Sonic Adventure: Remix is a 2D fan recreation of Sonic Adventure developed by Team Remix using both Sonic Advance sprites and custom sprites. The project was advanced both visually and gameplay-wise for its time. While the project was cancelled in 2006, a demo was released featuring Emerald Coast, along with Sonic, Tails, and Knuckles as playable characters. Today, we take a look back on the project and interview one of the developers.

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Level design is a mixed up 2D conversion of Sonic Adventure‘s level design. Additional paths and gimmicks have been added to smoothly convert the level design from 3D into 2D. Sonic and Tails’ main objective is to get to the goal ring, while Knuckles must find three shards of the Master Emerald. You can see how Tails and Knuckles might have played through their own versions of Emerald Coast in the actual Sonic Adventure had the stage been included in their stories.

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Sonic Adventure: Remix‘s recreation of Emerald Coast features everything found in the original Emerald Coast. The hotel at the beginning of the stage is in the game, along with the whale chase sequence. All of the sprites look extremely polished. The whale chase is no longer an automated scene and is now a platforming segment where the player must avoid hazards. The lighthouse section is also included. The stage ends with Sonic breaking open a capsule, similar to the original in trial mode. The gameplay is extremely polished and is what I imagine the old Dimps would have done had they been asked to develop a Gameboy Advance version of Sonic Adventure.

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Unfortunately, no other builds were released. The last build was released at SAGE 2006. The project was cancelled shortly after with the team moving onto an original Sonic fan game project; Sonic Firestorm a few years later. The project’s development is quite interesting with some unanswered questions. We reached out to VexusVersion who was one of the developers for some insight on the project.

Q: What inspired the idea behind not only recreating but remixing Sonic Adventure in 2D?

VexusVersion: An interesting question to start with because of one detail: I wasn’t the one responsible for starting the project. It was a man who I only ever knew as GamerGuy, and it took a while before I threw caution to the wind and asked to join in development, beginning what would soon become the fangame group Sonic Technical Institute. I suppose what drew me to the project was a really wanting to see a new spin on a game I had very fond memories of!

Q: The project was developed in the mid 2000s when there weren’t many resources available. How difficult was replicating Sonic Adventure‘s gameplay in 2D and what was the thought process behind translating the level design into 2D?

VexusVersion: Short story? Very difficult. Long story? I wasn’t even out of high school and barely pushing myself as an artist. By the time I joined in on the project, the basics were already present but the level design of Emerald Coast was more like a test level with new paint. I wanted to push the idea of adding more of the original areas. For example I added the lighthouse and expanding it into a more fully realised vertical climb section. With only a basic Windows XP setup and no actual art tools, progress was always slow going. It’s why the project rarely used original art assets, but I’m glad it’s there.

Q: What engine was the project developed using?

VexusVersion: The game was developed in GameMaker 6 for pretty much its whole runtime, but I can’t recall whose framework we were using for it (if any). I think by the time we were moving on to Sonic Headway, GameMaker 7 was finally a thing.

Q: Do you remember how Amy, Big, and Gamma might have been implemented?

VexusVersion: I remember Amy was pretty much done in the most up-to-date builds we had of the game, she was a mixture of both her Advance 1 and SA1 moveset, and I remember there was talks of making actual stealth sections where Amy could hide. In hindsight, I’m not sure how well that would’ve played out. Gamma was rarely talked about at the time, but Gunstar Heroes was definitely a point of reference. We never touched Big. It would’ve been a… large undertaking.

Q: Did development start on any other stages? If so, how far were they in development?

VexusVersion: Surprisingly, yes! While there was a fair bit of back and forth on how content should be presented, there was a prototype of Station Square as an isometric hub world where you explored around. I also developed a complete prototype of Sky Chase Act 1, which was a SHMUP level that periodically moved between a Sonic 2 side-scrolling style and Sonic Advance 3 Special Stage inspired 3D sections. I also remember starting art assets for Windy Valley.

Q: What was the reason for the project’s cancellation?

VexusVersion: Over time it finally sunk in just how AMBITIOUS this project was going to be. Not only did we only have one complete stage at the time, but we had plans to do the whole story, and how that was going to be drawn and programmed was barely done before we decided that working on a smaller scale project would be best. Our programmer (known at the time as AeroGP) had been working on a new framework that was more accurate to Sonic physics and we wanted to start fresh. That eventually became Sonic Headway. Then GamerGuy became too preoccupied with real life to continue fangaming, and that was that.

Q: Are you currently working on any new projects and where can people follow you for updates?

VexusVersion: The easiest place to catch me these days is on https://twitter.com/VexVersion and https://www.deviantart.com/vexversion (or just searching for anything @VexVersion) I’ve been currently working on a graphic novel set in an original comic universe called The Masons: a horror novel about a cop family in a small town. The comic group itself is called Myriad Anthology (https://www.deviantart.com/myriadanthology), and it’s an open comic setting where people can make comics in an And for people who remember me most for my own fangame: Super Sonic Knockout, I’ve been slowly working on something of a spiritual successor behind the scenes, but my focus is currently on the comic mentioned earlier.

Download: SARDemo2.9.zip