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[Die Squirrel Die]

In April of 1996, Bernie Stolar, who had jumped ship from Sony to become CEO of SoA, visited Wallis and asked what he needed to help further his chances of getting the game out on time. Wallis met with his team, and decided that the NiGHTS engine would be a huge help, “as we didn’t have time to develop all the tools necessary.” Eager to help, Stolar promised the tools, and delivered with editors and the engine code not long afterward. The problem was that the creator of NiGHTS and the man credited with the creation of Sonic the Hedgehog, Yuji Naka, was not consulted on this, and became very irate, and, according to Stolar, forbade the team from using the engine, even threatening to leave the company if it didn’t happen. The team was back to square one, with two weeks lost developing on an engine that they couldn’t use.

Naka is an asshole.

Why? I've read that account of Sonic Xtreme and considering the only sources are ex-SoA people who worked on the game, it doesn't strike me as the most balanced viewpoint (I like the constant references to 'politics' to give a conspiratorial impression).

I think it's perfectly fair of Naka to be pissed off at SoA for stealing the engine that he and his team had developed. We know that the NiGHTS team were incredibly passionate about the game, going above and beyond what was expected of them. Now imagine your in the same position and someone else comes along, takes your work without even asking your permission, and uses it to develop a game that, given it's brandname, is likely to overshadow your own efforts? You're telling me that you probably wouldn't do the same as Naka? I would find that very suspect.

 

[Broshnat]

Wasn't Naka talking about how cool it would be to do something with Sonic and Mario together in one game? So I wouldn't be surprised if we see SONIC vs MARIO show up at E3 or something.

That would be HUGE

 

[jarrod]

Why? I've read that account of Sonic Xtreme and considering the only sources are ex-SoA people who worked on the game, it doesn't strike me as the most balanced viewpoint (I like the constant references to 'politics' to give a conspiratorial impression).

Particulars aside, thye general opinion does seem to be Naka being an asshole, hard to work with, gigantic ego and often taking credit for what others have done. He drove away Ohshima and Mizuguichi after all.

 

[Die Squirrel Die]

Particulars aside, thye general opinion does seem to be Naka being an asshole, hard to work with, gigantic ego and often taking credit for what others have done. He drove away Ohshima and Mizuguichi after all.

I am aware of the general opinion of him, although having been on the boards a while it's definately something that's grown over time, and I remember this article, when it was originally posted, being a big catalyst for the 'screw Naka' campaign. Not saying he is an angel, hell there is way to much definitely genuine stuff about him to show that, just that if you hear a bad rumour about Naka, it becomes fact in most peoples mind much quicker than if it was about Kojima, Suzuki or Miyamoto etc.

I've never seen anything to corroborate Naka pushing Mizuguchi out, and I remember that conclusion being jumped to and cemented very quickly. Whereas a huge factor like the low commercial viability of his output was swept under the carpet. It strikes me as being far more likely that Mizuguchi wanted to carry on working on more auteur projects, but Sega wanted more mainstream stuff from him. Given Lumines and Meteos I think that the latter is a very distinct possibility.

Developers leave big companies to form new studios all the time, so it just seems a little overzealous to me, to lay all the blame at Naka's feet. Mizuguchi already seemed like a loose cannon to me. Didn't UGA have their offices away from the rest of Sega?

 

[SolidSnakex]

Developers leave big companies to form new studios all the time, so it just seems a little overzealous to me, to lay all the blame at Naka's feet.

I think the conclusion came from putting pieces together. There was never any talk about Mizugichi leaving Sega before he did, and there usually are some sort of rumors that start up when a well known developer is goin to leave. Then you have the whole thing with Naka being an ass to work for. So it just seems very weird that the second Sega decides to merge UGA and Sonic Team, Mizuguchi decides to bail out.

 

[Die Squirrel Die]

I think the conclusion came from putting pieces together. There was never any talk about Mizugichi leaving Sega before he did, and there usually are some sort of rumors that start up when a well known developer is goin to leave. Then you have the whole thing with Naka being an ass to work for. So it just seems very weird that the second Sega decides to merge UGA and Sonic Team, Mizuguchi decides to bail out.

How do we know it wasn't the merger in general and not Naka in particular?

