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There is an inkling of truth to the age-old saying, said by a wise and dangerously attractive young man:
“You can take the glitch out of the echidna, but you can’t take the echidna out of the glitch.” –VizardJeffhog
or
“You can’t teach an old echidna new tricks.” –VizardJeffhog
or
“Old echidna habits die hard.” –VizardJeffhog
Continue reading Freak-Out Friday: Knuckles Glitches Again in Sonic Boom: Fire & Ice
It’s been two years in the making, but Sanzaru Games’ Sonic Boom: Fire & Ice for the Nintendo 3DS is finally upon us. Having launched for the Americas just yesterday, the third installment of the spinoff series will be arriving in Europe this Friday while Japanese hopefuls will have to wait another month. Promises were made about the game shaping up to be better and faster-paced than the preceding Shattered Crystal, and according to most critics, Sanzaru certainly delivered.
You can check out the launch trailer above, as well as a review roundup below!
Continue reading Check Out the Launch Trailer for Sonic Boom: Fire & Ice
The Chaotix Detective Agency: the team that never turns down work that pays, a force where one and one makes three, and experts at taking a look at… more clues. Now, the subject of this week’s Mash-Up Monday!
When Team Chaotix was brought back and redesigned from Knuckles Chaotix into their more modern iterations established in Sonic Heroes, their re-debut came with an awesome and really catchy self-titled theme song with vocals by Gunnar Nelson. It also turns out it mashes together quite well with the Mariko Nanba’s Area theme for Sweet Mountain from Sonic Colours, as YouTuber Newbiespud found out by bringing both tunes together.
Check out their tribute to Vector, Espio, and Charmy below!
Continue reading Mash-Up Monday: Team Chaotix X Sweet Mountain Area
Sorry for the delay, good readers! As you likely noticed, the site went down for a brief spell today because goblins, so this couldn’t go up during a Freak-Out Friday on-time as planned. But hey, at least now we’re back on track!
During last week’s Mash-Up Monday, I proposed the idea of hosting a fun little photoshop contest here at The Sonic Stadium, and the response I received was absolutely bonkers. The theme was “Sonic Storybook,” based on the pair of Wii games that threw Sonic into the worlds of the Arabian Nights and King Arthur respectively, where you all had to throw together a box art with the idea of adding Sonic into a storybook of some kind. The best part of it? Just about anything goes. And you all answered in kind!
A lot of these entries went above and beyond my expectations, so it’s high time we show them off properly. Check them out below!
Continue reading Photoshop Contest, September 2016: Sonic Storybook Series
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5oPdHuVOOW4
It’s been one year since the SSMB community stream channel “Motobug” was founded, hosting everything from movie nights to streams of Nintendo Directs and PlayStation Live, as well as marathons of old Sonic Saturday morning cartoons. To commemorate this occasion and to celebrate everything Sonic, SSMB, and Motobug, forum user and channel co-founder Ryannumberonegamer will be hosting a “Sonic Musical Spectacular” (unrelated to the TSS Blackout remix project by DJ EAR) this Saturday at 5pm GMT (1pm EDT)!
Check out his statement below, pulled from the SSMB thread:
Who remembers those old hoaxes swirling around some of our favourite video games? Those days where prolific liars on the playground took advantage of our gullibility, saying you can only catch Mew in Pokémon Red and Blue from under a truck, or Aerith can live in Final Fantasy VII, or you can find the Triforce in The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time, all after a complicated set of conditions are met?
There was one hoax Sonic fans would remember from an old issue of Electronic Gaming Monthly, where you could unlock Sonic and Tails in Super Smash Bros. Melee by scoring 20 KOs in Cruel Melee mode. Impossible, right? Not so, for YouTuber MagicScrumpy did unlock the one and only video game character who is blue, collects rings, and goes fast by clearing those conditions – check out his video below!
Continue reading Freak-Out Friday: Sonic the Hedgehog in Smash Bros. Melee
We’re less than two weeks away until Sonic Boom: Fire & Ice launches on the Nintendo 3DS, and new information and footage from the game is dropping nearly by the day. That said, there is still an air of uncertainty and apprehension surrounding the new Sonic Boom-branded game, despite its one year-delay and SEGA’s promise to uphold a higher standard of quality in all of their games.
This scrutiny isn’t without grounds and neither is it be unexpected, considering the disastrous launch of Big Red Button’s Sonic Boom: Rise of Lyric on Wii U, which was received poorly by critics, and Sanzaru Games’ Shattered Crystal on 3DS, which didn’t live up to fans’ expectations for a 2D Sonic game. With Sanzaru once again at the helm, however, the team aimed to improve on Fire & Ice where Shattered Crystal went wrong, as the game’s creative director Mat Kraemer explains in an interview with GameSpot.
Ah, the Sonic Storybook series – a spinoff that never lived past Sonic and the Secret Rings, which brought the Blue Blur to the many tales of the Arabian Nights, and Sonic and the Black Knight, based on the old legends of King Arthur. The concept of mashing together Sonic with age-old folklore was a fun one that could’ve led to other game ideas: say, Sonic finding the lost city of Atlantis, or facing the Greek hero Hercules, or maybe even going through the pages of Hans Christian Andersen’s The Snow Queen.
