Sonic Frontiers - Review Roundup.

[Mega]

Sterling is nonbinary, IIRC, and uses they/them, unless something changed.

That being said, really not a fan of how negative they are toward the game already, and calling it the worst game of the year is excessive. Like it's fine if people don't like it, but the worst game? Really?

[ZinogreVolt]

Even within the same month, Pokemon Scarlet/Violet wound up having an unmitigated disaster of a launch, one much worse off than Sonic. Frontiers isn't winning any awards, nor does it really deserve to (besides maybe music), but frankly you have to actively be convincing yourself that Frontiers is that bad to say that it's the worst release of the year... in the same year as games like Babylon's Fall, Postal 4, High on Life, and so on.

[Dummy Bear]

Didn't Sterling also crap on Sonic Colors, the critical darling at the time, too?

As much as agree with them on their opinions on the games industry, games themselves on the other hand...

[Jango]

Isn't he a troll reviewer anyways?

[Wraith]

2 hours ago, Jango said:

Isn't he a troll reviewer anyways?

No. Their arguments are usually genuine even if the way they deliver them is inflammatory.



I tend to categorize types like him and Yahtzee as sort of pop-critics, where the appeal is as much about their personality and their humor as it is the review. The former gets in the way of the latter sometimes but other times they make clear, concise points I don't see other critics making so I don't brush them off entirely.

[Sonicka]

it should probably be noted that Steph did state in a tweet that the list wasn’t a “top ten” - so there is no order to these this year. 

11 hours ago, DaBigJ said:

And I don't disagree, persay, it just feels...weird that Sterling would do that.
 

Is Frontiers really that bad?

Objectively? No. It’s honestly very far from being the worst thing Sonic Team have put out based on what they have accomplished technically and with the gameplay loop experience. You only need to look at the reception to this title to see how well this game has been received overall.

Subjectively though, that depends. Steph clearly didn’t like this game at all… and I mean, AT ALL. Hence their personal criticisms and the score. And that’s fine. They are entitled to how they feel about it.

Steph has gone on record saying how Pokémon Scaret and Violet is one of the worst games they have played in the series… yet loves it and will still continue to buy the games. And It wasn’t on this list despite everything, so they know how hypocritical they can be. You can’t help what you love and what you hate at the end of the day. 

 

All I can say here is that it is a shame that they can’t see the bigger picture with Sonic Frontiers, not to mention the roadmap of content for support. And whilst I can see what they are getting at with their criticisms, (because the experience IS flawed), I personally also had a lot of fun in my 40+ hours initial playthrough.

So it’s hard to hear them say “Sonic Fans deserve better” when I genuinely feel that this title delivered. It’s somewhat insulting that they think we set our bar “so low” that we’ll take anything …I mean, No, no we won’t. But based on their experience does Steph really know the Sonic Community that well? We’re such avid complainers when the standard isn’t good enough, and we don’t settle for mediocrity or issues, so when something does pull through (aka, Frontiers) - it’s a win. 

Now, that doesn’t mean the game was perfect - but the fact that Sonic Team might just be on the right path now is hopeful that they’ll refine what works for future entires in this new generation of Sonic Games. 

[Badnik Mechanic]

2 hours ago, Sonicka said:

All I can say here is that it is a shame that they can’t see the bigger picture with Sonic Frontiers, not to mention the roadmap of content for support. 

Sorry... No.

I don't care if this game has a 50 year road map.

I still paid full price for a lackluster game that is fundamentally flawed and in someplaces downright unplayable with how poorly its designed at best and outright broken at worst.

They don't get to pull the 'we're still working on it/got big plans' for my free QA feedback.

Even if they released a mega patch that somehow resolved utterly everything and turned it into a dream game. Sorry no, they want me to be their test group, they pay me. Not the othe way around.

[Sonicka]

12 minutes ago, Badnik Mechanic said:

Sorry... No.

I don't care if this game has a 50 year road map.

I still paid full price for a lackluster game that is fundamentally flawed and in someplaces downright unplayable with how poorly its designed at best and outright broken at worst.

They don't get to pull the 'we're still working on it/got big plans' for my free QA feedback.

Even if they released a mega patch that somehow resolved utterly everything and turned it into a dream game. Sorry no, they want me to be their test group, they pay me. Not the othe way around.

So my point wasn’t that Sonic Team are/should plan to make the game better or patch it. I’m saying that Steph has missed that Sonic Team plans to fully support this game next year with a roadmap of content - which suggests to me that the game was successful enough for them to do this because it was decent. 

If you didn’t enjoy the game then that’s fair enough. Objectively I wouldn’t say it’s unplayable though. Janky? Sure. But this isn’t really a broken game in the truest sense. At least, from all the games I’ve played in my time this isn’t something I’d class in that category anyway. 

…That being said, I’m talking about my own PS4 experience - for other consoles I got no say. So if that’s the case on switch or whatever, then I wouldn’t personally know the lengths on how the game holds up. 

As for the worldwide player testing quote… wasn’t that just a dodgy mistranslated comment? Or have I missed something since?

In any case, I sit on the other end of the spectrum so my views gunna be a bit skewed towards the positive. I am Sorry to hear that you didn’t have fun with this one though. That sucks. 

[MetKey]

10 hours ago, Jango said:

Isn't he a troll reviewer anyways?

Sterling is, when it comes to Sonic, the most genuine critic around. Their Sonic 4 Episode I review remains one of their best ones to this very day, but the petty Sonic nerds just can't seem to understand them, Sad!

[Jovahexeon Jax Joranvexeon]

9 hours ago, MetKey said:

Sterling is, when it comes to Sonic, the most genuine critic around. Their Sonic 4 Episode I review remains one of their best ones to this very day, but the petty Sonic nerds just can't seem to understand them, Sad!

I can't tell if this is sarcastic or not, given how widely agreed to be terrible, their Sonic Colors review was.

[Badnik Mechanic]

I get why people think Sterling somewhat is a baiter when it comes to reviews.

And you could really tell that during their time at destructoid they were under some kind of "be edgy" mandate, Sterling has even hinted that was the case on several occasions, yet once you get past the edgy remarks and especially looking at their content post going independent, it's very hard to dispute a lot of the points raised in said reviews. 

[Jovahexeon Jax Joranvexeon]

18 minutes ago, Badnik Mechanic said:

I get why people think Sterling somewhat is a baiter when it comes to reviews.

And you could really tell that during their time at destructoid they were under some kind of "be edgy" mandate, Sterling has even hinted that was the case on several occasions, yet once you get past the edgy remarks and especially looking at their content post going independent, it's very hard to dispute a lot of the points raised in said reviews. 

Their points on problems with the gaming industry, have a much better track record than their reviews. I highly doubt the tendency to "be edgy" was a mandate from Destructoid.

[Wraith]

If your frame of reference for their reviews is, "The sonic colors review from a decade ago and the sonic one they just released" you don't have a good frame of reference to judge from.

[Jovahexeon Jax Joranvexeon]

21 minutes ago, Wraith said:

If your frame of reference for their reviews is, "The sonic colors review from a decade ago and the sonic one they just released" you don't have a good frame of reference to judge from.

Oh, I've seen a good chunk of their other reviews. Don't particularly care for them. That said, if you fancy them, then more power to ya.

What's more preferable is their discussion videos on the games industry, which feel far better and more focused with what to take seriously. The reviews? Nah. The tone's not endearing, and neither are some of the points they make.

Also, for folks who just check the scores, their scoring is very odd since it doesn't really sync up well with what they actually have to say in the reviews.

[Dummy Bear]

18 hours ago, Sonicka said:

 

Oh, I've seen a good chunk of their other reviews. Don't particularly care for them. That said, if you fancy them, then more power to ya.

