Does SEGA Even HAVE to Listen to Us?

[Scritch the Cat]

On 5/27/2010 at 7:19 PM, Blacklightning said:

I already made a fucking article on the subject, so I think I'll link that instead of repeating myself. In hindsight it's actually a bit embarrasing and incoherent to me these days, but the big points are there, especially the big four:

 

 

Frankly, a lot of those points are bad ones.  The insults certainly don’t help, but a lot of deeper understanding is missing from those even if they weren’t so rude.  I’ll go into detail addressing them individually later on.

[Blacklightning]

56 minutes ago, Scritch the Cat said:

Frankly, a lot of those points are bad ones.  The insults certainly don’t help, but a lot of deeper understanding is missing from those even if they weren’t so rude.  I’ll go into detail addressing them individually later on.

No need - I actually agree, that article was crap. You may notice it was written 10 years ago, which is a lot of time for viewpoints to change and develop. Seriously, where do you guys keep finding these posts? I had totally forgotten until now that I even had a blog once.

Anyway, the problem as it stands today isn't that Sega is listening to fans at all, but that they are simply incapable of parsing the good feedback from the bad. Even when they do find themselves stumbling apon sound advice, they manage to misinterpret it in incredibly asinine ways one can't help but liken to a monkey's paw - such as taking a suggestion that the franchise should follow the example of classic Sonic more and instead establishing modern and retro Sonics as entirely separate characters, which isn't something anyone ever asked for or works to the benefit of the series. I suspect part of this is down to language barriers innate to a japanese company insisting on catering to western audiences without the input of actual westerners, but frankly, these problems are rooted a lot deeper than simply who Sega and Sonic Team chooses to listen to - more recent Sonic games are bad in a way that their core concepts and directions are irrelevant to, and can't even seem to fufill their OWN intentions correctly, much less those of their audience of choice.

This is scarcely even a point of contention in any other fanbase - the only reason fan input was ever controversial here is that Sega and Sonic Team are bad at it. And that's really just the one common denominator in all of Sonic's grief lately, isn't it? We can't have nice things because Sonic Team are bad at things. Most people changed their tune REAL quick once Mania came out, so nowadays I think it's best not to overthink anything that can't be fixed with a team that actually knows what they're doing and stop making excuses for what we have now.

[Wraith]

I wouldn't take points someone made ten actual years ago all that seriously. Read any recent post from Blacklightning on this board and it's obvious he thinks differently now. 

 

 

[Kuzu]

I do want to point that out, Blacklightning's blog post still kind of rings true nowadays; fans still insisting that the series caters to them and gives them what they want. Sonic Adventure fans complaining that the series isn't "serious" enough, in spite of the fact that we just got Sonic Forces which goes all of the fuck in with the "serious" storyline. So they already got what they fucking wanted, and they hated it. Yet, you still see these chukcleheads on Twitter. 

But that's beside the point; fanboys being stupid and inarticulate as hell is just the nature of fanbases in general, especially when most Sonic fans are young and not at the developmental stage of their lives to properly articulate and be critical.  Most of the actual constructive people in the fandom have finally begun to understand that who Sega/Sonic Team caters to isn't the problem, they could literally make Sonic Adventure 3 tomorrow and would likely still have all of the same problems that have been plaguing the series since 1998. 

 

The problem was never about who is being catered to or not, but the development team's complete inability at polishing their games and having a concrete direction on what they want to do. This series is so obsessed with being a crowd pleaser and "giving everyone what they want" that they missed the fact that the games have to actually be functional. Mania didn't succeed because it was a "classic" game, Sonic 4 is a "classic" game too and its treated like shit, rightfully so. Mania succeeded because Christian Whitehead knew what they wanted the game to be, and made sure the game worked like it was supposed to. That is something so basic that almost every devs knows this, but Sega/Sonic team have consistently managed to miss that step and then fucking wonder why their games always get mediocre review scores. 

 

As long as Sega continues to halfass the series, then its really not going to matter who is being catered to. Adventure fans are basically crying about stuff, but there's literally no guarantee that bringing any of that stuff back would actually benefit the series. This is the Sonic 4 situation all over again when Classic fans were complaining how they wanted a new Classic game, and Sonic 4 was the result. The problem was never about "Classic" or "Modern" and which one was being catered to, the problem has everything to do with the devs just polishing their fucking games, and as long as they don't do that, we're gonna get more of the same shit we've always gotten. 

