Sonic Team's General Manager Talks about 2D HD Sonic Downloadable Games

LBD_Nytetrayn

This is a question people have been wondering for a little while now. With Mega Man 9 paving the way, and new 2D games coming to WiiWare in Gradius Rebirth and Adventure Island, some have wondered if SEGA might ever get a clue and make a WiiWare/XBLA/PSN 2D Sonic game akin to the Genesis titles.

So, what's the word? Um... that's a little tough to say.

“Actually, he has been working on Sonic Advance and Sonic Rush and is very keen on keeping the 2D game. But, having said that, he also thinks 3D Sonic [is good]…And he has been thinking so hard to incorporate those good things from both 3D and 2D. And this is one of the reasons that in Sonic Unleashed we have both 3D and 2D mixed gameplay, kind of switched, going back and forth…Although he thinks that the original 2D game was really good, he doesn’t intend to publish kind of a remake of the original game.” - Akinori Nishiyama, General Manager of Sonic Team, though a translator

That's coming from Nintendo Everything, which is unfortunately pretty bad at sourcing a lot of their news. So I don't know from where that originated. But it seems the translator is saying "he" to refer to Nishiyama, if anyone was wondering.

And I'm sure Dimps wouldn't mind doing the job, if Sonic Team won't...

But then...

Yesterday, I got the chance to sit down for tea and biscuits with Akinori Nishiyama, producer on Sega's upcoming Sonic reboot Sonic Unleashed. When you get a chance to ask someone high up at Sega why they, uh, don't make good Sonic games anymore, you don't pass that chance up. So I asked him, in light of the company's insistence on including 3D elements in Unleashed, whether Sega would be taking a leaf out of Capcom's book and putting out a 2D, HD Sonic remake (or even a new game) on XBLA or PSN?

Nishiyama: There's always the possibility. Whether it would be viable remains to be seen, but having a new game - or even a remake of the GBA games, which we now can't use [thanks to the DSi] - would certainly be possible. If we made one, would you buy it?

Me: [nods]

Nishiyama: Really?

Me: [nods]

Nishiyama: [laughs] Great! One of our ideas has been that on older consoles, you may have had only 16 colours. One thing we could do is make a game like Mega Man 9; do a new Sonic, but in an old style.

Encouraging words, but let's not jump the gun. This is Sega we're talking about, after all.

And that's the word coming from Kotaku.

So, I have no idea how likely it is, still. But at least we know now that the question has been put to them.

carmofin

the only time in recent days where i thought they even got remotely close to what a sonic game used to be like was sonic rush due to its brilliant soundtrack.
since everything theyve made since then clearly shows that sonic rush was merely an "accident" i dont really care what they say or think about the future.