insuredgecko
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Tears of the Kingdom is one of the most profoundly sad experiences I have had playing a game. It may seem to be a hyperbolic statement, but it is true; it is truly shocking just how much good this game squanders, wholly and absolutely. I am eighteen years old, nervous and afraid to graduate high school and go into the unfamiliar territory of adult life. It’s funny just how well the release of both games is timed. This is all to say, Breath of the Wild is an important game to me. It was my first game, the first game that truly captured me, my mind, body, and soul. The unparalleled freedom on display was wondrous for middle school me, and to me today.
The thing that made BotW so different, and so engaging, from every other open world I’ve played since, was the fact that it wasn’t scared to have lots of open space. Of course, there was still lots to do, but the main engine for exploration was not the fact that there was an external reward waiting for you on the other side of a hill, it was that you could go to that hill, even if it was difficult. And that maybe that hill had a good view, and there was something cool to see. To put it into succinct terms, BotW was allowed to leave things as they were. It was a world reeling from an apocalypse, a world of nature and sparse piano notes drifting through tree leaves and grassy fields. It was a world that was populated, not by people or checklists or things to do, but of places to see, of things to discover for no other reason than you could. To say it was magical feels like an understatement: it felt to me that there was a whole world imprinted onto that game cartridge. It was wondrous.
One of the key aspects holding this game back is the fact that the map is reused. This may not serve to be much of a problem at first, but once you realize just how wildly different the design philosophy and ethos are in Tears, things start to fall apart. Impressively, Tears of the Kingdom held this same wonder for me, initially. Upon realizing the breadth and scope of the Great Sky Island, I was incredibly excited. If we could expect this level of scope from the sky, this level of creativity and boundless ambition, then surely this would live up to its legendary predecessor. Truly, TotK is an incredibly bizarre game in this regard. On the surface, the two games look incredibly similar - and they are - but the design ethos of the sequel is so wildly different from the original that it’s so jarring when you’re reminded that this is, fundamentally, BotW but bigger and bolder. The game attempts to remind you of BotW only when it is convenient. The Great Sky Island is the Great Plateau, and clearly trying to emulate that idea, of a microcosm of the game serving as a tutorial. Unfortunately, with the scope of the game ballooning massively, it is impossible to do this in TotK. As a result, there are many mechanics - and in a truly baffling move, even an entire ability - that is simply left up to the player to find out on their own. This wouldn’t be an issue if these mechanics were not integral to the experience. Autobuild especially should have absolutely been given to you upon completing the tutorial area, and I really don’t know why it isn’t.
Comparing the Great Sky Island to the Great Plateau is a good way to see just how different - and more messy - TotK is as a game compared to BotW. The Great Sky Island has to introduce everything BotW did - climbing, sprinting, stamina, spirit orb / light of blessings, all four key abilities, temperature change, day/night cycle, cooking, story, and more, all while not overwhelming the player - in addition to Zonai devices, crystallized charges, energy wells, Zonaite, Ultrahand, a new story that is a direct sequel (so considerably more difficult), caves.. the list goes on. It is so massive, in fact, that there are entire swaths to the game not explained whatsoever, like different map layers, gloom, the entirety of the depths, Autobuild, Zonaite cost for building new structures via Autobuild, et cetera. Breath was already a massive game, and to add even more on top of that, while still accommodating new players who haven’t played Breath, means the game simply bites off more than it can chew.
There is a general sentiment that Tears is the true Breath, that the prequel was somehow just a test run. I don’t buy it. Truly, what is better in Tears that was in Breath? Combat remains wholly unchanged, with the exception of Fuse, which simply adds more busywork to the act of obtaining a strong weapon, and destroys weapon economy even more. Exploration is exactly the same, with the exception of Zonai devices, which only serve to make exploration easier, and areas gated off by story progression, like Thunderhead Isle, Construct Factory and Spirit Temple. Story is decidedly worse, a retread of the story of the prior game, but it has big anime beams and massive explosions and more cutscenes, so I guess that makes it better? Side quests are decidedly middle of the road, though I enjoyed the Lucky Clover Gazette quest chain.
So what is new? Mainly, story, traversal, and map. The main map of Hyrule, still by and large the most interesting place to explore, has been remixed with new environmental concerns, ruins falling from the sky, chasms splitting open the ground, and the general advancements of various settlements. Then there is the sky. It is truly, truly shocking to me that the tutorial area is the largest Sky Island in the game. These sky islands mostly serve as a distraction, and it’s really unfortunate, because they’re where the game is at its best: building Zonai contraptions to traverse the sky and visit far off locales. These are so small, however, that the non-dungeon sky islands were only around 10% of my total playtime. I don’t understand why they were so widely advertised when there are so little of them within the game.
If having too little space is the problem of the sky, then the depths have the same problem. The most memorable part of the game was falling down that first chasm, falling for what felt like forever, into the depths of the land. A whole new map, the size of all of Hyrule, is truly an exciting prospect. It is grand, like Hyrule, but that is where the similarities end, because there is simply no diversity in the depths. Spend a few hours down there and that’s it. There’s only two biomes - the main biome and lava falls - and only two main POI, being mines and Yiga hideouts. Everything else is just materials farming. Better weapons, the game’s only source of Zonaite, and the only source of crystallized charges. On paper, sure, it sounds like a lot. But without the visual variety that Hyrule offers, it’s simply unfun to explore, becoming a chore entirely by midgame, when you’re just going lightroot to lightroot, surprised by nothing and disappointed by everything.
The main map is BotW’s map, but with more things to do. it’s the best part of the game, but that’s because it’s from the better game: everything here, you’ve seen before. Shrines are the same, almost entirely a joke (although combat shrines are improved), there are towers, stables, villages, and now with caves and chasms dotting the map. The caves and wells are cool, but they’re not enough. There’s simply not enough here for it to be its own game.
Tears of the Kingdom is Breath of the Wild but louder, bolder, bigger. It's a worse game for it.
The thing that made BotW so different, and so engaging, from every other open world I’ve played since, was the fact that it wasn’t scared to have lots of open space. Of course, there was still lots to do, but the main engine for exploration was not the fact that there was an external reward waiting for you on the other side of a hill, it was that you could go to that hill, even if it was difficult. And that maybe that hill had a good view, and there was something cool to see. To put it into succinct terms, BotW was allowed to leave things as they were. It was a world reeling from an apocalypse, a world of nature and sparse piano notes drifting through tree leaves and grassy fields. It was a world that was populated, not by people or checklists or things to do, but of places to see, of things to discover for no other reason than you could. To say it was magical feels like an understatement: it felt to me that there was a whole world imprinted onto that game cartridge. It was wondrous.
One of the key aspects holding this game back is the fact that the map is reused. This may not serve to be much of a problem at first, but once you realize just how wildly different the design philosophy and ethos are in Tears, things start to fall apart. Impressively, Tears of the Kingdom held this same wonder for me, initially. Upon realizing the breadth and scope of the Great Sky Island, I was incredibly excited. If we could expect this level of scope from the sky, this level of creativity and boundless ambition, then surely this would live up to its legendary predecessor. Truly, TotK is an incredibly bizarre game in this regard. On the surface, the two games look incredibly similar - and they are - but the design ethos of the sequel is so wildly different from the original that it’s so jarring when you’re reminded that this is, fundamentally, BotW but bigger and bolder. The game attempts to remind you of BotW only when it is convenient. The Great Sky Island is the Great Plateau, and clearly trying to emulate that idea, of a microcosm of the game serving as a tutorial. Unfortunately, with the scope of the game ballooning massively, it is impossible to do this in TotK. As a result, there are many mechanics - and in a truly baffling move, even an entire ability - that is simply left up to the player to find out on their own. This wouldn’t be an issue if these mechanics were not integral to the experience. Autobuild especially should have absolutely been given to you upon completing the tutorial area, and I really don’t know why it isn’t.
Comparing the Great Sky Island to the Great Plateau is a good way to see just how different - and more messy - TotK is as a game compared to BotW. The Great Sky Island has to introduce everything BotW did - climbing, sprinting, stamina, spirit orb / light of blessings, all four key abilities, temperature change, day/night cycle, cooking, story, and more, all while not overwhelming the player - in addition to Zonai devices, crystallized charges, energy wells, Zonaite, Ultrahand, a new story that is a direct sequel (so considerably more difficult), caves.. the list goes on. It is so massive, in fact, that there are entire swaths to the game not explained whatsoever, like different map layers, gloom, the entirety of the depths, Autobuild, Zonaite cost for building new structures via Autobuild, et cetera. Breath was already a massive game, and to add even more on top of that, while still accommodating new players who haven’t played Breath, means the game simply bites off more than it can chew.
