Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed

Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed hits shelves early, and new details emerge…

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… but we aren’t going to write what they are! Why spoil the surprise? Instead, we’ll leave it up to readers if they want to head on over to the original Gamefaqs post where the spoilers began, or check out our forums where we’re discussing the new bits of information in spoiler tags. Until SEGA or Sumo Digital share things officially, we won’t be posting blurry photos of television screens or descriptions of the new tracks in news posts. Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed releases officially later this week!

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SEGA Five: A Salute to the SEGA All-Stars Part 4

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I can’t believe that four weeks have passed since we began this salute to the SEGA All-Stars appearing in Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed! Part 1, Part 2 and Part 3 can be viewed at those handy links. If you’re all caught up with us, let me introduce you to our five All-Stars for this week: Ulala of Space Channel 5, Shadow of Shadow the Hedgehog (oh, and some franchise called Sonic the Hedgehog), Sonic’s not-quite girlfriend Amy Rose, Aiai’s wife MeeMee and our flagman of the game Ristar.

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The Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed achievement icons are full of SEGA fan service!

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While we’ve known of the Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed achievement names and conditions for quite some time, we haven’t really seen all the icons for the achievements until today. From the looks of it, the icons double as license stickers. So complete an achievement, and you unlock a circular sticker to slap on your in-game license. While some achievement icons feature non-SEGA images like a photo camera and a gold star, other are incredibly cool! Like, for example, the star of the Dreamcast cult classic Segagaga and even the logo of a popular Dreamcast racing game. After the break, check out all the icons!

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Danica Patrick finishes 14th in O’Reilly Auto Parts Challenge

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What the hell is this? SEGAbits reporting on sporting events? Well, those who are following Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed should remember that Danica Patrick and Hot Wheels teamed up with SEGA to feature Danica Patrick in the upcoming video game, in turn SEGA sponsored Danica in the O’Reilly Auto Parts Challenge, which took place on November 3rd At Texas Motor Speedway in Fort Worth, Texas. Per the race results, Danica Patrick finished 14th out of 43 racers. Check out a gallery of images from the race here, and read a more detailed telling of Danica’s race here.

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SEGA Five: A Salute to the SEGA All-Stars Part 3

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As we move into November we reach the home stretch: Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed releases THIS MONTH. On November 18th to be exact. This week we continue our salute to the SEGA All-Stars with two of Sonic’s earliest rivals, Knuckles and Metal Sonic, as well as NiGHTS’ rival Reala. We also feature B.D. Joe of Crazy Taxi fame and the dwarf legend Gilius Thunderhead of Golden Axe. If you missed Part 1 and Part 2, what are you waiting for? check them out! If you’ve been following with us all along, continue our series with part 3 after the break.

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SEGA Five: A Salute to the SEGA All-Stars Part 2

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Our Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed celebration continues with part 2 of our salute to the SEGA all-stars who will hit the track this November. In part 1 we featured Sonic, Vyse, NiGHTS, Gum and Amigo. This week, we take a look at more characters from the Sonic and Jet Set Radio franchises, keep the ball rolling with the star of Super Monkey Ball and we see the return of a certain iconic ninja. After the break, it’s an all out all-star salute!

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Nintendo Direct gives us our first look at Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed on 3DS

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The Nintendo Direct stream, which concluded moments ago, gave SEGA fans their first glimpse of Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed running on the 3DS. The stream, which highlighted upcoming 3DS titles, ended with a montage of games and SEGA snuck in a few seconds of the game in motion. Sonic was seen flying through the Panzer Dragoon track, followed by Sonic in Seaside Hill changing from a car to a boat. It was quick, but the game looked great! Want to see it for yourself? Click here to skip right to the money shot. After the break, screengrabs of the video preview.

