The Sonic Generations Review Topic

[Korama]

If we look at the two characters that mainly get a pass; Tails and Knuckles, they were introduced into the franchise during the time that it was still considered direct competition for Mario.

Edited December 12, 2011 by Korama

[CrownSlayers Shadow]

Korama. What the fuck, man?

We're trying to have a decent conversation with one of the reviewers who managed to get the guts to face us directly and you act like a douchebag and paint him as a hater? If he was actually a hater me, V0yant, Marco would've already notice, but you're just being a flat out asshole here. Knock it off. The guy is showing us respect, now why don't you give it back?

Edited December 12, 2011 by ChaosSupremeSonic

[SenEDDtor Missile]

Korama. What the fuck, man?

We're trying to have a decent conversation with one of the reviewers who managed to get the guts to face us directly and you act like a douchebag and paint him as a hater? If he was actually a hater me, V0yant, Marco would've already notice, but you're just being a flat out asshole here. Knock it off. The guy is showing us respect, now why don't you give it back?

[Korama]

Calm down.

I thought it was clear that remark was in jest. There, I removed it, feel better now?

[SenEDDtor Missile]

Calm down.

I thought it was clear that remark was in jest. There, I removed it, feel better now?

[CrownSlayers Shadow]

Calm down.

I thought it was clear that remark was in jest. There, I removed it, feel better now?

[Korama]

No, because it's still sounds snarky as hell. I would've felt much better if you not done it at all considering everyone else has been respectful despite his difference of opinion.

You warned him about passionate fans here, I think he can handle my "snarkiness".

To Dead3ye:

Feel free to ignore my post. You already adressed some of my points anyway, while others were just random reminders that to some people at least, SMG 1 & 2 are neither perfect nor the most fun games out there that every other game resembling a 3D platformer has to measure up to (opinion, opinion...).

I don't think I offended you, but I'll say sorry just in case.

[CrownSlayers Shadow]

You warned him about passionate fans here, I think he can handle my "snarkiness".

Passionate as it even when we strongly disagree, we're still friendly. It's like a Shadow fan and an anti-Shadow fan being friends with each other despite their differing stances and arguments on the character.

Even when debates get fierce, we don't insult each other right off the bat by calling them a hater when they've been nothing but respectful with their views. Doing so is being more of an asshole than a passionate fan. If you wanted to be less of an asshole, you'd warn the guy first about what you're going to say before you actually say it.

But since you apologized to the guy, I think we can let it go.

[Your Vest Friend]

Ah...welp, I still stick to my original review of "solid gaming, lacking in substance". I think I was one of the first to sum the game up like thus, and now it's the tune of the general consensus. It's weird to have become the grain.

[HeroMystic]

While I can see the point, I don't exactly agree. I am one who sees each of those franchises as completely separate entities rather than a support for one another. While they are all a part of Nintendo's excellent first party platform, they each get their individual critiques without relevance to the others.

Well of course they get reviewed separately, but here's the big picture here: Platformers have been a dying genre for quite some time now. The only franchises keeping it afloat is Mario and some smaller franchises like the Prince of Persia series (I guess Ratchet and Clank series too though I never played those games). Mario is the leader of the platforming genre, but even I will admit, stuff like that takes huge amount of time to create for a 3D game.

So you have to wonder, what would happen if Mario was the only franchise that Nintendo had, everything else was third party, so therefore they could go to other consoles at any time. Now, considering Nintendo's bad streak with relationships towards other developing companies that would've definitely happened during the N64 era. So Zelda, Metroid, Kirby, etc went to either SEGA or Playstation. Heaven forbid that people actually bought the Saturn, but Playstation would've been in everyone's houses regardless of whether you were a Nintendo supporter or not. So what would Nintendo have to do in order to stay in the light? Spam lots of Mario games, maybe even experiment with his style a little to appeal to the westerners. Hell, lets say the other franchises didn't exist so Playstation or Saturn wouldn't get a blatant boost. There's still the fact that Nintendo had terrible relationships regardless and the majority of third party support went to Playstation.

And lets not forget. The only reason why Nintendo has even survived today is because of their heavy first party platform. For the longest time in the N64 and most especially the Gamecube age when Microsoft got into the fray and started the Online Multiplayer era, Nintendo had very very little 3rd party support. The only reason why Mario didn't need to throw himself at us despite this is because of his other franchises. Retro Studios took control of Metroid for awhile and did a phenomenal job with it, Starfox games were spammed... for better or worse. Legend of Zelda had two games on the N64, Pokemon got spammed so hard in both the N64 age and the Gamecube age, and Kirby got some spin-offs as well. On a very minor note, lets not forget our good 'ol buddy Sonic once SEGA went third party, and he just so happened to sell the best on the Gamecube.

