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Sonic has less invesment and budget than before


cakito123

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Since Sonic Forces and now with Sonic Team Racing, I realized a new pattern that I hope will not continue to repeat itself in the franchise. Although I very much doubt that it won't happen again and again.

Is it only my impression or did Sega stopped injecting a lot of money into the franchise?
I mean, we can see the amount of Assets reused in Sonic Forces throughout the game: the recycled levels of other Sonic games, Modern's straightforward and repetitive gameplay, and the reusing of Sonic Classic in the game...

Instead of thinking that Forces was a specific case in that regard, I think we can see that the same is happening with Sonic Team Racing, right?

I mean, Sonic Transformed certainly had a lot more money applied in its development, which resulted in a very varied game in every sense: several characters (20 in total, and 35 if we count post-release DLC/Special occasion stuff), tracks that were different from each other and were REALLY beautiful and dynamic... not to mention the gameplay that also changed in the middle of a race (car, plane, and boat thingy).

But watching Sonic team Racing develop, we have less than half of the previous installment: very few characters - 12 in total, 21 tracks that will probably be divided into 7 zones with the same assets and concepts (nothing confirmed about this yet, however), and tracks that until now have showed itself quite plain and simple compared to Transformed... Also, the marketing is quite small. We still don't have a proper trailer for example, only gameplay videos and some kind of... intro(?).

Speculating on this, it seems that Sonic Forces probably had a huge scope and investment early in the development considering the story, the idea and the characters... But then this was all cut off in the middle of development and we ended up with a game... that is the way it is.

With this, I ask myself, and I also ask you: 
What kind of game do you think we'll see from 3D Sonic in the future? Judging superficially now, it seems to me that Lost World was the last game of the franchise to receive a really great polish and a healthy pace of development, right?

Will Sonic Team and Sega continue to make huge scopes for sonic games that probably will not have that much money in development, or will we start seeing more "controlled" games like Sonic Team Racing?

(my first language is not english, so I hope I wrote it all okay for understanding hehe) 

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I’m pretty sure the series has had its budget minimized after the failure of Boom as well. Mania is an exception.

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21 minutes ago, Miragnarok said:

I’m pretty sure the series has had its budget minimized after the failure of Boom as well. Mania is an exception.

As great as Mania turned out to be, I'd honestly say it also counts as a project made on a tight budget. The biggest detraction even its fans hold against it are that most of its levels / content are borrowed from past games; although it goes without saying the developers put in lots of effort to spruce them up with new graphics, layouts, and mechanics; and the new content that did make it in is great as well. The production period for Mania was also relatively short (development officially lasting a year, according to Stealth; it would had likely been less than that if Mania wasn't delayed out of its original Spring release) and it shows with some elements didn't make it into the final release, such as small amount / haphazard implementation of cutscene transitions, and a lack of QoL gameplay options. Moreover, Sega didn't even have plans to give Mania physical distribution in the first place, and likely would had kept it a digital-only affair had fans not spoke up about it.

Even the Plus re-release, which addresses the latter two concerns (polish the existing package + retail re-release) has its own commented issues--the Encore Mode DLC is highly conservative in regards to layout changes when compared to the original Mania Mode; and aside from the Mania Adventures miniseries and the retraux commercial (both of which remained strictly online), there was hardly any mainstream (re: print/television/magazine/etc.) marketing for Plus, despite the game's glowing critical reception as a quality return to form for the series.

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2 hours ago, cakito123 said:

With this, I ask myself, and I also ask you: 
What kind of game do you think we'll see from 3D Sonic in the future? Judging superficially now, it seems to me that Lost World was the last game of the franchise to receive a really great polish and a healthy pace of development, right?

Lost World kicked up a lot of controversy for going for a more simplified and stylized art direction compared to the preceding games (which became a tradeoff to getting the Hedgehog Engine to run at 60 fps on the Wii U), as well as recycling much of its level assets throughout the game with its Mario-lite approach to game design. Although at the same time, the game also threw out the existing Boost playstyle in favor of something largely new with its attempt at parkour gameplay, so you can't really nail Lost World on being decidedly one way or another.

