When this game came into test and I played it a huge grin spread across my face. Why, you may ask? Well, the Nintendo Wii with its limitless possibilities has allowed SEGA to create a game that plays like the original Sonic titles, but in 3D! Out are the free-roaming environments and in has come the back-to-basics classic race-to-goal gameplay.

Loosely based on the Arabian Nights book, Sonic and the Secret Rings has diverse and beautiful landscapes for Sonic to burn across on his quest to save the world. Through the power of the ring you are bestowed, Sonic gains experience points and is able to unlock powerful new abilities. Are there other characters you ask? Don’t worry, this is purely a solo outing for our little blue freak.

The Wii remote during test allows me to feel like I am Sonic as I dodge, slide, jump and thump my way through transverse enemies and environments. That’s why I smile every day I test at work, because I can safely guarantee that you guys (the fans) won’t be disappointed. This is the true transformation of Sonic from 2D to 3D.

Worried that the game won’t be a challenge because of the intuitive Wii remote? Fear not, the game is littered with hardcore challenges that will take everything we’ve got to complete. And if that’s not enough there is a multiplayer party game mode where you whack, swing, spin and aim your Wii remote to victory with up to three friends.

Be very excited, come March 2nd. Sonic is back with a vengeance!

Marlon Andall - Assistant Team Lead, SOE QA

Thanks are in order. First to Marlon, Alan and Adam from SEGA Europe’s in-house QA team.

They helped us out with some advice for a web project we’ve got in the works at the moment, but while we chatted we were blown away by their enthusiasm for Secret Rings. Especially considering the well-documented rigours of the lengthy testing process involved in producing a game.

So we asked them if they’d like to write something for the blog about the game and they duly delivered. Scroll down for their posts. Cheers, guys.

Secondly, thanks to Justin and Dave. Justin heads up SEGA Europe’s online team, while Dave looks after our sports titles on the web. They both pitched up this morning wearing Sonic T-shirts, revealing at a stroke their true allegiance to the hedgehog. Say cheese!

Hi, this is Alan and Adam of SOE QA.

We’ve been working on Sonic and the Secret Rings since it came in for testing in mid December (you may have seen the backs of our heads in Justin’s blog entry back on Dec 14). We’ve been playing SSR day in day out and we’re still not bored.

We may have completed the game a hundred times, but we still love the challenge - trying to beat each other to get the top times on each mission. There are more than 20 hours of really tough, really fast gameplay to be had. In fact I think we can safely say this is the fastest Sonic game yet.

SSR has a completely original story, loosely based on the Arabian Nights book (with some bizarre twists) and features you’ve never seen before. This is the first Sonic game to include a kind of RPG element, as Sonic levels up with experience points. The higher your level, the more skills you unlock and the faster you go! By the time you reach level 60 you’ll be running so fast your eyes will bleed. The game also looks great, not that you’ll get a chance to appreciate the scenery at the speed you’ll be running.

The Wii controls work really well. This is no port; this is a true Wii game, designed from the ground up with the Wii remote in mind. And finally, if all that wasn’t enough, there’s loads of fun to be had with the huge selection of awesome multiplayer mini games, which make great use of the Wii technology.

This is back-to-basics Sonic. It’s all about speed, the way it should be. If you remember playing Sonic the Hedgehog 2 with great nostalgia, we think you’re going to love this.

Alan and Adam - SOE QA Testers

In the relatively short time I’ve been at SEGA, there have been several different Sonic games in many forms. Before considering the best approach for the promotion of any game, it’s important to identify the game’s strengths, or to use insipid marketing speak, its “Unique Selling Points”. In the case of Secret Rings, the central premise is very strong.

(Pictured above-right, Stefan with SEGA PR guys from Spain and France. And Sonic.)

When I was a tubby youngster, most people either supported SEGA or Nintendo in their choice of gaming console, so it was perhaps a surprise for me to learn that Sonic has featured heavily on Nintendo formats since SEGA’s rebirth as a software publisher. There have been at least four GameCube titles if memory serves, not to mention the very successful Sonic Advance series on the GBA and the frankly excellent Sonic Rush on DS. So the first thing to understand is that Sonic on Wii is a big deal.

Secondly, as I discussed earlier, it’s Sonic’s first solo outing since the original Sonic the Hedgehog (well, technically Sonic CD), so it’s very much a back-to-basics game. Whether you love or loathe the other characters in the universe, Sonic has always remained a popular constant, and this fact has been welcomed by the press.

Lastly, this isn’t a port and it’s a very large game - there are also lots of mini games to choose from, so there’s a lot of value to be had here.

So, once the game’s strengths and target market are established, the PR Managers in countries across Europe work closely with the central European PR teams to build up a list of the things we think we’ll need to effectively promote the game.

These will be assets in the form of screenshots, trailers, videos, concept art and rendered artwork. We’ll look at the game and determine which features will be of interest to the press and which ones we feel are newsworthy enough to sustain a period of coverage before the preview stage, where the magazines and websites will see much more of the game.

This is the proactive stage, designed to build interest. Most PR campaigns have an intense period of activity over about nine months (bigger games may stretch to 18 months and beyond), where each of these assets are released over time from announcement to review stage and beyond. I’ve mentioned that this is the proactive stage, but it’s also important to be prepared to react to opportunities that arise as the hype of each game grows. 

Magazine covers are the highlight of any campaign and are usually given out by a magazine in return for exclusive content (i.e. an exclusive first look) for high-profile games. The magazine covers also have great visibility on magazine shelves, so it’s the top prize for any campaign.   

For websites, exclusives are generally given in return for prominent slots on the homepage for a set length of time.