[Wraith]

Nep hit the nail on the head 10 years ago when she said it doesn't matter. None of the problems with the Sonic brand have anything to do with what the fans requested and anyone who thinks otherwise just wants the discussion that takes place here and in other circles to matter more than it actually does. 

The problem lies more with Sonic's position as a financial pillar for the company. They've been enforcing strict deadlines that risked compromising the quality of the end product since the third game in the series. When they got great results in spite of these decisions, they pushed more and more for more games to cover more platforms and release windows until straw broke the camel's back. No matter what you try and do or how talented you are your work is bound to suffer under poor conditions, which is why I don't feel like writing off Sonic Team as strictly incompetent. Even now, stories about Forces are coming out and indicating that the infamous four year long dev cycle might have just been a year-long mad dash to the holiday 2017 window instead. Not surprising given the franchise's history but disappointing after Sega successfully kept their promise about increased quality control elsewhere. Maybe Sonic Team has made some deep creative mistakes over the years, but the only proper way to fix that is to take the time to fix them. Saying "Fuck it, push it out anyway" reads as a massive disrespect to the consumer's time, money and intelligence. 

Even a Sonic game that starts life as an earnest response to feedback is going to fall short under these circumstances. A lot of the flip-flopping you see within the fanbase on what direction to go is because you would see them try something out of a wishlist and come up short due to obvious time/budgetary constraints.  We've had Sonic only. We've had an adherence to one gameplay style. We've had them kick the boost to the curb entirely and focus on slower, more technical movement. We've had lighter stories long enough to burn out and ask for something heavier again. Even the Classic/Modern split is something I've seen one person field before back when the tension in the fandom was higher, and Sega has done such a hack job at setting it up that not even any of the obvious benefits manifested. At some point you just have to wonder what's next on the chopping block. Is Sonic Adventure 3 finally going to come along and humiliate anyone who ever dreamed of it to begin with?

This approach to feedback is why you see Sonic fans eating eachother so often. Not only do they have "evidence" of certain ideas not ever being able to work, they think they can puppeteer the series into going in the right direction if they just change enough minds or push enough of the dissenters away. You might be able to change the trajectory of how the series presents itself and certain ideas, but the underlying problems are always going to be there unless something changes with how these games are made. 

And there's really no feedback you can give them that will stop this 'who gives a shit, just get it out' approach because at the end of the day it works well enough for them even if it doesn't work at all for us. Sonic as an IP is a success as far as creating a solid revenue stream for the company even if many of the products are artistically unfulfilling. When the returns started getting dicey, they just put less money into the games and still turned a profit. Sonic isn't great. It's arguably not even good, but it works. Mania, Forces and the film are all successes. It's arguable if Boom was but at the very least I can't keep jokes from it off my feed. 

Sonic Mania, the Comics and the new shorts prove that things can still work out when the right people are given the right circumstances, but I'm tired of every 'big' Sonic product either completely bypassing fans of the series for a scattershot casual audience so they can rake paper in the short term like Boom or the Movie, or being a shallow imitation of why I fell in love with this series to begin with like Forces. I would rather not see the next game for 5 years than them release something undercooked again, but it's pretty clear that how I feel about it doesn't really matter. They're gonna do what they do.

[Kuzu]

This series only puts its best foot forward when the people in charge actually have something to work towards; after Sonic 06, the reputation was in absolute shambles. Which, ironically, motivated the team to actually create something worth a damn and that's how we got Unleashed. Yes, the game got the same average and mediocre review scores that we usually see from the series, but even critics acknowledged that despite the issues, it was a step in the right direction, which led to Colors. 

But after Colors, it's rather fucking obvious what happened, and it's the same shit that happens whenever a company gets successful. They got complacent. They knew they put out products that reviewed well, and sold well and just left it at that. They no longer had anything to prove, so they stopped the upward momentum they had going with Generations, and decided to go back to that wild ass experimentation from before with shit like Lost World and Sonic Boom. And when those failed, they just slapped together Forces and called it a day. 