Honestly, it kinda depends on who you ask on where the budget started being pulled back in a significant manner. If you really care about the highly detailed / photorealistic art direction, Generations was the last game where they didn't skimp on the budget. If you're more invested in original content and zones, then that becomes Colors. If you're thinking about content and general presentation, that honor goes to Unleashed. Even 2006 gets its space if your perspective is the Adventure formula and everything that entails (non-Boost 3D gameplay, multiple genre playstyles / playable characters, etc.).

e: Sorry for double post, please merge posts if possible.

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1 hour ago, Space☆Yeow said:

As great as Mania turned out to be, I'd honestly say it also counts as a project made on a tight budget. The biggest detraction even its fans hold against it are that most of its levels / content are borrowed from past games; although it goes without saying the developers put in lots of effort to spruce them up with new graphics, layouts, and mechanics; and the new content that did make it in is great as well. The production period for Mania was also relatively short (development officially lasting a year, according to Stealth; it would had likely been less than that if Mania wasn't delayed out of its original Spring release) and it shows with some elements didn't make it into the final release, such as small amount / haphazard implementation of cutscene transitions, and a lack of QoL gameplay options. Moreover, Sega didn't even have plans to give Mania physical distribution in the first place, and likely would had kept it a digital-only affair had fans not spoke up about it.

Even the Plus re-release, which addresses the latter two concerns (polish the existing package + retail re-release) has its own commented issues--the Encore Mode DLC is highly conservative in regards to layout changes when compared to the original Mania Mode; and aside from the Mania Adventures miniseries and the retraux commercial (both of which remained strictly online), there was hardly any mainstream (re: print/television/magazine/etc.) marketing for Plus, despite the game's glowing critical reception as a quality return to form for the series.

Indeed, but you may notice that some of the traits previously cut due to budget had come back thanks to cuts in other areas of the budget. Photorealistic rendering died to give us Shadow playable. Real instruments were largely wiped out to give us a theme song. Particle effects were extinguished for some original levels. Badnik variety died off to bring in the London Symphony Orchestra.

 

But as of Forces, the budget has hit an all time low, bringing us to what i term the “Filmation era” of the franchise due to low budgets.  It’s the franchise in general, not just Sonic Team, that seems to be on a tight budget, which is perhaps how Boom vanished into thin air, and why IDW is so repetitive. Will the budget get raised a bit due to Mania? 

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I'm pretty sure Sonic's ever decreasing budget has been a thing for well over 4 years now. Sonic Lost World in particular, graphically didn't look nearly as nice as Generations and I still have yet to see a Sonic game top Unleashed graphically.

 

My deal is, I'm perfectly, 100% okay with less of the budget going into the graphics if it means the game itself will play better and not have Denuvo in it,  but unfortunately, the latter of those doesn't look like it's happening anytime soon. The former, however? Hopefully TSR proves me wrong but I still harbor a lot of skepticism about it. Now, the next Sonic Team game? That's even more up in the air,  I don't think even Sonic Team knows what comes next for Sonic Team. They're probably kicking around some ideas but what it'll solidify as is anyone's guess.

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To be honest, I do think that the problem is more with the expectances of the popular titles than anything else.

1994-1997 big title hiatus was caused by Naka, Ohshima, Iizuka and others being focused on other titles (=being tired of Sonic after 1, 2, CD, 3, and Knuckles)

Sonic 06 happened because 1) split of team into two teams, one making Secret Rings and rest completing 06, 2) Heroes was expected to be a bigger seller and Shadow wasn´t a good seller (for Sonic series in the 1998-2005 period)

Unleashed turned it over again in favor of "boost Sonic", so Colors and Generations got the right treatment (expect to sold at least half the number Heroes sold), but nope... Colors was released for Wii and even if it was released for any other console or PC, it would not meet the expectations anyway.