This is why when Mario spammed himself, it was in party games and sports games. There's a reason why beloved franchises like Starfox went through experimentation; Zelda went into a cel-shaded realm (then quickly back to OoT aesthetics); Metroid going from 3rd Person to 1st Person, and Fire Emblem suddenly being localized in America. It's because Nintendo needed to draw in more fans, and I assume using Mario to experiment with would be the last resort (Actually, this may be why Luigi's Mansion was produced because fans wanted a Luigi game).

This isn't just speculation either. There's two primary examples of this; I'll start with the lesser of the two: Zelda. Ever since OoT, Zelda has been milked out because it sells like hotcakes. There was Majora's Mask which is a direct sequel to OoT (which was unheard of), and if memory serves me right, it was all produced in a bit over one year. Then there was the Oracle games on the GBA. When Windwaker came out, shit hit the fan with fans and they went back to OoT-esque aesthetics in Twilight Princess, but WW-Link continued to be spammed in the DS games, and now there are tons of DS Zelda games. By the time Skyward Sword came out, people were tired of Zelda games, and therefore more critical of it. It became "more of the same" and they said the Zelda formula is a tired one. If you need proof, look at any review site that isn't IGN and they directly talk about this.

Now for our bigger example, our good ol' buddy, Sonic. I could say "draw your conclusions" here, but I'll go ahead and explain this. Sonic was SEGA's only mainstream franchise. The only other franchises I can think of is Phantasy Star and Virtua Fighter, the latter being more of a cult following thanks to Capcom's overwhelming popularity in the Fighting genre. The problem with Phantasy Star is it's an RPG, and therefore kiiiinda lacks flexibility, as it's more of a niche. So with Sonic being the only real mascot to popularize SEGA, Sonic got four games on the Genesis, six if you count Sonic CD and Sonic Spinball(I don't count Spinball as that is more of a spinoff). Sonic 3D Blast and the unfinished Sonic X-Treme was on the Saturn, and Sonic Adventure 1 and 2 are on the Dreamcast. Nevermind the huuuuuge brands of Sonic games on the Game Gear that I personally owned (every single one of them ). Then there was SEGA's collaspe into third party, and that's when things got iffy. Sonic Heroes was experimentation that fans didn't like, then Shadow the Hedgehog was bad, then Sonic 06 was bad, then Sonic Unleashed was bad, and all the general public could say was "Please stop killing Sonic over and over again", but the games kept coming year after year because SEGA needed the money to recover themselves. It's only just recently that SEGA has been able to get third party games for them to publish and they've been working with Nintendo to develop games for them (F-ZERO GX comes to mind).

What Mario continues to do well is re-invent itself, and that is why he is still a highly beloved character. Mario Galaxy is far from the experience of Mario 64. While it kept its core mechanics, it turned expectations on their head and was better off for it. Mario stays fresh by continuously innovating upon its already stellar experience. Those innovations is what keeps it from suffering from what some would call the "Call of Duty syndrome."

I can't really get behind this reasoning, mainly for what I've said above, but also because Mario has not been reinventing itself though he hasn't been staying the same either. He has RPG games, racing games, platformers, party games, "teaching" games(lol), the list goes on. He's plastered everywhere, but I can very well say that while Mario hasn't fell into the "Call of Duty syndrome", has has most definitely fell into the "Megaman Syndrome". The fact that Mario even went 2D for new Super Mario Bros. Wii actually sickens me, and it's one of the few Mario games that I don't like because it refuses to bring something new to the table (and that Propeller Mushroom is the worst idea they come up with yet). And from the looks of it, it seems this retro trend will continue for the 3DS and WiiU. Mario will have his moment where he will begin to stagnate, it just hasn't happened yet because of the other franchises, which from what I see are beginning to fall out of the limelight.

Edited December 12, 2011 by Marco

[Semjax]

The problem with Phantasy Star is it's an RPG' date=' and therefore kiiiinda lacks flexibility, as it's more of a niche.[/quote']

Just a quick note, that sometime in the mid 90's Phantasy Star somewhat faded out from the existence of consoles until early 2000's when the Gamecube came out and Sega brought it back as a wannabe MMORPG that almost no one played because it was seriously nearly impossible to play on the gamecube, and only once the Xbox came out was it actually -played- online. Phantasy Star has become less of a focus since the late 80's and early 90's so I can't really say that it, or Virtua Fighter, are really Mascot Material, there for I agree with what you said Marco that Sonic was pretty much the only one that was able to achieve any form of recognition for being used as a Mascot. But I digress as this really has nothing to do with the topic at hand exactly, just figured I'd comment on that.