The fact of the matter is; Sonic as a brand exceeds it's quality. The games can be absolute fucking dogshit, and rest assured they are more often than not, but they will sell because Sonic is just that damn popular. There may be better games out there, but you can bet your ass that if lil timmy saw a brand new Sonic game on the shelf, his parents will get it for him  regardless of how a bunch of fans on Twitter feel about it. 

 

Even among the fanbase that supposedly hate these games so much, will continue to buy them out of brand loyalty. It's the same fucking shit as when the Pokemon fanbase made a huge ass stink about Pokemon, and then the game still proceeded to sell millions. Sega/Sonic Team aren't stupid, they're likely very aware of the reception of their games. But they sell, so its not like there's much incentive to really change if the game still sells millions. That's how companies work; they don't care how much people complain on social media, they care about numbers and revenue. As long as the games continue to sell, then there's literally no reason for them to give a damn. 

 

[Scritch the Cat]

I think the following things have to be acknowledged.  For better or for worse:

1) SEGA will always be listening to someone about what to do with this series, because it's been conceived and marketed around the basic notion of being "cool", and that's not going to change.  That said, what's considered cool does sometimes change, which is why we get the occasional embarrassing thing like Shadow the Hedgehog.  However, I can't sign on the notion that Shadow's game is evidence that SEGA shouldn't listen to gamers' wishes (not even those of Sonic fans in particular), because the backlash it got is also probably responsible for them not continuing with that.  The game was mocked by Sonic fans and detractors alike.  Problems do arise, of course, when the popular critical consensus becomes that Sonic was never good.  But that's a sign that it's time to listen to the few people who disagree, because the only other option would seem to be, discontinue Sonic.

2) Sonic games will always be padded with peripheral gimmicks of some sort or other.  I'm obviously not in the "Sonic was never good" camp--I wouldn't be here if I was--but I am in the "Sonic has never been any stranger to slower additional gameplay styles that pad the game out" camp.  The first game had two zones, arguably three, made to render Sonic's running speed irrelevant, and the special stages.  The second and third games had a greater amount of their zones made to capitalize on speed, but even tougher special stages and the second had bad restrictions placed on getting into them.  Big the Cat was the most infamous way they chose to pad the series, but he was not the first, nor last.  There will be no last; I feel confident in saying, and that goes especially in boost games.  The more easily accessible Sonic's speed is, the more SEGA will slow him down to do whatever they want, whenever they want, however they want you to. I await them to prove me wrong, but after thirty years, why expect it?  The best thing I can reasonably expect is padding it out in ways I don't hate.  Forcing me to play as other characters to 100% the game would be acceptable to me; provided they weren't all total clones of other characters and none were as dull as Big in SA.

[Roger_van_der_weide]

4 hours ago, Kuzu said:

 Sonic Adventure fans complaining that the series isn't "serious" enough, in spite of the fact that we just got Sonic Forces which goes all of the fuck in with the "serious" storyline. So they already got what they fucking wanted, and they hated it. Yet, you still see these chukcleheads on Twitter.

Classic Sonic fans complaining the series isn't "classic" enough just got Sonic 4 episode 1, AND episode 2, AND half of Generations AND 2d sections in Colors AND Lost world pushing Classic imagary all over the place AND a third of Forces, which goes all of the fuck with the "Classic" style imitation.They got what they fucking wanted and they hated it. Yet you still see these chuckleheads on twitter


And as a result they  got rewarded with Sonic Mania and now they're happy.


Oh.


Forces was shallow as a kiddypool and got all the details wrong, just like Sonic 4 did in it's pathetic attempt to emulate Classic Sonic.
Doing a half assed job attempting to please fans isn't going to make these "chuckleheads" go away, no.
So Classic fans get to whine and bitch despite 7 years of pandering, yet Adventure fans need to shut up after one attempt huh? Nice.

