Support NeoGAF

[Kholinar]

Does Sonic need "serious" moments? It's a fucking hedgehog with shoes on.

I wish the series would pivot back to the original industry v nature. Go back to rescuing animals and the environment from obese polluters

This is the worst argument ever. Video games with fantastical elements do not preclude them from having emotional depth and complexity. Literally every video game ever can be reduced to that same argument. Does Nier need "serious" moments? It's a fucking skimpy weeb android with oversized swords attached to her back.

 

[NeoGiffer]

 

[Whitecrow]

I not saying Sonic don't have, but Sonic don't need to be a focus story game like TLOUS. He really shinny at gameplay.

Yeah, of course Sonic's core is the gameplay, but... why not both : D

I mean, stories have never been the reason of the franchise decadence (except THAT kiss), so if we can have both, I wouldnt mind.

 

[Kholinar]

Disagree. Not all. Sonic fanbase is very divided at this point. We have modern fans, adventure fans, retro fans and even boom fans.

Number one, don't even cap about 'boom fans,' because that is utter bullshit. Number two, both modern and adventure fans both care sincerely about how the narratives in these games are handled. Pre-2010, Sonic stories used to have - while normally being light in tone - complexity and depth, even if they might've missed the mark a few times. Number three, retro fans don't exist. Classic Sonic as it was known hasn't existed since fucking 1995.

 

[Damian black]

Number one, don't even cap about 'boom fans,' because that is utter bullshit. Number two, both modern and adventure fans both care sincerely about how the narratives in these games are handled. Pre-2010, Sonic stories used to have - while normally being light in tone - complexity and depth, even if they might've missed the mark a few times. Number three, retro fans don't exist. Classic Sonic as it was known hasn't existed since fucking 1995.

There are still a lot of people who like classic sonic, as already proven by mania's success.

 

[Miles708]

Sonic Mania is good but just so overrated. I wouldn't be against Mania 2, but only after a proper, proper 3D entry.

 

[Spaceman292]

Lmao, if you came here to hate, then get the fuck out of this thread. Stop derailing discussion with sardonic posts about how a game that hasn't even been announced yet will 'suck.'

I think people have more than enough compelling reasons to think that this will suck. It's made by the same people who made Forces.

 

[ShirAhava]

Who’s ‘people?’ The fan base? Because the Sonic fan base deeply cares about the quality of the stories and the characterisation of the cast.

YES!

My main issue with Modern Sonic games is not going deep enough into the stories/cast....they are sitting on a narrative goldmine and do nothing with it!

A SATAM Sonic RPG would be a dream come true

 

[levyjl1988]

Having to play as Amy is a good idea it varied the gameplay and mechanics. Using her Pico Pico hammer can be quite fun if they did it correctly.

Also if Sonic were to go super speed I wish the environment around him would go super slow from his perspective rather than he go super fast from other perspectives, when he goes super fast it is hard to keep up and his movement feels off causing controls to be an issue. They need to make it like Quicksilver point if view integrated into the game.

I’m thirsting for a new Sonic game, it’s been a while and I want a revolutionary one.

 

[Miles708]

Having to play as Amy is a good idea it varied the gameplay and mechanics. Using her Pico Pico hammer can be quite fun if they did it correctly.

Also if Sonic were to go super speed I wish the environment around him would go super slow from his perspective rather than he go super fast from other perspectives, when he goes super fast it is hard to keep up and his movement feels off causing controls to be an issue. They need to make it like Quicksilver point if view integrated into the game.

I’m thirsting for a new Sonic game, it’s been a while and I want a revolutionary one.

The usual misunderstanding with sonic games is that, for some reason, sonic must go extremely fast all the time.
This was never the intent, not in the 2D games , nor in the 3D ones (except for Rush gameplay ones, but that's a closed chapter I hope). You have to come up with an interesting and varied level design to have changes in rhythm, different platform obstacles, speedy parts and a touch of exploration and branching.

One way to make the character more controllable is to make it slower. Not as slow as Sonic 06, but again, Sonic Adventure was pretty much the right recipe to build up on.

