#like how they made sonic mania plus and if you already had sonic mania you could just buy the new content as dlc

[sonknuxadow]

im excited for sxs gens but im really unhappy with the state of the pre order stuff tbh. digital players (but not switch players for some reason) getting to play it 3 whole days in advance while people who would rather have a physical copy or wanted the switch version have to wait and get spoiled on everything ? a bunch of bonuses like character skins and an art book and an entire new level being locked behind the digital deluxe edition and inaccessible to people wanting physical copies? i might be wrong but i think geralds diary might be a physical only bonus so youd have to choose between it and all that other stuff unless you feel like dropping a bunch of money on 2 copies which definitely wouldnt be worth it. this whole thing sucks so bad i would be fine with games i like never coming with pre order bonuses ever again if stuff like this would stop happening forever

[lividria]

Funny Story: Sonic the Hedgehog

I'm going to preface this post with the fact that i am 9 times out of 10 bad at video games unless i have grinded them for days (as in like the game will say i've put 100+ hours in it of nothing but playtime) and even then i'm usually still pretty bad at them, and the fact that i really like sonic games in theory, i like the characters, love most of the music, i like going fast in platformers, i've taken some ideas from the games as inspiration for my own projects, you get the idea

i have tried, multiple times over the course of my life, to play sonic games and enjoy them, and every time i have either failed or been personally singled out by the universe and had my experience ruined, here's the list

Sonic CD: Mobile port has ads that play when you unpause, I got an ad for a mobile Friday Night Funkin' rip-off reusing shit from the fucking Sonic.EXE mod and the ad BROKE AND FROZE THE ENTIRE APP AND I COULDN'T DO ANYTHING AND I LOST SO MUCH PROGRESS so I deleted the app

Sonic 1: Do people actually enjoy Sonic 1 nowadays

Sonic Rush: Had to use some cheats to beat the game but I beat both campaigns and got all the emeralds... but i tried to pause the game during the true final boss, accidentally hit my emulator's Reset button and that somehow fucking deleted my save data and i couldn't get the true final boss unlocked again even with cheats to get as much progress back as possible, also I hate the power of friendship trope and I hated the way it was used in the ending too

Sonic Generations DS: I couldn't beat Time Eater as a kid and it's the only time a video game has ever made me cry because I got so frustrated (The closest I've gotten since was hearing Reunited in Undertale having finally played it years after first getting into it but I made it without a single tear haha I'm only kinda cringe), I never went back and beat the game and I honestly don't think I want to

Sonic Mania Plus: Rage quit at Chemical Plant I forgot why lol, may give it another go but

Sonic Forces: One of the worst games I've ever played (I'd say the worst is DangerZone from the Minecraft OreSpawn guy)

Sonic Frontiers: I have no clue who designed that stupid "herd the rock chao in the time limit also some can blow up" minigame and made it required to progress but I hope they got fired and then thrown out of a high-up window because that is bar none the worst minigame in any game I've ever played, no I did not beat it but it wouldn't matter because I wasn't really enjoying the main gameplay anyways

Sonic Dash: I hate grinding

Murder of Sonic the Hedgehog (I know it was a joke, shut up): I already mentioned I hate the power of friendship trope and I hated the ending as a result

The only Sonic game I've had no negative experiences with is Sonic Robo Blast 2. The fucking fangame made with a modified Doom engine. I never finished it, I don't know how close I got, but I have no bad memories with it.

Why does this happen to me.

[gbgamebun]

Road to Cream 64 v1 Part 6-2: Feelin' Cold, Spicy and Wet with These Tunes

Now then, where we're we...

Hazy Maze Cave: Sonic Adventure - Dilapidated Way (Casinopolis)

The idea was basically "well a sewers is kind of like a cave!". The other cave tracks in Sonic didn't feel appropriate for HMC to me and this did somehow. Hard to really point down as to why, but it just worked. Mystic Cave was still hit by that first rule at the time but even then I felt it just wouldn't fit.

Lethal Lava Land: Sonic Mania - Lava Reef Act 1 Volcano: Sonic Adventure - Red Hot Skull (Red Mountain)

It's funny how often I see people go "Why isn't this Lava Reef?" with the newer versions. I mean it used to be since it's kind of an obvious choice and the Mania version is a big ol' banger. There was nothing wrong with it, I guess I just wanted to see what else I could pick from for the sake of variety.

Red Hot Skull was another one of those "it makes too much sense!" tracks. While you're never in the volcano for too long, it still fits the dark atmosphere to a tee. plus since you couldn't fly in those versions, you were gonna be hearing this a lot longer so hey least falling to the bottom wasn't too bad right?

Shifting Sand Land: Sonic Lost World - Desert Ruins (Zone 4) Pyramid: Sonic Adventure 2: Keys the Ruin (Pyramid Cave)

For the main area, this was chosen from just going through the soundtracks I had already picked previously. I do love the jazz mixed in with the usual sitars you hear for desert tracks. So just preference for this one, nothing too crazy.

Pyramid Cave for the pyramid ended up working out better than I thought. I guess it would be an obvious fit but just cause it has the same as the thing you're in doesn't always work. I suppose SSL was one of the easier levels to figure out. Speaking of...

Dire Dire Docks: Sonic Lost World - Sea Bottom Segue

This was one of those tracks that was just living in my head when I was thinking out tracks to use for the game. Always felt it worked great for DDD and when I finally got it in, it did just that.

Snowman's Land: Mario & Sonic 2014 - Diamond Dust Zone Igloo: Sonic Adventure - Limestone Cave (Icecap)

So yeah, going back to that first rule I made for myself. If I didn't implement that on myself, I would've 100% gone for the original version. Not that there's nothing wrong with this version, otherwise why would I pick it?

There's a surprisingly amount of snow tracks that could easily fit in this stage or even CCM. Though for the igloo, the second part of icecap felt too good to pass up. There's just a lot of snow tracks in this franchise it's tempting to avoid using some now in case I wanna reuse them for a future hack.

Wet-Dry World: Sonic CD - Tidal Tempest Present (US)

While I felt the JPN version was more suited for more moody water stages, the US version I felt fitted more like rusty wet ruins, which was perfect for WDW. Like both soundtracks are fantastic in their own right, so I wanted to be fair and use one track from each region.

Though later versions of Cream 64 would have different tracks for WDW, least it managed to get in for v1.

Hopefully I can cram the last bits of the songs for Part 3. Cya there ->

[crusherthedoctor]

2, 8, 11, 19 :>

2. What's your favourite Sonic game and why?

Mania! With S3&K at an extremely close second place. Like, 1% close. (Just like how Spyro 2 is only 1% ahead of Spyro 3 for me.)

I think S3&K has the advantage in terms of story progression, but I love Mania for how it takes the S3&K formula and basically refines it even more, on top of how extra vibrant and CD-esque the game is thanks to the gorgeous sprite work, and the legendary compositions of Tee Lopes are the icing on the cake. Then the Plus version came along and made the game even better by adding Mighty and Ray (both of whom are just as fun as the main trio IMO) and introducing Encore Mode, which reminds me of the team up gimmick in Advance 3.

And it introduced these guys.

8. In your opinion, which Sonic game had the best bonus stages?

Already answered.

11. What's your favourite moment from the Sonic series?

There's... a lot that I could mention there. There's no shortage of great moments across the series. Tails saving the city from Eggman in SA1, Eggman's brilliant trap in SA2, Shadow telling Mephiles to fuck off back to MySpace in '06, Metal Sonic being a scary badass in the OVA, the intros for CD and Unleashed, Sonic putting Erazor in his place and comforting Shahra afterwards...

But I think I'll go with this one.

I mentioned before that I believe S3&K has the best story progression out of any game in the series. A huge part of this is because of just how well it encapsulates how insanely determined Eggman, this mortal man with a brilliant brain, can really be.

From the moment Sonic arrives on Angel Island, he's already carpet bombing the jungles on the off chance that you might become a casualty, and for the rest of the game, he never slows down. He destroys entire levels in an attempt to kill you (Marble Garden), he attacks you while the Death Egg is in the middle of its ascent (Launch Base), he even uses the functions of his beloved spacecraft to superheat the volcano of Lava Reef, and continues to attack you even after he's done so. Which is then followed by him going full Sheev on Knuckles and swiping the Master Emerald, despite you having just defeated the doctor moments beforehand.

So you're transported to Sky Sanctuary, braving the perils of the clouds and confronting Mecha Sonic (whose design is still a bad mothafucka), and at the very last moment, you finally make it onboard the Death Egg. It all culminates here. It's time to take this thing down for good. But Eggman is prepared. Very prepared.

He throws a gravity-altering device your way. Is this it? This little thing? No, that's just the starter. The main course, as you'll soon discover, is this:

The Great Eggman Robo, a titan of metal whose size rivals Baby Bowser in Yoshi's Island. Its two phases may be simple, but the scale is well and truly felt. A logical evolution of the Death Egg Robot from the last time you faced the madman aboard his ship.

But it doesn't end there. It's all going in flames, yet the doctor isn't stopping. He's trying to get away with the Master Emerald. You beat him down one last time, and... he's still getting away. Why isn't he giving up? Time to chase him down in space.

You follow him through an asteroid field, trying desperately to catch up with him. When you finally do, he's no less prepared than he was before.

But you soldier through, and destroy his craft. He goes down... and then comes back up right after, with the Master Emerald still in his hands. He is never going to stop. It's getting out of control, the asteroids are doubling, getting in the way of your rings. You're this close to losing him...

But at long last, you land that final hit. He's down. Truly down. You did it. You beat him.

In a game that already cemented his refusal to give up from the start, the finale of Sonic 3 & Knuckles shows you what a great villain Eggman is, and what a great hero Sonic must be to keep up the whole way through.

Compare that to Mephiles, who transformed into the mighty god Solaris, got in a fight with three super hedgehogs, and died instantly. What a wanker.

19. What's your favourite zone from the classic games, if you have one?

You should all know by now that I am not good at picking out levels I like in a franchise like this. Too many of them are awesome and/or pretty. D':

Can I at least pick one for every main/sort-of-main Classic installment?

Sonic 1: Marble (the level design may be blocky, but I like the aesthetic)

Sonic 2: Hill Top

Sonic CD: Quartz Quadrant

Sonic 3 alone: Launch Base

Sonic & Knuckles alone (THIS ONE WAS REALLY HARD): Sky Sanctuary

Knuckles Chaotix: Marina Madness

Sonic 3D Blast: Rusty Ruin

Sonic R: Radiant Emerald

Sonic Mania (SO WAS THIS ONE): Press Garden

[boobachu]

best place to start w sonic media?

Sonic the Hedgehog's biggest strength and weakness is diversity. There are infinite takes on what Sonic the Hedgehog should be and that's part of why the fandom's so split cuz we want one or more specific aspects so I'll give you some hints on where you might want to start cuz there's really no one good starting point.

Games where holding down on the D pad makes you roll and speed up: Sonic Advance. It's not as hard as Sonic 2 and it's not as long as Sonic 3 & Knuckles. It also has one of the better special stage systems. If you liked this game I'd go for Sonic 2 next, and if you thought the game was WAY too short then Sonic Mania is for you!

3D games that focus on platforming: Sonic Lost World is in my opinion the most fun to play as Sonic the character. It has a good progression of difficulty, but unfortunately the game does a poor job at teaching you how to use your moves.

Best grab bag game: Sonic Adventure 2 no contest. It has a really cheesy action-adventure story and three really different and fun gameplay styles. Plus it has the best version of chao garden if you wanna pet some dudes and race them

Hardest 3D Sonic game: Sonic Unleashed easily. If you wanna go as fast as possible and try again and again and again to get the best ranks you play this game. Also the werehog is god of war.

Hardest 2D Sonic game: That'll be Sonic Rush, it's also super fast paced and you'll struggle to balance speed and platforming.

Easiest 3D Sonic game: Sonic Forces. This also has a very customizable character (and technically has really difficult challenges, but you'll only run across that for 100%)

Easiest 2D Sonic game: Sonic 4. The second episode has way more depth tho and there's no real bonus from playing both episodes besides Metal Sonic

Comics: the new IDW comics, I love Archie but it's very '90s superhero comic and also very much an Archie comic (love triangles and romance drama) though the earliest Archie comics are very gag driven which would never be revisited until Sonic Boom (which, the Sonic Boom comics are the best thing to come out of that side project)

So far the first 30 or so issues of IDW are really, really good and the last 20 issues are really really okay. It's the one Sonic comic I'd recommend above all else. (also read the 30th anniversary special, that likely won't be on any online sites as it's technically a different canon alongside the movie one-shot)

Cartoons:

Sonic the Hedgehog (the movie) It's probably the most Sonic Sonic cartoon, but it's also only an hour long since It's a two episode original video animation and failed pilot.

Sonic the Hedgehog (the ABC series, aka SatAM) is easily the best if you love adventure and drama and want to see Sonic the Hedgehog have PTSD

Adventures of Sonic the Hedgehog is basically what if Americans made Sonic, it's the most like the story of the games (Sonic & Tails wandering the world and stopping Robotnik) but it's also a huge homage to early animation such as Felix the Cat (who is a big influence on Sonic's design, if you want to see Sonic's spiritual predicesor, watch The Twisted Tales of Felix the Cat, whom one of the directors/writers of AoStH did some episodes and designs for)

Also go for the new movies, the second one is way better but they're going for the slow decent into villanous madness for Robotnik and that's something that'd be lost by skipping the first movie.

Though, just like the '90s Super Mario Bros. movie, it's heavily inspired by Sonic's canons, it's not an adaptation of any pre-existing story. So don't be shocked if the games and comics are nothing like this (but if you turn out to like it good news Tails is getting a movie and Knuckles a mini-series so yay!)