Besides, I HATE the fact that Adventure fans desire for a richer story keeps getting translated into "Make it super dark and edgy with tons of death and scary imagary. Adventure 1 and 2 are light hearted for the most part, the darker elements don't come into play until the finale when it's earned. We want the story to be  rich and meaningful, which COULD involve darker elements for extra punch, but that isn't the main point. Shadow fans don't like modern Shadow, despite him being much the angry aggresive dark miserable edgey boy they supposedly like. Almost as if there's more going on with his character then just saying naughty words.
Sonic Forces' dumbass moment with Sonic getting tortured (Sorry, I mean, a character randomly saying torture happened with no followup on that) is getting the Adventure games wrong on 2 acounts, both being darker then they ever were AND then not even having the balls to carry it trough and at least have the torture have a freaking point or any impact on the story to begin with. Like most of Sonic Lost World's "Edgey" dialogue, it feels like cheap overcompensation to mask the fact how empty and meaningless the real story is.

And we can have endless debates how the story of the Adventure games wasn't "That deep" or "that good".
You know what, I agree. They could have bee much better.
So the solution is to improve, not to be satisfied with worse.

That said, I agree complaining at Sega is pointless, because they're terrible at understanding feedback. So I agree Adventure fans should probably stop demanding for Adventure 3, it's just going to lead to more superficial moronic disasters.
"Sonic adventure 3, from the makers who brought you Sonic Colors" is like hearing "Lord of the Rings, the Adam Sandler version".
Never the less, I don't tolerate Classic or Modern fans calling us off either.
Classic fans have been trough the exact damn journey, and Modern fans will probably go trough the same journey in the future after Sonic dropped down into yet another idiotic direction. Down the drain with all of us until we finally pull ourselves away from this emotional rollercoaster.

19 hours ago, Scritch the Cat said:

If SEGA is trying to please everyone, they had me fooled.  <...> Who asked for him to steal multiple ideas from Mario, of all things?!  Nobody, so far as I recall.

Oh, there's plenty of "Sonic should be more like Mario/ Nintendo should buy Sonic" noise within the fanbase.

OF COURSE what people MEAN is "Sonic should have the same level of focus and quality control as Mario" rather then "Sonic team needs to create cheap rip offs of Mario's level design, bosses and Galaxy gameplay", but chalk that up to Sonic Team doing a terrible job understanding feedback, rather then them not listening to feedback at all.
At this point I tend to look at Sonic Team as if they're the The Monkey's Paw, or those other fairytales about wish fulfilling genies that always fulfill your wish in a way where it backfires on you. They WILL grant your wish. Just in a way where you wished they didn't.

[Kuzu]

20 minutes ago, Roger_van_der_weide said:

Classic Sonic fans complaining the series isn't "classic" enough just got Sonic 4 episode 1, AND episode 2, AND half of Generations AND 2d sections in Colors AND Lost world pushing Classic imagary all over the place AND a third of Forces, which goes all of the fuck with the "Classic" style imitation.They got what they fucking wanted and they hated it. Yet you still see these chuckleheads on twitter


And as a result they  got rewarded with Sonic Mania and now they're happy.


Oh.


Forces was shallow as a kiddypool and got all the details wrong, just like Sonic 4 did in it's pathetic attempt to emulate Classic Sonic.
Doing a half assed job attempting to please fans isn't going to make these "chuckleheads" go away, no.
So Classic fans get to whine and bitch despite 7 years of pandering, yet Adventure fans need to shut up after one attempt huh? Nice.

That said, I agree complaining at Sega is pointless, because they're terrible at understanding feedback. So I agree Adventure fans should probably stop demanding for Adventure 3, it's just going to lead to more superficial moronic disasters.
"Sonic adventure 3, from the makers who brought you Sonic Colors" is like hearing "Lord of the Rings, the Adam Sandler version".
Never the less, I don't tolerate Classic or Modern fans calling us off either.
Classic fans have been trough the exact damn journey, and Modern fans will probably go trough the same journey in the future after Sonic dropped down into yet another idiotic direction. Down the drain with all of us until we finally pull ourselves away from this emotional rollercoaster.

You missed the entire point of what I was saying. This has nothing to do with Modern or Classic fans getting what they want. We've been "getting what we wanted" for years now, and nobody is happy.

You need to stop looking at this as "getting what you want". I literally said it, Mania is not popular because it panders to classic fans, because that gross misinterpretation of the game's success. As you pointed out, classic had a bunch of pandering to them and didn't please anyone at all. 

