Sonic the Hedgehog Gets Unreal

Who here loves Sonic the Hedgehog? The blue bomber from Sega certainly has a following. Take for instance the fans that are not scared to load up Unreal Engine 4 and spend countless hours creating textures, levels, and more for their fan game. Here is a compact list of some of the more interesting Unreal Engine based fan creations.

First, let’s get some ground rules out of the way rather than repeating them with each entry. First, the graphics in these fan creations are awesome. Second, these are not full games but some do offer downloads of the necessary files to use these as a base for your own creation, or to run around to your heart’s content. Three, these are fan works, they are not official so please don’t pester Sega with requests to release this or that.

Showcase Zone: Sonic GHZ 2.5 Demo is the Sonic re-imagining I hope Sega gives us someday. I love 2.5D games as they keep the old school gameplay elements but bring things into the modern era a bit with some 3D effects that add a bit of depth quite well.

Sonic Engine UE4 – Windmill Isle Act 1 Preview is one of the more realistic looking Sonic fan creations on this list. This results in Sonic seeming to have a “gliding” feel to his animations - his feet don’t move as fast as his surroundings would make it appear, at least not early in his run (once he is going though, everything is fine).

Sonic Jam Remix is a guaranteed entry here as I loved the original on the Sega Saturn – too bad Sega never expanded on the lobby area idea with a full-blown Sonic on Saturn. We did get it on Dreamcast but the luster was almost all gone by then, at least for me. Anyhow, this remix feels like an HD remake of that Saturn release (the lobby section anyhow).

Sonic in Kingdom Valley is super detailed but brings up the widespread problem I have with these fan creations. I just don’t think it would be very fun to play beyond the first playthrough or two. There is just so much jumping and timing of things – very un-Sonic if you ask me. Still, beautiful.

Now this is what I like to see. Remakes of stuff that is not remade to death already. Sonic R is certainly not redone to death (at least not to my knowledge). This remake is much like the others on this list, it is not complete, has a way to go, but is still beautiful. The cool thing here is that the developer is keeping the decidedly “game” look of Sonic rather than going to ultra-realism.