of the unreleased Sonic X-Treme) which shows how well the Saturn hardware can handle a Sonic style game. Would be love to see the awesome level design of Robo Blast 2 on that engine.
- hnlmorg 5y ago
  There are 3D Sonic games on the Saturn: + Sonic R + Sonic Jam I don't like Sonic R personally but some Sega / Sonic fans think it has an unfair reputation. However technical issues and game play aside, it's definitely a 3D Sonic . While most people will remember Sonic Jam for the Mega Drive era games that featured on it, Sonic Jam did have a 3D level used to select the different content in the package and that 3D level was the prototype for one of the failed attempts to bring a 3D Sonic to the Saturn. I also think it's worth highlighting this projects namesake too: Sonic 3D Blast. While it's isometric rather than "3D" it is definitely more sympathetic to the 2D Sonic games (which is unsurprising given Sonic 3D Blast was originally released on the Mega Drive too -- the Saturn release came later). There's also an updated ROM released from one of the developers from Traveller's Tales (the company behind Sonic 3D Blast). Personally though, I do think Sonic Adventure keeps a lot of the original feel too. Albeit you need to look past the City parts of the Adventure Stages. Even 20+ years ago those City levels feels weird. At this point it's also worth mentioning Sonic Generations (PS3 / Xbox 360 era) as that has some very nice moments that could be described as "Mega Drive in HD + 3D".
  - sirwhinesalot 5y ago
    By 3D Sonic I really mean 3D movement with Mega Drive Sonic-style level design. Sonic R is 3D rendered but it's a racing game. Sonic Jam's 3D level is just a level select, not a full game. Sonic 3D Blast is isometric which isn't really it either. Sonic Adventure has lots of different gameplay styles for the different characters, none of which fits classic Sonic (Sonic's levels are too on-rails) Sonic Generations is extremely on-rails, while the classic Sonic levels are classic Sonic in how they play, but including being 2D gameplay :) Sonic Robo Blast 2 is the first game I've seen that: 1) has full 3D movement and 2) classic Sonic exploratory level design.
spywaregorilla 5y ago
A bit tangential but I've never understood old school sonic games. So much of it seems to be blindly running or being funneled through a chaotic level. There's this sense that you have speed and it feels good, but because you don't know what's coming next, it's very easy to lose that speed, which feels really bad. I feel like the intention of these games was to memorize the levels so that you could actually play them quickly. Whereas in a mario game you can generally improv your way through a level on skill alone. I generally only wanted to play through a game once, and sonic always felt very jarring, like the level design forced me to stop because I didn't know there was going to be 3 random reversals and a loop. The good feeling parts were almost autoscrollers. The challenging parts tended to involve sonic moving very slowly with his awkward jump physics. Curious if someone can fill me in on what I was missing. I tried Sonic Mania recently and felt the same general frustration.
- hnlmorg 5y ago
  Most of the games of that era employed memorization as part of the game play because it was an easy way to prolong the life of the game given the hardware limitations of the day. Take your example: > Whereas in a mario game you can generally improv your way through a level on skill alone. The NES Mario's are notorious for being evil to those who haven't learned the levels. There's literal dead ends that will kill you if you chose the wrong path. Even the later SNES titles will have hidden stages that cannot be reached via improv alone.
- hombre_fatal 5y ago
  When I played Sonic 1 and 2 as an adult, I couldn’t tell if it was supposed to be more fun going as fast as possible or slowing down and collecting stuff. Loved the games as a kid, but couldn’t enjoy it as an adult. Sonic 3D Blast however was more fun to me since you’re exploring a level rather than holding right arrow.
  - spywaregorilla 5y ago
    That too. Mario levels tend to be designed such that you have segments where you run through and if you play the intended optimal route you'll collect all the coins. They mark the path. Sonic does this thing where there's just a bunch of rings and you almost certainly won't get all of them.
JoeAltmaier 5y ago
Basing games on engines - a long and fruitful endeavor. My favorite: a Star Treg TNG based level on Unreal Engine called "Run, Neelix, Run"
egypturnash 5y ago