Mania was great because it was a great game plain and simple. The devs knew what they wanted it to be and focused on that, rather than trying to please an arbitrary group of people.

Ya'all need to stop with this "us versus them" mentality, because its really doing nobody any favors at all. 

 

Focus on less on getting what you want, and more on wanting the game to be the best it can be even if its not exactly what you would have preferred.

[FlameStream]

I suspect that the next game will determine how some of current fans will approach this series (game-wise). No matter what happens some people will not be pleased.

I suppose the problem is that as soon as it's clear that the direction the games are going is not what a person wants, then the potential of sales and and future interest would go down drastically. You can already see it when some groups are saying "if Sonic is just mania from now on", or "if no more Mania from now on I quit" kind of posts around.

Sonic is too big for what the fans want out of it for games. So it's very scary to think this way as an investor; you always want to keep the leash and therefore make sure that there may some thing for everyone, if not now then in the future.

At least, that's what I would have said years ago. With Sonic not being the hottest thing for Sega anymore, I imagine that we may get a more simple budget focused experience out of it, not to dissimilar to what we've gotten. You just have to hope it's going to be something you like.

That said, Sonic is a multimedia franchise tofay. So venues other than games can hold your interest.

[Scritch the Cat]

3 hours ago, Roger_van_der_weide said:

Oh, there's plenty of "Sonic should be more like Mario/ Nintendo should buy Sonic" noise within the fanbase.

OF COURSE what people MEAN is "Sonic should have the same level of focus and quality control as Mario" rather then "Sonic team needs to create cheap rip offs of Mario's level design, bosses and Galaxy gameplay", but chalk that up to Sonic Team doing a terrible job understanding feedback, rather then them not listening to feedback at all.
At this point I tend to look at Sonic Team as if they're the The Monkey's Paw, or those other fairytales about wish fulfilling genies that always fulfill your wish in a way where it backfires on you. They WILL grant your wish. Just in a way where you wished they didn't.

I was mostly thinking of the Wisps when I wrote the bit about Mario.  I don't know of any Sonic fans who asked for Mario-like power-ups.  That doesn't mean none ever existed, but they sure didn't make noise like the more infamous, stereotypical complaints, such as:

*Big the Cat is the antithesis of what Sonic should be.

*Sonic never really worked in 3D.

*The Sonic and Shadow stages are the best/only good parts of the Adventure games.

*Sonic's friends are annoying.

*Shadow's game is cringey.

*Elise kissing Sonic is disgusting, and that they tried making this an emotional love story is absurd.

So I don't think SEGA added them in Sonic Forces in order grant any fans' wishes.  Nor do I think they added a greater platforming focus and enemies that look like Bowser and his children in Sonic Lost World due to any fans' wishes.  Rather, I think they did it because those games were originally Nintendo exclusives and they wanted to appeal to Nintendo's fans, which maybe in SEGA's mind means Mario, Mario, Mario.

That these elements have stuck around so much is...maybe surprising, maybe not.  I rest my case that SEGA's approach to Modern Sonic is largely about trying to find things to plug all of the holes they made when they tore almost everything out.

Come to that, for all this talk of how SEGA doesn't succeed when they try to grant people what they are requesting, mostly because they seem unable to make it, and the resulting arguments that the series is worse as a result, you know why I remain just fine at continuing to request what I want out of the series even if that's true?  Because to put it bluntly, I don't want to see this series get better if getting better means becoming something mutually exclusive to what it had been.

And this isn't just about what I love vs what other people do.  It's about the totally sensible belief that when a series gained a huge fanbase doing a certain thing in the past, it shouldn't betray those fans.

[Scritch the Cat]

56 minutes ago, FlameStream said:

I suspect that the next game will determine how some of current fans will approach this series (game-wise). No matter what happens some people will not be pleased.

I suppose the problem is that as soon as it's clear that the direction the games are going is not what a person wants, then the potential of sales and and future interest would go down drastically. You can already see it when some groups are saying "if Sonic is just mania from now on", or "if no more Mania from now on I quit" kind of posts around.

