Meh Sonic Retro ( the actual game ) was a Sonic game written in C++. ( speaking of which code would be nice ). That correct me if I am wrong lead to that game "Freedom Planet" ( most likely unless otherwise stated ). I do not know the full story but I think SEGA holds this event ( or some event in the west ) every year or so or was it that the person basically sold this to SEGA and ported it to cell phones?
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Again the bigger project ( original Sonic Retro ) was basically a person who created their own Sonic game using their "own" code. That was the main idea. The website itself draws itself with a bunch of program enthusiasts. Which also draws a bunch of major programmer pricks.
This website itself is basically a typical game forum. However some of the threads consist of programming talk. You know the drill, if one forum is down they move to the next forum and so forth. This forum is basically the equal of PCEFX ( A closed off PCE forum ) and GBAtemp ( a closed off GBA-3DS rom stealing hacking emulation forum ); or even SSUK ( a closed off forum ) However Sonic Retro is more like GBAdev ( which is still up ) a forum for programmer enthusiast.
This forum ( which okay so far ) is more like an the offical SEGA forum but less people. If SEGA forums fell this forum would fill up with users.
And the answer to that next question is yes not including GBAdev.