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The Boost mechanic has several antecedents (Advance 2 & Heroes for examples of them), but the first instance of something akin to what the Boost is today was introduced in Sonic Rush. This boost came from the fulfillment of a meter through gameplay. In its debut, you could fulfill the Tension Gauge to a maximum point, and briefly gain unlimited usage of the Boost. One could also Spin Attack during a boost, to help with downhill segments. Boost probably originated as part of a hardware gimmick to show off the dual screen potential of the DS, allowing players to jolt between the two screens. These hardware-based gimmicks were once very common (this is the origin of Big’s fishing, Chao Gardening, lock-on technology, etc), but seemingly vanished after the examples in Lost World (does Forces’s shared avatar online rental feature count?). This move returned in Sonic & the Secret Rings, under the alias “Speed Break”, likely somewhat inspired by Sonic 2006’s Mach Speed Sections. This could only ever be used when your meter was full through the accumulation of Pearls. Time Break was an alternate move that could be used this way. Notably, this title was a game where players were automatically moving forwards under most circumstances, meant to showcase motion control. This move was also akin to Shadow the Hedgehog’s Chaos Control meter, except without flight. The screen blurred as Sonic rocketed forward. This allowed for the ability to blast across enemy-riddled sections easily and collect more rings. Boost did not occur in a major capacity in the main series until Unleashed. This mechanic was changed to become the focus of the gameplay, in a startling and radical total abandonment of the rolling and momentum mechanics of the older games. Now it would fill quickly, as Sonic collected and attracted rings to him, making the Light Speed Dash more situational. This move served as not only acceleration, but also a crowd-control weapon, a method of traversing water (which was instant death otherwise, like it had been in several past games), attracting rings, and leaping over gaps with a jump. Most new moves the game had were oriented around the vastly increased velocity of the gameplay, such as the Quick Step and Drift. While the Drift did offer new options for controlling our hero whilst turning around, this would cause the player’s natural turning to worsen in later games. The move’s attack purpose was further exaggerated, with Sonic otherwise only having his Homing Attack, Spin Jump, Stomp, slide and spinning kick in his arsenal when not a Werehog, the last of which was very underpowered, and would be axed after this game. Enemies would also fall in one hit from Sonic’s attacks, something that had previously fallen to the wayside in favor of life bars. His rolling abilities were now gone, though the slide is somewhat of a substitute for them. To me, the slide just feels far more generic than rolling. Rolling emerged from the fact that a hedgehog was chosen, and tied into the pinball and billiards elements of the earlier games. However, I think the Slide could compliment rolling, if used right, like in Advance or Adventure 2. Perhaps slides can be used to lay down under low ledges, dodge attacks and feint for a counter-hit, and to hold onto momentum before one returns into a roll. The Slide’s aesthetic has a lot of pizazz to it, as well, distinct from Amy’s head-slide or something like Mario sliding. Boosting was the main tactic to use on bosses, as they ran away from the player. Confusingly, in Night stages, enemies that were done in with a single hit from the Boost would now take several blows as a Werehog. In the WiiS2 version, the Boost bar was segmented. One boost would cost one unit of the segmented gauge, which could be expanded via gameplay. Boosts could not be performed continuously, and when one boost started, players had to wait for it to end before they could launch another. In Colors, Air Boosts and Air dashing were mapped to the same button, depending on if one had Boost energy or not, due to the control limitations of the Wii. More notably, Boost energy was only granted by White Wisps released from capsules or Badniks. This would make players more judicious about when to use the Boost, allowing for slower level designs. Unfortunately, the results were a lot of block platforming in the stages. Notably, the game does not allow for Boost gauge customization. This game also introduced the concept of Boost-based finishing moves used against final bosses, with the Final Color Blaster. In Game Land, players were even rewarded with the sound of a bowling ball hitting pins when they struck a group of enemies at once with it. In order to discourage speeding into pits, diamond-shaped, orange warning signs were added onto them. These static, non-interactive signs came off to me as a bad idea, more of a patch onto poor level design than a true gameplay function. Why not let players leap off of these signs for better platforming control? They did fit the setting, as the theme park was still partially under construction… by Eggman no less. Generations weakened the ring