Sonic's Rise and Fall
Sonic the Hedgehog. When we think of him we also think of other things. His glory days on the Sega, how much we hate his friends, who the heck is Silver, Tails sounds like a boy, and how much we hate his current \ games or just barely like them. What happened to Sonic? A lot of things really, but is he still worth keeping around? I think so.
Sonic back in the day was amazing. Great graphics mixed with cool fast speeds, a good difficulty level as the game progresses, and platforming. A lot of people seem to forget that Sonic isn’t just fast and that platforming was a big element in the older games. You try and be fast every second and you’re bound to run into an enemy, miss a platform, hit some spikes, etc. You had to take it slow at times and focus, and it was fun.
Sonic back in the day was amazing. Great graphics mixed with cool fast speeds, a good difficulty level as the game progresses, and platforming. A lot of people seem to forget that Sonic isn’t just fast and that platforming was a big element in the older games. You try and be fast every second and you’re bound to run into an enemy, miss a platform, hit some spikes, etc. You had to take it slow at times and focus, and it was fun.
We got introduced to Tails and Knuckles in those early days. This was a good move. Each game had a new character which was fresh and interesting, especially since you could play as them too which is why is was fun. Tails acted like Sonic except he could fly short distances, Knuckles was the same but could glide, but they still kept the speed and replaced how platforming and finding hidden items could work with these new tools. Just like getting a new item in a game or powerup, this was their equivalence. We were also introduced to characters such as Amy Rose and Metal Sonic in Sonic CD during this era. They were welcomed like those before. I’m not sure how much we really needed Amy though but she wasn‘t a problem, and Metal Sonic is a great idea to add a new enemy in the mix.
So what happened? Sonic 3D blast was disappointment. It strayed from the formula and even the style of gameplay switching to an isometric view. Already I can say that changing two very important elements mixed with some not so great controls, equals a bad experiment. This early on it’s forgiven as it’s just that, an experiment at something new. Everyone is entitled to this. Sonic Adventure though was the transition into the 3D era for real this time, and according to many critics it worked and gave fans a happy breath of air to see Sonic no loose his great elements in the 2D era behind him.
Now this is where things begin to take their 10 year turn into the weird and wrong directions. Sonic Adventure and Sonic Adventure 2 introduced new characters to the series and real storylines. A storyline in Sonic up until this point was really… simple. Theres a hedgehog, some chaos emeralds, and a man trying to take over. Defeat him and win. Trying to bring story into a world of talking animals in a human world doesn’t seem to… be believable. Sonic Adventure 2 did okay with this but not great still, and the reason they did good was mostly because of Shadow the Hedgehog. He is confused and has a dark past that is actually interesting and exciting. Sadly we see too much time of characters such as Tails, Amy, and sometimes Rouge who gets better as time goes on. Giving Tails a voice was a bad idea, as during the next 10 years he sounds younger and younger. He apparently also is an engineer and can build cool things such as the Tornado plane that he flies around in. If maybe for story purposes we saw more of this, and for gameplay we got to actually play him like we used to in Sonic fashion rather then in a giant robotic suit thing, then maybe there would have been more hope for the future. They took Tails away from his original element, and Knuckles still was alright to a degree, but this was the last truly good Sonic game for years to come on the consoles.
After a couple years of GBA games with some decent scores that people tend to forget about for some reason, and a racing game, came Sonic The Hedgehog for the PS3 and 360. It failed miserably from huge technical glitches, extremely long loading screens, more glitches. Horrible controls, and did I mention glitches? It was such a failure, it will forever be a speed bump in Sonics history that unfortunately will never be forgotten. For console fans, it was the first game in years and it was a failure, so how long would we have to wait again? Not long at all really, a year later a Wii title came out that sadly suffered a similar fate. Dispite good visuals, it had bad controls and a weird difficulty scale which made for another title to be disaster. Two strikes in a row and no good Sonic game for years mostly due to the lack of console games from 2001 to 2006 or so is the biggest reason. It’s only two games in the new millennium which isn’t too bad for a long running franchise right? That would be the case, but then a DS title came out in the form of… an RPG? Why now of all times during two failures would they experiment again? No idea, but this is generally an ignored game, and console fans still missing their beloved Hedgehog of past, who played well and didn’t have a great story or massive friends list. Then to top it off it had a second Wii title that shared the exact same fate as the one before. The pile is adding up fast.
Today’s newest games are Sonic 4, Sonic Unleashed, and Sonic Colors. All three games offer something different, and all do something right. Sonic 4 is great for being like it’s old brothers, but it doesn’t quite make it. The physics didn’t match exactly like the older titles and created some problems. Sonic Unleashed had brillint and beautiful levels in the game in a day and night system. The Day levels are fast and amazing, but the night levels you play as… a werehog? What the heck? The levels last 3 to 7 times as long as the day levels, and you are extremely slow and it’s all of a sudden a beat um up game. So this game sadly falls short as well due to this. Sonic Colors finally brings us closer to what Sonic Unleashed tried to do, and does it well with new powerups included in the package. This title falls just a little shy though of being great Sonic again due to some control issues again! This leads to some stupid deaths and being more aggravated then you should be.
Today’s newest games are Sonic 4, Sonic Unleashed, and Sonic Colors. All three games offer something different, and all do something right. Sonic 4 is great for being like it’s old brothers, but it doesn’t quite make it. The physics didn’t match exactly like the older titles and created some problems. Sonic Unleashed had brillint and beautiful levels in the game in a day and night system. The Day levels are fast and amazing, but the night levels you play as… a werehog? What the heck? The levels last 3 to 7 times as long as the day levels, and you are extremely slow and it’s all of a sudden a beat um up game. So this game sadly falls short as well due to this. Sonic Colors finally brings us closer to what Sonic Unleashed tried to do, and does it well with new powerups included in the package. This title falls just a little shy though of being great Sonic again due to some control issues again! This leads to some stupid deaths and being more aggravated then you should be.
Next coming up is Sonic Generations. To celebrate 20 years of Sonic, this game looks like it will be amazing and finally the true Sonic game we have deserved since Sonic made his debut in 3D. I can only wish Sonic well in his travels and hope he continues to stick around and rise from the ashes of experimentation, failures, and become an iconic figure for new gamers being born today.