And there are near weekly rumours of Sega people about to jump ship. Most of them revolve around Naka or Suzuki.

It's all very well putting pieces together, but you may not have all info that you think you do.

 

[jarrod]

Not saying he is an angel, hell there is way to much definitely genuine stuff about him to show that, just that if you hear a bad rumour about Naka, it becomes fact in most peoples mind much quicker than if it was about Kojima, Suzuki or Miyamoto etc.

To be fair... how many "bad rumors" have we heard about Kojima, Suzuki or Miyamoto coming from credible sources?

I've never seen anything to corroborate Naka pushing Mizuguchi out, and I remember that conclusion being jumped to and cemented very quickly.

You should visit the Tokyopia boards.

Whereas a huge factor like the low commercial viability of his output was swept under the carpet. It strikes me as being far more likely that Mizuguchi wanted to carry on working on more auteur projects, but Sega wanted more mainstream stuff from him. Given Lumines and Meteos I think that the latter is a very distinct possibility.

I don't, considering Miz was the one who started Astro Boy PS2 and his team went on to make Feel the Magic. Sort of flies in the face of your theory there.

Developers leave big companies to form new studios all the time, so it just seems a little overzealous to me, to lay all the blame at Naka's feet.

Not Naka directly, but Miz wasn't about to go work under him. Sega management was partly to blame, though Naka's reputation didn't help in all likelihood. I think there would've been at least a chance of Miz working under Suzuki, Tsukamoto, Kumagai or Nagoshi.

 

[Die Squirrel Die]

Come on Feel the Magic I can accept as being a bit of a hard sell (although not as much as Rez - get jiggy with a sexy lady >>> wireframe graphics to a marketing person), but Astroboy. It may have bombed but it at least had some semblance of commercial viability given it's licencsed from a classic manga.

 

[jarrod]

Come on Feel the Magic I can accept as being a bit of a hard sell (although not as much as Rez - get jiggy with a sexy lady >>> wireframe graphics to a marketing person), but Astroboy. It may have bombed but it at least had some semblance of commercial viability given it's licencsed from a classic manga.

My point was that Miz was already looking into more commercially viable games... hence that's a pretty poor excuse for him leaving.

 

[Die Squirrel Die]

Who's to say that he was looking into those game and that they weren't pushed on him? It might of just been that the merger was then the final straw that made him say 'screw you guys, I'm going home'.

 

[jarrod]

Who's to say that he was looking into those game and that they weren't pushed on him? It might of just been that the merger was then the final straw that made him say 'screw you guys, I'm going home'.

Okay, but now you're jumping to tons of conclusions to valiate your own "don't jump to conclusions based on rumors" viewpoint. See how easy it is?

 

[Die Squirrel Die]

I was just demonstrating that without solid facts, a lot of stuff is easy to tag onto someone and it'll stick. This whole defending Naka thing was in response to the guy who posted all the evil deeds of Naka, most of which are rumours and conjecture based on those rumours.

Unlike the Naka is a Son of a Bitch brigade, I wasn't presenting my theory as fact, just a possibility.

 

[jarrod]

I was just demonstrating that without solid facts, a lot of stuff is easy to tag onto someone and it'll stick. This whole defending Naka thing was in response to the guy who posted all the evil deeds of Naka, most of which are rumours and conjecture based on those rumours.

Sure... but your own conjecture for arriving at that conclusion isn't based on anything really but pure speculation. At least for evil-Naka, we have rumors about Naka's misdeeds, some even coming from established industry veterans.

Unlike the Naka is a Son of a Bitch brigade, I wasn't presenting my theory as fact, just a possibility.

Sure it's possible... just rather unlikely given the circumstances.

 

[Odnetnin]

Originally Posted by Rahul:
Wasn't Naka talking about how cool it would be to do something with Sonic and Mario together in one game? So I wouldn't be surprised if we see SONIC vs MARIO show up at E3 or something.

That would be HUGE

Nah. That would dilute the Mario brand name to be associated with a subpar license.

 

[D-X]

Originally Posted by Rahul:
Wasn't Naka talking about how cool it would be to do something with Sonic and Mario together in one game? So I wouldn't be surprised if we see SONIC vs MARIO show up at E3 or something.




