Monthly Archives

October 2015

Community

SEGA Hosting Official Lost World Community Event in London, October 31st

soniclostworld271015

Sonic Lost World is right around the corner for those that don’t own a Wii U – trusting of course that they do have a PC and a Steam account – and it seems that SEGA is pulling off at least one official community event this year after all. Summer of Sonic it ain’t, but SEGA Europe is going to be hosting a relatively small community open day at London’s Loading Bar on Saturday, October 31st.

The event starts at 14:00, finishes at 20:00 and you must be at least 18 to enter – alcohol will be present, this being the Loading bar after all. Visitors will be able to play the new version of the game ahead of it’s general release on November 2nd, as well as get the chance to meet Dan Sheridan, the new European community manager. There’ll be a chance to win prizes, presumably from some form of challenge involving the game itself, though this isn’t clarified. The first fifty people to turn up to the event will receive goodie bags, apparently again featuring that Sonic hat. Yes, the same one as Summer of Sonic 2011.

Tickets are limited, so grab one from the event page here. You can find the Loading Bar at 97 Stoke Newington Rd London, London N16 8BX, but the map on the event page is probably easier.

I’m starting to wonder how many of those Sonic hats were or are still being made.

Community, Fan Works

Sonic Amateur Games Expo Starts Dec. 18

CldwEXn
With the 2015 iteration of the Sonic Hacking Contest now in the rear view mirror, those who missed the chance to enter can instead opt to enter the Sonic Amateur Games Expo.
Billed as a platform for amateur game developers to showcase their projects, the event offers an open invitation for anyone developing a game to register and give it exposure, even if it has nothing to do with Sonic or Sega.
Historically, SAGE focused on a week-long celebration and exposition of these games, and has featured guests such as MAGfest maestro Dominic “Andross Guy” Cerquetti and Mike Pollock. Events include entertaining activities such as Bad Fanfic Readings or a Dr. Eggman Voice Contest as judged by the good doctor himself. In between, people are invited to run a radio station or to stream shows to the community.
For a fully detailed list of guidelines for registration to stream or to submit a game, hit up this link. The last day to register is Dec. 11.

Arcade Games, Game News

SegaSonic Popcorn Shop Dumped


Recently, Waku Waku Sonic Patrol Car finally made its way onto MAME thanks to the work and funds of some pretty cool individuals. I ended the article with a little bit of a rib saying that SegaSonic Popcorn Shop should be the next game dumped.
Now that one can be marked off the list because it too has now been dumped and should be hitting MAME. The main notable note is that this game also operates on MegaDrive-type hardware named the SEGA C2. It also curiously comes with an English switch, meaning there is a possibility the game came to the West in limited numbers, or at least was planned to.
800px-Segasonic-pop-corn-shop3You won’t find much of a game here since this was more a little video demo that played as the “player” waited for the selected popcorn to be finished. The cabinet did have button and a crank to distract the player, but it didn’t particularly matter if you played or not. Naturally, emulating it won’t yield much unless you have a microwave near your general vicinity and some flavoring agents (salt, butter or curry, if you want to keep the authenticity of the machine.)
But this could make for a neat arcade board to setup at home for the more dedicated.
The story is pretty simple: Sonic and Tails want popcorn, Eggman wants to bludgeon Sonic with a hammer (because that’s his way of saying he wants some too or something), Eggman steals popcorn as it pops, Sonic blows up the machine and roasts Eggman, because he’s a jerk and doesn’t share. Enjoy those calories.
So that now makes two of the rare three obscure arcade Sonic titles dumped and preserved on the Internet. That basically leaves the most obscure of them left: SegaSonic Cosmo Fighter Galaxy Patrol.
Much like with Waku Sonic, I encourage those that want to or are interested in arcade game preservation to look into sending in donations to the dumpers (as it’s usually not cheap to do this) or join up communities that specialize in preservation.
Full disclosure: I’m not taking any credit for this happening, but it does amuse me.

Game News

New Sonic Xtreme Release Brings 150 New Levels


Sonic Xtreme has been seeing quite the resurgence as of late, but this takes the cake for the most impressive release to date.
Forum member Andrew75 announced the release of never before seen iteration of Xtreme head programmer Ofer Alon’s V037 NV1. This is a PC port created by Jollyroger and it packs a staggering 150 stages to play around with, most of which never before seen. Andrew does mention that a number of these stages are simply just reskins of other stages in the list, but with either new textures or with some setting changed for testing. Most of these are just test levels after all.
For a full breakdown on changes and download links, direct your favorite point and clicking device to this little bit of text.

