Sonic R - 1997 Japanese SAT Preview Footage Unearthed

I never had a problem with the handling of Sega Touring Car, though I was already used to the arcade version. Apart from the frame rate dropping every time you passed under a bridge, the handling was virtually identical to the Model 2 original. However, one strange thing I always noticed in this game's many incarnations (no pun intended) was the context-sensitive steering... just try turning on a straight and you'll see what I mean!

As for the idea of Sega using the 4MB RAM cartridge, I don't actually think Sega was too bothered with this particular upgrade. Besides, their own in-house development teams were capable of far better without it. Does anyone really know what Capcom used it for in Final Fight: Rejected "or whatever it was called?" There's just no reason why a game like that needed the extra hardware while such visually superior titles as Virtua Fighter 2, Fighting Vipers and Last Bronx were possible on a standalone Saturn. Even third party efforts including Savaki, Anarchy In The Nippon and D-Xhird didn't need any help.

 

Another platforming game that I found to be quite impressive on the Saturn was Ninpen Manmaru... in fact, it reminds me quite a bit of Sonic World!

 

My point is that to do Sonic justice, you'd have to design it without those limitations.

 

For once I'm going to bring a thread back on-topic, so here's a link to some early promotional footage of Sonic R that (I think) originally came from Sega of America's website:

http://www.archive.org/details/007143

In addition to the early character position icons, there's a few shots of both the final Resort Island background design AND the prototype version as seen at the 1997 Electronic Entertainment Expo. Furthermore, the title screen uses a variation of the rejected cover art, which I seem to recall being changed because it gives away the identity of Metal Sonic as an unlockable bonus racer.

Finally, the music featured in this clip has absolutely nothing to do with the Sonic R... actually, it's Race To The Bass from Daytona USA Championship Circuit Edition. Could this have been a placeholder until Richard Jacques had completed his proper soundtrack, or just something SOA put in because they knew the E3 mix of theme song Super Sonic Racing had scratch vocals at this point during the game's development?

EDIT: Jump to approximately 2:50 of the following to find the other Sonic R footage I mentioned before that contains "demo" audio:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z1ASRu5J7RU

P.S. Could someone please identify the music heard between roughly 11:13 and 11:44 in this video?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5RWpfkAa5Do

Thank you in advance for any help with this one - it's been driving me mad for AGES now!

 

controversial?? can you elaborate on this?

 

Maybe "controversial" isn't the right word, but I think he means everybody complained about the music because it was so crappy.

 

x

 

i love all this info about saturn sonic... but i do feel a 3d game could have been done, the levels would probably have to have been a bit more linear like sonic adventure 2 or sonic adventure 1's levels such as the first level on the beach.

anyways, something i've noticed about many saturn sonic r previews, notice the different time of day? the sunset backgrounds etc? the pc version had night day and sunset etc as well as rain, yet the saturn didn't but it's shown in the beta footage. I wonder if they removed the features due to limitaitons? I mean it's shown there in the game beta and I can't imagine it being any more work to put them onto the saturn instead of just pc... annoying indeed.

ah well keep this info coming i love reading about saturn history.

 

There's plenty of early shots with that sunset background version of Resort Island, plus those videos I linked to before. However, did you also know that a smaller number yet of pictures showed this very course with a few palette-swapped textures to give the impression of night racing? You can tell this was a mere colour inversion because rock surfaces that were normally light grey became darker, while the HUD (or what there was of this at such a preliminary stage in development - it's mostly just debug information such as position co-ordinate text) is simply changed from white to black. I believe some images from this first public build can be found on the "usual suspect" Sonic prototype websites, mostly scanned from the same magazine sources. Maybe when I find it I'll upload the one clip I've yet been able to find online, which features a 50% complete build I'd describe as a missing link of sorts between the E3 code and leaked prototype that surfaced a while back... just don't hold your breath for any great revelations, as much of this game's design was finalised long after it went into full production!

 

Nintendo had Mario in 3D and so putting out a 2D sonic game would've made the saturn look A. Uncapable or B. Make sonic look old news.

however refusing to put out any sonic (3d or 2d) is an even bigger mistake

 

it still boggles me why they removed it or kept it out and the pc version still had it. I absolutely refuse to believe it's due to technical limits or time limits since it shows right there in BETA they had the sunsets in there...

Ah well, in regards to saturns sonic title I remember you mentioning speed highway shows elemtns from it's saturn version of SA many parts of SA look like it was ported from saturn right over to dreamcast. I'm sure there's more examples but still, I know a 3d sonic was possible, sonic world showed that it wasn't slow in any way, they simply made sonic move slow, they could have easily changed a single line of code to make his x speed faster without a doubt. besides as ith all sonic games imagine sonic world being more linear then open world with loops here and there again referring to sonic adventures level style and you can see it's possible, heck using camera tricks like in SA1 whyen running down the side of a building could also hide clipping.

Regarding drawing distances Exhumed/powerslave has the longest draw distances I have ever seen in a saturn title. a PERFECT example of this was in the SET ARENA level, stand behind the door where the boss lies then look out towards the portal where you end the level after floating to the exit when you get the shawl of isis. look how far away the rendering is it's VERY VERY far, it does produce glitching in the engine but take like one step forward and it goes away, it shows how damn far the rendering was and I have no doubt with real optimizations, better knowledge of how to code for the hardware as well as sega not making the saturn such a stupid design anything could have been possible.