What’s with that specific last example, you may ask? This week’s Mash-Up Monday, being “Shadow and the Snow Queen”—a combination of “Let it Go” from Disney’s Frozen, “Snow Halation” from the Love Live! anime, snippets of Crush 40’s “I Am All of Me” from Shadow the Hedgehog, and bits of “Rooftop Run” from Sonic Unleashed—based on a very real crossover idea that spawned between the Sonic and Frozen fandoms.
Check it out below, and read on for the Sonic Storybook Series photoshop contest!
Continue reading Mash-Up Monday: “Shadow and the Snow Queen”, Plus Sonic Storybook Photoshop Contest
This year’s Tokyo Game Show kicks off on September 15th, and with it will come plenty of big reveals from some of the industry’s biggest developers and publishing giants, as well as over 200,000 people expected to be on the show floor to try out upcoming titles.
SEGA will be attending the event with livestreams going on throughout the show, showing off the likes of Yakuza 6, Persona 5, and the new Puyo Puyo Chronicle among other wares. The latest SEGA 3D Classics compilation title from M2, SEGA 3D Fukkoku Archives 3: Final Stage, and Sanzaru Games’ Sonic Boom: Fire & Ice will also be present, complete with new gameplay footage and a live stage event featuring special guests like M2 President Naoki Horii and Sonic series director Takashi Iizuka respectively.
Check out SEGA’s complete TGS 2016 schedule below!
Sonic Mania keeps looking better the more we see from it, and all the more so with every little bit of footage sprinkling forward towards its Spring 2017 release. With that in mind, what if we looked better the more Sonic Mania we have on ourselves? Your dreams can come true today, as SEGA is selling a pair of official Mania T-shirts through Amazon – a Studiopolis Zone-based shirt and a “Triple Theat” tee starring icons of the game’s three playable characters.
However, this promotion is running for this month only, up until September 30th, and at the moment is only available through Amazon US. The Studiopolis tee, as well as a Triple Threat design with the Sonic Mania logo printed on it, were previously available on Amazon UK, though their listings appear to have vanished.
Have a closer look at the shirts themselves in the gallery below!
Continue reading Three Weeks Remain for Limited Edition Sonic Mania T-Shirts on Amazon
The definition of insanity is “repeating the same actions over and over again while expecting different results,” so says some famous scientist of the previous century. However, such unyielding determination is to be commended, especially when one manages to succeed despite the odds after several attempts, but at what cost?
Such is the case for this week’s Freak-Out Friday, as we take a look at Let’s Player Cobanermani456’s 40 minute-long compilation of his Sonic Unleashed fails. No, we’re not talking about the base game here, my good readers – we’re talking about the incredibly unforgiving and unfairly difficult stages available via the DLC Adventure Packs, with death after death after death compiled into one glorious video with copious amounts of schadenfreude to delight yourself in. To our younger readers though, be warned, for there be lots of swearing!
That said, pull up a chair, grab some snacks and join in on Cobi’s suffering after the cut!
Continue reading Freak-Out Friday: Cobanermani456’s Sonic Unleashed Fail Compilation
There’s not much time before the launch of Sonic Boom: Fire & Ice for the Nintendo 3DS. Come the end of September, Sonic fans in the West can get their hands on the third playable instalment of the Sonic Boom series, helmed by Shattered Crystal developer Sanzaru Games as the studio aims to improve where the previous game went wrong – with SEGA going so far as to delay it by a whole year as part of their pledge to aim for a higher standard of quality for all of their games from here on out.
SEGA of Japan recently hosted a near-two hour long livestream showing off several of their upcoming games, including the latest Yakuza, the recently revealed Puyo Chronicle, and Atlus’ highly anticipated Persona 5, but not without kicking things off with a sneak peek at the localized Sonic Toon: Fire & Ice. Gameplay featuring Sonic, Knuckles, and Sticks was shown off in the segment, as well as another look at the Sonic Rivals-esque Bot-Racing. You can check out the interview in full, or watch just the gameplay with footage spliced together by BlueParadox, after the cut!
Continue reading New Footage of Sonic Boom: Fire & Ice Gives Us Another Look at Bot-Racing
Music mashups of Sonic the Hedgehog and Michael Jackson songs are nothing particularly new, but that doesn’t stop them from sounding incredibly amazing – and with Michael Jackson’s involvement with Sonic the Hedgehog 3 confirmed at last (and later confirmed again), the fact that several of these exist across the web isn’t surprising given how well they mix, like thinly sliced fresh cucumbers, a tablespoon of mayonnaise, a pinch of black pepper, and bread no less than 3/4 of an inch thick.
That’s the case once again with today’s Mash-Up Monday, as we take a look at DarkHyperSonic7’s mashup of the King of Pop’s hit “Man in the Mirror” with Tomoya Ohtani’s “Sea Bottom Segue” from Sonic Lost World. Maybe it’s just my personal bias with any song that includes a piano given how gorgeous Michael’s vocals are when in contrast with Ohtani’s beautiful melody on the keyboard, but listen to it for yourself after the jump and let us know what you think of it in the comments!
