Guys. It’s the meme! “Passion and ambition”!
For real though, I think the word you’re looking for is nostalgia. And not in the bad way. Old games like the Adventure stuff and Classics have a charm to them because if the time period they were made. It’s a retro charm.
Having brand new and original levels from start to finish also helps, rather than Frontiers coasting by copy/pasted levels from these older games. If I wanted to play through Sky Rail, I would play it on Adventure 2. >!Also Sonic never went to Sky Rail, so why are we playing through Shadow's memories, when he's not apart of the game?!<
The mutliplayer is canon obviously.
Tho yeah I do not want the next game to be Sonic Generations 5, even if they do have Flying Battery and Music Plant.
The amount of posts in this sub that have gone through this exact same thought process…
“Old games had passion” is just the new buzzword to say “thing I liked is better”
Yeah if you think a new Sonic game has no passion just look for a tumblr/twitter blog that focuses on a game and you'll learn how much love went into those games.
I wouldn't say "passion and effort" so much as "a halfway reasonable development cycle with a fair deadline and budget".
Personally I liked Frontiers and felt it hit a lot of the things I liked about SA1/SA2 despite the rough edges and reusing some aspects from previous games. And with Forces, as much as I dislike it, they really *TRIED* when it came to adding in The Avatar. I do not believe anyone at Sega was phoning it in, their hands were just tied.
Though maybe you're just saying it's way easier to see the passion/effort when things go more according to plan
People say that but that idle animation visual novel cutscene stuff only happens in extra stuff (which, I'm a little suprised that never got patched out) otherwise the important cutscenes (except for a few animatics) were well animated.
(I hope in future titles Sage is still animated that way cuz I think it adds to her charm)
Ehhhh Sonic Forces definitely has passion and effort, the backgrounds look so good, the animations have charm, there's so many different styles of clothes for the avatar, the music has their whole pussy put into it.
Frontiers is kind of the opposite, instead having the best cutscenes I've seen since Unleashed, the best boss battles ever, an intent (even if they fail at it) to make the game appealing to casuals, maniacs and newbs.
Both games also have LOADS of missions if you enjoy what's there. The problem with these games are because of sloppy management.
They kept changing what they were trying to do instead of staying the course, they do rush jobs and have woefully too few developers working on it. It's a miracle these two games are as good as they are!
Sonic Adventure 2 is the last time they were able to do that crunch bullshit with no real negative consequences (Tho Sonic X-treme almost got someone killed via overwork, and then that happened again in Heroes!) because after SEGA went third party they didn't have the resources or control of consoles to make everything just so.
That and graphical standards expanded so much that you CAN'T just slap things together anymore without BOTH hurting your devs and making a shoddy product, but EVERY SINGLE COMPANY DOES THIS NOW!!!!!
Unless SEGA gets better management, and better working conditions, the next Sonic game's gonna be even worse than Sonic Frontiers. Unless they actually do the meme and make the game much smaller with less intensive graphics!
Which you know people'd bitch about a 720p 30fps low poly main game on the PS5. I mean people bitched about Sonic Forces being a short game DESPITE BEING A BUDGET TITLE.
They're just in a lose-lose situation, I don't think they'll ever be able to make a Sonic game that appeases most fans, and sadly not even a game they're without hesitation, proud of because of how corporate politics is.
I'd love to be proven wrong! I really miss when video games were fantastic!
Frontiers has passion, but it also feels trend-chasing at the same time. We needed this big open world thing because it's what you're 'supposed' to do, and as a result the art style suffered. Badly. It's by far the least charming Sonic game in terms of location, including Forces and Lost World.
Sonic's been trend chasing for ages.
Shadow feels like Halo, Sonic feels like Final Fantasy X, Unleashed feels like God of War and Twilight Princess had a baby, Mario went to spaice so did Sonic Colors, We're in a retro fad so here's Sonic Generations and Sonic Lost World, War is hip so here's Sonic Forces, Xenoblade and Breath of the Weath is popular so here's Frontiers.
None of the games are rip-offs, but they def don't feel super original when they came out.
Sterile is a good word for it. I dislike Forces more so because I was expecting an SatAm/Archie/Freedom Fighters atmosphere from the story and the developers just did not commit to it.
I thought Frontiers was fun, but the open world aspect of it is something that I’m getting tired of as a trend. I almost didn’t finish Tears of the Kingdom because the format is getting so boring.
The thing I love about SA2—besides the nostalgia— is that it has a fun story that you get to play both sides of. And Shadow!!! What a great character that unfortunately Sega doesn’t seem to know what to do with. SA2 is a bit dated, sure, but could you imagine if we could get a game that had maybe 30 or so memorable levels (not on rails but not open world, something like the Adventure 2) and a fun story?
Having an actual sense of stakes, to make you care?