Sorry if that wasn't helpful, I've never really had to reccomend Sonic before, most people I know either played Sonic 2 or SA2 or something at least once. It's like reccomending Mario, you just assume people'd play it already.

Though I guess it's not the '90s anymor eXD

[beevean]

How was Infinite better than Mephiles in your opinion? I think Infinite had a bit of potential but Pontiff ruined what little there was.

Is Forces a Pontaff game? It doesn’t look like one, and I think they just translated/collaborated? No seriously, I remember reading the credits and being confused. Anyway.

Let’s get out of the way the most shallow reason I prefer Infinite: design. Infinite’s design is damn cool, he’s so edgy that it’s obvious he’s meant to be a caricature, with his clawed gloves and boots with his own friggin’ symbol on it, but he’s still appealing to the eyes. Before you finish the game, the mask also adds intrigue: why is he wearing it, and why is he blind in one eye? It motivates you to get to know more about him. It also helps that he’s a canid, a family that is quite rare in the series - I can only think of Tails and Chip - and it makes him unique but not in a special OC way. (this also means he even has some cute features like big ears and a fluffy tail, which add delicious contrast to his “I'm the toughest of terrors I am the darkest of days” design)

On the contrary, Mephiles has two designs: Multiplayer-Mode Shadow...

And Nightmare Shadow.

And sure, the crystallized form is pretty cool to look at, but he still Shadow. I get that he was reborn from Shadow’s shadow (some writer felt very clever that day), but I kinda would have preferred to see him take other forms. Well, it’s not like the devs had the time to add a third model...

(also, both of them have awesome voices so I can’t put one above the other)

As for the rest, here’s a rundown:

- Mephiles, along with Iblis to a lesser extent, overshadows Eggman. He’s yet another villain that takes the stage and reduces the good ol’ doc to a miniboss, more preoccupied with stealing the McGuffin... I mean, Princess Elise, than to do some interesting villaining - this has the ripple effect of making Sonic the Hedgehog, in a game called Sonic the Hedgehog, nearly useless to the main plot until he’s killed. I have little tolerance for villains who want to be more “dangerous” than Eggman at this point, and Mephiles was only one of the last ones that played this overused trope seriously (wish he was the last one, but Dark Gaia is a smear on an otherwise beautiful game... but that’s another story). By contrast, Infinite is always Eggman’s weapon, and the game never implies you’re supposed to think less of the scientist - Infinite may be an arrogant buffoon, but he never leaves Eggman’s side. The two work on a tandem, and basically Infinite is terrifying raw strength combined with Eggman’s superior intellect. Took him long enough, but Eggman has essentially tamed a powerful beast like he’s been planning to do since Chaos.

- Mephiles is meant to be this master manipulator, a 4D chessmaster moving pieces across time and space to get to his goal. I love the idea, really: he’s the raw intellect of a god without any of the strength of a god, so he has to play dirty and play on mortals’ emotions. The problem is that the game isn’t competent enough to pull such a feat, so everyone basically has the IQ of a brick - everyone who has even watched some videos points out at least two things:

1) how can Silver, even if he grew up in a destroyed city, trust some random guy without a mouth and reptilian eyes who suddenly tells him “here’s the cause of your problems, now go back in time and kill him” and Silver is just like “okie dokie” without even asking “excuse me, and whomst the fuck are you”

2) Mephiles can travel in time anywhere he wishes AND he can apparently conjure the Emeralds at his side. There is literally nothing stopping him to go to Silver’s future and rejoin Iblis there, or even prevent the incident that split them. The game set no limitations to his powers, and so we’re free to think about the most obvious solutions, and so his overly complicated plan that hinges on a boy killing another boy 200 years in the past after he bonded with the Iblis seal to make her cry in grief, plus triggering Shadow’s trauma on the side... even more hard to follow, because it’s all useless.

Infinite, to be fair, has a similar problem with his powers: the Phantom Ruby’s potential has never been specificed, but it seems to be a strong reality warper that can even teleport people (Mania) - and yet we only see Infinite conjure clones and spikes with it, which is boring. However, one thing he has over Mephiles is that the guy’s blatantly an idiot. Like, the story doesn’t shy away from showing how his arrogant, sadistic mistakes like “lol i’ll leave you alive because you’re not worth my time” have serious repercussions to Eggman’s plans, to the point that the guy at the end is like “you know what, I’m sick of your shit” and kills him. And you may be like “how does that make him better than Mephiles” - well he’s more believable, and more human (relatively speaking), and Forces’ story was written with feet but no one got their IQ divided by itself so there’s that.

I get the feeling Infinite is meant to be both intimidating and a parody of overly edgy and cool villains like Mephiles himself, and for me it works. Mephiles... he’s kinda like ShTH: he takes himself way too seriously. Except ShTH is funny, at least.

To be kind to Mephiles, his backstory is at least more precise, and definitely more interesting: as I mentioned, I love the idea of a god that was split into powerless intellect and mindless strength. In a better game, Mephiles would have been an interesting villain, completely ineffectual in a physical battle and maybe in constant pain, but omniscent and with a streak of sadism.

Infinite, on the other hand, clearly went through a shift in backstory: the main game hints at the fact that he was made in a lab, but then Episode Shadow comes in and he’s just some guy who was bullied too hard. I... okay.

Anyway, Infinite is more appealing to me and he doesn’t break Forces’ already fragile plot like Mephiles does. also he cute. there :V

[blazehedgehog]

Do you think we'll ever get a Sonic Mania 2?

At this point? Probably not. I'd heard whispers from different people over the years that Evening Star was working with Sega on something, and now I'm figuring that's Sonic Origins Collection. By all accounts it sounds like the Retro Engine versions of Sonic 1, Sonic 2, and Sonic CD, plus a new Retro Engine version of Sonic 3 & Knuckles. (Or, I guess, at this point, it's called the Star Engine)

That being said, Sega is extremely cagey and refuses to confirm exactly what's up with the Origins versions of these games, outside of the fact that they are widescreen and "aren't emulation." So maybe it's not Star Engine. Maybe they hired another, separate, completely different developer to retread the same ground yet again. Or maybe they're just worried the fan boys would burst a blood vessel if they were having these guys work on anything but Sonic Mania 2.

After all, if they said "Evening Star is doing these ports" then maybe that creates an unrealistic expectation that these games are going to be significantly changed, when Sega is lowballing things a little more. Like, when you say "from the developers of Sonic Mania," you expect the high color graphics and detailed animations from that game. The reality is that they are probably going to stick closer to the way the Genesis games originally looked and sounded for Origins.

One possibility I've considered is that there were those at Evening Star (before they were even named as such) that were a little scared of becoming "The New Sonic Team." They might not have want to be pigeon-holed as a development team that would be shackled to only make Sonic games for the rest of their lives. After all, that's why Yuji Naka left. Depending on how you view things, Sonic Team, whatever that means nowadays, hasn't made a non-Sonic game since Phantasy Star Portable in 2008. It's just been Sonic game after Sonic game after Sonic game.

(Though before some nerd swoops in and "um, actually"s me: they have assisted on a number of games, like Mario & Sonic Olympics and some Puyo Puyo games, but I wouldn't consider that quite the same.)

Anyway, if that's true, I wouldn't blame Evening Star for wanting to keep Sega at arm's length. I'm sure they love working with Sega, I'm sure there's no bad blood or hard feelings or anything like that. Sega let them live their dream, and absolutely nothing I've heard suggests they are ungrateful for that fact. But I think the last four years since Sonic Mania suggests they are trying to move forward carefully and with consideration.

Besides, what would Sonic Mania 2 even be? It was called Sonic Mania because it was the ultimate nostalgic culmination; the biggest, loudest, most loving tribute to Classic Sonic ever made. You could say, "more original levels," but that's not really what Sonic Mania was about, you know? And they kind of wrung the stone dry on those four 16-bit games. If they did a new 2D Sonic, you'd expect it'd be called something besides "Sonic Mania" at the very least.

This is pure speculation on my part, but maybe something like that was pitched and it fell apart before going anywhere notable. I imagine the moment you get away from "we're paying tribute to games that already exist" then things get really complicated, really fast. Speaking from personal experience, back in 2012 a friend commissioned me to make some minigames for a project he was working on, and basically gave me carte blanche to make whatever I wanted as long as it was original. I'd made original games before, but usually they were spun off from another fan project (like The House). This was the first time I’d ever been told to start from scratch.

Endless possibility stretched out before me, and the thought that I could just make whatever I wanted was kind of paralyzing at first. There were no rules I was trying to follow, there was nothing I was trying to perfectly replicate, I could just do... anything. It felt strangely high pressure. Like I finally had to put my money where my mouth was. A real test to see if I could stand on my own two feet. No more safety nets.

How do you follow up Sonic Mania? I mean, really follow it up? Not just "Take Sonic Mania and make even more levels." How do you evolve Sonic Mania? I imagine there are lots of directions something like that can go that could lead to the project stalling out.

But I don't know. All I know is that I heard Evening Star was working with Sega and nobody knew what the project was or is, or even if they were still doing it. Let's not read too far between the lines there.

[egg-emperor]

Merry Eggsmas, I hope everyone is having a good day/night! I'm going to show off the Eggman/Sonic stuff I gifted myself as a reward for getting through the year. I'm sure you can guess what most of it consists of heheh

I got:

The 25th anniversary Tomy classic and new Jakks Pacific modern plushies! 💖💕💜

I almost got the Tomy plush in 2016 but I didn't have money on me, he was sold out the next time I visited the store, and he became pricy on eBay. But I finally found him for a good price! He’s one of Tomy’s better quality Sonic products and I love the shiny look to it. The Jakks Pacific modern plush is beautiful too! He's small and simple but still an adorable and worthy addition to the collection! The material of his coat is nice and soft.

I already bought the bigger Jakks Pacific Eggman figure a few months ago, so I now have the mini one too.

The paint is slightly off on mine, especially on his nose but I’ll touch it up when I can. It looks great for a smaller figure! The size comparison is funny. I love them both! 💜

This unofficial Eggman Lego mini figure and official Nanoblocks figure!

The Lego has such impressive detail and paint for a bootleg! I wish there was an official figure for the beautifully round Eggman in Lego Dimensions though, because he was supposed to be a big figure rather than a mini one. But I still love this! As for the Nanoblocks, it was a pain in the ass to build because it's so small and complicated but it looks cool!

I have Tubbz Ducktor Roquacknik at last!

It’s easily the best looking of the set because it was really weird how Sonic, Tails and Knuckles had noses and hands on top of beaks and wings. The mustache on the beak for Eggman works perfectly!

This neat mug with Sonic Mania Adventures art! It’s my second Eggman mug since I got one of Eggman’s head last year lol

It's been a while since I've brought any kind of physical comic or book so I decided to get this Universe #75 variant cover and a sticker activity book!

I don't need physcial copies of Archie or IDW since I own them all digitally. But I had extra cash, so I bought one of my favorite variant covers of Eggman demanding the spotlight he deserves! I'm slightly disappointed that they reduced the amount he’s spitting in the final version but I still love it. XD The sticker and activity book doesn't have as much Eggman as I hoped for but it's pretty good! I might show the contents sometime.

I also got some stocking fillers like a face mask, pins, keychain, dangler, magnet and gloves. If you couldn’t tell already by the very small Eggman socks I have in my collection, I don’t care if the items fit me or not. I just want to grab literally any Eggman merch I can!

A couple of days ago, I finally went into a store for the first time since like February or March and found Metal and Knuckles in store. The Eggman trap spring is my favorite accessory yet because you can actually push it in!

I finally decided to get the Cable Guys Tails, since they still haven't made an Eggman. When there’s only team Sonic merch available, I always go for Tails. I would trust him the most out of them to take care of my devices.

On a Sonic Official stream they said they weren't sure if they could make a Cable Guy Eggman work because of his big belly. But his arms are long enough to put out in front of him to hold things! Especially if it was modern because they’re longer, but I’m sure classic could work too! Plus, I think his belly would be great for devices and controllers to lean against. So that's no excuse! XD

That's all the stuff that arrived in time for Eggsmas! There's still something that hasn't arrived yet, but I'm happy that most of it was here today. I'm pleased with the amount of modern and classic Eggman because they're always what I want most! I hope there's more new merch for the two best designs for the anniversary next year. :D

I'm eager to see how all of this will look on my Eggman shrine once I'm done rearranging it. I'll make a new up to date post to replace my current pinned when it's done!

[bulgariansumo]

The Messy Relationship Between Sonic and Localization

Ask any Sonic fan and they’ll tell you that the fandom is one of the most fractured things to ever exist. It’s a miracle whenever we can all agree, and that usually comes from us collectively hating something (Sonic Movie’s original design, Ken Penders, etc.)--and even then, there’s a dedicated few who disagree. Many of us have such differing opinions on what the series “should” be, that satisfying all--or even a majority--of Sonic fans is next to impossible. How did it get this way? I think it has a lot to do with localization.

Classic Era

The 1990’s wasn’t the best decade when it came to localizing anything, especially not video games. Often, some creative liberties would be taken when adapting a source from Japanese to English.  The Sonic franchise was no exception to this. The first split comes from the game manuals. Me and @rontufox​ already made a post discussing this, but the Japanese manuals gave a little background info on the series’ lore and worldbuilding. The English versions gave a bare-bones description of the premise of each game, but that’s about it. There were no mentions of an apocalypse caused by people misusing the Chaos Emeralds, of Sonic finding the ring that would foreshadow Knuckles Chaotix, or of Knuckles thinking the Death Egg was a ‘Dragon’s Egg’ described in ancient legends. Sonic went to a bunch of colorful zones, beat up Dr. Robotnik, collected some magic stones, and maybe a new character or two would tag along, but there was nothing else to it. There was no dialogue and few cutscenes in the games at this time, so the English localizers could get away with this.

