SEGA has launched its new official website for Sonic & SEGA All-Stars Racing, and just like so many before them, they have underestimated the resourcefulness of the internet, thus leading to a bunch of new information that they really had no intention of letting us see yet. Perhaps someday these companies will learn, but today is not that day.
One mistake which didn’t require any hacking to find, however, was the appearance of Virtua Fighter’s Jacky under All-Star moves:
The image has since been removed, but it’s too little, too late. Further delving into the site’s code revealed the image you see of Akira at the top of the story, who appears to be joined by Jacky, with the two perhaps driving as a pair.
TSSZ News pulled the top screen of Akira from the following character select screen, which also seems to allude to some other characters:
Between Big the Cat and Amy Rose is one of the Bonanza Bros., while just past Akira and Ulala is a silhouette believed to be none other than SEGA’s original mascot, Fantasy Zone’s Opa-Opa, which ties in with one of the All-Star Move icons. Plus, a Space Cat AS icon seems to solidify Chu Chu Rocket as a part of the lineup as well. They assert that with the latter’s presence, Sonic Team’s slots are filled, meaning NiGHTs may be excluded.
Elsewhere, they’ve dug up some new information on the game’s selection of tracks. “There are also two you may not know about,” they say. “We found information setup for a Samba de Amigo themed track, under the presently misspelled title ‘Samba de Amido.’ There’s also another new, not yet formally revealed track in the file, called Whale Lagoon.”
Stepping away from TSSZ for a second (but staying on the topic of tracks), SEGA has posted the latest developer diary of Executive Producer Steve Lycett, wherein he states the following:
Next we’re off to see AM2. Once word gets round who we are, we’re extremely privileged to be asked what we think of Tokyo R-Tuned, which at that stage wasn’t even totally finished. We’re led into a maze of wires, with cabinets that are plugged into all manner of development kits, and get to be, I suspect, the first westerners to play the game. It’s amazing by the way. Not only did we leave with the things we wanted, we were also offered levels from R-Tuned if we’d like them…!
He doesn’t say whether they accepted or not, but at least we know now that an R-Tuned track is a distinct possibility.
Finally, TSSZ manages to confirm the existence of downloadable content… at least, on the Xbox 360. The Sonic & SEGA All-Stars Racing website points out that you can “Download Additional Characters via XBOX Live,” but does not mention any of the other platforms.
There is plenty more to see and ponder on the official website, including more icons and descriptions of characters’ All-Star Moves and items.
Finally, GoNintendo has picked up the following video, which shows off the full lineup of playable characters as we know it, as well as their known All-Star Moves:
