GRAPHICS: Genuinely gorgeous. The world, the creature designs, Alice (the hair physics!), the fact that her appearance and outfit changes depending on the chapter you're in to better match the area around you (a mermaid-esque dress for the Deluded Depths, a dark steampunk look for the Hatter's Domain, a soft floral outfit for the Mysterious East), it's all beautiful - even if that beauty is sometimes a very twisted brand of it. The additional outfits are wonderful, too - I personally love the Late But Lucky, Cheshire, and Hattress dresses (she has cogs for pupils!). The Vale of Tears is beautiful, especially in the moments before the game begins to pull out the darker stuff, and the Cardbridge genuinely took my breath away.
CHARACTERS: The game mostly focuses on Alice (who is great by herself - I've read a fair number of essays on how important her character and how her mental health/story was handled were), but there are some fascinating and well-conceptualised supporting characters too. The Cheshire Cat has always been a favourite, as has his appearance, the Carpenter is always fun to get to again on replays, and the Queen of Hearts is beautifully designed. The main antagonist is appropriately sinister and ominous.
DIALOGUE/VOICE ACTING: I thought the voice acting was pretty good, and everyone's approaches to their lines fit well with the tone of the game. Alice's voice is sharp and she hits the emotional beats pretty well, and the Cheshire Cat and Bumby are stand-outs.
PLOT: It's dark and potentially upsetting for younger players, but I got into this game at 11-12 and loved it, so your mileage may vary. It weaves between twisted and dreamlike while in Wonderland to depressingly realistic while in London or when confronting Alice's mental state.
GAMEPLAY: Platformers aren't usually my thing, but I really enjoyed the platforming in this game. The different worlds keep everything varied and interesting, and there are always different things to keep you on your toes - you're platforming over dominoes in Vale of Tears, giant cogs and steam jets in Hatter's Domain, paper fans in the Mysterious East, floating playing cards in the Cardbridge, etc. The combat is fun enough, with a variety of different and interesting weapons to unlock along the way, and I found myself having to be pretty strategic about when to dodge and when to attack and when to back off, so it wasn't just mindless slashing.
MULTIPLAYER: None.

Favourite Male Character: The Cheshire Cat ...does he count as male?
Favourite Female Character: Alice
First Character I Liked: Alice
Favourite Character Design: The Cheshire Cat
Favourite Moment: Either floating down into Wonderland for the first time, the first time entering Cardbridge, or the train station scene at the end
Favourite OST: Vale of Tears, Jack Splatter, Radcliffe's Fate
Least Favourite Character: Bumby

Yume Nikki and I have been passing acquaintances for more than a decade. Every so often, I'd fire the game up (undoubtedly an outdated build, now that I think about it) and explore a little; and, after an hour or two, put it down, bored.

However, if this and the general tone of other reviews here is any indication, Yume Nikki wasn't the kind of game I could easily put to the side and declare "not for me". Even as I searched Madotsuki's dream-wastes for gripping ephemera, and frequently came away empty-handed (and slightly disquieted), the game never lost its grip on me - since 2012, when I first downloaded it.

And- you know what, in retrospect, I realise was my grave mistake in those days?

I played Yume Nikki with a guide.

Trying to shortcut your stay in these dreams, treat your stay in Madotsuki's dreams like "tourism", get to the "interesting part" where something cool happens that makes the wandering "worth it"- well, that attitude diminishes the wandering! It robs the game of its ability to unfold its atmosphere to its fullest. Ahead of anything else, Yume Nikki, in your mind, must NEVER be a "problem to solve". "A game to complete." I get those that want to bypass the Hellmaze (it's the reason I took away a half-star from its score lol), but...

Yume Nikki needs you to remain, and to persist. Yume Nikki needs you to wander. Yume Nikki needs you to be subsumed, wants to be played in a dark room with no distractions and certainly no walkthroughs open on the side.

And when I finally did it like that, when I embraced the uncertainty and the depths of its exploration,

Yume Nikki rewarded me.

Earlier this year, on a single exploration through this dream, I saw both some of the most inspiring art I've seen in any video game, and played through the most heart-thumping stealth segment in any video game I've ever played: I went to space; I delved into sewers. I grew long hair. I extinguished fire by controlling rain. I tiptoed around bookshelves to evade a bloody ball of hair that, in the top-down perspective, was just as frequently obscured as myself, often needing me to make educated guesses of its whereabouts.
EDIT: A friend told me later that what I saw couldn't have hurt me - but it certainly didn't feel safe - which further solidifies my point.

After that play session, I was energised - and I finally really understood this game. All the years of trying had been worth it.

