Sonic The Hedgehog

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

So, will I finally be able to get a genuinely good 3D Sonic game on a console that I actually own?

[Spark Of Spirit]

It's looking like it!

[Spark Of Spirit]

Check out the Dreamcast era trailer!

Speed Highway!

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

Looks really good but....Since when the hell was Sonic Heroes a Dreamcast game?

[Spark Of Spirit]

It might have been in planning for the Dreamcast? I don't know. They probably just wanted to fit them in threes for balance.

[talonmalon333]

Sonic Heroes fits in with the Dreamcast era. If you ask me it has the aura of a "Sonic Adventure Reject". LOL.

[Avaitor]

So I found a demo of Generations on the display PS3 at my local GameStop. I decided to play it, and went through Green Hill Zone again. It felt like playing the old games again, which is a great feeling.

So much so, I found a copy of Mega Collection for the GameCube, and hit that up. Man, I love these games. I think that I'm getting back into the franchise in full now. In fact, that as soon as I get the money, I'm buying Colors, and I even started watching SatAM. I'll write about that elsewhere on this board later.

[talonmalon333]

So I found a demo of Generations on the display PS3 at my local GameStop. I decided to play it, and went through Green Hill Zone again. It felt like playing the old games again, which is a great feeling.

So much so, I found a copy of Mega Collection for the GameCube, and hit that up. Man, I love these games. I think that I'm getting back into the franchise in full now. In fact, that as soon as I get the money, I'm buying Colors, and I even started watching SatAM. I'll write about that elsewhere on this board later.

Awesome. I plan on doing something like that before getting Generations too.

[Spark Of Spirit]

Sounds like a plan. Sonic 1, CD, 2, 3K, Adventure, and Colors should make a good playthrough before I get my hands on Generations.

[talonmalon333]

Sounds like a plan. Sonic 1, CD, 2, 3K, Adventure, and Colors should make a good playthrough before I get my hands on Generations.

No SA2 and 4?

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

Well, Sonic 4 is still fairly recent among Sonic titles, and I would assume that would count as Desensitized having played that recently enough so it doesn't really warrant an immediate replay. As for Sonic Adventure 2, I think Desensitized established that he just downright doesn't like that game.

As for me, the only 3D Sonic games that I have played and generally liked are the Adventure games. Both of them definitely have their obvious faults, but I found both of them to still be fairly fun games, and their controls and camera aren't nearly as bad as people make them out to be (both of those are certainly issues in each game, but neither of them are even close to what I would call "broken"). I like Sonic Adventure 1 a bit more because it has more actual Sonic stages while also having a fair amount of fun stages for other characters that aren't all that bad to play as for the most part. With SA2, I feel that Knuckle's missions have been made needlessly more frustrating (and Rogue's are even worse), and I can't stand playing in those damn mechs as either Tails or Eggman. So, that really only leaves Sonic's and Shadow's levels as the ones that I have any actual fun with. I wouldn't have minded if the Heroes campaign mode for SA2 was all just Sonic whereas the Villains campaign mode was all just Shadow. That would have made for a much more entertaining game, IMO (although admittedly a lot shorter, too, considering how the speedy nature of Sonic's and Shadow's stages make them considerably shorter than playing as any of the other characters).

[Spark Of Spirit]

I actually forgot about 4, but since it's only part of a game and in many ways a remake of other levels, I'll pass. I already got Generations coming up for that.

SA2 would require me playing as non-Sonic characters, which I don't really want to do. Maybe I'll pop it in and play a few levels in time attack from Sonic's story.

Heroes would be better if it didn't handle like crap. Nobody is fun to play as and the levels are like twice as long as they need to be. I'll just be sticking with the core gameplay (IE, Sonic) for my replays.