Generations despite being only 9 zones did a brilliant thing. For the first time ever, there was a chance to play with a really lively Sonic environment. But it sold very little, thus we ended up with Lost World having the budget cut after the Generations failed to sell well, and Forces had its budget cut after the Boom fiasco. Team Sonic Racing continues in the "style" with small budget from the beginning.

Honestly at this time I feel like:
1) if we wanted a game with all original zones, anyone would say no, not because of catering the nostalgia, but because SEGA isn´t pumping resources anymore.

2) if we wanted a game with all returning zones á la Generations, with the Generations art style and direction, you would get the very same answer for the same exact reason.

Mania was also a one-thing only.

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I think it is more SEGA's money issues than anything else. SEGA almost went completly bankrupt. There was a time when we thought Sonic Boom may be the last Sonic game, and that they may only make mobile games like Runners. 

With this in mind, Sonic probably has a higher budget than other projects.

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SEGA is a small company yeah, and Boom was a failure sadly. They shouldn't have invested all that money in Boom...! This is why they are spending less with Sonic and more with other games. I hope the success of Mania and the financial success of Forces give them more money to work on bigger titles for the future. Forces was a short game but you can most definitely notice the lack of budget and content in TSR, sadly.

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SEGA isn't small or anywhere close to bankrupt; thanks to being a part of SEGA Sammy Holdings, the company's practically been coasting by since 2004, with financial stability being the least of their worries. What now decides the fate of games and studios is the money they do, or can, bring in.

It's mostly why I think Forces is a pretty significant indicator of how the series will be now, yeah. On one hand hearing "the game has met expectations" is good to hear because the franchise isn't exactly failing to sell, per se, and has a place in SEGA's future plans as always, but the way the numbers are being held close to the chest in spite of the "success", like Microsoft with the Xbox One, or Nintendo with their recent Labo endeavors, combined with the intended scope of Force's production, is way too suspect to be disregarded. My take is that it's a knee-jerk reaction to recent Sonic titles not preforming as optimally as the Unleashed-Gens days on SEGA's part, and for the time being, Sonic's projected sales and budget being scaled down to only to what they expect to make back from it from now on.

I don't think this'll be completely damning for the series, as plenty of franchises can make due with a smaller budget with good enough ideas and a bit of creativity, but at the very least I don't expect to see the franchise being filled to the brim with resources any time soon. Either I'm wrong or not, but if this is the case, I hope someday the series can get back the kind of pull it used to have with game sales so that Unleashed-tier budgets can be feasible again, or at least Gens tier. We still haven't seen what Sonic can be like when he's let loose on current-gen tech, dangit, it can't end here...

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8 hours ago, Space☆Yeow said:

Lost World kicked up a lot of controversy for going for a more simplified and stylized art direction compared to the preceding games (which became a tradeoff to getting the Hedgehog Engine to run at 60 fps on the Wii U), as well as recycling much of its level assets throughout the game with its Mario-lite approach to game design. Although at the same time, the game also threw out the existing Boost playstyle in favor of something largely new with its attempt at parkour gameplay, so you can't really nail Lost World on being decidedly one way or another.

Honestly, it kinda depends on who you ask on where the budget started being pulled back in a significant manner. If you really care about the highly detailed / photorealistic art direction, Generations was the last game where they didn't skimp on the budget. If you're more invested in original content and zones, then that becomes Colors. If you're thinking about content and general presentation, that honor goes to Unleashed. Even 2006 gets its space if your perspective is the Adventure formula and everything that entails (non-Boost 3D gameplay, multiple genre playstyles / playable characters, etc.).

e: Sorry for double post, please merge posts if possible.

That's not about the game being good or graphically outstanding that I'm talking about, is more about how the game came to life with it's budget and money. 

I mean, Forces was a development failure mainly because obviously its budget didn't correspond to the enourmous scope  game needed (I mean, c'mon, the final boss is from another game). The idea, story, world building, level design and everything else needed to be much bigger for the game to be considered a 100% original game with its own identity. In other words, Forces really needed a Unleashed-tier budget to come to life as a great game.

As for Lost World, the game was indeed a success in that regard. For more that we can complain about it, most bad points on the game come to game design choices, not lack of material/assets, or new content...

