Echoing Sentiments: A Comentary on the Sonic Franchise

I’m finally writing the Sonic opinion piece I’d been meaning to get around to doing. I was actually inspired by a recent opinion piece over at Wired (http://blog.wired.com/games/2008/03/opinion-a-call.html).

I love Sonic the Hedgehog. His games had a huge impact on my life; the series is responsible for love of the video game. From that series I branched out and continued to explore the game universe. I can thank Sonic Team for some of the best experiences I’ve had in front of a television set.

Not recently however.

After 1994 the Sonic series started to falter. Sonic was virtually nonexistent during the Saturn era, and when he reappeared in 1998 (in Japan) with Sonic Adventure. Super Mario 64 had managed to top the core aspects of this game two years prior. Still, Adventure was a high point for the series. Its anticipated sequel was going to fix many of it’s problems. It, however, mostly failed to do that. Adventure was a hodgepodge of terrible game ideas. Fans of the series should have realized something was up when only a fifth of the game was speed related. I certainly didn’t realize it in ‘99 when I was blowing off junior high school assignments to finish the game. But, fishing? Shooting? Slow “standard” platforming? Treasure hunting? These things have no place in a Sonic game. Adventure 2 cut fishing, and the slow platforming aspects, but kept the shooting and treasure hunting, as well as the trademark speed levels. Both the shooting and treasure hunting morphed into a tedious wreck. The game was built, presumably, as a speed game (Knuckles and Rouge run blazingly fast for their segments).

These elements just don’t belong.

These are two games in which the best fun was reduced to a small fraction of the actual game. Even these sections were plagued with an odd camera and awkward level design choices. Sega dropped out of hardware after Adventure 2 was released. New home console Sonic games were put on hold in favor of ports of the Adventure games, and a ray of hope shined brightly as Sega announced Sonic Advance for the Gameboy Advance.

That series went on to be the best thing to happen to Sonic since ‘94.

That series, however, declined in quality as it progressed. By the third entry Sonic Team’s amazing narrative style found it’s way in. The final entry was also bogged down by a quasi Team mechanic borrowed from Knuckles Chaotix and the just released Sonic Heroes. It didn’t work.

Heroes. Want to talk about series decline? Here’s the real beginning of it.

The Adventure games, despite their flaws are still highly regarded among the fans. Playing them now is difficult, but in their time they were a blast to play. Heroes had plenty of that charm as well, the game even shifted to almost entirely focusing on speed. Still, the team mechanic and the wobbly game play that resulted from that choice, as well as the poorly crafted story ruined the game.

Shadow the Hedgehog was the breaking point for most gamers. Not only did it feature Heroes’ clunky gameplay set-up (except worse, somehow), bland repetitive levels, it also feature guns and some wonky story about Shadow being crafted by alien creatures (which is a rant all in itself. Fucking aliens. What a dumb fucking story choice). It was obvious that this was some marketing ploy to attracted gamers high on last generations big “breadwinners” Halo and Grand Theft Auto. That or someone at Sega had completely lost their mind.

Ironically, one of Sonic’s greatest games launched right along side this abomination, Sonic Rush (which was probably the last worthwhile Sonic game).

Sonic Team just kept tarnishing the series name with the Riders series, Sonic and the Secret Rings (which, for some reason fans seem to enjoy, despite it’s many flaws (ie: terrible story, horrendous level design, and atrocious control scheme), and the graphically pretty Shadow clone, better known as Sonic the Hedgehog (or Sonic ‘06).

Just recalling this history makes me inclined to agree with anyone who says it’s time to just end the series. The quality has dropped, and the Sonic fans that started with Sonic 1 have abandoned hope. Sonic Team has proven time and time again they can’t handle the properties their famous for making (look at their Nights sequel). The team is a shell of it’s former self. They’re probably hard at work on their next failure. Somehow though, it will still sell enough copies for the team to get another chance at reanimating the monster they’ve made out of Sonic.

However, in an odd move Sega commissioned BioWare to develop a Sonic RPG for DS. The game shows promise (despite taking Sonic into a traditionally slow paced genre), but how can any Sonic fan not be skeptical, especially with talk of another alien species making an appearance in Sonic’s world. That element has me scared for the game. And, it’s Sega admitting they can’t handle the property. It’s time to retire the blue blur, maybe just for a while.

It actually would have made perfect sense, story wise, to call it quits with the end of Adventure 2. Everyone, villains included, worked together to save the planet. Eggman was a good guy to me after that; it was very hard for me to see him as evil after what he did at the end of that game. It ended very peacefully, even with Shadow’s death, which could have worked on a symbolic level to signify the end of the series.