This is not easy and, as much as it's cool to shit on Sonic Team (for very valid reasons), even more trained teams world pretty much struggle with that.

 

[Carna]

Sounds promising, maybe? I don't want another nostalgia game, or game panders to the people that hate the franchise. or what forces was (character creator can stay.

 

[Fake]

Its just like Sonic Boom and Sonic Forces taught them nothing.

 

[Mister Wolf]

The usual misunderstanding with sonic games is that, for some reason, sonic must go extremely fast all the time.
This was never the intent, not in the 2D games , nor in the 3D ones (except for Rush gameplay ones, but that's a cold chapter I hope). You have to come up with an interesting and varied level design to have changes in rhythm, different platform obstacles, speedy parts and a touch of exploration and branching.

One way to make the character more controllable is to make it slower. Not as slow as Sonic 06, but again, Sonic Adventure was pretty much the right recipe to build up on.

This is not easy and, as much as it's cool to shit on Sonic Team (for very valid reasons), even more trained teams world pretty much struggle with that.

Good post. I'm tired of Sonic games looking/playing like an endless runner or racing game down a linear track.

 

[retsof624]

Normal gameplay without that overused boost shit is good to hear

 

[nikeboy94]

When it comes to making a Sonic story, I thought the tone and vibe they had in Sonic Unleashed was perfect - with a great balance of fun vs serious. It opens with an exciting/intense opening movie followed by a fun adventure around the planet. It only really gets serious towards the final battle. I thought they stroke a good balance between fun & serious and made the story a lot more enjoyable even if the overall plot (and the character chip) was a bit lackluster.

Sonic colours, I thought, started becoming "too fun" when it came to its story, but still quite enjoyable. Sonic's story does excel when its a bit more chill and doesn't take itself too seriously.

If you look at Sonic 06 or Sonic Forces where the story was super serious and convoluted...it just becomes a pile of sh*t.

For the rumoured game, I'd hope that maybe they go for a simpler story with a lot of background lore. Keep the story simple, but have it fun & exciting. Any deeper level stuff should be presented as interesting lore that is sprinkled throughout the game. That might be the way forward for Sonic. Or... just maintain the balance that Sonic Unleashed had in its story.

Sorry....*end of thought-dump*

 

[Sorcerer]

Here hoping the new Sonic game turns out to be a political simulator that goes fast.

 

[Miles708]

When it comes to making a Sonic story, I thought the tone and vibe they had in Sonic Unleashed was perfect - with a great balance of fun vs serious. It opens with an exciting/intense opening movie followed by a fun adventure around the planet. It only really gets serious towards the final battle. I thought they stroke a good balance between fun & serious and made the story a lot more enjoyable even if the overall plot (and the character chip) was a bit lackluster.

Sonic colours, I thought, started becoming "too fun" when it came to its story, but still quite enjoyable. Sonic's story does excel when its a bit more chill and doesn't take itself too seriously.

If you look at Sonic 06 or Sonic Forces where the story was super serious and convoluted...it just becomes a pile of sh*t.

For the rumoured game, I'd hope that maybe they go for a simpler story with a lot of background lure. Keep the story simple, but have it fun & exciting. Any deeper level stuff should be presented as interesting lure that is sprinkled throughout the game. That might be the way forward for Sonic. Or... just maintain the balance that Sonic Unleashed had in its story.

Sorry....*end of thought-dump*

I kind of agree to some extent.
Sonic Forces story was an unmitigated disaster, and while Unleashed was A LOT better, it still had a somewhat weird rhythm. Also the jokes are usually bad (but some animations were awesome).

I agree too serious can get ridiculous very quickly, but also a good story must have some stakes and some moment when jokes stop for a bit.

More than anything, I really hope they make their characters smile/laugh/angry/scared etc. Basically all sonic characters adhere to a pre-set default emotion (tails is always happy, sonic is always cool, knuckles is always angry) and range very little despite the situation. That really hurts the story and limits also the jokes potential.

