
Ristar himself is, after all, based on an early concept for Sonic that was canned for the sake of gameplay that wouldn’t require the player to use more than one action button in order to do anything to simplify and speed up gameplay. Ristar’s silhouette is reminiscent of Sonic, with 3 visible spikes rotruding from his head. Within each normal stage is a hidden entrance to a bonus stage where the player tries to grab a special item and possibly get a continue. The game code itself is based on some of the previous Sonic games some sound effects are recognizable to those who have played them, and the game engine is also based on that of Sonic 1. Each level has two normal stages, the first one ending with some sort of unusual mini-boss encounter, and the second stage leading into a boss battle.

Ristar (Genesis)On first impressions Ristar does feel a lot like Sonic, at least from the perspective of game structure. The end result of this competition is well-known - the joint effort of Hirokazu Yasuhara (lead game designer), Naoto Ohshima (character designer and artist), and Yuji Naka (programmer) and about a dozen other people produced the classic game, Sonic the Hedgehog.
