Sega’s new Sonic game is being developed by Arzest, the Japanese studio run by the mascot’s original creator Naoto Ohshima, VGC has been told.
Ohshima, credited as designing Sonic and providing the art for the franchise’s earliest games, returns for his first series entry in over 20 years with Sonic Superstars.
Sonic Team boss Takashi Iizuka said in an interview at Summer Game Fest on Saturday that the company originally intended to work again with developer Christian Whitehead, who directed 2017’s Sonic Mania, but plans fell through.
Iizuka then approached Ohshima, who worked on the original Sonic the Hedgehog and other entries in the 90s, to lead the next 2D game with his development team, known for developing titles like Hey! Pikmin and Yoshi’s New Island.
Sonic Mania developers Headcannon and Christian Whitehead are not involved, Iizuka confirmed.
“When we were working on Sonic Mania and the game was finished and Chris was done, we had a conversation with Chris and the team about what the next 2D game we were going to make should be,” he explained.
“We had some concepts and ideas laid out between the teams but we couldn’t get the project started. And so it got lost for a while with Chris and the team.
“I’m friends with a lot of my old co-workers and I’m talking to Ohshima-san about how we should make a Sonic game together and if he’s interested. He was the original creator of Sonic the Hedgehog, so we had a conversation about whether his company Arzest would be interested in working on a Sonic game
“So there were ideas with Chris and the team that fell through. Sonic Superstars was actually developed by Arzest, but Sonic Team in Japan is working with them on the design and some other elements. Arzest and Ohshima-san are 100% game developers.”
Iizuka explained that he felt he could trust Ohshima’s team due to his valuable experience working on the original Sonic games. Ohshima is best known as the creator of Sonic’s character design, but Iizuma says few people know that he actually designed many of the levels as well.
“What Ohshima-san really brings is his classic Sonic experience, having worked on Sonic 1 and Sonic CD. He has an understanding of how to make a truly classic Sonic game.
“A lot of people think that Ohshima-san just came in and figured out what Sonic would look like, drew the character and that was it. But he was also doing the level design on Sonic 1 in addition to drawing and creating the character . So he experienced making a Sonic game because he did level design for the original game.”
In addition, Iizuka announced that Sonic 3 composer Jun Senoue will lead the audio on Superstars
“When we’re talking about the people who are still around who worked on the classic Sonic games, there aren’t many people actively making games left from that really small group.
“But there are three people; me, Ohshima-san and the third is Jun Senoue at Sega, who did the music for Sonic 3 back in the day. He also participates in the development of Sonic Superstars. Jun is the game’s music director and is really focused on making it sound like a classic game.
“But it’s clear that he’s not sitting around making all this music by himself: he’s working with internal teams at Sega to create music in the classic Sonic vibe and he’s also working with some external teams like Tee Lopes who help Sonic Mania.”
Sonic Superstars lets players control either Sonic, Tails, Knuckles or Amy Rose, and for the first time in a Sonic game, there will also be co-op support for up to four players.
The game will be released in the fall of 2023 digitally and physically, on PS5, PS4, Xbox Series X/S, Xbox One, Switch and PC.