Nah. That would dilute the Mario brand name to be associated with a subpar license.

Nintendo would never let Mario's brand to be diluted. Hold on...DDR and NBA Street...

 

[SonicMegaDrive]

Originally Posted by Rahul:
Wasn't Naka talking about how cool it would be to do something with Sonic and Mario together in one game? So I wouldn't be surprised if we see SONIC vs MARIO show up at E3 or something.




Nah. That would dilute the Mario brand name to be associated with a subpar license.

 

[D-X]

Rumour has it a Sega employee has said Sonic Heroes 2 is in development. Which raises the questions why isn't it multplatform? Are the Xbox and PS2 versions coming in 2006? They hoped to get the GC version out by 2005, the original was out on GC before the other platforms in US.

 

[Rahul]

Nintendo would never let Mario's brand to be diluted. Hold on...DDR and NBA Street...

Actually DDR and NBA are arguably extremly high profile licenses, so it's just a matter of wondering whether DDR/NBA are diluting Mario or whether it's the other way round ( :lol ?).

Either way, a Sonic vs Mario game would be instant money for both parties. Provided it's good. I could write up a design doc for it off the top of my head that could make use of both characters' unique abilities in an interesting way, so it can't be that hard to produce something that makes money. Something better than just putting Sonic in SSBM, anyway.

 

[Odnetnin]

Actually DDR and NBA are arguably extremly high profile licenses, so it's just a matter of wondering whether DDR/NBA are diluting Mario or whether it's the other way round ( :lol ?).

Either way, a Sonic vs Mario game would be instant money for both parties. Provided it's good. I could write up a design doc for it off the top of my head that could make use of both characters' unique abilities in an interesting way, so it can't be that hard to produce something that makes money. Something better than just putting Sonic in SSBM, anyway.

If its Sonic in a game with Mario.. I want Sonic to be in the INTRO sequence... has his powers taken away/hurt bad by robotnik so we won't have to see him again... and then Mario and Luigi can come and save the day.

sales +1
I don't see why it'd be instant money for Nintendo, their franchise do okay to begin with. Sega'd be the one benefitting with their b-grade license and horrible sales

 

[KiNeSiS]

If its Sonic in a game with Mario.. I want Sonic to be in the INTRO sequence... has his powers taken away/hurt bad by robotnik so we won't have to see him again... and then Mario and Luigi can come and save the day.

sales +1
I don't see why it'd be instant money for Nintendo, their franchise do okay to begin with. Sega'd be the one benefitting with their b-grade license and horrible sales

How dare you spit in the face of a match over a decade in the making!

 

[pilonv1]

Surely it will be a port of Sonic Shuffle or something? Especially after seeing how well Mario Party does every year.

 

[AniHawk]

Surely it will be a port of Sonic Shuffle or something? Especially after seeing how well Mario Party does every year.

Sonic Collection 2:

Sonic R
Sonic CD
Knuckles Chaotix
Segasonic the Hedgehog
Sonic Shuffle
Sonic the Fighters
NiGHTS
Christmas NiGHTS

And some other stuff somehow.

 

[SonicMegaDrive]

I'd add Samba De Amigo(both versions), Chu Chu Rocket, Burning Rangers, and a demo of the unreleased Sonic X-Treme to that. For a special bonus, they aught to have another 'Sonic World' like they had in the Sonic Jam disc. But with updated facts, bonuses, and other neat stuff.

 

[D-X]

They should let the supporting cast get their own games again - how about Sonic Shuffle 2 - Tails Shuffle, 3-Amy Shuffle, 4-Eggman Shuffle, 5 Knuckles Shuffle

 

[Rlan]

KnuckleShuffle.

Thing is, neither property would benefit from the other. Both are the biggest sale-grabbers for both parties. It's SEGA's OTHER properties that need to get in the limelight, because otherwise they're screwed.

They had the right idea with SEGA Superstars, but from what I can tell it tanked. Anyone got US / EUR / JPN numbers?

Now a SEGA Smash Brothers would allow many of SEGAs old franchises to return and possibly get out there. I mean, everyone now know who Roy and Marth now are, and Ness, which I can only assume helped BOF games in the US [And would help Mother if they bothered to release it over here].