Since there wasn’t much to go on games-wise, English fans at the time got their perception of Sonic and his world from various comic and cartoon adaptations. The American-produced ones portrayed Sonic as an in-your-face smart aleck who was almost completely full of himself. The UK-produced Sonic the Comic starred Sonic as a self-described “cool guy” who cared little about the people around him, including friends. Whatever worldbuilding these adaptations had either didn’t exist or diverged completely from the games, because the writers, even if they did care, didn’t have much to go on. There also weren’t a lot of Japanese Sonic adaptations at the time, and the only one that got localized was Sonic the Hedgehog: The Movie (aka Sonic OVA). To English-speaking fans, Sonic was an arrogant but funny hedgehog who despite everything, got the job done. Aside from Dr. Robotnik, other characters were an afterthought and could be replaced as needed.  

Adventure Era

Sonic Adventure released in 1998 with fully voice-acted cutscenes, and localization differences started catching up. Some things were easy to fix, such as Dr. Eggman (Robotnik’s name in Japanese) being a nickname for Dr. Robotnik. Other things weren’t that simple. For instance, some of those little things mentioned in the Japanese manuals started showing up again, specifically the apocalypse caused by people misusing the Chaos Emeralds. Sonic Adventure was a soft-reboot, where most previous characters and worldbuilding are still there, but some details are left behind so that newcomers have an easier time entering the series. There also might be changes in the series’ tone. For example, Sonic Adventure was somewhat more serious than previous games could be, but still overall lighthearted. This was also the first of many mainline games during this time to have an ensemble cast. Instead of just playing as Sonic, or maybe Tails and Knuckles, you were required to play all three of them plus other characters, with different stories and gameplay styles. This was a tall task, but these games pulled it off well enough to be very popular at the time. Themes of friendship became very prominent in the games around this time, and to further cement it, Sonic X, a Japanese-produced anime came out and got localized in the United States. Sonic was still a little cocky in English dubs of the games and anime, but he was also free-spirited and very supportive of his friends instead of being preoccupied with being the coolest person in the group. For the most part, his English and Japanese portrayals were nearly indistinguishable. Other characters also got more screentime and focus on their personalities, and popular new characters like Shadow and Rouge were introduced to the cast. All was going great.

Then 2006 came around. Shadow the Hedgehog and Sonic the Hedgehog (aka Sonic 06) came out, ushering in a period of very poorly received Sonic games, the latter being seen as a contender for the worst game of all time. Shadow the Hedgehog was an attempt at explaining why the titular character was alive after apparently being killed off Sonic Adventure 2, but the gritty and somewhat melodramatic tone was seen as ill-fitting for the Sonic franchise. The gameplay was also lacking, in part due to other characters tagging along with Shadow and repeatedly telling him hints and mission objectives. The problem of characters talking a lot mid-gameplay was present in Sonic Heroes, but the gameplay itself was passable enough that the game didn’t completely suffer for it. Shadow the Hedgehog tied up the last plot threads the Sonic Adventure series left behind, so the series had to go somewhere different. Sonic 06 was another soft-reboot, so that newcomers wouldn’t have to study up on the games from Sonic Adventure to Shadow the Hedgehog. Because the game was rushed for the holiday season, it was glitchy, didn’t feel good to play, and the writing was… very flawed. The game’s tone was slightly lighter than Shadow the Hedgehog, but still a little too melodramatic for most fans.

With all of these changes in mind, further splits in the English-speaking fandom occurred. Many vocal Classic fans were thrown off by the series being heavier on plot, worldbuilding, and Sonic’s friends. They wanted to go back to a time when none of that existed, and when Sonic was just an arrogant jokester--a time that only existed in 90’s US and UK. Newer, Adventure-era fans grew up with these new changes and loved them, though many of them were also not happy with Shadow the Hedgehog and subsequent games’s handling of these things. Because of Shadow the Hedgehog and Sonic 06’s spectacular failure in handling different characters’ gameplay, one sentiment was repeatedly echoed--that only Sonic should be playable. Since then, with very few exceptions, only Sonic has been playable in mainline Sonic games. This still wasn’t enough to save the games. Games after Sonic 06 often had a core gimmick to them, many of which weren’t received well, and the ones that were got replaced by the next game. The writing had the same feeling to it, though. It shied away from the melodrama of the most hated entries, but still retained the sincerity of entries like Sonic Adventure.

Modern Era

That changed in 2011 with Sonic Colors. Instead of Sonic Team writing the games, they hired Ken Pontac and Warren Graff, two American writers known for working on Happy Tree Friends. Neither had much knowledge of the previous games’ characters, worldbuilding, or stories, but this was intentional. Sonic games sell less in Japan, so Sega probably wanted to put more focus into pleasing audiences in America and Europe. The two went off some basics about the characters and setting, and what little they knew previously. There is some supervision by Takeshi Iizuka, a longtime Sonic Team member who is currently the head of the series after creator Yuji Naka left in the mid-2000’s, but he is interested in the series going in a new direction. Sonic Colors was another soft reboot of the series, but because of the writer’s lack of knowledge about the series a lot more details were lost and changes made than in any of the previous ones. The writing is lighthearted, but most of the sincerity has been traded for attempts at comedy, which tend to be hit and miss. Sonic as a character retains his free spirit and some kindness towards his friends, but some of the self-importance of his English interpretation is making a comeback. Many of the characters from previous games make returns, but they’re written oddly (“Y’got this, Sssonic!” - Shadow, Sonic Generations (2011)) and the writers don’t quite know how to integrate them. Sonic Colors was well-received for its gameplay, and even the writing was praised at the time, but most subsequent games have middling reception. None are considered outright bad (except Sonic Boom, but that was a spinoff that Sega contracted a different company to do) or outright good (except Sonic Mania, which Sega contracted a team of fans to do.)

Conclusion

As it stands now, the Sonic franchise is a strange hybrid of the Japanese and English interpretations of Sonic. A lot of the Adventure Era fans are old enough to start noticing the changes in the writing in the Modern Era, and some aren’t big fans. Some are, though. Some of the Classic fans are satisfied with these changes, others aren’t impressed either preferring the Classic or even Adventure Era. Some people like the Classic Era, but not the English interpretations of the series. There are likely Modern fans who grew up with this version of the Sonic franchise and love it, but there may be ones that have seen previous iterations and prefer those better. There are many differing opinions and few can agree on what would be good for Sonic. Would things have been different if localization had been handled differently in the 90’s? Who can say? All we have to go by are ripples from the errors of the past.

[nuttyrabbit]

Sonic Forces Thoughts

The title may seem a bit strange, given that the game is 3 years old already, and I’ve given my thoughts on the story plenty of times before as well as shared those of others, but I wanted to make this post because I decided to actually sit down and play Sonic Forces front to back for the first time since the game was on sale on the Nintendo Switch Eshop for a stupidly cheap price (10 dollars as of the time of this post)

Now that I’ve actually beaten the game and seen pretty much all the game has to offer (outside of Episode Shadow), I might as well give my thoughts on it.

On the whole, the best way to describe Sonic Forces is “mediocre”, because almost everything about it is just mediocre. The story, the  music (which kills me to say), the level design, everything about the game just reeks of unfiltered mediocrity.   It’s not terrible, but it’s not good either, it’s just kinda....there.

Now I could leave it there but I actually want to go into detail, so I’ll break it down into a couple of sections to get my thoughts out in an organized way under the readmore, starting with 

STORY:  As I said at the start of the post, I’ve said my piece about the story many times over and agreed with the thoughts of others on that matter, so I’ll keep this quick. 

The story feels incredibly undercooked and doesn’t even come close to fulfilling its potential, especially when it comes to Infinite. Holy shit I could spend 2 hours ranting about how much wasted potential this fucking character is on a story and gameplay level but at this point it’s beating a dead horse.  

The characters and their characterization is generally fine (except Tails holy shit what did they do to you) but like Infinite, they feel grossly underutilized and feel like they’re there for the sake of it rather than because they contribute anything of meaning. 

I don’t have much else to say other than that the story shares a common problem with the rest of the game in that it is very short. Like, I got Forces yesterday and I beat it in the span of what? 5 or 6 hours? As such, the story feels incredibly rushed because of that.  This segues into my next topic 

Gameplay:  This is a bit of a broad topic but I’ll break it down into something manageable, going from general to specific

Difficulty: Starting with difficulty, Forces is, for the most part, an incredibly easy game. The game defaults to the “hard” difficulty but it should really be called “normal” because nothing in this game will give you too much trouble (at least for reasons of actual difficulty). The boss fights, especially the final one, are pitifully easy and simplistic, especially if you use the Burst Wisp. Seriously, that thing destroys all the Avatar bosses with no issue. As such, the incredibly low difficulty makes the games’ length that much more noticeable, which speaking of

Length: The game, as I’ve said before, is incredibly short. I beat it in 5-6 hours but you could easily beat it in around 3 or 4. There’s 30 stages plus the Episode Shadow stuff and some bonus stages you unlock with Red Rings, but almost all of them are laughably short, the longest of them clocking in at around 4 or 5 minutes and the shortest being barely a minute and a half (the bonus stages are ~45 seconds long).  The only time I spent more than 5 minutes in a level is if I repeatedly died on a certain part, which happened only once or twice and for reasons I will get into.   It somehow feels shorter than Mania, a game that was sold for half the price initially and has less levels.

Controls: Next up is the controls and holy shit this is where the bulk of my complaints lie.  I don’t know how, but Classic and Modern Sonic control noticeably worse than they did in Generations or pretty much any other Classic or Boost game.  

Classic Sonic feels incredibly heavy, making each platforming section feel less I’m controlling Sonic the Hedgehog and more like I’m controlling an immobile brick.  That’s not even getting into how badly they fucked up his physics. The fact that this came out months after Mania is laughable.

Modern Sonic on the other hand, feels way too loose.  Whether it be in 3D or 2D, I feel like I’m barely in control of him when I start to gain speed, and there’s been multiple times where I careened off a cliff despite steering him away from it. It’s made even worse by the fact that for some fucking reason, they took away the drift, something that’s been in I think every 3D boost game since Unleashed.

They also gave Modern a double jump, but the double jump is so worthless and heavy that it’s gotten me killed more times than it’s actually helped me. It feels so stiff and awkward to use and combined with Modern’s loose controls, most of my deaths in this game came from Modern deciding to just randomly plummet into a pit because  I couldn’t correct a jump or he just slid off the edge of a runway for no good reason. Stage 27 is the best example of what I’m talking about because holy shit.

Finally there’ the Avatar, and he probably controls the best of the three, so I don’t have too many complaints on that end other than the fact that his jumps are incredibly slow and floaty.

Level design:  As I said before, most levels are incredibly short, being over pretty much as soon as they begin.  The design in the levels themselves is at best momentarily interesting (The 2nd Modern level for instance), and at worst is absolutely atrocious and terrible (Whoever decided to put an autoscroller in a Sonic level is just awful). and most of the time it just evens out to being incredibly boring and forgettable. This isn’t helped by the fact that most of the levels themselves are either throwbacks to previous games,  generic cityscapes covered in white or on fire, or that ugly, ugly jungle aesthetic.  There’s no levels in this game that really wowed me aesthetically or on a gameplay level. Hell, I can barely remember the names of most of the levels 

Music: The music in this game ranges from forgettable (most of the Modern tracks) to skullfuckingly awful (Every. Single. Classic. Song). Though that being said, I did like a couple of the Avatar themes, and the vocal tracks (Fist Bump, Infinite’s Theme, Light of Hope) were all pretty decent, though not nearly on the same level as prior games.  This is probably the most forgettable soundtrack in all of 3D Sonic. Even Lost World had more memorable and interesting tracks than this. 

Avatar:  I already talked about my grievances and thoughts on Modern and Classic in the control section, but I wanted to give the Avatar his own section because it’s easily the best part of the game.  Getting new gear for your Avatar and customizing them is admittedly really fun,  and I had a good time making my new OC Kick the Dog (do not steal).  The Wispons give a decent amount of variety and replayability to the levels that the other playstyles don’t have (Red Rings do dick in this game other than unlock clothes and EX levels which are so insignificant they ain’t worth it) and their levels are easily the most fleshed out and interesting of the bunch.    If I ever come back to Forces, it’ll probably be to replay Avatar levels

Content:  This game has barebones content, with the most pressing things outside of the main levels being Episode Shadow (which is 3 stages long), the bonus levels (pitifully short), the SOS missions (replay the levels again), and collecting the red rings/ silver moons/ whatever (Only unlocks more clothes and bad bonus levels).  Compared to something like Generations, which was also pretty short but had a lot of side content and unlockables that made it worth coming back to, and something like Mania which is packed to the brim with content and replayability, Forces is just kind of pathetic.  

Graphics:  One thing I’ll give the game is that the pre-rendered cutscenes and even some of the real time cutscenes look really damn good, at least aesthetically. Character animations still leave a lot to be desired though. The in-game graphics look fine. Nothing great but not terrible.  Keep in mind I played it on Switch so that could easily affect things, but generally the game looked....okay.

FINAL THOUGHTS:  As I said before,  Sonic Forces is the definition of “mediocre”. It’s a completely unremarkable game from start to finish, and most of what it does is done better by just about any other competent 2D or 3D Sonic game.  The  Avatar is fun and interesting and I want the playstyle to make a return, but that isn’t enough to save the game from being incredibly mediocre and just plain forgettable.   