The team clearly knew what they needed to do and create to make the game what it came to be without exploiting the money invested. And it worked. Lost World is packed with a lot of content, tight controls, different aesthetic (I am aware about reusing assets throughout the whole game, but this isn't really bad considering they managed to make each zone different) and level design mechanics in each level. 

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4 hours ago, The Deleter said:

SEGA isn't small or anywhere close to bankrupt; thanks to being a part of SEGA Sammy Holdings, the company's practically been coasting by since 2004, with financial stability being the least of their worries. What now decides the fate of games and studios is the money they do, or can, bring in.

SEGA was in real financial trouble only a few years ago. Divisions were closed and staff were layed off. It looked absolutely dire, as if they might even head into bankruptancy. You can't just shrug it off.

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There's probably several factors at work.
After Rise of Lyric, Sega promised higher quality in future games. That might also reduced the amount of content and ambition of current games. Easier to keep the game tight and clean when the amount of content is more manageble.


That said, gotta say the smaller scaled games are getting to me. Don't mind the occasional breather episode like advance and colors, but I DID get into this series because I was into the grand spectacle heavy adventures from Sonic 3 and Knuckles, Adventure, Unleashed. Sonic Generations was cute and fun, but the endless nostalgia victory laps are really killing the momentum of the series. And Sonic Forces, despite technically being the grand spectacle adventure I am thirsty for, ironically only made it worse by merely emphesizing how far the series has drifted away from being a compelling adventure rather then a deteriorating nostalgia recycling plant.

Now i'm looking toward the hollywood movie in hopes of revitilizing the series, and that's kinda sad.

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1 hour ago, Roger_van_der_weide said:

There's probably several factors at work.
After Rise of Lyric, Sega promised higher quality in future games. That might also reduced the amount of content and ambition of current games. Easier to keep the game tight and clean when the amount of content is more manageble.


That said, gotta say the smaller scaled games are getting to me. Don't mind the occasional breather episode like advance and colors, but I DID get into this series because I was into the grand spectacle heavy adventures from Sonic 3 and Knuckles, Adventure, Unleashed. Sonic Generations was cute and fun, but the endless nostalgia victory laps are really killing the momentum of the series. And Sonic Forces, despite technically being the grand spectacle adventure I am thirsty for, ironically only made it worse by merely emphesizing how far the series has drifted away from being a compelling adventure rather then a deteriorating nostalgia recycling plant.

Now i'm looking toward the hollywood movie in hopes of revitilizing the series, and that's kinda sad.

Not even IDW did it for... oh. 

 

Yeah, if the Sonic movie flops, that’s the last Sonic project with a solid budget ever, or at least until Sega-Sammy Holdings croaks and Sega gets bought out, or something else equally unlikely. Unless they take the Cuphead route...

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6 hours ago, Plasme said:

SEGA was in real financial trouble only a few years ago. Divisions were closed and staff were layed off. It looked absolutely dire, as if they might even head into bankruptancy. You can't just shrug it off.

It did not. If you look at the annual income for the company, 2015 is the only year they operated at a loss, which triggered restructuring in both the games and pachinko divisions, yes; But one year at a loss is a small drop in the puddle for a company as big as SEGA Sammy. 

The restructuring and layoffs are a result of the company's proactive focus on revenue and profitable assets. If you look at the restructuring and layoffs around the same year as the loss, or their financial report, they cite how the arcade and packaged games revenues have fallen, and the hope to instead refocus on mobile and PC efforts. (And you can see how it payed off and the result of the new focus nowadays, as well) If you look at studio closures and layoffs at any other point in the company's lifetime, it's either one way or another the company attempting to trim the fat based on what brings in money, and what doesn't. This has been SEGA Sammy's main goal from the merger since the start, with SEGA "operating at a loss for nearly 10 years" and "lacking a clear financial base", while Sammy wanted to diversify past their established businesses with SEGA's entertainment assets.