Sonic Mania is the return to form classic fans have sought after for years, and expectations are high since its debut appearance at the 25th anniversary party in San Diego, revealing a remixed Green Hill Zone from Sonic the Hedgehog as well as a brand new stage with Studiopolis Zone. With this year’s PAX West winding down, more footage from the game has surfaced, all direct feed and featuring both Zones on full display!
Check out GameXplain and Polygon’s differing playthroughs of these levels after the jump, and be sure to leave us your thoughts in the comments.
Continue reading New Sonic Mania Footage from PAX West Shows off More of Green Hill and Studiopolis
Sonic Before the Sequel, the breakout title for then-fledgling game developer Felipe “LakeFeperd” Daneluz, shattered expectations for a fan-developed 2D Sonic game after its initial release in 2011. The full-length retro-styled game lived up to its ambitious name thanks to its gorgeous presentation, its ingenious Zones, a charming story featuring Sonic and Tails meeting for the first time as they try to stop the Death Egg’s launch, and, as of its rerelease for the online Sonic Amateur Games Expo in 2012, a stunning original soundtrack that even saw praise from THE Jun Senoue. Continue reading TSS Review: LakeFeperd’s Sonic Chrono Adventure
In 2007, after years of barbs and jabs at one another from either side of the 90s Console Wars, celebrated company mascots Super Mario and Sonic the Hedgehog finally starred in their first crossover game in the aptly titled Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games. 2008 marked a brand new start for the Blue Blur in his own games as well, with the release of Sonic Unleashed later that year on several platforms – a game that brought new life to the series with transitional 2D and 3D gameplay and the Boost ability, a mechanic that went on to become a staple in later titles until recently. Continue reading Mash-Up Monday: Endless Possibilities X 400m Dash
Last month, Jerod The8BitDrummer performed a spectacular drum cover of the entire Sonic the Hedgehog 3 & Knuckles soundtrack — in a single take! — during one of his live Twitch streams. His drum cover of Michael Jackson’s legendary Sonic OST made for an intense and physically demanding feat that took nearly 90 minutes to accomplish. Now he’s at it again. Continue reading The8BitDrummer Returns With a Fantastic Drum Cover of the Sonic 2 OST in One Take
What’s that? The Battle of the Bigs wasn’t enough for you? You want — no, NEED more Big the Cat in your life?
Don’t worry, friend. I’ve got ya covered.
Continue reading Freak-Out Friday: Big the Cat Adventure 3 by Roger van der Weide
Madness descends on April 15th to the 17th, as this year’s Midwest Media Expo will be in full swing in Dearborn, Michigan! Founded a couple of years ago by the good folks who also founded Youmacon in Detroit, this coming MWME will be filled to the brim with live panels, fun events, cosplayers, artists and vendors, and of course, special guests, with more information likely to be announced towards the date of the con itself.
If you’re in the area and looking for a really, really good reason to register for the convention, perhaps this fun little event will tickle your fancy.
Among the guests attending the Midwest Media Expo are voice actors Jon St. John and Kyle Hebert. Some of you might remember St. John for his vocal talents as Duke Nukem in his titular gaming series, Execk from Chris Niosi’s animated webseries TOME: Terrain of Magical Expertise, and our personal favourite Big the Cat from Sonic Adventure until Sonic Heroes. As for Hebert, he lent his voice to familiar faces such as Son Gohan from Akira Toriyama’s Dragon Ball, Ryu from Capcom’s Street Fighter games, and, since Sonic Colours for the Nintendo DS, Big the Cat!
So what happens when you book both voice artists for the same convention? Only the stuff of legend.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9hxeBOkaOB0&feature=youtu.be&ab_channel=JonSt.John
The “Battle of the Bigs” event will pit both big men with their stupid Big voices against each other in a battle of wits. If it’s truly as incredible as it sounds, this once-in-a-lifetime event between Big the Cats is not something to be missed!
That said, clear up your calendars for April and register for your own passes to the Midwest Media Expo today!
Source: Facebook
Consider this Freak-Out Friday a history lesson in gaming, one that dates back to the bygone era of the mid-1990s.
What’s that? “This doesn’t have anything to do with Sonic the Hedgehog,” you say?
You fools.
What you are about to bear witness to has everything to do with Sonic. In fact, this is about something much, much bigger than Sonic, for had it not been for this man, the Blue Blur — no, SEGA as a whole — would not be around today.
Continue reading Freak-Out Friday: Segata Sanshiro, SEGA’s Greatest Hero
Sonic 3 & Knuckles, compared to the original Sonic the Hedgehog and its sequel, had an entire team of artists behind the game’s musical score, compared to the talents of Masato Nakamura working on the first two games in the series solo. Spearheaded by the late Michael Jackson, the King of Pop himself, and Brad Buxer, the result was that nine different composers had worked on the soundtrack for the 1994 SEGA Genesis classic, leading to an incredibly cinematic and highly varied OST that still resonates with fans to this day. Continue reading The8BitDrummer Played an Amazing Cover of the Entire Sonic 3 & Knuckles OST in One Take!
