Sonic Origins was just announced for Sonic's 31st birthday. The compilation will feature ports of the first three Sonic games for the Genesis, Sonic & Knuckles, and Sonic CD from the Sega Saturn. But more than that, Sega updated the games to work on widescreen displays and added two gameplay modes that either retain the original life limit or let you play with unlimited lives.
Origins also adds a ton of new content, such as animated cutscenes, hard mode, mirror mode, and additional music tracks from other Sonic games like Sonic Spinball. But it turns out a lot of that will actually be locked behind paid DLC.
A new chart on the Sonic Origins website reveals the features you'll get for either pre-ordering Sonic Origins or purchasing either the Premium Fun Pack or the Classic Music Pack. Pre-orders get 100 bonus coins, instant access to mirror mode (which would otherwise need to be unlocked via gameplay), and a letterbox background. Getting the Premium Fun Pack seems to be the only way to get access to hard missions, as well as character animations in the main menu, camera controls over the main menu islands, and animations during the music islands. The Classic Music Pack provides those extra songs from the classic Genesis era.
Getting the Digital Deluxe Edition of Sonic Origins provides you with access to most of these features, but not the letterbox background. The base game is $39.99, while the Deluxe Edition is $44.99, so the individual prices of these DLC packs are likely to be more than $5.00 in order to incentivize people into buying the Deluxe Edition.
Fans are somewhat perturbed about all this content being locked behind a paywall, but at least one has taken that rage and used it to create a simplified chart that’s a little easier to understand.
Sonic Origins arrives June 23 on all major consoles and PC.