Mario is going to face a similar problem in his next game. Galaxy’s theme and ending just make that game the perfect end to the series. These mascots can’t be pushed on forever, despite the money they make their companies. It’s as if dignity has no meaning as long as the cash flow keeps coming, which is a terrible shame. It’s a problem this industry faces, sequelitis, it’s called in some circles. Eventually we will get tired of established series, especially if it seems like their parent companies are just beating life out of them. Even Disney had to put Mickey Mouse on hiatus. He still represents the company, and he makes plenty of cameos all over the place, but he hasn’t had his own major production in a very long time. He’s a dignified icon. Sega, Nintendo, Capcom (yeah, I’m calling you out on Megaman (and Street Fighter), Konami (I love Metal Gear, but Kojima, if I see MGS5 after you called it quits here I’ll be fucking pissed), it’s time to dignify your properties and end this sequel festival. We know your studios can make great games; maybe it’s time for something new.

It is time.

Olimar, Smash Bros. Impressions, and WiiWare Price Gouging

Olimar is the mad notes.

So far it’s what people probably expected. Good ol’ Smash doing what it does best. The Sub Space is a bit of a let down though. Nice CG, boring playable sections.

I also caught wind of Nintendo’s WiiWare service pricing. I was abit appauled that Pokemon Ranch was going to be $10. Ten bucks to walk around and see poorly modeled versions of your Diamond and Pearl Pokemon. That’s great. A real game like Star Solider R is only going to cost what a SNES game costs, which is insane in my opinion. Sometimes Nintendo does great things, but they always want top dollar for their not so great efforts too. Like WarioWare on Wii. That was a budget game at best, not a full priced one. I know wii is popular, but maybe they should look at what Sony did with PS2 software. First party games were often released at a forty dollar price tag, and many of these games were monstrous games too. Even third parties caught on to that, which was great. I don’t think Nintendo’s all about that though. Oh well. Don’t buy Pokemon Ranch for ten bucks. Not worth it.

Chiming In on the Audiosurf Phenomenon

So, I tried Audiosurf the other day (I’ve been trying a lot of new games ever since I pulled my head out of Galaxy’s metaphorical ass, a few days ago . . .). I had to try it, the buzz around it was hard to ignore. It is amazing.

For those who haven’t played or heard of Audiosurf it’s a music puzzler. Players control a little ship flying over a highway; these are created based on the songs players pick (and the song options are any MP3 files, literally any MP3 file will work, even podcasts). On this highway colored ‘bricks’ appear on certain beats of a song. These ‘bricks’ are placed within three lanes and gather at in a grid the bottom of the screen. The goal is to get three or more ‘bricks’ of the same color together to score points.

It’s descriptions like what I have above that drove me away from the game. when you try to type out what the game is it just sounds complicated. It isn’t. The nature of the game is this: you pick a song, the game generates a highway, and you move your mouse to collect ‘bricks’ (trying to match three of one color to earn points).

There is no way to lose. There are ways to not earn points, but there is no way to fail. In fact there’s even an option to just cruise the highway the game creates. This might be the game’s best feature. It has so many ways to play. It’s got several modes, and varying difficulties, but you never have to adhere to any of what the game tells you. You can play the hardest difficulty, and just say, “fuck it”, and cruise and there will be no penalty besides a really low score. Players choose the amount of effort they want to put into it the game, all the time. It’s great.

Just enjoying the highway is fun too. Some songs have mind boggling bends with fast areas and slow crawl areas, over all kinds of bumpy terrain. It’s just fun to look at. This, also can be problematic. In the time I spent with As much as I loved the craziness, it was almost to much for me to handle. This is the closest I’ve gotten to getting sick from playing a game. It’s color everywhere while the highway is flipping every which way. My mother would probably die if I showed this to her (she has a hard time watching any kind of video game. She couldn’t even handle 2D Sonic games).

Even so, I wish I owned the full game this second. It’s a game that will suck you right in. I can see myself buying a new disc and wanting to load up Audiosurf to see what kind of madness will ensue. It’s a very original experience that will constantly beg a player to keep playing.

It’s a really weird experience. The game itself is totally fresh, but the soundtrack is something that will be different for everyone. On the first play through a song it’s this odd synthesis of familiar music with a radical new experience. It’s this experience that’s driving me to keep typing. I guess I just can’t capture it with words. Audiosurf is an experience, and it might be a good idea to try it out.

I know I’ll be purchasing it soon.