Here is the release trailer for it if you would like to get a vague sense of it in action, since there’s just screenshots on the web page: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Ia097A0pKNM https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Ia097A0pKNM
vhgyu75e6u 5y ago
For those that would like to see how smooth the game can be, I highly encourage to watch the AGDQ speedrun of the game where they explain a lot of mechanics: https://youtu.be/Z41SIqcsJVU https://youtu.be/Z41SIqcsJVU
lostgame 5y ago
Wow. This project is now more than 20 years old. I recall playing this when I was 11(?),12(?). I’m 32 now. My first forum post ever - under this moniker, lostgame - is from their forums 21 years ago. I actually consider SRB2 to be the greatest 3D Sonic game of all time - obviously including SEGA’s poor efforts - due to the fact that it’s the only one that actually successfully managed to convert the Genesis/MD style of Sonic gameplay into 3D, preserving its sense of speed and exploration in ways that Sonic Adventure 1/2, Heroes, Sonic Colours, etc - just never did. Even the widely-heralded ‘best 3D Sonic game’ Sonic Unleashed, spends literally half the game as a beat-em-up instead of an actual Sonic game. I dunno what the hell happened to Sonic after the megadrive days (well, I sorta do, bad management and a crumbling company) - but having grown up with him, and having been a huge fan for a long time, it’s an absolute travesty what happened to him. I’m cringing in Sonic ‘06. The fan community has been - for so long - so much better at producing content than SEGA themselves that SEGA actually just hired the fans to make Sonic Mania. It’s intensely embarrassing - and shows how brutally shitty of a game dev SEGA is internally - when your fans, with no budget; in their spare time - create a game engine that is so much bafflingly better than anything you’ve created in ten years with large budgets. Check out the official GBA port of Sonic 1 vs the fan made version. There’s no excuse for any large company like SEGA to release fundamentally broken software. Especially when one fan with no budget does better in a couple weeks. And Sonic Mania - made by fans - instead of the company that created the IP - ends up being the highest rated game in the series in 15 or so years. Like - wow. Owch. SEGA’s brutal business failures are one of my favourite tech stories. If you haven’t heard about it - check out the hilariously awful mid 90’s period where they released two conflicting 32-bit systems that of course ended up both being total flops and failures. (The Saturn did okay in Japan, but that’s another story.) tl;dr - if your fans make better content than you do as a company, as has been the case with Sonic for years - there is something seriously fucking wrong with your company.
aliswe 5y ago
I guess because Doom is a 2d raycaster engine (with added height) then we cant have multiple platforms over eachother, and certainly not loops? Just like the Duke Nukem 3D engine ... Not that 3D loops would feel anywhere as awesome as the loops in the Sonic heyday. That time is not going back...
- rasz 5y ago
  Did you mean unlike Duke Nukem 3D engine? Duke used portals, and even supported slopes, albeit quite surprisingly slope calculations performed floating point math making Duke 3D the first game requiring FPU for smooth play (5 months before Quake). Any time you see slope on the screen in Duke 3D on an FPUless system your FPS will tank. NexGen Nx586 is the best example, a 90MHz Pentium level CPU dropping down to 10fps on first level of the game (roof with sloped vents).
- qbasic_forever 5y ago
  gzdoom has portal support for doing room over room: https://zdoom.org/wiki/Portal https://zdoom.org/wiki/Portal With stacked sectors you can make truly room over room 3D looking things, check out the walkway on this end of level fight and how the player takes elevators up to it to get powerups, and then back down to fight the enemy wave: https://youtu.be/PjWnVYhzCmQ?t=2450 https://youtu.be/PjWnVYhzCmQ?t=2450
bitwize 5y ago
I'm... kinda indirectly responsible for this. Back when I was a kid I made and released Sonic Doom, a partial conversion WAD that kinda turned you into Sonic, with appropriate music, sounds, and some graphics. The general reaction ranged from "it's cheesy" to "it's blasphemous". Yeah, people took their Sonic deadly seriously, even in the 90s. But it served as the base/inspo that led others to create one of the greatest 3D Sonic games of all time, even better than many of Sega's official releases, so I'm a bit proud of my small contribution to this project.

