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| Iron D 2830th Post
 
Platinum Carpet V.I.P- Board Master
    
    
    
    
     
|  "Re(2):Sonic Unleashed" , posted Wed 26 Mar 14:16
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I've seen those. Since I'm not a hardcore Sonic fan, so my perception with the franchise can be quite blurry. If somebody could give me a rundown on the "good" elements of a Sonic game...
(Yes, I've played the MegaDrive ones, just not as extensively i.e. finished since I've never owned a Sega system during that era...was too poor to get Mega Collections when it came out)
Some people say it's the balance between hardcore platforming elements and exploration coupled with speed. Most fans seem to think Sega has been focusing merely on the speed aspect during its latter years.
Well, I'll admit right now that there is a deeply nostalgic link that I have to the Sonic series. Few things remind me of the finer points of my childhood than Sonic games (only the TMNT could be bigger childhood nostalgia elements for me...and that's a maybe).
But that's not to say that the Sonic series isn't good anyway. The games were good, simple fun. Pick up and play, not complex.
The graphics were great for their time (and still pretty now, if you ask me), and then there's the music. Sonic music is right up there with Streets of Rage music in it's popularity. This makes sense, since Yuzo Koshiro did some of the music for the Sonic games.
To sum it up, it was always good, simple fun with a great soundtrack. Timeless, they can still be played and enjoyed to this day.
Er.....
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| Pollyanna 2470th Post
Platinum Carpet V.I.P- Board Master
| "Re(4):Sonic Unleashed" , posted Wed 26 Mar 18:22
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btw sfried here is a good blog post about how to save sonic the headgehog. It basically list what's great about sonic in the old days and what went wrong.
http://www.destructoid.com/how-to-save-sonic-the-hedgehog-77069.phtml
The guy has some good points, but he's a dumbass. "Everything should be exactly how it was before and exactly NOT how it is now, and everything should be exactly the same forever except Sonic, who should be more like Dante."
A number of recent Sonic games have had very bad level design. 2D/3D doesn't matter. If the new game has tons of "surprise deaths" then it won't be any good.
Also, either make an interesting plot or get rid of the plot. I say get rid of the plot, but Klonoa showed me that you CAN have a good plot in a platformer.
Did no one play Sonic Rush Adventure? It was actually pretty good! You had to skip the cinemas, (which were numerous, lengthy and completely pointless), but otherwise it was pretty fun! Excluding the soundtrack, it was definitely a step up from Sonic Rush.
青春謳歌 弱肉強食
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| IkariDC 719th Post
Red Carpet Regular Member
| "Re(5):Sonic Unleashed" , posted Wed 26 Mar 18:50
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The graphics were great for their time (and still pretty now, if you ask me), and then there's the music. Sonic music is right up there with Streets of Rage music in it's popularity. This makes sense, since Yuzo Koshiro did some of the music for the Sonic games.
Yuzo did the music for the first Game Gear/Master System game.
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Did no one play Sonic Rush Adventure? It was actually pretty good! You had to skip the cinemas, (which were numerous, lengthy and completely pointless), but otherwise it was pretty fun! Excluding the soundtrack, it was definitely a step up from Sonic Rush.
I played it a bit (like 2 or 3 stages and try the boat thing) and I though it was a step down in almost every way from Sonic Rush. Don't ask me to point out why, I only had the feeling that it was not good enough, but maybe not having Hideki Naganuma in charge of the music pissed me off. You always mention that Sonic Rush had bad level design but for me it was ok.
GAZEROCK IS NOT DEAD
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| Pollyanna 2472th Post
Platinum Carpet V.I.P- Board Master
| "Re(6):Sonic Unleashed" , posted Wed 26 Mar 20:25
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You always mention that Sonic Rush had bad level design but for me it was ok.
You mean you didn't frequently fall to your death without knowing why? You didn't have to do the levels over and over again to learn where the pitfalls were? And you were a fan of the extended running straight in a line to make you feel like you were going fast?
