Welcome to the Archive site of The Sonic Stadium (2008-2023)
Please note that this site is no longer being updated or maintained; as a result, there may be design issues, and links to images and other media may be broken. Links to posts may redirect you to the same article on the current Sonic Stadium website.
While Sonic has had plenty of figures and toys across the last 30 years, few attempt to recreate his second-most iconic ability, rolling into a ball. As it turns out, there was originally a concept for rolling Sonic as early as McDonald’s 1994 Sonic 3 Happy Meal promotion.
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Unused concept art can often give us interesting glimpses into what could have been. New concept art for the Sonic movie by artist Bayard Wu shows a variety of alternate takes for Sonic’s surrogate mom, Longclaw, as well as alternative designs for the film’s cut lizard villain. According to Wu, the lizard’s name was “Rava.” We reported on Rava earlier this year, when concept art done by other artists was released.
Check out Wu’s art, which he released on his Artstation page, below:
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Early movie concept art can be pretty weird and cool, and it should surprise no one that this is especially true for the Sonic movie. Twitter user Marx Pan came across some concept art from early 2018 on Chinese microblogging website Weibo.
Created by Weibo users Xu Tianhua Thx and Jin Xiaoyu for Blur Studios, one of the movie’s special effects houses, the concept art showcases a never before seen lizard villain and Sonic getting into a bar fight with Captain America himself, Chris Evans, who was apparently the actor Jeffrey Fowler wanted early on.
This concept art appears to confirm a detail found in the movie’s copyright, which mentioned a lizard villain wanting to use Sonic’s power to take over the universe.
You can check the images out on the Xu Tianhua’s page, or look at them below:
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Remember how Sumo Digital kept dropping hints that they really wanted to do a fighting game? Looks like it was an idea which was seriously being considered if this discovery is anything to go by.
A design company by the name of Funsolve recently uploaded a bunch of concept art images for a number of Sega games, including the House of The Dead Overkill, Sonic & Sega All Stars Racing Transformed and more interestingly, two completely unknown All-Stars concepts, All Stars Brawl & All Stars Football.
The football concept is exactly what you would think, the Sega All Stars playing football with the trademark weapons being used during the game.
The brawl one however is the more interesting concept, with Super Sonic used to show the characters can fly around the stage as well as stand on platforms using power ups and throwing objects at opponents.
One annoying part of the concept art is that the brawl concept art was laid out like a comic book… only the second part of it is cut off and we really want to see how that fight was going to turn out.
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The Sonic Stadium may link to retailers and earn a small commission on purchases made from users who click those links. These links will only appear in articles related to the product, in an unobtrusive manner, and do not influence our editorial decisions in any way.
There’s a wealth of information to be gained from these previously unseen images!
It turns out that Sonic the Hedgehog co-creator Hirokazu Yasuhara was in Krakow, Poland to hold a presentation at the Digital Dragons Conference Centre. And with him, he brought some interesting new insights into the development process of the first two Sonic games!
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The Sonic Stadium has discovered even more Sonic Boom concept art, but this time for last year’s Nintendo 3DS release Sonic Boom: Fire & Ice. The images were found on the portfolio of Casey Holtz a contract designer who worked on the game’s level and system design.
Responsibilities:
Level layout on 12 Race levels
Level layout on4 Adventure levels
Boss battle design, tuning, scripting
General systems tuning and support.
The concept art gives us a look at early stage and boss level sketches. In the original image files we can see they date back between November 2014 and early 2015 telling us the game was still in the very early stages not long before it was announced in June 2015, so it’s no wonder the game was delayed until September last year.
Check out the images in our gallery below and share your thoughts in the comments.
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Sega have just held a Sonic event at Joypolis in Japan which we previously reported would be live-streamed (we do not yet have an archive of said live-stream yet). In the event, they have unveiled a couple of key things (the second of which is being posted about next), first is that they have unveiled a slew of sheets featuring many characters and their various stages of designs along with their final design.