There is a general sentiment that Tears is the true Breath, that the prequel was somehow just a test run. I don’t buy it. Truly, what is better in Tears that was in Breath? Combat remains wholly unchanged, with the exception of Fuse, which simply adds more busywork to the act of obtaining a strong weapon, and destroys weapon economy even more. Exploration is exactly the same, with the exception of Zonai devices, which only serve to make exploration easier, and areas gated off by story progression, like Thunderhead Isle, Construct Factory and Spirit Temple. Story is decidedly worse, a retread of the story of the prior game, but it has big anime beams and massive explosions and more cutscenes, so I guess that makes it better? Side quests are decidedly middle of the road, though I enjoyed the Lucky Clover Gazette quest chain.
So what is new? Mainly, story, traversal, and map. The main map of Hyrule, still by and large the most interesting place to explore, has been remixed with new environmental concerns, ruins falling from the sky, chasms splitting open the ground, and the general advancements of various settlements. Then there is the sky. It is truly, truly shocking to me that the tutorial area is the largest Sky Island in the game. These sky islands mostly serve as a distraction, and it’s really unfortunate, because they’re where the game is at its best: building Zonai contraptions to traverse the sky and visit far off locales. These are so small, however, that the non-dungeon sky islands were only around 10% of my total playtime. I don’t understand why they were so widely advertised when there are so little of them within the game.
If having too little space is the problem of the sky, then the depths have the same problem. The most memorable part of the game was falling down that first chasm, falling for what felt like forever, into the depths of the land. A whole new map, the size of all of Hyrule, is truly an exciting prospect. It is grand, like Hyrule, but that is where the similarities end, because there is simply no diversity in the depths. Spend a few hours down there and that’s it. There’s only two biomes - the main biome and lava falls - and only two main POI, being mines and Yiga hideouts. Everything else is just materials farming. Better weapons, the game’s only source of Zonaite, and the only source of crystallized charges. On paper, sure, it sounds like a lot. But without the visual variety that Hyrule offers, it’s simply unfun to explore, becoming a chore entirely by midgame, when you’re just going lightroot to lightroot, surprised by nothing and disappointed by everything.
The main map is BotW’s map, but with more things to do. it’s the best part of the game, but that’s because it’s from the better game: everything here, you’ve seen before. Shrines are the same, almost entirely a joke (although combat shrines are improved), there are towers, stables, villages, and now with caves and chasms dotting the map. The caves and wells are cool, but they’re not enough. There’s simply not enough here for it to be its own game.
Tears of the Kingdom is Breath of the Wild but louder, bolder, bigger. It's a worse game for it.
It’s very weird to see a series that has until now had such a small, tight team with a very clear authorial voice jump in prestige so that we’re now several rereleases out and firmly in the realm of originally unintended sequels and spinoffs. I didn’t realize that Apollo Justice actually preceded this game in release or I WOULD have played that one first and even now that I’ve committed to cleaving the series in half by trilogy with this little stop off in Investigation town in between. my brain is beginning to itch a bit. But it’s a neat exercise to get such a hard break in style from the original games and this one, which sees Takeshi Yamazaki (who came onto the series during the DS rerelease period and seemed like mostly an odd job guy before getting a planning gig on Apollo Justice) as the scenario writer, working closely with relative series newcomer Motohide Eshiro in the producer role to innovate the gameplay quirks that define this subseries. The fresh writing alone gives the game a very distinct vibe from its predecessors for better and worse.
The shift towards investigating with the intent to prosecute crimes places a greater focus on the methodology of the acts you’re looking into, and cases are generally speaking really complex in this game, and less structured, which I think is good. Investigations are more dynamic to begin with just by virtue of moving a little guy around a usually pretty limited screen, which drastically reduces pixel hunting – but they also only go as long as they need to because you’re not inhibited by the two-or-three day long trial system. It leads to a more natural progression. Edgeworth’s special logic minigame where he pieces together little bits of information in his mind as he collects them is unfortunately simple the whole time but it doesn’t ever stop being satisfying in the way that getting an answer right in these games almost always is. That’s the saving grace of the game – the act of playing Ace Attorney simply feels good.
The grace needs to be saved because the PACING is completely dreadful the entire time. There’s no punch, no drama to any of the cases here. Not even one time do you nail a villain at the end of a chapter with a big drop of a huge reveal or a satisfying click of a puzzle piece coming together. More than once I was caught off guard when I finished a case because I didn’t realize that the small, mundane piece of information I’d just revealed was going to be the clincher. This is at its worst in the final case, which might be the longest finale in the series, or maybe it only FEELS like it is, because it is so deeply tied to the previous case and it completely solved all of the emotional arcs of every major character roughly two hours before the game ends. Yeah you wrap up your spunky teenaged sidekick’s traumatic backstory, you earn the respect and friendship of the interpol detective who hates prosecutors, you solve the decade-old mystery of the phantom thief that’s haunted the game.
But what’s this? You have to catch the guy who runs the smuggling ring! Who killed….some guy! And it’s SO easy. Not once in this sequence did I find myself unable to immediately guess the correct answer to a riddle fifteen minutes before I was allowed to present it, and we are CONSTANTLY being interrupted by new characters storming into the room not to save the day but to do comedy bits. It doesn’t really spoil the mood though because there’s NOT really a mood to spoil because like I’ve mentioned nobody really cares at this point beyond the basic principle of not liking asshole murderers getting away with it!
On the subject of Too Many Characters, this is a place where the game strikes me as particularly insecure. This game is a nonstop parade of guys I Did Not Need To See Again. Why is Maggie Byrde making her third appearance? Why is Officer Meeks here for one scene? How do we, as a polite society, keep letting Wendy Oldbag have bigger and bigger roles in these games even though she continues to have One Joke and it Sucks Ass??? It’s tough because it sucks in both directions. On one hand, everybody involved in this series (including Shu Takumi, he is not innocent here) should be tried in a criminal court for the character assassination of Larry Butz, who in the first game was a kind of mean and stupid guy who is unlucky in love but ultimately has a heart of gold and is a key person in the lives of both of his friends and over time has become a moronic creep who will try to fuck any child he meets and doesn’t understand most of the things that come out of his own mouth. On the other hand I would love to spend more time with Ema Skye, I would love to check in with her, see what she’s up to, hear all about what she’s got going on. There’s a lot of potential for that character, especially free from the shadow of her big story in the re-release of Ace Attorney 1. Why is she only in one screen of the entire game?? If she’s gonna be here she should be here. It feels weird and desperate, like they’re scared I won’t like the game if they don’t constantly jangle keys in the shape of guys I remember in front of my face.
It’s a shame too because I do think the original characters are the actual best part of the game. I like Ema but I think in her original appearance she’s way too much of a Maya clone, distinguished mostly by having a Different Gimmick rather than a different personality. Kay Faraday is a completely different genre of spunky teen sidekick than either of the previous girls, and I find her endlessly funny and charming. Aggressively weird and goofy and cool and with a very fun gimmick that she clings to based on a series of genuinely affecting tragedies. Everyone in her orbit rocks too, Callisto Yew and Detective Badd both hall of fame Ace Attorney guys. Lang’s drama is not convincing to me but his connection to Shih-na is and his reactions to how their relationship evolves salvage him for me, and his affection for his subordinates is by far the funniest joke in the entire series. The original stuff here is consistently the best shit in the game. I wish it felt like they knew that.
For the first game that as far as I know had zero involvement from the series creator, it’s really interesting to see how it feels the same and how it feels different, and where it’s successful and where it’s not. I think the flaws are desperately glaring, and they are unfortunately mostly play-related, but the moment-to-moment act of Doing Ace Attorney is maybe the best it’s ever been. I just wish it was remotely as impactful as it ever had been in the past.
The shift towards investigating with the intent to prosecute crimes places a greater focus on the methodology of the acts you’re looking into, and cases are generally speaking really complex in this game, and less structured, which I think is good. Investigations are more dynamic to begin with just by virtue of moving a little guy around a usually pretty limited screen, which drastically reduces pixel hunting – but they also only go as long as they need to because you’re not inhibited by the two-or-three day long trial system. It leads to a more natural progression. Edgeworth’s special logic minigame where he pieces together little bits of information in his mind as he collects them is unfortunately simple the whole time but it doesn’t ever stop being satisfying in the way that getting an answer right in these games almost always is. That’s the saving grace of the game – the act of playing Ace Attorney simply feels good.
The grace needs to be saved because the PACING is completely dreadful the entire time. There’s no punch, no drama to any of the cases here. Not even one time do you nail a villain at the end of a chapter with a big drop of a huge reveal or a satisfying click of a puzzle piece coming together. More than once I was caught off guard when I finished a case because I didn’t realize that the small, mundane piece of information I’d just revealed was going to be the clincher. This is at its worst in the final case, which might be the longest finale in the series, or maybe it only FEELS like it is, because it is so deeply tied to the previous case and it completely solved all of the emotional arcs of every major character roughly two hours before the game ends. Yeah you wrap up your spunky teenaged sidekick’s traumatic backstory, you earn the respect and friendship of the interpol detective who hates prosecutors, you solve the decade-old mystery of the phantom thief that’s haunted the game.
