Much has been written about Sonic X-treme over the decades, and with good reason – it was billed by some as the game which could have reversed Saturn's fortunes in the West, but it ended up becoming one of the most famous unreleased projects in Sega's history.
Sega Retro had the chance to speak to designer Chris Senn last year, and the lengthy interview is well worth a read for any self-respecting Sonic fan. Senn touches upon Sonic X-treme more than once and details the moment the project ultimately fell apart.
In March 1996, Sega executives from Japan visited Sega of America to assess the progress of the game, which was effectively being developed by two different teams in two different game engines – and it was this fateful meeting which decided the fate of the project, which had originally started life as a 32X game in 1994.
"After Ofer [Alon, programmer] and I basically became ostracized from the rest of what had become Sega of America Product Development - it was no longer STI, that changed - Ofer and I were continuing with Sonic X-treme development while the rest of the company was working with Point of View, the technical director's company that he had started and brought forth as a possible solution to finish the Sonic game, because they really wanted one for Christmas," explains Senn.
He says that what Sega president Hayao Nakayama was shown that day was "like a really old version of Sonic's editor - or Ofer's editor - basically just blocks, brick-making, no pads... We had that because we were working separately, and it had advanced a long way."
Apparently, Nakayama "hated" what he was shown, and didn't see what Senn and Ofer were working on "because of politics - because all of his entourage was there and all the executives and Sega of America PD [Product Development] were there - him crapping on it just meant, 'Anything related to this gets no more money,' or, 'Just stop.'"
What happened next appears to haunt Senn to this day:
"Ofer and I… I still remember that moment. This is a regret in my life - not a huge one, but career-wise, it was a regret. Ofer and I were in his office and we had to get to the meeting, and he was coding something just to tweak some part to polish it. I'm like, "It doesn't matter. Nobody's going to care. Let's go. We're going to miss our meeting." He kept typing, and I thought, alright, I'm going to go meet him there. I ran off just in time to get outside the conference room door, where there was this explosion - pissed-off executives and the entourage walking down the hallway.
I was like, "Well, wait, aren't we going to meet with -" Then Manny Granillo, the executive producer, just looked at me and goes, "I dunno, dude, we'll figure it out later." It was basically a huge bomb that had gone off. I'm like [pained sound]. Then Ofer came huffing and puffing, sweating with his PC under his arm, and he's like, "What's going on?" "We missed it." "What do you mean we missed it?" I said, "We're too late."
I was thinking, "Just like I said we would be," but the moment that I regret was - I did see Nakayama coming out of the door. This wouldn't have gone over well anyway, but I regret not having the nerve to speak to him in Japanese and say, "We have something to show you." That was just me being too timid. The energy was so negative; I think that was the main thing that threw me off. Maybe if I'd said that, it might have softened a little bit - but I don't think so. I think because he was so pissed off, plus he would look like, "Who are you and why weren't you part of the main presentation?" Why should I talk? There were just a whole bunch of reasons why it could have gone off the rails. But that was a clincher moment. That was the fork in the road - meaning we (Senn and Alon) could no longer continue developing Sonic X-treme for the Saturn or anything else."