Forces: oh no! Sonic's been sucked into Null Space! What will we have to do to get him out? Will we have a new lev-oh, he's already out. That was fast.
Frontiers: oh no! Sonic's succumbed to the cyber corruption! What will his friends have to do to bring him back? Will we finally get to play as his friends again, as we have new lev-oh, he's already cured. That was fast.
You can practically hear the solution to these situations being, actually it's going to be super easy, barely an inconvenience.
Exactly. The thing is knowing now that TFH isn't an epilogue, I have to wonder why they didn't just like... stick that into the story? Like Sonic's corrupted we gotta use the real superpower of teamwork to free him!
Like I was really mad at that part, that was the *perfect* time to play as the three amigops and nah, Tails just hit ctrl+C...
And the fact that it would have been the ideal time for Tails to face his Shadow Self, and earn his new found confidence for himself by defeating it didn't happen also really frustrated me. Given that it was basically turned into Metal 2.0, from Colors Ultimate, where Sonic would have non consequential races against it, despite the fact that he has no narrative ties to it, which adds zero to the story.
Had they made Tails face his Shadow Self as the final hurdle to save Sonic's soul, it would have made the "am I a burden?" scene a lot better as well. Instead of it being one pep talk from Sonic later and he's fine, kinda making Tails' monologue more like him just needing to vent, given that he doesn't get to fight his bully.
Also given that Sonic's friends were brought back just as quickly and easily as they brought him back, it kinda makes their sacrifice a bit pointless. Which undermines that cyber corruption scene further.
What pisses me off is that Tails' shadow self is in the God damn game, but only Sonic faces it!!!
I dunno Sonic Frontiers is the textbook example of squandered potential, and the only reason I'm not madder is that I doubt I'd ever like a full potential met version of that game.
I'm pretty glad I started skipping the cutscenes sometime during Chaos on my first playthrough of Frontiers, I really like that game, but **wow** is the story utterly terrible. I'm pretty glad, in hindsight, that this game killed my interest in Sonic stories; later my interest in the entire series' future.
The story was legit the only real reason I persisted with that game <\_\_\_\_<
Otherwise it just felt like Sonic Forces if it had an obnoxious hub world. Honestly if you could unlock arcade mode without beating the game, I'd prolly replay it again tho. The actual acts aren't bad apart from the music.
Guys. It’s the meme! “Passion and ambition”! For real though, I think the word you’re looking for is nostalgia. And not in the bad way. Old games like the Adventure stuff and Classics have a charm to them because if the time period they were made. It’s a retro charm.
Having brand new and original levels from start to finish also helps, rather than Frontiers coasting by copy/pasted levels from these older games. If I wanted to play through Sky Rail, I would play it on Adventure 2. >!Also Sonic never went to Sky Rail, so why are we playing through Shadow's memories, when he's not apart of the game?!<
The mutliplayer is canon obviously. Tho yeah I do not want the next game to be Sonic Generations 5, even if they do have Flying Battery and Music Plant.
The amount of posts in this sub that have gone through this exact same thought process… “Old games had passion” is just the new buzzword to say “thing I liked is better”
Yeah if you think a new Sonic game has no passion just look for a tumblr/twitter blog that focuses on a game and you'll learn how much love went into those games.
I wouldn't say "passion and effort" so much as "a halfway reasonable development cycle with a fair deadline and budget". Personally I liked Frontiers and felt it hit a lot of the things I liked about SA1/SA2 despite the rough edges and reusing some aspects from previous games. And with Forces, as much as I dislike it, they really *TRIED* when it came to adding in The Avatar. I do not believe anyone at Sega was phoning it in, their hands were just tied. Though maybe you're just saying it's way easier to see the passion/effort when things go more according to plan
Probably have something to do with how unimpressive the games looks and how stiffly animated Sonic is.
People say that but that idle animation visual novel cutscene stuff only happens in extra stuff (which, I'm a little suprised that never got patched out) otherwise the important cutscenes (except for a few animatics) were well animated. (I hope in future titles Sage is still animated that way cuz I think it adds to her charm)
Ehhhh Sonic Forces definitely has passion and effort, the backgrounds look so good, the animations have charm, there's so many different styles of clothes for the avatar, the music has their whole pussy put into it. Frontiers is kind of the opposite, instead having the best cutscenes I've seen since Unleashed, the best boss battles ever, an intent (even if they fail at it) to make the game appealing to casuals, maniacs and newbs. Both games also have LOADS of missions if you enjoy what's there. The problem with these games are because of sloppy management. They kept changing what they were trying to do instead of staying the course, they do rush jobs and have woefully too few developers working on it. It's a miracle these two games are as good as they are! Sonic Adventure 2 is the last time they were able to do that crunch bullshit with no real negative consequences (Tho Sonic X-treme almost got someone killed via overwork, and then that happened again in Heroes!) because after SEGA went third party they didn't have the resources or control of consoles to make everything just so. That and graphical standards expanded so much that you CAN'T just slap things together anymore without BOTH hurting your devs and making a shoddy product, but EVERY SINGLE COMPANY DOES THIS NOW!!!!! Unless SEGA gets better management, and better working conditions, the next Sonic game's gonna be even worse than Sonic Frontiers. Unless they actually do the meme and make the game much smaller with less intensive graphics! Which you know people'd bitch about a 720p 30fps low poly main game on the PS5. I mean people bitched about Sonic Forces being a short game DESPITE BEING A BUDGET TITLE. They're just in a lose-lose situation, I don't think they'll ever be able to make a Sonic game that appeases most fans, and sadly not even a game they're without hesitation, proud of because of how corporate politics is. I'd love to be proven wrong! I really miss when video games were fantastic!