But what’s this? You have to catch the guy who runs the smuggling ring! Who killed….some guy! And it’s SO easy. Not once in this sequence did I find myself unable to immediately guess the correct answer to a riddle fifteen minutes before I was allowed to present it, and we are CONSTANTLY being interrupted by new characters storming into the room not to save the day but to do comedy bits. It doesn’t really spoil the mood though because there’s NOT really a mood to spoil because like I’ve mentioned nobody really cares at this point beyond the basic principle of not liking asshole murderers getting away with it!
On the subject of Too Many Characters, this is a place where the game strikes me as particularly insecure. This game is a nonstop parade of guys I Did Not Need To See Again. Why is Maggie Byrde making her third appearance? Why is Officer Meeks here for one scene? How do we, as a polite society, keep letting Wendy Oldbag have bigger and bigger roles in these games even though she continues to have One Joke and it Sucks Ass??? It’s tough because it sucks in both directions. On one hand, everybody involved in this series (including Shu Takumi, he is not innocent here) should be tried in a criminal court for the character assassination of Larry Butz, who in the first game was a kind of mean and stupid guy who is unlucky in love but ultimately has a heart of gold and is a key person in the lives of both of his friends and over time has become a moronic creep who will try to fuck any child he meets and doesn’t understand most of the things that come out of his own mouth. On the other hand I would love to spend more time with Ema Skye, I would love to check in with her, see what she’s up to, hear all about what she’s got going on. There’s a lot of potential for that character, especially free from the shadow of her big story in the re-release of Ace Attorney 1. Why is she only in one screen of the entire game?? If she’s gonna be here she should be here. It feels weird and desperate, like they’re scared I won’t like the game if they don’t constantly jangle keys in the shape of guys I remember in front of my face.
It’s a shame too because I do think the original characters are the actual best part of the game. I like Ema but I think in her original appearance she’s way too much of a Maya clone, distinguished mostly by having a Different Gimmick rather than a different personality. Kay Faraday is a completely different genre of spunky teen sidekick than either of the previous girls, and I find her endlessly funny and charming. Aggressively weird and goofy and cool and with a very fun gimmick that she clings to based on a series of genuinely affecting tragedies. Everyone in her orbit rocks too, Callisto Yew and Detective Badd both hall of fame Ace Attorney guys. Lang’s drama is not convincing to me but his connection to Shih-na is and his reactions to how their relationship evolves salvage him for me, and his affection for his subordinates is by far the funniest joke in the entire series. The original stuff here is consistently the best shit in the game. I wish it felt like they knew that.
For the first game that as far as I know had zero involvement from the series creator, it’s really interesting to see how it feels the same and how it feels different, and where it’s successful and where it’s not. I think the flaws are desperately glaring, and they are unfortunately mostly play-related, but the moment-to-moment act of Doing Ace Attorney is maybe the best it’s ever been. I just wish it was remotely as impactful as it ever had been in the past.
The strongest whip Belmont fan can't beat the weakest Eric Lecarde fan
I love Castlevania so much I wish dying was real
Convinced that the development process of this game as the writers spending most of their time making sure that one trial goes as hard as physically possible and then realizing "Oh yeah, we need three more of these"
Why would I ever have sex when there's no way it can be even half as good as this game
Don't make the mistake of playing this on keyboard like I did
This game might be kind of good
Unpopular opinion and scorching hot take: This is good
That's what the mask is
That's what the point of the mask is
That's what the point of the mask is
The fact that the goofy orca DLC case is unironically better than any of the actual Dual Destinies cases is simultaneously the funniest thing ever and the saddest thing ever
This game feels like it was made to strawman a political ideology that doesn't even exist
My first experience with a Castlevania game was Portrait of Ruin. I enjoyed it fine enough, but it didn't really stick with me all that much. Next, I played a couple levels of Castlevania IV but never came back to it. The little I played was fun but never totally hooked me. Then, at the end of the summer of 2019, I played Bloodstained Ritual of the Night. I had a blast playing it, so much so I ended up Platinuming it. This got me excited to play Symphony of the Night (which I conveniently bought at a convention a month prior to playing Bloodstained). Fast forward to March 2020 apparently (I literally thought it was October 2020, guess that year really was a blur) and I decided to finally play SOTN. I had such a great time, but thought it was more comparable to Bloodstained. A really fun time but nothing amazing. Well I'm happy to say this replay has changed my mind on this game for the most part.
The first thing you'll notice about this game, and it's one of its best aspects, is the presentation. At least from what games I played, it's the best looking PS1 game or one of the best at least. That's the power of sprites, they consistently stay appealing unlike some early PS1 titles. Plus, the really cool part is the game mixes both spritework and 3d models and it gives it this really unique look that I love. When you see those book enemies in the library or the coffin after saving, they stand out so much amidst all the 2d spritework...and they look good too!
The other best aspect of this game is undoubtedly the soundtrack. I remembered Dracula's Castle and Lost painting quite fondly but the entire soundtrack is absolutely fantastic. It ranges from jazz to classical to metal, it has it all. The colosseum theme became another favorite of mine among the aforementioned two. God is it so catchy, I love it. A great soundtrack can really win a game over for me and this one does not disappoint.
As for the actual gameplay, it's fun! The movement is very fluid in this game which is nice. Alucard has this backwards dash thing that's very helpful in getting around. Instead of using one whip and upgrading it a couple times like in Classicvania, Alucard has a large assortment of weapons to choose from. He still has a whip, but now he can use all different types of swords, daggers, rods etc. They have different ranges and different stab rates which just makes the combat more varied and fun. You also have these spells that require you to put in a button combo to use them. I personally never got the hang of these too much but it's really cool how you can activate from the start of the game if you know the combos. There's also a familar system which let's you assign a little fella that goes alongside you, levels up and grows stronger. I thought that was pretty neat but was more of an afterthought when I was playing.
This game gives you a lot more options as you can see, and that's because unlike past Castlevania games...this game is nonlinear. Instead of playing through levels, you go through a large interconnected castle....collecting different abilities that let you progress through even more of the castle. Thus, the vania part of Metroidvania was born. For such a groundbreaking title, how is the item progression handled in this game? I Honestly thought it was much less of a focus than the combat. There's not many progression abilities in this game, just never felt like the focus was on the exploration while using new abilities...it was moreso let's explore this part of the castle and level up and shit. Maybe that's just me but for item based exploration, I much prefer Metroid. The backtracking was not as fun as it was in something like Metroid either, there's warps which is nice but I had to constantly trek back and forth between certain areas, some more secret shortcuts or something would've been nice. Either way, the castle is a lot of fun to explore...but I guess there's actually two of them huh.
So the inverted castle overall is actually kinda cool. The game get's really easy in the mid-game cuz you become so overpowered by that point and doesn't get hard again until the inverted castle. Hoo boy tho, some parts of the inverted castle can kick your ass. The harder difficulty and the new enemies/bosses I did really enjoy when going through the castle essentially a second time. Cuz yeah, it's pretty much padding...but like it's changed enough where I didn't mind really. The OST also gets changed to the same 4 or so songs which is kinda meh but at least Lost Painting is one of them.
I forgot to mention the bosses. Most of them are just alright. A lot of them are pretty easy but nothing bad. A couple of them kinda stink, especially Beezlebub. I think that boss is the only down right bad part of the game. He's either dummy easy with certain sub weapons, or annoying as shit. I remember him giving me trouble when I initially played the game and yeah, he was no different this time around.
Hmm what else...oh yeah I actually thought the story was pretty cool for what it was. I really enjoyed the whole dynamic with Alucard, Dracula and Lisa. Those scenes were super interesting. The voice acting is obviously pretty cheesy but I think it fits incredibly well with a game like this, idk I liked it a lot. I was also trying to get 200.6% but missed a couple tiles so I got 198 something %. Pretty sure I got the best ending tho so that's good.
A couple more miscellaneous things, I really like how many secrets/little details this game has. I feel like every playthrough you'd be discovering something new. Also, the official artwork for this game absolutely fucks man, it's amazing. Alucard is so hot.
Alright I should probably end this here, it's 2:30 in the morning and I'm just here writing what might be my longest review lol. Idk man, there was a lot to say, hope I didn't ramble on for too long. It's not perfect imo but this game overall is pretty fantastic. I still prefer Super Metroid tho personally. Next is Bloodborne my beloved and hopefully I can beat that before Mario Wonder on the 20th.
The first thing you'll notice about this game, and it's one of its best aspects, is the presentation. At least from what games I played, it's the best looking PS1 game or one of the best at least. That's the power of sprites, they consistently stay appealing unlike some early PS1 titles. Plus, the really cool part is the game mixes both spritework and 3d models and it gives it this really unique look that I love. When you see those book enemies in the library or the coffin after saving, they stand out so much amidst all the 2d spritework...and they look good too!
The other best aspect of this game is undoubtedly the soundtrack. I remembered Dracula's Castle and Lost painting quite fondly but the entire soundtrack is absolutely fantastic. It ranges from jazz to classical to metal, it has it all. The colosseum theme became another favorite of mine among the aforementioned two. God is it so catchy, I love it. A great soundtrack can really win a game over for me and this one does not disappoint.