For SEGA's game franchises, the main company going bankrupt isn't really a problem anymore; What kind of revenue they can bring in individually, regardless, is. So basically Sonic isn't in danger of outright dying like how he was during SEGA's dark age, but he is susceptible to being nipped in the bud if he's no longer that big a money maker for the company, due to how proactive the management of the company is with keeping everything profitable above all else. SEGA Sammy is and has been completely stable. It's just, as a game company, there's a pretty big tradeoff in terms of budget/employment leniency for game studios, as a result...

Edited by The Deleter
fixed some of the refs
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So I just felt like I should post something here because there's a clear lack of knowledge on 'how Sega funds things'.

I see people saying Boom and ASRT and lumping it in with Sonic Team games.

This is a bit of an unfair comparison to make when trying to discuss game budget.

 

When a game is made by an outsourced studio, like Sumo Digital, Big Red Button or even Dimps, it's not a case of 'here is all your budget, please make us a game.'

 

There's a number of ways that a studio gets Sega to say 'hey make us this', but let's just go with one scenario right now. 

 

The studio may initially pitch the game, Sega may not approach them.

We've seen this a number of times, that skateboarding Sonic game, that cross bike game, the football and fighting game and the many many attempts to make a Streets of Rage 4. These were ideas pitched to Sega, Sega turned them down.

 

But if Sega likes the idea, they may decide to green light the project, at which point the studio will need to 'pitch' for the budget which Sega will provide. However, this is unlikely to be the full amount, it's likely that they will get a partial sum and then during various milestones during the project, the game will have to be presented in order to get more money. 

Without knowing for certain, I imagine this is how Mania happened, we know it was pitched to Sega as Discovery, Sega then green lit the project but it was tooled to become Mania. 

 

However, another possible way is the following.

Sega has the idea, pitches it to multiple studios, studios them compete for the project.

Now the pitch will likely consist of several parts, but the main initial deliverables will be the following.

* Development Doc (at least the initial/scope to completion)

* A sample of gameplay (this might not look anything like the final project, it will be something amazingly basic just to illustrate the pitch).

* Concept art.

* The budget (this is how much money the studio wants from Sega to make the project).

 

Now... at this point, Sega may or may not go with either pitch, but assuming they like one of the pitches Sega may green lit one, but there will be final discussions on the project, including the budget. 

Should point out, I do not know if under this scenario Sega pays the failed pitches a sum or not, I would imagine some money is exchanged however.

 

Now, with an inhouse team, it's still very similar to the above... but with one key difference.

The development is constant, even with prototypes... So the money is also flowing... Kinda.

So, we've heard tales about how someone visits Sega plays a prototype of an unknown Sonic game, or we see a tech demo at E3 which never comes out, or something gets leaked or discovered (e.g. Sonic Forces VR, Sonic DS) etc etc.

Now.... these may or may not go anywhere... but they still need paying for, programmers need their money, artists need their money, and Iizuka needs new gardening tools.

So someone needs to fund that development, be it Sega, or if Sonic Team has a budget which they use for when not on a green lit project (this I do not know for certain at all, just guessing now).

So say one of these prototypes gets green lit, and the team decides 'this is what we want,' it's likely that it'll undergo the same pitch scenario similar to the third party studios. If the higher ups don't like the idea, they may kill the project, request changes or request a prototype at a specific date to justify further funds.

If the project is greenlit, then budget funds are released. 

 

...But... compared to the previous scenarios, where do you say 'this is when the development and budget started?' With the outsourced studios, it's a little easier to say 'this is the budget for our title' and even then that budget is negotiated and you do have the chance that the studio may have been able to get a bit more money out of Sega depending on how good the pitch was.

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If Sonic is going to continue on a low budget, then really SEGA should just hand it over to the Classic canon for a while. Let’s see a gorgeous, all-new 32-bit game from Headcannon, then hell, maybe another one. Then for the 30th anniversary (wow I feel old), break out the big guns. 

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17 hours ago, cakito123 said:

That's not about the game being good or graphically outstanding that I'm talking about, is more about how the game came to life with it's budget and money. 

