It's funny how sometimes when you least expect it the answers to long-running questions suddenly just appear.  I remember eagerly making my way through an issue of Electronic Gaming Monthly back in 1992 and coming across a quick blurb discussing Sega's upcoming CD-ROM peripheral for the Sega Genesis and how the company was working on a CD version of the then-upcoming Sonic the Hedgehog 2.  The article even had screenshots to back up the claim.  Of course, now we know that the CD Sonic project became Sonic the Hedgehog CD and was its own thing compared to Sonic the Hedgehog 2, but those screenshots of Sonic holding a CD that Dr. Robotnik wanted to take from him didn't turn up in either game and ended up as lost gaming lore.  The EGM piece states that the screens are from technical demo that may not end up as part of the final product, but now we know for certain that is the case as HiddenPalace.org has posted the original Sega CD demo for curious fans to discover.

Among the exhibits present at the show for the Sega CD was a technical showcase of what the Sega CD was capable of. The demo features everything that the Sega CD would be known for - full motion video, sprite rotation and scaling, a larger color palette, and CD quality audio, all presented in a neat five minute presentation running on actual hardware! This was one of the very first projects that the Sega Multimedia Studio would create before going on to create Jurassic Park for the Sega CD - a project that would end up taking over 20 months to complete. The demo features clips from then upcoming films such as Cool World, Batman Returns, and even a little clip from a Bugs Bunny cartoon (a clip from "The Big Snooze" no less)! While the demo is very sporadic with what it presents, almost seemingly random for the sake of throwing things on the screen, it's a nice demonstration of not only what the Sega CD could do, but what the Sega Multimedia Studio were capable of.

Unfortunately, not everyone present at the show was aware of what they were really seeing. Reports of a Sonic game exclusively for the Sega CD can go as far back as February of 1992 under the title "Super Sonic". With rumors of the upcoming Sonic 2 appearing at SCES 92, and the fact that expectations were set with the upcoming Sega CD, it's no wonder that the first instance of Sonic appearing on the Sega CD was misidentified as a new Sonic title. Each video game magazine at the time would take the same shots of Sonic (not of anything else from the demo, suspiciously) and would write how it was proof that the screenshots were of either an upcoming Sega CD exclusive title, a Sonic 2 port, or even a Sonic 1 port.

Of course all of the magazines of the day published articles "confirming" this demo as proof of a Sonic title for the Sega CD.  Sonic the Hedgehog sold magazines back in his prime, and word on a new (or even old!) Sonic game for the new hardware would draw much more attention and interest than an article drying explaining the contents of a five-minute demo reel that only included Sonic for an moment.  Today we'd call such articles clickbait, but back then it was just called "selling magazines".  And speaking of Sonic CD, HiddenPalace.org has also released a series of eight in-development versions of the game spanning from early work to nearly finished product, so there's plenty for Sonic fans to check out this weekend.  As a fan from way back who remembers reading about all of this stuff in magazines such as EGM, it's great to have a chance to see exactly what it all was and learn about its place in gaming history.