Around a year and a half ago, longtime Sonic fan animation community Sonic Paradox had its collective YouTube channel hacked into and stolen. Hopes of reclaiming their old network would fade with Google technical support not being of any help, and a backup channel was made from that point on.
Thanks to their YouTube partner over the course of the past few months, however everything is now right as rain again: Sonic Paradox has its old channel back!
Well, almost. Rotund evil genius Doctor Eggman just took control of the recently reclaimed Sonic Paradox channel while the staff busied themselves with undoing the damage caused by the original hacker; with their attention focused elsewhere, Robotnik announced his plans to overthrow the Sonic Paradox “dictatorship” and start a new series of Robotnik Shorts. His plan goes about as well as you’d expect, but don’t take my word for it: give it a watch below and see for yourself!
As for what will happen to the videos on Sonic Paradox’s backup YouTube channel, widescreen HD remasters of the original Sonic Shorts Volumes (plus the Knuckles Briefs!), they will be reuploaded onto their reclaimed channel in due time. The backup account, in the future, will instead cater more to livestreaming.
Be sure to subscribe to the returned Sonic Paradox YouTube channel for hilarious Sonic shorts and more in the future!
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C5-ErbSrTOc
Four months ago, Mark “Alvin Earthworm” Haynes announced that he is rebooting Super Mario Bros. Z, his Dragon Ball Z-inspired flash series crossing over fan favourite gaming franchises Super Mario and Sonic the Hedgehog. After Mobius has been reduced to ashes by the merciless and power-hungry Metallix, it is up to Mario, Luigi, Sonic, Shadow, and Yoshi to search the Mushroom Kingdom for the seven Chaos Emeralds before the mechanical menace finds them first.
Now, the first episode of the reboot—”Fierce Battle Between Fierce Rivals”—has finally launched, and is ready for viewing above!
With the Mushroom Kingdom’s first official Smash Tournament underway, the final round of the melee tourney pits the heroic plumbers Mario and Luigi versus the double-crossing bad boys Wario and Waluigi in an all out brawl for the championship title. That is, until the tyrannical King Bowser Koopa intervenes and begins his latest attempt at Mushroom Kingdom conquest – and the first step of his plan? To destroy Mario!
To those familiar with the original series, “Fierce Battle Between Fierce Rivals” combines the events of the first two episodes into a glorious 30 minute-long presentation. In Mark’s own words, this was how he had originally intended it to be back then, but technological limitations at the time caused it to be split into two episodes.
You can continue to support Mark Haynes and Super Mario Bros. Z via his Patreon – as a bonus, those who pledge a certain amount can actually watch new episodes three whole days before the public release.
SMBZ’s first run began in 2006 and spawned 8 episodes in all before the series was put on an indefinite hiatus in 2009. In 2013, Mark spoke of a number of alterations he would perform on the overall story before ultimately confirming a series relaunch.
Source: Patreon
To celebrate Sonic’s 24th anniversary, SEGA was internally working on their own take on the endless runner genre with their new mobile game, Sonic Runners. While the game was released early in smaller markets for testing, it finally dropped internationally on iOS and Android devices towards the end of June, and with it came the release of the first volume of the game’s soundtrack.
And now, just in time for Christmas, the EP-length Sonic Runners: Original Soundtrack Vol. 2 has finally arrived on digital streaming services!
The second volume, like the first, is solely composed by Tomoya Ohtani himself, and is mainly comprised of some of the music featured in recent in-game events – unsurprisingly, the music is gorgeous and an absolute blast to listen to, making the second volume a must-have for any Sonic OST fan’s library.
The track listing is as follows:
The second volume is available now on iTunes (UK / US) and Amazon (UK / US), with individual tracks costing £0.79 / $0.99 a pop. If you choose to get the entire 7-track album right away, the price sits at an affordable £5.53 / $6.93 – with Vol. 2 sounding as beautiful as it does, it’s an absolute steal!
Planning on downloading this gem for yourself? If you’ve already bought the album, which track is your favourite of the bunch? Sound off below!
Crush 40 as we know them today has been gracing our ears since “Open Your Heart” in 1998’s Sonic Adventure, and set a new standard for music throughout the following line of Sonic the Hedgehog games – nearly every main Sonic title released since the Dreamcast era has been accompanied with a memorable theme tune of some sort. Most popularly, fans of both the band and the series would immediately think of “Live and Learn” from Sonic Adventure 2, “What I’m Made Of” from the final boss battle against the Metal Overlord in Sonic Heroes, or even “Knight of the Wind” from Sonic and the Black Knight, all performed by vocalist Johnny Gioeli, and Sonic music composer-slash-guitarist Jun Senoue.
The duo have performed at a number of fan venues over the years, namely the Summer of Sonic and Sonic Boom conventions, but most recently, the pair was confirmed to perform live at the recent Youmacon in Detroit. While awesome news, a good many were understandably bummed at missing such a wonderful opportunity to see them live.
Until today!
IXI! Studios of Toronto, Canada travelled to the Detroit convention and managed to capture an hour of footage from Crush 40’s Youmacon show! Rock out to a plethora of classic Sonic tunes and miss their concert no longer through the video below!
