Even if they were the same I honestly feel no sympathy for Rafa Knight. She's kinda a dick and a bit unprofessional considering that one meltdown she had.

I wonder if they mean "Custom made like the spritework was for Origins" or actually made for this game.

I can understand being frustrated over having your work be used and uncredited or not receive any royalties, regardless if it's spelled out in the contract or not. That said, I have to wonder how different it could actually look without strongly resembling Knight's work. It's not going to be easy to prove they're the same through opacity blending forensics. 

Furthermore, if they had access to these models before, why wait until now to make use of them? Add to that the changes made to Classic Sonic's model, I'm inclined to infer that they just went ahead and had a jam session making new models for Knuckles, Amy and Fang and touched up Tails, Sonic and Eggman while they had their modelling programs open. 

Why is it that as soon as I saw former artist, I just knew it was gonna be Rafa Knight.

I honestly take this with a gigantic pitcher of salt. To my knowledge, Rafa Knight has always had a ego, and as stated above - more or less ended up losing her jobs with SEGA in the first place for unprofessional behaviour.

On top of that, while I could be dead wrong - it’s also hard for me to imagine SEGA/Sonic Team would willfully do this after both the Penders debacle and everything that went down at Archie. They already had to deal with lawsuits from past creators claiming they own this or that, or that SEGA has been stealing their work. I sincerely doubt they’re going to kick the hornet’s nest over a Amy model they could’ve just made on their own terms.

Either the model is the same, and Rafa isn’t exactly being truthful about the situation (Given the debacle that happened with Penders, I could very easily see SEGA putting a condition into their artist contracts that they legally own everything created for the covers), or the model isn’t the same at all and Rafa’s using this for a quick publicity bump. Either way, I sincerely doubt SEGA just stole a model like this so blatantly.

Really hope they settle this for once. I don't wanna see some Ken Penders situation part 2 with lawsuits and stuff happening again.

I try to be sympathetic to Knight -- and you have to admit, even it's by coincidence, they look really similar -- but in this case I'm hoping it really is a product of suggestion.

I don't think Katie is lying, at least not intentionally. But yeah, I think it's fairly likely that Knuckles and Amy at least are her models that she created for SEGA. They may have made some adjustments and built the animations from scratch, but they're far too similar not be Knight's.

She created those models for SEGA and whether or not they should have to credit her/pay royalties is a matter for another discussion. I actually... Don't know what her point is here? She already said that she doesn't mind them being used (and it's likely entirely legal). So why is this being brought up? 

Things being said are worth all kinds of discussion...even if the other person doesn't mind.

1 minute ago, StaticMania said:

Things being said a worth all kinds of discussion...even if the other person doesn't mind.

I mean to the point of seeking clarification about it from SEGA directly and publicly, when the contract probably stipulated that she waives all rights to acknowledgement. 

Some people just really like pointing out their work.

I don't know anything about Rafa Knight, and I don't believe SEGA reused her work, but if they did and didn't credit her, that is shitty of them, whether she's a dick or not. 

If the models were commissioned for use in perpetuity by Sega, then it's fair game that they use them with or without her input or concern. The only thing they really ought to do is ensure that she is properly credited for her work - assuming these models are the same, or were otherwise used as a base to build off of.

The most I know of Rafa Knight is them having a fit over their work on Archie. I take it some other events happened prior to this?

Since she was a contractor, the contract most likely states that the models could be repurposed for anything else they had in mind and that she signed away whatever rights she had. Even so, it's not hard to believe Sega making them from the ground up considering how Rafa Knight only made Sonic, Knuckles, Tails, Amy, Mighty, and Ray while they managed to make Nack and Trip in a similar style. Superstars Sonic is evidently different from Rafa Knight's version and it seems that way for Knuckles and Tails.

Personally, I think they used her models as reference at the very least or they edited them for game usage and slight adjustments. I get that she just wants the acknowledgement, I feel like that's fair, but I wonder if they'd even be required to with the nature of how those kinds of contracts work. Also given that messy callout post between her and Webber where he mentioned her unprofessionalism and breach of contract (the big stinger here), I wouldn't be surprised if that's why they wouldn't credit her whatsoever.

So that was a lie

Oh so they in fact did mean "custom made for this game" exactly like the stolen Sonic 3 Compete sprites in OG Origins were. 

1 hour ago, DaBigJ said:

So that was a lie

"Circumstancial" 

- Game Freak

Yeah, that is some serious similarities.

They didn’t really do that much different with the models to make it that much different.

Katie was probably misinformed. I sincerely doubt that she would intentionally go out of her way to lie about something like this. 

Rafa made those models for SEGA years ago. She's legally not entitled to any credits. I don't understand why she making such a song and dance over this. Unfortunately Katie decided to respond and now this situation just like even worse. 

You asked that before it was confirmed and it was a weird question then too. Because Rafa would like recognition for creating art assets that were eventually used in the game even if she's legally not entitled to financial recompense and even if she burned all of her bridges with the company in the past? Because Sega has a history of doing things along these lines, then giving platitudes when they get shit for it?

Yeah, sure, Rafa is the stereotypical mega creep Sonic fan who Sega will under no circumstances ever work with again and it was all contract work that she likely has no right to claim anything over; but has Sega actually given an update on what they were going to do about the (barely) edited Sonic 3 Complete sprites yet or is that something we're just supposed to forget because they apologized and wait for them to do the same thing again in some other instance? Because if they don't do anything about that what did that person do to justify Sega hoping everyone just forgets about it?

On 6/23/2023 at 5:06 PM, Blue Blood said:

Katie was probably misinformed. I sincerely doubt that she would intentionally go out of her way to lie about something like this. 

What difference does this make? Whether she knew what she said was a lie or whether she was just saying what she was told to say without knowing any better is somewhat immaterial when she is the community manager and therefore the fall guy when Sega gets caught lying about something. It's no different from the poor bastard who had to run interference with SwSh.

Just like it also doesn't make any difference if she knew whether or not "Jun Senoue has been working really hard to adapt the original music" was a lie when she said so when we now know that Jun didn't actually do shit.

So the lesson here is basically “don’t lie and change quads to tris of someone else’s work to claim otherwise?”

Honestly don’t see what the problem was with crediting Rafa Knight regardless of whatever bridges they burned with Sega. Doesn’t mean Sega would need to bother with them for any future projects.