Yume Nikki, if you let it be itself undissected, is a game you come away from with stories to tell.

I genuinely feel like it's not a game that wants you to complete it - while I'm not spoiling the ending here, the game's conclusion certainly makes that interpretation sound.

It's also one of those true video game mysteries: For people who don't know Japanese especially, but I think for basically everyone who isn't Kikiyama, this game's internal workings in RPG Maker 2003 are so complex that I don't think we'll ever come to holistically understand it, and know every single thing it's capable of.

And that's more than okay. That's beautiful! Play Yume Nikki - and don't be afraid of wandering.

Cupid Parasite is an absolutel WILD RIDE of an otome, and I mean that in the best way possible. If you love lots of laugh-out-loud moments in your otome games, then play this game. CupiPara also goes out of its way to cram in as many cheesy romance tropes as possible. Here is a list of just a few that can be found in the various routes of this story:

- Fake dating
- Soulmates
- Friends to lovers
- Forbidden love
- Secret identity

...And many more that I can't list without giving spoilers. CupiPara knows exactly what it is, and embraces its cheesiness fully. Huge recommend if you want a sweet and funny read.

Also, Ryuki is my favorite.

If it weren't for the disgrace of a video game I have as my only .5 star, Shadow The Hedgehog would probably be the closest game to being the absolute worst I've played to completion. Its 4am when writing this and I could make the argument that this game wasted more of my time than UDG, but that could just be due to how fucking long each route drags on despite only clocking in about an hour after the first couple runs.

This game isn't worth going the extra mile to analyze gameplay or story wise so I'll just summarize my thoughts as best as I possibly can. Story wise, I genuinely think this is the worst the franchise has to offer. The story is so fucking bad that I'm blanking on literally anything to say, as it retreads the worst beats SA2 covers, defeating the point of what that game and Heroes were trying to set up. Instead of this being about Shadow rediscovering himself through those living in the present, of which are his friends(?), we instead have him leaving his past behind him and making good on his promise to Maria (and now Gerald)... AGAIN. Its a waste of time by itself and I'm just describing half of the routes. The Dark side routes are laughably bad as morality choices and spit in the face of every single character involved, but it would be a pretty cool mechanic in a competent game. The idea of siding with the heroes for 90% of the game then switching at the very end to the Black Arms would be hilarious, as long as it meant playing a game that wasn't this. Speaking of the routes, hope you like playing the game 10 times to get the "true ending"! I'm perfectly fine with replaying zones in Sonic games, sometimes even just for an hour straight to familiarize myself with the level in its entirety, but there isn't a single stage in this game that deserves that kind of repeated attention, its just lazy and each level isn't designed for this at all, as these are probably the most linear stages in the series other than Forces. For the gameplay itself, it is quite literally Heroes but even more slippery, thats it. As per the course with Sonic Team games, there's always something unfinished about it to its core, and the reuse of the engine and past level assets are flat out vile. To specify the reuse of engine would be fine but Heroes handling shouldn't be used in anything but that game, as it rarely even worked there either. As far as the gunplay, its not the worst thing ever. There are a lot moments of jank but its one the only new additions to this game that I can say I'm fine with. The other new addition I can say I like is the new english cast. Not much to say as they don't stay very long but this, Sonic X and 06 are probably the worst way to start voicing the characters, as Sega didn't have much in mind for what they wanted them to be. It wasn't until Unleashed where I'd say they hit their stride consistenly, which sucks but such is the enjoyment of mid 2000s voice direction.

So yeah this wasn't fun, and it didn't help that I had no nostalgia of this entry to speak of, something I can't say for most of the other games of this era and going forward. Also I know its not that serious but at the same time, the people who pass this off as just mid or harmless in context of the franchise are part of the problem as to why Sonic had an identity crisis after this point (although Sega is mostly to blame for it obviously, about 75% I'd say).

Sonic, as a franchise, has three particulars about it that really stood out to me from back when it started, three core tenants that SEGA have been routinely trying to work out how to translate forward whenever a new game comes out, and despite the initial reactions to Frontiers being a stark separation from what came before, I think it’s interesting to look at what we have in the game and how Sonic Team chose to tackle these challenges in a new way.

1. An adaptation of SEGA’s arcade score-based philosophy brought to a home console experience.
2. A response to the trends of its time period (originally inversely to Mario)
3. A means to harness what was possible with technology to be a showcase for a style of play few others have dared to replicate.

