Sonic Superstars - SPOILER Thread

[Ming Ming Hatsune]

5 hours ago, Sonicka said:

To be honest, the “cancel power” instruction could just be a misread on my part. But actually there probably should be a way to shut them off when you want. 

Only one power allows you to cancel when it's activated. It's when you're super.

[Palas]

5 hours ago, Sonicka said:

• Level gimmicks 1)  I don’t think these are all terrible, but a lot of these are either out of place, aren’t taken far enough, or just don’t work. Press Factory Act 2 sticks out to me as an example. I didn’t like these sorts of things in S&K and Sonic Mania either (with the light / vent pull switches) as they just serve to slow the pace of the player down. However, at least they had an aesthetic and level narrative purpose in those titles (and also you weren’t outright killed if you let it go on for too long). I see no logical reason for a self destruct droid to follow the team around after Press Factory already blew up in act 1, it also makes zero sense for there to be giant green switches in the level that reset the timer of this one droid. It’s a shame as I really liked PF act 1. 

This is one thing I won't be able to agree with-- I really liked Press Factory Act 2's gimmick and, instead of slowing you down, I think it actually speeds you up. It carries a sense of urgency you won't really find anywhere else in the game (except maybe Egg Fortress Act 2), and it's a really nice change of pace. The level really hates you and won't let you have your way exploring for extras or even trying to cheat by using Bullet.

 

(I also really like Press Factory Act 1 though)

[Shiny Gems]

Just when I was ready to call it a night...

Spoiler

I finally beat the final boss of Trip's Story. That was sure rough.

I was beginning to think I would never have done it in one night!

 

[Iko]

1 hour ago, Spooky Gems said:

Just when I was ready to call it a night...

  Hide contents

I finally beat the final boss of Trip's Story. That was sure rough.

I was beginning to think I would never have done it in one night!

 

Spoiler

It's not even that hard, it's just super boring and frustrating.

It didn't take many attempts to me either, though forcing me to replay the first phase over and over and having to guess how to survive and attack the boss by trial and error (being killed in the process) wasn't really the best design decision.

The lasers in phase 1 are easy to dodge, but sometimes I wanted to rush and the slope physics limited my freedom of movement, plus they spawn in a weird way (once a laser glitched and went down instead of left), so every now and then there was a wasted attempt because I accidentally hit one of those lasers.

The webs are a joke once you learn how to dodge them... they killed me like once or twice and just out of distraction on my side; occasionally I let myself stuck in a web on purpose in order to dodge the cork gun attack (if you mash the buttons fast enough you will detach just a moment before the boss shoots at you); I did it when I was near to a slope and didn't have enough momentum to climb it, so much that falling from the web by gravity would let me dodge better than running.

[JezMM]

I too had the "cancel power" confusing with L1+R1!  Thanks for clearing that up Sonicka.

 

In addition I also didn't realise the Cyber Station boss was meant to be your own custom robot.  I had no interest in that feature and I was just sort of confused as to what the relevance of these incredibly boring looking robots were since they never come up in the story again after that fight and clearly have the look of a "naked" prototype lol.

In Trip's story, I had fiddled with the robot customisation inbetween and had set my robot to the Mecha Sonic DLC just to see how it looked etc, and come out.  So when an Egg Robo ran off with Mecha Sonic in a pod on Sky Temple I was like "oooh okay Trip is gonna fight Mecha Sonic, I was hoping there'd be a bonus boss or something here".  Then the Cyber Station boss happens and it's exactly the same but Mecha Sonic instead of the generic one and I'm like "ah, that's a shame, not even any new attacks for Mecha Sonic huh, alright then".

Only through this thread I learn that none of the above was the intended experience, lmao.

 

I mean the battle itself is still pretty unclear story-wise.  Like, I guess the story is just "Eggman finds Northstar Island, wants to unleash this ancient dragon, but also on the way figures he might as well steal some old robots he found and use them, also he let Nack build a big mech.  Also he invented a time reversal device that's good for two uses only.  Oh and he does succeed in unleashing the dragon but is nowhere to be seen when he does.  All a bit weird.  At least Trip's side of the story was pleasant and made enough sense.

[Salamander]

Just finished the game this morning (as in, truly finished).  My feelings on the game have been on a bit of a rollercoaster throughout, up and down... but unfortunately I've come out pretty sour on it.  I happily replayed Mania with everycharacter but I really don't want to ever touch Superstars again.  It's just generally a bit of a lacklustre product - compounded by boss design with too great an emphasis on spectacle and artificial difficulty.  It feels like Sonic Team and Arzest designed this game with the idea in mind that it would be played by a hardcore nostalgic audience looking for a challenge?  Like, what a misread; this game could and should have been an intro game to 2D Sonic for a new generation of players, but instead it's just tedious and crushing.

