I feel for you, Sonic the Hedgehog.
Through the hours I've spent with you in this incarnation, I saw an ambition unlike any other. A burning passion, very reminiscent of the fire that burned in your chest back in Adventure 1. That will to inspire, to impress; to usher in a new generation of video games with style and attitude. It's only a shame that in your haste to do so--a haste you should be all too familiar with--you stumbled, as you did many times before. Sadly, this time, you failed to get back up on your feet, and the end result is the worst fall in your career.
A lack of creative consistency. A lack of familiarity with new, cutting-edge hardware. A lack of time.
Sonic 06 is the culmination of every bad decision this series has made in its three dimensional life up to this point. "Sonic had a rough transition to 3D"? No, my dear friend. Sonic had a rough growth in 3D, and this game stands as the apex of those growing pains.
Bad camera, poor collision detection, stiff movement(which is EGREGIOUS considering the INTENTIONAL freedom previous 3D games gave in you in terms of movement. More on that later.), large hub worlds with fuck all to do in them, braindead combat sections that take way too long to get through considering the rain puddle-esque depth that said combat features, and an overabundance of those "just let the game do its thing. touch anything and you're dead" moments, except oops! This time you should've moved. Back to the checkpoint you go.
It's hard to believe they managed to get so many things wrong here. Adventure 1, 2 and Heroes were fun games to play. Yes, they all feature at least one of the issues I've brought up previously, but not in this magnitude. They were all games that managed to succeed in spite of their failures; again, a stumble rather than a fall.
Now, as weird as it may sound, I wasn't bored while playing this. Oh no, there were plenty of laughs to be had, but much like Shadow the Hedgehog, I wasn't laughing with the game.
The sheer amount of bullshit you can pull off in this game is staggering. Entering certain areas of a stage with a character that was never meant to visit them, completely skipping puzzles and sections by clipping through walls or flying so high with boxes or other collision glitches that you can just fall on top of the goal ring. Oh, and let's not forget the gem power-ups you can acquire as Sonic which apparently weren't coded correctly, meaning you can use them indefinitely, meaning you can just infinite jump your way through his campaign once you unlock it.
All of these things were VERY funny, but more than that, they're baffling. How does this pass? How is any of this approved? Sure, we're talking about SEGA, aka Mr."As long as a bug doesn't impede progression, don't submit it", but how could they market this game with any confidence when it's filled to the brim with so many amateur mistakes? There are piles of shovelware out there that feature competent programming this game wishes it could replicate. It's embarrassing that a character with this much history and presence in the video game industry gets a stain this gigantic in his resume.
And the only thing I've covered so far is the gameplay, I haven't even started going over the presentation. But for now, let's have some praise. After all, that half star is there for a reason: Music.
All (legit)Sonic games have good music, that's a given. It's the "Free Space" in any video game Bingo card, but Sonic 06 honestly surprised me with the quality of its soundtrack.
I knew of the vocal tracks, I was a Sonic fan in the late 00s after all, but they're the weakest part of this OST IMO TBQH. Wave Ocean, Dusty Desert, Soleanna Castle Town, Tropical Jungle, Aquatic Base, fucking FLAME CORE! Seriously, the guitar at 2:38 actually made me put my controller down and just. vibe with Knuckles until the song looped. Beautifully crafted from top to bottom, with only a couple of bad spots. It feels as if the sound team was trying their best to make up for the overwhelming lack of faith permeating in the rest of the staff. "Sure, this is the third time you have to light up these orbs to open a door and the combat isn't any better, but maybe if you can relax to the rhythm of a gentle math rock-esque guitar, you'll feel better about it?" Oh, like you wouldn't believe, Tomoya Ohtani. I'm only sorry that your hard work couldn't save the rest of this trainwreck.
POST PUBLISH EDIT: How could I forget to mention End of the World? I love it when games have themes that get more dynamic as you progress, and this is one of the best I've heard yet. I may have checked out of the story from the halfway point onward, but this brought my attention back, if only for a moment.
Shadow the Hedgehog is a 2005 platform game developed by Sega Studios USA (the former United States division of Sonic Team) and published by Sega as part of the Sonic the Hedgehog series. In my review of it, I mentioned how it served as the breaking point for my hatred towards this setting in Sonic games. You know what I'm talking about, the serious, shonen anime energy fucking festering around the veins of this series since Adventure 1. Not only did this setting fail to provide any stories worth following considering it's too far up its own ass to care about consistent writing, it also managed to completely shit all over the visual identity Sonic games relished on for years up until the start of the 3D era. I do think Shadow 05 is the worst looking game of said era, but Sonic 06 is the runner up. It's only when Heroes came around that we got to see this series back to its visual roots.
