We’ve got two big contests at SAGE this year, one to immortalize your artwork in the greatest unofficial official game of all time, and another to immortalize your game creation skills in shame (and win some cash for Amazon!) Hit the jump for details on both:
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SAGE 2016 has finally launched! Be sure to swing by the interact page after you’ve checked out the booths, and don’t forget to brush up on your gaming skills for RAGE…
We are now one week away from SAGE 2016. At this point in time, the staff is currently twisting knobs, duct taping holes, and looking at the site and going “that should probably hold.” While we continue to get things assembled and in line for SAGE’s comeback, there’s a number of things we’d like to announce and clear up before the 15th.
Character mods, fishing derbies and content restoration are all welcome in the return of the Sonic Hacking Contest for the year of 2016! The contest has been accepting entries for quite awhile. This time however the website has gone live which will mark the home for all entries and streaming personalities showcasing the entries and judging the results.
Remember though, entries are accepted until October 9th. Both longtime contenders and newcomers are always accepted so long as you have an account with us at Sonic Retro or Sonic Stuff Research Group.
I’m still waiting for the ultimate hack for Sonic Lost World to appear, and now that time has come for you to show everyone! Head on over to the new website and good luck to all participants!
![uCy4RHs[2]](https://www.sonicretro.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/uCy4RHs2.gif)
The first incarnation of Nazo Unleashed was released on Newgrounds a little over 10 years ago as of this month. For a lot of fans, seeing Sonic combined with the action of Dragon Ball Z just clicked. Over the years, Aaron Cowdery a.k.a. Chakra-X, has proceeded to release high definition remasters of the original before eventually opening up a Patreon to support his latest endeavor, Sonic: The Wrath of Nazo. We interviewed Chakra-X and several members of the Nazo Unleashed team about the project, their own history, and what we can expect to see in 2019.
Summer Games Done Quick is back again this year, and Wednesday is their Sonic block. You’ll get to see runs of Sonic Colors on Nintendo DS, Sonic Riders, Sonic Adventure 2 Battle and the fan favorite Sonic the Hedgehog (2006).
Summer Games Done Quick is the annual event, like its alternate event Awesome Games Done Quick, is a week-long charity marathon that helps raise money for the Doctors Without Borders. Donating during each run also puts you n for raffles to win prizes. Be sure to tune in, check the schedule and watch how Sonic has gotta go fast.
2.5D might be one of the best ways to blend new with the old. Scenery, characters, objects, everything in a title can take advantage of modern day hardware while still feeling like the games of yesterday. The Sonic series began to take to 2.5D more and more starting with Sonic Unleashed, with the entire “boost trilogy” doing the brunt of the platforming in the 2.5D sections, with the high speed antics in 3D, almost racing-esque segments.
In 2013, a Retro user by the name of Ell678 began work on his own Sonic fan game, one that would be comprised almost entirely in 2.5D by utilizing SonicGDK. Since that point in time, Sonic Incursion has begun to take shape into the extraordinary title we see here today. A huge fan of the early Genesis games, Ell678 felt he could take what he adored about the level design the two games had and put it into something modern while still maintaining a “classic” presentation.
Yesterday Sega Europe announced the SEGA Mega Drive Classics Hub for Steam. Basically it’s a fancy emulator shell that lets you play Mega Drive games in a virtual room. It has the standard features you might expect officially released emulated games to have like save states and visual filters. But outside of that, it’ll have one very interesting sounding feature: Steam Workshop support.
According to Sega’s blog post, the Steam Workshop support is for “modified versions” of the Mega Drive games. You might think that this sounds a lot like they are letting people share ROM hacks, which would be huge news. And it turns out: they are! It was later confirmed on Twitter that you’ll be able to share “custom ROMs” of the games with other Steam users. So yeah, ROM hacks.
It’s no news that Sega is okay with people making and sharing ROM hacks. After all, they haven’t tried to stop us from letting people host them on this site. But to let people share them through an official channel like this has never been done before. More details on how Steam Workshop support will exactly work will be shared next week, but so far this all sounds very promising.
The SEGA Mega Drive Classics Hub will launch on April 28th, and will be released as a free update to the current Mega Drive emulator on Steam. It’ll be compatible with all of the Mega Drive games Sega are selling on Steam, and you’ll be able to make use of the hub if you already own any of them. This of course includes all of the Mega Drive Sonic games that are being sold on Steam.