The reality is that those are big ifs until proven otherwise, and I guarantee you SEGA won't be dumb enough to say they won't ever make a certain type of Sonic game again.  Whatever they announce soon might let some people down, but these days it's understandable given that the pandemic slowed them down and reduced their capacity to make things.  Announcing anything at all would be rather refreshing right now; even if it isn't a bold new direction or a return to the good old days.  But this series can always break trends.  I didn't expect the boost would ever leave, but it did momentarily for SLW, and then they also were kind enough to keep it out of SM.

56 minutes ago, FlameStream said:

Sonic is too big for what the fans want out of it for games. So it's very scary to think this way as an investor; you always want to keep the leash and therefore make sure that there may some thing for everyone, if not now then in the future.

At least, that's what I would have said years ago. With Sonic not being the hottest thing for Sega anymore, I imagine that we may get a more simple budget focused experience out of it, not to dissimilar to what we've gotten. You just have to hope it's going to be something you like.

Incidentally, how many years are you talking?  I ask because up until the pandemic hit, I didn't see much justification for Sonic games not to be diversified more along the lines of Mario games.  There are pretty consistently:

*New 3D Mario platformers.

*New 2D Mario platformers.

*New Paper Mario RPGs.

*New Mario and Luigi RPGs.

*New Mario Sports games.

With Sonic having a more definitive personality than Mario, his franchise can't be quite as flexible with how he plays, but there's more than enough wiggle room for things like Sonic Mania to exist without preventing, say, new Adventure games to exist, too.  I think SEGA does, in fact, have the money to do this; they just have to choose to invest it--and I also believe there's a big enough fandom for the Adventure series to make a new Adventure game profitable.  I can't speak for it being good, but I do think it would make back its budget.

[Scritch the Cat]

58 minutes ago, FlameStream said:

That said, Sonic is a multimedia franchise tofay. So venues other than games can hold your interest.

It actually kind of surprises me that it is, given that on the gaming front Sonic has been iffy at best for well over a decade.  Though I stand by my earlier post that SEGA will try to keep Sonic's reputation from getting negative, just so he can be a mascot that doesn't bring them shame, some of the things on the periphery seem like they're trying to capitalize on a great reputation that no longer exists.

[espio]

3 hours ago, Roger_van_der_weide said:

At this point I tend to look at Sonic Team as if they're the The Monkey's Paw, or those other fairytales about wish fulfilling genies that always fulfill your wish in a way where it backfires on you. They WILL grant your wish. Just in a way where you wished they didn't.

i think this sums it up perfectly tbh

i don’t think the problem is sega listening to the fans , it’s that when they do listen they execute it in such a stupid way for example : sonic boom , shadow the hedgehog , team sonic racing , forces , riders zero gravity , sonic 06 etc

[Scritch the Cat]

4 minutes ago, espio said:

i think this sums it up perfectly tbh

i don’t think the problem is sega listening to the fans , it’s that when they do listen they execute it in such a stupid way for example : sonic boom , shadow the hedgehog , team sonic racing , forces , riders zero gravity , sonic 06 etc

You really have to wonder, though, how SEGA manages to botch things that people were certain they had down and expected to be constants without even having to ask them to keep them.  Many feel the boost mechanic had been perfected in Sonic Generations, and Classic Sonic had been passably recreated in that game (though not flawlessly).  It's one thing to not nail a brand new parkour mechanic that whole new game is based on, it's one thing if the new character creation system isn't great, but how did they go downhill, mechanically, from what they proved they could do a decade ago?

[espio]

10 minutes ago, Scritch the Cat said:

You really have to wonder, though, how SEGA manages to botch things that people were certain they had down and expected to be constants without even having to ask them to keep them.  Many feel the boost mechanic had been perfected in Sonic Generations, and Classic Sonic had been passably recreated in that game (though not flawlessly).  It's one thing to not nail a brand new parkour mechanic that whole new game is based on, it's one thing if the new character creation system isn't great, but how did they go downhill, mechanically, from what they proved they could do a decade ago?

i’m not quite sure i mean it could be sega rushing games to meet deadlines or just laziness 

they’ve shown us plenty of times that they’re very capable of making really great and fun games i don’t know why it’s so hard for them to stay consistent 

[knuckles20]

On 12/29/2020 at 2:08 AM, Kuzu said:

Focus on less on getting what you want, and more on wanting the game to be the best it can be even if its not exactly what you would have preferred.