As for the actual gameplay, it's fun! The movement is very fluid in this game which is nice. Alucard has this backwards dash thing that's very helpful in getting around. Instead of using one whip and upgrading it a couple times like in Classicvania, Alucard has a large assortment of weapons to choose from. He still has a whip, but now he can use all different types of swords, daggers, rods etc. They have different ranges and different stab rates which just makes the combat more varied and fun. You also have these spells that require you to put in a button combo to use them. I personally never got the hang of these too much but it's really cool how you can activate from the start of the game if you know the combos. There's also a familar system which let's you assign a little fella that goes alongside you, levels up and grows stronger. I thought that was pretty neat but was more of an afterthought when I was playing.
This game gives you a lot more options as you can see, and that's because unlike past Castlevania games...this game is nonlinear. Instead of playing through levels, you go through a large interconnected castle....collecting different abilities that let you progress through even more of the castle. Thus, the vania part of Metroidvania was born. For such a groundbreaking title, how is the item progression handled in this game? I Honestly thought it was much less of a focus than the combat. There's not many progression abilities in this game, just never felt like the focus was on the exploration while using new abilities...it was moreso let's explore this part of the castle and level up and shit. Maybe that's just me but for item based exploration, I much prefer Metroid. The backtracking was not as fun as it was in something like Metroid either, there's warps which is nice but I had to constantly trek back and forth between certain areas, some more secret shortcuts or something would've been nice. Either way, the castle is a lot of fun to explore...but I guess there's actually two of them huh.
So the inverted castle overall is actually kinda cool. The game get's really easy in the mid-game cuz you become so overpowered by that point and doesn't get hard again until the inverted castle. Hoo boy tho, some parts of the inverted castle can kick your ass. The harder difficulty and the new enemies/bosses I did really enjoy when going through the castle essentially a second time. Cuz yeah, it's pretty much padding...but like it's changed enough where I didn't mind really. The OST also gets changed to the same 4 or so songs which is kinda meh but at least Lost Painting is one of them.
I forgot to mention the bosses. Most of them are just alright. A lot of them are pretty easy but nothing bad. A couple of them kinda stink, especially Beezlebub. I think that boss is the only down right bad part of the game. He's either dummy easy with certain sub weapons, or annoying as shit. I remember him giving me trouble when I initially played the game and yeah, he was no different this time around.
Hmm what else...oh yeah I actually thought the story was pretty cool for what it was. I really enjoyed the whole dynamic with Alucard, Dracula and Lisa. Those scenes were super interesting. The voice acting is obviously pretty cheesy but I think it fits incredibly well with a game like this, idk I liked it a lot. I was also trying to get 200.6% but missed a couple tiles so I got 198 something %. Pretty sure I got the best ending tho so that's good.
A couple more miscellaneous things, I really like how many secrets/little details this game has. I feel like every playthrough you'd be discovering something new. Also, the official artwork for this game absolutely fucks man, it's amazing. Alucard is so hot.
Alright I should probably end this here, it's 2:30 in the morning and I'm just here writing what might be my longest review lol. Idk man, there was a lot to say, hope I didn't ramble on for too long. It's not perfect imo but this game overall is pretty fantastic. I still prefer Super Metroid tho personally. Next is Bloodborne my beloved and hopefully I can beat that before Mario Wonder on the 20th.
Super Mario Bros Wonder is an interesting case. After four New Super Mario Bros games and them not being super innovative compared to each other, 2D Mario had become stale. Were they bad games? No, they just didn't do anything special in the slightest. Now after 10+ years since the last NSMB game, we have the next big 2D Mario game, Mario Wonder. Does it do enough different from the NSMB series? Hell yeah it does! Am I totally in love with it and consider it peak 2D Mario like a lot of people have been feeling? Sadly no, it has several issues that really hold it back in my eyes. But it does do a lot right.
The biggest change from NSMB and one of the best aspects of this game is the changed art style. Gone is the very samey art style that was used in all the NSMB games. Now Mario and the gang are expressive as ever and really feel more like their more classic games. There's so many different animations for various moves and interactions with things, it's great. They even brought back Mario's hat moving up and down when he jumps from Mario World. There was clearly a lot of love put into the overall style of the game, definitely a much-needed change, I think.
Another really nice change is just the amount of new stuff they crammed into this game. This game is absolutely filled to the brim with brand new enemies and level gimmicks. There were some returning enemies ofc but like 80% of the enemies in this game were all brand new, and that's just awesome imo. And as for the level gimmicks, they tie into the new wonder flower which basically just throws all kinds of ideas at you. One level you may see singing piranha plants, another one you might see Mario turn into a spiked ball. There's even one where you ride this super cool dragon, man that was cool. The abundance of different ideas, even if they do get reused sometimes, is just very immense.
I also enjoyed the secrets this game had. It's definitely not as expansive as Mario World in that regard but finding the game's secrets were pretty fun. Especially since it unlocked the special world that you can access early on like Mario World, man that was cool. I'd say I enjoyed most of the worlds in this game actually besides World 3 (idk it was just lame) but besides that every world was pretty solid. My favorite world though had to been 4 just because I remember being really impressed with some of the levels there.
Badges were whatever. I didn't really use them most of the time because I felt they made the game easier depending on the badge. The badge levels tho were pretty cool even if a little short.
Alright time for the negatives, why I don't love this game as much as everyone else. One of the biggest issues I had was the difficulty curve. I honestly did not think this game had a good climb in difficulty. I found every world pretty easy for the most part up until the bowser levels, which amped it up a little bit. And then the final badge stage was actually decently tough. I found past games, even the NSMB games to have a much better difficulty curve. Speaking of that final badge stage, while I found that somewhat difficult (even if it did have 3 checkpoints in it, that and the final regular stage in the special world were nowhere near as hard as some of the final stages in some of the more recent Mario games. Found that somewhat disappointing along with the easier difficulty as a whole.
Another thing I didn't like were the lackluster bosses. Reusing Bowser Jr 4 times was just really lame imo. They got so creative with the levels and they end up doing that for the bosses? Man, that's just so much missed potential I think. Speaking of the final Bowser fight, it was alright? It was again easy but also felt uninspired. Like the first thing I thought of when I saw it was the final boss to DKCR. Idk, they could've done much better with it along with the bosses as a whole.
Something else that kinda irked me, while I do like how experimental a lot of the levels can be, a chunk of them just felt like filler. You have your regular levels, your little badge levels which is fine but then you have these break levels that sometimes take literally 5 seconds to beat. I'd much rather play actual full-length levels instead and a lot of the time I just said out loud "what was the point of that". Idk, I never hated any of them, again they just felt more like filler.
I guess one more little thing that annoyed me, and it ties into the easiness of the game, is the fact that when you collect those purple coins worth 10 and then die, you keep it even after dying. Star coins never worked like that in the NSMB games and it makes certain levels that would otherwise be pretty tough to 100%, super easy.
The talking flowers I'm neutral on. They can be kinda funny but they never made me hate them nor like them too much. They're just kind of there and don't disrupt the gameplay really.
Before ending the review tho, I will say after beating the final final badge level, that final badge you get is very awesome. I just love how weird the developers got with this game, that badge reminded me of that one song in We Love Katamari lol. Also the end credits to the game were really cool too.
In the end I did really enjoy this game and it's definitely a step-up from the NSMB games overall. However, it has enough issues imo that hold it back from being really great. I know that's a hot take, I'm not expecting a ton of people to agree with me but I'd take Mario World any day over this game personally. I'd put this game around on par with Mario 3 and 3D World methinks. Also speaking of Mario World, playing this made me wanna replay that so that's what I'm gonna do. Look out for that review next!
7.5/10
The biggest change from NSMB and one of the best aspects of this game is the changed art style. Gone is the very samey art style that was used in all the NSMB games. Now Mario and the gang are expressive as ever and really feel more like their more classic games. There's so many different animations for various moves and interactions with things, it's great. They even brought back Mario's hat moving up and down when he jumps from Mario World. There was clearly a lot of love put into the overall style of the game, definitely a much-needed change, I think.
Another really nice change is just the amount of new stuff they crammed into this game. This game is absolutely filled to the brim with brand new enemies and level gimmicks. There were some returning enemies ofc but like 80% of the enemies in this game were all brand new, and that's just awesome imo. And as for the level gimmicks, they tie into the new wonder flower which basically just throws all kinds of ideas at you. One level you may see singing piranha plants, another one you might see Mario turn into a spiked ball. There's even one where you ride this super cool dragon, man that was cool. The abundance of different ideas, even if they do get reused sometimes, is just very immense.
I also enjoyed the secrets this game had. It's definitely not as expansive as Mario World in that regard but finding the game's secrets were pretty fun. Especially since it unlocked the special world that you can access early on like Mario World, man that was cool. I'd say I enjoyed most of the worlds in this game actually besides World 3 (idk it was just lame) but besides that every world was pretty solid. My favorite world though had to been 4 just because I remember being really impressed with some of the levels there.