I can blame myself (and all my friends who played the game) and say the random pitfalls were my problem and not the game's, but without the frequent, unpredictable deaths, the new complaint is that the game is too short and too easy.
The levels in Sonic Rush Adventure all had multiple paths and situations that you could react to beforehand. I thought the "extended straight direction running" was better managed with the obstacles as well.
I can very easily see someone disliking the game, though. Its production values were kind of shoddy, the music was mediocre, the boss fights took too long, the cinemas were completely unbearable, the minigames were mildly amusing at best, the new characters stunk and the island you screw around on was tacky. I wouldn't blame anyone for picking the game up saying "this is ugly and where did the awesome music go?"
However, I can't accept someone (not necessarily you) saying that the level designs were better in Sonic Rush and I can't imagine anything being more important than level design in a game where all you do is dash and jump. Sonic Rush Adventure was an ugly package, but it was an improvement where Sonic games needed it the most.
Also, and this is a question to anyone who didn't have a problem with the level design in Sonic Rush...what made it inferior to the earlier, more liked Sonic games? Or was it better?
青春謳歌 弱肉強食
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| Iron D 2832th Post
Platinum Carpet V.I.P- Board Master
| "Re(6):Sonic Unleashed" , posted Wed 26 Mar 20:25:
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Yuzo did the music for the first Game Gear/Master System game.
And the first Genesis/Mega Drive game. Actually, I thought I hear he did some music for Sonic 2 as well, but I'm not completely sure on that.
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Did no one play Sonic Rush Adventure? It was actually pretty good! You had to skip the cinemas, (which were numerous, lengthy and completely pointless), but otherwise it was pretty fun! Excluding the soundtrack, it was definitely a step up from Sonic Rush.
I haven't played Adventure yet, but I played and thoroughly enjoyed Rush. In fact, I thoroughly enjoyed all of the Game Boy Advance Sonics as well.
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Also, and this is a question to anyone who didn't have a problem with the level design in Sonic Rush...what made it inferior to the earlier, more liked Sonic games? Or was it better?
Sonic Rush had more of the "mostly just running" thing going for it. One of the main reasons that the level designs were better in the Genesis/Mega Drive games was because there WAS exploration to be done. The guy in the article posted up there mentioned this, and he's right.
So many times I've seen reviews on recent Sonic games and the reviewer says something like "this game is less about speed than the older Sonic games" and I think to myself, was it really?
There were tons of hidden nooks and crannies where rings, power-ups, extra lives and bonus levels were. Running trhough a wall that appeared to be solid would reveal a hidden room. Basically, exploration was a HUGE part of the 16-bit Sonic games, and anyone who says otherwise...I have to wonder how much they really played them.
In the 2d Sonic games from the GBA era on, there was alot less of this (almost to the point of non-existence).
Er.....
[this message was edited by Iron D on Wed 26 Mar 20:51] |
| Sensenic 1607th Post
Red Carpet V.I.P- Platinum Member
| "Re(7):Sonic Unleashed" , posted Thu 27 Mar 01:26
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Sonic Rush had more of the "mostly just running" thing going for it. One of the main reasons that the level designs were better in the Genesis/Mega Drive games was because there WAS exploration to be done. The guy in the article posted up there mentioned this, and he's right.
So many times I've seen reviews on recent Sonic games and the reviewer says something like "this game is less about speed than the older Sonic games" and I think to myself, was it really?
There were tons of hidden nooks and crannies where rings, power-ups, extra lives and bonus levels were. Running trhough a wall that appeared to be solid would reveal a hidden room. Basically, exploration was a HUGE part of the 16-bit Sonic games, and anyone who says otherwise...I have to wonder how much they really played them.
In the 2d Sonic games from the GBA era on, there was alot less of this (almost to the point of non-existence).
Completely agree on this point both with you and the "Make Sonic to be like the days of old again! (And like Dante!)" article.
