![]() ![]() Steve: I’ve touched on it a little bit, but the current build of Islands has been completely rebuilt from the ground up since SAGE 2018. TSS: Last year’s demo had a full level with extra moves, but this year we played a test level, and it seems like Sonic’s moveset has been stripped down. (Sonic Island’s demo from 2018 is a bit different from this years!) Essentially, while most mechanics planned have been seen in some form, my aim is to work them all seamlessly into Sonic’s movement, providing a function and, in some cases, a risk/reward system, for all of them, with the goal of keeping Sonic feeling as free flowing as possible. Or even a parkour-like system, but one that works with Sonic’s physics and is directly tied to momentum. Things like the instashield being used in 3D to help aid manual platforming, with the reward being perfect momentum conservation, both horizontally and vertically. In terms of original mechanics, there are plans for stuff like a ring banking system (to be used with things like ring barriers or a shop system), but for the most part, every mechanic planned for the game has been attempted in some form by the mainline games, I’m just taking the elements that I think worked the best and trying to work them together in a cohesive way that lends itself not only to speedy gameplay, but for more acrobatic and free flowing exploration gameplay. This idea was briefly explored in the 2018 demo, and I’ve had new ideas since then on how to expand the gameplay into a more even blend of sandbox exploration, and A to B, act-based gameplay. ![]() Steve: The main gameplay loop is planned to be a throwback to 3D Blast’s Flicky mechanic, while mixing it with something more akin to a traditional collectathon, like Mario 64 or Banjo-Kazooie. TSS: What features do you hope to add that haven’t been in a 3D Sonic game before? So…long story short, close to 3 years, but for the current version, just over a year. This prompted yet another rebuild, with this current framework being the one seen at SAGE 2019. Only then did I realize just how much work needs to go in to not only making a game play well, but making it run well, too. I took what I learned trying to make this framework and built it again, with this next version becoming the demo that was released at SAGE 2017, and eventually, after a year of additions, tweaks, and just learning in general, it became the build released at SAGE 2018, the one I think most people are familiar with. After the release of GHP Act 2 and Sonic Utopia, I got inspired to use the Sonic Physics Guide to try and recreate the classic gameplay in 3D. Steve: That’s a tricky question to answer, but the earliest version of Islands was around the beginning of 2017. ![]() TSS: How long has Sonic Islands been in development? That, along with how the series has been moving further and further away from what I feel like Sonic does best (except for Mania of course), and that’s having a sense of freedom and control, along with an emphasis on exploration a trait that a lot of people seem to overlook when thinking about things the earlier games did well. ![]() With so many high quality Sonic fan games being made, and it being one of the larger fan game communities (not to mention how cool SEGA is about it all), it felt like a natural choice to dive in to learning how to recreate the playstyle of one of my favourite games of all time. Steve: The largest motivation would have to be seeing how accessible it is to get into game development now. TSS: What’s the motivation behind making your own 3D Sonic fangame? When done correctly, it can feel incredibly satisfying. Navigating and exploring these stages through a clever balance of building, maintaining and redirecting your speed is, to me, what Sonic is about. The thing about the Sonic series that always kept me coming back to it was the sense of exploration you get with stages that are built around a character as fast as Sonic. Making games for a living has always been a dream of mine, drawing up GDD style booklets in class and all that, but I never really got into the meat of what it takes to make one until more commercial engines like Unity became widely available. I’ve been a fan of both gaming and Sonic since I was less than a year old, and Sonic 1 was the first game I ever played. I’ve been learning how to code and build games in Unity since around 2016 and I’ve learned so much since then. Steve: My name’s Steve and I’m a self taught and, to be honest, still fairly novice, coder and game designer. Sonic Stadium: Please introduce yourself! What got you interested in game design, and Sonic specifically? ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |