The current tone of the Sonic game series

[Blazey Firekitty]

Well, a guy transforming sentient animals friends into robots, and conquering cities and refineries isn't the most light hearted of stories. It's not brooding like SA2's story with Shadow, but certainly not the most light hearted story to tell. I could say really that you can find a good deal of both shades in it. Even the classics had levels that weren't always brightly colored and stuff. That and in Sonic Adventure, the allusion to death, war, stealing, killing and genocide isn't very...light hearted either.

Those are actually good points, come to think of it. I guess I mentioned SA2 because Shadow is usually the first thing that jumps to my mind when I think "dark." I guess the series has always had a tradition of setting up somewhat dark situations, than making them feel more lighthearted by introducing spectacular acts of determination and heroism.

[speedfreak]

It somewhat hard to tell precisely what the thought process was with SA 2, let's take those really boring driving levels as an example. The level itself was really boring which makes me think they were mandated by the story, but when Tails finds the president, they don't really do all that much, the whole subplot could have been dropped faster than the hackers in Bayformers (Transformers) 1. It's really hard to tell which came first, the level or the story that required it. Worse yet, lots of the stuff planned for Adventure 2 was cut, making it even harder to tell, the resulting game might be like it is because they had to finish up whatever they had and get it out the door. I recall hearing that Iizuka had said in an interview that he had wanted to have a Casino Night Zone style pinball table in at least one of the Adventure games, but didn't for the sake of the story. But you also have to consider something peculiar about Iizuka: He will lie through his teeth during interviews. Or maybe he isn't lying and his brain is just fuzzy.

Sonic 06 isn't an example of a plot affecting the gameplay, it's an example of the plot not being tidy enough to fit properly within the game, and I am speaking metaphorically right now.

There was a pinball table in SA1.

Edited October 3, 2009 by speedfreak

[ZaneZONIC]

Well since were on the topic of games...ill say that the old games kicked the new games' ass. I mean sonic adventure 1 and 2 and the genesis games were what sonic should be...running and collecting rings and running around in balls and what not...i mean secret rings and black knight was fun but seriously...a darkspine sonic? and a sword...its kool but its not sonic cool ya know? I miss the days where a wherehog didnt exsist...seriously a wherehog? I have one word for that... HELL NO

[azoo]

It somewhat hard to tell precisely what the thought process was with SA 2, let's take those really boring driving levels as an example. The level itself was really boring which makes me think they were mandated by the story, but when Tails finds the president, they don't really do all that much, the whole subplot could have been dropped faster than the hackers in Bayformers (Transformers) 1. It's really hard to tell which came first, the level or the story that required it. Worse yet, lots of the stuff planned for Adventure 2 was cut, making it even harder to tell, the resulting game might be like it is because they had to finish up whatever they had and get it out the door. I recall hearing that Iizuka had said in an interview that he had wanted to have a Casino Night Zone style pinball table in at least one of the Adventure games, but didn't for the sake of the story. But you also have to consider something peculiar about Iizuka: He will lie through his teeth during interviews. Or maybe he isn't lying and his brain is just fuzzy.

Sonic 06 isn't an example of a plot affecting the gameplay, it's an example of the plot not being tidy enough to fit properly within the game, and I am speaking metaphorically right now.

Wow... Phos, you just won the forum over like, ten times over. Although Speedfreak is right; there was definitely a pinball table in SA1. However, it was rather buggy if you ask me.

[Phos]

There was a pinball table in SA1.

Like I said, Iizuka was either lying or his brain is fuzzy.

Takashi Iizuka: The Sonic Adventure series was much more story-driven, so I was limited to the types of level designs that would make sense within the scope of the game. But with Heroes, I had much more freedom to explore more action-oriented levels, the type that used to be Sonic-only stages. I really wanted to put a 3D pinball stage into the Adventure series somewhere, but due to the limitations of the storyline I just couldn't do it.

That, or he didn't count the Casinopolis table as the same kind of thing. The ones in Casino Night Zone were part of the level, the ones in Casinopolis were just pinball tables.

Edited October 3, 2009 by Phos

[Dejablue]

i think it wasn't just a rumor that Tails wasn't supposed to be playable in SA2. Thats probably why his driving stage was pointless.

except for Shadow I thought all of the Sonic games were fairly light hearted.

Even in 06 when Sonic died I laughed through that entire scene.

[CrownSlayers Shadow]

Oh man, don't remind me.

That death scene was the most poorly executed scene of the entire series. It wasn't serious, but it wasn't funny...ironically it might make you laugh.