Simon Thomley
From Sega Retro
Simon Alexander Thomley |
---|
Place of birth: United States |
Date of birth: 1979-08-11 (age 45) |
Employment history: |
Role(s): Programmer[1][2] |
Forum user name: Stealth |
Twitter: @HCStealth |
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Simon "Stealth" Alexander Thomley is an American programmer and video game developer[1], and founder of game development company Headcannon[2], known for being one of the earliest key members of the Sonic scene.
Contents
Career
Thomley is noted for creating multiple Sonic the Hedgehog-series game modification utilities, such as SonED, and is also responsible for producing one of the first Sonic games made in C++ - Project Mettrix. Thomley was also one of the first individuals whose fansite, the now-defunct Organized Chaos, was incorporated into the Sonic Stuff Research Group.
In his later work with the Sonic scene, Thomley became famous for being the first coder to fully implement the character Knuckles in the original Sonic the Hedgehog as Knuckles the Echidna in Sonic the Hedgehog. In addition, he has contributed a significant amount of work toward the development of the famous romhack Sonic Megamix, and is one of the founding members of Team Megamix.
Headcannon
- Main article: Headcannon.
In November 2012, Thomley founded independent video game development company Headcannon in preparation of working with Christian Whitehead on the Android and iOS ports of Sonic the Hedgehog and Sonic the Hedgehog 2. A corresponding website was launched on March 9, 2013 (three weeks before the port of the first game was revealed at GDC 2013), and each of the company's projects was subsequently given a dedicated section on its release. Thomley continues to operate and credit himself under the Headcannon name for his development projects.
Prior to the official development of Sonic the Hedgehog CD (2011), Thomley had assisted Christian Whitehead in creating a pitch demo of the title by providing information gained and pseudo-code developed from reverse-engineering certain original Sonic gameplay elements such as Sonic the Hedgehog CD's Special Stage, and the boss mechanics of EGG-HVC-001. This work was done before Headcannon had been established, and once development had officially started, Stealth would not develop for the series again until Sonic the Hedgehog (2013). Nevertheless, he received credit in the game's "Special Thanks" section, and as with other entries he developed for, he is credited by his full name of Simon Thomley.
Thomley also produced the Headcannon Game Engine, a script-based multi-platform 2D game engine with corresponding development tools.
Sonic scene
Throughout the years, Thomley has also taken on important or otherwise respectable roles in the Sonic scene.
- Founder of Organized Chaos (later Headcannon.)
- Co-founder of the Sonic Stuff Research Group.
- Administrator of Area 51.
- Tech member and former moderator of The Sonic 2 Beta Page and Sonic Retro.
- "CulT Family" member of Sonic CulT.
Projects
- Headcannon Game Engine
- SonED
- SonED2
- StealthPatch
- Sonic the Hedgehog: Project Mettrix
- Knuckles the Echidna in Sonic the Hedgehog
- Sonic for MegaCD
- Sonic Megamix
- Sonic Robo Blast 2
- Sonic CD+
- Sonic the Hedgehog GBA
- Sonic DS (fan game)
- Sonic CD DS
- Sonic the Hedgehog disassembly
- Sonic & Knuckles disassembly[3]
- Sonic Crackers partial disassembly
Production history
- Sonic the Hedgehog CD (PlayStation 3; 2011) — Special Thanks
- Sonic the Hedgehog (iOS; 2013) — Programmer
- Sonic the Hedgehog (Android; 2013) — Programmer
- Sonic Mania (Windows PC; 2017) — Programmer (as Simon "Stealth" Thomley)
- Sonic Mania (PlayStation 4; 2017) — Programmer (as Simon "Stealth" Thomley)
- Sonic Mania (Nintendo Switch; 2017) — Programmer (as Simon "Stealth" Thomley)
- Sonic Origins (PlayStation 4; 2022) — HEADCANNON Lead Developer + Lead Programmer
- Sonic Origins (PlayStation 5; 2022) — HEADCANNON Lead Developer + Lead Programmer
- Sonic Origins (Xbox One; 2022) — HEADCANNON Lead Developer + Lead Programmer
- Sonic Origins (Nintendo Switch; 2022) — HEADCANNON Lead Developer + Lead Programmer
Photographs
- Main article: Photos of Simon Thomley
External links
- Official website (Headcannon)
- Simon Thomley at LinkedIn
- Simon Thomley at Twitter
- Simon Thomley at YouTube
- Before Sonic Mania, There Was Sonic Project Mettrix: A Short Biography of Simon Thomley article by Jamie Christensen at Infinite Frontiers