Not sure what to use a spoiler tab for or not, I mean it says SPOILER Thread right there in the title?  So I'm just leaving them out.  If I mention anything elsewhere I'll put it in a spoiler tab there.

Most of the game is alright, I suppose?  I quite enjoyed the visual design and storytelling and I think it's reasonably possible to put together what's going on with Trip as a character, but things really start to fall apart towards the end; the zone transitions were pretty tepid anyway but with Cyber Station they just don't bother, and there's no real attempt to explain why the dark dragon is unsealed or how it's re-sealed.  I do like that the egg is always there in the Story Mode map selection screen!  I suppose my inference, and this is coming pretty much entirely from the mural we briefly see in-game and only really get a good look at in the prologue animation, is that Trip's ancestors used the Chaos Emeralds to seal away a powerful and evil member of their clan, when the emeralds are gathered again the dragon is unleashed, and by defeating it you contain its power again.  So it's possible to reconstruct what's going on... but it's a bit of a guess.

The music is a mixed bag, I think that's generally agreed.  I think part of the issue is with the... I'm not sure what the correct term would be, the instrumentation, the soundfont?  Mentally I compare it to Mania, and I just can't imagine the Superstars music style ever giving us anything like Mania's Metallic Madness tracks, for instance.  It's too artificial and too limited.  It's going for a deliberately retro sound, but I don't really understand why - do they want this to be a retro product or not?  They deliberately avoided using pixel art, but they want the soundtrack to be a throwback?

The level design is fine when it wants to just let you play the game, but when the gimmicks come in, things start to get unpleasant.  I will say that Egg Fortress 2's time-reversal gimmick is inspired, but I struggle to think of any other gimmick I actually enjoyed.  The various air current gimmicks in Sky Temple never feel good or natural to interact with, the Cyber Station squid controls far too loosely for the tight hurt corridors it must pass through, Press Factory's presses just disturb the pacing - as do, if I'm honest, the lamppost bonus games, though this is an issue I also had with Mania; S3&K's lamppost bonus games were really short and felt short and gave you immediate material benefits, but both Mania and Superstars have quite long and slow bonus stages which only reward you with something quite abstract.  Since I've segued to bonus stages, I'm okay with the special stages?  It took a little while to understand how they worked, but they make sense once you get there and I don't mind special stages being an opportunity to experiment with alternative gameplay.

And then there's the difficulty.  As the game goes on, it really feels like the game is out to get you in a way I just didn't feel in the classics.  It feels like another "retro" touch except the genuinely retro games weren't like that at all!  And this is overtuned yet farther when you get to Trip's Story, which is just Eggman's house of gotcha traps.  There's no really interesting difficulty here, just gotcha spikes and offscreen Eggbot lasers - nothing that felt really meaningful to interact with.  I have a hard time even calling it difficulty, it's just annoying.

The boss design has the issue of frequently favouring spectacle over playability.  I understand why they did it, but it does mean that gameplay is constantly interrupted by animations and cycle transitions.  They pretty much all need to be sped up and reduced in frequency; allow players more hits per cycle, repeat each cycle fewer times.  This reaches its apex with the final bosses.  In many ways I actually don't think they're that bad - once you learn them.  Because the difficulty is in learning them, and that's compounded by the ever-longer iteration times every time you die.  Just giving a checkpoint between phases would vastly alleviate the frustration here, without changing a single thing else; apparently Emerald powers replenish between phases anyway, so it feels like they know this.  But once you learn the attacks, the final bosses have very few moves that are genuinely dangerous; the Fang mech is particularly mechanistic and predictable, you never need to take a single hit.  it's the little slip-ups that doom you to another long wait.

The Last Story boss, the dragon, though?  That's a mess.  Set aside the fact that the attacks are just timewaster moves which knock you around, which is entirely meaningless when the battle is not in a chase format like Doomsday Zone, and you see that the entire difficulty of the fight is in the ring generation RNG.  Will the game give you a nice little cluster of rings, or zilch?  Will it spawn one of your friends - and will it be one of the good ones?  Will it put them where you can see them - and will they then be eaten by the perspective switch?  I saw Amy a couple of times in my early attempts... and then never ever again over a couple of hours of trying.  When I finally won it didn't feel like I'd done anything different to my countless losing attempts; the game just decided to let me have enough rings that time.  Just a poorly-designed boss all-round, clearly thrown together at the tail-end of development.