Now, my own personal opinion, going back to the whole 'The characters made the games bad' despite people moving on from it... Personally I can not agree with this, my main reason for not agree with this is because like every game in modern times, a game requires a story, I'll elaborate more on that in a moment. Hell, even back in the old days when sonic was a 2D side scroll speedster game there was -still- a basic story behind it which was like most games that day 'go forth, beat the big bad, save the world'. It wasn't until Sonic 3 & Knuckles that the story got a bit more in-depth. Being simple still, but deeper, it was basically 'Eggman stole the Master Emerald, Sonic and Knuckles have to get it back with Sonic going after eggman earnestly and Knuckles being a dick and trying to stop sonic cause he was tricked by Eggman, and then figures out he was tricked and get back at Eggman.'

Now, getting back to my original point of a game requires a story, when I say that, I mean that as stated above each game has its own story. Upon the generational improvement of the Systems Era, ala Dreamcast, Gamecube, Xbox, PS2, and so forth, the games became more along the lines of a work of art rather then just some everyday joe that you play and pause and then go about your day. They become a massive enthralling adventure, when Sonic entered this Era he was up against some major competitors in forms of Storyline, and one of the biggest competitors I could muster up would probably be the Metal Gear Solid franchise, which was famously known for its amazingly long sequences of dialogue, Cutscenes, and more precisely, its amazing storyline. This being said, Sonic needed to catch up and make its own story, bare with me I'm getting to my point.

To make an enthralling story, you require more then just a single group of characters, in this case, Sonic Tails and Knuckles. In my honest opinion the additions of these characters are actually an improvement as without them Sonic might not have had such a strong impact storyline wise, and for all we know without a story the games themselves could've crumbled into the past, much like the Saturn and Dreamcast did. So when it comes down to it, like many others have said, its not the character additions that are bad, but rather how they were handled by the developers and the writers that make them seem bad. That is really all I have an opinion on as the rest is personally entering territory that I really don't know as much in as this. So yes, coming from a person who enjoyed Sonic The Hedgehog (2006) and the addition of Silver The Hedgehog, that's my opinion.

[Neon]

Gaming Truth 3DS Review: 8.75

http://www.gamingtru...ons-3ds-review/

Sonic Generations has been hands-down the Sonic game I’ve been wanting to play, but never knew would exist. The level design has become something that is almost near perfection, and is leaps and bounds far more fluid than whatever title you thought was best in the the series.

Wut?

Edited December 12, 2011 by Neon

[Xenos]

Gaming Truth 3DS Review: 8.75

http://www.gamingtru...ons-3ds-review/

Wut?

[KrazyBean]

Gaming Truth 3DS Review: 8.75

http://www.gamingtru...ons-3ds-review/

Wut?

Wow, the level design is great...but it definitely isn't near perfect.

[Emmett L. Brown]

Mario will have his moment where he will begin to stagnate, it just hasn't happened yet because of the other franchises, which from what I see are beginning to fall out of the limelight.

*checks watch*

It's been twenty-eight years so far. Let me know when that one plays out, Cassandra.

[Scar]

*checks watch*

It's been twenty-eight years so far. Let me know when that one plays out, Cassandra.

[Neon]

G4 Video Review:

http://www.g4tv.com/videos/56633/sonic-generations-video-review/

4/5

[KHCast]

G4 Video Review:

http://www.g4tv.com/...s-video-review/

4/5

[Xenos]

Okay, Shut up morrigan you don’t know what your talking about.

Okay just because they are RE-CREATING levels from past sonic games doesn’t mean It’s the same level just in hD.There’s new content like missions and music to make it a new experience. And i thought adam was doing the review.At least they didn’t say the story was confusing-”They use a time machine to go through time”

[KHCast]

Even though some of the stuff in the review bugged me, the review was actually pretty brief, but got the job done with what time they had anyways.

It was a nice review, and hey, at least it got a 4/5.

[Your Vest Friend]

The Metacritic score we were confused about earlier seems to have settled. It's down to 77 again.

[Soniman]

So....now its even lower than Colors?

Damn it all

[sonfan1984]

I'm to the point where I've stopped giving a damn about the numbers on Metacritic weeks ago.

[KrazyBean]

I'm to the point where I've stopped giving a damn about the numbers on Metacritic weeks ago.

Same...I personally enjoy the game and that's all that matters to me. We all knew that Sonic Generations won't be a critically acclaimed game anyway, but it did well, especially since it was released with the big hitters this year.

Edited December 15, 2011 by KrazySanta14

[Saint Nathan]

*checks watch*

It's been twenty-eight years so far. Let me know when that one plays out, Cassandra.

Mario has already gotten stale in the 2D department with NSMBWii, and by the looks of how people are talking about SM3DS it's getting there with 3D as well.

Mario is already getting stale. It's not a matter of time, it's happening right now.