Sonic Forces | PS4, Xbox One, Switch, PC "The Next Generations"

[FriendBot]

Did previous Sonic games ever had super bouncy animations for Sonic?

 

[JosepHenry]

Animation is something I hope they improve, Sonic has only one Homing Attack animation. 

Something I will give credit to Rise of Lyric.

[Chris Knopps]

Just now, Soni said:

Did previous Sonic games ever had super bouncy animations for Sonic?

 

Sonic Adventure

Sonic 06

I actually did enjoy the animations for Sonic back in 06 though, especially the spikes.

[Lady Soniko]

Sonic in Adventure had a nice bouncy run animation, his SA2 run also had like 3 stages of animation, walking, jogging and full tilt sprinting with arm swings and everything, also there was a bend to his toe and heel in those games, it's very easy to see the downgrade in character animation from SA onwards. Especially with Shadow's skate animation from SA2, through to Shadow through to Sonic 06 and onwards.

Also if the Generations Modern/Classic animation reel (you know the one where he dances and stuff) can be beautifully animated and bouncy why can't the in-game models be too? They got it right with the Ranking animations at the end of the level, just not the actual in-game models during gameplay.

[FriendBot]

Is that so? Hmmm, never really was a big observer for that sort of detail. Although the Adventure did had stages to the running but I don't think the animation itself was anything spectacular. If you ask me, Rise of Lyric's animations were really good; very fluid and has the cartoonish stretch to it; that's just entertaining to see in motion. I don't think any of Sonic Team-made games ever reached that level of ingame animation imo.

[Kintor]

9 minutes ago, Chris Knopps said:

Isn't the answer clear?

Let a man dream.

Yeah, I think it'd be pretty cool to fight some SWATbots in a modern Sonic game. Overall SatAM had a great art style and some creative designs with all of Robotnik's machinery, especially the SWATbots.

And who knows, with all this talk of 'joining the resistance' and Sonic apparently leading an army against Eggman(s) I'm kind of getting an updated Freedom Fighter vibe from the whole thing. It'd be out of leftfield but perhaps Sonic Team is taking some more inspiration from SatAM in this new game

[Lady Soniko]

That was because Ex-Naughty Dog employees animated Sonic and his friends in that game, it has a very Crash Bandicoot and Jak & Daxter feel to it, which is one of the best things about RoL, it's beautifully animated.

[Waveshocker Sigma]

Eh, I don't like bouncy animations on Sonic. I prefer seeing him become more solid and steeled as he speeds up and slams through everything in his way. That's even how his full speed runs in the Adventure games looked whenever he went down a hill or got Speed Shoes. Knuckles has the more bouncy run even at full speed in SA1 and I always felt like it made him look pretty ridiculous, and not in a charming way.

[Indigo Rush]

Animations in Sonic games in general post-Classic (sans the Advance games) era have consistently failed to push the bar beyond the bare minimum, which honestly drives me up a wall because to this day I'll trumpet my opinion that those animations are one of the most overlooked aspects of what helped set Sonic apart from other platformers back in the 16-bit days of old. To see Sonic continuously fail to impress and let other mascot platformers like Mario outclass him in expressiveness and animation is simply irking. Sonic can and has done better.

[Jovahexeon Jax Joranvexeon]

3 minutes ago, Lady Soniko said:

That was because Ex-Naughty Dog employees animated Sonic and his friends in that game, it has a very Crash Bandicoot and Jak & Daxter feel to it, which is one of the best things about RoL, it's beautifully animated.

Heck even Lost World with its idle, death and moving animations felt more lively with its flavor.

[Shaddy Zaphod]

The fact that Sonic's quills don't even really animate when he moves tells me that these animations are obviously unfinished. I think we're overreacting a bit over very little

[FriendBot]

Although the most bouncy animation I've seen (that weren't from other developers) we're from Lost World actually. Some of the animations isn't that impressive but just enough to make them stand out, heck the idle stance Modern Sonic has in the gameplay teaser is the same stance from Lost World. Which is a more memorable stance than the generic idle stances from past games. The jumping animation had a more bouncy feel to it which can also be seen in Forces as well. 