That's the main reason why Sonic Boom season 2 is so funny and entertaining.

 

[levyjl1988]

The usual misunderstanding with sonic games is that, for some reason, sonic must go extremely fast all the time.
This was never the intent, not in the 2D games , nor in the 3D ones (except for Rush gameplay ones, but that's a closed chapter I hope). You have to come up with an interesting and varied level design to have changes in rhythm, different platform obstacles, speedy parts and a touch of exploration and branching.

One way to make the character more controllable is to make it slower. Not as slow as Sonic 06, but again, Sonic Adventure was pretty much the right recipe to build up on.

This is not easy and, as much as it's cool to shit on Sonic Team (for very valid reasons), even more trained teams world pretty much struggle with that.

If they can make a Sonic game like this, it would be revolutionary.




taking inspiration between Quicksilver and the Flash would be a great start, different ways of conveying speed.

 

[MMaRsu]

Hedgehog species and lore

This shit is fucking retarded

 

[MMaRsu]

All we want and will never get

I dont understand how SEGA is so clueless and inept.

 

[The_Mike]

Guys an insider I know has leaked the intro.
Source: Dude trust me.

 

[EverydayBeast]

Ain’t play a sonic since the 90s

 

[levyjl1988]

Hedgehog species and lore

This shit is fucking retarded

They got to explain how Sonic was raised by an owl, like in the movie.

 

[Umbasaborne]

Part of me wanted 06 to be good. Back then i was really into the idea of a sonic game that had a story of the same scope and scale as final fantasy. Now, id want a sonic game to match maybe a modern cg animated disney movie with how it handles story

 

[Miles708]

Hedgehog species and lore

This shit is fucking retarded

All videogames are retarted .

 

[thicc_girls_are_teh_best]

Why make life hard for themselves when they could "just" do a Sonic Mania 2?

I don't understand it, either. Get the team back together, throw more resources their way. They could even make a retro 3D Sonic game with the 3D bonus stage engine in Sonic Mania, modified here and there. Otherwise, Sonic has never been a series about the "lore" or really even the story; it's meant to be gameplay-centric like the Mario games. Sounds like they are putting investment in the wrong area tbh because we know more about the plot than we do the game structure or mechanics.

 

[Saber]

Lmao, do I have to believe they gonna put any sort of good emphasys on the lore? Like, really? Sonic Forces isn't enought to know what kind of trash writers are we dealing with?

Also, female robot minion + Sonic and Amy only playable? Lol ok(double Lol for the "good new entry")

This looks like some kind of Sonic mentally fanboy writting a crappie fanfic. But tbh, this isn't that far away since we got things Forces, the very definition of cringe shit plot.

 

[Keihart]

L

re and characters f

cus, is this game being designed with a furry community focus ?

Edit: ok, so this is only a leak, it reads like a fanfic about a fanfic game, cant see it happening unless sonic team is this detached from reality....on second thought, maybe they are.

 

[NeoIkaruGAF]

Sonic has had lore in their games since SA1 came out. Where have you been? And Mario does genuinely have lore, funnily enough. Paper Mario, M&L, RPG, Galaxy 1, SMW2.

Well... Mario doesn’t pretend to have any sort of canon, and never takes its “lore” seriously. It’s there in one game, gone in the next most times. That’s why people asking for Geno in Smash will never not be cringe.

That’s how you should manage “lore” when your character is a blue hedgehog in red shoes that runs very very fast, methinks. Otherwise you end up with Obama chuckling, Sonic getting kissed by human girls, and Ow the Edge stealing candy from babies. Or something. I haven’t really played a 3D Sonic game, but even I know that something went wrong down the line with that *cough* lore.

 

[Hudo]

I don't understand it, either. Get the team back together, throw more resources their way. They could even make a retro 3D Sonic game with the 3D bonus stage engine in Sonic Mania, modified here and there. Otherwise, Sonic has never been a series about the "lore" or really even the story; it's meant to be gameplay-centric like the Mario games. Sounds like they are putting investment in the wrong area tbh because we know more about the plot than we do the game structure or mechanics.

