Sonic The Hedgehog (Series)

[WR91]

Here, we can talk about anything and all things Sonic. From the original Genesis/Master System all the way to the current titles. Chat about it today!

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What're some of your favorite Sonic moments and memories?

One of my favorite Sonic games is the original from 1991.

It is in fact won my first game of the year award.

[Moonface]

I played some of the original Sonic as a kid when visiting hospitals and they'd have the game playable in the waiting areas of the kids wards, but I never enjoyed it so much that I wanted my own copy at home.

After that I never touched Sonic again until Heroes, and disliked it so much that I returned it two days after buying it to get a refund.

I dabbled a little in Sonic Mania and it's good, but it didn't grab me enough to want to go back to it again. I'd say overall Sonic just doesn't really engage me enough to want to go out of my way to play more of it.

[Mr EliteL]

I have Sonic Advance, Sonic Adventure 2 Battle, Sonic Heroes, Shadow the Hedgehog and Sonic Unleashed. Oh and er...Sonic 3D.

Sonic Advance is closest to a proper Sonic game I've played, and I did enjoy it very much.
Adventure 2 Battle is my favourite game out of the bunch, really liked the story, Shadow and gameplay.

Sonic Heroes was OK, I did somehow managed to play through each team and get to the end. I hated Big and disliked Omega though. My save file corrupted I think and I didn't bother going through everything again.

Shadow the Hedgehog was OK but less so than Heroes, I didn't complete it nor care to now.

Wish I never asked for Unleashed, didn't complete that either. I don't what overcame me to want it. >.<

Sonic 3D, NO NO GET OUT OF MY HEAD. To be fair I only played it as a kid, couldn't control Sonic whatsoever and really hated it. Tried to back to it later and still couldn't figure what to do, so I think I got rid of it then. Hope so.

[ShiraNoMai]

Sonic Frontiers Officially Revealed/Announced



While leaked in some circles months ago, the cat was let out of the bag tonight at The Game Awards 2021 with the reveal of this new title from Team Sonic, headed up by Morio Kishimoto (Sonic Worlds/Forces) and being written by Ian Flynn (Official Sonic The Hedgehog comic writer).

[Moonface]

It's either going to be really good or really bad, and I don't think Team Sonic has what it takes to pull this off. The large open areas will do well for Sonic's speed, but a lot of the areas in the trailer just look generic and bland. I doubt many people could see still images of the environment and realize they're looking at a Sonic game. I'd love to be proven wrong, but I can't say I'm feeling confident about this right now.

[ShiraNoMai]

Yeah Trihex pointed out that there was way more traffic on the Sonic Movie trailer in comparison to the game trailer, and it basically shows how little faith the fandom has in Sonic games quality anymore

The only saving grace this game has so far is the writing. Ian Flynn's comics are actually surprisingly very well done so if a competent story is in the makes, that's got one good thing going for it. Unfortunately it's going to need more than a good story to actually make the game be good, but it's better than nothing at this point

[Mr EliteL]

It only needs some shots of random springs and loops, then whoo, it's the Sonic world! Sort of kidding because it's bound to have them somewhere as it's just an iconic environment feature. As much as it would look off in an open world game. Perhaps this is what a Sonic game needed even though so many other titles have taken the route already and just a matter of time other notable series jump on.

I don't have any faith either, but a supposed competent writer is a good start. Do agree, other than the silly comment above I made, that it needs something more to stand out as a Sonic game instead of just throwing the character straight into an open world.

[Moonface]

Well, Frontier's has a potential chance of being decent, since Sega seem to be taking the quality of the game pretty seriously:

“Originally it was planned to be released on this year, the 30th anniversary of Sonic, but we have postponed the release for a year in order to further brush up the quality. Not only for this title, but during the development phase, we have been steadily conducting analysis to improve the quality of the title before release, such as introducing game testing based on external evaluations, and I have a feeling that it will become a good game and have high expectations for it.”