For the first point, although Sonic started as a franchise on home consoles, minus a few arcade games here and there, the first games still had a score to keep track of with ways to balance earning more by the end of levels, limited lives and continues. The highscore stuck around for years, with Sonic Adventure 2 making it a gameplay objective to earn a highscore for the mastery ranks of every level. But it’s been because of this arcade style philosophy that most modern Sonic games end up with short, elaborate zones holding levels designed to be beaten in only a few minutes but designed to be replayed over and over.

Sonic Frontiers answers this by peppering its open zones to have bite-sized challenges at around every corner. There’s very little downtime in Sonic Frontiers, which I think helps keep the pace up. Almost everywhere you look there’s a rail or a spring or a dash panel, with islands 2 and 3 in particular having a lot more height structures and being fairly large in size. Despite pop in, seeing larger, vast structures in the distance does inspire wanting to find out what’s at the top of the challenge, and there’s sometimes a bit of level fun along the way. The game has a lot of quick engagements with several rewards at the end of them, and the open zones being a flow to get from setpiece to setpiece I think is a solid gameplay loop, provided the terrain supported the potential with player expression, but more on that issue later.

Cyberspace is also there as an answer to the high score replayability of past titles, and I think conceptually they’re solid. They’re spread far enough around the world that finding one actually feels like a bit of a surprise, short enough to feel like a quick change of pace and you’ll not need to play many of them just to progress. But, to get the elephant out of the room, the only momentum these have is managing to boost off of the halfpipes and there’s only four themes to go around. It would’ve been SICK to have Eggmanland as a fifth theme, surely, they have Unleashed assets hanging around somewhere to reuse, but alas. The 2D ones I got something out of, mainly due to the bounce to air boost combo giving you some additional height and fixing the insanely speedy acceleration from Forces, but 3D feels very wrong; air control is directionally locked when trying to make platforming which leads to a lot of slippery turning and falling off the sides. I really wish they would’ve kept the Open Zone controls in these; THOSE I think felt pretty comfortable after some tinkering and it’s the main disconnect from what’s otherwise being an incredibly cohesive full experience. This concept is sound, but I hope gets an overhaul for a supposed sequel.

When it comes to being in touch with current trends, it’s far from a secret Sonic’s existence was born of attitudes from the early 90s, but continuing that down the line, Sonic Adventure 1 was constructed as an elaborate tech demo for the Dreamcast complete with an entire campaign to show off its capability for fishing. Sonic Adventure 2, and specifically the creation of Shadow the Hedgehog, feel almost prophetic for what would be viewed as “cool” during the 2000s, the kind of nu-metal emocore cool bouncing off the more spunky ATTITUDE Sonic himself was created under. Sonic 06 was trying to adapt too many things in its rushed development, the increased focus on real time worlds, physics systems, hubs full of NPC sidequests and the grandiose storytelling not overly dissimilar to the Final Fantasy X’s of the world. Since then, we’ve had Sonics focused on dual world gameplay, God of War combat, motion control sword swinging, Mario Galaxy level tubes and custom characters.

Sonic Frontiers’s hat to throw in this ring is player freedom. Past 3D Sonics have often had the issue of containing multiple different gameplay styles or arbitrary conditions players HAD to power through in order to get through to important content across the game. Sonic Unleashed was a particularly egregious example of this with its medal collecting blocking progression and often necessitating backtracking through levels. Frontiers in comparison is refreshingly loose in progressing across the world. Multiple small missions exist in Frontiers to bridge story gaps, but they’re quick and aren’t terribly taxing so players should get back into it fairly fast. That players can use a fishing minigame to help bypass walls of whichever kind of progression they don’t want to deal with the most I find to be pretty funny, when considering how the fishing minigame back in Sonic Adventure is viewed as a primary case of out of place content being outright required to finish the main story of the game. That “repeated content” in an open world game is presented mainly through quick bits of speed and platforming and light map opening puzzles instead of overly elaborate sidequests which I think, again, largely keeps the pace of the game up. Everything you can see (aside from plot progression doors) is something to be toyed with immediately, even if I wish there were more creative ways to finish sequences beyond air boosting to reach character tokens early.

There’s also a skill tree combat system, and it’s a mixed bag. The many moves can look cool and have satisfying sound design but combat itself is very simplistic, to where mini bosses need to have their own gimmick to spice things up. I like MOST of these (the Shark goes on for too long) for giving certain enemy encounters a distinct feel. It’s a combat system that’s very drive-by, in a way not unlike the classics, prioritizing efficiency and style and not effective use of button combos. You see an enemy, do the thing to make them vulnerable, get a thing and then keep running. I still prefer this to locking you in rooms within levels like a lot of the 2000s Sonic’s liked to do, yet it’s hardly deep. But I do appreciate how for the first time ever in a modern Sonic, said combat moveset is actually transferred through during the Super Sonic battles. Those go insanely hard; you have to babysit the camera to keep track of your onscreen position, but they’re the incredibly satisfying and raw energy Sonic’s been losing since the turn to more lighthearted games. The metal music tracks for these are prime workout music in what even without them is Sonic’s most varied soundtrack since 2008.

