This might be old news to some/most/all? of you, but I only recently found out that MJ did some of the music of Sonic 3 that he wasn't credited for, including the ending sequence. I quote from the Wikipedia article:
Buxer also claimed that the ending music of Sonic the Hedgehog 3 later became the basis for Jackson's single Stranger in Moscow.[14][15]
Proof:
Further reading:
According to STI director Roger Hector, Michael Jackson was brought in initially during development to compose music for the game, but no mention of his involvement was included. This was supposedly due to the scandals that arose around Jackson at the time, his involvement was removed from the title, and much reworking had to be done.[12] These claims are dubious, however, and various interviews have made it clear that any involvement Jackson may have had was done without the knowledge of Sega's executives or marketing staff, and no contracts or formal agreements had ever been made.[13] James Hansen, of Sonic Stuff Research Group, retorts that Cirocco (credited as "Scirocco" in Sonic 3) still has possession of presumably a demo version of fabled soundtrack. "I actually have "ALL" of the tracks...," he writes, "from the original humming of Michael calling in the middle of the night leaving messages, to his ideas at Record One with Matt and Bruce. - BUT, I don't think I can let any of that out to the public without permission." [13] In December 2009, Michael Jackson's composer, Brad Buxer, told French magazine Black & White that Jackson was actually involved with some of Sonic 3's compositions, supposedly not being credited because he wasn't happy with how they sounded, due to the lack of optimal sound reproduction on the Genesis.[14][15]
I also just watched this.
Alright, this is Sonic 2, but the resemblance is absolutely chilling. o_O This might just be a coincidence, but I've been mindblown all the same.
It's only a few sonic 3 tracks which have any resemblance to actual Michael Jackson songs, in particular Carnival Night Zone and the Sonic 3 credits track. Other Sonic 3 tracks like Launch Base and the boss musics are clearly inspired by his style though.
The sonic 2 video is nothing more than being in a similar key and layering some vocals over it.
i didnt find this out until recently. i just searched up sonic 3 again when my maths teacher unknowingly played the sandopolis music in the middle of the class. (he just thought it was just music, i was the only one in the class to realise what song it was.)
Ah, Sonic 3 & Knuckles. Probably one of my 5 favorite video game soundtracks. I learned about this a long time ago and wasn't really surprised. Like Ralphis said, Carnival Night is super-similar to his style. I also wonder if he did the Zone One boss music for Sonic 3, what with the WOO C'MON! at the beginning of the track.
03-31-10 19:14 