POST PUBLISH EDIT #2: That's not to say I'm against the series going for a more serious vibe--these games always did have more of an edge compared to other "mascot games"--but if they want to go in that direction, it has to be done right. So far, all Sonic games featuring stories with this tone failed to impress me and end up coming off as half-hearted.
The realistic textures and human models simply Do Not Work with Sonic & Co.'s inflatable toy adjacent models. Any screenshot where one of the main characters is standing next to a normal ass person looks like a Skyrim nexusmods preview image. They don't mesh at all.
Horrendous pop-in, next to no environmental animations(seriously, Sonic just phases through the water surface when you fall in the ocean. Not even a basic ass splash_particle.png, nothing.), characters and enemies just pop out of existence at certain points, some cutscenes have no BGM, like Omega shooting the fuck out of Mephiles in dead silence, while other cutscenes have no sound effects, like Iblis falling flat on his ass in, again, dead silence. One of the newspapers has "SOREANA" written on it, and it's not even an easily missed background detail. Sonic proudly spreads the newspaper open in front of the camera for all to see the typo. They really just didn't give a shit.
I won't even get into the story, considering how little it's worth; literally, since the ending undoes everything. All I'll say is: Amy would NEVER watch someone else kiss Sonic and let them keep their head after.
At the very least, there is one redeeming factor to Sonic 06, besides its soundtrack. It serves as the series' definitive rock bottom; it does not get any worse than this. We'll have other instances of mediocrity, of failure and misdirection, to be sure, but never again will this series go through another embarrassment in this scale. But, you know... It really goes to show how much people love this blue fucker. Any lesser franchise wouldn't survive a car crash like this.
I feel for you, Sonic the Hedgehog. You'll get your chance to shine again in the future, you'll laugh and play and inspire again, for there will always be those who stand by you no matter what. I consider myself one of those people. For now, just rest.
Through the hours I've spent with you in this incarnation, I saw an ambition unlike any other. A burning passion, very reminiscent of the fire that burned in your chest back in Adventure 1. That will to inspire, to impress; to usher in a new generation of video games with style and attitude. It's only a shame that in your haste to do so--a haste you should be all too familiar with--you stumbled, as you did many times before. Sadly, this time, you failed to get back up on your feet, and the end result is the worst fall in your career.
A lack of creative consistency. A lack of familiarity with new, cutting-edge hardware. A lack of time.
Sonic 06 is the culmination of every bad decision this series has made in its three dimensional life up to this point. "Sonic had a rough transition to 3D"? No, my dear friend. Sonic had a rough growth in 3D, and this game stands as the apex of those growing pains.
Bad camera, poor collision detection, stiff movement(which is EGREGIOUS considering the INTENTIONAL freedom previous 3D games gave in you in terms of movement. More on that later.), large hub worlds with fuck all to do in them, braindead combat sections that take way too long to get through considering the rain puddle-esque depth that said combat features, and an overabundance of those "just let the game do its thing. touch anything and you're dead" moments, except oops! This time you should've moved. Back to the checkpoint you go.
It's hard to believe they managed to get so many things wrong here. Adventure 1, 2 and Heroes were fun games to play. Yes, they all feature at least one of the issues I've brought up previously, but not in this magnitude. They were all games that managed to succeed in spite of their failures; again, a stumble rather than a fall.
Now, as weird as it may sound, I wasn't bored while playing this. Oh no, there were plenty of laughs to be had, but much like Shadow the Hedgehog, I wasn't laughing with the game.
The sheer amount of bullshit you can pull off in this game is staggering. Entering certain areas of a stage with a character that was never meant to visit them, completely skipping puzzles and sections by clipping through walls or flying so high with boxes or other collision glitches that you can just fall on top of the goal ring. Oh, and let's not forget the gem power-ups you can acquire as Sonic which apparently weren't coded correctly, meaning you can use them indefinitely, meaning you can just infinite jump your way through his campaign once you unlock it.
All of these things were VERY funny, but more than that, they're baffling. How does this pass? How is any of this approved? Sure, we're talking about SEGA, aka Mr."As long as a bug doesn't impede progression, don't submit it", but how could they market this game with any confidence when it's filled to the brim with so many amateur mistakes? There are piles of shovelware out there that feature competent programming this game wishes it could replicate. It's embarrassing that a character with this much history and presence in the video game industry gets a stain this gigantic in his resume.