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The Sonic Stadium has discovered some concept art pieces from 2012 racer Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed. The highlight is the above collection of items and weapons featuring many that went unused. See more after the jump! Continue reading S&ASRT Item & Vehicle Concepts Found
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The Sonic Stadium has discovered even more concept art from Sonic Boom: Rise of Lyric and a few pieces from Sonic Boom: Shattered Crystal. The images were among the portfolios of artists Oscar Ponce and Jason Norton who used to work at Big Red Button Entertainment. The latter’s artwork is especially intriguing as it reveals scrapped ideas for Eggman’s mech, a ‘battle mode tank’ and what we can assume is a golem boss battle. Check out all fifty seven of the images in our gallery below and give us your thoughts in the comments.
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The Sonic Stadium has discovered even more concept work for 2014’s Wii U exclusive Sonic Boom: Rise of Lyric. The work was found on Amped UX’s website revealing they too had a hand in the game’s development.
The studio provided the following services:
* UI/UX Design, Wireframes, and Project Management
* Heads Up Display (HUD) UI Actionscripting
* Progression/Systems Design
* Localization Production & Integration
* High Level Concept & Documentation
* Secondary Quest & NPC Design
* Level Geometry Whiteboxing & Visual Scripting
* Final Script Debugging and Level Layout Revisions
You can learn about these development procedures in huge detail over at Amped UX at the below links. They’re a good read if you’re interested in game development or getting into the industry.
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Back on December 14th we reported that Senior Designer Henry Grey shared alternate logos for Sonic Boom on his page at Creativepool, and now today our own Shadzter once again has found that Henry has shared even more over at Cargo Collective which you can see above.
Which logo do you find interesting? Any you prefer to the final one? Let us know in the comments!
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The Sonic Stadium has uncovered what appears to be an unused promotional poster for Wii exclusive Sonic and the Black Knight. The poster was created by a company called KJSCoverArt who have designed a lot of album covers for various artists, as seen on their portfolio. We assume this image must have been made pretty early on because you’ll notice Sonic is wearing two of the same gauntlet he wears in the game instead of just one, as well as a helmet, which looks much like Shadow/Lancelot’s. Other changes include slight differences in Caliburn’s hilt and the game’s logo.
What do you think of this artwork? Would you have preferred Sonic to have worn more armour? Speak out in the comments.
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The Sonic Stadium has uncovered alternative designs for Sonic Boom’s logo that were scrapped in favour of the above final product we have now. The images were found on Senior Designer Henry Gray’s page at Creativepool where he describes Sonic Boom as “A grown up, adaptable and animated identity for the largest franchise from the Sonic stable to date”. You can check out the designs below.
Do you think SEGA should have gone with one of the other logos, or do you like the one we have? Speak out in the comments!
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It appears Sonic Classic Collection for Nintendo DS was originally going to be a much bigger collection at one point, with more games and content. The Sonic Stadium has found images on the portfolio of former SEGA Studios Australia employee Brooke Luder that reveal Sonic Spinball, Sonic 3D Blast (aka Sonic 3D Flickies’ Island) and Dr. Robotnik’s Mean Bean Machine were all part of the collection during development. This would explain why sprites from Sonic Spinball and Sonic 3D Blast can be seen in the credits roll.
Another image shows that video content was planned too, though no examples are given. You can check out more images in the gallery at the bottom of this article.
SONIC CLASSIC COLLECTION
SEGA Australia had the good fortune (WOOO!) of acquiring the Sonic Classic Collection port to Nintendo DS.
I created all the UI artwork for the port. This included recreating all the game logos as Sega no longer had the original editable logos. It also involved designing and creating the in-game assets for all the front end menus and ingame menus that weren’t part of the original game play and creating sprite sheets for the EFIGS language conversions.
Studio: SEGA Australia
Fun Factor: OMG!
Publisher: SEGA America
Release Date: 2010
Platform: Nintendo DS
Position: Senior UI/UX Artist
Software: Photoshop, Illustrator
Skills: Graphic Design/Layout
In non-Sonic news that will no doubt disappoint a lot of SEGA fans, Luder’s portfolio reveals that a Crazy Taxi 4 pitch was made by SEGA Studios Australia. No information about the pitch unfortunately, but we’re shown the above piece of concept art at least.
CRAZY TAXI CONCEPT ART
A concept piece created for the Crazy Taxi pitch from SEGA Australia. Illustrated in Photoshop and logo design created in Illustrator.