If you really want to try Forces out yourself, I’d recommend getting it at a deep, deep discount. I got it at around 10 dollars and I’d say it’s worth between 10 and 20 dollars. Do not pay full price for this game. 

But otherwise, just skip it.

[clownkiwi]

hehe, so since im in a video game mood rn and thinking a lot about old video games/video games i love, if you were to ask me “hey ruby!!! what games/sequels/trilogies would you like to see remade???” well, here’s which ones i think should get remade: (this’ll be a pretty long post, so you can just click the link down below if ya want to read the whole thing)

out of any old final fantasy game that should get a remake like the final fantasy 7 remake, if i had to choose one, it would have to be final fantasy 6. that’s just one of my favorite final fantasy games (right up there with final fantasy 7, that is), and like. final fantasy 6 is kind of the perfect bridging gateway game between the fantasy/medieval/middle earth early final fantasy games (from 1-5) to the futuristic/modern/grounded to earth final fantasy games (7, 8, 10, 13 & 15), so like. realistically??? final fantasy 6 is probably one of the only few games i think should get a final fantasy 7 remake-esque remake, and it is one that i think can work in that realistic style compared to something like. final fantasy 9 or final fantasy 4, ngl

super mario rpg, obviously, id love to see that game get a remake. maybe with like, a lot more characters (luigi & wario would work perfectly in there), any content they had to cut out, maybe add more to the game that we didn’t even think of that could work (like, not just story padding, maybe stuff like the koopalings, daisy, wart from mario 2). idk, id just like a super mario rpg remake done in a similar style to the link’s awakening switch remake

despite how important these games are to mario’s history as they are the first original handheld mario platformers, as well as introducing wario, another important mario character, it’s kinda weird how nintendo hasn’t really paid much attention to the super mario land trilogy, or even the wario land series. and while i think a new wario land game will certainly get everybody (myself included) very excited, id also get excited if the original mario land series got an all stars-esque remake. heck, id get excited if all the wario land games got remade too in their own package (like, the mario land trilogy will just have mario land 1, 2 & 3, while the wario land remakes can either start out with mario land 3, or virtual boy wario land, or even wario land 2)

i think the original paper mario trilogy of the 2000s should get their own remake/upscaled ports to the switch as well. stuff like paper mario 64 should obviously get remade from the ground up, while stuff like the thousand year door & super paper mario should get like. upscaled graphics, or even new content (like in the thousand year door, there should be a whole sidequest or extra campaign dedicated to luigi’s own journeys that he goes on at the same time as mario’s, i think thatd b pretty neat & funny)

if any megaman game were to get a remake, i think they should be like. the original zero storyline megaman x games. like, ya know, megaman x1-5. and while ik games like megaman x1-3 already get a lot of love, and megaman x5 doesnt really get as much hatred (i think??? i never finished that game), i think megaman x4 should get a lot more love. not only is it my favorite megaman x game, but like. it has a pretty good storyline, each character gets their own unique story, and like. i just like a lot about megaman x4, i really do, and im sad it commonly gets referred to as the worst megaman x game just because of its voice acting. it gets a lot of flack for its voice acting, and honestly, if the voice acting was just mediocre or average, then i really think a lot more people will appreciate this game. like, in my eyes, if megaman x1-5 got remakes in the cel-shaded rendered style of megaman 11 or dragon ball fighterz, then thatd b cool. id also b down to a new megaman x game too aoisdjfiaos

ok, so, kirby games!!!! ik stuff like kirbys adventure & kirby’s super star got remakes, and while they’re great, id love to see more kirby games get remakes!!! and i got two seperate candidates that’d work. and that first one will be a remake of the “dark matter” trilogy of kirby games. games like kirby’s dream land 2, kirby’s dream land 3, & kirby 64. i think these games are pretty important in the kirby series as not only are these the first instance of the deep lore seen in later kirby games (stuff like return to dream land, planet robobot, and star allies), but like. dream land 2 was the first game to introduce kirbys animal allies, which have become staples for a lot of the kirby games (dream land 3, wow, thats all i could really think of oasidjfio). so like, yea!!! thatd b pretty epic

another kirby “trilogy” id love to see get remade or even get remasters of onto switch would have to be the “return to dream land” games. games like kirby’s return to dream land and even the 3ds games that were built off of that: kirby’s triple deluxe & kirby’s planet robobot. i mean, these games are fairly recent, and stuff like return to dream land isn’t even 10 years old yet. but like, i think if these games got upscaled graphics/models & resolution, as well as a bunch of new/cut content, it can also work

oooooooooooooooooo boy, there are a lot of sonic games id love to see get remade considering i think about sonic alot. stuff like sonic 3 & knuckles getting the sonic 1, 2 & cd treatment (get upgraded ports to ios & android, a bunch of new content from sonic mania, etc), as well as said sonic 1 & 2 mobile ports get released to steam or other consoles. itd be cool to see shadow the hedgehog get an upgraded port to the switch for a low price. maybe even see sonic x-treme get completed. but if theres any sonic game id love to see get a full on, worked from the ground up remake, it’d have to be the sonic dreamcast trilogy. and by that, i mean sonic games that were worked off of the same dreamcast technology/engine. games like sonic adventure 1, 2 & sonic heroes. and like, not just stuff like the gamecube or steam ports. i mean, full on remakes with updated models, updated animations & cutscenes, updated rendering, updated voice acting, updated everything!!! with that, id love to see the chao garden get a full blown overhaul, with more deeper chao breeding, more games to play with your chao, more special, unique chaos & even stuff like chao bonuses to the main campaigns. and even somethign that’d be cooler would be like. either free updates or DLC that would add more campaigns to these games with new characters (like the babylon rogues, the classic characters, silver & blaze, etc), and like. i KNOW thats a lot to work on, but like, i think a lot of people would appreciate that. plus, i consider the sonic adventure games would be a perfect introduction to the sonic series, i think these games could get a lot more people hooked onto the series!!! new & old fans alike!!! but, thats just my thots, and this would be impossible realistically. id still want it 2 happen tho 🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺

while ik everyone wants that gen iv remake, may i recommend a??? gen v remake??? pokemon black & white are still one of my favorite pokemon games, they were very close to me growing up, and i. just have so much goddamn appreciation and love for this game!!!! i think its one of game freaks more underappreciated games, and ik there a ton of people that can agree with me on that!!! it was just such a different and unique experience, with such a deep story, really good and underappreciated and underloved pokemon designs, and just. i’d love it if we really got a gen 5 remake, especially seeing how much game freak has been putting a lot more gen 5 nostalgia in all of their recent products (from a ton of gen 5 pokemon appearing in detective pikachu, to gen v pokemon getting galarian forms in pokemon sword & shield, and even gen v pokemon appearing in a lot more spin offs lately). like. trust me, pokemon black and white isn’t really as bad as people made it off to be in 2011. it really is a modern masterpiece in video games, i really recommend checking it out and begging game freak to give it a remake about as much as yinz have been begging game freak to remake diamond & pearl

obviously mario 64, sunshine, & galaxy 1 & 2 should get full on remakes. yinz know i wanted one this whole year, and im very disappointed we got these barely upgraded ports to switch instead. thats it on that, i dont need to go into further detail

ummmmmmmmmm, yea, thats kinda it. i cant think of any other games id love to see get remade. ummmmmmmm let me know what u think about this list, and tell me whatever type of other games you’d love to see get remade!!!

thats it ruby out

[neoclassic-sonic]

What about the rest of the Forgotten Sonic Characters?

With Sonic Mania Plus comes two returning characters, Mighty and Ray! After 20+ years they’ve finally made their comeback ever since their debut in the segasonic arcade game! Even the Hooligans have made a semi-cameo appearance in the form of the Heavy Magician’s illusions in Mirage Saloon Zone! Since Mania is a celebration of every Sonic game ever it was nice to experience these old characters revitalized back to life!

But with the revitalization of old characters, what does that say about the state of the rest of the forgotten sonic characters? Will they ever see the light of day again? Do some have a more chance of appearing again? Or are they doomed to obscurity? Let’s review the list, starting from when they were introduced and their last major appearance! Starting with:

Sonic CD’s Rosy the Rascal (1993) Latest appearance Sonic R (1996)

I’m sure all of us were disappointed when she wasn’t playable in mania plus. But! With her appearance in the christmas special, she may become playable in the next sonic mania game! Or at least a cameo other than an Amy Doll.

Sonic Triple Trouble’s Fang the Sniper (1994), last appearance Sonic Fighters (1996) and you know what? Let’s throw in Bean and Bark (1996), last appearance Fighters Megamix (1996)

“Hey! What’s the big idea! We just saw them in Mania! You even said they were in Mania!” Well that’s where you’re kinda wrong kid. I said semi-cameo. The hooligans did not actually appear in Sonic Mania, at least not in their actual forms. Right, remember those three were just illusions by the magician. While those were references sure, those aren’t actually the hooligans. While their appearance in a next game like mania is less likely (given they were mirage saloon’s gimmick, and they’ve already had their representation) I wouldn’t be surprised if there wasn’t at least one reference to them in the near future.

Next up! Knuckle’s Chaotix’s Chaotix! (1995) with Espio’s last appearance in the Sonic Fighters (1996)

“Uh hey, what gives? The Chaotix crew have already appeared in modern games, they were just in Forces and Vector is in TSR! what are you on?” Well what I’m on, you see reader, is on Iizuka’s bullshit! You see since their first modern appearance on Sonic Heroes, Takashi Iizuka has stated on record that the modern chaotix crew is not the same characters as the ones in the 32x game. You see when development on the chaotix game was shifted from sonic team to another developer, the story hadn’t been written yet. Same with the characters characterization. That’s why you have a sophisticated 16 year old Charmy. Hot headed detective Espio. Pacifist nomad Mighty. God-fearing, music-loving Vector! While some of the character traits were carried over (like charmy being the glue that held the chaotix together, mighty is still a pacifist in mania, vector still has his headphones, while espio’s detective shtick got applied to the whole crew), they were basically new characters. Even though the chaotix game was viewed noncanon for years, with countless references to it in sonic mania, it seems that sega is much more willing to accept the chaotix as it was. It is very likely that this may get retconned (given how bullshit some of Iizuka’s statements on plotline are), they even might actually cameo in the next mania game if ever! 

Tails Skypatrol’s Witchcarters! (1995)

Finally some actual forgotten characters! Bet you didn’t know they exist huh! Well you probably do if you’re reading this list, but i digress. Introducing the witchcarters, Carrotia the Rabbit, Fockewulf the Wolf, Bearenger the Bear and Witchcarter. These characters served as one-off antagonists and henchmen in this spinoff game, where they were left ignored for around 20 years until Archie Sonic’s Eggman’s Dozen arc where they were given redesigns to fit the modern era. They are the less iconic of the two groups of antagonists that Tails has had to fight. But they are very likely to appear in the next mania-like game.

Tails Adventure’s Battle Armada (1995)

Oof another Game Gear title but one that’s more memorable than skypatrol! Along with a metroid-style gameplay, we are introduced to the battle armada! Speedy, his father and Dr. Fukurov are a few of the notable casts introduced here! For around 20 years they were ignored until Archie Sonic (again). They are given a much bigger role compared to the witchcarters! The idea of Speedy as a rival to Tails like metal sonic is to sonic, is such an interesting concept to me! they have a greater chance of appearing in the next mania like game as compared to skypatrol!

Sonic the Fighter’s Honey the Cat! (1996)

Yeahhh, ok let’s be blunt. I love honey the cat. But she probably won’t appear in a game any time soon. Here’s why: She’s basically the mobian version of an already existing character (candy from fighting vipers). She’s a hacked character in the arcade version, removed from the gcn port and an easter egg in the latest port. She was only limited to cameos in the comic before finally debuting properly in the sonic the fighters arc in archie sonic. While Sega has definitely been more lenient with her, unless there’s another fighting game that will come out, honey won’t be appearing any time soon. (and if she does I really hope they use the rest of the fighting vipers cast too, Pane the Boar exists now! and it’s not like anyone’s using the IP! I’d like it if they just,,,, retooled fighting vipers and it’s characters for a sonic fighting game spinoff without sonic characters haha)

Sonic R’s Metal Knuckles and Tails Doll (1996)

Sonic R introduced the counterfeit counterparts to the other 2/3s of team hero. Metal Knuckles and Tails Doll. While I bet they were only created to fill out the roster, we can’t deny that their designs are cool. I don’t want to rule them out because they’re 3d characters since Bean and Bark made 2d appearances in mania, but it’s a mystery on what kind of role they’ll fulfill. Metal Sonic’s first appearance in CD was explicitly clear that he was your rival, someone to beat. These two’s appearances are kinda shoehorned as someone you have to race with but there’s no backstory. Unless there’s racing challenge in the next mania game or these characters are retooled to being a miniboss, they probably won’t appear in a major role in the next mania game, if they ever appear it’d probably be as a background cameo. (which is a shame!)

Sonic Adventure DX and Adventure 2 Battle’s Tikal and Chaos! (1999) latest appearance Tikal-Sonic Runners (2015) Chaos(illusion)-Forces (2017)

Finally we’re out of the classic era and into the adventure era! The adventure era is regarded by a lot as either a. a transitional era between classic to modern sonic, or as a part of the modern sonic era. either way this is where tikal and chaos’s first and playable appearances were made. Now this is a weird case since Chaos came from the Master Emerald and Tikal is a ghost. In their ending you can see them hanging with the chao. Ever since then they’ve been MIA. While I thought they went back into the emerald, it seems that it’s actually questionable what happened to their fate. Will we ever get to see them again? Well this is where things get pretty dicey here on out. These characters don’t have “Classic” immunity, meaning they dont have the possibility to appear in the next mania-like game since they aren’t classic. Unless we have another storyline regarding the echidna colony (unlikely due to penders) then we probably wont see tikal and chaos in a major way any time soon.