Bringing back characters from Golden Axe, Comix Zone, Streets of Rage, Vectorman and the other boatloads of SEGA 16-bit titles could only help them put the characters back in the community and work from there.

Although I still say a Capcom Vs. SEGA would work better

 

[SonicMegaDrive]

Here's an idea for a new Smash Bros. game. It could be called Mario VS Sonic SMASH! Basically, it's a sequel to Melee, but it brings back most of the old Nintendo characters, and adds a whole bunch of Sega characters as well.

This would be your roster:

One the Nintendo front:
Mario
Link
Samus
Kirby
Donkey Kong
Luigi
Fox
Pikachu
Yoshi
Captain Falcon
Ganon
Ness
Bowser
New:
Pit
Wario
Little Mac
I can't decide between Bald Bull, King Hippo, and Super Macho Man.
Diddy
Hamtaro(Oh yeah, baby!)
King Dedede
Andy, Sami, and Max
Mike Jones
Charizard
Meta-Knight
Captain Olimar
Either the main character from Kung Fu, or the one from Balloon Fight.

On the Sega Front:
Sonic
Joe musashi/Shinobi
Alex Kidd
Opa-Opa
Toejam and Earl
Ulala
Alis(Phantasy Star)
Altered Beast
Vectorman
Akira
Sketch Turner(Comic Zone)
Space Harrier
Ryo Hazuki
Metal Sonic
Nights
Pengo
Flicky
Congo Bongo
Wonderboy
JJ, Apple, & Champ(Zillion)
Knuckles
Dr. Robotnik
Shadow
Beat(Jet Grind Radio)
Janet(Virtua Cop)
Samba(From Samba de Amigo)


If they could sneak other non Sega/Nintendo characters like Simon Belmont, Mega Man, and Solid Snake I'd be happy.

52 characters in all. Released for the Nintendo Revolution. Lots of unlockables.

I'd buy it.

 

[duckroll]

I'll rather buy the Naki Smash! game where you get to pick one of 52 characters to smash a 50 foot tall Yuji Baka. Oh sorry I meant Naka. Whoops.

 

[D-X]

It seems the closest we'll get to a game with lots of classic Sega characters in it is Shenmue - capsule toys

 

[SonicMegaDrive]

I'll rather buy the Naki Smash! game where you get to pick one of 52 characters to smash a 50 foot tall Yuji Baka. Oh sorry I meant Naka. Whoops.

Allow me to reiterate - I'd buy it!

 

[jarrod]

Sonic Collection 2:

Sonic R
Sonic CD
Knuckles Chaotix
Segasonic the Hedgehog
Sonic Shuffle
Sonic the Fighters
NiGHTS
Christmas NiGHTS

And some other stuff somehow.

This is what I'd want... though limit it to Mega CD/Saturn (no way Sonic Team's going to bother coding 32X, System 32 or Model 2 emus)

-Sonic CD
-Sonic R
-Sonic 3D Blast
-Sonic World (section of Sonic Jam)
-NiGHTS
-Christmas NiGHTS
-Burning Rangers

 

[Die Squirrel Die]

Wouldn't Saturn emulation be a bit trickier. I thought the appeal of the Mega collection was how simple it was to put together? If they could do a Saturn emulator though, oh how wonderful it would be if they ported some of their other games, PDS, SFIII (all 3 scenarios translated), Dragon Force, etc.

 

[FortNinety]

Can you all imagine the collective orgasm that would be triggered by screenshots of a new 2D Sonic game?

Also, maybe this is the place to ask: is Sonic Advance 2 any good? I hear that too has too many annoying side characters that one has to deal with.

 

[SpoonyBard]

Saturn emulator would be practically impossible on this generation of consoles. Porting the games would be easier, even though that would also require more effort than Sega is likely to make...

 

[Die Squirrel Die]

Can you all imagine the collective orgasm that would be triggered by screenshots of a new 2D Sonic game?

Ain't going to happen man. Best not to build false hope. It's going to be Sonic Heroes II.

 

[Die Squirrel Die]

Saturn emulator would be practically impossible on this generation of consoles. Porting the games would be easier, even though that would also require more effort than Sega is likely to make...

