I typed this up last night out of boredom. It was posted as a Blog on my MySpace, but I'm posting it here just to see what the fellow gamer thinks...
[quote= Myself because I'm fucking awesome.]
I typed this up becuae I'm bored. I'm also a fan of video games, and Sonic the Hedgehog. Sonic's rocky road has inspired me to generally bitch about it.
If you fancy brightly colored anthropomorphic animals, and a self proclaimed evil genius with an un-canning resemblance to an egg, then you've probably heard of the Sonic the Hedgehog series. I've been a fan of Sonic since I played Sonic 2 waaaaay back at my aunt's house on my cousin's Sega Genesis. I'd say I was probably five or six. At that time, I could never manage to get past the Oil Ocean though�
So yeah, I've been following the series for quite some time. Even though my exposure was limited unlike with Mario etc, I still liked the games for their simplicity, and simple fun of running really fast through loops and down hills. When Sonic entered the 3D realm he got a stumbling start, and limped out before he was shot dead by shit stains such as Shadow's game, and that other one with lots of CG pre-rendered crap, and some silver guy from the future. I like the Adventure games, and Sonic Heroes well enough to not label then as shit stains� If that's saying a whole lot.
Though I agree with the camera problems (though they're pretty minor, and insignificant� most of the time) there is something I never understood about another complaint; something along the lines of "I can put down the controller and watch the game play itself"� Okay�. people. You act like you had so much more control over Sonic on loops, and down hills in the 2D games. If anything you had less control, because you were limited to forwards, and backwards, and you couldn't move left or right. I'm not defending the 3D games, but I am saying that some complaints are stupid.
So, automation isn't a real complaint in my book. All of this is null'd by the fact that the jerky controls/ special moves, poor, and borderline unprofessional stage design, trial and error situations (see: Sonic Heroes), and generic, crappy, un-Sonic elements are added together to create these horrid games. Why do I like the adventure games still? In spite of all the extra "innovative" crap, Sonic's/ Shadow's/ Tails' (SA1) stages are still somewhat entertaining. Even when mixed with the hunting and shooting stages, they still shine forth and give us a shallow glimps of what a good 3D Sonic may be like.
Sonic Heroes is a step in the right direction, but it is far from perfect. It brings back the traditional "Two stages, boss, special stages get Chaos Emerald" set up of the 2D predecessors. There are no more hunting and shooting stages. However, it seems that Sega can't stay away from experimental gimmicks since you now control three characters. The stage set up is also pretty basic (but this is a good thing� kinda�) You generally start out on a large hill, or straight away followed by some jumps enemies� blah, blah, blah. Sounds good, but the stages are designed very poorly, and are down right buggy in some cases (There are points in the Seaside Hill Zone where you can walk right through the large stone steps, and fall to your death). When you actually need something to be automatic, we'll use Rail Canyon Zone as an example: When you are launched from something, you often times miss the next rail even if you try to land on it. It is pretty hit or miss with when you should, or shouldn't touch the joy stick while air-borne). One of my favorite stages has to be Casino Park Zone. It is a throw back to Sonic Spinball, and the Casino Night Zone from Sonic 2. It's pretty cool, and for the most part, not buggy. Sonic Heroes feels rushed in my opinion. It could have been a great game� But, it's not so much.
Next up is Shadow the Hedgehog. I guess Sega thought that by adding unnecessary vehicles, and guns that it would make this game good. You'd think they would have learned not to add gimmicky crap to a Sonic game� Guess not. Honestly, I have not had the misfortune of playing this game, so it's probably unfair for me to judge it too harshly, but from what I've seen, and heard (and I've seen and heard a lot) it looks like it is shit in a game case� It seems like Sonic Heroes with twice the fail, and half the effort.
Sonic Riders� Played it briefly� I haven't really played it enough to get a good feel for it, since it is a straight forward racing game, which I'm not really a fan of anyway. It actually seemed okay though.
Sonic the Hedgehog, for the PlaySatan3, and Xbox 360. I played it for all of two minutes at GameStop. This game, again, takes some new characters, and complex time twisting plot and attempts to apply it to Sonic. It still boils down to "Eggman taking the Chaos Emeralds, oh lawd, get them back!". Read the paragraph about Sonic Heroes, and multiply everything by enough to make you wanna crawl into a hole, and die. And DIE. Like the series has after this.
Or has it? Even though the 3D Sonic games have raeped what's left, the 2D GBA/ DS/ PSP games have proven quite faithful to the original formula, and remained entertaining. Sonic Advance 1, and 2 are probably the best of the Advance series. Advance 3 is okay, but it borrows the multi-character combo from SH. It is still a pretty good game though. It's arguably the most difficult of the Advance games, that's for sure. Maybe because the level design is somewhat lacking. You'll find yourself missing jumps, and falling for a good bit, a lot. Sonic Rush (DS) was also good. Even though it had a generic character (from the future) it was still good enough. Its stage designers must have been sober, or a new group was hired, because the hit or miss trial and error stages from SA3, and SH are gone. Sonic Rivals (PSP) also looks promising. It is 3D, but it is side scrolling (like the boss stages in Rush). I've yet to try it, but I think it is a racing themed game. I'll still try it though. Some day�
One last game�. Sonic and the Secret Rings. Let's ignore the incredibly corny story, and look only at the game play. For once, a gimmick has worked out for the better. This game still has problems (Like moving backwards, and sometimes, the Wiimote isn't as responsive as it should be with timing jumps, or so I've read). The controls are basic, once again. You are almost constantly moving along a preset "track". You can steer left and right, and jump. I've yet to play the game, but it looks good so far (GAMEPLAY wise. The story is shit).
I've rambled on enough about Sonic. I have nothing better to do on a Tuesday night, so I took some time to write this little review of Sonic in general. I hope you enjoyed reading this, or something. Yes, I really have no life, or nothing better to do then ramble on about Sonic. So� yeah. Don't get me started on the Legend of Zelda (I could write volumes about the timeline, or why it is simply awesome), or why Sony eats ass.
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So, for any Sonic fans out there, what do you think about the series so far?