Badges were whatever. I didn't really use them most of the time because I felt they made the game easier depending on the badge. The badge levels tho were pretty cool even if a little short.
Alright time for the negatives, why I don't love this game as much as everyone else. One of the biggest issues I had was the difficulty curve. I honestly did not think this game had a good climb in difficulty. I found every world pretty easy for the most part up until the bowser levels, which amped it up a little bit. And then the final badge stage was actually decently tough. I found past games, even the NSMB games to have a much better difficulty curve. Speaking of that final badge stage, while I found that somewhat difficult (even if it did have 3 checkpoints in it, that and the final regular stage in the special world were nowhere near as hard as some of the final stages in some of the more recent Mario games. Found that somewhat disappointing along with the easier difficulty as a whole.
Another thing I didn't like were the lackluster bosses. Reusing Bowser Jr 4 times was just really lame imo. They got so creative with the levels and they end up doing that for the bosses? Man, that's just so much missed potential I think. Speaking of the final Bowser fight, it was alright? It was again easy but also felt uninspired. Like the first thing I thought of when I saw it was the final boss to DKCR. Idk, they could've done much better with it along with the bosses as a whole.
Something else that kinda irked me, while I do like how experimental a lot of the levels can be, a chunk of them just felt like filler. You have your regular levels, your little badge levels which is fine but then you have these break levels that sometimes take literally 5 seconds to beat. I'd much rather play actual full-length levels instead and a lot of the time I just said out loud "what was the point of that". Idk, I never hated any of them, again they just felt more like filler.
I guess one more little thing that annoyed me, and it ties into the easiness of the game, is the fact that when you collect those purple coins worth 10 and then die, you keep it even after dying. Star coins never worked like that in the NSMB games and it makes certain levels that would otherwise be pretty tough to 100%, super easy.
The talking flowers I'm neutral on. They can be kinda funny but they never made me hate them nor like them too much. They're just kind of there and don't disrupt the gameplay really.
Before ending the review tho, I will say after beating the final final badge level, that final badge you get is very awesome. I just love how weird the developers got with this game, that badge reminded me of that one song in We Love Katamari lol. Also the end credits to the game were really cool too.
In the end I did really enjoy this game and it's definitely a step-up from the NSMB games overall. However, it has enough issues imo that hold it back from being really great. I know that's a hot take, I'm not expecting a ton of people to agree with me but I'd take Mario World any day over this game personally. I'd put this game around on par with Mario 3 and 3D World methinks. Also speaking of Mario World, playing this made me wanna replay that so that's what I'm gonna do. Look out for that review next!
7.5/10
I love Sonic the Hedgehog.
Playing through Sonic Frontiers for the first time, it was hard not to have a big, dumb smile on my face when Kellin Quinn’s vocals for Undefeatable or Break Through it All accentuated some of the series’ most spectacular boss fights in recent memory. I appreciated talking to Amy, Knuckles, and Tails, and having these characters feel like characters again, for the first time in a long time. I loved the melancholic story and desolate environments. Although they felt incongruous with the last decade of Sonic’s output, it felt like another bold step forward for Sonic Team, a new horizon, uncharted territory – starting nearly from scratch and reinventing Sonic’s movement yet again was a big gamble, and one that I felt paid off.
Sonic Frontiers was not a perfect Sonic game by any stretch of the imagination. For every triumph there was comparable failure: everything from the stripped down boost gameplay in Cyberspace stages, to the lackluster combat, to the abhorrent pop-in, and obviously much more I won’t discuss here. You’ve probably heard all this before.
Sonic Frontiers was and is not a perfect Sonic game, but if not a step in the right direction - it's at least a proper reorientation, a much-needed weaning from the over-streamlined boost formula from Sonic Forces, and a manifesto that Sonic Team could still, in fact, create a game that - even at its worst - pushed the series forward.
I love Sonic the Hedgehog.
I’ve loved Sonic the Hedgehog since I was a kid. I met my best friend, Garrett, sixteen years ago on YouTube through shared interest in Sonic the Hedgehog. We used to play Xbox Live together. He visited me for my high school graduation. We played through Sonic ‘06 the Summer of 2015. We still visit each other every year or so.
I took a short break from the series when I couldn’t finish Sonic Unleashed, and then jumped back in with Sonic Generations. I remembered why I loved these games to begin with.
Sonic Mania is my favorite game of all time.
When the Sonic Symphony World Tour show was announced in Los Angeles, I asked Garrett to visit me again. We both took a week off work.
This is the same week that Sonic Frontiers’ third and last update was released: the Final Horizon. We agreed to play through it together.
For the first time since Sonic ‘06, we were able to play as Amy Rose in 3D. Exploring Ouranos Island and coming to grips with Amy’s moveset was a joy, at first. She has a triple jump again! She can glide now! We ran into a mini-boss that killed us immediately.
“Let’s just ignore that one,” I told Garrett.
We realized our speed/ring/attack/defense stats had returned to Level One. Amy Rose was a clean slate. No upgrades. We were certainly in no condition to fight an endgame mini-boss.
We hit the story beats we needed to, then the game let us control Knuckles. This was a surprisingly emotional moment. Although it hadn’t been sixteen years since we’d controlled Knuckles, it felt like meeting an old friend.
“Oh, God,” Garrett groaned suddenly as he started to glide around the map.
“What’s wrong?”
He handed me the controller, “Feel this.”
I picked up the controller and started to glide as Knuckles. I understood what he’d meant. The windup was unusual. The turn radius was abysmal. The input delay was horrific.
“What the fuck?” I said out loud. It took a few more minutes before I put the above criticisms into words.
“Yeah,” Garrett laughed, summating, “it doesn’t feel good.”
We spent the most time as Knuckles and, subsequently, experienced two Starfall events, which have a chance to occur randomly each night cycle and allow players to (essentially) farm Koco to upgrade their character’s stats.
The Final Horizon wants to have its cake and eat it, too. Multiple playable characters necessitate a highly varied moveset for each, but to balance it properly, any upgrade materials earned as Sonic do NOT carry over to other characters. Amy, Knuckles, and Tails have their own upgrade materials, their own upgrade trees, their own level progression. HOWEVER, the new Ouranos Island is built in such a way that every character must have a Cyloop ability, and each character must unlock their respective Cyloop ability using their upgrade tree, which requires exploring Ouranos Island and earning enough upgrade points to unlock the Cyloop ability for each character in the first place, so they can explore the island even more and, eventually, complete their main objectives.
It feels unusual, however, to block progression in such a way as to force players to upgrade their characters here. In the base game, Sonic learns new attacks through his skill tree, but none of these are essential to making progress (except for the Cyloop, which is the first ability that Sonic unlocks anyway).
Here, having to use the skill tree to unlock basic abilities for characters like “melee attack” and “parry” that were already regular abilities for Sonic feels arbitrary. It’s not like it takes too long to unlock these abilities anyways, players need only find two or three special Koco to obtain these abilities, but it feels unnecessary.
It’s disappointing. I play with Knuckles for a certain amount of time and learn that he can only climb on certain surfaces, so as to keep the game balance intact. It makes sense, but it doesn’t cushion the blow any. I discovered a challenge that requires Knuckles’ ability to latch onto walls and climb. A cannonball hits me and I fall to my death. I try again. A cannonball hits me. I try to recover and latch onto the wall, but Knuckles doesn’t respond. I fall to my death. I try again.
I remember playing Sonic Adventure 2 Battle on my Nintendo Wii. The year is probably 2007 or 2008. I remember playing through the Hero Story for the first time and finally being able to play as Knuckles. I remember Knuckles’ second level: Pumpkin Hill.
You know me, the fighting freak Knuckles, and we’re at pumpkin hill. You ready?
Nostalgia is a potent drug, strong enough to trick us into believing that even the most unremarkable chapters of our lives are golden, perfect snapshots. Only when we return to these chapters, we find reality is oftentimes much less kind than our memories tend to be.
I’ve replayed almost every mainline Sonic game countless times. I know that I love Sonic Adventure and Sonic Adventure 2 in spite of their flaws.
I know that I love the sensation of gliding through the air as Knuckles, the pure joy of nose-diving in rapid circles, of sticking to each and every surface, of burrowing underground to find hidden treasure. Rats. I know that I love playing as Knuckles. I know that I was disappointed when I played as Knuckles in Sonic Frontiers because it wasn’t the Knuckles I remembered. It wasn’t the Knuckles I fell in love with.
“You’d think they would’ve figured this out by now,” I said to Garrett, mostly out of frustration after another cheap death, “it’s like… I’m thinking about, like, sewers.”
He didn’t know what I meant by that. I tried to explain it and probably ended up sounding like a doofus – completely unintelligible.
“I’m sure there are people who know how to make sewers, and maintain them,” I waffled around the point I was trying to make, “but, you know, I’m not sure that we know how to make them.”