Why does this have to be a choice? Why can't I get games that have quality with stuff I've been missing from the  games for nearly 14 years now. There's no reason I can't get quality out of Sonic games that have multiple playable characters, actual 3D gameplay (and not the fake 3D we've been getting since 2010) and more engaging plots. Also bold to assume the "darker" plot is the only thing Adventure fans didn't like about Forces.

[Kuzu]

23 minutes ago, knuckles20 said:

Why is this have to be a choice? Why can't I get games that have quality with stuff I've been missing from the  games for nearly 14 years now. There's no reason I can't get quality out of Sonic games that have multiple playable characters, actual 3D gameplay (and not the fake 3D we've been getting since 2010) and more engaging plots. Also bold to assume the "darker" plot is the only thing Adventure fans didn't like about Forces.

Because unless you're part of the dev team, I'm almost certain that Sega doesn't care about the ramblings of a few fans on the internet. Classic fans rambling got them Sonic 4, and I don't think I need to say they weren't satisfied with that.

Sonic Forces basically had most of what you asked for; it had  a "serious and engaging plot" about war, and multiple playable characters. The 3D gameplay is the only thing that it lacked. But beyond that, it pretty much marked off your checklist.

Obviously you and others weren't satisfied however. Sega's approach to game development and listening to feedback kind of guarantees that you're never going to get exactly what you want unless you get lucky and have the right people in the right position that share your interests like the Mania team.

 

 

Beyond that, you honestly just need to pray and hope Sega give you enough of what you wanted  to be satisfied. It literally is just playing Russian roulette with this series.

[knuckles20]

Just now, Kuzu said:

Sonic Forces basically had most of what you asked for; it had  a "serious and engaging plot" about war, and multiple playable characters. The 3D gameplay is the only thing that it lacked. But beyond that, it pretty much marked off your checklist.

The "playable characters" were Sonic A, Sonic B, and a blank slate with no defining personality that isn't that much different than the silent retro Sonic. And before you bring up the Shadow DLC why the hell should I be satisfied with last minute table scraps that only adds 15 minutes to the game as opposed to him being part of the main game from the start. So that's a complete miss for me. 

And I found nothing engaging about the plot when they continue to make everyone who isn't Sonic appear to be helpless yes men. That pissed me off in Generations and Lost World and I knew they were going to pull that crap again the moment I saw Classic Sonic in that 1st trailer.

[Kuzu]

7 minutes ago, knuckles20 said:

The "playable characters" were Sonic A, Sonic B, and a blank slate with no defining personality that isn't that much different than the silent retro Sonic. And before you bring up the Shadow DLC why the hell should I be satisfied with last minute table scraps that only adds 15 minutes to the game as opposed to him being part of the main game from the start. So that's a complete miss for me. 

And I found nothing engaging about the plot when they continue to make everyone who isn't Sonic appear to be helpless yes men. That pissed me off in Generations and Lost World and I knew they were going to pull that crap again the moment I saw Classic Sonic in that 1st trailer.

You didn't read anything else I said did you....

[knuckles20]

51 minutes ago, Kuzu said:

You didn't read anything else I said did you....

Oh I did. I just explained why I don't care about Forces' half-hearted attempts to meet my criteria of what I want from the games.

Also,

1 hour ago, Kuzu said:

Beyond that, you honestly just need to pray and hope Sega give you enough of what you wanted  to be satisfied. It literally is just playing Russian roulette with this series.

I've been playing Sonic Team's Russian Roulette for years and the only things I can say I won out on is the comics and a mobile game that's a spinoff of a console title that claims to be a love letter to early 2000s games. Everything else that's been released in the 2010s has been either trying so hard to pander to people who want Sonic to remain stagnant in the genesis days (Every main title since Colors) or got screwed over because Sega make last minute demands in order to fulfill other priorities (look up Sonic Synergy). So it's all the more reason why I should be vocal on what I want from the games.

[Kuzu]

11 minutes ago, knuckles20 said:

Oh I did. I just explained why I don't care about Forces' half-hearted attempts to meet my criteria of what I want from the games.