150 points by bpierre 5y ago

The problem with projects like these is that once they become popular, they get a cease and desist letter and they're forced to stop. This means that the effort behind this game will be in vain just because they decided to use trademarked elements of the Sonic franchise. An example of what to do instead is this StarFox-inspired game that does not use any elements from the StarFox franchise: https://exzodiac.net/ https://exzodiac.net/ . By respecting intellectual property, they can publish and monetize their game. I am not affiliated with that project.

yaseer 5y ago
I agree that's the norm, however, Sega's attitude to Sonic fangames seems to be the exception that proves the rule. They are surprisingly receptive to the community, and in the case of Christian Whitehead, began to contract him for ports, and then eventually a Sega-approved, fan-made game; Sonic Mania. [0] https://kotaku.com/sega-takes-shot-at-nintendo-encourages-fans-to-keep-ma-1786527246 https://kotaku.com/sega-takes-shot-at-nintendo-encourages-fa... [1] https://screenrant.com/sonic-hedgehog-fan-games-sega-response-legal-allowed/ https://screenrant.com/sonic-hedgehog-fan-games-sega-respons... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_Whitehead https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_Whitehead
hnlmorg 5y ago
StarFox is Nintendo and they're famously aggressive in protecting their IP. Sonic, however, is owned by Sega who are famously laid back about fans using building stuff like this. In fact the Sega game Sonic Mania (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sonic_Mania https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sonic_Mania) was made by fans after Sega contacted them to work on a Sonic 25th anniversary game based on the quality of those fans work on their hacked ROMs.
- 29athrowaway 5y ago
  That's a good outcome but Sega can change their stance at any moment. And they still have to like the game to let you publish it.
  - hnlmorg 5y ago
    > That's a good outcome but Sega can change their stance at any moment They could. But they've already had a long history of not doing that. So while the risk is there, it is definitely less risky than doing it with (for example) Nintendo IP. And to be honest I don't consider "Sega might change their minds" as a good enough reason not to do something. Intellectual property laws are already broken enough without suggesting people shouldn't engage with assets from the few companies that are more generous to their fans, just in case those companies change their mind. That feels like a senseless loss to me. > And they still have to like the game to let you publish it. While they are releasing the source, assets and some precompiled binaries for free, I don't think it's fair to say it's being "published" because generally when that term is used with regards to gaming it means something a lot different to releasing a project on GitLab. Semantics aside there's always going to be risk with a fan projects. However suggesting they release with original assets misses the point of these projects. They're exist because of the parent project not in spite of it. Sure they could release an original game with the same mechanics but different assets, however the point of this is a re-imagining of Sonic...specifically Sonic. Releasing this with original assets would undermine the point that this is intended to be a Sonic game (albeit an unofficial one). It's a little like asking a Queen tribute act to play original music. The point that band was formed was to cover Queen's music. I do understand that music royalties solves this problem, somewhat, so the analogy isn't water tight. But I hope you understand the sentiment behind it. To go back to the StarFox example you gave in your original post, the aim of that project was to publish a commercial game rather than something for fan service. So the aims are different between that and this Sonic game (and this is also why I made the distinction about this Sonic game not being "published" even though technically speak it is).
ArclightMat 5y ago
Well, this thing has been in development since 1998![0] Furthermore, SEGA has historically been very lenient with the Sonic community, where you can see prototypes of the games out in the wild being discussed [1], a yearly fangaming/ROM hacking contest [2][3] and a lot more. And of course you have 16-bit remakes and Sonic Mania, where former modders ended up being scouted by SEGA to work on official games. While SEGA could change their instance some day, I believe the current situation is beneficial to them, as even their marketing team (i.e the official Sonic twitter) is made up of former fandom members. [0] https://wiki.srb2.org/wiki/Versions https://wiki.srb2.org/wiki/Versions [1] https://hiddenpalace.org/News/Dreams_Come_True:_Sonic_1_(MD)_Prototype https://hiddenpalace.org/News/Dreams_Come_True:_Sonic_1_(MD)... [2] https://sonicretro.org/2021/10/18/shc-2021-the-results-are-in/ https://sonicretro.org/2021/10/18/shc-2021-the-results-are-i... [3] https://sagexpo.org/ https://sagexpo.org/
leonidasv 5y ago
I would like to point that SRB2 is already somewhat "popular". It's been in development since at least 1999 and has an enormous community. I remember playing it online around 2006 and, at that time, the game already had a big community: I quickly found non-US/Europe servers filled with human players. Sega may change its mind any time, of course, but it won't be just because the project got popular: for its niche, it's already.

