Sonic 4 Ep. 1 Beta Video is… Staggering

Betas and beta videos get leaked through the pipeline all the time these days, but it’s rare that you find one with such a dramatic disparity between the test run and the final release as Sonic 4 Episode 1. Youtuber 1stkirbyever posted this eye-opening video that reveals alternate builds for Sonic’s stages, and quite frankly, some of the omissions look surprisingly appealing, namely the complete different builds for stages like Casino Night Act 2 and Lost Labyrinth Zone Act 2.

Ever since the Sonic-loving community had a collective aneurysm over a potential mine cart stage, I’ve always wondered what would have been if Sega hadn’t shown us those accursed mine cart images. The video reveals some motion control physics for that stage, which actually looks like it could have been a fresh little twist on a dead gaming horse that’s been beaten so much it no longer resembles an animal.  Now that we have the replacement, I’d love to give that original a try. Just to see if we were all crying over nothing.

I’ll have to admit though, it made me laugh out loud to see Sonic use one of his springs to pop a mine cart out of a ditch. Hilarious.

What do you guys think?

[Source: Sega Nerds]