STACK #229 November 2023

GAMING FEATURE

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Iizuka-san kindly shared these tips for getting into Sonic Superstars … TIPS FROM THE TOP! “Have fun and play around with things! The game has been designed so can play from start to finish with just Sonic and no emerald powers, but give the emerald powers a try if you like them, or play with someone else if you want to, or switch up characters just to see if you can get to new or different locations. See how quickly you can run through the acts, or take your time and explore to find hidden places. You might be surprised at how much there is hiding in plain sight…”

In celebration of the arrival of Sonic Superstars , we had a chat withTakashi Iizuka, the game’s producer and head of SonicTeam, about the new adventure. Words Amy Flower YOU SUPERSTAR! SONIC,

and fully understands what makes a great Sonic game. I spent a lot of time with Ohshima-san and the team talking about level design, and I got a lot of great ideas from them to help make Sonic Superstars what it is today!” Sonic Superstars brings us 12 shiny new zones. We put Iizuka on the spot and asked which was his favourite. “That's a very difficult question to answer!” Iizuka-san laughs. “The very first zone is a very traditional Sonic zone, so it introduces a lot of core mechanics and what makes Sonic games so unique. In most side-scrolling platform action games, when you miss a jump and fall to the bottom of the screen, you die, but in Sonic games, there’ll be a new route to follow down below and you can even work to get back up to the route you were on previously. Even if you miss another jump, you will still fall down to yet another path that will still take you to the end of the game. That’s all there in Bridge Island, and it’s a great starting level for players of all skill sets.” Iizuka-san hopes that fans both new and old will get a lot from Sonic Superstars . “We hope longtime fans will appreciate all the attention paid to recreate that classic look and feel of the game. In addition, we’ve added in a great multiplayer feature to the game so this is the perfect title for longtime fans to play together with family or friends who might be new to a Sonic game, and be able to share a fun Sonic experience.”

S onic Superstars takes the classic 2D Mega Drive era gameplay and gives it an update both graphically and gameplay wise. We wondered what sparked the idea to go back to the roots of Sonic. “Last year we released

Much work went into the game’s art to retain the original Sonic charm. “We spent a lot of time making sure the art aesthetics were all true to the classic aesthetic,” explains Iizuka-san, “and to make sure the level design and level gimmicks all felt true to the original design philosophies. In addition to that, the team at Arzest faithfully recreated the physics of the classic game through side-by-side

Sonic Frontiers ,” says Iizuka-san, “which was the advancement of the 3D high speed modern Sonic gameplay that started 20 years ago with Sonic Adventure . The team expanded on that linear gameplay with the open zone concept to create our new modern Sonic game format to build on for the next 20 years. In a similar way we wanted to solidify the classic Sonic game format to build on for the next 20 years, but instead of creating a new format, the team wanted to preserve all the 2D gameplay while modernising the look and features of the game. Using a 3D game engine and 3D models the team went in and authentically reproduced the game physics, controls, and design of the legacy classic format.”

iteration, so the character moves and reacts in the same way. But the cherry on top of all of that was the detailed recreation of all the animation to match the original 2D pixel art animation with the new 3D models, so even the look of the moving game is faithfully recreated.” Original Sonic designer Naoto Ohshima has returned to the fold to help further with

maintaining that classic Sonic feeling. “We wanted to make sure that the classic gameplay was successfully recreated, so working with Ohshima-san and his development team at Arzest was key,” Iizuka san informs us. “Not only is he the original designer of Sonic, but he has also made classic Sonic games,

• Sonic Superstars is out now!

56 NOVEMBER 2023

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