Sonic Questionnaire Blows Lid on Sega’s Thinking
Serious market research shows wider character exposure plans
The glory...
Sega’s US arm has launched an online survey requesting feedback on all things Sonic related, exposing what appears to be the seeds of plans to breathe new life into the franchise.
The survey seems to be concentrated on gathering thoughts regarding the various characters appearing in the Sonic the Hedgehog franchise and likely a reaction to the riotous, if relative, success of Sonic Mega Collection Plus for PlayStation 2 and Xbox in the US and Europe.
Characters that have been somewhat shielded from all but the hardcore, such as Shadow the Hedgehog and Amy Rose are asked about in detail, along with prospective names for possible game formats.
Tails: The Flight of the Fox, Knuckles: Fury Fists, Shadow the Hedgehog: Chaos Unleashed! and Dr. Eggman and the Lost Emeralds are all bandied as possibilities, interesting fodder to ponder in our forums at the very least.
We’ll bring you updates on all things Sonic, right here, as they break.
The survey seems to be concentrated on gathering thoughts regarding the various characters appearing in the Sonic the Hedgehog franchise and likely a reaction to the riotous, if relative, success of Sonic Mega Collection Plus for PlayStation 2 and Xbox in the US and Europe.
Characters that have been somewhat shielded from all but the hardcore, such as Shadow the Hedgehog and Amy Rose are asked about in detail, along with prospective names for possible game formats.
Tails: The Flight of the Fox, Knuckles: Fury Fists, Shadow the Hedgehog: Chaos Unleashed! and Dr. Eggman and the Lost Emeralds are all bandied as possibilities, interesting fodder to ponder in our forums at the very least.
We’ll bring you updates on all things Sonic, right here, as they break.
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Comments
Nintendo King 21 Feb 2005 22:40
1/10
I'm gonna take that survey. I hope Sonic dies though, lol.
Dreadknux 22 Feb 2005 00:09
2/10
Tell you what, I'll never forgive fanboys/girls under 13 if they make a new spinoff game on Shadow.
The sad thing is, it's pretty much inevitable now, if SEGA indeed do plan to make a spinoff on one character.
Yuji Naka constantly talks about "listening to the fans". Although that is pretty much debatable, exactly who in the hell are SEGA of America listening to, if this survey's anything to go by?
It was never a questionnaire to see what "fans really want" anyway. It's too closed-ended and driven towards an inevitable "We ARE going to make a spinoff game". Cheers SEGA. Really listening.
The sad thing is, it's pretty much inevitable now, if SEGA indeed do plan to make a spinoff on one character.
Yuji Naka constantly talks about "listening to the fans". Although that is pretty much debatable, exactly who in the hell are SEGA of America listening to, if this survey's anything to go by?
It was never a questionnaire to see what "fans really want" anyway. It's too closed-ended and driven towards an inevitable "We ARE going to make a spinoff game". Cheers SEGA. Really listening.
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NiktheGreek 22 Feb 2005 00:41
3/10
Nintendo King: Welcome to 2005. John Major isn't the Prime Minister anymore. The Nintendo-Sega conflict is long dead, Mario is appearing in EA basketball games and Namco-developed arcade games, and Sega no longer makes hardware. Anything else you need updating on, give me a shout.
See, if Sonic Heroes was anything to go by, they were listening to the fans. Prior to that game, the lovely community whinged for a return to minimal story, two-act zones and special stages, and they largely got it. Also, they often moaned about the linearity of Sonic Adventure 2 (having previously been annoyed at the wide spaces that Sonic Adventure offered). Sonic Heroes attempted to implement fixes to all of these. These are the observations I've made at various boards over the years (Area 51, Sonic Secrets Center, SSRG, SCARZ and Sonic Classic).
Result? One of the least popular Sonic games I can think of. Whilst it's not fair to completely remove the blame from Sonic Team (some of the design choices were atrocious, and they completely missed the point of having the different teams), I'd say a large chunk of Sonic fans simply haven't got a clue what they want from a 3D Sonic game.
The major changes of each 3D Sonic game appear to have been brought on by press and fan criticism, but the changes never seem to please anyone. Sonic Team is at it's best when not under pressure from the fans or a big name (see: Samba de Amigo, Sega Superstars, Feel the Magic, NiGHTS).
In my opinion, the best way that Sonic Team could improve it's games is to stop listening to the fans.
Svend Joscelyne wrote:
Tell you what, I'll never forgive fanboys/girls under 13 if they make a new spinoff game on Shadow.
The sad thing is, it's pretty much inevitable now, if SEGA indeed do plan to make a spinoff on one character.
Yuji Naka constantly talks about "listening to the fans". Although that is pretty much debatable, exactly who in the hell are SEGA of America listening to, if this survey's anything to go by?
It was never a questionnaire to see what "fans really want" anyway. It's too closed-ended and driven towards an inevitable "We ARE going to make a spinoff game". Cheers SEGA. Really listening.
The sad thing is, it's pretty much inevitable now, if SEGA indeed do plan to make a spinoff on one character.
Yuji Naka constantly talks about "listening to the fans". Although that is pretty much debatable, exactly who in the hell are SEGA of America listening to, if this survey's anything to go by?
It was never a questionnaire to see what "fans really want" anyway. It's too closed-ended and driven towards an inevitable "We ARE going to make a spinoff game". Cheers SEGA. Really listening.
See, if Sonic Heroes was anything to go by, they were listening to the fans. Prior to that game, the lovely community whinged for a return to minimal story, two-act zones and special stages, and they largely got it. Also, they often moaned about the linearity of Sonic Adventure 2 (having previously been annoyed at the wide spaces that Sonic Adventure offered). Sonic Heroes attempted to implement fixes to all of these. These are the observations I've made at various boards over the years (Area 51, Sonic Secrets Center, SSRG, SCARZ and Sonic Classic).