I mean, Forces was a development failure mainly because obviously its budget didn't correspond to the enourmous scope  game needed (I mean, c'mon, the final boss is from another game). The idea, story, world building, level design and everything else needed to be much bigger for the game to be considered a 100% original game with its own identity. In other words, Forces really needed a Unleashed-tier budget to come to life as a great game.

Eh, not really? What is it about Forces that says the game didn't succeed in its production because the development didn't have enough resources on hand? The rudimentary level design that members of the development team themselves said was a deliberate choice on their part? The badly-shoehorned classic Sonic portion of the game that virtually nobody was really asking for in another modern Sonic game the first place? The high amounts of recycled assets and returning classic zones in a game that was in development since Lost World's release from four years ago? The staggering amounts of game-breaking bugs and giant signs of missing content the game actually doesn't have anyway? (The last of which is to say--for all of its problems, the game is finished from a general design standpoint and is technically functional.)

It's an overused term and one that will irk some who genuinely like the final game that was released, but the phrase "polishing a turd" seriously comes to mind here with how people talk about the biggest problem with Forces being that it suffered from a lack of budget or because it was rushed to release. Putting more money into a production as flawed as Forces isn't really going to net you a better game in quality, it's likely just going to ensure more technical polish / refinement on what's already a lackluster project.

I've said it so many times already--go back and compare how Forces was designed and how it fared in its reception compared to that of Mania. When you realize that even with hefty financial backing from a multi-million dollar business, the small coalition of fans who were given much less resources to work with put more thought into building their game.

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7 hours ago, Space☆Yeow said:

Eh, not really? What is it about Forces that says the game didn't succeed in its production because the development didn't have enough resources on hand? The rudimentary level design that members of the development team themselves said was a deliberate choice on their part? The badly-shoehorned classic Sonic portion of the game that virtually nobody was really asking for in another modern Sonic game the first place? The high amounts of recycled assets and returning classic zones in a game that was in development since Lost World's release from four years ago? The staggering amounts of game-breaking bugs and giant signs of missing content the game actually doesn't have anyway? (The last of which is to say--for all of its problems, the game is finished from a general design standpoint and is technically functional.)

It's an overused term and one that will irk some who genuinely like the final game that was released, but the phrase "polishing a turd" seriously comes to mind here with how people talk about the biggest problem with Forces being that it suffered from a lack of budget or because it was rushed to release. Putting more money into a production as flawed as Forces isn't really going to net you a better game in quality, it's likely just going to ensure more technical polish / refinement on what's already a lackluster project.

I've said it so many times already--go back and compare how Forces was designed and how it fared in its reception compared to that of Mania. When you realize that even with hefty financial backing from a multi-million dollar business, the small coalition of fans who were given much less resources to work with put more thought into building their game.

Look, fact is that we don't know why the game came to be the way it is, so that's all speculation. But I will say I really don't believe the reason was because  "SoNiC TeAm wAs LaZy aNd InCoMpEtEnT"

They had TOO MUCH on their hands. Forces was obviously supposed to be a huge deal like unleashed was some day. And yes, I think ST didn't have enough money or time to even make Sonic Forces the way it was supposed to be. More money = more people working at the project, better pacing development and less time. Not saying that money was the only reason the game failed, not at all. I'm saying that more budget into Forces would surely make the game look better. Don't know if would make a great game, but better nonetheless.

That's just logical: the scope for the game is so big (Eggman finally conquering the world, a resistance being formed, a adventure-type story, etc) that they decided to reutilize every single thing they could from past games because they didn't have enough resources. That was a choice indeed - of course reusing assets and whatnot was a choice deliberately made. But do you really really think they would choose to reuse everything instead of creating new stuff to implement in-game if they had the option? 

That's just not realistic to think about in my point of view. They made this choice because they had to and it was the best choice they had in their hands. 

I know how Sonic Team have a fame of being lazy, but I don't agree with that at all and also don't think it makes sense too. What I see when I play almost any bad Sonic game nowadays is just that something really stupid is happening at Sega that makes then treat Sonic Team like shit, so they struggle to create its own ideas and projects because of external sources.

