A few years ago, some former Sonic Mania developers came together to form a company called Evening Star. Now, this new company -- including Christian Whitehead -- are making an original 3D platformer.
Sonic Mania is a 2017 game that aimed to recapture the magic of the original 2D Sega Genesis games, and it seemed like it was succeeding based on our hands-on experience at E3. The finished product ultimately turned out to be a pretty damn good love letter to old school Sonic the Hedgehog fans.
One of the instrumental people behind this project was Christian Whitehead, a former developer of Sonic the Hedgehog fan games. He was so good at his hobby, in fact, that Sega hired him on to make mobile versions of Sonic games, and he got a chance to help lead Sonic Mania. Whitehead later co-founded the new game development studio Evening Star back in 2019, and now that studio is finally ramping up work on its first project.
What We Know About the New Game from the Former Sonic Mania Developers at Evening Star
The details on this new game from former Sonic Mania developers are a little light, but there are some interesting bits of information buried in today's announcement.
The first and most obvious clue is the silhouette of a character as seen in our cover image. It's a little difficult to say for certain, but it looks like a mouse with a bow on its tail to me. Whoever this character is, Evening Star's new game is going to be in 3D.
"Evening Star is currently working on our debut title, a fully original 3D action platformer game powered by our Star Engine!" read today's announcement highlighted on Reddit. "We are excited to be teaming up with a new publishing partner, and we can't wait to share more details with you soon"
The game will be powered by the Star Engine, a "HD 3D game engine" that was created by Evening Star to facilitate the development of the kind of games these people want to make. As the Star Engine page notes, this can essentially be thought of as a "high definition companion" to the Retro Engine, which Whitehead had created to work on the Sonic games.
Today's announcement also notes that the company is hiring a 3D Artist, Engine Programmer, Gameplay Programmer, and Level Designer to work on this new project. Unfortunately, there are no real significant details about Evening Star's first project in those listings. For now, you can have some fun with old-school Sonic the Hedgehog gameplay by buying Sonic Mania for PC and consoles starting at $19.99 or your regional equivalent.
What would you like to see from Evening Star's first game? How do you think Sonic Mania compared to other recent Sonic the Hedgehog games? Let us know in the comments below!