I can't think of a time I ever heard a company admit to delaying a game before actually announcing the game in the first place. I think Sega deciding to do this without a public reaction persuading it to happen says a lot, especially when Sonic can sell by name alone. It probably also explains why the trailer didn't show gameplay if they didn't want to show something that they already know isn't going to represent the final product properly and there's little point showing off something that could be criticized when it's already being improved upon, because that'll just rile up fans for nothing and cause bad PR.

I'm still going to be really cautious about my expectations for the game, but I do hope this is a sign of good things in the end.

[Mr EliteL]

I kinda wish them all the best really because Sonic games may sell fine because of the series, but there's been average or worse games for a good long time with only a couple or so standing out like Sonic Generations and....I don't know, Sonic Colors? Not like I play or follow the series any more. No idea how the game with the custom character did. The delay could almost turn out like the movie and it turns out much better than expected, would be great to see that finally, although of course we knew why the movie needed the delay.

[ShiraNoMai]

I sometimes ask myself if Sonic was ever good but

I'm glad they're really trying this time. I'm sure it has nothing to do with their mounting losses made on the games over the past decade...

[Moonface]

@ShiraNoMai: I thought that even though a lot of the recent games haven't been amazing that they were still selling well enough to not all be constant losses. But I'm judging that on never hearing about them performing badly. If they are though, I'm surprised Sega haven't tried to do a sequel to Sonic Mania since that game surely made good money given it was definitely a good Sonic game.

I just looked at the official website because I was curious what platforms Frontiers is for (I couldn't remember) and some of the stuff sounds a little concerning. It mentions dense forests, and I just wonder how that will work with the fast speed Sonic games go for. I guess they can make it where Sonic automatically moves out of the way of trees like the horses do in Breath of the Wild when riding them, but I hope they're not so dense that it becomes hard to see anything of note while speeding through them.

[Moonface]

Sonic Frontiers | First Gameplay Footage
Sonic Frontiers is receiving coverage throughout the entire month of June thanks to IGN First, and things are kicking off with this seven minute video of gameplay footage:

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Dear lord this looks abysmal. I feel like I'm watching one of those dull as rocks Unreal Engine 4 videos that slap a character into a field and try to make it seem like that's what the future of Mario/Zelda/Sonic etc. should be like. There's no character to the world, and the whole thing looks like a tech demo of trying to nail down Sonic's movement in an open world.

I'd like to have given something positive about this too but I really don't have anything. Shame because an open world Sonic should work really well but this is way off the mark.

[Mr EliteL]

Well that was...dull. Sonic's base acceleration needs to be a lot quicker, unless the player who was controlling him wasn't putting enough of a sharp push in the direction they wanted to go in. Walking is fine though. The world feels too vast and empty, sure there's environment and such, but doesn't look like a lot to do, and of course the opposite would be too cluttered so neither are a good way to go. Agree about the way it looked like them Unreal Engine 4 videos.

[Moonface]

Sonic Frontiers | Combat Gameplay Footage
Following on from the gameplay footage released two days ago, IGN have released a new video showcasing the combat of Sonic Frontiers.

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I can't say this footage has done anything to sway me from my opinion of the game so far. The music can't be final, because having these fights with this calm piano music all the time just feels odd and it's hard to feel excited by the combat when the music aims for relaxation. I can't actually decide what I feel about the combat because the sound design just hinders it so badly from having any impact or excitement. The best I can glean is that it looks shallow and repetitive, but that might not have been so bad if the sound design was trying to make it seem exciting at all.

[Mr EliteL]

Out of the games I played, there wasn't really battle music when fighting an enemy just the stage or boss dedicated theme, but here it does need something like that now. Not sure if later games started changing music mid play. Again, Sonic needs to be quick so that move where he circles enemy is slow, I get it's so you can control creating the circle, but I feel it could be done quicker. There was a moment when Sonic did manage to do a tight circle quickly though so perhaps there will be a way, wish the showcase actually showed more of that. Sonic having a sort of mid-range projectile now seems good, better be alternate methods though and not only that. Eh, nothing really impressed me anyway so whatever.