[talonmalon333]

I don't check enough to know that he doesn't like SA2. As for me, I like it better then the first one. Fewer characters I don't wanna play as (Tails, Eggman, Knuckles, and Rouge... rather then Tails, Knuckles, Gamma, Big, and Amy). Plus, I actually enjoyed SA2's plot. Seems clear to me that SA2 was meant to end the series being that Sega was leaving the competition (Shadow dies, Rouge gives up her job, Tails becomes independent, even Eggman reconsiders his motives)... But we all know what happened next, what crapped all over SA2's plotline and began the fall of greatness.

Anyway, before Generations comes out, I intend on playing 1, CD, 2, 3&K, SA, SA2, 4, and Colors. Being that I have yet to play Colors, and there are other upcoming games that are more important then Generations, it'll probably be a few months before I can do this.

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

I don't check enough to know that he doesn't like SA2. As for me, I like it better then the first one. Fewer characters I don't wanna play as (Tails, Eggman, Knuckles, and Rouge... rather then Tails, Knuckles, Gamma, Big, and Amy).

But at least the 1st game doesn't downright force you to play the other characters unless you want to play through the last boss fight. You can just go through Sonic's 8 missions and call it a day, and completely ignore the other characters if you don't like them. With SA2, you have to play through the missions of other characters in story mode to get to the good ones. Plus, there are less Sonic stages and even combining them with Shadow's stages there isn't a whole lot of variety. Also, missions for the side characters in SA2 are even more poorly designed than any of those from the 1st game, for the most part.

[Spark Of Spirit]

10 Sonic levels in a complete story, then you can shelve the game and play something else, which is what I usually do. (Though sometimes I play as Tails or Knuckles because 5 stages doesn't take that long) SA2 has less Sonic stages than SA1 (4 less, specifically) and the non-Sonic gameplay is pretty irritating.

In a related story, I decided to go back and finish my SA2 playthrough after Eternal Engine almost made me crack the disc in half. All I had left was Meteor Herd, a crappy Tails boss and two Sonic levels left, so it didn't take very long.


Stage 14 - Meteor Herd

Good thing I remembered some of the hints, because instead of 15 minutes, I could have been here for like an hour otherwise. Again, I don't like the radar at all in the Treasure Hunting levels in SA2, going through big open levels to find one specific thing at a time is just plain dumb since the radar doesn't really give you much of a clue. Thankfully, after a Rouge boss battle that's it for Knuckles in SA2.Oddly enough, as much as I didn't like these, I hated Tails stages more than I used to comparatively. At least I was less prone to cheap deaths from the controls in the Treasure Hunting levels.

Stage 15- Crazy Gadget

If it wasn't for how weird the controls get in the gravity switching parts, this could possibly be one of the best Sonic levels, but there's a lot of cheap deaths because you can't actually see where you're switching gravity to some of the time, and awkwardly jumping platforms while the controls are reversed at a bad camera angle you can't adjust to is just annoying. Good stage, but frustrating elements bring it down to me.

Then there was a Tails boss fight against Robotnik that sucked. The one in SA1 was better due to.. well, Tails not sucking in that game.

Stage 16 - Final Rush

Holy crap, I forgot about this stage! Awesome, awesome, and awesome! For a final stage, it not only manages to be hard, but there are alternate routes all over the place, lots of platforming and speed, tense moments trying to not fall to your death, and the boss battle with Shadow afterwards to end the story is actually pretty fun. Best stage in the game, easily. I hope this is DLC in Generations because I want more of it.

And that's it for my playthrough of SA2. I might go through the Dark story for the hell of it later, but for now I got what I wanted out of the game. Was it worth it? Well, kind of. But really only for these stages:

City Escape
Metal Harbor
Green Forest
Pyramid Cave
Crazy Gadget
Final Rush

Metal Harbor is a bit too short for my taste and Crazy Gadget has some annoying control issues, but they were all pretty fn to play through as a whole. If you're jonesing for some SA2 or just to replay it, just go to stage select and play the Sonic levels and ignore everything else. You'll probably be better off for it.