What's more preferable is their discussion videos on the games industry, which feel far better and more focused with what to take seriously. The reviews? Nah. The tone's not endearing, and neither are some of the points they make.

Also, for folks who just check the scores, their scoring is very odd since it doesn't really sync up well with what they actually have to say in the reviews.

 

Not to mention the hypocrisy of giving the newest Pokemon a free pass despite having a myriad of it's own problems, just because they liked the game in spite of it's problems.

You can't go telling Sonic fans who are satisfied with a seemingly broken product that they "deserve better" while defending another seemingly broken product just because you happened to satisfied with it because judging by some reactions I saw on forums and social media, Pokemon fans "deserved better", too.

This is why I have such a problem with people using reviews of other people's opinions as objective proof of quality; people are inherently biased to a degree.

Edit: wrong quote.

[Jovahexeon Jax Joranvexeon]

10 minutes ago, Slash said:

This is why I have such a problem with people using reviews of other people's opinions as objective proof of quality; people are inherently biased to a degree.

And the degree that many people tend to forget is that this applies to "official reviews" too. Critics aren't any different from other human beings. They just happen to grant scores that influence the metacritic score. Doesn't mean that their reviews are automatically good or better than non-licensed reviewers. And they shouldn't be taken as the be-all end-all gospel.

Not to say that it can't be a good indicator for game, but the average can easily get messed and shouldn't be taken as the golden gauge of quality.

[Dummy Bear]

1 minute ago, Jovahexeon Jax Joranvexeon said:

And the degree that many people tend to forget is that this applies to "official reviews" too. Critics aren't any different from other human beings. They just happen to grant scores that influence the metacritic score. Doesn't mean that their reviews are automatically good or better than non-licensed reviewers. And they shouldn't be taken as the be-all end-all gospel.

Not to say that it can't be a good indicator for game, but the average can easily get messed and shouldn't be taken as the golden gauge of quality.

Not to mention the problem with some reviewers(especially Social media ones) care more about being "trendy" or "controversial" for clicks.

 

[Wraith]

I've seen a lot of accusations of hypocrisy or bias, but not a lot of arguing against the actual points being made in the review, or the followup.

[Dummy Bear]

20 minutes ago, Wraith said:

I've seen a lot of accusations of hypocrisy or bias, but not a lot of arguing against the actual points being made in the review, or the followup.

Such as?

Because I'm certainly not going to entertain clicks and reinforce their views. I said I would never listen to their reviews about games after Sonic Colors and I meant it.

Seriously, give me some examples.

[DaBigJ]

1 hour ago, Wraith said:

I've seen a lot of accusations of hypocrisy or bias, but not a lot of arguing against the actual points being made in the review, or the followup.

I mean, you haven't been arguing against or for them yourself either all that much 

[Sonicka]

2 hours ago, Wraith said:

I've seen a lot of accusations of hypocrisy or bias, but not a lot of arguing against the actual points being made in the review, or the followup.

Literally most of what Steph describes to dislike I either enjoyed or didn’t encounter the same problems.

Ultimately the issue most seem to take is that the culmination of the review reads like it’s going towards a 4 or 5 rating, and they sink it with a 1.5 for no credible reason despite all their points. Personally, I don’t really care for the score ultimately because I know from my personal playthrough that this game was a good time.

Now, I’m not immune to not seeing some of the jankiness of the game, but it certainly isn’t anywhere near as broken as Steph claims it to be, and as for the tonal dissonance of the environments looking like asset flips, well, I’m not that surprised they felt that way given the amount of greenlight games Steph has played. I think the realism vibe was certainly an odd one - but played in contrast with Cyberspace it made sense to me, as did the rails and small platform challenges. For what the Starfall islands represented, these elements made sense, even for lack of proper context or narrative explanation.