Also, the credits are like ten minutes long, which is way too long for a playable credits sequence.  They really need to speed up the scroll speed, the medley has time to loop like twice.

So, yes.  It's nice that they tried.  The ideas were there.  The execution was not.  Next time hire a more competent dev team.

[A super No.1 washedupgamer]

I think the next Superstars style game should have some talk bubbles but no voice acting. (Not during gameplay, but slower segments like hubs)I dream that it would look like a playable idw comic with a handrawn/cel shaded artstyle.

Superstars is a good game, with some good ideas, but a lot of decisions hold it back from being an evolution of the classics. I'd like it if a new game skirted the line between saturn era sonic and sonic adventure games. Like, a hub world with tails' lab with stuff to do there, An island to explore with branching zones and gimmicks would be cool too.

[Shiny Gems]

10 hours ago, Iko said:

 

  Reveal hidden contents

It's not even that hard, it's just super boring and frustrating.

It didn't take many attempts to me either, though forcing me to replay the first phase over and over and having to guess how to survive and attack the boss by trial and error (being killed in the process) wasn't really the best design decision.

The lasers in phase 1 are easy to dodge, but sometimes I wanted to rush and the slope physics limited my freedom of movement, plus they spawn in a weird way (once a laser glitched and went down instead of left), so every now and then there was a wasted attempt because I accidentally hit one of those lasers.

The webs are a joke once you learn how to dodge them... they killed me like once or twice and just out of distraction on my side; occasionally I let myself stuck in a web on purpose in order to dodge the cork gun attack (if you mash the buttons fast enough you will detach just a moment before the boss shoots at you); I did it when I was near to a slope and didn't have enough momentum to climb it, so much that falling from the web by gravity would let me dodge better than running.

 

Spoiler

I see. Maybe I kept being hasty in some areas, but that was my fault. But yeah, those webs were rather easy to dodge.

In phase one of the fight, when Fang does the dive with those illusions of his ship, I once glitched through the instant KO laser beam walls that were supposed to kill me.

But anyway, maybe if I was more careful, I would have done it in fewer attempts. But yeah, the boss fight was rather repetitive, and to me, kind of frustrating.

 

[Salamander]

One cute Easter Egg I noticed: Everyone's Eggmobiles in Frozen Base Act 2 and the Egg Fortress world map are individualised and come from their debut games!  Sonic's is from Sonic 1, Tails's from Sonic 2, Knuckles's from Sonic 3, and Amy's from CD.  Trip's appears to be a miniaturised version of the Angel Island boss from Sonic 3.

On a somewhat related note, I really like the visual design of the bosses throughout the game.  The artists nailed them looking like actual machinery.

[Shiny Gems]

I finally beat Sonic Superstars, the true final boss, and...

Spoiler

It wasn't exactly a walk in the park, and I jokingly think the Black Dragon, who was the true final boss, was a lost member of the Black Arms form Shadow the Hedgehog (The game), but beating the true final boss and the game was worth it.

 

[Sonicka]

I have dozens of more thoughts on this game now. Sadly not very good ones.

(Apologies if this post is a little all over the place / poorly edited) - the need to vent your thoughts via phone isn’t ideal!)

So, I’m now over halfway through Trip’s story… and what an insufferable mode this is. Especially as something to gatekeep a “final story” or battle. Is this a continuation? Is it happening at the same time as Sonic’s story? Why is Trip suddenly confident now to get through this game when she had to be (literally) carried in the main story. I really don’t get it. Much like the rest of the game the story is very incohesive to follow - I knew where I was at with Knuckles story in 3&K… but here? I just don’t know.

Why is an Eggrobo chasing you around as well? I appreciate the throwback… but this makes so little sense. If it’s set after the main story then surely Nack should be the stand-in for every boss as a “revenge” sort of thing. But also, if this is after the main story why are certain levels repeating? Press Factory shouldn’t exist for example and so on. 

Then there is the lore… which I want to know more about but can’t make any sense of. I gather that Trip is maybe the last of her kind? A protector of the island and its culture? Maybe a bit like Knuckles again in that sense… but the mural seems to indicate that the Sungazer tribe harnessed the Chaos Emeralds and used its powers in specific ways, and that the giant versions of the animals (including the huge snake) were important somehow… maybe to keep the purple dragon that isn’t explained at bay? I can’t be sure. Is it purple just as a reference or tie in to THE END which we also see for some reason in the background? Who knows? And at this point I’m not even sure Sonic Teams lore keepers do. 

