Megathread Sonic Frontiers (2022) | MT | General Discussion (DO NOT discuss leaks here please)

[DaN]

I’ve read a lot of your complains and thoughts about the cyberspace levels and the rest of the game and I want to give my 5 cents.

I am quite curious about Frontiers and cautiously optimistic after watching the last trailer and a bunch Gamescom gameplay footage.

the Open zones portions seems addictive and the controls appear to be sharp. I still have some doubts about some animations like the parkour ones but overall the game seems to be engaging and polished.

I understand some of the criticism surrounding cyberspace levels when it comes to reusing assets and levels like GH and CP. It is pretty lazy and I hope we will find more original levels or at least old ones that were never re used (For example Apotos, Hang Castle, Starlight zone and so on).

When it comes to these levels being short I’m 50/50. I’m quite sure levels will be greater in scope going forward but maybe now these boost like sections have found their right purpose after all these years: being sort of special stages and not the main “thing”. I’ll try to make myself clearer: I enjoyed Unleashed and Colors when they came out, but the core Sonic gameplay, while fun, always felt “not enough” for me. Generations surprised me with clever level design like Seaside Hill and I was hoping they would continue to evolve, but Forces was a disaster, and it became almost as automated as Sonic Dash.

I also noticed that Sonic appears to control a lot better in these cyberspace sections (while being maybe too short) and less on rails like Unleashed, Colors and mostly Forces. If going forward Sonic Team can implement  more Generations Seaside Hill like levels I’ll be more than happy, mostly because these sections are now “special stages”, a sort or minigame.

 

the only real gripe I have with this title right now is the art direction. I don’t dislike the Nier-eque feel at all, but the open spaces from what has been shown are quite soulless. Also, the in -game sonic model and the jump animation feel soo out of place to me. It does not fit with the new aesthetic at all. I would have preferred a SA2 Sonic or a 06 Sonic. I hope I’ll be able to spice things up a bit with customization.

 

 

 

[light-gaia]

Cyberspace is not an after thought because we are hearing about it since the first leaks of people who played Fronties back in 2019. It's also not the "real" game either because Takashi Iizuka confirmed it's possible to beat the game without going to cyberspace because there are tones of ways of getting the vault keys

 

After seeing this videos, I think the city level is definitely Speed Highway 

Edited August 25, 2022 by light-gaia
Grammar checking

[Sonicka]

6 minutes ago, light-gaia said:

After seeing this videos, I think the city level is definitely Speed Highway 

Interestingly - the 2D city cyberspace level gave me a lot of Radical Highway Generations 3DS level vibes

Regardless, I’m enjoying the looks of all these so far. They are short and sweet for sure - but due to their function at least this won’t irritate me like a lot of Forces end goal lines did. 

[Shaddy Zaphod]

It doesn't really look anything like speed highway though. It's just kinda...roads. We didn't even know there were buildings before today. Green Hill is immediately identifiable as green hill, chemical plant is chemical plant, sky stanktuary is sky sanctuary. This doesn't look like any previous stage and none of the level design has (to my knowledge) resembled anything we've seen before.

Anyway, here's gamexplain with 15 minutes of uninterrupted footage, thank god.

 

[azoo]

1 hour ago, Shaddy Zaphod said:

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Gameplay thread. Starts with drop dash.

This playthrough actually made Sonic’s controls look decent, and the open areas sorta fun to navigate. Drop dashing seems to add quite a bit to the movement in ways most players are ignoring (Sonic novices ignoring the roll, what else is new). Game seems a little more enjoyable in the hands of someone who knows how to play a Sonic game.

The titan boss and cyberspace levels still look super unrefined though, lol.

 

[Cayenne]

Personally, I think the city level looks like a mix of Generation's Speed Highway with Skyscraper Scamper. Some elements are very similar to the ones seen in those stages.

 

 

[Shaddy Zaphod]

Here's a look at those movement sliders. They really did go for it with this, huh. I still am bewildered that this is even in the game, but nonetheless not complaining.

[A super No.1 washedupgamer]

1 hour ago, Shaddy Zaphod said:

  Reveal hidden contents

Gameplay thread. Starts with drop dash.

My only complaint is the tutorial in the beginning. One second he's gaining speed, then it just stops All of a sudden to tell you about things. Then it starts back. It's really jarring. I hope you have the option to turn it off.

[VO.SUPER]

22 minutes ago, azoo said:

This playthrough actually made Sonic’s controls look decent, and the open areas sorta fun to navigate. Drop dashing seems to add quite a bit to the movement in ways most players are ignoring (Sonic novices ignoring the roll, what else is new). Game seems a little more enjoyable in the hands of someone who knows how to play a Sonic game.

The titan boss and cyberspace levels still look super unrefined though, lol.

I think the big thing to hope for is that the later ones are more interesting. We are looking at the earliest ones. And judging by all the footage of gameplay interruptions, notifications, tutorials, it's clear Sonic Team is pulling punches. 

So the only thing to do is hope the later ones are better. 

But that involves giving benefit of the doubt. Which Sonic Team doesn't always deserve. 

[Soniman]

51 minutes ago, Shaddy Zaphod said:

Here's a look at those movement sliders. They really did go for it with this, huh. I still am bewildered that this is even in the game, but nonetheless not complaining.

