I want to get the negatives out of the way immediately, as I enjoyed this game on the whole. The camera is HORRIBLE at times. It’s somehow more annoying than Mario 64’s camera. Big and Amy’s gameplay are not fun and highly underdeveloped. Their de-emphasis on speed would have been tolerable if they were fun to control, but they aren’t. Finally, the cutscenes, dialog, voice acting, and especially the mouth animations are laughably bad. I will, however, give credit to Sonic Team for trying to tell its story through several unique playable characters. This kind of worldbuilding, especially in a platformer, was unheard of at the time.
Ambitious is the best word to describe Sonic Adventure. That can be dangerous, but for the Blue Blur’s first foray into 3D, I was amazed at how much Sonic Team got right. The level design is top-notch for most characters, as they are easy to follow while rewarding curious and skilled players with additional rings, lives, power-ups, and shortcuts through stages. Using Sonic’s spin dash and homing attack never gets old and he is thankfully not the only source of fun to be had here. Tails, Knuckles, and E-102 Gamma recontextualized levels in interesting ways and have fantastic controls.
As Tails, I loved skipping huge chunks of levels by flying though boost rings or dropping to a lower platform. Vertical levels like Speed Highway and Windy Valley really benefit from this playstyle. Knuckles has you hunting emerald shards. A solid idea, though having Tikal point you exactly where to go made a couple levels too easy. E-102 Gamma’s shooting stages under a time limit were conceptually neat, but I never had to worry about running out of time. If you started off with far less time, they would perfectly resemble Mario Galaxy 2’s stressful speedrun levels where you had to keep collecting clocks (or shoot stuff in Gamma’s case) to keep the timer active. This would have worked perfectly for Gamma if you ask me. I also wish these characters had more than five stages to play though each.
Overall, I had a good time with Sonic Adventure. I understand now why fans want more 3D Sonic games to resemble it. It gives you a level of freedom and control that most of the later games lacked. As someone whose first Sonic games were Sonic Riders, Sonic Colors, and the storybook games, I viewed the iconic hedgehog differently growing up. I didn’t even play the Genesis games until last year. However, apart from the subpar storybook games, I really enjoyed all of those 3D titles for various reasons. They each prove that 3D Sonic works and can even support different types of gameplay. The problem is the execution from Sonic Team, which is wildly inconsistent to say the least. As such, it may be difficult to know whether Sonic Adventure is still worth playing. I say it is. It has significant flaws, but a majority of them are a result of it being a product of the early 3D era. The core foundation is still strong.
If you do intend on playing it, buy the PC version and download the SADX Mod Installer. I cannot recommend the installer enough. The setup is very simple and provides a plethora of options that increase the game’s fun factor, the best of which are HD widescreen and a full restoration of the Dreamcast lighting.
Ambitious is the best word to describe Sonic Adventure. That can be dangerous, but for the Blue Blur’s first foray into 3D, I was amazed at how much Sonic Team got right. The level design is top-notch for most characters, as they are easy to follow while rewarding curious and skilled players with additional rings, lives, power-ups, and shortcuts through stages. Using Sonic’s spin dash and homing attack never gets old and he is thankfully not the only source of fun to be had here. Tails, Knuckles, and E-102 Gamma recontextualized levels in interesting ways and have fantastic controls.
As Tails, I loved skipping huge chunks of levels by flying though boost rings or dropping to a lower platform. Vertical levels like Speed Highway and Windy Valley really benefit from this playstyle. Knuckles has you hunting emerald shards. A solid idea, though having Tikal point you exactly where to go made a couple levels too easy. E-102 Gamma’s shooting stages under a time limit were conceptually neat, but I never had to worry about running out of time. If you started off with far less time, they would perfectly resemble Mario Galaxy 2’s stressful speedrun levels where you had to keep collecting clocks (or shoot stuff in Gamma’s case) to keep the timer active. This would have worked perfectly for Gamma if you ask me. I also wish these characters had more than five stages to play though each.
Overall, I had a good time with Sonic Adventure. I understand now why fans want more 3D Sonic games to resemble it. It gives you a level of freedom and control that most of the later games lacked. As someone whose first Sonic games were Sonic Riders, Sonic Colors, and the storybook games, I viewed the iconic hedgehog differently growing up. I didn’t even play the Genesis games until last year. However, apart from the subpar storybook games, I really enjoyed all of those 3D titles for various reasons. They each prove that 3D Sonic works and can even support different types of gameplay. The problem is the execution from Sonic Team, which is wildly inconsistent to say the least. As such, it may be difficult to know whether Sonic Adventure is still worth playing. I say it is. It has significant flaws, but a majority of them are a result of it being a product of the early 3D era. The core foundation is still strong.
If you do intend on playing it, buy the PC version and download the SADX Mod Installer. I cannot recommend the installer enough. The setup is very simple and provides a plethora of options that increase the game’s fun factor, the best of which are HD widescreen and a full restoration of the Dreamcast lighting.