Tuesday, April 13, 2010

The Concept: Sonic and the Legend of Atlantis

Hey, I've always liked Sonic games, and growing up I used to doodle my own little Sonic adventures in the margins of my notebooks. I even used to draw levels and create basic ideas which looking back at them now, really needed some serious work. But I enjoyed it, and I kept at it. Years later, when I got serious about game design and started getting serious with it, it wasn't long before my mind asked "What could you do with a Sonic game?" I promptly told it to be quiet, but deep rooted childhood ideals don't die easily in my mind, and the ideas kept coming back, even if I didn't use them.



Then one day on a Sonic related forum I frequented, the question was raised about where the next Sonic Storybook game should take place. Thinking quickly what had already been covered (Arabian Nights and Camelot) I suggested that it take place in Atlantis. When asked how such a game could work, all those years of boiled over Sonic design rushed to my head, and I wrote a quick (and admittedly very simply) plot and gametype pitch that was more of a dam releasing a geyser of ideas than anything else. But it worked, and as the months went on I found myself tempted to return to that initial several page rush of concepts and start fleshing things out. But, as my rational mind said, it was a licensed trademark, and so I ignored it for a time. But finally my brain would not be denied any longer, and I decided that the best thing to do would be to post my designs publicly, as I'll never be able to use them (barring some lucky streak of interest from Sega) but I consider it great practice, not only as a way to test my skills of design with an established franchise but to receive possible peer feedback.

So without further fanfare I present Underwater Hedgehog, the design documentation blog for Sonic and the Legend of Atlantis.

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