Sonic the Hedgehog

Is the new Sonic as bad as everyone says? We lock our rose-tinted specs away and give our own frank verdict.
Version
 Xbox 360, PS3		Developer
Sonic Team		Publisher
SEGA		Genre
Adventure



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Some of the side mission mini-games are tedious trial-and-error affairs that take 30 minutes to work out. Well, it was called 'intelligence test' - it took me twenty minutes to do what is possible in twenty seconds. OK, it took thirty minutes really. But there are just so many flaws in the missions. It's a shame, as mission variety and ideas are pretty good on the whole, but they are often crippled by silly problems and the unnecessary, ridiculous loading times. When the broken design, time limit and Tails' dodgy camera are all in the equation it makes for a very frustrating experience. But then, personally I felt than several of San Andreas' key missions were similarly broken and nobody complained then. It's just 'in' to moan about 3D Sonic games, right?

"You're often spared by second-chance ways out of lava pits; they've at least identified where death drops are most likely."

Moving onto control in the main game, then. It's a fundamental challenge to have a 3D Sonic that has good speed, and controls consistently. Control in the final game does appear to have been tightened since the demo versions, and is slightly better performing in terms of glitchiness than Heroes, though not by much. Now for example, when there are massive blind jumps or falls, it doesn't let you mess up as it freezes your control until you land, although in areas where the landing point is obvious they give some control and put it down to marginal skill. You'll often be spared with second-chance ways out of lava pits from time to time as well, suggesting the team has at least identified where unavoidable death drops might be most likely.

I suppose it's a difficult balance with this sort of speed to not make it impossible to die at tricky areas, but it's not my job to figure out how Sonic Team should do it. Making it impossible to plummet after a light dash would be a good start though. There are many spots that should be cleaned with simple invisible wall or magnet fixes, and sensitivity needs to be more context sensitive - obviously you don't want to move around with same sensitivity when you're trying to time a perfect life-or-death rail jump as when your running across huge spaces. And running into certain walls sees ultra-fast Sonic fall down for a few seconds. Whose bright idea was that?

Dispatching enemies does feel more fluid and controllable than in Heroes by some margin though, owing to intuitive directional control as you bounce from one to another, rarely seeing you spaz off over a cliff edge, as was commonplace in Heroes.

P L E A S E   V I S I T   O U R   S P O N S O R :

Once speed is picked up, it can be a blast. But it's way too easy to die and half the time it feels like a battle with the game's control and level design, particularly if anyone is going to be interested in collecting bonuses such as hidden silver coins. Difficulty never results from challenging or intelligent enemies but often from what feels like unfair circumstances.

"Dispatching enemies does feel more fluid and controllable than in Heroes by some margin."

I don't know how younger players are supposed to battle through the areas of broken control using trial-and-error and find it an enjoyable experience; perhaps they are just a lot more forgiving of such flaws when the characters they like are on the screen? If that's the case, since I played through, then the kid in me is forgiving as well, but the critic inside is crying.

The camera isn't quite as bad as everyone moans on about though. If it was flawed before, it isn't automatically still bad, for anyone lazy enough to figure out what is and isn't a bad camera in a 3D action game. Having said that, it could still do with some fixing in occasional places. You can press L to re-center behind Sonic, but when an object obscures Sonic it either obscures completely without transparency, or it moves upwards and looks down towards sonic meaning you have no field of vision to what's ahead. Or, it just refuses to move period, perhaps glithing into a shaky screen. Often your respawn point within a town area is automatically positioned at a glitch hotspot, so without even pressing anything the screen shakes. That is crap, but really the camera doesn't pose this level of inconvenience for the vast majority of the game.

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Video Coverage
(See Latest Videos & Video FAQ Here)
PLEASE DO NOT DIRECT LINK TO ANY MEDIA FILE ON KIKIZO
DescriptionDur.SizeDetails
Sonic the Hedgehog
Sonic Gameplay, direct audio, 60fps (normal quality)   		1:46 63MB DFA, ED, 16:9
856x480p60
5.0Mbps
Sonic the Hedgehog
Intro sequence, direct audio, 60fps (normal quality)   		1:07 38MB DFA, ED, 16:9
856x480p60
5.0Mbps
Sonic the Hedgehog
Latest trailer (normal quality)   		1:16 16MB DF, SD, 16:9
640x480p30
1.7Mbps
Sonic the Hedgehog
Direct feed gameplay extended   (PS3, X360 - Sega)		 02:19 86MB DF, ED, 16:9
852x480p60
5.2Mbps
Sonic the Hedgehog
Direct feed trailer extended   (PS3, X360 - Sega)		 02:04 32MB DF, SD, 16:9
640x360p30
2.3Mbps
Sonic the Hedgehog
Direct feed gameplay short   (PS3, X360 - Sega)		 00:35 17MB DF, ED, 16:9
852x480p60
4.2Mbps
Sonic the Hedgehog
Realtime in-game gameplay footage demonstrated by Yuji Naka (hi quality)   		5.08m 140MB HD, 60
800x448
4Mbps
Sonic the Hedgehog
As above, normal quality   		5.08m 70MB SD, 30
640x360
2Mbps
Sonic the Hedgehog
The full trailer (hi quality)   		2.22m 64MB HD, 60
800x448
4Mbps
Sonic the Hedgehog
As above, normal quality   		2.22m 64MB SD, 30
640x360
2Mbps