Sonic Shuffle’s Void and Lumina (2000)

With character designs looking more akin to NiGHTS into Dreams than a sonic characters, void and lumina are the more different looking characters. Opting for a more fairy look instead. Sonic Shuffle is a board game somewhat akin to mario party. These characters were one-off characters, and i guess that’s it. Unless sega makes another board game using the mainline sonic universe (not storybook sonic) then we won’t see these two again anytime soon.

Sonic Hero/Advance 3/Battle’s Vanilla and Chocola and Emerl/G-merl (2003-2004)

Woof, that’s a lot of characters. So let’s tackle them one by one shall we? Vanilla is Cream’s mother. Kidnapped ala princess peach style in the advance games, she is cream’s driving force to join sonic’s team into taking eggman down. Likewise, Chocola is Cheese’s brother. These two chao are pets of Cream. Chocola is Cream’s driving force to join team Amy into taking down eggman in sonic heroes. Emerl was a robot that died in Sonic Battle and Gemerl is the reconstructed gizoid from emerl’s remains, after the events of advance 3, gemerl lives with cream and vanilla, often portrayed in the comics as the bodyguard for the two. So how likely are they to appear? Well not anytime soon by the looks of it. They only appear if Cream has a heavy role in the story, and with each passing installment cream has been getting lesser roles. I like to think of Cream as the “next sonic”. She has the drive and the heart to become the succeeding hero. I’d love for her to get her own series of games where she is the hero. But unless she gets more roles or she gets her own spinoffs (not likely), these three wont appear anytime soon.

Sonic Riders (2006) latest appearance for storm-Sonic Free Riders (2010) for Jet and Wave-Olympics (2020)

Sonic Riders introduced three babylon rogues. Jet was introduced as Sonic’s rival when it came to races, a title loosely held by metal and shadow (metal was created to be sonic’s rival at everything and shadow was conceptualized as being an antithesis to sonic, jet is the first to be his rival in speed only). Given the nature of these games it’s actually a surprise as to why they didn’t appear in team sonic racing, or in their two previous racing games. Jet and Wave appeared in the olympics 2020 recently but storm has been mia lately. When the next racing game does come out and when they expand their roster we might see the babylon rogues debut in some sweet rides!

Sonic 06′s Elise

Unless it’s in a remake Elise has no chance of returning back due to the whole nature of 06 (and it’s storyline)

Sonic and the Secret Rings and the Black Knight’s Shahra, Merlinus, Caliburn

Not likely given that they are one-off characters in a storybook.

Sonic Rush Adventure’s Eggman Nega and Marine (2007)

I’d really love for Marine to appear again. Eggman Nega appeared in Rivals, he even appears in the olympic games, why can’t marine appear again? Sadly, unless we get a game that involves the sol dimension, these two are out of the question.

Sonic Chronicles’s entire cast (2008)

Haha. no. Most well-known as the first rpg-like game that involves the sonic characters. This game introduces Shade along with other characters. However due to the Penders lawsuit, these characters are now off limits, even to sega. this may also be the reason why we have not seen gemerl again.

Sonic Unleashed’s Lah and Chip (2008)

Chip is the Light Gaia and Lah was made for the special. We probably won’t see these characters again despite having the best writing so far.

Sonic Colors’s Yacker (2010)

Yacker didn’t fare well compared to the rest of his wisp friends. and honestly? I don’t feel too bad. while he may appear if sonic ever does need a flagship representation for the wisps, i doubt he’ll have another big role like in colors.

Sonic Lost World’s Zeti (2013)

Cause let’s face it, only Zavok and Zazz are in the limelight recently. The Zeti are a very polarizing addition to the sonic cast. they don’t have the same rep as the wisps, yet they’re designs are a bit too unique to just be left behind again. What sega’s doing now though is a bit disappointing. Half ass shoe horns into plots. Well at least for TSR, which is a racing game spin-off. We also saw this in forces (along side chaos and shadow of all people). I just hope this isn’t a trend that persists. Either make a proper plot or don’t include the character at all sega. as to when we’ll see them again, that is up to sega. this is a bit of a cloudy are cause sega doesn’t seem to be afraid to use them, but for some reason they arent too confident either.

Sonic Boom’s Sticks.(2014)

Unless There’s another boom game or Sticks is redesigned to modern standards as opposed to boom standards, we’ll probably not see her again. which is disappointing.

Sonic Forces’s Infinite and OC character (2017)

They aren’t really forgotten since it’s only been 2 years. But infinite’s basically been forgotten already! He has no appearances in other games outside forces. Not even in team sonic racing, you’d think he’d be a shoe in, but he isnt! You’d think the make your own avatar would be something that’d be implemented from everygame onward (ngl it was the only good thing about forces) but it’s also isnt seen in tsr. which seems like wasted opportunities!

[musingsofonehuman]

I’ve been thinking a lot about what I wanna use this space for, and in general I wanna use it for a variety of things, one of those things being music. I love music, music for me is a form of expression, where my words fail me, music takes its place. I like listening to any type of music, it very much depends on the mood I’m in, but I want to talk about a particular type of music, video game music.

Video game music is so varied, even within cover versions, video game music is so expansive, it covers a range of genres, and sometimes it can get overlooked, so I want to highlight a few of my favourite tracks and talk about them. I’m gonna be talking about specific tracks and not soundtracks overall, I’m not an album person, I’ll listen to a song from an artist but I won’t listen to a full album, plus, even bad games can have one good track. I’m gonna be talking about these tracks in terms of how I feel about them, I’m not knowledgable on music composition, so I can’t talk about the structure of tracks, nor am I knowledgable about the many instruments used, but I can talk about my emotions with each track, and how I feel listening to them, as well as my experiences within the game. Basically, this is not gonna be technical, but more emotional, because that’s how I enjoy music, at an emotional level. So, let’s begin with a few tracks today.

Shovel Knight: Specter of Torment - Hidden by Night (Lich Yard)

Shovel Knight is a fantastic 2d platformer that I would recommend anyone with a love for platformers to play, and while the Specter of Torment expansion does have a few control problems, the music is incredible. The music in the original game was a stand out, and this expansion took it to new heights, remixing the originals in a way that paid respect to them while adding something new, and Hidden by Night is one of the best examples of this. Taking a track that already had a bit of a kick to it, upping the tempo and kicking the beat up some more to make a high energy dance track, and while it still retains that core melody throughout, it’s been tweaked to give it its own styling.

When I played Specter of Torment, this was the last level I chose to play, and it felt right, I had been through many challenges at that point, and when I arrived, I was ready to tackle Specter Knight’s home turf, so for the music to kick into high gear made it feel like a final challenge, the final test of my abilities. One of the things that really helps the tracks is the drum beat, I love a good drum beat, it helps to maintain the tempo and pace of a song, allowing the melody to focus on providing the core of the track, and in this track, the drum beat gives the song that extra flair, that extra kick it needs to turn it into a frenzy. While the original sets a good baseline, the remix steps over it and ascends higher than the original ever could.

Sonic Mania - Hydrocity Zone Act 2

How Sonic games always end up having fantastic soundtracks, I’ll never know, even in the mediocre games such as Sonic Colours and Sonic Forces, the soundtracks still standout from everything else, and Sonic Mania is no exception. Arguably the best Sonic game ever, Sonic Mania took what people loved about 2d Sonic and brought it to the modern generation, with that, they brought a load of old stages over and remixed them, which meant they remixed the music as well. There are so many standout tracks in this game, but Hydrocity Zone Act 2 is a good place to start.

Again, it builds upon its predecessor by upping the tempo and adding more of a beat to the track, but out of everything in this track, it’s the brass that stands out to me. While the melody and general tone of the track remain the same from Act 1, Act 2 adds more punch to the track by adding some horns to the mix (I think they’re horns, hard to tell, again, I’m not an expert, just an enthusiast). The horns play a supporting role, beefing up when the melody when it needs it most, so while the melody still stands out, it receives a boost at certain parts to help elevate it. This gives the track this dance/disco vibe, it starts as a toe tap, and pretty soon turns into this full on disco track with everyone getting their groove on. Once again, another track that succeeds what came before it.

Tekken 7 - Infinite Azure (Round 1)

Speaking of dance tracks, Tekken 7. I’ve played the Tekken games on and off for a long time, always in a casual manner, but one thing I never noticed about Tekken was its music, until Tekken 7. In terms of fighting games, the soundtrack is a standout, whereas Street Fighter is more understated in its soundtrack and Gulity Gear as rock/metal aspects, Tekken decided they were gonna go down the techno/electronica route, and it works. It gives Tekken a distinct feel, different from other fighting games, guitars and violins replaced with synths and bass, giving it this very hardcore feel, and yet, for all of that, they can still throw curveballs like Infinite Azure.

The track feels stripped down compared to other tracks, giving us the essence of the track without too much to distract us, a sweet piano playing the core melody, with a vibrant beat behind it and a funky bass line to match. When you play this track in game, you don’t really notice because you’re so focussed on the game, it’s when you listen to it outside the game that you start to appreciate it, you start to notice all the little details of the track, and what makes it so great. I actually enjoy listening to this song a lot, it’s one of those that you don’t skip, you turn the headphones up and nod your head to the beat, jamming along with it. You could drop this track at a club, and it would get a good reception. This is definitely a track you need to listen to outside of the game, and just bathe in its toe tapping coolness.

I think that’s enough for now, three is enough to go on. Who knows how often I’ll do these, hopefully often, but I honestly don’t know. Anyway, enjoy the tracks. 😁

[crusherthedoctor]

Why abandoning Classic Sonic for the sake of Modern Sonic won't achieve anything.

I won't beat around the bush here. I think the fandom is letting its annoyance with Classic Sonic's influence cloud its common sense and logic.

So a lot of fans are irritated by how Modern Sonic gets little respect compared to Classic Sonic, and how that's seemingly extended to the games and SEGA themselves, due to how Classic elements keep appearing in Modern titles, often in an unnecessary way and at the latter's expense for one reason or another. This is perfectly reasonable, and I can understand where these fans are coming from, even if I don't completely agree per say. Believe me, I'm bored of seeing Green Hill everywhere as well. (Except for the one in Mania, that one was amazing.)

The problem is that we're now convincing ourselves that Classic's presence is, in itself, the main culprit for why the Modern games don't do as well... And that's not true, no matter how much we may want to believe it.

You can definitely make a point about Classic Sonic being shoehorned into Modern titles, or how many times Green Hill appears, or how the Modern characters aren't seen as often as they used to be. That last one in particular bothers me as well, make no mistake. But at the end of the day, while they may bother us, those things in themselves are NOT making or breaking the games.

The QUALITY of the games are doing that.

The gameplay ideas implemented are doing that.

Sonic Team being burnt out to hell and desperately needing a break to rejuvenate themselves is doing that.

In light of the Classic backlash, we're acting as though the permanent burial of Classic will automatically make the games improve, or that it'll allow SEGA and Sonic Team to move on for the better. Lost World and Forces had Classic elements, and they ended up being divisive, so it makes sense, right...?

Well if that's the case, explain Shadow the Hedgehog. That game had no Classic insertion in any way, and it was still a godawful game that damaged the franchise's reputation and continues to be mocked to this day. Then Sonic '06 was the same, but somehow even worse, and even more immortal in its special brand of infamy. And despite how they may be perceived within the fandom nowadays, even Unleashed and the Storybooks ultimately sabotaged themselves in spite of their good ideas and promising intentions, all without a Classic Sonic in sight.

Meanwhile, Mania Plus was the highest rated Sonic game in decades. You don't have to like the game, but you can't ignore that monumental achievement, and the idea that they need to get away from the things that led to the highest rated Sonic game in decades shows an extreme inability to recognise the bigger picture for the sake of appealing to our own personal demands. Some journalists may indeed praise it just because it's a Classic game, which is obviously dumb and nonsensical, but the reality is that it's just a really damn good game that had a lot of care and attention put into it. No matter how many times its detractors insist that it's a soulless cash grab.

We all hate Classic extremists and fanbrats, right? So why are we becoming exactly the same as them, possibly even worse, only the other way around? Just as they continue to trash everything Modern because it's not Classic, we're now trashing everything Classic because it's not Modern. How can we expect SEGA to take our concerns more seriously than the Classic extremists, when we're doing the same things with similar biases?

We've become what we hate, and this needs to change if we want the franchise to actually go forward. The proper fusion of both sides for a more unified franchise and direction may never truly happen at this point, and that will always be disappointing. But whatever our opinions are on Classic OR Modern, and however much the former's interference in the latter may annoy us, we must understand that the actual effort put into the game, mixed with the caution necessary to refrain from self-sabotaging ideas, is ultimately what makes the game good or bad. Not whether Green Hill is there or not.

Journalists and critics may never truly stop bashing Modern Sonic at this point, no matter what Modern does. Is that infuriating? Of course it is. But even so, the solution is NOT to eliminate Classic, and alienate a shit-ton of Sonic's audience in the process. The solution is to simply improve Modern, and make him earn his respect without throwing in gameplay gimmicks that don't work. (Sonic CAN have alternate gameplay styles IMO, but they need to be compatible, and work for Sonic rather than against him.) Classic presence or no, if a Modern game is made with the best quality, it will get praised.

And even if it doesn't, or if it gets retconned by the critics as a bad game after a couple of years, is getting rid of Classic really going to change anything about that, other than make that fire grow even hotter than it already is?