What surprised me while playing was how this freedom aspect actually ties into the plot of the game, and more specifically, the character of Sage. She’s an AI created by Eggman that routinely attempts to halt Sonic’s progress using the world’s technology, while at the same time questioning what his unfettered morals are to her black and white understanding. This parallels with Sonic’s, and in turn the player’s tenacity to go about the open zones accomplishing objectives, helping your friends recover their memories, and standing up to the giant bosses and mini-bosses. It’s through the player’s sense of progression through the world and Sonic’s interactions with his friends (for the first time in over a decade feeling genuine and not like an excuse for comedy skits) that Sage begins to question her purpose and whether Sonic’s intentions are pure despite also wanting to please her master, his longtime enemy. An actual CHARACTER ARC conveyed through the player’s gameplay in the open worlds, and I find that neat. The rest of the plot was light but pretty pleasant to experience due to Ian Flynn’s character dialogue and….some of the animations. The canned NPC animations are very stilted, but the actual hand animated cutscenes are headed back in a more actioney camera direction with expresses as much as can out of these models, with even some concept art used for flashbacks expanding the lore. The Sonic gameplay Vs Sonic lore video only got more wider after this game.

Beyond the story, there’s also what Frontiers is trying to accomplish on a tech level. As much as blast processing and lock-on technology could be seen as marketing buzzwords today, SEGA adopting them represents trying to push Sonic, and by extension themselves, as being on top of what technology can be. In 2D, the best Sonic level design still had to have branching and a sense of speed blasting through the levels, but it could be said to have been easier to craft it all considering the games were sprite based and only so much needed to be on a screen at once. Going into 3D made it harder to manage creating an innumerable amount of unique assets the player would speed by in seconds, from multiple angles and setpieces, rather than only following the sandbox trend other platformers found more comfortable. There’s few things truly like what a 3D Sonic game is capable of, but it’s a difficult beast to manage and polish.

Sonic Frontiers finally takes the step of making sandboxes the core tenant of the game while also retaining the sense of speed. While the first island is fairly small, the second island is incredibly spread in terms of content and all the nooks and crannies within the canyon of the biome while the third island is a vast set of separated landmasses. If there’s one major pro I can give the open zones in Sonic Frontiers, it’s that, with the right capabilities, you really do FEEL fast while exploring in a way that no other open world type game has even tried to accomplish. Using the Drop Dash to slide down the many slopes, power boosting to cross large portions of the map in seconds, and jumping rails at the right angle to hurdle forward through the air like a slingshot.

That being said, there are two issues with this approach. The first is pop-in, which can be incredibly apparent even on the next gen consoles where the game does genuinely have moments of looking quite stunning otherwise, with the day/night cycle. It can be a pretty jarring immersion breaker that makes it harder to gauge where to land on sometimes, even if such is thankfully less apparent during the 2D segments and cyberspace. Seeing it had me wonder if this is more an engine limitation or an actual programming issue?

The second issue is more annoying because of the potential for fun movement in the world: inconsistent reactions to the terrain. Inconsistency is something that could be said to have been associated with Sonic games for years, and as much as Frontiers earnestly tries to have the most fluid 3D Sonic experience out of all of them (never had any bugs while playing aside from briefly flinging off a structure one time) it’s hard to tell, in the game’s current form, what terrain will let Sonic fly through the air and the player subsequently trick their way across platforms, and to what terrain Sonic will cling to and fall like a rock. It can be fun when it happens, but it’s rarely of your intention. I hope this is something they’re better able to delineate in a followup.

I’m glad Sonic Frontiers earnestly looked at these core elements of Sonic to make something I think has done a lot to understand what me and many other Sonic fans personally adore about the brand despite all its ups and downs, but the future continues to be uncertain. I want them to go further, stabilize the control, make terrain more consistently reactive to your movement, have more vibrantly Sonic aesthetic open areas as the new indulgent playgrounds and if Cyberspace is still going to exist have more variety or consistent 3D handling with the worlds. But I also don’t want them to drop the format they’ve created, more serious yet still cheeky tone, Ian Flynn’s understanding of the characters and the more animesque plotting/spectacle.

But this is Sonic Team, or more specifically, SEGA glaring at them near constant. You never know when they’ll live and learn.

(ps. Someone at Sonic Team really liked Ikaruga)