Yeah, it seems to me that the Sonic team at Sega don't really know what they want to do and because Sonic is still a big thing for Sega management, the team gets more free passes than any other, lol.

 

[Phunkydiabetic]

Sounds good.

If they make Amy a somewhat likeable character, that would be great.

Come on, my body is ready for another good 3D Sonic game.

Another?

 

[SpongebobSquaredance]

No one wants ugly ass sprites either. If they do sprites they should look like they haven't been stuck in the 90s.

Come on now, Mania looks incredibly animated and detailed.

 

[Kholinar]

I don't understand it, either. Get the team back together, throw more resources their way. They could even make a retro 3D Sonic game with the 3D bonus stage engine in Sonic Mania, modified here and there. Otherwise, Sonic has never been a series about the "lore" or really even the story; it's meant to be gameplay-centric like the Mario games. Sounds like they are putting investment in the wrong area tbh because we know more about the plot than we do the game structure or mechanics.

When has Sonic never been about the lore or story? Literally every Sonic story has had an extensive story in some fashion since SA1; Sonic has never been starkly about gameplay like Mario has since, like, S3&K. This narrative that Sonic is only about "gameplay" is just blatantly false. SEGA even has a fucking lore encyclopedia coming out in September.

 

[MasterDerico]

I love sa1, sa2, unleashed, generation and even the shadow game.
Disappointed about the "no boost", but they can make him fast enough to not need boost...

Can't wait to see more info about this project!

 

[Bo_Hazem]

It's sad to see Sonic becoming extremely boring and unbearable to play. They should just make him walk a bit for a change. Just look at the cartoon side of Sonic, make it more story dense, change the fucking gameplay.

 

[oagboghi2]

Come on now, Mania looks incredibly animated and detailed.

Apparently these are "ugly ass sprites" now

 

[Fake]

Hedgehog species and lore

This shit is fucking retarded

What I find more retarded are people asking for a more focused lore after Forces.

I mean, wtf Sonic Forces is a totally focused story game and was a fucking mess. Even Tails was supposed to die in there, c'mon.

 

[Miles708]

I'm not sure I follow the narrative some of you are suggesting, according to which there can't be Sonic Mania 2 and a 3D chapter, as one excludes the other. Sonic Team wouldn't develop the 2D title anyway, so there's no overlap anyway.

What I find more retarded are people asking for a more focused lore after Forces.

I mean, wtf Sonic Forces is a totally focused story game and was a fucking mess.

Sonic Forces is many things.
"Focused" is not one of them.

 

[The Wheel of Fortune]

But will there be a chao garden?

My man asking the real questions here.

Surely by now they know that fans really want a new Chao Garden, right?

 

[Whitecrow]

No one wants ugly ass sprites either. If they do sprites they should look like they haven't been stuck in the 90s. Technology has evolved since then for better looking games with no pixelation. People who want Sonic 3.5 over and over are blinded by nostalgia.

This.
At this point in time, sprites in official games should not be a thing.

 

[Miles708]

My man asking the real questions here.

Surely by now they know that fans really want a new Chao Garden, right?

Unlikely. Very.
You might want to go with Balan Wonderworld for that.

 

[thicc_girls_are_teh_best]

When has Sonic never been about the lore or story? Literally every Sonic story has had an extensive story in some fashion since SA1; Sonic has never been starkly about gameplay like Mario has since, like, S3&K. This narrative that Sonic is only about "gameplay" is just blatantly false. SEGA even has a fucking lore encyclopedia coming out in September.

You touched on exactly what I mean; maybe I should've phrased it better and said that the series has never prioritized lore at the expense of gameplay, because like you said, it hasn't been starkly about gameplay since S3&K. But I don't think it's controversial to say that for many, the best games in the series ARE S3&K, S3, S2, SCD, Generations, and Mania, with SA1 and SA2 coming afterwards and most of the other games trailing notably behind all of those.