Community, Fan Works, Site News

Sonic Hacking Contest 2015 Voting Now Open

SHC2015_LOGO[UPDATE: The SHC site seems to be overloaded! For now, hang out in the IRC channel provided below for as-they-happen updates.]
Rise and shine, Retro. Chances are if you’re reading this, you’re already groaning that another work week has come in this hamster wheel called life. But that’s fine, because there are several new hacks waiting for you to get your digits all over.
If you swing on by the Sonic Hacking Contest 2015’s website, you now have a selection of titles from some of the Sonic Scene’s more technically inclined to try out and evaluate. While you can play the games without restriction, voting does require a Sonic Retro or an SSRG account, so try to snag one by Saturday if you want to guarantee your vote.
If you’re not about that, you can enjoy a week of streams, with one kicking off in a less than 20 minutes. These streams will let you see some of the community’s finest play the games for you to watch and just hang out with fellow fans. Fan-favorites MegaGWolf and SomecallmeJohnny also return, with a music workshop hosted by DalekSam Saturday, if you’re interested in learning how to create songs for games. The schedule is as follows:

5pm BST / 12pm EDT to 7pm BST / 2pm EDT – Monday to Friday: Donnie
7pm BST / 2pm EDT to 9pm BST / 4pm EDT – Monday, Wednesday and Friday: Spanner
9pm BST / 4pm EDT to 12am BST / 7pm EDT – Monday to Friday: MegaGWolf
12am BST / 7pm EDT to 3am EDT / 10pm BST – Monday to Friday: SomecallmeJohnny
5pm BST / 12pm EDT to 7pm BST / 2pm EDT on Saturday: DalekSam Music Workshop
7pm BST / 2pm EDT to 11pm BST / 6pm EDT on Saturday: Nova
7pm GMT / 3pm EDT to 9pm GMT / 5pm EDT (clock change on Sunday): Results Show

So come on by and relax in the Sonic Hacking Contest’s IRC. Just point your favorite client (or mibbit) to irc.badnik.net #shc2015.

Animation

Sonic Boom is getting a second season

iambeingnaggedaboutaboooomshadow
The second season of Sonic Boom (the TV show, not the SatAM episode) has gone into production, at least according to French website Mediakwest. This was announced today at the MIPCOM trade show by LER, the distributor of the series outside of the US and Asia (not including Japan). The amount of new episodes that are being produced is unknown, but if it’s the same amount as the first season we’ll be getting another 52 episodes.
The first season has already finished airing in France at this point, with the US only having to catch up to the last six episodes. The season finale will feature the first appearance of Shadow on the show, which I’m sure Mike Pollock is overjoyed about.
[Via TSSZ News]

Game News

SEGA to port more of their past games to PC “in the coming months and years”

Steam
So while Sonic Lost World coming to PC next month is neat, the news did not stop there. SEGA announced what could be considered bigger news in a single paragraph hidden within the press release: that it’s not the only game they’re porting to PC.

“We’re delighted to be able to bring Sonic Lost World to PC.” Said John Clark, VP of Commercial Publishing for SEGA Europe; “This is the latest in a string of high quality PC ports of past SEGA titles that we will be building on in the coming months and years.”

People have been requesting SEGA to port various games to PC including Vanquish, Resonance of Fate and Skies of Arcadia for quite some time now. It sounds like they may have been listening to those requests. Of course they could also be porting Sonic games like Sonic Colours or the underappreciated Sonic Unleashed.
They should really prioritize porting Jet Set Radio Future though.
[Source: Gamasutra]

Game News

Sonic Lost World No Longer Wii U Exclusive, Coming to PC on November 2nd

Lost World PC
The once Wii U exclusive Sonic Lost World is coming to PC through Steam. It’ll be released on November 2nd and you’ll get the excellent Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed if you pre-purchase it. The NiGHTS themed DLC will be included, though it seems doubtful that we’ll be getting the Nintendo-themed DLC as well. Not until it’s inevitably modded in anyway.
You can pre-purchase the game on Steam here for $29.99/£19.99/€27.99. The Steam description touts that it’ll have new features like 60 FPS gameplay (except it already was 60 FPS on Wii U… oops), HD resolution support, full gamepad and keyboard support, and all of the Steam features like achievements and cloud saving.
Really the most exciting potential feature is the one that isn’t listed: mods. Like with Sonic Generations, there’s the potential for various mods like character model swaps or improved graphics. So hopefully people will be making a decent amount of those.
Also Gene wanted me to plug his review of the original Wii U version, so you can read that here.
[Source: Gematsu]
Update: The price that was mentioned in the article used to be incorrect, and Sonic community manager RubyEclipse has since clarified what the actual pricing is supposed to be on our forums. This article has been changed to reflect that.

 

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