[Wraith]

I've felt like Mario Games have looked better than Sonic games for a while now. the gap between Mario Odyssey and Sonic Forces is closer but what we've seen of Mario Odyssey is way more expressive.

You can also interact with a lot more of what you see in Mario Odyssey, too. Just kind of a far cry from the old days all around lol. 

[Chris Knopps]

7 minutes ago, Indigo Rush said:

Animations in Sonic games in general post-Classic (sans the Advance games) era have consistently failed to push the bar beyond the bare minimum, which honestly drives me up a wall because to this day I'll trumpet my opinion that those animations are one of the most overlooked aspects of what helped set Sonic apart from other platformers back in the 16-bit days of old. To see Sonic continuously fail to impress and let other mascot platformers like Mario outclass him in expressiveness and animation is simply irking. Sonic can and has done better.

Keep in mind SEGA of Japan oh so "brilliantly" refuses to let Sonic show any major expressions because they think it "isn't cool".

SEGA of Japan wouldn't know what's cool for Sonic if someone put ice down their pants.

(Praises the Whitehead team and SEGA of America once more)

(Edit)

For folks wondering where I got that tidbit, it was clarified via Archie staff in the past as to why Sonic can't be "too" expressive.

[Jango]

C'mon guys, we always do this. This is a WIP, a lot of water will run untill the game's out.

Remember when SEGA revealed Modern Green Hill gameplay for the first time and mostly everybody started saying "oh no, it's just a narrow corridor with fancy graphics around it, the whole game's gonna be like that! 4/10".

And then BAM:

In our faces.

Relax. I'm sure as hell Sonic's animations will improve.

[Kintor]

1 minute ago, Josh said:

I've felt like Mario Games have looked better than Sonic games for a while now. the gap between Mario Odyssey and Sonic Forces is closer but what we've seen of Mario Odyssey is way more expressive.

Nah, the latest batch of Mario games have a nasty tendency to use too much bloom as a way to try and disguise low-quality textures. I expect that Sonic Forces, thanks to the power of modern platforms (like PC, PS4 and Xbox One) is going to look much better then Mario Odyssey. You can see this already in Sonic Forces, the complex lighting in the modern gameplay already puts it above Sonic Unleashed.

As for the Switch version of Sonic Forces, it'll probably be a simililar situation to Sonic Unleashed Wii/PS2 compared to PS3/Xbox 360, a seperate version of the game with lower quality assets because of Nintendo's weaker hardware.

[Shaddy Zaphod]

1 minute ago, Kintor said:

As for the Switch version of Sonic Forces, it'll probably be a simililar situation to Sonic Unleashed Wii/PS2 compared to PS3/Xbox 360, a seperate version of the game with lower quality assets because of Nintendo's weaker hardware.

Unlikely. The level of difference between Forces and Generations is such that it'll probably run fine on the Switch, as well as Forces would had it been on the 360/PS3

[blazefan519]

1 minute ago, Kintor said:

As for the Switch version of Sonic Forces, it'll probably be a simililar situation to Sonic Unleashed Wii/PS2 compared to PS3/Xbox 360, a seperate version of the game with lower quality assets because of Nintendo's weaker hardware.

I honestly doubt that it'll be that big of a jump for the Switch. It's significally easier to port and runs 1080p 60fps pretty easily (Fast RMX and Mario Kart 8 Deluxe are great examples of that).

[Lady Soniko]

I'm not denying that the animations could improve later but the fact remains that Sonic has constantly had sub-par character animation over the entire series after SA/2 so yeah it definitely is something to make note of.

Anyway I've railed on animation woes for a bit, is it really such a bad thing to want to see your favorite character animated beautifully like he deserves?