[c7thetumbler]

Quick Game Reviews: What I played 2018

I’m gonna go ahead and do this for the whole year, which includes games that WEREN’T released this year, but I played this year. I also made this throughout the year, so most the opinions were right after I played it and if it’s been updated further might not include that in my blurb.

I needed to type and felt like I needed to make something. This might motivate me I suppose. Let’s get started

DOOM 2016 [PC]

I grew up on Pokemon, Mario, and Doom II. I couldn’t play it until I got my new computer this year so yeah way too late. This is a pretty solid game, though thanks to all of the bonuses and honestly nearly intrusive leveling up system kinda stepped in the way of the raw combat. It’s obviously my choice, but I felt encouraged to spend a lot of time exploring areas I’d already cleared rather than run and gun.

That being said, I still loved it. The secrets were, for the most part, really clever and fun anyway and the combat is delicious. I would strongly recommend this

A Hat in Time + Seal the Deal DLC [PC]

I love this game. A lot. It’s really cute and looks really good, it’s got a ton of charm, and it’s honestly a very good time overall. I 100% the base game last year when it first came out, and I would highly recommend to fans of 3D platformers, and still worth a try if you’re on the fence on them. The mod support is also great that it’s in there and I want to try that a lot. however the DLC...

So the new level is pretty short and while it’s fun, it’s not as good as the other levels. The characters (I think) are really cute and the charm is all there and that great, but it has all of 3 levels, and 2 of them are exploring the exact same places (the boat) and the 3rd is a nice twist on that, but other than that it’s pretty barren. The time rifts were fun as well, but alone... eh. The Death Wish portion, that is the super hard challenge mode...

... is not good. Obviously my opinion, and I might be missing the point, but after having been frustrated over and over and over again, the game itself is just not tight or clean enough to warrant it. My backing for this is that a large portion of the challenges rely on originally unintended level geometry or quirky mechanics in order to complete, and having challenges that require you to be in the know about these honestly inconsistent “quirks” is just not good. Specific examples: the ice hat giving you a small boost to avoid jumping in challenges is alright but fluctuates in how much height it gives you a lot, the challenges around the train chase still have the wonky hitboxes that do not line up with what’s still on screen, and the parade challenge has an invisible hitbox on the main platform that can kill runs. In short If you have found you love the main game and are a bit of a masochist, go for the DLC.

Pokémon Ultra Sun [3DS]

This is more or less just a revisit of the same generation with some very minor changes. The story changes take the focus away from Lillie and Lusamine (and as a result how interesting the former and evil the latter are) and places it on Necrozma and Ultra Beasts. I really like what they did with Necrozma, but overall it feels like a lot less. And while the Rainbow Rocket post game was nice and fun nostalgia, it’s still missing a solid post game like B2W2 or Gen II had. 

Ultra Wormholes are cool though, and all the good mechanics from SM are still there, so honestly I would recommend this if you haven’t played gen 7 and like Pokémon.

Hey! Pikmin [3DS]

It’s awful. I can’t think of a reason to pick this up.

I can rant about this for years, but it basically got the Zip Lash/ Sticker Star treatment: it took a franchise known for something and made it something else that was bad. It’s an incredibly slow puzzle “platformer” where you have to collect a bunch of treasure using pikmin you find in the level, it’s laggy even on a n3DS, and even though the point of the game is to collect enough treasure to leave, if you do that they’re all like “by the way, you still have to beat the final boss” so the entire auto-collecting side game you put your pikmin into is entirely pointless. This is honestly the worst 3DS game I played this year.

Hollow Knight [PC]

So I’m normally not that great with the games-that-are-pretty-dang-hard, and this was no exception. That said however, I did get pretty far (probably) before I got to a boss fight I just couldn’t beat (It was an onslaught of rolling knights in the raining city or something, it’s been a while). And after that I tried finding more power-ups and stuff to help, but I had to set it down after getting bottlenecked there. That being said, I can very easily see why people like this hardcore metroid-vania platformer, and would still recommend it if you’re into the Dark Souls style of high difficulty and mechanical mastery in other genres.

Axiom Verge [PC]

This is another Metroid-style game. I really liked this one as well, especially how its power-ups weren’t the traditional “You jump higher now” traversal power-ups. It really has a nice atmosphere and theme that still feels alien and metroidy while also feeling like the glitchy world by giving you weapons and movement abilities that let you glitch and change the environment around you. I really liked it! My only real complaint is the bosses get really challenging through a result of eventually figuring out what weapon and strategy is was designed for, and there are some areas that I was completely lost trying to find where I was going next, but all in all it’s pretty solid.

Octodad: Dadliest Catch [PC]

I normally really hate games where the focus is “lol, you can barely control your character! hahaha.” I actually really liked this one; it isn’t hard to get the hang of it and it’s really funny and still enjoyable at the same time. I rarely actually felt annoyed at the controls. I had a ton of fun with it, even if it was a little short.

Kirby Star Allies [Switch]

My complaints are very much the same as everyone else’s here; it’s a pretty okay Kirby game, but it lacks real challenge and is pretty quick. the real “star” of the show is playing the game with different characters, but since you can’t do that until after you play through as Kirby, by that point it’s either grown on you or hasn’t. The best part is the unique levels they made for the DLC characters, Gooey, Marx, Dreamland buddies, etc. Those are a ton of fun. If you like Kirby games, this one’s no Super Star but you’ll likely love all the attention to the free DLC characters and it’s not bad by any stretch.

HOB [PC]

It’s a 3D, top-down Zelda style game with an emphasis on some platforming elements. The world is wonderful, definitely the Aesthetic with clockwork worlds that Spiral Knights wishes it could’ve had. I actually had a ton of fun with it. The secrets and exploration were great, combat is ehhhhhh but that’s not really the focus. It’s a good time, If you like Zelda but with some puzzle platforming and great atmosphere, check this one out!

Poi [PC]

This is a Unity 3D platformer that attempted to brush off the Unity, and does an alright job with being mechanically tighter than most, but still has the Unity feel. Controls are a bit loose, could’ve used a lot of polish, but honestly this scratched the 3D platformer collect-a-thon itch for a bit and I actually 100% it. You have to love 3D platformers like Sunshine or Banjo Tooie to be able to like this, but if you do it’s a pretty fun romp.

Princess Remedy In a Heap of Trouble [PC]

This is a fun, short bullet-hellish game with an old-school Atari aesthetic. It’s pretty fun, but honestly I like the mechanics in the free game better (though this has more content). It’s fun, it’s funny, it’s quirky (and kinda short), try out the free game and if you like that one give this a try! The main difference is the “date” mechanic, where people you heal can join you to give you a different special power from healing, to various kinda of bombs, time freezing, homing bullets, etc. Once you find one though, it’s hard to convince yourself to try something else.

Splatoon 2: Octo Expansion [Switch]

This is Splatoon 2′s expanded hard/challenge mode. I’m a big fan; a few of the challenges are eh, but overall the aesthetic and branching map structure are super fun. The expanding on the lore and bonuses are also great; even though earlier I don’t normally go for the extremely hard, I found myself 100%’ing this. There’s a really tough challenge at the very end of all that, and I would say If you liked Splatoon 2, pick this up. It’s the expansion of Single Player that it deserves, though prepare for a few frustrating challenges.

... But now you have to pay for a terrible service to play it online so keep that in mind...

Celeste [Switch]

This is a fucking great game and you should buy it. It’s a challenging (very hard) platformer in the line of super meat boy and maybe even I Wanna Be The Guy, but this does it extremely right. restarting is very quick, the controls are incredibly tight, and the levels are genuinely clever and fun.

The story is also really solid, and I can’t recommend the whole package as a solid game.

Grow Up [PC]

This is the sequel to Grow Home, a game I’ve quick-reviewed a long time back. I liked the whole explore a whole planet and find some neat stuff, however the challenges are reliant on some weird procedural animations which don’t necessarily cooperate. It kinda overstays it’s welcome as a result, though the open nature of it is really fun. I have a hard time recommending this one, but it’s still a pretty solid romp even if it fights you a bit.

Sonic Mania Plus [Switch]

Having 100% the base game which I highly recommend, I was expecting a lot more things to do with this. Encore mode is fun; I really like how you can change up your characters and have to adjust on the fly. The new special stages are tough but fun, but the pinball minigame is.. not good. Gets old pretty quick. additionally it doesn’t add much after encore mode. Might and Ray have abilities that meaningfully add some neat gameplay stuff, but after how great the base game was, I was expecting a little bit more. That being said, the DLC is a nice bonus for the base game and you can’t really go wrong with it.

Lovely Planet [PC]

So I made a point to only play this game when I was drunk. The first few times I happened to be when I played it, so I stuck with it. This is a quick-restarting FPS with a focus on perfect shots and maneuvering to destroy all the target and get to the end as soon as possible.It’s hard as balls but really silly, so if you’re into perfectionist gameplay it’s worth a go. Probably not drunk tho.

Ever Oasis [3DS]

IIRC, this came out at a time where there was a lull in Nintendo games, or at least 3DS games so this one was very much skimmed over. It’s a mix between a town management sim and Zelda-style dungeon crawling and resource gathering. On paper, and even somewhat in game, this is a cool idea; you get townsfolk who can go with you on missions, each with their own abilities, and what you get outside of the town is used to help expand you town, which will buff you/your townspeople's abilities to go further in dungeons.

In practice however... they don’t really mesh. The limitation of 1 item per party member and items being locked to specific people you need to find, going to dungeons is a chore as you need to find out which characters you need to actually play (often not your best). Meanwhile, time passes so quickly and your town’s shopkeepers run out of resources so quickly, it’s a full time job to keep up the town and then you run out. They mitigate this near the end game by have the ability to make parties out of townspeople who can’t own shops, which are very rare. The ending is good up until the last moment where they do a thing that doesn’t make sense to get some points for emotion but... It just doesn’t work to me.

All in all, it has a demo to show how a dungeon works, and if you like management AND what that dungeon has to offer, go for it. Otherwise, the setting and character design are great but not enough to really hold interest

Q.U.B.E. 2 [PC]

The First game was Portal-esque in that you navigated the first-person Cube puzzle maze without any dialogue while manipulating the chambers with a variety of cube-spawning and extending abilities. You had to piece out and interpret the story yourself. This is the opposite; there’s a lot of dialogue, story set-pieces, and it’s bizarrely paced. You’ll get through most the game in like an hour, but then the last 2-3 chapters are the bulk of the game. Those are pretty fun, but the game is still incredibly short and I liked the tone of the first better. It’s short, it’s not bad, but it doesn’t really stand out.

NES Classic 

So I dunno if I love or hate this thing. It’s great because it’s an official NES with controller and emulator and gives me the opportunity to play a buncha games I hadn’t before, but the controller cable is too small, the damn thing has trouble getting enough power (EDIT: This was actually my aparement’s faulty wiring, though if you aren’t supplying it with enough power the sound won’t work either), and this things existence is probably part of the reason we’ve not seen a proper virtual console support on Switch. You can hack it to be able to upload other ROMs to it, which is neat (I haven’t done that), but ultimately it’s worth looking at the games and asking yourself: Do I really want to play most of these? Do I really want to buy this when I’ve already bought most of them?

SNES Classic

This is the same as above but more expensive with less games... But to me is a better value. It has a better selection of games (in my opinion), though they could’ve included some better ones. It still has the power issues (which are overcomable easily) but comes with 2 controllers with longer cables. Also StarFox 2 is a very nice game. I’d recommend this more than the NES Classic, but again, weigh what’s in it vs what you actually want to play if you can’t already

WarioWare Gold [3DS]

This is a compilation game done right. It has the WarioWare charm and the voice acting adds even more to it. The microgame selection and adaptations are wonderful, and honestly I don’t have any complaints. It has changed everything to fit in one of 3 (+2 smaller ones) categories: Mash, Twist, and Touch (+ blow and short). These are normally separate by category, but near the end they mix and match and even do some fun mix-up with it in the very last rounds and bonus game modes.  Whether your first WarioWare or a veteran, this is in my opinion the best in the series, and I would suggest you give it a go.

Monster Hunter World [PC]

So this one is hard. I really wanted to like it, and after playing Dauntless I thought I would. I even promised friends I would play it with them frequently and keep up but... between friends being able to play when I couldn’t and the game’s wonky controls and online issues, I was falling behind and getting frustrated. That’s kinda side stuff; if I really liked it I could’ve caught up. The truth is, I liked Dauntless better because while it was also very buggy, the combat was just a lot more straightforward and responsive. Monster Hunter seemed like Dauntless with a bunch of annoyances added onto it. There are tons of collectibles and recipes, weapon sharpness is entirely pointless when the monsters run anyway to give you breaks, the weapons I played seemed sluggish to attack with, and monster attacks were unclear a lot of the time. Everything just felt like a pain in the ass or waste of time to deal with and put a lot of focus on inventory management or grinding, and to me the core game you would do that for just wasn’t there.

Like I enjoyed the free roaming and exploration, but the fighting is just not for me and that’s the whole point of the free roaming and all that. I feel bad about not liking this after enjoying Dauntless, but I just am not into Monster Hunter and will be skipping the series from now on.

Katamari Forever [PS3]

I got this one thinking it was a compilation game of all the Katamari games!

It was not. It’s actually the hardest Katamari game... Which kinda surprised me about how much of a dick they are when you start out since their controls are incredibly weird and unintuitive (you get used to them) and anything short of perfection will get the Kings to any where from passive aggressively imply you did poorly or just straight out call you awful and not to bother.

