U Sonic the Hedgehog 3 Tough fate: the game was radically redone and did not have time to hand over to the release period, which was cut into two parts. In this chaos, prototypes were born, which are very interested in fans – it is curious to find out how the game looked at different stages of his life!

On the eve of the Hidden Palace and The Cutting Room Floor communities, it was possible to find a rare pre -relief version Sonic 3. To better understand its value, let’s plunge slightly into a video game history.

Development Sonic 3 officially started in January 1993. At first, the authors wanted to create an isometric three -dimensional game of type Sonic 3D Blast. To do this, they were going to apply a chip that Sega cooked specifically for the release Virtua Racing on Sega Mega Drive.

The production of the chip has stalled, nonukcasinosites.co.uk/review/golden-pharaoh/ so the development of a three -dimensional Sonic 3 stopped in June 1993. Everything would be nothing, but Sega agreed on marketing support from the outside McDonald’s in February 1994-it is at this point Sonic 3 had to go into release at all costs. And the creation of the game should have been completed even earlier, because the printing of cartridges and the breakdown of the circulations need additional time.

Developers decided to take as a basis Sonic 2 and concoct a straight sequel with the same gameplay base. Sega I attracted many outsourcers to speed up the process, but it did not help much: in the fall of 1993 it became clear that the restrained Sonic 3 Do not have time to hand over to release.

So the game was cut into two halves. Conditional Sonic 3 Part 1 went to print in November 1993 and still went out in February 1994 under the name Sonic the Hedgehog 3, A Sonic 3 Part 2 finished in June 1994 and sent on sale in October 1994 under the name Sonic & Knuckles. Sega even allowed to insert into the cartridge Sonic 3 cartridge with Sonic & Knuckles, To eventually get a united version (read: the one that was planned originally).

Here is somewhere at the junction of production Part 1 And Part 2 And our prototype appears. And he has a separate difficult story! Sega tried to hide the problems in production and stop leaks, so she showed Sonic 3 the public is not as willing as it was with the previous parts of the series. In order for journalists to prepare a pre -self, they are usually sent by the game samples, but with Sonic 3 They did it differently – the media brought to a special event, where they met a trickel under a strict supervision Sega. The company even forbade guests to take screenshots and instead issued a pack of officially approved pictures.

Due to the strict rules of the event, almost no publication managed to publish a preview Sonic 3 Until the end of 1993. The exception is the British Sega Magazine (and its copy for Germany in German), which partially financed the European unit Sega. The first issue of the magazine was released on December 10, 1993-together with it they gave an application with a brief history of the series Sonic the Hedgehog and … one of the most detailed materials about the upcoming Sonic 3!

The Sega Magazine described in detail the prototype Sonic 3, They talked about its features, attached pictures from each gaming zone and published screenshots, which, apparently, did not come from a common pack from Sega for journalists, and shot directly in the working version.

This work version was dug in fans. It is dated November 3, 1993-it is probably the earliest assembly Sonic 3, which is now possible to get. It is very different from the release version of the game: it has a location of Flying Battle Zone, which was eventually transferred to Sonic & Knuckles, There were pieces of unreasonable content, bonus levels are replaced by software tests, and Angel Island Zone (first location Sonic 3) designed differently.

Fans began to gut the insides of the prototype in search of all sorts of interesting details and are already collecting differences on the wiki page. Download "rum" of the early version Sonic 3 For an emulator, you can at this link.