While at Youmacon 2015, the convention-hopping IXI! Studios (who have travelled to previous MAGFests, ConBravos, and Anime Norths among others) have also managed to film the Team Four Star panel (including the premiere of the new Dragon Ball Z Abridged episode, parodying the movie Super Android 13), the two Little Kuriboh Q&As (Yu-Gi-Oh Abridged episode 65 premiere, Secret Panel), and the Elite 3 panel featuring the Pokémon ‘Bridged 23 debut.
Source: IXI! Studios
h0i!!
welcom to…
TEM SONIC STADUM!!!!
u shud check out…
TEM MASH-UPS!!!!
yAYA!!
Toby Fox’s UnderTale has pretty much taken the web by storm at this point. Released for PC and Mac through Steam back in September, the EarthBound-inspired title by the one-man dev team was released to widespread acclaim for its game-changing morality mechanic, unconventional combat, quirky characters and even quirkier writing, and stellar soundtrack. The game has already received a handful of nominations for The Game Awards 2015, for the categories of “Best Independent Game”, “Best Role-Playing Game”, and “Games For Change”.
To those unknowing, the world of UnderTale is that of a realm of monsters, banished from the surface and sealed away beneath the earth following a terrible war against humans countless years ago. You play as a human child named Frisk who falls through a gap up Mt. Ebott, a mountain from which no one who climbs it ever returns from, and finds themselves trapped underground among the same monsters of legend with no way out, save for a magic barrier at the end of the caverns. Filled with determination, Frisk then travels through the underground, but how they travel is ultimately up to the player.
You can either spare the monsters you come across and move on, adopting the route of the pacifist, or you can kill them and unleash a full-blown genocide onto the denizens of the underground and level-up conventionally. The path you choose will ultimately and entirely affect the rest of your time spent playing UnderTale, to a degree that has yet to be explored in video games up until now.
Now with that short stint of exposition out of the way, why not see out how UnderTale music meshes with classic Sonic tunes? Three of ’em, in fact! Special thanks to my friend Stingybee365, for her support and input on selecting this week’s mash-ups!
For your sakes, I’ll try to keep major spoilers to an absolute minimum where avoidable.
Our first mash-up, courtesy of Lavalamp, is… well, special.
Carnival Night Zone stood out as a stage in Sonic the Hedgehog 3 & Knuckles for the sudden change of tone it provided: after blazing forest fires, wide-spanning and interconnected underwater tunnels, and ruined remains of a long lost civilization (all thematically fitting for a fabled floating island) came a theme park with flashing bright lights and towering machinery, colourful balloons floating about, and that damned barrel that brought many Sonic players to their knees way back before online guides were even a thing.
As wacky as some of UnderTale’s characters and locations can get, none can really compare to the very infamus (VERY!!!!!!!!!) hidden village of the Temmies within the Waterfall region… called Temmie Village. Its citizens? Temmies. Their diet? tem flakes. The save point? Fills you with detemmienation.
So of course, it warrants for both of their abominable songs to be blended together into one unholy union.
celbrating tems new colleg degree, proving tem learnt MANY THINs, “tem go 2 carnivl!!!!!”
awawawawah!!
Now that we’ve said b0i!! to Temmie, we can move on to the nittier and grittier mash-ups and higher standard grammar.
Next one up, called “Genocide Adventure 2”, is by MtH!
Crush 40 need no introduction, but Toby’s “MEGALOVANIA”? Definitely. Played during a particular boss fight exclusive to the game’s dubbed Genocide Route, the tune originally appeared in the EarthBound Halloween ROM Hack back in 2009 (made by the same guy, actually!) for the final boss, and again as Vriska’s theme for one of the official Homestuck Adventures albums.
it’s a beautiful day outside. birds are singing, flowers are blooming… on days like these, kids like you….
S h o u l d b e b u r n i n g i n h e l l.
Take heed should you choose that particular path… because you’re going to have a bad time.
This next one wasn’t one that I’d have ever anticipated, but the end result was definitely a song worth savouring! Why? Of all things, this is a Sonic Rush Adventure mash-up — didn’t see that one coming, did ya?
The sequel to Sonic Rush saw its release on the Nintendo DS back in 2007, starring Sonic and Blaze once again as they chase after the scourge of the seas, Captain Whiskers. The robotic and familiar looking pirate made off with the Jewelled Sceptre: native to Blaze’s world, the sceptre possesses the Power of the Stars, which has the power to alter reality to one’s favour, and dwarves even the Chaos Emeralds and Sol Emeralds in comparison. After Sonic and friends succeed in retrieving the sacred artefact, it is stolen once again under everyone’s noses, this time by the real villainous masterminds behind the game’s events: Doctor Eggman and Doctor Eggman Nega.
The ensuing final battle that takes place in the Deep Core underneath Southern Island was a memorable one indeed, all the more with the music provided by Seirou Okamoto. Sir Spacebar felt it appropriate to combine it with one of UnderTale’s own climactic boss battle tunes, “Finale”. Without further ado, here’s “DeepCoremination”!
Last, but not least, isn’t the kind of mash-up you might be expecting, but nonetheless, I just wanted to share it because it sounds plain friggin’ cool.