Here’s the part where randomly in the giant text post I just completely break whatever I was talking about because I’m 95% no one actually reads this so for shits and giggles the first person to reply to my tweet where I posted a link to the blogpost stating that they found this paragraph will get a free me replying back to that tweet saying “nice” back. An enticing gift amirite? Anyway continuing on.

That being said, it’s pretty fun after all that; there are one or two levels designed to be super annoying but the ones where you play the core game of quickly building your Katamari are for the most part very solid. This is for existing fans of the series, but i had a pretty good time with it after I got past the barrier to entry.

Shantae: Half-Genie Hero: Ultimate Edition [PC]

I’ve talked about liking Shantae before on this blog; I mentioned that I liked Pirate’s Curse but the fact that side missions and collectibles were actually required for game completion. This Shantae looks great and all, but they completely tossed out the open-like nature and makes it a series of linear levels that you have to revisit at least 2-3 times to find the stuff that should’ve been off somewhere in a different series of areas and optional that’s really just slightly out of reach due to a power up you arbitrarily find after the level you needed to use it in ends. Dungeons are completely gone; the game literally is just “go right” and remember all the little things you couldn’t get to for when you have to backtrack over and over again.

That’s just the base game, and even with all that said it’s not a bad game, it just doesn’t really feel like a Shantae game anything other than aesthetically. I spent a few hours trying to 100% the base game, but after getting 99% and discovering I had to backtrack yet again to a snake merchant to trade for dances just to use them once and trade back, I just had 0 interest in getting the final percent. There are also a variety of different takes on the same campaign where you play as Shantae in different costumes with different abilities, Risky, or even Bolo + Skye + Rotty, and again those look fun but... I don’t really want to play the same game another 10 times.

Dragalia Lost [Android]

This is Nintendo’s first jump into mobile with a new IP, and while it’s definitely banking hard on more traditional gacha mechanics (you can get 5 star items instead of Hero characters only), it’s definitely not bad. It’s pretty generous with stamina and resources, at least when you start, and my only major complaint is how you seem to hit a wall in terms of how long it takes to really progress about a week or so of playing every day in. And it’s quite a wall; there’s quite a lot of grinding needed once you get to chapter 6 (the current final chapter that really feels like just the end of a prologue (Edit, they recently added chapter 7)), so you really need to like it. The levels are kinda simple as well, though there’s a maze-like area in the story that’s a bit more clever so it’s a start at least. All and all, it’s worth a try, but if you don’t like the top-down brawler after the first world, it’s not worth forcing through gacha mechanics for; especially since after you complete normal story mode, all you’re going to be doing is grinding to get through hard and the summoning currency gets scarce fast. For reference, getting enough to be able to challenge the High Dragon quests and not immediately die in them takes 2 months of grinding specifically for that purpose if you use your stamina optimally, which you won’t because events are more fun anyway

Overcooked 2 [Switch Download]

So this is actually really fun with a friend or 3; and that’s where it really shines. Sure, you can do it single player but it just doesn’t feel as fun. This is a sort of quick time-management game where you have to frantically run around cooking various recipes before they run out of time, to get a star rating at the end. There’s some bad levels, but the majority are really fun and it feels very fair even in single layer; I always think at the end regardless of the rank that I could’ve managed my dudes to do even better. The only real complaint is the loading times seem... unnecessarily long. Especially for restarting a level. It’s nothing too bad though.

Luckily this has online multiplayer, so I highly recommend picking this up on a platform that your friends have it on, ie Steam. I got it on Switch and in hindsight since I strongly dislike Nintendo’s online service I really wish I had gotten like a 2-pack on Steam. That’s not a complaint with the game though; I really liked it!

Super Mario Party [Switch]

Probably the best Mario Party in a very, VERY long time. This is going to be a longer review. I played this first with Keewy and his roommates and we had a great time in every single game mode (except online).

The Mario Party mode is really good; they’ve shrunk the map and reduced how much stars cost to 10 coins, but 10-15 turn games can still take an hour to an hour and a half. This makes it a much simpler, easier to get mode, but the real star here is them bringing back the Ally & character dice mechanic from Mario Party Star Rush (had it’s good moments, but was on 3DS so that’s it for that). Each character can roll a normal 1-6 dice, but they also each have a unique die that has different numbers on it. These are for the most part balanced; character with higher numbers on their dice also have downsides instead of a 1. 0′s, losing coins, and in some cases gaining coins (because you still don’t move), and it adds a level of strategy to it where otherwise it would be just “roll and hop for the best. That’s what it is still, but sometimes you can choose. You can also pick up other characters who will help you in minigames, give you the option to roll their die, and add 1-2 spaces to your roll. It’s super fun.

The River Rafting mode is 4-player co-op, and it’s pretty fun as well your first run through. Not single player though; this very much shines with 4 people. However, because there are only like 8? 4-player co-op minigames, you see every game on your first run so it doesn’t really hold up after your first couple runs.

The dance mode is great; it’s like Rhythm heaven but Mario Party themed. Again, these minigames are really fun, but once you play through all 3 difficulties, which takes about 10 minutes, there aren’t any you haven’t played. 

2v2 is ripped straight out of Star Rush, which is a great thing. Again, don’t play this with a cpu on your team at least. As far as I can tell, even in Mario Party mode, CPU’s make the same brain-dead decisions on the boards regardless of their difficulty level. Anyway, this has the same 4 boards but opened up vastly; You now roll, combine it with your partner, then add any allies you may have picked up along the way’s 1-2 rolls and other bonuses. The point is to land on the starspace and buy it, and it’s just a good time to see the strategy involved with either going for the stars, allies, or secondary goals. By far the best alternative Mario Party gameplay style in a while (way better than Island Tour’s linear maps and 9-10′s Car mode), but again there’s only the 4 maps.

So I guess my only true complaint is that while there are a lot of minigames, they’re split so much over the different modes they don’t feel like a lot and you see repeats frequently. Additionally it would be nice to turn on/off the bonus stars at the end and other options involving maybe skipping some of the cutscenes (star moving, places changed, etc.). All in all, the best and most interesting Mario Party in a long, long time. I highly recommend it if you have a friend to pick it up with.

Just Shapes & Beats

Got this game for a bit of random multiplayer. It’s a pretty fun, music based bullet hell game all about staying alive through the song while crazy stuff happens on screen. The story mode doesn’t overstay its welcome, but there’s also plenty of content and challenges for those who are so inclined, and only one of the levels felt utterly, bullshitingly unfair (which is really good with bullet hells) so It’s a fun time if you’re into top down bullet hells, and better with a friend in challenge mode

Pokémon Let’s Go Eevee [Switch]

I could write a dissertation on this game and how it’s neither good or bad; it’s just kinda... there. Some aspects are incredibly disappointing; the capture mechanics are absolute garbage, forced motion controls are atrocious, player/npc animations and interactions are completely stilted and lazy, the world is very bland vs Sun and Moon, the performance in handheld mode drops frames sometimes which is unacceptable, there’s almost zero post game, and even more. It’s by all means an HD reskin of a Gameboy game running on their crappy 3DS engine.

But there’s a lot of good here as well; seeing pokemon in the overworld is amazing and should be the case in the series moving forward, partner pokemon (eevee) are fun and fucking adorable, riding pokemon is great, having fast captures makes chaining a really fun mechanic, Having some of the E4 and Gym leaders interact with you during your quest makes the world interesting, connectivity with go is very limited but still good, having only one pokemon be obtainable only once in the game is a welcome and frankly overdue change in the game, removing breeding/abilities/held items really streamlines the mechanics and makes the game more enjoyable in a lot of cases, and I could go on.

I’m not going to recommend it, but I mean if you liked any pokemon game you’re definitely not going to not have fun with this one, even if the randomness in the capture mechanics frustrates you to no end

Super Smash Bros Ultimate [Switch]

So I mean it���s smash bros. Not much really to say about that, it’s pretty good. I kinda like Smash Bros not just for the multiplayer but the single-player as well, which is why Brawl is still my Favorite so take that as my approach here. The normal gameplay is fine, though the input buffer feels wonky at times and some characters are much harder to play against than others, which in combination with the sheer amount of characters makes it very difficult to get the hang of and counter accordingly, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing. It’s just the barrier between playing casually and playing a bit more seriously feels sudden when randomly coming across characters that have inherent advantages from being wonky. Cloud for example seems to have a move for evertyhing, can spit out attacks very quickly, and if you try anything silly they’ll just charge a better move, and then randomly fighting a Ganondorf is like “I hope they don’t know how to read you because you can die at like 35 from a single fuck up”

The Single Player content though was... Disappointing. Not nearly as bad as Sm4sh, but it seems like they spent so much time putting as many characters and stages in the game as possible that they realized they wouldn’t have time to do old game modes the same way, so they made a system which allowed them to make custom smash battles with weird attributes and built the entirety of the bonus content on that. There’s really only adventure mode which is just a progression of Event Matches which gets somewhat stale and repetitive quickly, Mob Smash is just not really that fun past your first run or two, All-Star Smash is actually near impossible and not even rewarding, Classic does one or two cool ideas with routes but they clearly got lazy with a lot of characters there too, and the only platforming challenge in the game is the bonus level which takes 30 seconds and never changes.

Their Online mode is unacceptably bad and lacks options for random fights as well, and given that they’re charging for it this is just flat-out unacceptable. Buy it if you like playing Smash for the Multiplayer (which is almost everyone), but this is a hard pass if you were expecting a large amount of interesting content like Brawl’s Adventure mode had. Or are incapable of learning past a certain point, like me.

Katamari Damacy Reroll [Switch]

So after having played Forever earlier in the year and hearing how much praise this got, I had very High expectations! Unfortunately the controls are still ehhhhh and the game is surprisingly short; I beat it over the course of a 4ish hour flight. It’s definitely a lot nicer to you than Forever is, but in terms of amount of content it’s not aged well. If you’ve not played it before, pick it up on sale, but as far as I can tell this outing doesn’t add anything new to the original and it’s just a straight up re-release

Mario Tennis Aces [Switch]

So does anyone actually look forward to Mario Tennis Games? The past two have been husks of content and this one’s not really much better. The charging mechanic is interesting, but doesn’t feel that consistent or fair in some scenarios, but like was anyone waiting for this to get announced? Or is this just a “safe” series that sells okay and pads out the library for quick cash?”

It’s weird that they knew the Adventure mode was something fans really, REALLY wanted and touted it as some huge deal, even advertising it with a cool pre-rendered cutscene, and the whole mode with all challenges turns out to be at most a couple hours long, repetitive, and only actually has the two cutscenes (the 2nd being like 10 seconds). They made some silly RPG level up mechanic which didn’t feel like it made any difference, you can’t change your character so you’re really only learning how Mario plays, and it does a really poor job of explaining the different kinds of shots to you so it’s not even good for learning the game. I wasn’t expecting an experience worth telling for generations with the plot either, but even that gives up on itself; Luigi is possessed but he doesn’t do anything the whole game until you fight him, not even with the 3/5 power stones you have, and these power stones you spent the game collecting don’t do anything or matter because Bowser comes out of no where and “takes” the racket and power stones and challenges you to an admittedly fun boss fight. Not in a cutscene mind you, you’re just told this happens. It’s just lazy.

The game has some visual issues too; it’s missing any sort of stylistic flair and honestly just looks like an up-res’d Wii game, though with smoother models. Shadows flicker and cut through textures, and something weird’s going on with anti-aliasing that makes everything look blurry as hell too. I will say props for going to the effort of making tennis costumes for every character though; so that’s more effort than what went into Ultra Smash.

If you’re a huge, HUGE fan of Mario Tennis, go nuts. But uh, yeah this isn’t really worth your time for the price otherwise

Starlink: Battle for Atlas (Starter Pack) [Switch]

Yeah so it’s rich coming from me, but honestly this game is only hindered by the physical toys. As far as I can tell you can only play as generic Mr. No Personality or Fox, and then you only have the two options for weapons. The game could get interesting combat-wsie with the combinations of ships and like I think 14ish different weapons? But with just the starter pack you run through what the game has to offer pretty quick.

It is interesting though how I very rarely play Ubisoft games and hadn’t played one since their open-world formula milking, but right away I could tell that it was a Ubisoft open world game. There’s a lot to do, a lot of planets to explore, movement is fun and surprisingly easy, combat is pretty straightforward and has potential, but the key thing is that there’s like 30-50 facilities on each planets with like 4 different types of objectives (3 of which are “kill the same bad guys immediately here”), and you can spend hours on one planets doing some minor variance on that same thing over and over and over.

It’s a pretty good start in terms of base mechanics for what would be a cool system for an open StarFox game (and I know it wasn’t trying for that) but the repetitiveness of exploring, frankly pathetic writing in terms of characters, and locking a lot of the interesting content behind toys detracts from the experience. It’s definitely not un-fun, but after clearing 4 planets and seeing that’s just what the game is doing I don’t have any interest in continuing.

At least other than to see StarFox, because Ubisoft did them better justice than Nintendo has in years.

Best Game I Played in 2018: Celeste

Easy choice here, Celeste has a wonderful story, looks gorgeous, plays like a dream and managed to be an incredibly challenging platformer that didn’t make me lose my patience ever, which is AMAZING considering how little patience I have whenever I fail at a game.

I was going to pick the best game that actually came out in 2018 but honestly it’d be between like 4 games that I had gripes with in some way or another, so i’m going to say Overcooked 2 is pretty fucking solid and leave this whole run on sentence in the heading font because why not it’s my dead blog I can do whatever the fuck I wan-

Anyway that’s it. Hope everyone had a good year

[beevean]

Sonic and speed: are we misunderstanding them?

This article was originally written in Spanish by @latin-dr-robotnik​ on his blog - you can read it here!