This is probably me speaking from the fact I got into the franchise on Genesis/MegaDrive; there are definitely different factions in the fanbase that often feel at odds with each other. For people who got in with the Adventure games for example, the classic games may not be as good to them. For those who got in with the Boost Era games, the Adventure games might be crummy to them, etc. Sega are responsible for these different factions in the fanbase due to having very little cohesion and consistency in output of Sonic games for the better part of two decades, but it is what it is.

Yeah, it seems to me that the Sonic team at Sega don't really know what they want to do and because Sonic is still a big thing for Sega management, the team gets more free passes than any other, lol.

Time and again I've gotten the impression Sonic Team just want to take a break from Sonic, and I think it would be for the best if they did to fully recharge. Get Christian Whitehead and his team back for a Mania 2, get the SoR4 dev in on a new Sonic game, do a true sequel to All-Star Racing Transformed with Sumo Digital, maybe just focus on a sequel to the first film etc. and come back with a new mainline Sonic game in 2023 or whatever.

I get they're trying to keep the IP in good mindshare and relevance but you'd think the movie, various TV shows and smaller games would've proven by now that they don't need to keep pumping out mediocre 3D Sonics in order to keep the brand relevant.

If they can make a Sonic game like this, it would be revolutionary.




taking inspiration between Quicksilver and the Flash would be a great start, different ways of conveying speed.

That'd actually be a perfect setup for a future Sonic game; would make movement speed more controllable, precise, and keep asset production costs in line too (that's one of the biggest cost factors for most 3D Sonic titles).

 

[Keihart]

No one wants ugly ass sprites either. If they do sprites they should look like they haven't been stuck in the 90s. Technology has evolved since then for better looking games with no pixelation. People who want Sonic 3.5 over and over are blinded by nostalgia.

I mean, if you have to choose between good animation and resolution , i'll always pick better animation. But sure, if they make it animate as good or better while upping sprites resolution i have a hard time imagining anyone complain.

Sonic Mania has great animation.

 

[Miles708]

If they can make a Sonic game like this, it would be revolutionary.




taking inspiration between Quicksilver and the Flash would be a great start, different ways of conveying speed.

Done it in the movie, too!


It could lead to some very cool segments, but I don't think playing constantly in slow-motion would be so appealing.

 

[SpongebobSquaredance]

Apparently these are "ugly ass sprites" now

I get his point though. There are definitely a lot of indie games using sprites that just look bland and barebones. However, Sonic Mania isn't one of them.

 

[Fake]

Sonic Forces is many things.
"Focused" is not one of them.

Boom?

 

[Grand Theft Scratchy]

I just want another 3D Sonic game like Sonic Adventure. Bring back Adventure fields, Chao garden, and a decent story.

I liked Sonic Mania too but that wasn't Sonic Team, it was Christian Whitehead and other external developers.

People acting like only 2D Sonic was ever good are wrong. Playing as Sonic in 3D on the Dreamcast was really fun.

 

[D.Final]

I just want another 3D Sonic game like Sonic Adventure. Bring back Adventure fields, Chao garden, and a decent story.

I liked Sonic Mania too but that wasn't Sonic Team, it was Christian Whitehead and other external developers.

People acting like only 2D Sonic was ever good are wrong. Playing as Sonic in 3D on the Dreamcast was really fun.

I accept also a Mania sequel

 

[celsowmbr]

Well... A year ago, there was a rumor about "multiple games" on Sonic's 30th Anniversary.
So, its very plausible a game like this one (with a good name, unlimited) and Sonic Mania 2 too.
Well... We need to wait a little long, probably in march on SWSX event

 

[Little Chicken]

This is the worst argument ever. Video games with fantastical elements do not preclude them from having emotional depth and complexity. Literally every video game ever can be reduced to that same argument. Does Nier need "serious" moments? It's a fucking skimpy weeb android with oversized swords attached to her back.

It's Sonic, it's for kids, it has had 30 years of tragic attempts at narrative depth unsuccessfully thrown at it, it has a bat with big tits on it.