Martyn Davies, also known as BlastProcessed, rearranges tunes as though they were being played off of a SEGA Genesis/Mega Drive. His effort is worth noting, seeing he bars himself from ever using MIDI files and simply transplanting them into a different sound font before calling it a day, instead relying on a YM2612 VST alone to get the job done (and going over the actual console’s sound limitations for the plain hell of it). That calls for some serious time, effort, and energy.
That is why I feel the need to cap off this Mash-Up Monday with his take on “ASGORE” from UnderTale, the tragic theme to the King of All Monsters in the Underground!
BlastProcessed has also done UnderTale’s “Spider Dance” — feel free to check out the rest of his “Genesis covers” library too while you’re at it!
Found any other interesting Sonic music mashups out there on the web? Maybe you have one of your own you’d like to share? If so, you can reach me via any of the following to see your choice on the next Mash-Up Monday:
Feel free to post your respect and recognition towards Lavalamp, MtH, Sir Spacebar, and BlastProcessed’s mash-ups below in the comments! Nyeh heh heh!
Thought we’d bring back this fun little weekly feature, because why not? We’ve gone on for too long without the weekly what-the-hecks on The Sonic Stadium!
Sonic the Hedgehog 2 introduced a number of staples in the Sonic series since it first launched in 1992: the Spin Dash ability, a seventh Chaos Emerald and subsequent Super transformation, the two-tailed fox Miles “Tails” Prower as the Blue Blur. Aside from its prequel, Sonic 2 was the highest selling game on the Mega Drive/Genesis, having sold over 6 million copies on its initial run, and cementing SEGA’s status as a successful and legitimate threat to Nintendo and their plumber mascot.
Like Sonic 1, the sequel title was scored by Dreams Come True musician, Masato Nakamura, and a number of the game’s most memorable songs still resound with fans to this day.
Smooth McGroove, renowned on YouTube for his faithful a-capella covers of video game music, uploaded his mesmerizing rendition of the introductory stage of Sonic 2, Emerald Hill Zone.
McGroove previously covered Chemical Plant Zone from the same game, and Sonic 3‘s Ice Cap Zone Act 1, as well as Sonic 1‘s Green Hill Zone, Marble Zone, and Star Light Zone.
No Mash-Up Monday this week, but if you have any Sonic music mash-up suggestions for next week, you can either share your suggestions in the comments section below, or you can reach me via any of the following to see your choice next Monday:
[ Feature image is Super Sonic vs. SSJ Goku, by Lamar Wells! ]
As though Akira Toriyama’s Dragon Ball hasn’t garnered enough success during its initial run in print and on television the world over, the famed manga and anime series is having quite the revival period in recent years.
Sequel films Battle of Gods and Resurrection: F have since contributed to the series mythos with the introduction of the Super Saiyan God, and a new sequel anime series – Dragon Ball Super – continues to add to Goku’s many adventures, following the defeat of the alien warlord Frieza, Doctor Gero’s Androids and his ultimate creation in Cell, and Bibbidi’s evil, planet-levelling monster of eons past, Majin Bū.
Numerous parallels exist between Dragon Ball and Sonic the Hedgehog – a set of seven magical artifacts said to grant miracles, Super transformations, time-travelling heroes sent back to the present to save their future, just to name a few – but there’s only one such parallel we explore here on Mash-Up Monday (or would a “Fusion Friday” have worked better for this one?), and that’s music!
Our first mash-up – “Dragon Spring” – was submitted to us by TrueBlueFuse, combining the opening to Dragon Ball Z Kai with one of my favourite tracks from the mobile endless runner, Sonic Runners! Takayoshi Tanimoto’s “Dragon Soul” fuses with Tomoya Ohtani’s “Spring Emotions” below!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hb7Cy5z1EZI
Thanks for sending it in, TBF!
On the other hand, Dragon Ball fans in the West are likely to have grown up to Bruce Faulconer’s score, so perhaps the next mash-up, “Knight of the Power” by Hyper-Shan, might suit your fancy!
Faulconer’s “Gohan Powers Up”, first played during the Z Warriors’ climactic battle with Cell (heck, some of you might even recognize this tune from Chakra-X’s Sonic: Nazo Unleashed animated fan film!), combines with Crush 40’s “Knight of the Wind”, from Sonic and the Black Knight, and the end result makes for a rather mystical take on an otherwise rock-heavy track. On one hand, it’s easier on the ears, but on the other, it sounds otherworldly!
Found any other interesting Sonic music mashups out there on the web? Maybe you have one of your own you’d like to share? If so, you can either share your suggestions in the comments section below (as well as your thoughts on TrueBlueFuse and Hyper-Shan’s mash-ups above!), or you can reach me via any of the following to see your choice next Monday:
Following the disastrous 2006 release of the next-gen Sonic the Hedgehog on Xbox 360 and PS3, early demos and trailers of the next instalment in the main series helped manage to generate a ton of positive press for SEGA and the Blue Blur, as they hinted at a return to the high speed platforming fans and critics have come to know and love over the years. Sonic Unleashed was soon unleashed onto the gaming world, and the end reception the game had received is mixed, split right down the middle – like night and day!
