Camp Sonic

Play Magazine isn’t the only one with new info regarding Sonic Unleashed this month! While not as in depth as Play, Nintendo Power also published a short piece on Sonic Unleashed, with some new details in regards to the Nintendo Wii.

Sonic Unleashed for the Wii will feature gameplay that is, “changed, tuned, and balanced specifically for the Wii” says Patrick Riley (Game producer at SEGA of America). He continues, “the levels will be different, designed specifically for the Wii version.”

Also important to note is that the teams who brought you Sonic Rush, and Sonic Rush Adventure are playing a huge role in the development of Sonic Unleashed for the Wii… so it’s probably safe to dismiss those worries you’ve had about a tuned down Wii version (yes, it will be tuned down visually, but c’mon… these guys know how to build a killer game).

Scans from Nintendo Power’s Sonic Unleashed article after the jump. (more…)

Out of all the magazines to have a cover story on Sonic Unleashed, Play Mag takes the cake with their May 2008 issue featuring 10 pages of Sonic Unleashed goodness. In celebration of their lengthy publication, we’re going to recap a few of the things they mentioned about the game.

Oh yeah, and we have scans from the Sonic Unleashed Article in Play Magazine.

The real meat of the article was the exclusive interview with Sonic Team Producer, Yoshihisa Hashimoto (that guy we mentioned a few days ago). To get started, Hashimoto reveals to us that Sonic Unleashed is under new management, which ought to bring a sigh of relief to many of us losing faith in the series. While the Sonic Team is still in charge of development, the core development team in charge of design is completely new. What does all this verbage mean for you? A fresh, NEW Sonic experience, unlike any of the recent installments!

The team has decided to divide gameplay into two different views, which would be the 2D sideview, and the 3D forward view. According to Hashimoto, the two mechanisms are split about half and half throughout the game, and “fills the void” us classic Sonic fans have experienced ever since the hedgehog ever made his way into the 3D realm. Also, to put to rest any rumors about Sonic Unleashed being restricted to rails (ie: Secret Rings), he will have complete ability to roam around in immersive 3D environments.

To our delight, Hashimoto also revealed that “Silver won’t make an appearance in this game“. That’s one more excessive character we can mark off our Not Wanted list. Rather than focusing much on new characters, Sonic Unleashed will focus on “Sonic and his travels around his world in a big adventure“. Phew!

Sonic Unleashed will feature hub like stages (similar to towns in previous titles), that will act as a means of adding “color and background to Sonic’s adventures“. While we’re not entirely thrilled of this concept, Yoshihisa assures us that the hubs will not hinder the tempo of the game. SEGA has learned from their mistakes in the past, and are making sure they address them to provide us with an awesome Sonic experience, and so far, we’re impressed.

We highlighted some of Sonic’s new moves in Sonic Unleashed a few days ago, but we’ve been clueless as to how new moves are going to function in the title. Apparently, new moves can be found within stages and added to Sonic’s abilities as you are playing (versus a purchase system introduced in previous games). Some abilities mentioned in the article that we haven’t seen before include stomping and wall jumping.

What about graphics? We’ve heard that Sonic Unleashed is coming to 4 consoles, but how will each console compare visually? The team has been working for the past 3 years on the Hedgehog Engine, which is being used to power both the Xbox 360 & Playstation 3 versions of the game, while developers will be working hard to develop visuals that mimic the engine on the Nintendo Wii. This may come as a hard hit to Wii players who up until now have thought the Wii will be getting the stunning visuals we’ve seen so far.

For the full read, we highly suggest you go pick up a copy of the magazine yourself. It’s really worth the read, and we’ve only covered a portion of it here. Our hopes are high for more information coming soon!

Scans after the jump! (more…)

I’d like to take a short break from Sonic Unleashed for a second, and give you kind folks some insight to how well Camp Sonic is being received in the Sonic community. Apparently, our constant coverage of Sonic Unleashed has been a huge hit with fans everywhere, and I think it’s only right to be sharing some of these statistics with the rest of you:

• Camp Sonic was launched on March 25th of 2008. That effectively puts us at 1 month old.
• In the short amount of time we’ve been online, Camp Sonic has gained nearly 100 Subscribers via email using feedburner (located on the right, in case you hadn’t noticed).
• We’re currently serving over 55,000+ Pages a month to the Sonic Community, all filled with the most up to date information about Sonic Unleashed, and related screenshots and videos.
• Most of our viewers are from the United States, but we have a few fans from the UK, Canada, and 52 other countries!

There you have it folks. 1 month ago, we were hardly an established site. 34 days go by, and we’ve become the most comprehensive Sonic Unleashed resource on the net.

We couldn’t do it without you guys and gals! I can’t tell you how much I appreciate the community here at Camp Sonic! Keep it up!

We’ve only heard bits and pieces of what to expect in the forthcoming Sonic Unleashed. There’s something about the return to the retro Sonic feel, a couple of screenshots showing off impressive graphics, and then there’s that whole thing about a Werehog…

We’re obviously drooling for a little more about the game, but for what it’s worth we’ve compiled a list of known abilities our protagonist will have in Sonic Unleashed!

Sonic Drifting

One of Sonic’s new abilities will include Sonic Drifting, which will allow the hedgehog to make turns on a dime, even when moving at very high speeds! We’ve got quite a few shots of this new ability in our Sonic Unleashed Gameplay Screenshots Gallery.