The Forgotten Wonder

I don’t know anyone that owns a PSP. I had one friend who did, and then that unit made it’s way into my hands. I, foolishly, sold it. After taking part in several game forum discussions, I ended up with a new PSP.

It’s easy to forget that it’s home to several unique games. I’ve been in this Mario Galaxy haze for so long now that I simply forgot other games existed. I figured eventually I’d snap back into reality; I didn’t expect to find myself playing Metal Gear Ac!d again though. MGA is one of the many gems of the PSP. A year ago, when I had the old unit, I had Ac!d, Metal Gear Solid: Portable OPS, Exit, Megaman Powered Up, and Power Stone Collection. Even looking at that list I wonder why the hell I ever sold hose away. Each one of those games is completely unique to the PSP (save for Power Stone) and each was great in it’s own right.

I just want to write a little abstracts (and as always, bonus commentary) for two games, Metal Gear Ac!d and Crush.

Ac!d is Metal Gear, but with cards. It’s a crazy mix up of the thick Metal Gear plot and action, but on a grid based plain where you use cards to accomplish all of the games goals (all of which are based on things from every other Metal Gear game (one example is the Nikita Missle Launcher from MGS 2, playing this card allows you to control a missile (still restricted by grid movement) on the battle field)). It’s a card based stealth action game. I’m under the impression that the Ac!d series was a bit over looked, I found MGA for under ten dollars used, and the sequel retails for ten new. Granted they’re old games, now, but the second doesn’t even retail for $20 new. Great for me, but a sad indication that this series isn’t going to see another installment.

Crush is a story driven puzzle game. Players assume the role of an insomniac questing for the cure to his insomnia. Apparently, you cure insomnia by wearing a device called C.R.U.S.H. Said device places users into puzzle scenarios where you change from 2D to 3D to solve puzzles. The puzzles are mind benders and the story is actually pretty entertaining. It’s mostly witty banter between a crazed professor and the protagonist (Danny), and it’s actually pretty funny. The puzzles are tough, but it’s a rewarding kind of tough, which is nice. It’s sweet. Bonus: Sega published this game (but didn’t have one of their studios develop it), making it their only good game of 2007 (which is hilarious because their internal teams failed with every release last year).

Waiting for Tranquility, and a note on Downloadable Content

Officially, Brawl is one week away. I am thankful, and I have two reasons why. Here they are:
Reason 1: It’s coming up on two years since Brawl was announced. May 2006, about three more months and we would have be pained with a two year wait. Smash fans almost suffered as much as Zelda fans did with Twilight Princess, which, I believe, was a three year wait. The wait for Galaxy was pretty painful as well. With Smash out of the way there are virtually no big Wii titles on the horizon. Well, there are, but there’s nothing as big as Galaxy or Brawl; no AAA experience that people have invested a year or more of waiting to play (unless you really love your Mario Kart). We can finally relax for a while, which is fantastic. We can just pour hours upon hours into Brawl, and not give a shit about whats coming up. Tis good news.

Reason 2: This is simple, it’s Smash Bros, and it’s ass kicking time.

Other Business: Nintendo announced a Pay to Play online service. Certain games will have online service fees. Also developers can now sell additional game content via WiiWare. My initial feelings on these matter were very negative, I hate service fees, and downloadable content blows. On closer inspection, common theory in regard to the fees seems to indicate that this might just before MMOs, which, according to SquareEnix weren’t possible on Wii due to Nintendo’s regular online service. I’m sure other games will take advantage of PtP, but if it’s most an MMO deal, that’s fine (because I don;t play those kinds of games anyway). Brawl and Mario Kart will be free to play online, and that’s great.

DLC, on the other hand, still bugs me. The only DLC I’ve ever been okay with is Guitar Hero and Rock Band DLC, anything else just seems like over charge. And, I think the people that publish RB and GH are doing it. Those games, and Madden, should release one game per console generation and then just add songs, or engine updates, through DLC. It’s a better business model .They could put the songs or rosters online, and still make a disc for those without an internet connection (who the fuck doesn’t have the net now though?). I mean, put the songs online, then make a compilation disc for $20. Easy enough, and much more consumer friendly. I doubt it’ll happen though. Digital Distribution just hasn;t taken off yet. It will. Episodic and periodic content is the future.

That’s it. There’s a rant I didn’t even expect. If I don’t get another one of these off before next Sunday, Happy Brawl day (make sure to go at midnight, get Brawling early!).

This, how would one begin to describe how awesome this screen is. Just think about how this will look in motion, in a fucking week!