Continue reading Defend It! The Completionist Defends Sonic Unleashed
OH! MY! GOD! Three mash-ups on a single Monday!?
Conceived by Hirohiko Araki back in 1986 and acting as one of the forefathers of modern shōnen, JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure is an ongoing Japanese manga series that tells the tragic tale of the Joestar family, whose members possessing unique latent powers are forever bound by destiny to battle against supernatural forces. JJBA spans across multiple story arcs following the preluding battles between Jonathan Joestar and Dio Brando, each part with their own starring JoJo, and is currently well into its eighth part almost 30 whole years later, dubbed JoJolion.
After a handful of OVAs and a number of video games over the past few decades, JoJo has finally received a stellar anime adaptation for its first three arcs so far – Part 1: Phantom Blood, Part 2: Battle Tendency, and Part 3: Stardust Crusaders. However, one of the unspoken rules of a good anime is that it needs a really good opening sequence, and thankfully, the JJBA anime has had four incredible ones as of now!
Why all the JoJo exposition on a Sonic fan-site, you say? Context for this week’s mash-ups, of course! No need for alarm either: I can assure you that none of these are the work of an enemy「Stand」.
First up is mash-up artist BotanicSage‘s concoction, which brings the opening tune “Bloody Stream” for Battle Tendency and Hideki Naganuma’s “Vela-Nova” from Sonic Rush together into an even funkier jam combined. I suppose you could say that the end result is a real match…「Made in Heaven」! Eh?
Eh?
…get it?
…
. . . . . .
Yare yare daze, you’re no fun at all.
Anyway, here’s “Bloody Nova”!
We’re switching gears from jazz to rock now as we turn to our next JoJo/Sonic mash-up, this one by guilhox!
When some people think of a memorable Sonic theme, chances are they’re going to think of the iconic “Live and Learn” by Crush 40. When it comes to JoJo, understandably, a lot of folks will point to Jin Hashimoto’s “Stand Proud”, the opening track for the first half of Stardust Crusaders, the arc that formally introduces the ethereal spiritual projections known as “Stands” into the JoJo universe. Rock out to the fused “Live and Stand” below!
Albeit this is a Jet Set Radio mashup rather than a Sonic-themed one, we might as well feature this final gem for the week! Richard Jacques’ “Everybody Jump Around” from the SEGA Dreamcast classic is mixed together with “A Fine Fellow Arrives” by Yugo Kanno, the latter straight from the original soundtrack for Stardust Crusaders. Courtesy of Swordy, here is “Jet Set JoJo”!
Found any other interesting Sonic music mashups out there on the web? Maybe you have one of your own you’d like to share? If so, then you can post some in the comments below (as well as your thoughts on BotanicSage, guilhox, and Swordy’s mash-ups above!), or you can reach me via any of the following to see your choice next Monday:
Even Speedwagon would be impressed!
Hiroyuki Sawano is a brilliant composer, there’s no two cents (or pence?) about it. Without you knowing, you might’ve already listened to some of his work if you’re an avid anime watcher: Blue Exorcist, Attack on Titan, and Kill la Kill are among a number of shows he had scored. Recently, he has even lent his talents for a little Monolith Soft-developed game called Xenoblade Chronicles X, which is hitting the West in early December!
However, to one man, he felt that Sawano’s music was missing something, some sort of spark… say, a dash of blue.
So he went and combined some Sonic music with it and called it a day!
All kidding aside, Triple-Q has done an amazing job in combining the vocal track “Till I Die” from Kill la Kill, composition by Sawano with lyrics by cAnON and vocals by CASG, with a small selection of Sonic music from recent games. From Sonic Colours comes the Area and Act 1 themes of Planet Wisp, by Mariko Nanba and Kenichi Tokoi respectively, with a later transition into Tomoya Ohtani’s “Sea Bottom Segue” from Sonic Lost World.
The end result is absolutely nothing short of spectacular, because “Till Our Planet Dies” sounds like pure magic to the ears. Give it a listen yourself!
If you’ve liked what you’ve heard, you can check out Triple-Q’s library of mash-ups on his YouTube channel, which includes other Sonic-themed mashups that we have featured in the past: “Pull Over (That Metal Too Fast)“, “Knuckles Gets It Started In Here“, and “Green Panty Zone“! You can also download the collaborative KLK tribute album organized by Triple-Q, Cut, Paste and Kill, which is full of wonderful mash-ups just like this one. Click here for more details!
Found any other interesting Sonic music mashups out there on the web? Maybe you have one of your own you’d like to share? If so, then you can post some in the comments below (as well as your thoughts on Triple-Q’s mash-up above!), or you can reach me over the following to see your choice next Monday:
Have a good week, everybody!
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tz8qsmLmgI4
[ Or, to those with trouble seeing the video, here’s a direct link! ]
Super Mario Bros. Z was a massive fan undertaking by one Mark Haynes, also known as Alvin Earthworm, that began way back on Newgrounds in 2006, acting as a crossover between the Mario and Sonic the Hedgehog games with gorgeous Dragon Ball Z-inspired fighting sequences layered on top.