“What?”
“Like, you don’t think about this? That making sewers isn't common knowledge?”
“What are you talking about?”
“How many people know how to make sewers? How many people will know how to make sewers? Imagine everyone who knows how sewers work – one day, they all die, and nobody wrote it down. Like, imagine it’s all tribal knowledge, or something.”
What I meant is that I’m worried. I have so much anxiety about the future. Sometimes I’m worried that nobody is worrying enough. There are entire lexicons, pillars of society, professions, sectors, that will be lost to time – just slowly fading out, forgotten, and by the time somebody realizes that nobody put the fundamentals down to paper, it’ll already be too late.
Another library of Alexandria is lost, every day, for the rest of time, forever.
Somehow, Sonic Team remains incapable of emulating the movement of either Sonic Adventure. It eludes them even now.
In a series where increasingly chaotic galaxy-ending terrors converge on an anthropomorphic hedgehog who has the ability to go Super Saiyan, with each entry escalating in scope, ambition, and performance – the ease of basic movement remains a foreign concept.
The sewers are overflowing with noxious waste. Vile, repugnant sludge. The streets are drowned in garbage. Your home is sinking into bedrock. It’s always been like this.
I remember Knuckles’ second level: Pumpkin Hill.
I remember gliding between the stony mountaintops, scaling the rocky pumpkin obelisks, evading ghosts, chasing oscillating signals of the shattered Emerald. It’s closer…
I remember the sunset skybox. I remember the JPEG artifacts eating the edges of the stony pumpkin mountain faces like sweet fire. I remember the background music, looping around back to its first verse.
We finally got to play as Tails. There was catharsis, exhalation. Our baby boy could fly again. Another finger of the monkey’s paw curled inward.
Our opinions of the Final Horizon diverged much more around this point. Garrett was content to play these characters again, and I couldn’t hide my disappointment.
We traded the controller often. Sometimes one puzzle or platforming section was too difficult or obtuse and either of us would tap in while the other tapped out. Some platforming challenges were puzzles in and of themselves. Every time we died or found ourselves at an impasse, we’d give each other a look, or laugh out loud.
I love Sonic the Hedgehog.
“This is… uh,” I stammered, “this is… like, the next Sonic ‘06.” I said.
Garrett laughed, “Don’t say that.”
Neither of us hated Sonic ‘06, not like a lot of people do. Then again, it was our childhood. Our biases were impossible to avoid. I couldn’t shake the thought. This was the next Sonic ‘06, I thought to myself. For better or for worse.
When we finally assumed control of Sonic and the game directed us to our first (of five) towers, we hit a wall. Although Rhea Island was notorious for its long, perilous tower ascents, it was at least kind enough to provide checkpoints; as we struggled upwards, only to come crashing down once more, we realized there would be no checkpoints.
Sonic Frontiers had become Getting Over It.
Every time we came hurtling back down to earth, I’d start singing $uicideboy$.
One last pic and I’ll be gone
Make it count
Put the flash on
Never really felt like I belonged
So I’ll be on my way
And It won’t be long
We continued, swapped the controller between each other for each attempt, each time a little closer to heaven… nearly an hour later, we’d finally conquered the summit.
We did this, again, and again, and again, until we finally reached the fifth and final tower.
To be fully transparent, there is a lot to like about the Final Horizon. Beyond the novelty of being able to play as Tails, Knuckles, and Amy in 3D again for the first time in over a decade is an achievement, and praiseworthy on its own. Once I was comfortable with Sonic’s movement again, the towers were actually very engaging and memorable platforming challenges that I felt were deserving of their endgame difficulty. Lastly, the additional Cyberspace stages were also fun, much more challenging and interesting ideas with unique gimmicks for each stage – I only wished these were part of the main quest, and not relegated to completely optional content.
That being said, the experience of the final “trial” is probably the worst Sonic Frontiers has to offer. This penultimate boss rush might be the most cynical idea of difficulty I’ve seen in any Sonic game ever. The perfect parry mechanic retroactively cheapens these encounters by demanding frame-perfect timing, and ruins the spectacle by requiring mechanical mastery to proceed.
I’ve finished every Fromsoft Souls game (except for Sekiro) and there wasn’t a single one with parrying mechanics that were this demanding. For my first two attempts, I grappled with Giganto and attempted only to learn the parry timing; if Sonic loses one ring as Super Sonic each second, and the game only gives you 400 rings total for this encounter, that means a regular attempt will average around six-and-a-half minutes. During the thirteen minutes I attempted to learn Giganto’s parry window, I only managed to successfully parry him twice.
This is straight up not finished. Nobody playtested this. Almost every user I’ve seen discussing this boss rush has mentioned that dropping the difficulty down to Easy “fixes” the perfect parry (and it does) but this is not how difficulty should be designed. If almost every player can unanimously clear 99% of the game on the hardest difficulty, but can only progress at the eleventh hour by dropping the difficulty down to Easy, that’s a huge problem.
The new final boss is also marginally better than the older one, by default. This updated final battle features a beefier Super Sonic with blue eyes(!) and a new second phase for Supreme. It also features the absolute worst camera for any Sonic boss fight I’ve played, a brand new targeting mechanic that isn’t explained anywhere, and a cutscene that outright kills you if you don’t have enough rings.
I love Sonic the Hedgehog.
Rolling the final cutscene on the Final Horizon and watching Sonic launch himself through the image of an Eldritch God should’ve been an easy victory lap, but it wasn’t.
“We’re so fucking back,” for better or for worse.
Garrett and I and our friend Jordan (another longtime Sonic fan) were strapped for time as we watched the credits roll. It was 6:15pm. The concert started at 8. We were ready to leave before the credits had finished. I wore the hoodie I bought at the Sonic Speed popup cafe in San Diego. It was 7pm when we hit serious traffic a mile away from the Dolby Theatre.
Garrett and Jordan took turns adding songs to a growing playlist of Sonic OSTs. I sat in near-gridlock, frozen bumper-to-bumper in an ocean of automobiles. Jordan played E102’s theme from Sonic Adventure.
“This makes me feel an emotion that doesn’t exist,” he said.
My eyes glazed over in silent terror. It was 7:30pm. It was only a concert. I knew it wouldn’t be a big deal if we were late. I wanted death. Old habits made playthings of my emotions, paralyzed me. Old anxieties like nightmare tendrils, looming deadlines overhead – the hands of the clock a guillotine ready to drop. I bit my lip. I still wanted death.
Cars moved inches at a time, each red light another eternity. 7:45pm. We finally hit another artery, the lifeblood of the city flowed freely again, us along with it. I found the parking I reserved ahead of time after circling the area once. It’s 7:55pm.
We reached the Dolby Theatre at 8pm on the dot. The three of us walked inside the wide auditorium together as the final countdown began. We sat down. The lights dimmed. As the orchestra started playing, a wave of relief washed over me. We'd made it.
Watching the show, I had to appreciate the accompanying background montage which appeared on a massive monitor above the orchestra, as it highlighted the many flourishes and creative liberties of the performance. The music synchronized to Sonic as he took incoming damage in Labyrinth Zone, prompting audience laughter; or the dramatic flooding sequence in Chemical Plant Zone; or the first appearance of Metal Sonic in Collision Chaos and his eventual defeat in Stardust Speedway.
It was then I realized that Sonic’s greatest strength, as a series, was its many iconic moments. Not only the dramatic story beats, as in cutscenes, but its many instances of semi-interactive storytelling; as in the flooding sequence in Chemical Plant Zone, or running away from an Orca, or an oversized truck, or traversing an upside down castle.
After the intermission, however, was our main event. Not only what we’d been craving all night, but our entire lives.
I've been in love with this series for well over half my life now. When I was a kid, I always used to listen to Sonic the Hedgehog soundtracks. I thought Zebrahead’s His World was the rawest thing I’d ever listened to when I was thirteen. I listened to Crush 40 religiously, each vocal track another unforgettable experience – a story’s climactic end heralded by Johnny Gioeli’s radical vocals.
As the second act began and the first chords of Shadow the Hedgehog’s (I am) All of Me filled the Dolby Theatre, setting the crowd alight, I remembered why I fell in love with the series again.
I don’t even like Shadow the Hedgehog anymore, man. That game sucked!
However, what I’ve always loved was Shadow’s soundtrack –its dark, industrial sounds and heavy metal ethos seeped into every crack and crevice of its experience. When I was a kid, I thought it was the coolest thing ever.
So imagine the experience of seeing Crush 40 live, playing a song you’ve unconsciously memorized the lyrics to forever ago, backed by a full orchestra, in a room filled with Sonic fans screaming the lyrics alongside you.
I never thought I’d be here.
As a kid, I never thought I’d get to see Crush 40 live, and yet here they were. I’d fulfilled one of my oldest wishes. I was able to see Crush 40 live with my best friend.
Kellin Quinn made an appearance for the encore, and performed Break Through It All and Undefeatable. Better memories of Sonic Frontiers resurfaced.