And the only thing I've covered so far is the gameplay, I haven't even started going over the presentation. But for now, let's have some praise. After all, that half star is there for a reason: Music.
All (legit)Sonic games have good music, that's a given. It's the "Free Space" in any video game Bingo card, but Sonic 06 honestly surprised me with the quality of its soundtrack.
I knew of the vocal tracks, I was a Sonic fan in the late 00s after all, but they're the weakest part of this OST IMO TBQH. Wave Ocean, Dusty Desert, Soleanna Castle Town, Tropical Jungle, Aquatic Base, fucking FLAME CORE! Seriously, the guitar at 2:38 actually made me put my controller down and just. vibe with Knuckles until the song looped. Beautifully crafted from top to bottom, with only a couple of bad spots. It feels as if the sound team was trying their best to make up for the overwhelming lack of faith permeating in the rest of the staff. "Sure, this is the third time you have to light up these orbs to open a door and the combat isn't any better, but maybe if you can relax to the rhythm of a gentle math rock-esque guitar, you'll feel better about it?" Oh, like you wouldn't believe, Tomoya Ohtani. I'm only sorry that your hard work couldn't save the rest of this trainwreck.
POST PUBLISH EDIT: How could I forget to mention End of the World? I love it when games have themes that get more dynamic as you progress, and this is one of the best I've heard yet. I may have checked out of the story from the halfway point onward, but this brought my attention back, if only for a moment.
Shadow the Hedgehog is a 2005 platform game developed by Sega Studios USA (the former United States division of Sonic Team) and published by Sega as part of the Sonic the Hedgehog series. In my review of it, I mentioned how it served as the breaking point for my hatred towards this setting in Sonic games. You know what I'm talking about, the serious, shonen anime energy fucking festering around the veins of this series since Adventure 1. Not only did this setting fail to provide any stories worth following considering it's too far up its own ass to care about consistent writing, it also managed to completely shit all over the visual identity Sonic games relished on for years up until the start of the 3D era. I do think Shadow 05 is the worst looking game of said era, but Sonic 06 is the runner up. It's only when Heroes came around that we got to see this series back to its visual roots.
POST PUBLISH EDIT #2: That's not to say I'm against the series going for a more serious vibe--these games always did have more of an edge compared to other "mascot games"--but if they want to go in that direction, it has to be done right. So far, all Sonic games featuring stories with this tone failed to impress me and end up coming off as half-hearted.
The realistic textures and human models simply Do Not Work with Sonic & Co.'s inflatable toy adjacent models. Any screenshot where one of the main characters is standing next to a normal ass person looks like a Skyrim nexusmods preview image. They don't mesh at all.
Horrendous pop-in, next to no environmental animations(seriously, Sonic just phases through the water surface when you fall in the ocean. Not even a basic ass splash_particle.png, nothing.), characters and enemies just pop out of existence at certain points, some cutscenes have no BGM, like Omega shooting the fuck out of Mephiles in dead silence, while other cutscenes have no sound effects, like Iblis falling flat on his ass in, again, dead silence. One of the newspapers has "SOREANA" written on it, and it's not even an easily missed background detail. Sonic proudly spreads the newspaper open in front of the camera for all to see the typo. They really just didn't give a shit.
I won't even get into the story, considering how little it's worth; literally, since the ending undoes everything. All I'll say is: Amy would NEVER watch someone else kiss Sonic and let them keep their head after.
At the very least, there is one redeeming factor to Sonic 06, besides its soundtrack. It serves as the series' definitive rock bottom; it does not get any worse than this. We'll have other instances of mediocrity, of failure and misdirection, to be sure, but never again will this series go through another embarrassment in this scale. But, you know... It really goes to show how much people love this blue fucker. Any lesser franchise wouldn't survive a car crash like this.
I feel for you, Sonic the Hedgehog. You'll get your chance to shine again in the future, you'll laugh and play and inspire again, for there will always be those who stand by you no matter what. I consider myself one of those people. For now, just rest.
The level desing is the best in the whole series. Sad that they give no time to the Sonic Team to make this game, it could have been the best of all Sonic...
A broken mess of a game. Probably the worst of the series...but i cant stop loving it. I loved it at childhood and i love it now. so well say 50/50. Bad game/Love it still.
Peak trash.
A game that makes you frown. Better voice acting for Sonic than in Shadow the Hedgehog or Sonic Unleashed.
White woman kisses an anthropomorphic blue hedgehog and it saves the world... or smth like that, idk.