A group of Sonic fans is working on producing a 32-bit-inspired fanmade prequel to the original Sonic the Hedgehog for the PC.
Sonic Overture '95 features scrapped characters and designs from the original Sonic including an earlier take on Dr. Robotnik, unused enemies seen in screenshots from the 1990 Tokyo Toy Show demo, and a blue rabbit that was once in the running to become Sega's mascot before losing out to the hedgehog.
As implied by the "95" in its name, the game is designed to pay tribute to the 32-bit era and even contains a Sega Saturn startup screen and various 3D elements. This includes a 3D-style boss fight with Dr. Robotnik at the end of one of its stages, as well as a number of swinging 3D spike traps.
The project recently came to our attention thanks to a new video from the Sonic YouTuber bickuribox12, which led us to want to find out a little bit more about it.
According to what we were able to discover, the game is meant as a revival of a 2014 demo (which was also called Sonic Overture), which was originally co-directed by the Sonic fan developers Jass and Jordan Lange. However, as the current team states, this new project is not directly associated with or endorsed by Jass or Lange in any way.
Instead, the credits now list another member of the original Sonic Overture team Pixy-Pie as the new project director, artist, and animator, with Additional Trees joining them as the lead-level designer and programmer, alongside LakeFeperd (who you might know as the creator of Spark the Electric Jester). This is in addition to some other support artists and musicians.
A demo of the game has been available since December and features two of the game's zones: Sunrise Gate Zone and Granite Zone. If you want to give it a try, you can download it now from itch.io for free.