For the final song, Johnny Gioeli joined Kellin Quinn for Live & Learn. Quinn provided backup vocals. Hearing him scream, “Hold on to what if?” cut deep into my soul.
The performance ended.
“Los Angeles,” Johnny addressed us, “we’ve made a beautiful memory here tonight.”
We made our exit shortly after. Garrett told me his only regret was not being able to attend the 3:30 showing as well. Rarely do we get to experience these moments twice.
I love Sonic the Hedgehog, and yet it was hard to not be disappointed by the Final Horizon.
What should’ve been a resounding triumph was neither an encore nor a reprise, but yet another new direction – an unwelcome challenge, a pale imitation of old glories. I was disappointed. But seeing Crush 40 live reminded me why I loved Sonic in the first place.
I’ll cherish these memories. They won’t always be perfect, but sometimes they are.
I know I’ll return to Sonic Frontiers again one day, but for now, yet another chapter of the blue blur’s legacy comes to a close.
In hindsight, I know that even if Sonic Frontiers ended up being poorly received, it wouldn’t kill Sonic. If Sonic ‘06 couldn’t kill Sonic, nothing can kill Sonic. Regardless of whichever new journey the hedgehog embarks on next, I know I’ll be there day one, eager to see what’s in store. After all, the adventure is never solely the end; the adventure ends up being the memories we take with us.
Playing through Sonic Frontiers for the first time, it was hard not to have a big, dumb smile on my face when Kellin Quinn’s vocals for Undefeatable or Break Through it All accentuated some of the series’ most spectacular boss fights in recent memory. I appreciated talking to Amy, Knuckles, and Tails, and having these characters feel like characters again, for the first time in a long time. I loved the melancholic story and desolate environments. Although they felt incongruous with the last decade of Sonic’s output, it felt like another bold step forward for Sonic Team, a new horizon, uncharted territory – starting nearly from scratch and reinventing Sonic’s movement yet again was a big gamble, and one that I felt paid off.
Sonic Frontiers was not a perfect Sonic game by any stretch of the imagination. For every triumph there was comparable failure: everything from the stripped down boost gameplay in Cyberspace stages, to the lackluster combat, to the abhorrent pop-in, and obviously much more I won’t discuss here. You’ve probably heard all this before.
Sonic Frontiers was and is not a perfect Sonic game, but if not a step in the right direction - it's at least a proper reorientation, a much-needed weaning from the over-streamlined boost formula from Sonic Forces, and a manifesto that Sonic Team could still, in fact, create a game that - even at its worst - pushed the series forward.
I love Sonic the Hedgehog.
I’ve loved Sonic the Hedgehog since I was a kid. I met my best friend, Garrett, sixteen years ago on YouTube through shared interest in Sonic the Hedgehog. We used to play Xbox Live together. He visited me for my high school graduation. We played through Sonic ‘06 the Summer of 2015. We still visit each other every year or so.
I took a short break from the series when I couldn’t finish Sonic Unleashed, and then jumped back in with Sonic Generations. I remembered why I loved these games to begin with.
Sonic Mania is my favorite game of all time.
When the Sonic Symphony World Tour show was announced in Los Angeles, I asked Garrett to visit me again. We both took a week off work.
This is the same week that Sonic Frontiers’ third and last update was released: the Final Horizon. We agreed to play through it together.
For the first time since Sonic ‘06, we were able to play as Amy Rose in 3D. Exploring Ouranos Island and coming to grips with Amy’s moveset was a joy, at first. She has a triple jump again! She can glide now! We ran into a mini-boss that killed us immediately.
“Let’s just ignore that one,” I told Garrett.
We realized our speed/ring/attack/defense stats had returned to Level One. Amy Rose was a clean slate. No upgrades. We were certainly in no condition to fight an endgame mini-boss.
We hit the story beats we needed to, then the game let us control Knuckles. This was a surprisingly emotional moment. Although it hadn’t been sixteen years since we’d controlled Knuckles, it felt like meeting an old friend.
“Oh, God,” Garrett groaned suddenly as he started to glide around the map.
“What’s wrong?”
He handed me the controller, “Feel this.”
I picked up the controller and started to glide as Knuckles. I understood what he’d meant. The windup was unusual. The turn radius was abysmal. The input delay was horrific.
“What the fuck?” I said out loud. It took a few more minutes before I put the above criticisms into words.
“Yeah,” Garrett laughed, summating, “it doesn’t feel good.”
We spent the most time as Knuckles and, subsequently, experienced two Starfall events, which have a chance to occur randomly each night cycle and allow players to (essentially) farm Koco to upgrade their character’s stats.
The Final Horizon wants to have its cake and eat it, too. Multiple playable characters necessitate a highly varied moveset for each, but to balance it properly, any upgrade materials earned as Sonic do NOT carry over to other characters. Amy, Knuckles, and Tails have their own upgrade materials, their own upgrade trees, their own level progression. HOWEVER, the new Ouranos Island is built in such a way that every character must have a Cyloop ability, and each character must unlock their respective Cyloop ability using their upgrade tree, which requires exploring Ouranos Island and earning enough upgrade points to unlock the Cyloop ability for each character in the first place, so they can explore the island even more and, eventually, complete their main objectives.
It feels unusual, however, to block progression in such a way as to force players to upgrade their characters here. In the base game, Sonic learns new attacks through his skill tree, but none of these are essential to making progress (except for the Cyloop, which is the first ability that Sonic unlocks anyway).
Here, having to use the skill tree to unlock basic abilities for characters like “melee attack” and “parry” that were already regular abilities for Sonic feels arbitrary. It’s not like it takes too long to unlock these abilities anyways, players need only find two or three special Koco to obtain these abilities, but it feels unnecessary.
It’s disappointing. I play with Knuckles for a certain amount of time and learn that he can only climb on certain surfaces, so as to keep the game balance intact. It makes sense, but it doesn’t cushion the blow any. I discovered a challenge that requires Knuckles’ ability to latch onto walls and climb. A cannonball hits me and I fall to my death. I try again. A cannonball hits me. I try to recover and latch onto the wall, but Knuckles doesn’t respond. I fall to my death. I try again.
I remember playing Sonic Adventure 2 Battle on my Nintendo Wii. The year is probably 2007 or 2008. I remember playing through the Hero Story for the first time and finally being able to play as Knuckles. I remember Knuckles’ second level: Pumpkin Hill.
You know me, the fighting freak Knuckles, and we’re at pumpkin hill. You ready?
Nostalgia is a potent drug, strong enough to trick us into believing that even the most unremarkable chapters of our lives are golden, perfect snapshots. Only when we return to these chapters, we find reality is oftentimes much less kind than our memories tend to be.
I’ve replayed almost every mainline Sonic game countless times. I know that I love Sonic Adventure and Sonic Adventure 2 in spite of their flaws.
I know that I love the sensation of gliding through the air as Knuckles, the pure joy of nose-diving in rapid circles, of sticking to each and every surface, of burrowing underground to find hidden treasure. Rats. I know that I love playing as Knuckles. I know that I was disappointed when I played as Knuckles in Sonic Frontiers because it wasn’t the Knuckles I remembered. It wasn’t the Knuckles I fell in love with.
“You’d think they would’ve figured this out by now,” I said to Garrett, mostly out of frustration after another cheap death, “it’s like… I’m thinking about, like, sewers.”
He didn’t know what I meant by that. I tried to explain it and probably ended up sounding like a doofus – completely unintelligible.
“I’m sure there are people who know how to make sewers, and maintain them,” I waffled around the point I was trying to make, “but, you know, I’m not sure that we know how to make them.”
“What?”
“Like, you don’t think about this? That making sewers isn't common knowledge?”
“What are you talking about?”
“How many people know how to make sewers? How many people will know how to make sewers? Imagine everyone who knows how sewers work – one day, they all die, and nobody wrote it down. Like, imagine it’s all tribal knowledge, or something.”
What I meant is that I’m worried. I have so much anxiety about the future. Sometimes I’m worried that nobody is worrying enough. There are entire lexicons, pillars of society, professions, sectors, that will be lost to time – just slowly fading out, forgotten, and by the time somebody realizes that nobody put the fundamentals down to paper, it’ll already be too late.
Another library of Alexandria is lost, every day, for the rest of time, forever.
Somehow, Sonic Team remains incapable of emulating the movement of either Sonic Adventure. It eludes them even now.
In a series where increasingly chaotic galaxy-ending terrors converge on an anthropomorphic hedgehog who has the ability to go Super Saiyan, with each entry escalating in scope, ambition, and performance – the ease of basic movement remains a foreign concept.
The sewers are overflowing with noxious waste. Vile, repugnant sludge. The streets are drowned in garbage. Your home is sinking into bedrock. It’s always been like this.
I remember Knuckles’ second level: Pumpkin Hill.