Studio: SEGA, Australia
Location: Brisbane, Australia
Software: Photoshop, Illustrator
Skills: Illustration, Logo Design
Luder has also shared some concept art of SEGA Studios Australia’s official video game for the London 2012 Olympic Games.
LONDON 2012 OLYMPICS CONCEPT ART
I was involved in early stage graphics prototyping for SEGA’s London 2012 Olympics game. As part of this experience I created some of the early stage pitch art for game play prototyping.
Studio: SEGA Australia
Fun Factor: Gold!
Location: Brisbane, Australia
Position: Senior UI Artist
Software: Corel Painter
Skills: Illustration, Concept Art
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Big Red Button developers have been busy again by recently uploading more test footage and concept art from Sonic’s last console outing Sonic Boom: Rise of Lyric. In the above footage taken from Tuan Nguyen’s demo reel (with Skylanders footage cut, thanks to SSMB’s Blue Blood), we can see the scrapped beautiful hub world first seen in the GDC 2013 CryEngine 3 demo footage in a playable state.
https://vimeo.com/116913752
Devon Roderick has also released two test footage clips in the above video, one of a cutscene and one of an NPC.
Onur Cayli has released a large amount of images showing character renders he worked on, including the rather creepy looking Shadow render you see above.
What do you think of these latest releases? Do you wish the beta hub made it to the final product? Speak out in the comments.
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Conceptual drawings for both the famed Sonic 2 ‘Tour Truck’ and indeed Sonic the Hedgehog 2’s logo have been found, courtesy of Market Reactive, a United Kingdom based marketing group that according to their website, was the main marketing force behind the Sonic the Hedgehog series in the early 90s in Europe. Continue reading Sonic 2 Logo and Tour Truck Concepts Found
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SEGA have revealed brand new (and some downright beautiful looking) concept art from both the Wii U and 3DS versions of Sonic Boom. You can see not only some interesting environmental concepts like a sprawling large forest and giant cliffs, but also a couple of enemy designs which you’ll see in the games. These are all available in our gallery below, so be sure to check it out and let us know what you think.
In case you missed it somehow, there’s been a plethora of new content revealed this E3 for all three versions of Sonic Boom. Check out the trailers for Rise of Lyric (Wii U), Shattered Crystal (3DS) and the TV Show.
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This path has a branch! Branching paths confirmed!
Beleaf it or not, there’s some contraverstree over this piece of artwork. I’m stumped that someone would find this oakfensive, but they’ve really flipped their twig about it! Frankly, I think they’re barking up the wrong tree. They need to get to the root of the problem and tell Sega what kind of art they pine for. Maple they’ll listen. Don’t beat around the bush either or your efforts will be foilaged! Take a fern stance on the issue! No ifs, Ents or buts about it!
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I would like to apologize (or make some of you happy) on the lack of bad puns in this weeks post. I mean, last week gave us ice cubes and a snowman. I coulda gone on for days just on that! But this weeks art is hard to write around as far as puns go. Here we have…A Ring Shooter. Yup. That’s what it is alright. Ummm… I guess Sonic won’t have to worry about ring around the tube? It’s totally tubular? “SIGH!” Sorry. That’s the best I got. Read on for…a floating platform.
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SEGA has started a very familiar campaign called ‘Concept Art Friday’ which will see SEGA release concept art for Sonic the Hedgehog 4: Episode 2 every Friday on their blog and on Sonic’s Facebook page. To kick things off, SEGA has today released two images on their blog of what appears to be a wheel switch from Sonic the Hedgehog 3′s Marble Garden Zone and an image on Sonic’s Facebook page of a new badnik.
Check back next week for more. In the meantime, let us know what you think of SEGA reusing this marketing strategy in the comments section.
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You may remember when we informed you about a competition being held at Sonic Wrecks to win some Sonic & SEGA All-Stars Racing goodies. Site owner and SEGA Europe Community Manager ArchangelUK has now revealed every prize in photo form including the never before seen Big the Cat concept art.
The competition is open for just 2 more days so if you haven’t already taken part then head over to Sonic Wrecks now to get your entry in.
