Bioware Talk DS Sonic RPG

By Jorge Ba-oh 16.02.2008 14

Bioware recently spoke to IGN on the upcoming DS RPG featuring Sonic the Hedgehog and friends, The Dark Brotherhood.

IGN: The Sonic games are traditionally action / platform based. Why bring the Hedgehog into the RPG genre?

Mark Darrah BioWare are big fans of the Sonic IP. One of BioWare's core strengths is developing story driven games, so it was natural to bring Sonic to that genre. Fortunately, the Sonic IP is filled with rich characters and is an excellent series to expand the storyline.

IGN: How does the storyline in Sonic Chronicles begin?

Mark Darrah Eggman was defeated some time ago and Sonic has gone out to explore the rest of his world. He has been gone for a while and then gets a call from Tails - Knuckles has been kidnapped! Not only that, the chaos emeralds are disappearing!

IGN: The storyline is made up of two acts. Please explain how this works?

Mark Darrah The first Act takes place mostly in Sonic's World. Sonic and his friends are figuring out what is happening and trying to stop the Master Emerald from being taken. In the Second act, the group must travel to another dimension to stop a new threat to Sonic's World.

IGN: What kinds of locales will gamers recognize from the Sonic series?

Mark Darrah To name a few: Green Hill Zone, Central City, Mystic Ruins and the Blue Ridge Zone
...

IGN: Explain to us how the two screens on DS are being used.

Mark Darrah In exploration, the top screen serves as a mini-map for the current area. In other screens, it is used to display the non interactive parts of the GUI.

Head on over to IGN for the remainder of the interview.

Box art for Sonic Chronicles: The Dark Brotherhood
Developer

BioWare

Publisher

SEGA

Genre

Turn Based RPG

Players

1

C3 Score

Rated $score out of 10  7/10

Reader Score

Rated $score out of 10  6/10 (6 Votes)

European release date Out now   North America release date Out now   Japan release date Out now   Australian release date Out now   

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Glenjamin is offline. Glenjamin 16.02.2008#1

Hmmm... Pretty much everything that was stated in last month's Nintendo Power. Smilie

 
tiamat1990 is offline. tiamat1990 16.02.2008#2

Well those guys are one of the best developers out there so I' not totally negative about this. Still, I can't understand how this is going to work out.

 
Simes is offline. Simes 16.02.2008#3

Greenhill zone ftw

 
jb is offline. jb 16.02.2008#4

Nice, good to see some classic Sonic environments make appearances.

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JoshSL is offline. JoshSL 16.02.2008#5

Why can Mario have RPGs and Sonic can't? That's what doesn't make sense to me.

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Darkflame is offline. Darkflame 16.02.2008#6

"Mark Darrah Eggman "

His name is Dr Robotnic. Formuly Ivan Kintobor!

oh, wait, thats the guy being interviewed :p

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JoshSL is offline. JoshSL 16.02.2008#7

Kintobor is a non-canonical name Smilie I know it sounds elitest, but as far as the games go, he was only ever called Dr Ivo "Eggman" Robotnik Smilie

( Edited 16.02.2008 15:02 by SuperLink )

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Azuardo is offline. Azuardo 16.02.2008#8

I got confused with the interviewee's name there too XD

I'm looking forward to seeing how this turns out though. Sonic needs some good games under his belt again.

 
Cheesing It Up is offline. Cheesing It Up 16.02.2008#9

Sounds a bit...odd. Hopefully it'll be a good game though!

 
Sprite is offline. Sprite 17.02.2008#10

SuperLink said:
Kintobor is a non-canonical name Smilie I know it sounds elitest, but as far as the games go, he was only ever called Dr Ivo "Eggman" Robotnik Smilie

It depends what you quote as canon really. Robotnik was Kintobor in both the Archie and Fleetway comics. And I can't entirely remember but I'm pretty sure there is a reference to Kintobor in the original Sonic the Hedgehog manual.

Saying that, the canon is really offset between the originals and the Adventure series. There are a few obvious ones, such as the fact that in the Adventure games, Angel island (the floating island) is a small lump of rock the size of a car park, as opposed to the monstrosity that is the Island which took up the entirety of Sonic 3.

Tbh, I'd imagine that if acknowledging it all, Sega/Bioware are likely to Retcon the "Robotnik/Kintobor/Eggman/Robuttnik (come on you have to get that one)" to fit with the modern storylines.

It's annoying really, as Sonic X is the basis for canon now, and even then it's not that well done. They got rid of the Hidden Palace, the super emeralds and all sorts, so trying to get any real link between the Old and New Sonic games is as futile as fighting fire with the flamemaster 3000.

Bollocks, I used Sprites account, it's lightmare people.

 
Glenjamin is offline. Glenjamin 17.02.2008#11

Does anyone ever remember the original Sonic The Hedgehog promotional comic that went along the first game? Dr. Robotnik (Eggman) used to be someone else completely that looked a bit similar to the Robotnik we know today. He was a good guy too who wanted to help the world and so forth. He met Sonic one day when Sonic popped into his lab one day. Sonic was "brown" and looked just like an actual hedgehog. During an experiment the doctor was performing, the "Power Rings" turned Sonic "blue" and transformed the doctor into the evil Robotnik. It was an interesting mini comic. I wonder if this game's story will touch that comic any. The Nintendo Power interview stated that there was an interesting storyline/plot twist that fans would really fine interesting. I think that might be it.

 
JoshSL is offline. JoshSL 17.02.2008#12

Yeah, that was the adaption, but I don't know if it's canonicle.

And Sonic X isn't canonicle, it's an adaption of the games. It's sort of an alternate Sonic world, much like the world of Sonic The Movie and the comics, because in Sonic X, Sonic and his friends are not from earth, yet in the games they are (in the first few Sonic games the action was based on isolated islands like South Island and Christmas Island.)

The comics are just adaptions of the actual game story, changed around a little to make it looks more interesting. If we're talking about Fleetway, Super Sonic is completely evil as is Chaos, however we know it's the total opposite in the actual games. In the game series of Sonic, taking into consideration there are almost no references to the other canons, all we can go by are the other Sonic games, because they do have a running storyline. Even as far as Sonic Adventure there are specific references to Sonic 2 and Sonic CD.

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ohm is offline. ohm 18.02.2008#13

Look I think Bioware are great developers, but I think this game is going to suck. I am actually quite saddened they actually decided to take up on this. Work on original IP like you did with Mass Effect.

 
JoshSL is offline. JoshSL 18.02.2008#14

I'm not. It's the only chance Sonic has of being in a really good game. As a Sonic fan I'm ecstatic, and if you ask me, Bioware need to take a BREAK for original IPs, since it's pretty much all they ever do. Smilie

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