Ghast 5y ago

Great game for a quick LAN party. The licence is interesting, as Sega seem to not have any copyright, but the trademarks, such as Sonic and Tails, are retained. So it mostly operates like free software, but if you wanted to sell it, you'd have to remove the trademarked elements.

VVVExobyte 5y ago

Built on WHAT?

flatiron 5y ago
Ha. Give it a try it very good.
birracerveza 5y ago
Doom has some pretty crazy stuff built on it. Just the other day I saw Doom Shinobi[1], which is impressive but there's far more impressive stuff by far, SRB2 being one of them, and another one being... Sonic Robo Blast 2 Kart[2]. Pretty insane how far people can take the engine. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ec6FHhHDII https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ec6FHhHDII [2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gAqQ68-Cx0w https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gAqQ68-Cx0w
- AdmiralAsshat 5y ago
  This is the power of a well-known, well-written, open-source engine. It was best-in-class when it was released ~30 years ago. It still works, and hobbyist gamers don't care if the graphics are a little antiquated.
qbasic_forever 5y ago
zdoom/gzdoom are really full-featured 3D engines now. They can scale down to play original Doom content, but they also support full 3D models, colored lighting, sloped surfaces, and even room over room. The reason to use a doom engine like this is that level creation is still a 2D draw out each sector task, which is a lot simpler and easier to pick up vs. modern engine's fully immersive 3D modeled level creation.

Kaze404 5y ago

And let's not forget SRB2Kart, probably the best Mario Kart game :p https://wiki.srb2.org/wiki/SRB2Kart https://wiki.srb2.org/wiki/SRB2Kart

bennysomething 5y ago
What is this??? I've never seen it before? Is it running of half life source engine?
- adamrezich 5y ago
  same (gz)DOOM engine
  - bennysomething 5y ago
    Seriously? The videos make it look like it's running on s proper 3d engine.
    - Kaze404 5y ago
      Yeah, it's hard to believe at first. In case you're curious, here's the source code https://git.do.srb2.org/KartKrew/Kart-Public https://git.do.srb2.org/KartKrew/Kart-Public
pasquinelli 5y ago
srb2:kart is the real shit.
aquova 5y ago
I like SRB2, but I love SRB2Kart. It has a huge amount of levels and a vibrant modding community (mods for a mod of a Doom mod...)

sirwhinesalot 5y ago

This is the closest thing to a 3D version of classic Sonic gameplay I've ever seen. The 3D games (starting on the Dreamcast) might as well be an unrelated series to the Mega Drive originals. It plays surprisingly well, would have been amazing to have had a game like this in the Saturn days. There's a fan made tech demo called Sonic Z-Treme (a reimagining of the unreleased Sonic X-Treme) which shows how well the Saturn hardware can handle a Sonic style game. Would be love to see the awesome level design of Robo Blast 2 on that engine.