Quick Step

When cruising at such high speeds, it’s to be expected that your going to run into things if you’re not careful. Thankfully, Sonic has a new move called the Quick Step, which allows him to quickly maneuver around obstacles in his path almost instantly.

Spin / Spin Dash / Spin Attack

The classic move that made Sonic who he is today… or rather, who he used to be, and hopefully will once again become. We’ve grown to love this part of Sonic so much, we even incorporated it in Camp Sonic’s Logo!

Homing Attack

Very similar to Sonic’s Spin attacks, but will allow Sonic to home in on targets close to him (just like in Super Smash Bros. Brawl if you’re familiar with that title, or in the Sonic Adventure games).

Sonic Boost

This new move will allow Sonic to convert his Power Ring Energy into sudden bursts of Speed! We’re not entirely sure how this ability functions or looks, but we’re taking a stab in the dark and saying it might look something like this:

Which is also demonstrated in this gameplay footage trailer for Sonic Unleashed.  It seems like a move that we’ve seen before, but it’s hard to say if it functions the same way or if it’s called the same thing.

We know that there are at least a few other moves that have yet to be revealed to the Sonic Community from SEGA, and we’ll add those to the list as time goes by. Until then, hopefully this is enough to chew on for those of you craving more information like we are!

SegaDawg is one of the writers of the SEGA America Blog, and recently he’s been one of the main guys revealing information about Sonic Unleashed. Today, he gave us some initial impressions he has with the game so far after watching (and playing) the unfinished title.

From the Blog:

• There’s speed, and lots of it. Those of you wanting 2D — you’ve got it. Those of you wanting 3D, well, you’ve got it too. Each perspective brings its own challenges.
• The gameplay itself on the level I played really felt like classic Sonic. There’s rings, there’s bumpers, there’s loops, there’s jumping … but there’s also a few other things in there as well that add to the experience.
• The level I played had multiple paths so you’ll be encouraged to play each level several times over and try to find the fastest path or the most rings you can.
• There was a cool section in 3D perspective where Sonic has to use a quick-step to the left or right to avoid multiple obstacles in his path. This is done with a button-push, not with the stick, so it’s an almost-instant jump left or right without breaking stride. Pretty cool.
• The landscape and environments look great and there are some things there that Sonic can interact with.
• A couple of the sections felt a lot like a roller coaster.
• Not all the bumpers work in Sonic’s favor.

It’s been speculated that there will be multiple paths throughout the levels, especially with gameplay footage showing multiple rails, and screenshots depicting maps with seemingly multiple directions. A lot of the other stuff he reveals just goes back to what we’ve come to understand and love already-Sonic is returning to his classic days (with a mix of 3D thrown in).

We’re really thankful for updates like this, but man do we want to hear about that Werehog or what?

Play Magazine had a really great interview with Sonic Team Producer, Yoshihisa Hashimoto, and while not a whole lot about the game was specifically revealed, it’s still a great read.

He firmly believes that this game REALLY will be what we’ve wanted from Sonic all along:

“…this will be the game Sonic fans have been waiting for. Sonic will be reborn in the state he always should have existed in with a new control scheme, fresh new gameplay elements, all while simultaneously returning to Sonic’s roots….”

I think it’s the “fresh new gameplay elements” that have most folks worried, but I suppose that we’d all be crazy to expect the exact same formula we’ve seen in previous games (especially the most recent ones… ewww).

“…The whole development team is aiming to make Sonic Unleashed the best Sonic game ever, and that includes the Genesis-era titles! We hope that even people who haven’t played Sonic games will feel “Wow, Sonic is back!”…”

Will Sonic Unleashed live up to that dream? We certainly hope so.

More Info @ Play Online.

Official Nintendo Magazine might have gotten the first look at Sonic Unleashed, but Play Magazine is bringing us never before seen visual elements (Check out Play Online’s Sonic Unleashed Screenshots).

And man, do they look good or what?

I absolutely loved the original look of Sonic back in the early days, but this new stylistic approach is really starting to impress me. Just check out the details in the models and textures. Sure, it’s not at the same level at Gears of War 2 or something, but it sure does look pretty for a Sonic title.

Kudos SEGA… Kudos to you.

Knuckles has been confirmed to appear in Sonic Unleashed, making him the 4 confirmed character in the upcoming release following Sonic, Tails and Amy (Not counting Super Sonic and Werehog Sonic). From to the UK’s official Playstation Magazine:

Tails and Knuckles are also slated for starring roles, but the word is, new characters will be kept to a minimum.

That’s all we wanted to hear! Fewer characters, more Sonic!

According to a recent poll held here at Camp Sonic, a majority of our voters decided that they were going to be purchasing Sonic Unleashed for the Nintendo Wii this holiday season. Over 51% of you decided that the Nintendo Wii was the console to play Sonic Unleashed on, while the Xbox 360 came in second with 29% of votes, and the PS2 and PS3 received 10% and 7% respectively.

Only 3% of you are yet to decide which console you’ll be getting the game for.

From the sounds of it (or what little information we’ve received thus far), the Nintendo Wii will be the primary console which the game is being built for, while the other next generation consoles will be getting slightly more polished versions. Whether or not any of them will be getting online modes, or extra features, no one can say for sure yet, but we hope to learn more soon!

Thanks for voting!

Hey folks, this is just a friendly reminder that you can pick up a copy of the Official Nintendo Magazine today for an exclusive sneak peek of a play test with Sonic Unleashed.  Don’t forget to pick up your own copy today!

We’ve got a summary of ONM’s Sonic Unleashed Preview.