The first Adventure still reverberates in my head as the first time I saw Sonic the same way as I did after the first game, or maybe after S3&K; friggin' cool. Although at the time I was kind of young to notice that it was, in fact, a definite <i>jump the shark</i> moment for the series, it really felt like a phoenix been reborn anew. I still can't find any single game that manages to bring all those emotions, those amazing sensations as Adventure did, and I still have to play Adventure 2 to see if it could outperform such greatness.
Though yeah, the thing's still quite glitchy, but... whatever.
FlashTHD wrote:A Wildfire sequel wouldn't fall under my definition of a serious project. More like giving a sequel to one -more- game that was a little less than deserving of it. But i'll concede the rest.
LOL Sonic Riders Zero Gravity.
And I think SEGA'll have it's stellar time once again soon enough... why, do you ask?
Just look at this business success pattern:
Master System/ SG-1000 Mark III = Bad
Genesis/ Mega Drive = Good
Super 32X = Bad
Saturn = Half bad
Dreamcast = Definitely good
Remaining of the sixth generation = Quite bad
Today = ... Good?
You have to remember, though, that the Saturn's good half was practically phenomenal. It's also consists of A++ titles that are more expensive than the PS3 and never made it to the western markets (here's lookin' at you, <i>Radiant Silvergun</i>), but that's the price of luxury, I guess (if old late 1990s games qualify as "luxury").
Anyway, if Sega's on an upswing, I'm not 100% convinced. I'll admit, though, that <i>Sega Rally Revo</i> and <i>Virtua Fighter 5</i> seemed to be pretty good, though, so certainly somebody over at Sega is still competent. The only thing to do now is to take that competency and apply it to the <i>Sonic</i> series... sooner, rather than later.
Popcorn wrote:Nah, Sonic Heroes and particularly Shadow looked terrible from the start. I thought Sonic 2K6 looked genuinely attractive, though-- that one nearly suckered me in.
Popcorn wrote:...I don't think I've ever seen a game fail to withstand the passage of time as badly as SA1 did.
Quoted primarily for truth. With the 2D games, I can go back and 'relive the glory days' if I have a good block of free time. Replaying SA1 just makes me wonder how low my standards were as a kid. Was 3D really as rickety back then as that game makes it look? Because I remember being blown away.
So do I, and I distinctly remember why. Here in 2007 I have no problem enjoying the game still, and neither do I think I was wrong to be floored in 1999 - there be your problem.
Although at the time I was kind of young to notice that it was, in fact, a definite jump the shark moment for the series
Go play SA2 before you commit to that. I can get (but not agree with) why some would think that was the jump. Advance 2 is the surest bet...I was too naive to catch on then myself.
It's still fun, the world just seems a lot clunkier to me now than it felt like back then when I'd never played a 3D game (save for Sonic R). But to be fair, the feel was all there. That counts for so much more than I ever thought it would. The level design was fun, (and the closest they've ever come to classic Sonic; how'd they ever let that get so far away from them?) the levels were varied (Secret Rings is the closest they've come to good level selection since then that didn't feel obligatory and uninspired like Music Plant or Hang Castle) and the music was, in my mind, the peak of the saga (I don't care what monotonous power-chord sequence Jun Senoue will pass off as his next level theme, he'll always be the genius that scored Emerald Hill in my book).
SA2 had a darker feel that centered on its 10th-Anniversary-Epic! plotline, and really screwed the pooch when they went into space way too early, exhausting the ARK for level possibilities. But the execution was there. Compare Chaos 4 turning to 6 with Shadow's first Chaos Control. But there was nothing here I enjoyed exploring as much as Station Square, or Emerald Coast, where I felt safe in diverging from the path instead of fearing punishment. Although, it just dawned on me that we haven't been able to fly as Tails since SA1 (if you bar Heroes, which I feel fine in doing since you could barely get any altitude, nor was Tails really designed to do anything but cross the many and perilous gaps that exist simply to qualify Tails' being there.) Could that be an element we're missing?
Heroes is where the gameplay itself started to suffer, not at all aided by its total lack of a driving plot or inspired level control. Upon seeing those aforementioned checkerboard hills, I thought "here's a game with a classic feel". Nope, those hills were just token. Heroes is a game without a feel.
Shadow is a mess, and is also when the plotlines went from "camp" to "garbage." This followed into Sonic 360, which is terrible because it looked like the most interesting feel for a game since SA1. But alas, the plot is time travel, dimension travel and Shadow the Hedgehog, the three most nefarious accomplishes of the awful story.
In fact, this goes back to what I said earlier, S360 and Wildfire both looked great, felt great, but they were rushed, and that's what turned into, respectably, a pile of trash and a decent game with potential to be amazing.
So, now, exploring this "Sonic 2 remake" possibility. That game already has a good feel, unless they plastic-coat it like they did with Heroes, the Olympics, and pretty much every other spin-off. Would they turn the whole game into 3D, element by element, so it'd be the same game with an extra dimension?
Sadly, it would probably lend itself twice as well to an SR-ing, given that it can't really exist on more than one plane. If they go that route, let's just hope they conceive a better way to back up, and to look behind you. (Although to be fair, that only wrecked me once. It's still a glaring omission.)
SATSR is so far the only sonic game I could not force myself to play through because of the controls. Everything else about the game was rather good (as said before, sonic's attitude was captured well and I appreciated the concept art) but my god, the controls made he dang thing absolutely unplayable. I finally, (for the first and hopefully last time in sonic game history) downloaded a 100% save game file that so I could at least enjoy the Dark Spines fight, and found that it was a pain also.
And no Sonic 2 remake, at this time SEGA needs to leave the original games completely alone; need I remind you of " Sonic the hedgehog" for the GBA?
DackAttac wrote:I don't care what monotonous power-chord sequence Jun Senoue will pass off as his next level theme, he'll always be the genius that scored Emerald Hill in my book)
Oooooooh shit. Coast. Yeah, that'd be what I meant.
Wooduck51 wrote:SATSR is so far the only sonic game I could not force myself to play through because of the controls. Everything else about the game was rather good ... but my god, the controls made he dang thing absolutely unplayable.
The controls really are the deal-maker/breaker on SATSR. You either learn to live with them, or don't. They're too non-responsive to defend as "fine", but on the other hand, if I could adapt, the learning curve isn't out of the realm of (albeit masochistic, brake-riding) possibility. But there's really not much else I could find to complain about (music aside) in that game, which is, sadly, a huge step forward.
“I had this dream of a Sonic game in 3D that had only Sonic, Tails and Knuckles as playable characters, the graphics looked better than in a Dreamcast game, and the camera angle was almost good. It had no fishing, or snowboarding, or surfing, or all that crap, but that three style of gameplay. Sonic levels where focused on going fast, Tails levels where focused on exploration, since you could fly high and go to places Sonic couldn’t, and knuckles levels where not as fast as Sonic levels, but still fast, and had mini-boss fights. It all was great until I realised I was watching a TV add, they bought the actual game and it was crap, and then broke up..."