hnlmorg 5y ago
There are 3D Sonic games on the Saturn: + Sonic R + Sonic Jam I don't like Sonic R personally but some Sega / Sonic fans think it has an unfair reputation. However technical issues and game play aside, it's definitely a 3D Sonic . While most people will remember Sonic Jam for the Mega Drive era games that featured on it, Sonic Jam did have a 3D level used to select the different content in the package and that 3D level was the prototype for one of the failed attempts to bring a 3D Sonic to the Saturn. I also think it's worth highlighting this projects namesake too: Sonic 3D Blast. While it's isometric rather than "3D" it is definitely more sympathetic to the 2D Sonic games (which is unsurprising given Sonic 3D Blast was originally released on the Mega Drive too -- the Saturn release came later). There's also an updated ROM released from one of the developers from Traveller's Tales (the company behind Sonic 3D Blast). Personally though, I do think Sonic Adventure keeps a lot of the original feel too. Albeit you need to look past the City parts of the Adventure Stages. Even 20+ years ago those City levels feels weird. At this point it's also worth mentioning Sonic Generations (PS3 / Xbox 360 era) as that has some very nice moments that could be described as "Mega Drive in HD + 3D".
- sirwhinesalot 5y ago
  By 3D Sonic I really mean 3D movement with Mega Drive Sonic-style level design. Sonic R is 3D rendered but it's a racing game. Sonic Jam's 3D level is just a level select, not a full game. Sonic 3D Blast is isometric which isn't really it either. Sonic Adventure has lots of different gameplay styles for the different characters, none of which fits classic Sonic (Sonic's levels are too on-rails) Sonic Generations is extremely on-rails, while the classic Sonic levels are classic Sonic in how they play, but including being 2D gameplay :) Sonic Robo Blast 2 is the first game I've seen that: 1) has full 3D movement and 2) classic Sonic exploratory level design.

spywaregorilla 5y ago

A bit tangential but I've never understood old school sonic games. So much of it seems to be blindly running or being funneled through a chaotic level. There's this sense that you have speed and it feels good, but because you don't know what's coming next, it's very easy to lose that speed, which feels really bad. I feel like the intention of these games was to memorize the levels so that you could actually play them quickly. Whereas in a mario game you can generally improv your way through a level on skill alone. I generally only wanted to play through a game once, and sonic always felt very jarring, like the level design forced me to stop because I didn't know there was going to be 3 random reversals and a loop. The good feeling parts were almost autoscrollers. The challenging parts tended to involve sonic moving very slowly with his awkward jump physics. Curious if someone can fill me in on what I was missing. I tried Sonic Mania recently and felt the same general frustration.

hnlmorg 5y ago
Most of the games of that era employed memorization as part of the game play because it was an easy way to prolong the life of the game given the hardware limitations of the day. Take your example: > Whereas in a mario game you can generally improv your way through a level on skill alone. The NES Mario's are notorious for being evil to those who haven't learned the levels. There's literal dead ends that will kill you if you chose the wrong path. Even the later SNES titles will have hidden stages that cannot be reached via improv alone.
hombre_fatal 5y ago
When I played Sonic 1 and 2 as an adult, I couldn’t tell if it was supposed to be more fun going as fast as possible or slowing down and collecting stuff. Loved the games as a kid, but couldn’t enjoy it as an adult. Sonic 3D Blast however was more fun to me since you’re exploring a level rather than holding right arrow.
- spywaregorilla 5y ago
  That too. Mario levels tend to be designed such that you have segments where you run through and if you play the intended optimal route you'll collect all the coins. They mark the path. Sonic does this thing where there's just a bunch of rings and you almost certainly won't get all of them.