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SEGA Five: A Salute to the SEGA All-Stars Part 1

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Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed is only a month away! In anticipation of the game’s release, we here at SEGAbits want to highlight the many All-Stars appearing in SEGA’s racing title. To do this, we’re kicking off a four week salute to the characters appearing in the game. Each week will focus on five SEGA All-Stars. We’ll share why we think these characters are important to SEGA’s history, and why we’re looking forward to racing as them. Let’s kick off part one with the first five, can you guess who they are?

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Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed has awesome realistic physics that affect your driving!

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If you have been paying attention to All-Stars Racing Transformed interviews from Sumo digital you would know that they talk a lot about how advanced and complex the physics are but never go into detail. So I asked S0L and got a good answer…

It all runs under full physics, whether car, boat or plane. We wanted to do this so the behaviour was more predictable, since last time we cheated and faked a lot of it. It adds a whole heap of depth of control as a side effect, plus it means you’ll got consistent vehicle behaviour.

The water also is a dynamic surface, so waves affect the boats, splashes and explosions too. Between the physics there and the rendering (making water look like water means a lot of effects!) this is why we opted for a capped framerate of 30. In order to get to 60, we’d have to pull back on the graphical look of the game a lot, and when we’re doing a whole new engine to make it look as good as it does, you have to make this compromise.

No-one complained about the framerate at Play Expo at any rate 😛

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S0L
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So yeah, sounds really good! This physics will make the game feel more like a racing game, rather than a small kart game, which is something else that Sumo Digital also likes to brag about.

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SEGA officially reveals Danica Patrick with screens, a trailer and a toy car!

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SEGA has officially revealed Danica Patrick’s in-game model and car via three new screens and a new trailer. Also revealed, a retailer exclusive diecast Hot Wheels car which will be available with the purchase of Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed at select retailers thanks to a partnership between SEGA and Mattel. Marcella Churchill, Senior Director of Marketing at SEGA of America, had this to say about the partnership:

“Using Danica Patrick’s existing relationship with Mattel and Hot Wheels, we were able to extend our brand beyond the Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed game universe and into consumer products with the creation of this custom toy. The Hot Wheels brand has a reputation for developing beloved childhood toys and our partnership will undoubtedly ignite this nostalgia amongst fans when they get to race this transforming vehicle within the game.”

The trailer also reveals a release date for the Vita and 3DS versions: December 11th, 2012. After the break, screens of Danica and her car the Danicar as well as an image of the diecast toy.

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Ristar revealed to be the flagman in Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed

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In the last All-Stars Racing title, fans pushed for NiGHTS and Ristar and ended up with NiGHTS making a cameo as the flagman and Ristar appearing alongside the track in the Death Egg DLC. Now, in Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed, NiGHTS moved his way up to the racing roster leaving the flagman spot open. Sumo Digital hinted that a flying character would take NiGHTS place, and fans speculated on a number of characters including Opa Opa. But in the end, thanks to a preview from ve3tro.com, Ristar has been confirmed as the game’s flagman.

You know the development team tried their best when the race starts and Ristar is cheerfully waving the flag. Each of the courses is a visual treat that will certainly make gamers smile. The various transformations that take place in real time make it even more exciting to look at.

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Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed coming to iOS in 2013

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Given the success of the first title on iOS, it was only a matter of time until SEGA and Sumo Digital revealed that an iOS version of Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed is in the works. According to Gareth Williams, design director at Sumo Digital, the game is “absolutely” hitting the App Store but not until “after Christmas”. What isn’t decided, however, is how they’ll sell it. At the moment, it’s either sell it for a few dollars and include in-app purchases or give it away for free and allow players to buy characters. Whatever payment method they pick, the first game sold over two million so the sequel is sure to be a success.

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Danica Patrick’s All-Stars Racing Transformed vehicle revealed

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Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed guest characters Danica Patrick and Wreck-It Ralph have their vehicles on display in two new promo photos. Danica’s images are the most interesting, as up until now we have yet to see anything of her in-game self. Danica’s car might look familiar, as it is based off the design of a fictional car she designed with Hot Wheels for a toy car. Ralph remains unchanged from when we saw him last at the Sonic Boom event. After the break, check out Ralph’s image.

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