Still kind wary about this, I just hope the default isn’t really bad feeling and right off the bat we need to spend half an hour fiddling with sliders to make it feel good 

[Iko]

Is the city level original or what? It gives a lot of Generations 3DS vibes to me, but I can't find a specific level which fits the structure. Also some parts resemble a bit of some 2D sections of Tropical Resort or Sweet Mountain from Colors, but the whole level does not seem to be based on any of that, only a couple of sections. There's one part that resembles a Sonic Rush part that was also referenced in Sonic 4, the big stair with springs at the corner of each step. It does also resemble Route 99 from Advance 3 too, but I'm not sure.

For sure it gives me a lot of deja-vu feelings but I can't figure out the specific level.

[HywelAtTheMoon]

7 minutes ago, Iko said:

Is the city level original or what? It gives a lot of Generations 3DS vibes to me, but I can't find a specific level which fits the structure. Also some parts resemble a bit of some 2D sections of Tropical Resort or Sweet Mountain from Colors, but the whole level does not seem to be based on any of that, only a couple of sections. There's one part that resembles a Sonic Rush part that was also referenced in Sonic 4, the big stair with springs at the corner of each step. It does also resemble Route 99 from Advance 3 too, but I'm not sure.

For sure it gives me a lot of deja-vu feelings but I can't figure out the specific level.

I'm getting a bit of Empire City from Unleashed in terms of aesthetics. 

[light-gaia]

1 hour ago, Shaddy Zaphod said:

It doesn't really look anything like speed highway though. It's just kinda...roads. We didn't even know there were buildings before today. Green Hill is immediately identifiable as green hill, chemical plant is chemical plant, sky stanktuary is sky sanctuary. This doesn't look like any previous stage and none of the level design has (to my knowledge) resembled anything we've seen before.

Anyway, here's gamexplain with 15 minutes of uninterrupted footage, thank god.

I think it looks similar to Generation Speed Highway, in my opinion. We have the cars, the same way we have them in Generations, some platform elements look similar as well. I think the level look different because it's day and there are the cyberspace background. The layout is different, of course

[StaticMania]

Do the cutscenes look better animated than anything that came before?

It would sure be an oddity that the cutscene animation is better than the game-play animation.

[PSI Wind]

21 minutes ago, Soniman said:

Still kind wary about this, I just hope the default isn’t really bad feeling and right off the bat we need to spend half an hour fiddling with sliders to make it feel good 

Everyone who's praised the controls, given the time limit, most likely didn't mess with anything

[Graystripe2000]

Here could be an uh-oh. 

 

[Shaddy Zaphod]

[StaticMania]

Outside of the Footage getting taken down, there's nothing really worrying about that...

[Iko]

12 minutes ago, HywelAtTheMoon said:

I'm getting a bit of Empire City from Unleashed in terms of aesthetics. 

It's definitely a mix of Empire City and Speed Highway (Generations), but what I'm talking about is the level design, not the aesthetics.

[A super No.1 washedupgamer]

You know what would be cool? If the cyberspace stages really did have alternate goals like, say you reached the goal ring/orb/post thingy, but you discover a platform above that takes you down a further path that suprises you with some brand new level design that leads you to a second goal. But, there's another path behind that one that takes you through harder level design to the true goal of the cyberspace stage. Something like that hasn't been seen since shadow the hedgehog I think. Cosmic fall did something like this.

[Razule]

13 minutes ago, Graystripe2000 said:

Here could be an uh-oh. 

I'm curious how they managed to do that at a public event, but that's an "uh oh" for SEGA, not us.

[Kuzu]

They're really going in on these EVA references huh

[LegoFedora]

52 minutes ago, Iko said:

Is the city level original or what? It gives a lot of Generations 3DS vibes to me, but I can't find a specific level which fits the structure. Also some parts resemble a bit of some 2D sections of Tropical Resort or Sweet Mountain from Colors, but the whole level does not seem to be based on any of that, only a couple of sections. There's one part that resembles a Sonic Rush part that was also referenced in Sonic 4, the big stair with springs at the corner of each step. It does also resemble Route 99 from Advance 3 too, but I'm not sure.

For sure it gives me a lot of deja-vu feelings but I can't figure out the specific level.

Definitely original level. People are comparing it to speed highway or radical highway despite there being next to no similarities except that they both have roads in them. The reaction to this level is making me realize why Sonic Team keeps reusing level themes. They know people wouldn't be able to recognize an original level anyways.

Definitely a new zone with the multiple highways with zooming vehicles/white color scheme in the background and foreground.

[Iko]

So this game already looked disappointing, and when you think your expectations were at the lowest, it finds another new way to disappoint you even more.

Not just that, but also, all the content we are finally watching were not supposed to be revealed yet, it was just the usual messing up things on Sega's part.

I find it kinda disgusting how there is absolutely nothing going in those cybespace levels... very few badniks and used as homing attack bridges at best, no level gimmicks; when it's not automation, it's basic platforming on flat platforms, and everything is static, not even a moving platform. Graphics are a little fancier, but this is worse than the Sonic Simulator IMO.

The section ripped from the beginning of Windmill Isle act 2 is the only one which looks a little bit fun so far, and that's not even anything special, it just requires you to do 1 "precision" jump in 3D with another route below.

[The Deleter]

I remember when people were using "they're not 1-to-1 copies of past level design" as worst-case-scenario strawman arguments towards people who were weary of just the level themes of Generations being used. It was only a few months ago after all.

The fact that we actually live in a reality where it's the actual situation is something else, wow