JoeAltmaier 5y ago

Basing games on engines - a long and fruitful endeavor. My favorite: a Star Treg TNG based level on Unreal Engine called "Run, Neelix, Run"

egypturnash 5y ago

Here is the release trailer for it if you would like to get a vague sense of it in action, since there’s just screenshots on the web page: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Ia097A0pKNM https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Ia097A0pKNM

vhgyu75e6u 5y ago

For those that would like to see how smooth the game can be, I highly encourage to watch the AGDQ speedrun of the game where they explain a lot of mechanics: https://youtu.be/Z41SIqcsJVU https://youtu.be/Z41SIqcsJVU

lostgame 5y ago

Wow. This project is now more than 20 years old. I recall playing this when I was 11(?),12(?). I’m 32 now. My first forum post ever - under this moniker, lostgame - is from their forums 21 years ago. I actually consider SRB2 to be the greatest 3D Sonic game of all time - obviously including SEGA’s poor efforts - due to the fact that it’s the only one that actually successfully managed to convert the Genesis/MD style of Sonic gameplay into 3D, preserving its sense of speed and exploration in ways that Sonic Adventure 1/2, Heroes, Sonic Colours, etc - just never did. Even the widely-heralded ‘best 3D Sonic game’ Sonic Unleashed, spends literally half the game as a beat-em-up instead of an actual Sonic game. I dunno what the hell happened to Sonic after the megadrive days (well, I sorta do, bad management and a crumbling company) - but having grown up with him, and having been a huge fan for a long time, it’s an absolute travesty what happened to him. I’m cringing in Sonic ‘06. The fan community has been - for so long - so much better at producing content than SEGA themselves that SEGA actually just hired the fans to make Sonic Mania. It’s intensely embarrassing - and shows how brutally shitty of a game dev SEGA is internally - when your fans, with no budget; in their spare time - create a game engine that is so much bafflingly better than anything you’ve created in ten years with large budgets. Check out the official GBA port of Sonic 1 vs the fan made version. There’s no excuse for any large company like SEGA to release fundamentally broken software. Especially when one fan with no budget does better in a couple weeks. And Sonic Mania - made by fans - instead of the company that created the IP - ends up being the highest rated game in the series in 15 or so years. Like - wow. Owch. SEGA’s brutal business failures are one of my favourite tech stories. If you haven’t heard about it - check out the hilariously awful mid 90’s period where they released two conflicting 32-bit systems that of course ended up both being total flops and failures. (The Saturn did okay in Japan, but that’s another story.) tl;dr - if your fans make better content than you do as a company, as has been the case with Sonic for years - there is something seriously fucking wrong with your company.

aliswe 5y ago

I guess because Doom is a 2d raycaster engine (with added height) then we cant have multiple platforms over eachother, and certainly not loops? Just like the Duke Nukem 3D engine ... Not that 3D loops would feel anywhere as awesome as the loops in the Sonic heyday. That time is not going back...

rasz 5y ago
Did you mean unlike Duke Nukem 3D engine? Duke used portals, and even supported slopes, albeit quite surprisingly slope calculations performed floating point math making Duke 3D the first game requiring FPU for smooth play (5 months before Quake). Any time you see slope on the screen in Duke 3D on an FPUless system your FPS will tank. NexGen Nx586 is the best example, a 90MHz Pentium level CPU dropping down to 10fps on first level of the game (roof with sloped vents).
qbasic_forever 5y ago
gzdoom has portal support for doing room over room: https://zdoom.org/wiki/Portal https://zdoom.org/wiki/Portal With stacked sectors you can make truly room over room 3D looking things, check out the walkway on this end of level fight and how the player takes elevators up to it to get powerups, and then back down to fight the enemy wave: https://youtu.be/PjWnVYhzCmQ?t=2450 https://youtu.be/PjWnVYhzCmQ?t=2450

bitwize 5y ago

I'm... kinda indirectly responsible for this. Back when I was a kid I made and released Sonic Doom, a partial conversion WAD that kinda turned you into Sonic, with appropriate music, sounds, and some graphics. The general reaction ranged from "it's cheesy" to "it's blasphemous". Yeah, people took their Sonic deadly seriously, even in the 90s. But it served as the base/inspo that led others to create one of the greatest 3D Sonic games of all time, even better than many of Sega's official releases, so I'm a bit proud of my small contribution to this project.