Here's my thoughts on Forces so far though

• It looks gorgeous, it could potentially even blow Unleashed's art direction and style out of the water if they keep up the diverse and detailed backgrounds
• Sonic definitely looks faster thanks to the new effects for boosting, very nice art direction for the effects so far
• I'm liking the hue of his fur and the overall model so far looks very meaty and appealing to look at, awful animations aside.
• I hate that wisps are back, y'all know my beef with Colors at this point and I'm disappointed if Wisps are the source of your boost again.
• I'm loving the theme song and music so far, especially the second half of the theme
• Grimdark/more story orientated game has already piqued my interest.
• Yes thank god buttrock and guitars are back, also vocal theme woohoo
• Not happy Classic is there but we'll see the reasons why
• A 3rd gameplay style has me concerned that they're just throwing in all the previous games gameplay to cater to everyone because they aren't sure what to do with Sonic anymore 
• LOVE the Logo, but has Sonic games ever really not had a good designed logo?

[Chris Knopps]

1 minute ago, Kintor said:

Nah, the latest batch of Mario games have a nasty tendency to use too much bloom as a way to try and disguise low-quality textures. I expect that Sonic Forces, thanks to the power of modern platforms (like PC, PS4 and Xbox One) is going to look much better then Mario Odyssey. You can see this already in Sonic Forces, the complex lighting in the modern gameplay already puts it above Sonic Unleashed.

As for the Switch version of Sonic Forces, it'll probably be a simililar situation to Sonic Unleashed Wii/PS2 compared to PS3/Xbox 360, a seperate version of the game with lower quality assets because of Nintendo's weaker hardware.

I wouldn't go into "auto-assume" mode on this either.

The console has shown capability potentials and future updates are coming to further improve its performance, especially when docked.

The only difference worth expecting is a 30FPS portable mode, other than that, I'd say expect the same experience all around.

Keep in mind the Wii was just the GameCube with motion control as its focus, the Wii U just a Wii with more PS2 era capabilities.

The new Switch is... I'd say between PS3/PS4, leaning toward PS4, but not QUITE there, so we should be safe.

[blazefan519]

Just now, Shaddy the guy said:

Unlikely. The level of difference between Forces and Generations is such that it'll probably run fine on the Switch, as well as Forces would had it been on the 360/PS3

Exactly.

[Kintor]

Just now, Shaddy the guy said:

Unlikely. The level of difference between Forces and Generations is such that it'll probably run fine on the Switch, as well as Forces would had it been on the 360/PS3

A version of Sonic Forces will probaly run on the Switch (albeit at 20 FPS no doubt), but the overall visual expeience will be significently different to what can be achieved on other platforms.

[Chris Knopps]

1 minute ago, blazefan519 said:

Exactly.

I've seen this tossed around as cautions before, may want to avoid one word responses.

Can be a tad touchy on that, just a heads up.

[blazefan519]

1 minute ago, Kintor said:

A version of Sonic Forces will probaly run on the Switch (albeit at 20 FPS no doubt), but the overall visual expeience will be significently different to what can be achieved on other platforms.

Doubt it. Docked it should be 60fps, with maybe only slight differences in lighting. Other than that, it should essentially be the same version.

[FriendBot]

5 minutes ago, Jango said:

C'mon guys, we always do this. This is a WIP, a lot of water will run untill the game's out.

Remember when SEGA revealed Modern Green Hill gameplay for the first time and mostly everybody started saying "oh no, it's just a narrow corridor with fancy graphics around it, the whole game's gonna be like that! 4/10".

And then BAM:

In our faces.

Relax. I'm sure as hell Sonic's animations will improve.

You could've chose a different screenshot because that section is pretty barebones as well. run through a narrow corridor where you either jump to hit some Rainbow Trick Rings to go to a Quick Step section (which is as barebones as you get but hey, quick reaction movement can be addicting at a basic level I guess) or jump down and do some water running segments.