Weren't OoT, MQ and MM bonus discs emulated from an N64? I thought I heard they were.

 

[SolidSnakex]

Ain't going to happen man. Best not to build false hope. It's going to be Sonic Heroes II.

Or they'll finnaly realise that the Sonic levels alone are good enough to carry the game and just craft 20 really nice levels and only have the secondary character pop in on certain levels to give Sonic some quick help.

 

[jarrod]

Yeah a Saturn emulator would take some work, but it could definitely be done on this generation's selection machines. Sega already has a decent Saturn PC emu running on comparable spec machines and Naka's actually a coding guy (he developed a perfect NES emu on Genesis as a hobby). I think it could definitely be done, and would be much simpler than actually recoding ports (if they went that route, they might as well throw in DC games like Samba or Chu-Chu).

Funny as it sounds, Dreamcast actually could've handled a Saturn emu much easier than PS2/GC/Xbox thanks to it's SH4 being able to run SH2 legacy code.

 

[Die Squirrel Die]

Or they'll finnaly realise that the Sonic levels alone are good enough to carry the game and just craft 20 really nice levels and only have the secondary character pop in on certain levels to give Sonic some quick help.

Yeah, and how long have people been saying that. Since after SA1, then especially after SA2, and SH has only reinforced that wish. And have ST listened? Have they fuck. I'm telling you, it'll be SHII, with 4 people a team now, and 2 new teams.

ST are pissed off at being a third party developer, and they are going to make sure that we feel their wrath.

 

[SpoonyBard]

Weren't OoT, MQ and MM bonus discs emulated from an N64? I thought I heard they were.

Yeah, but N64 was much simpler design compared to Saturn. N64 basically had just a CPU and a graphics chip, Saturn had:
- Two Hitachi SH2 32-bit RISC @ 28.6MHz
- One Hitachi SH1 32-bit RISC
- VDP 1 32-bit video display processor
- VDP 2 32-bit video display processor
- Motorola 68EC000 sound processor
- DSP sound processor
- Saturn Control Unit (SCU)

 

[D-X]

Funny as it sounds, Dreamcast actually could've handled a Saturn emu much easier than PS2/GC/Xbox thanks to it's SH4 being able to run SH2 legacy code.

I thought the DC had a Saturn emulator in Japan, Satcast or was that just a joke?

 

[SpoonyBard]

I thought the DC had a Saturn emulator in Japan, Satcast or was that just a joke?

That was an Aprils Fool joke.

 

[jarrod]

N64 basically had just a CPU and a graphics chip

If you're going to reduce things that much, Saturn basically had dual CPUs and a sound chip.

 

[SpoonyBard]

Nah, Saturn really was very complex compared to N64 or PS1.

 

[jarrod]

Nah, Saturn really was very complex compared to N64 or PS1.

There's only 3 seperate "chips" in Saturn, similar to 2 seperate "chips" in N64. If you're going to count VDP1/2 seperate, you should do the same for N64's RSP and might as well count the headache inducing UMA. Saturn was more complex than N64/PS1 sure, but not by an impossible amount and it's rather simple by today's standards. Sonic Team should have no problem really.

 

[D-X]

Would Sonic Team really bother porting a game they didn't start (or for that matter like)? At the time it canned we were told it was because the game it didn't come up to scratch. If it didn't cut it then how would it fare today?

They should make Sonic X-Treme but a new version where the X-Treme bit means a radical (RE4 scale) change to the series, just like the original X-Treme was going to be to the Sonic games of old.

 

[SonicMegaDrive]

No game should ever feature the word "X-Treme" or "Extreme" ever again. The same goes for the word "Underground".

 

[D-X]

No game should ever feature the word "X-Treme" or "Extreme" ever again. The same goes for the word "Underground".

Sonic is guilty for both X-Treme and Underground

 

[SonicMegaDrive]

Yep.

And "X".

Anything with the word "X" in it is destined for mediocrity.

 

[D-X]

Yep.

And "X".

Anything with the word "X" in it is destined for mediocrity.

X-Box? 32X? X-Men? X-Factor?

 

[jarrod]

What about X-Com, Xbox and X-Men?