Hello! It's been a while since I last posted anything here.

You might have noticed that I posted Sonic XA's v0.1 Demo a while ago (April 24th to be more precise), but I haven't made any announcement posts or tech discussions about it. My mistake! I just realized that the game has been progressing a lot lately and, as things were, if I were to address updates with the next post, I would also have to address things from the current demo at that time.

I am going to talk about a few topics today that go over the most important features of v0.1. I know this seems a bit late, but some of these changes are different enough from the Xmas/New Year Demo. Further, I will probably be presenting the next update when we're near SAGE 2025. That's because, even though I do post a lot about this game on social media, I still don't wanna spoil everything. :)

So let's dive into what makes v0.1 special.

New Sonic Sprites!

One of the major differences of the v0.1 Demo is how Sonic looks. I have changed Sonic's sprites from the Sonic 1 / Sonic CD style to a new look that better resembled the "32-bit era" to me (or whatever the coold kids call it...).

The sprites were created by CartoonsAnimate22 and allowed for some extra animations that also gave Sonic XA more personality!

As per the last post's update, Sonic also rotates when running on certain ramps. This is important to give the actual sense that you're in a Sonic game. Furthermore, Sonic won't just rotate its animation angle at every ramp. It performs a check that makes its animation snap at certain angles, so the rotation will look a lot like the Mega Drive / Genesis games.

Balancing on Ledges and Bubble Gulping animation

Some animations were still missing on older builds of Sonic XA. A particular example is the absence of Sonic gulping bubbles while underwater. This missing animation has been introduced now, including some extra code that allows the player to actually see the gulping animation for a few frames too.

Another interesting feature is the behaviour of balancing on ledges. Depending on Sonic's direction, the player will have a balancing animation where it seems Sonic is going to fall to the front or backwards. Ledge behaviour is basically related to an extra ground sensor for ledge balancing on the absolute middle of the character. If one of the "normal" ground sensors isn't colliding with the floor, and the ledge sensor isn't colliding either, then it is balancing time!

Super Peel-Out!

This one was requested through a comment on a YouTube video, and I thought that it should be in Sonic's moveset. By pressing Up + Jump, Sonic will charge the Super Peel-Out move, which makes him run at high speed. This move has a top speed generally higher than the Spindash, though it still leaves Sonic vulnerable to enemies (which are not yet present on this build...).

Now Sonic has the Super Peel-Out and the Drop-Dash as exclusive moves. This differentiates him as a speed-focused character.

That brings us to the question: what would I need to differentiate Sonic from? Well...

New Characters: Miles "Tails" Prower and Knuckles the Echidna!

That's also something that I wanted to do a long time ago! Now you can play with Tails and Knuckles!

There's still quite a few things to finish on them, but they're mostly playable already. I guess the videos speak for themselves!

Conclusion

I hope you enjoy this latest build! Took me a while to write this article, but it is finally out.

You will also find the latest v0.1 Demo builds attached to the end of this post, if you wish to play it.

Stay tuned -- there is a lot already changed in the project, and more information wil come soon!