Jumping back to gameplay, I’ve noticed that you play through the specific character acts in Trips Story mode… and this doesn’t work. Even with her abilities, it just serves to show how bad some of the latter zones level designs are even when they are mixed up. It’s unsuitable (even as character acts they weren’t all that great to begin with TBH).

I also didn’t realise until I found a special stage ring in Trips Story that your save profile keeps progress of your current collection of emeralds (I had 4 at the time of finishing the main story) which is sort of nice, even if this makes no sense in context). That being said, I will GLADLY take this benefit as I passionately dislike these special stages. The rules of engagement are far too random as the target to get the emerald is usually either broken or there is something I’m fundamentally not understanding about the proximity or objective.

I think it took me near enough 20-30 attempts just to get the green emerald for example. I changed tactics eventually after giving up and looking online for ideas, but even this wasn’t a perfect solution (you have to go above and try to intercept the path - yet this doesn’t really work because you are always locked on target to the emerald so trying to change your path is difficult).

After that nightmare, the final two emeralds were smooth sailing. I got them on first try (actually the final emerald I got within 10 seconds…) so, what even are these stages? There is no skill ceiling to these whatsoever. 

Anyhow, now I have all the powers! Hurrah! I’ve been experimenting and a lot of them are indeed super situational making certain routes unprogressable without emerald abilities which is… weird? Unless this is just a Trip story thing? I find it very odd that there are lots of instances where random gatekeeping blockades are in place in a level and a placeholder sign with a dodgy blown up JPEG image of the power up you should use appears. Why is this like this other than to block a path? Why is a sign even there at all when the auto ability suggestion power is available? It’s almost like they were concerned that not only would players forget about selecting the emerald powers, but that we would also not notice that the auto power selector activates… except… except it doesn’t activate for these situational blockades. This is very poor implementation and just designed to be obstructive for the sake of randomly slowing you down. Also, you lose your power once you are hit a single time from an enemy which is… pretty lame since you have a countdown already. The game even bugs the music out when you activate a power before facing a boss, I played a couple of Bosses with regular act/level music because of this. XD

Anyway, after the powers I tried out Super Sonic aaaand… he is… kind of buggy? My game actually crashed when I activated him the first time, the second time I noticed dozens of framerate dips the moment I speed off screen as it tried to keep up with him. And as mentioned - SS is the only power you can actually cancel with L1 and R1. This is not signposted to the player so either it’s a mistake or the cancellation effect was supposed to happen for other powers as well.

As for Dragon Form Trip? She actually reminds me of Debug mode from the classic Sonic games. You sort of just drag the character around the screen and are invincible (flame breath is cool… but ultimately not that useful and is superficial). This does makes me understand why Sonic isn’t able to fly around the screen in an unlimited capacity as it really would break the game in two - there is no skill in flying around and it’s far to easy to go to places you shouldn’t as Dragon Trip / Tails (EG, skip over the loops that take you from the background to foreground). There are too many areas you just should be able to go that don’t rejoin the main level structure. 

In any case, on Trips story I’m now at Golden Capital (which I have decided is the worst Zone in the game) and I have had now had about enough and don’t actively want to continue this game to completion - can’t believe I’m saying that. Beyond Golden Captial’s ear grating soundtrack, it took me upwards of 30 minutes to clear Act 2 alone as Trip (technically Knuckles level) as everything is working against you. The spike hazard placements, cheap ceiling or crushing deaths, Eggrobos (to knock you down several stories after a climb because you didn’t know they were there) or the spamming of Badniks just to name a few issues. Trips unreliable wall climbing gimmick also feels out of place here,  it’s truly awful.  

The sad thing is that this feels like an act that by all means should be the “Sky Sanctuary” of the game (hell, it shares some musical theme throwbacks in Act 1), and I also really like that they took some designs from the concept art of Sonic 1 (the Sun) and repurposed them here - it’s a very cool idea that ultimately got wasted. Nothing in this Zone makes any sense to me, traversal gimmicks, the blocky beta look and feel, what type of zone it’s supposed to be… pinball again? I don’t understand.

It is the Boss with Nack that I’ve had it now. This was bad enough to do in the main campaign - but I just don’t have the time or patience when you can’t skillfully take him down, it’s drawn out, boring between phases (no checkpoints!) and the surprise placements of lava and flamethrowers in the autoscroll sections mean you have to memorise where to place your character. It’s not enjoyable and far less climactic than the game tries to make it. 