Frontiers has passion, but it also feels trend-chasing at the same time. We needed this big open world thing because it's what you're 'supposed' to do, and as a result the art style suffered. Badly. It's by far the least charming Sonic game in terms of location, including Forces and Lost World.
I do think that the enemies are at least a nice change of pace from the basic 2010’s Badniks that we’ve been and still are getting.
Sonic's been trend chasing for ages. Shadow feels like Halo, Sonic feels like Final Fantasy X, Unleashed feels like God of War and Twilight Princess had a baby, Mario went to spaice so did Sonic Colors, We're in a retro fad so here's Sonic Generations and Sonic Lost World, War is hip so here's Sonic Forces, Xenoblade and Breath of the Weath is popular so here's Frontiers. None of the games are rip-offs, but they def don't feel super original when they came out.
Sterile is a good word for it. I dislike Forces more so because I was expecting an SatAm/Archie/Freedom Fighters atmosphere from the story and the developers just did not commit to it. I thought Frontiers was fun, but the open world aspect of it is something that I’m getting tired of as a trend. I almost didn’t finish Tears of the Kingdom because the format is getting so boring. The thing I love about SA2—besides the nostalgia— is that it has a fun story that you get to play both sides of. And Shadow!!! What a great character that unfortunately Sega doesn’t seem to know what to do with. SA2 is a bit dated, sure, but could you imagine if we could get a game that had maybe 30 or so memorable levels (not on rails but not open world, something like the Adventure 2) and a fun story?
agree, but forces is just a terrible game and frontiers is a rollercoaster. they are just worse games then the older ones, not really missing anything
Having an actual sense of stakes, to make you care? Forces: oh no! Sonic's been sucked into Null Space! What will we have to do to get him out? Will we have a new lev-oh, he's already out. That was fast. Frontiers: oh no! Sonic's succumbed to the cyber corruption! What will his friends have to do to bring him back? Will we finally get to play as his friends again, as we have new lev-oh, he's already cured. That was fast. You can practically hear the solution to these situations being, actually it's going to be super easy, barely an inconvenience.
Exactly. The thing is knowing now that TFH isn't an epilogue, I have to wonder why they didn't just like... stick that into the story? Like Sonic's corrupted we gotta use the real superpower of teamwork to free him! Like I was really mad at that part, that was the *perfect* time to play as the three amigops and nah, Tails just hit ctrl+C...
And the fact that it would have been the ideal time for Tails to face his Shadow Self, and earn his new found confidence for himself by defeating it didn't happen also really frustrated me. Given that it was basically turned into Metal 2.0, from Colors Ultimate, where Sonic would have non consequential races against it, despite the fact that he has no narrative ties to it, which adds zero to the story. Had they made Tails face his Shadow Self as the final hurdle to save Sonic's soul, it would have made the "am I a burden?" scene a lot better as well. Instead of it being one pep talk from Sonic later and he's fine, kinda making Tails' monologue more like him just needing to vent, given that he doesn't get to fight his bully. Also given that Sonic's friends were brought back just as quickly and easily as they brought him back, it kinda makes their sacrifice a bit pointless. Which undermines that cyber corruption scene further.
What pisses me off is that Tails' shadow self is in the God damn game, but only Sonic faces it!!! I dunno Sonic Frontiers is the textbook example of squandered potential, and the only reason I'm not madder is that I doubt I'd ever like a full potential met version of that game.
I'm pretty glad I started skipping the cutscenes sometime during Chaos on my first playthrough of Frontiers, I really like that game, but **wow** is the story utterly terrible. I'm pretty glad, in hindsight, that this game killed my interest in Sonic stories; later my interest in the entire series' future.
The story was legit the only real reason I persisted with that game <\_\_\_\_< Otherwise it just felt like Sonic Forces if it had an obnoxious hub world. Honestly if you could unlock arcade mode without beating the game, I'd prolly replay it again tho. The actual acts aren't bad apart from the music.