Today on SHP, I’d like to bring attention to a topic that I keep noticing being discussed everywhere (especially now during quarantine), and that somehow worries me: are we misunderstanding Sonic and his characteristic speed?

During these last few weeks there has been a new, relatively unusual explosion of videos and comments on the Internet regarding Sonic and, relevant for today, what is the best game or the best level. The simplest reason has to be the lockdown we’re going through, and which is leaving us with more time to play or think about those games we want to play, or never will. On the other hand, the most cynical side of me believes that this boom of Sonic-related content is because Game Apologist’s video about S3&K and Sonic in general was so popular, it sparked the “interest” of other creators (the video itself is great, and I elaborated my opinions on it here). Whatever the case, there is a greater discussion about Sonic going on right now, and I feel like it’s not directed where it should be.

Before starting: there are a bunch of videos that helped me shape a good part of the opinions I’m going to explain today. You don’t need to watch all of them, and they’re not mandatory to fully understand this article, but if after reading it you’re left wanting for more, or you’d like to hear different options, I’d recommend you watch these:

1.     Sonic and Speed (Errant Signal)

2.     The First Levels of Sonic Games (Super Bunnyhop)

3.     SONIC the HEDGEHOG: How Level Design Can Break a Game (Broken Base Gaming)

4.     How Sonic Mania Makes a Level (RelaxAlax)

5.     City Escape is Peak Sonic Game Design (ZoomZike)

6.     Lost Valley Is Not Peak Sonic Game Design (ZoomZike)

What is the problem?

In a series as big and ever-changing as Sonic’s, there is a wide repertory of formulas and possible answers to the question “how to design a game?”. In some cases we’re still looking for an answer, in others we’re looking for alternatives (I talked not too long ago about the accessibility of Sonic Mania and 2D Sonic in general – Spanish only!), and most of the time, the answer has already been given in the past.

This looking for answers in the past has taken us in many directions, like constantly looking back to Sonic Adventure to solve the great enigma that is 3D Sonic; but I’d add that the recent retrospectives about Sonic and its first 2D games have raised some criticism and questions that, while valid, end up muddling a formula that has proven itself to be effective and crucial in the design of everything related to Sonic.

What really worried me is the criticism about Sonic’s speed and the levels that are considered “slow”, and we’re going to delve into this.

The basic Principles of Sonic

Speed. Platforming. Exploration. These are Sonic’s basic Principles and have always been, from its beginning until today. These three concepts are at the core of not just the level design, but the games themselves as well. The best levels in the series know how to balance these aspects, and the best games are those that can keep a balanced flow, preventing the game from going too fast, and losing its exciting component along the way, or from going too slow and becoming boring, causing the player to lose interest. Naturally, in these games there have to be all sorts  of levels: faster, more relaxed, more open and more labyrinthine, all coexisting in harmony and without going too far in one direction. Ignoring these Principles puts the quality of the levels at risk, and even our understanding of the character.

I would have put my own examples here, but just before starting to write this section I got some wonderful ones from Beevean. If you don’t remember her, she helped a lot with the article about the music of Classic Sonic, and I already warned her that if she kept posting examples this good, I would have had no choice but to feature her again. The discussion started from this post, and she says:

If you approach Sonic thinking its only characteristic is “gotta go fast”, the game you’re gonna get is Advance 2. The very flat, boring, “there’s no way to put normal obstacles in these levels so we’re gonna throw bottomless pits at the player until they get sick of them” Advance 2.

Some fast levels can be awful - Stardust Speedway is a disaster from a level design standpoint and the whole level seems to work against you. Some slow levels can be super fun - you rarely run in Lava Reef and you spend most of the time dodging obstables, but that doesn’t stop it from being one of the most beloved levels in S3&K. There’s no arbitrary reason that separates “good” levels from “bad” levels, it’s an amalgamation of many factors - plus of course your personal enjoyment.

And in her tags (because we both include more information in our tags than in our posts) she adds:

The levels that are widely considered bad usually put too much focus on one of the factors you mentioned.

Marble Zone is too slow and linear.

Luminous Forest is too fast and linear.

The Doom and Lost Impact are too labyrinthine.

And so on.

My personal example is Sonic Mania and its progression during the mid-game, from Flying Battery to Mirage Saloon:

Flying Battery is a long level, filled to the brim with speed and emotions, especially during Act 2. After beating the boss, the player is likely going to feeling exhausted after being thrown left and right, and so…

The following level is Press Garden. Act 1 is a relatively closed and relaxed level, but still moving at a reasonable pace. If the player is familiar with the level they can finish it quickly, but they still can take their time appreciating the view of the printing and the machinery of the zone. Act 2 enhances this, with an absolutely lovely view and an active but still relaxed flow…

Then there’s Stardust Speedway, which is divided into two completely opposite acts. Act 1 is a relatively fast level, but very relaxed and almost a Zen-like experience when the player lets himself be carried away by the starry night sky, and with a relative absence of lights or discomfort on the screen (enemies and obstacles aside). Act 2 is the other way around, a largely colorful, explosive, fast level (to the point that I, anything but a speedrunner, managed to finish the level in 31 seconds, 2:10 minutes if you include the fight with Metal Sonic), culminating in one of the longest, most intense bosses in the game that marks the halfway point of the adventure…

After such an exciting journey, the next level is Hydrocity, once again split in half with a calmer, more exploration-oriented Act 1, and an Act 2 that, similarly to the original level, is one of the most adrenaline-filled water levels in the series. The boss is intense as well, but verging on being tedious and not nearly as fast as the level itself…

And finally, Mirage Saloon. Every version of Act 1, regardless of the quality, are there to set up Act 2, a largely open, fast-paced level.

In short, the Mania experience is made of peaks and valleys of emotions and adrenaline, keeping the game to a reasonable pace and with a good dose of speed, exploration and platforming. The player can break the flow anytime to look for Giant Rings and other hidden goodies, and that doesn’t ruin the charm of the level. In the same way, the faster levels require the player to be familiar with them and to know how to platform to get the best results, without giving you free speed like it’s not worth it (looking at you, Advance 2).

Even the worst levels have the chance to redeem themselves, like for example Labyrinth Zone in the “Misfit Pack” Mania mod.

 Breaking the Principles.

When a level or a game breaks the balance for too long, it might become too easy (the infamous “hold right to win”), too boring (the most common argument against Sonic 1 because of levels like Marble Zone and Labyrinth Zone), or too obtuse (the criticism against Sonic CD). The key word is “for too long”, as Beevean already explained how levels that prioritize one thing over the others can still be considered good stages by the majority of the fandom (example: Lava Reef, and I’d add Spring Yard and Final Egg).

As I said before, Mania shows us how there are levels that prioritize certain aspects, but only for a few minutes at a time. Mirage Saloon Act 1 for Sonic and Tails may be a slow, boring level, but it’s only 3 minutes long in a game that lasts 2-4 hours. Same goes for Carnival Night Act 2, a long, tedious level, but that is still a 4-9 minutes long interval before getting back on track with Ice Cap and Launch Base.

3D Sonic is a much more complicated situation, as every game has its pros and cons. Adventure 1 is one of the games that experiments the most with the Principles in a 3D plane, but it breaks the flow of the stages with the plot and hubs worlds to explore (which are pretty divisive even to this day; for the record, on this blog we’re pro hubs). Adventure 2 gets rid of the time-wasting hubs but each character focuses on one Principle at the time: Sonic and Shadow focus almost exclusively on speed with some platforming, Tails and Eggman on action and platforming, and Knuckles and Rouge are all about exploration (and RNG…). Sonic Unleashed does pretty much the same, just reintroducing the hub worlds, while Sonic Generations is at its core a balanced mix of speed, platforming and exploring (plus a much smaller hub between levels), and… well, I think I made myself clear. 3D Sonic is a mess of ideas that orbit around the fundamental Principles, but that for some reason are never kept consistent between games.

Going back to utterly breaking the Principles, there’s one level above all that destroys every one of those extremes, never taking the middle road and without worrying at all about what players might think of it. This level is…

Eggmanland

If Sonic Mania is a clear example of a relatively balanced flow, in its mid-game at least, Eggmanland may be the biggest example of what happens when each and every one of the Principles is taken to its extremes. Let me explain:

Speed: Eggmanland can be both too fast for the player to react, between QTE and super quick jumps that may lead to your death if you’re not fast enough (and you rarely will), or too slow of a slog to navigate (the long Werehog sections).

Platforming: Eggmanland can have too much tricky precision platforming, made even harder due to a lack of a drop shade (the second Werehog section is infamous for this), or it can throw stretches where you do almost nothing but hold X and maybe go through a QTE, which if failed lead to your death once again; at worst you have to wait, which sends us back to our previous point.

Exploration: Eggmanland can be a giant, confusing labyrinth (there is no shortage of stories of player getting lost in this behemoth of a level), and at the same time it can have some long linear room to room progression, separated by doors about as fast as Big the Cat.

I should say that, despite all of this, I love Eggmanland a lot, and same goes for Beevean; but this is something that has to do with what we mentioned before, personal preference. From a technical standpoint, and according to many players, Eggmanland is an absolute nightmare.

Are we misunderstanding Sonic?

Going back to the central topic of this article, I believe that I put enough emphasis on the importance of balance in Sonic, so let’s go back to the previous question: what is the problem?

In short, I disagree with the voices that call for redirecting Sonic towards “fast”, adrenaline-filled stages. These people, with their own retrospective, are doing some sort of revisionism with Sonic levels, automatically branding levels that aren’t as fast as others as “bad”. We’re ignoring the true value of platforming and exploring the levels, and the perception of the character is at risk.

Like Beevean said, looking at Sonic just as “gotta go fast” is, plain and simple, absurd. Sonic is much more than this restless teenager that, just like that movie with the bus, if he doesn’t run at speeds higher than 90 mph his heart will stop. Yes, going fast is a big part of his initial appealing and his way of life (“My stories only end when I stop running”); but when Sonic’s speed is brought up in these discussions, the rest of what makes the character is left outside: how much he admires nature and how much he likes to take a rest every now and then before the next adventure. Sonic OVA, Sonic Adventure, Sonic X and even Sonic Lost World’s ending show that Sonic is not just speed, but also rest, curiosity, exploration. There are even cases where the journey and the friends and memories made along the way are much more important than the destiny itself (Sonic Heroes, Sonic Unleashed), and on several occasions it’s been shown as an actual weakness of the character the fact that he would act recklessly and under the influence of the fateful “gotta go fast”. This aspect of Sonic’s attitude might probably be product of the aggressive marketing campaigns this character endured (ever since the Genesis “Blast Processing”), but it doesn’t tell the whole story, and it’s unacceptable to enforce this line of thought over everything we know about the character.

And to end this long section where I was hinting at one of the most important points of one of the most thoughtful games of the series, let’s not forget that Sonic is pretty aware that everything has a beginning and an end, because that’s the Nature’s way of things and we have to live life at its fullest, for it is finite. Running at top speed is just one of many ways Sonic lives his life, and his eyes will forever be filled, not so much with speed, but with curiosity.

Conclusions

To recap this long article, let’s remember that

Speed, Platforming and Exploration are the three basic Sonic Principles. The momentum in the games comes from the interaction between these elements.

Speed is not something that’s delivered for the sake of being delivered: it usually is a reward or an incentive to keep the player interested, engaged and excited for what’s to come.

Breaking the Principles impacts the experience of the game in many aspects… unless you’re Eggmanland and you’re breaking every single Principle in one level anyway.

To narrow Sonic down to just “speed” is to ignore everything else that this character represents. “Gotta go fast” is a facet of his design and personality, but not the only one.

Starting from this, we can sit down and discuss about “good” and “bad” levels in the series all day long, but I don’t think it’s necessary. Now that we’re about to discover what’s next for the series, I believe it’s important to clarify what Sonic represents in every stage, so that with some luck we can see better consistency and quality in his future adventures.

Speaking of this last point, I just remembered The Geek Critique’s series of Sonic retrospectives, another series of videos that inspired me and I found enlightening. Do you guys remember the videos I linked to at the beginning? Well, it’s time for you to watch them :P (if you want to, of course)

(I’d like to thank Beevean again for suggesting the best examples I could have needed. Seriously, she helped much more than it looks)

What do you guys think? What is the ideal Sonic level, and why? Do you agree that Sonic is much more than a speedy blue hedgehog? In the meantime, we’re hopefully going to see each other very soon. See you next time!

I feel this theme is strangely fitting to conclude this article, lol

~

After the Spanish article was posted, I reblogged with this:

To add something more, I was chatting with a friend of mine who pointed out that, for all the talk in the fandom that we want to see less linear levels, most of the fan favorites are pretty linear - Ice Cap, Speed Highway, City Escape, Rooftop Run… I told him that yeah, linearity isn’t a synonym of bad level design because linear levels can still be enjoyable: with these particular cases, what makes them different from a random Lost Valley is that they have other elements that make them stand out (snowboarding, running down a skyscraper, skateboarding through San Francisco, climbing the Big Ben…). Plus they have something to compensate for the linearity, like fluid platforming.

In the case of Ice Cap and Speed Highway, there’s also a contrast between their halves: IC Act 1 is cramped and heavy on platforming, while Act 2 is much faster and without many obstacles, almost as a reward; Speed Highway starts out as fast and exhiliarating, with little platforming getting in the way of running, but the At Dawn section is a short open space, to let the player catch their breath, to the point that even the music and the aesthetic are much more relaxed. So, as you said, the balance is kept, and when you add a memorable setting and music, you have a great level in your hands.

Thank you @latin-dr-robotnik​ for giving me the permission to post this! I just had to translate this fascinating article to share it with everyone :>