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Retro Spotlight

Community, Fan Works, Interviews

Retro Spotlight: The Sonic Mania LEGO Project


About a year ago, we posted a LEGO themed Sonic Mania project from community member toaster. The goal for any project posted to LEGO’s Ideas site is to reach 10,000 signatures, at which times, the project will be reviewed and determined if the licenses can be obtained and if the project will move forward in any official capacity. Fast forward to today, where the project is creeping ever so close to that goal, having been sign almost 9,000 in just a hair under a year! We spoke with toaster at length about the project, including its inception, inspiration, and the reception so far. Hit the jump to hear what she had to say!

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Fan Works, Interview

Retro Spotlight: SRB2Kart and the Kart Krew – Part One


Sonic Robo Blast 2 has been around for twenty long, eventful years and despite this long development, the community has thrived throughout it all. Mods of all sizes have been the backbone of the project and one of the biggest, most recent mods is none other than SRB2 Kart, which changes the game from a platformer to a kart racer, similar to the Team Sonic Racing game released last month. We had a lengthy correspondence with the team behind the mod, Kart Krew, and like their project, their answers were massive!  After working for ages to compile their answers, we’ve decided to split this particular Spotlight into three separate articles, which will be released in the following weeks. So enjoy part one of this three part series from the Kart Krew and the development of SRB2Kart!
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Fan Works, Interview

Retro Spotlight – Sonic Studio


Level creators are nothing new to video games at large, but throughout the long history of the series, Sonic the Hedgehog has only had one level editor officially released. While long since gone, as PlaySEGA itself has been shut down for several years now, those who played it will likely recall a less than stellar recreation of the original Sonic the Hedgehog with some new sprites thrown in for a fairly limited experience. Enter Lapper, a Sonic Retro user who has been working diligently since 2010 to create a more thorough and consistent level creator based on previous Sonic titles on the Genesis dubbed Sonic Studio (formerly known as Sonic Maker.) We took some time to grill Lapper about his project and what we can expect in the future.
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Community, Interview

Retro Spotlight – Freedom Planet 2

Going on three years now, Freedom Planet launched on Steam after a successful Kickstarter campaign in 2012. For the uninitiated, Freedom Planet drew heavy inspiration from Sonic the Hedgehog, while also adding a huge emphasis on combat and exploration. Fast forward to now, and we’re highly anticipating the release of the sequel, Freedom Planet 2. Sporting a fresh look, new engine, and so much more, GalaxyTrail is looking to up their game significantly. We sat down with Strife, a very active member of the Retro forums, to discuss the sequel, transitioning tools, and much more.
Animation, Fan Works, Interview

Retro Spotlight – The Wrath of Nazo

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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.
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Fan Works

Retro Spotlight – Sonic Incursion

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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.
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