With the seven Chaos Emeralds warped away from a Mobius reduced to ashes, it was up to Mario, Luigi, Yoshi, Sonic, and Shadow to gather the mystical gems and keep them from the tyrannical Mecha Sonic’s clutches, all while dealing with Bowser’s latest attempt at conquering the Mushroom Kingdom.
The animated webseries earned a phenomenal following in its heyday, until production ultimately ceased following the eighth episode, “The Great Doomship Defensive”, in 2009. Due to a busier life offline and waning investment (which is, all in all, completely understandable), Mark withdrew from the Super Mario Bros. Z scene and laid the series to rest, as SMBZ then became an object of nostalgia for many of the web’s denizens while time marched on.
The inaugural battle between Mario and Metal Bowser, the brawls between Team Mario, the Koopa Bros, and the revived Axem Rangers X, the destruction of Yoshi’s Island, the 8bit battles that rocked the fabled Minus World, the introduction of Fire Sonic, that Mecha Mario tease… Needless to say, SMBZ had a lot of memorable high points.
The last that was heard from the series was a rather bizarre 2010 April Fools’ short and an upload of what would’ve been the intro from Episode 9…
…until Mark spontaneously released an animation test back in October 2013 – a remake of SMBZ’s very first scene. He advised fans not to get too excited, or to take it as confirmation that he would be working on the series again, but spoke of a number of alterations he would perform to the story, some of the fight scenes, and dialogue if he went ahead with rebuilding the series from the ground up.
Well folks, get ready to party like it’s 2006, because it is happening. Attributing the introduction of Flash-to-HD Video software Swivel as a major plus, the returned Alvin Earthworm has formally announced that Super Mario Bros. Z is being revived, and that the first episode is indeed on the way!
And, to build up hype for fans old and new, Mark has even gone and redone the opening sequence for the series to kick things off. Compare with the old opening on Newgrounds! Revisit and marathon the old series (NG / YT)! Get in touch with your old Internet friends from way back when and spread the word! Don a banana suit and shout “I LOVE CEREAL!” to the heavens before spontaneously com–––okay, okay, don’t do that, but hey, you get the idea! GET EXCITED!
Super Mario Bros. Z is BACK!
Mark Haynes, Alvin Earthworm, all the best to you, and glad to have you back!
Were you around during the first run of SMBZ? What were some of your favourite moments, or your most favourite battles from the show? Is this the first time you’ve heard of the series as it is? Let us know below!
And if I may add anything else… might I just say that this really takes me back to the old VGLan days.
…wow, I feel old.
Close your eyes and think back to a time when the console wars were coming to a close, Big Blue hit the 10 year mark, and SEGA had released their final bid in keeping the Dreamcast alive – Sonic Adventure 2.
Ooooor you could think back to a time when SEGA fell apart as a first party company, and then went on to port this game onto the Nintendo Gamecube as a third party developer – Sonic Adventure 2: Battle. Either or!
After a case of mistaken identity, wrongful arrest, escaping imprisonment, and breezing through the prison island’s metal harbour, Sonic breaks free into the military patrolled greenery and confronts the doppelgänger hedgehog behind his string of misfortunes. Enter Shadow, the Ultimate Lifeform.
Remember that particular clash? Where blows were finally being dealt, and words were being eaten? Now imagine it in high def.
Hypo, who first recreated the Giant Talking Egg scene from Sonic Adventure, gave the sequel’s Faker scene the Source Filmmaker treatment. Everything from the initial encounter to the brawl itself, as well as the aftermath, has been remastered for your viewing pleasure – perfect for a nostalgia fix!
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pU72XlMODgI
One week ago, Jirard “Dragonrider” Khalil had… changed.
That one video gamer who many have come to know and love as The Completionist, for some inexplicable reason, took a turn for the demonic on the heels of his 99th review for the SNES title Mega Man X 3, and Greg Wilmot, series cohost and the last to have interacted with Jirard, had since gone missing.
Somehow, this was all tied to the black sheep of Sonic games, the forever scorned ugly duckling, Sonic Team’s pitch for the 15th anniversary of the franchise.
Continue reading The Completionist 100th Episode – Sonic the Hedgehog 2006
Did you know these interesting voice acting facts? For those fans who always enjoy a good piece of trivia or two on Sonic the Hedgehog, for those who’ve always been fascinated by the VA business to some degree, or for those braggarts who want to come across as more knowledgeable towards their peers, have I got just the thing!
Did You Know Voice Acting? is a series of short videos crafted by TOME: Terrain of Magical Expertise producer Chris “Kirbopher” Niosi, providing some level of insight on all things voice acting in the gaming and animation industry. Each episode caters to a specific franchise in mind, such as Cartoon Network, Dragon Ball, and, for today’s topic, Sonic.
Curious to see what you’ve already known about the Sonic voice cast, past and present, or fascinated by the prospect of finding out tidbits of info you don’t already know? Watch on below!
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y-0CHWQrkGU
With that, don’t forget to head on to Sonic Characters – Part 2 and the recently released Part 3 for more info! If these have whet your appetite, might I suggest going through the series itself?