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As a person that grew up with sega in the early 90s. They are in fact very lazy and have a hard time committing to things.

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6 hours ago, Meta77 said:

As a person that grew up with sega in the early 90s. They are in fact very lazy and have a hard time committing to things.

Not intending to be rude, but how exactly being a person that grew up watching a company from the 90s and from a distance can take any conclusions about their decisions and their reasons for said decisions?

Unless you already worked at SEGA or Sonic Team or something like that, I really would like to know how can you be so sure about their ins and outs (?)

( I understand we have the ability to deduct stuff based in context, predictions, and confirmations, but even then, this isn't a guaranteed and verified enough information for someone outright say "oh yelp, they're all lazy" )

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11 hours ago, cakito123 said:

Look, fact is that we don't know why the game came to be the way it is, so that's all speculation. But I will say I really don't believe the reason was because  "SoNiC TeAm wAs LaZy aNd InCoMpEtEnT"

They had TOO MUCH on their hands. Forces was obviously supposed to be a huge deal like unleashed was some day. And yes, I think ST didn't have enough money or time to even make Sonic Forces the way it was supposed to be. More money = more people working at the project, better pacing development and less time. Not saying that money was the only reason the game failed, not at all. I'm saying that more budget into Forces would surely make the game look better. Don't know if would make a great game, but better nonetheless.

That's just logical: the scope for the game is so big (Eggman finally conquering the world, a resistance being formed, a adventure-type story, etc) that they decided to reutilize every single thing they could from past games because they didn't have enough resources. That was a choice indeed - of course reusing assets and whatnot was a choice deliberately made. But do you really really think they would choose to reuse everything instead of creating new stuff to implement in-game if they had the option? 

That's just not realistic to think about in my point of view. They made this choice because they had to and it was the best choice they had in their hands. 

I know how Sonic Team have a fame of being lazy, but I don't agree with that at all and also don't think it makes sense too. What I see when I play almost any bad Sonic game nowadays is just that something really stupid is happening at Sega that makes then treat Sonic Team like shit, so they struggle to create its own ideas and projects because of external sources.

I mean I literally just posted to you a link to a video/quotes about how the game was designed straight from the developer's mouth but if you want to write it off as "speculation" then go off I guess

It's also not "speculation" to note the game isn't a buggy mess with missing chunks of material like how Sonic 2006 and Boom: Rise of Lyric turned out to be. Same goes for pointing out most of the game's assets are recycled from past levels because they quite clearly are. It's not just the fact they've gone back to zones they've remade before; the same textures and models for zones like Green Hill and Chemical Plant are literally lifted from the Generations counterparts.

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The only thing that can be said to be speculation would be to say that virtually nobody wanted classic Sonic in this game; but I seriously challenge you to ask people around here, Retro, and elsewhere if they were really hoping for Forces to be another classic Sonic/modern Sonic teamup game. Go check reactions to Forces' very first teaser and I guarantee you you'll notice lots of mixed responses towards classic Sonic showing up.

And I don't know about the rest of you, but at this point; I'm far past the point of thinking "benefit of the doubt" is a argument to seriously try.

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2 hours ago, cakito123 said:

Not intending to be rude, but how exactly being a person that grew up watching a company from the 90s and from a distance can take any conclusions about their decisions and their reasons for said decisions?

Unless you already worked at SEGA or Sonic Team or something like that, I really would like to know how can you be so sure about their ins and outs (?)