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It’s Thursday and it’s 7PM GMT so what does that mean? You’re right, it’s the official Sonic The Hedgehog 4 Episode 1 webpage content unlock. What goodies do SEGA have in store for us this time? More in game Badnik art and Concept art? Correct again. This time it’s a “new” version of Marble Garden’s floating spiky fish thing; Bubbles. So yeah, it looks like the dude from Sonic 3 but more so. The description seemingly reveals the global recession has also hit Eggman so “budget cuts” mean some versions of the Badnik don’t even have spikes. I swear I’m not making that up. We are warned about the “Red Ones” though, which sounds like a more vicious variant. Check out the website for full sized images and hold on tight for next weeks update of, you got it, more Badnik and Concept art!
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The latest Sonic 4 website countdown reached zero at 7pm GMT tonight and unlike some of the previous unlocks this one actually had content behind it. Firstly the website now sports a “Wallpapers” option under the Multimedia section where you can download a wallpaper (funnily enough) with the Sonic 4 logo in one of three sizes. Secondly the site yielded more concept art, this time of various stylised greenery in the shape of bushes and such. Both items can be seen on the official Sonic 4 Website.
So with two more items unlocked, as seems to be the way with everything on the site, two more countdowns have begun. Thats right, we’re now waiting for more concept art and our second Badnik model, both of which are due to be unlocked at 7pm GMT next Thursday. What do you think we’ll see? Answers in the comments section below!
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Today was filled with more broken countdown clocks on the Sonic 4 website. Hopefully, everybody has come to realize that despite the longer wait, the payoff isn’t going to be that great regardless (see: motobug). SEGA of America really needs to fix that site. It’s a real mess.
I digress. The “concept art” (note the quotes) is of a badnik from Sonic 2‘s Emerald Hill Zone. It looks like Masher will be hoppin’ up some waterfalls to bite your blue balls as you cross wooden bridges in Sonic 4. CHOMP.
The Sonic Stadium may link to retailers and earn a small commission on purchases made from users who click those links. These links will only appear in articles related to the product, in an unobtrusive manner, and do not influence our editorial decisions in any way.
The Sonic Stadium may link to retailers and earn a small commission on purchases made from users who click those links. These links will only appear in articles related to the product, in an unobtrusive manner, and do not influence our editorial decisions in any way.
Remember the Shellcracker concept art that SEGA revealed last week for Project Needlemouse? Well, one fan has decided to draw up some more in that style. This time, it’s one of Shellcracker’s running buddies, Slicer, the biggest dick in the entire game. Looks pretty official to me, but I’ll let you be the judge:
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Steve Lycett who began his developer diary for Sonic & SEGA All Stars Racing which we reported about earlier has revealed a couple of new screens and a piece of Amy Rose conept art to SEGA of America’s blog where they too have posted the diary entry.
Will we see more in the next diary entries? We’ll keep an eye out, for now here’s the pics –
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ShadiWulf from Rings & Emeralds has discovered the website of the art studio that was commissioned to produce concept artwork for Sonic World Adventure (or Sonic Unleashed to you and I). Geoffroy Thoorens, on his personal website Djahalland, was working at art studio AOKI when they were asked to provide settings for the game back in 2007. He has recently uploaded all of those works online, and you can see them here (or on the Djahalland website).
Click the image to see all the Concept Art
The concept art is focused on the stages found in the final game, you can even see some of your favourite moments from the game like the lood de loops in Holoska. The artwork is amazing for the persons first job, it’s great to see how much effort went into the design on the stages and it certainly shows, in this art and the final game.
The Sonic Stadium may link to retailers and earn a small commission on purchases made from users who click those links. These links will only appear in articles related to the product, in an unobtrusive manner, and do not influence our editorial decisions in any way.
It’s Thursday and it’s 7PM GMT so what does that mean? You’re right, it’s the official Sonic The Hedgehog 4 Episode 1 webpage content unlock. What goodies do SEGA have in store for us this time? More in game Badnik art and Concept art? Correct again. This time it’s a “new” version of Marble Garden’s floating spiky fish thing; Bubbles. So yeah, it looks like the dude from Sonic 3 but more so. The description seemingly reveals the global recession has also hit Eggman so “budget cuts” mean some versions of the Badnik don’t even have spikes. I swear I’m not making that up. We are warned about the “Red Ones” though, which sounds like a more vicious variant. 