Also,

I've been playing Sonic Team's Russian Roulette for years and the only things I can say I won out on is the comics and a mobile game that's a spinoff of a console title that claims to be a love letter to early 2000s games. Everything else that's been released in the 2010s has been either trying so hard to pander to people who want Sonic to remain stagnant in the genesis days (Every main title since Colors) or got screwed over because Sega make last minute demands in order to fulfill other priorities (look up Sonic Synergy). So it's all the more reason why I should be vocal on what I want from the games.

So yea, you did miss the point...

Look, tldr; It doesn't matter how loud or vocal you or anyone else are about what you want, because there's literally no guarantee the game will be to your standards because of how they have addressed feedback in the past. You can literally cry all you want about this stuff, because unless you're apart of the development team, there's literally no way for them to satisfy each and every demand from the fanbase. Add to the fact they continuously rush these games out to meet a deadline and that makes it even more unlikely. 

In short, shit is fucked and will continue to be fucked so as long as Sega continues their approach to making games. And no amount of crying about Sonic Adventure 3 is going to change their minds unless it starts hitting them in their wallets. But good luck convincing people not to buy Sonic games. 

Sega COULD change, but there's literally no incentive for them to do so. It's nice to believe that "Maybe they'll get it THIS time" but there's literally no evidence to suggest that anything has or will change in the future. It would take another monumental disaster like Sonic 06 to really force them to budge, but there really hasn't been a game like that and no, Forces is not that game because that game is merely mediocre and still apparently sold a lot despite it all. 

[BadBehavior]

3 hours ago, Kuzu said:

Sega COULD change, but there's literally no incentive for them to do so. It's nice to believe that "Maybe they'll get it THIS time" but there's literally no evidence to suggest that anything has or will change in the future. It would take another monumental disaster like Sonic 06 to really force them to budge, but there really hasn't been a game like that and no, Forces is not that game because that game is merely mediocre and still apparently sold a lot despite it all. 

Even 06 sold well, enough to make platinum hits. Difference between then and now is Sega aren't scared of game journalists who keep bringing up "rough transition to 3D" and "Sonics shitty friends" as if they expect a chorus of laughter whenever they do.

[Scritch the Cat]

24 minutes ago, BadBehavior said:

Even 06 sold well, enough to make platinum hits. Difference between then and now is Sega aren't scared of game journalists who keep bringing up "rough transition to 3D" and "Sonics shitty friends" as if they expect a chorus of laughter whenever they do.

They’re not?  Then why aren’t even Tails and Knuckles playable again in the main series.  I think SEGA still hasn’t made any apology for blaming all of Sonic’s problems on other characters and altering the series to get rid of them.
 

For all the claims that SEGA will manage to botch any possible wish that fans give them, the truth is that some wishes they flat-out aren’t even trying to grant.  In fact, this is the first I’m hearing the notion that Sonic Forces was supposed to be a throwback to the Adventure era, and I really don’t see much resemblance.  It’s plot _would_ have been a perfect one to let us play as some other characters, but it still seems like SEGA won’t even TRY to make most of its characters work as gameplay. It goes almost without saying that without those multiple characters, it’s not really a Sonic Adventure game.

[BadBehavior]

1 minute ago, Scritch the Cat said:

They’re not?  Then why aren’t even Tails and Knuckles playable again in the main series.  I think SEGA still hasn’t made any apology for blaming all of Sonic’s problems on other characters and altering the series to get rid of them.
 

For all the claims that SEGA will manage to botch any possible wish that fans give them, the truth is that some wishes they flat-out aren’t even trying to grant.  In fact, this is the first I’m hearing the notion that Sonic Forces was supposed to be a throwback to the Adventure era, and I really don’t see much resemblance.

I meant the "then" was during the Dark Age when they were afraid of game journos and the "now" is the Even Darker Age when they're not. They just shrug off everything critics say nowadays. You pretty much agreed with me.

While Forces may not have been trying to explicitly throwback to the adventure era in it's marketing, it was the implication many younger fans got, the kind you see inhabit the Sonic subreddit. They got REALLY excited in the lead up to Forces release. Which only made the disappointment sting even harder because of course thats what happens when you get hyped for a game.