( I understand we have the ability to deduct stuff based in context, predictions, and confirmations, but even then, this isn't a guaranteed and verified enough information for someone outright say "oh yelp, they're all lazy" )

Oh boy. Hmm well I'm going to keep it simple as I can. For one multiple up in multiple interviews and reports on sega. The company makes nearly as many dumb movies as present konami. Such as the 32x Saturn fiasco. Greed was a main factor in this  the dreamcast was another. They basically gave up after the ps2 came out. Sonic 06. Another game that could have been the best ruined by management splitting the team and rushing it. They rush a lot. Pso2 they had the English version basically ready to go but sega JP did not give sega America the green light  force was also another big project rushed to meet a imaginary deadline by sega. With lots of cut corners. Sega was it's own biggest enemy in pulling out of the console war

I'd write more but I'm in class so my response is fast

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1 hour ago, Space☆Yeow said:

 

It's also not "speculation" to point out most of the game's assets are recycled from past levels because they quite clearly are. It's not just the fact they've gone back to zones they've remade before; the same textures and models for zones like Green Hill and Chemical Plant are literally lifted from the Generations counterparts. same goes for highlighting the game isn't a buggy mess with missing chunks of material like how Sonic 2006 and Boom: Rise of Lyric turned out to be.

The only thing that can be said to be speculation would be to say that virtually nobody wanted classic Sonic in this game; but I seriously challenge you to ask people around here, Retro, and elsewhere if they were really hoping for Forces to be another classic Sonic/modern Sonic teamup game. Go check reactions to Forces' very first teaser and I guarantee you you'll notice lots of mixed responses towards classic Sonic showing up.

And I don't know about the rest of you, but at this point; I'm far past the point of thinking "benefit of the doubt" is a argument to seriously try.

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It is indeed a fact that they reutilized a lot of assets, but that's not really what I am talking about.

Sorry if I'm not being clear enough, I'll try again:

I am not asking or speculating about whether they did or didn't. That's obvious they did reutilise a lot of assets, and the game is considered basically mediocre-bad at this point also this reason. I'm not contesting Sonic Forces's quality of content right now.

The focus of my point is WHY they did what they did. WHY did they choose to reuse every asset they could? And the answer to that is just speculation since we don't work at Sega/ Sonic Team.

My guess is that Sonic Team had to reutilize those assets and all the stuff, because I don't really believe when people say that Sonic Team is LAZY. 

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I mean I literally just posted to you a link to a video/quotes about how the game was designed straight from the developer's mouth; but if you want to write it off as "speculation" then go off I guess

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About the interview:

The bad level design was just one of the reasons the game is terrible. And when you stop to think about it, (and now that's me guessing) Sonic Team probably didn't have enough time, money, and people to make something truly good considering the scope Forces has.  So yeah, reading the interview just strengthens my theory that Sonic Team had to make a game with not much at their hands.

 

33 minutes ago, Meta77 said:

Oh boy. Hmm well I'm going to keep it simple as I can. For one multiple up in multiple interviews and reports on sega. The company makes nearly as many dumb movies as present konami. Such as the 32x Saturn fiasco. Greed was a main factor in this  the dreamcast was another. They basically gave up after the ps2 came out. Sonic 06. Another game that could have been the best ruined by management splitting the team and rushing it. They rush a lot. Pso2 they had the English version basically ready to go but sega JP did not give sega America the green light  force was also another big project rushed to meet a imaginary deadline by sega. With lots of cut corners. Sega was it's own biggest enemy in pulling out of the console war

I'd write more but I'm in class so my response is fast

 

The thing is, you weren't working at Sega and Sonic Team when all that happened, so you can't really say if all those bad decisions from them was actually their best option, you know? Also, I'm restricting myself to Sonic Team, cuz I dunno how Sega handles other titles and IPs.

Sonic Team is a developer team under Sega's umbrella, so, again, you can't really know if Sonic Team's decisions were all really really bad or actually their best option under Sega's demands and circumstances. I'm not saying ST are smart either, because if Sonic Team has [ x ] materials and budget to make a game, they should always create a realistic scope for said game. And with Forces, they obviously didn't do that.

I just don't think is fair to say Sonic Team is LAZY. That's a really really bad adjective to say when you don't exactly know what's going on ad why, and one which I don't agree at all.

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It's really ignorant and entitled to call a dev team lazy. Almost everyone gets into video game development because they have a passion for it, and often end up working grueling schedules.

 

If you gave Michelangelo 15 minutes and two biro pens, you wouldn't end up with the Sistine Chapel ceiling. That wouldn't make Michelangelo a lazy artist.

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