So far, Sonic and The Secret Rings is on its third magazine cover in the UK, on the best-selling multiformat magazine GamesMaster, which I’m really pleased with. It’s for an exclusive preview of the full game (see the cover to the left).

Next up in the campaign will be general previews, followed by reviews. Reviews are perhaps the most trying time of any PR campaign, where we send out a final or near-final copy of the game for the magazine/website to recommend or ward off potential buyers of the game.

I think it’ll be the former, and I hope you agree once the game is on the shelves!

Stefan - UK PR Manager

The first game I played after joining SEGA, as I stood waiting for my induction process to begin, was a demo of Billy Hatcher and The Giant Egg, the first non-Sonic platformer from SONICTEAM. It wasn’t a Sonic game, but I thought it was quite cool that I was now working for a company with that blue logo on the loading screen, considering I’d spent so much time with Sonic as a kid. Well, not Sonic himself. You understand…

I’m currently working on the launch of SEGA’s second European title for the Nintendo Wii, Sonic and the Secret Rings. We announced the game on 10 May 2006, the week of the Electronic Entertainment Expo (also known as E3) in LA. The queues for the Nintendo stand were enormous - it could take up to six hours to get a hands-on of the Wii. Considering that, I was chuffed to find two consoles set up behind the scenes at the SEGA stand. It also meant we were able to give many journalists their first hands-on experience of the new console.

Secret Rings plays completely differently to any other Sonic game that’s gone before. I’d had the privilege of visiting SONICTEAM the month before to see the 360 game (pictured right, Stef and UK games journalists at SONICTEAM), which as some of you know is like a greatest hits of Sonic gameplay, with the obvious inspiration being Sonic Adventure and Sonic Heroes. But Secret Rings… this one’s something else altogether. 

The first thing I realised about Secret Rings is that it’s been set away from the usual Sonic-universe environment; the setting and the storyline are inspired by the Arabian Nights tale, which allows for some really rich landscapes. Sonic’s also on his own - this is very much a solo outing.

Next up, and perhaps more importantly, Sonic runs on a pre-determined path. It could be argued that previous Sonic games have allowed almost too much freedom, which is wasted when going at speeds. So, instead of hindering your enjoyment, this ‘on-rails’ approach allows you to have much more control over the character whilst moving at greater speeds. This is a very good thing, and (I feel) the closest Sonic’s 3D games have come to achieving the feel of the 2D originals.

The main control method is actually steering Sonic from left to right using the Wii remote. You collect rings and little orbs that build up a gauge allowing special moves, and then use the D-pad to perform them. Jump using the ‘2′ button, and then shake the remote forward and down to perform a homing attack whilst in the air.

I know more than anyone that Sonic in 3D gets a bit of a mixed response from the press, perhaps because the 2D games worked so well. But, so far, I’m very encouraged by the reaction to this new game…

Stefan - UK PR Manager

Since this is the first time I’ll write a blog for the site (although it may be the last after the site editor sees it), I thought I’d talk about my first experiences with Sonic.

The first time I saw Sonic, I was about 14 years old, and out shopping at the Belfry Shopping Centre in Redhill. Dixons (an electrical store at the time) had a display unit in the front of their shop, with three small monitor screens showing off the rolling demo video from the first Mega Drive game. I was fascinated by the speed of the character doing loop after loop through a landscape with more colours than I’d seen before in a videogame. Actually, I lie, I’d seen more colours on a ZX Spectrum loading screen, but I guess that doesn’t really count.

I remember wondering whether the actual game would look that good. It turned out it did, but I’ve certainly found myself wondering that a lot when I see game trailers these days. I picked up the controller but it wasn’t plugged in. It was about six months before I got to play it properly.

I wasn’t that poor but didn’t get a chance to buy too many games, so I needed to play them a lot to get enough value out of each. I must have clocked up at least 100 hours on the first Sonic game, and then at least that much on Sonic 2. I think most of the time I spent on the latter was in trying to pull off the Super Sonic cheat, though, as I have big fat fingers.

I first started at SEGA in 2003, reasonably close to the relaunch of the company as a software-only publisher. I now manage the PR for SEGA’s games in the UK’s gaming press. What that means, in a nutshell, is that I promote the company’s games and help to build pre-awareness for each launch. Sonic’s a big part of that.

And right now, of course, it’s all about Sonic and the Secret Rings. More on that in my next post…

Stefan - UK PR Manager

The Blognik’s been a bit neglected since Christmas, so sincere apologies to everyone who’s dropped by looking for an update.

Extended holidays around Christmas time, coupled with the inevitable post-Christmas backlog of emails haven’t helped, but the main reason we’ve been quiet is we’re now fully engaged with building the new Sonic City website.

Noses to the grindstone in SEGA’s web-monkey enclosure. We’ll let you know when there’s something to see.

Thanks to everyone who sent us emails over the Christmas/New Year period by the way. We even got a few Christmas cards!

Our man Jonic Linley, for example, emailed us this morning asking if we were still alive. We are, Jonic, and your email is what prompted this post. So thanks for that.

Mr Kev ‘ArchangelUK’ Eva, also dropped an email in our mailbox this week. His site - www.sonicwrecks.com - has been relaunched and looks ace. There’ll be a new Radio Redux podcast coming along soon and we happen to know it’s going to be pretty interesting and, quite possibly, very embarrassing for some. Here’s hoping! ;0)

Finally, a heads-up. Watch the Blognik very soon for a series of wee (or should that be Wii?) posts from SEGA’s pre-eminent PR guru, Stefan. While he spends most of his time working with the UK’s big games magazines and such, he’ll be letting us in on his special relationship with Sonic over the next few days. Look forward to insights on what exactly PR is all about, the forthcoming Sonic and the Secret Rings and more…

Until then…

Rom - SEGA