A portion of a Glixel interview with Sonic Mania's Christian Whitehead...
G: In a sense, you can say that Sega gave you and your fellow fans the reigns with Sonic Mania. How did that come about, and how did it feel?
CW: I think of it as an incremental step. The first game I ever worked on by myself was the Sonic CD port, and, even at that point, I wanted to make new additions, because I thought it would be cool. But, because it was the first project, (Takashi) Iizuka-san - who is the lead guy for Sonic Team, who I hadn’t even met at that point - he said “Keep it original,” and I kept to that. We did manage to get one new thing in there, which was that you could play as Tails. When he saw that we put that in, and it worked really well, he was more convinced.
When we did Sonic 1 for iOS, we put in Knuckles and Tails. Iizuka-san needed to be sure that we were able to pull it off. We explained the technology, and he gave us guidance with the process. By the time we got to Sonic 2, we decided to put in a new stage, or, rather, a stage that was supposed to be in Sonic 2, but didn’t make the cut - Hidden Palace Zone. We said, “Well, let’s finish it and put it in.” It was a fun creative challenge. For that to happen, Iizuka-san and (Yuji) Naka-san - the original programmer for Sonic - they both needed to be satisfied with what we did with that. We were trying to meet those standards. Every single time, we’ve managed to meet it. Sonic Mania was the chance to make an entirely new title.
It’s been a privilege. This is the first project where we’ve had a larger team - four artists, four level designers, three programmers - so scaling up was a challenge in itself, especially because we’re in different areas of the globe. One of the most fun things about this project has been experiencing the talents of other people. For example, the animated intro by Tyson Hesse - I could just never have imagined that we were going to have that.
G: Can you tell me a bit about your plans for the future?
CW: Well, I think my immediate plans are to take a bit of a holiday. (Laughs) I’m always thinking ahead in terms of what I want to do tech-wise and creatively. I’ve got my own ideas for what I would do with Sonic, but there’s really no point in telling any of that, because it would have to be a collaborative process with Sega. I think our team has definitely enjoyed working on Sonic a lot, and I’d love to do more. Before I did Sonic Mania, I set up the engine for Freedom Planet 2, and I prototyped a few original games, which I definitely have an interest in pursuing. As far as Sonic Mania 2, initially, I was planning on moving onto an original game, but I couldn’t have imagined working on something this big.
from GoNintendo
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