Ecco the Dolphin’s Remaster Is Getting a Physical Release, and Its Creator Is Already Overthinking the Box
Ed Annunziata says his Ecco the Dolphin remaster, Ecco the Dolphin Complete, will get standard and deluxe physical editions, and he wants Sega to fold in the Dreamcast game.
Ecco the Dolphin is coming back, the remaster is getting a physical edition, and the best news is who is fussing over the details.
Ed Annunziata, the man who created Ecco at Sega in 1992, confirmed during a Discord Q&A that the upcoming remaster, which he is calling Ecco the Dolphin Complete, will get both a standard physical release and a deluxe collector’s edition. He was clear that the deluxe box will not be the usual pile of generic trinkets. In his words, whatever comes with the Deluxe Edition must be somehow integrated into the Ecco Universe, and it needs to be clever and weird. That is exactly the right instinct, and it is the kind of care you only get when the person making the box also made the game.
The word Complete is doing real work here. Annunziata says he is meeting with Sega to try to fold in Ecco the Dolphin: Defender of the Future, the 2000 Dreamcast game, and Ecco Jr., so the collection actually lives up to its name. There is no release date, no platform list, and no price yet. He has been honest that the physical and deluxe planning is still early while the focus stays on the game itself.
I am flagging it now anyway, because this is the version of a retro revival I want to see more of. The original creator is involved, the goal is a complete record rather than a quick cash-in, and a physical edition is on the table from the start instead of being treated as an afterthought. Ecco was always a strange, beautiful, brutally hard thing, and it deserves to come back on its own terms. I will be watching for the platform and pricing details, and I will be first in line for whatever weird object ends up in that deluxe box.