They also think that the controls are bad (despite these being customisable), they found the reused layouts for cyberspace stages the best bits, but also call Sonic Team out as being shameless in reusing SA2/Unleashed layouts. So what’s their criticism here? Sonic Team shouldn’t reuse layouts for these short cyberspace specials stages despite that they claim they are fun? 

I could go on, but look - the fact of the matter is Steph didn’t gel with Frontiers and the review reads as though they gave up halfway through trying to find any sense of fun so just ran with that feeling. There isn’t much more to say. 

[Blueknight V2.0]

I agree with almost everything in AntDude's Frontiers review...and it's probably the best review I've seen for the game! I typically tend to avoid YouTuber reviews when it comes to something I really enjoyed, 'cause they tend to effect my overall opinion afterward. But this one perfectly reflected what I thought about it.

 

[Red Hot Jack]

On 12/28/2022 at 5:15 AM, Badnik Mechanic said:

Sorry... No.

I don't care if this game has a 50 year road map.

I still paid full price for a lackluster game that is fundamentally flawed and in someplaces downright unplayable with how poorly its designed at best and outright broken at worst.

They don't get to pull the 'we're still working on it/got big plans' for my free QA feedback.

Even if they released a mega patch that somehow resolved utterly everything and turned it into a dream game. Sorry no, they want me to be their test group, they pay me. Not the othe way around.

Unplayable is exaggerated anyway. Call it incomplete sure, but it's not like there isn't a good game or improvement over previous ones (which isn't saying much), more like an overall enjoyable game with technical flaws.

If you didn't enjoy it for the direction or whatever, it's okay and it's a different thing than it being broken.

 

[Badnik Mechanic]

17 hours ago, Slash said:

Such as?

Because I'm certainly not going to entertain clicks and reinforce their views. I said I would never listen to their reviews about games after Sonic Colors and I meant it.

Seriously, give me some examples.

Urm... No.

If you're not willing to even read or look at the argument, why are you even in this thread commenting on it? 

This mindset that some people have of "Oh I stopped reader after..." or "I said I would never look at another review by X and I've not done so for X Years!" you might think "I sound like a badass saying that" or some kind of higher pedestal position, but no, you sound like a person with an utterly weak argument because you literally don't have one.

 

[Dummy Bear]

2 hours ago, Badnik Mechanic said:

Urm... No.

If you're not willing to even read or look at the argument, why are you even in this thread commenting on it? 

This mindset that some people have of "Oh I stopped reader after..." or "I said I would never look at another review by X and I've not done so for X Years!" you might think "I sound like a badass saying that" or some kind of higher pedestal position, but no, you sound like a person with an utterly weak argument because you literally don't have one.

I just looked at their reviews and it was exactly what I thought it would be: another whingefest trying to present their subjective opinions as objective fact while also having an air of "woe is me the Sonic fanbase has been attacking me" while also borderline insulting the fanbase by saying that their standards are so low that they'll settle for the bottom of the barrel.  Hell, they straight up insult people who unironically like this game and that's not cool, no matter how you feel about the game.

They think the controls are shit but I think this game is the best Sonic has controlled in a 3D game, barring a few wierdness such as stopping on a dime.

And they say the gameplay is literally mashing a bunch of buttons and that's it. literally. NO. That's NOT literally it. There's much more to it that button mashing and you know it! There's unlockable moves, there's puzzle challenges, there's fishing, there's unlockable stages. Speaking of which, they contradict themselves they then say these puzzles and challenges are nothing but boring pointless busywork. So which is it? Is the game nothing but button mashing or is it nothing but busy work?

They says that the artsyle is shit, but I actually really like it since it puts more emphasis on the somber tone of the story. This one I can give a pass since it's so subjective.

I'm not sure what they said about the story because I had to stop right there because the statements were giving me a headache because it's literally all the same complaints I've heard from everyone else, only Steph is SEVERLY inflating their score.

The review was EXACTLY what I was expecting. Are you happy, now?