Further to this, from looking at the comments on here it makes me feel less than enthused to continue with this game. Especially if the final boss of Trips story is as irritating (and the True Final boss of the game doesn’t look any fun either). I don’t really want to waste my time when I’m not enjoying myself just to say I’ve completed it. I don’t like that I feel this way about a Sonic title - I normally will see or find something to push me through to the end whether I enjoy it or not. 

What’s really sad about this whole game is that the first two Zones of Superstars were really REALLY promising, they had excellent music and themes - rollercoaster rides of level design that zipped along at an epic pace, it was fun. But it all just goes downhill from there for me. And no amount of “classic physics” or wonderful looking character models can save it for me if the rest of the game just leans into feeling like a super cheap experience.

As a last ditch, I thought maybe I could have some fun in battle mode (nope!), or at least create a cool looking robot and buy the custom parts… but everything was so expensive and designed around grinding coins for hours to buy single parts. I can’t even make Metal Sonic as it’s too laboursome! I even discovered that when you purchase a spray paint colour that it’s a one time use affair (for individual body parts!) and you can’t undo your choices. How bloody stingy does this game need to be for something so minor a reward? This could have been a really neat counter to Sonic Forces Custom Avatar feature, but the effort is not worth the payoff. 

So yeap, not feeling this one anymore. Initially I gave Superstars the benefit of the doubt and would have rated it a 6 or 7… but as an overall product, I’d say it’s closer to a 4 or 5 (for me). And whilst not as painfully mediocre as Sonic 4 Episode 1 was (or middling as Sonic Forces), at least those games were consistent so I knew what to expect. The Quality control is all over the place in Superstars and this actually kind of makes it worse in that respect. 

I get that there is potential DLC next year (would make sense for Ray and Mighty to reappear considering there is 2 empty spaces spare on the character selection screen), but unless they can make the levels fun to play I doubt this will make much difference to me sadly.

Ultimately, this isn’t the direction I’d like Sonic Team to take classic Sonic. This plays like the Megadrive era but doesn’t move it on in a progressive direction. It’s a shame as they were on great form with Mania and this attempt with Arzest (whilst done in good faith) is actually a pretty big step backward again. PLEASE reconsider placing all your eggs back into the basket with Evening Star next time Sonic Team, they know how to handle your series. 

Edited October 29, 2023 by Sonicka

[Stasis]

Fully completed and had a good time. Not happy with the story though as there’s barely one there. I got lost after Knuckles opens the chest with any remaining emeralds in and Trip goes super for some reason. No Dr Eggman at the end. What happened to the Eggrobo? How was the dragon unsealed? 
 

Fangs final boss took a good number of attempts to beat but as with the other bosses really enjoyed it. The True Final boss I beat on my second attempt and was very disappointing.

[DaBigJ]

Oh no...

[Lorekitten]

Is this confirmed by multiple sources? Because if I'm not misinformed, someone official previously stated that Shadow wasn't coming to the Classic era. Of course, Sega being Sega, they can change their minds whenever they want, but until I see more sources I'm gonna be skeptical.

[ZinogreVolt]

Smart of Sega to start up the big Shadow rollout in time with the next movie. Really looking forward to seeing how he plays and what he looks like in a Classic setting. I wonder if they're gonna give this some weird story justification, or if this will strictly be a gameplay-only thing.

[Ryannumber1gamer]

1 hour ago, Lorekitten said:

Is this confirmed by multiple sources? Because if I'm not misinformed, someone official previously stated that Shadow wasn't coming to the Classic era. Of course, Sega being Sega, they can change their minds whenever they want, but until I see more sources I'm gonna be skeptical.

Apparently further details implies it's just going to be Sonic in a Shadow costume, with some altered animations (Skating instead of running). Don't know if that's true or not, but it would technically skirt around the rules, in the same way that Amy's modern dress appearing skirts around them.

[Red Hot Jack]

If Shadow skates that would be actually cool... which is why I don't really expect that. Although the rabbit skin also has some unique animations so I wouldn't rule that out. But yeah, bring more skins for the single player, Shadow in anticipation of movie 3, also Knuckles with the OVA hat before the miniseries arrives.

[castell-neath]

Im really not in to these 100 kills by hammer, glide, spindash etc achievements. It just feelings like padding out a s.all gamenfornreplay value. The 600 fruit one is frustrating as hell too. Urgh