Ever since Advance 2 and the more I read or heard about games like Sonic Rush or Secret Rings trying to capture "ye olde Sonic spiritte", the more I kept thinking... "but wait, the original successful games were not THAT much about speed." There were lots of points where you had to stop and wait for your chance to jump, or to explore... There were points where you had to reach a minimum speed enough to break a wall but in a limited space...
I think too that plot-wise they're going too far and taking themselves too seriously. The simpler plots of 1 and 2 (I really loved how the last levels from this one connected into each other) were enough.
And I'm not saying to just go back the old formula, just like the first Advance (for that, we do have the old ones and Advance). No, I think that a good enough 3D one for Sonic has already been found and used... in the first Sonic Adventure. There the levels had their share of speed but also, their share of platforming and exploration (in that game, generally divided in their own halves of each level), instead of the straight running obstacle courses that the levels from the 2nd where (at least, as far as I've seen, haven't played it fully).
To me the best example of 3D Sonic level design coing now to my mind would be the second half of the highway level. There, not only you had a great deal of exploration possible, but there were some points that precised not only speed but good control from the user in order to reach them (some items in walls, for example). And being a closed scenario there was no room for cheap pitfalls.
Personally, I think that improving on that formula they would hit my weak spot, so to speak, instead of, as they're apparently doing, taking a full step back and making the game (at least partially) 2,5D.
At least it seems Jim Sterling got his second point granted. :p
おやおやぁ~
"Farpaitement!"
-Obelix-
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| Pollyanna 2475th Post
Platinum Carpet V.I.P- Board Master
| "Re(7):Sonic Unleashed" , posted Thu 27 Mar 06:46
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Sonic Rush had more of the "mostly just running" thing going for it. One of the main reasons that the level designs were better in the Genesis/Mega Drive games was because there WAS exploration to be done.
I wholeheartedly agree with this and everything you said after it, but I don't think I would say it had "mostly just running" going FOR it. While running like crazy has its joys, it has to be balanced with good gameplay.
I'm also with Sensenic in thinking that Sonic doesn't have to be 2D to be good. Sonic Adventure 2 was a mess because of all the different characters you had to use, but it and SA1 both had some good points. They just weren't quite "there."
It's disappointing, because the new Sonic (the 360/PS3 one) has a lot of exploration aspects in it with big levels and such, but it also suffers from the sloppy design/what am I doing/senseless running/pitfalls issue.
Still, the game had some good ideas. Running on walls and water and such was lots of fun. I like really using the environments in a 3D game like that. I remember how excited I was when I saw the opening to Sonic CD where Sonic is flipping and jumping and vaulting off things. To me, if you can make a game that recreates that...a game with big WELL-DESIGNED environments to explore and fun ways to get around them (swinging, running, spinning, flying), you'll have all you need. You don't need an elaborate story, but you do need impressive SCENES. A picture is worth a thousand words after all.
Ah, but...I mean...the 3D Sonic games all did this on some level, I just don't think any of them came together quite right.
I didn't give a lot of time to the 360/PS3 one. Was it really that bad?
青春謳歌 弱肉強食
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| Iron D 2833th Post
Platinum Carpet V.I.P- Board Master
| "Re(8):Sonic Unleashed" , posted Thu 27 Mar 18:25
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Nope, Masato Nakamura did the soundtrack for the first 2 Mega Drive games.
See, I'm having this strange sense of deja vu here, because I was having this discussion with a couple of members of this board a few years ago (can't even remember who they were), except that I was the one who swore that Koshiro had never worked on a Sonic game. In the end I conceded that those guys must be right. Now here I am later, and I'm on the other side: claiming that Koshiro did work on some of the 16-bit Sonics and having someone tell me otherwise.
Well...in any case, on the subject of the 2-d Sonics, I will admit that I have not played the more recent Sonic the Hedgehog, but I have played Adventure, Adventure 2, Heroes and Shadow. The quality dropped with each title. I actually really like both Adventure and Adventure 2, but Heroes was some of the laziest game design I've ever seen. And Shadow was just a friggin' joke.
So I also believe that Sonic can be done right in 3-d. There just needs to be competent developers.
Er.....
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