I remember gliding between the stony mountaintops, scaling the rocky pumpkin obelisks, evading ghosts, chasing oscillating signals of the shattered Emerald. It’s closer…
I remember the sunset skybox. I remember the JPEG artifacts eating the edges of the stony pumpkin mountain faces like sweet fire. I remember the background music, looping around back to its first verse.
We finally got to play as Tails. There was catharsis, exhalation. Our baby boy could fly again. Another finger of the monkey’s paw curled inward.
Our opinions of the Final Horizon diverged much more around this point. Garrett was content to play these characters again, and I couldn’t hide my disappointment.
We traded the controller often. Sometimes one puzzle or platforming section was too difficult or obtuse and either of us would tap in while the other tapped out. Some platforming challenges were puzzles in and of themselves. Every time we died or found ourselves at an impasse, we’d give each other a look, or laugh out loud.
I love Sonic the Hedgehog.
“This is… uh,” I stammered, “this is… like, the next Sonic ‘06.” I said.
Garrett laughed, “Don’t say that.”
Neither of us hated Sonic ‘06, not like a lot of people do. Then again, it was our childhood. Our biases were impossible to avoid. I couldn’t shake the thought. This was the next Sonic ‘06, I thought to myself. For better or for worse.
When we finally assumed control of Sonic and the game directed us to our first (of five) towers, we hit a wall. Although Rhea Island was notorious for its long, perilous tower ascents, it was at least kind enough to provide checkpoints; as we struggled upwards, only to come crashing down once more, we realized there would be no checkpoints.
Sonic Frontiers had become Getting Over It.
Every time we came hurtling back down to earth, I’d start singing $uicideboy$.
One last pic and I’ll be gone
Make it count
Put the flash on
Never really felt like I belonged
So I’ll be on my way
And It won’t be long
We continued, swapped the controller between each other for each attempt, each time a little closer to heaven… nearly an hour later, we’d finally conquered the summit.
We did this, again, and again, and again, until we finally reached the fifth and final tower.
To be fully transparent, there is a lot to like about the Final Horizon. Beyond the novelty of being able to play as Tails, Knuckles, and Amy in 3D again for the first time in over a decade is an achievement, and praiseworthy on its own. Once I was comfortable with Sonic’s movement again, the towers were actually very engaging and memorable platforming challenges that I felt were deserving of their endgame difficulty. Lastly, the additional Cyberspace stages were also fun, much more challenging and interesting ideas with unique gimmicks for each stage – I only wished these were part of the main quest, and not relegated to completely optional content.
That being said, the experience of the final “trial” is probably the worst Sonic Frontiers has to offer. This penultimate boss rush might be the most cynical idea of difficulty I’ve seen in any Sonic game ever. The perfect parry mechanic retroactively cheapens these encounters by demanding frame-perfect timing, and ruins the spectacle by requiring mechanical mastery to proceed.
I’ve finished every Fromsoft Souls game (except for Sekiro) and there wasn’t a single one with parrying mechanics that were this demanding. For my first two attempts, I grappled with Giganto and attempted only to learn the parry timing; if Sonic loses one ring as Super Sonic each second, and the game only gives you 400 rings total for this encounter, that means a regular attempt will average around six-and-a-half minutes. During the thirteen minutes I attempted to learn Giganto’s parry window, I only managed to successfully parry him twice.
This is straight up not finished. Nobody playtested this. Almost every user I’ve seen discussing this boss rush has mentioned that dropping the difficulty down to Easy “fixes” the perfect parry (and it does) but this is not how difficulty should be designed. If almost every player can unanimously clear 99% of the game on the hardest difficulty, but can only progress at the eleventh hour by dropping the difficulty down to Easy, that’s a huge problem.
The new final boss is also marginally better than the older one, by default. This updated final battle features a beefier Super Sonic with blue eyes(!) and a new second phase for Supreme. It also features the absolute worst camera for any Sonic boss fight I’ve played, a brand new targeting mechanic that isn’t explained anywhere, and a cutscene that outright kills you if you don’t have enough rings.
I love Sonic the Hedgehog.
Rolling the final cutscene on the Final Horizon and watching Sonic launch himself through the image of an Eldritch God should’ve been an easy victory lap, but it wasn’t.
“We’re so fucking back,” for better or for worse.
Garrett and I and our friend Jordan (another longtime Sonic fan) were strapped for time as we watched the credits roll. It was 6:15pm. The concert started at 8. We were ready to leave before the credits had finished. I wore the hoodie I bought at the Sonic Speed popup cafe in San Diego. It was 7pm when we hit serious traffic a mile away from the Dolby Theatre.
Garrett and Jordan took turns adding songs to a growing playlist of Sonic OSTs. I sat in near-gridlock, frozen bumper-to-bumper in an ocean of automobiles. Jordan played E102’s theme from Sonic Adventure.
“This makes me feel an emotion that doesn’t exist,” he said.
My eyes glazed over in silent terror. It was 7:30pm. It was only a concert. I knew it wouldn’t be a big deal if we were late. I wanted death. Old habits made playthings of my emotions, paralyzed me. Old anxieties like nightmare tendrils, looming deadlines overhead – the hands of the clock a guillotine ready to drop. I bit my lip. I still wanted death.
Cars moved inches at a time, each red light another eternity. 7:45pm. We finally hit another artery, the lifeblood of the city flowed freely again, us along with it. I found the parking I reserved ahead of time after circling the area once. It’s 7:55pm.
We reached the Dolby Theatre at 8pm on the dot. The three of us walked inside the wide auditorium together as the final countdown began. We sat down. The lights dimmed. As the orchestra started playing, a wave of relief washed over me. We'd made it.
Watching the show, I had to appreciate the accompanying background montage which appeared on a massive monitor above the orchestra, as it highlighted the many flourishes and creative liberties of the performance. The music synchronized to Sonic as he took incoming damage in Labyrinth Zone, prompting audience laughter; or the dramatic flooding sequence in Chemical Plant Zone; or the first appearance of Metal Sonic in Collision Chaos and his eventual defeat in Stardust Speedway.
It was then I realized that Sonic’s greatest strength, as a series, was its many iconic moments. Not only the dramatic story beats, as in cutscenes, but its many instances of semi-interactive storytelling; as in the flooding sequence in Chemical Plant Zone, or running away from an Orca, or an oversized truck, or traversing an upside down castle.
After the intermission, however, was our main event. Not only what we’d been craving all night, but our entire lives.
I've been in love with this series for well over half my life now. When I was a kid, I always used to listen to Sonic the Hedgehog soundtracks. I thought Zebrahead’s His World was the rawest thing I’d ever listened to when I was thirteen. I listened to Crush 40 religiously, each vocal track another unforgettable experience – a story’s climactic end heralded by Johnny Gioeli’s radical vocals.
As the second act began and the first chords of Shadow the Hedgehog’s (I am) All of Me filled the Dolby Theatre, setting the crowd alight, I remembered why I fell in love with the series again.
I don’t even like Shadow the Hedgehog anymore, man. That game sucked!
However, what I’ve always loved was Shadow’s soundtrack –its dark, industrial sounds and heavy metal ethos seeped into every crack and crevice of its experience. When I was a kid, I thought it was the coolest thing ever.
So imagine the experience of seeing Crush 40 live, playing a song you’ve unconsciously memorized the lyrics to forever ago, backed by a full orchestra, in a room filled with Sonic fans screaming the lyrics alongside you.
I never thought I’d be here.
As a kid, I never thought I’d get to see Crush 40 live, and yet here they were. I’d fulfilled one of my oldest wishes. I was able to see Crush 40 live with my best friend.
Kellin Quinn made an appearance for the encore, and performed Break Through It All and Undefeatable. Better memories of Sonic Frontiers resurfaced.
For the final song, Johnny Gioeli joined Kellin Quinn for Live & Learn. Quinn provided backup vocals. Hearing him scream, “Hold on to what if?” cut deep into my soul.
The performance ended.
“Los Angeles,” Johnny addressed us, “we’ve made a beautiful memory here tonight.”
We made our exit shortly after. Garrett told me his only regret was not being able to attend the 3:30 showing as well. Rarely do we get to experience these moments twice.
I love Sonic the Hedgehog, and yet it was hard to not be disappointed by the Final Horizon.
What should’ve been a resounding triumph was neither an encore nor a reprise, but yet another new direction – an unwelcome challenge, a pale imitation of old glories. I was disappointed. But seeing Crush 40 live reminded me why I loved Sonic in the first place.
I’ll cherish these memories. They won’t always be perfect, but sometimes they are.
I know I’ll return to Sonic Frontiers again one day, but for now, yet another chapter of the blue blur’s legacy comes to a close.
In hindsight, I know that even if Sonic Frontiers ended up being poorly received, it wouldn’t kill Sonic. If Sonic ‘06 couldn’t kill Sonic, nothing can kill Sonic. Regardless of whichever new journey the hedgehog embarks on next, I know I’ll be there day one, eager to see what’s in store. After all, the adventure is never solely the end; the adventure ends up being the memories we take with us.