Result? One of the least popular Sonic games I can think of. Whilst it's not fair to completely remove the blame from Sonic Team (some of the design choices were atrocious, and they completely missed the point of having the different teams), I'd say a large chunk of Sonic fans simply haven't got a clue what they want from a 3D Sonic game.
The major changes of each 3D Sonic game appear to have been brought on by press and fan criticism, but the changes never seem to please anyone. Sonic Team is at it's best when not under pressure from the fans or a big name (see: Samba de Amigo, Sega Superstars, Feel the Magic, NiGHTS).
In my opinion, the best way that Sonic Team could improve it's games is to stop listening to the fans.
Pandaman 22 Feb 2005 06:53
4/10
Okay, I'm just going to flat out say what is undoubtedly on ALL of our minds...
When and where can I get my copy of "Dr. Eggman: The World's Not Enough"?
When and where can I get my copy of "Dr. Eggman: The World's Not Enough"?
Ditto 22 Feb 2005 11:24
5/10
My formula for a successful Sonic Game
1. Remove all impurities from the ingredients. This includes every peripheral characters such as Amy, Shadow.
2. Rename "Eggman" back to "Robotnik".
3. Look carefully at the flaws of previous games such as camera and level design.
4. Include in the game just the two original characters and knuckles.
5. Put the best designers on the project, pour finance in. Design the game throughly.
6. Look carefully at the design and see if it's crap. If it is, start again.
7. Repeat until finished.
1. Remove all impurities from the ingredients. This includes every peripheral characters such as Amy, Shadow.
2. Rename "Eggman" back to "Robotnik".
3. Look carefully at the flaws of previous games such as camera and level design.
4. Include in the game just the two original characters and knuckles.
5. Put the best designers on the project, pour finance in. Design the game throughly.
6. Look carefully at the design and see if it's crap. If it is, start again.
7. Repeat until finished.
Joji 22 Feb 2005 11:59
6/10
I think it's commendable of Sega to listen to fans via this questionaire at all. Many developers don't do much of this kind of thing much to our annoyance.
True the questionaire is going more for the Sonic angle but it's nice to be asked for once.
True the questionaire is going more for the Sonic angle but it's nice to be asked for once.
LUPOS 22 Feb 2005 13:28
7/10
My formula for a fantastic sonic game in 3D.
1. take all the sonic levels from Sonic adventure and mulitply by about 30.
2. if there is time allow tails and knuckels to play through the levels designed for sonic... make them play basically liek sonic with onl ythe mild allow them acces to a few alternate paths... no stupdi walking robots... no god awfulll beep following treasure hunting crap.
3. Absolutly HAVE to call him Dr. Robotnik.
thats it... i loved the first sonic adventure... as long as i was sonic... tails was tolerable... and knuckles was just god awfull... i think they actually did an amazing job making sonic feel like sonic in 3D.
the level inside the giant tornado?! the whale chase scene?! fantastic! Following those damn beeping emeralds around a bland ugly ass cave? its a testament to how good the sonic levels where that i actually forced myself to play through the knuckles levels! Why on earth they took such a cool charcter and made him into a cranky prospector is beyond me!
_________
1. take all the sonic levels from Sonic adventure and mulitply by about 30.
2. if there is time allow tails and knuckels to play through the levels designed for sonic... make them play basically liek sonic with onl ythe mild allow them acces to a few alternate paths... no stupdi walking robots... no god awfulll beep following treasure hunting crap.
3. Absolutly HAVE to call him Dr. Robotnik.
thats it... i loved the first sonic adventure... as long as i was sonic... tails was tolerable... and knuckles was just god awfull... i think they actually did an amazing job making sonic feel like sonic in 3D.
the level inside the giant tornado?! the whale chase scene?! fantastic! Following those damn beeping emeralds around a bland ugly ass cave? its a testament to how good the sonic levels where that i actually forced myself to play through the knuckles levels! Why on earth they took such a cool charcter and made him into a cranky prospector is beyond me!
_________
Ditto 22 Feb 2005 13:54
8/10
And keep the rather excellent music "Escape from the City" from Adventure 2.
Joji 22 Feb 2005 14:15
9/10
Speaking of questionaires I'd like to see more of this kind of thing from other developers. nly when you know what customers want can you really meet them half way. Sonic Heoes not included.
Newtynho 22 Feb 2005 17:22
10/10
I think that Sonic Heroes is the closest to an ideal 3d Sonic game that ST's ever got. The biggest problems with that game were technical.
They still need to improve the camera considerably, and if they want to make a 3d game with ultra-fast characters, they'd better reduce drastically the number of places where you can fall to death.
The linear stage structure was a good move, nothing like the terrible Knuckles stages in Sonic Adventure 2, but they still feel kinda long. They should make the game longer than the 2d games not by making long stages, but by multiplying the total number of levels by 4 or 5 and making each one twice as short as those in Sonic Heroes.
Only Knuckles, Sonic, Tails and Shadow should be playable. And "Eggman" is definitely awful. It's ROBOTINIK!
They still need to improve the camera considerably, and if they want to make a 3d game with ultra-fast characters, they'd better reduce drastically the number of places where you can fall to death.
The linear stage structure was a good move, nothing like the terrible Knuckles stages in Sonic Adventure 2, but they still feel kinda long. They should make the game longer than the 2d games not by making long stages, but by multiplying the total number of levels by 4 or 5 and making each one twice as short as those in Sonic Heroes.
Only Knuckles, Sonic, Tails and Shadow should be playable. And "Eggman" is definitely awful. It's ROBOTINIK!