magnetism of the Boost, and also drained the bar much faster when crossing water. There were also add-ons to the Boost available for the player to obtain. These included Endless Boost, which provided unlimited boosting but made you more vulnerable, the Blast Off which can grant free boosts under certain circumstances, and the Auto Gauge which automatically fills the bar under certain circumstances. Notably, the Shadow rival fight had an interesting use of the boost as the primary mechanic. Boosting into each other felt good. Lost World, while lacking the Boost, introduced 2 equivalent mechanics in a spammable Spin Dash and a run button. These mechanics had no penalty for their use, unlike the Boost. This allowed users to spam them for efficient battle and transversal of the game’s tubular maps, which did not help with the smaller and simpler Badniks in the game. However, enemies would often again take multiple hits, but this mechanic felt far less natural or arcadey compared to even the Werehog, and one did not see any sort of live counter for enemies. Enemies would have to be hit with a charged Homing Attack or a new Kick move, which were quite good ideas on paper, allowing players to knock enemies into each other and slam them around. These mechanics were utilized adequately, but not in an exciting way (may have to do a topic on this later), making combat feel largely cut-and-dry, although a degree of the billiards elements made a return. No synergy existed between his moves. The Kick didn’t work with the Homing Attack, the Bounce, or the Spindash. Determining whether the kick or Homing Attack would work was reduced to a guessing game, as enemies had no tells. For instance, you don’t have a clue to kick the Anton until it is too late and they have counter-attacked your HA with a grapple What momentum elements that remained of the Boost did not exist in this new Spin Dash. You could only use a single jump out of the Spin Dash now, rather than the greater variety available with the Boost. Sonic now relied on a gear-shift system. Once Sonic ceased to move, he came to an utterly dead stop. I ended up quitting the game at Tropical Coast Act 4, where one has to use these mechanics to grind apple juice to proceed. I think the rest of this should be covered in a Lost World analysis, however. Given how the team refused to lessen the number of 2D segments or add back other characters to the game, I feel that in philosophy, it is still ultimately a Boost title, just without a true boost incorporated. The aesthetic was even further simplified to prevent distracting the player, to the point where the aesthetics sometimes look mind-bendingly odd & abstract (Dessert Ruins makes no logical sense whatsoever), or irritatingly bland and Mario-ish (The overall progression seems to be based on NSMB). Other characters in the series, aside from newer and less-liked creations such as the Deadly Six, were made even less important than previous games, due to a lack of optional missions concerning them. Grinding was also made less interactive than ever before, reduced to an automated sequence as the basis of a few stages. Due to the game’s poor reception and sales, the next main game returned to being a standard Boost title. (We don’t talk about Rise of Lyric, right?) Forces continued the general trends of the era and took them to uncomfortable extremes. Levels have become cartoonishly linear, and present negligible challenge. This is purportedly due to a nodule found in Generations that is missing in this game. It also added a “Double Boost” move for the co-op stages, where Sonic uses the energy of the custom character to increase the potency of the Boost. However, the Boost cannot be given skills to change its properties, unlike Generations. Grinding, meanwhile, became a bit more interactive than in Lost World, perhaps as an engine leftover. Frustratingly, people complained about SLW being slow, but for the wrong reasons. The real reason why I believe that SLW is slow is not in the lower running velocity and disappearance of the Boost, but instead the gimmicky Wisps, intrusive tutorials, almost paywall-like animal collection, and unintuitive puzzles. This may have resulted in the Boost formula returning in full force in the next Sonic Team-developed main game. Boosting has continued to appear in some form in various spinoff entries. Examples include the Soul Surge from Black Knight, the Sonic Boom from Rivals, and the Dash Boost from Dash. Each has had different mechanics, and often, any character would be able to use them. My ideal version of the Boost? The short answer to this would be Advance 2’s Boost mode, along with maybe having the Boost as a Super Sonic-only move. The long answer is that this Boost, even if incorporated into normal Sonic play, would take elements from the Rush and Secret Rings Boost designs, in that a bar must be filled using specific items to use the Boost, and it can be combined with rolling to provide more control on slopes, and more damage potential. Perhaps a second meter could provide unlimited Boost usage for a short period, like how the Rush boost worked? Possibly, a second degree of Boost could also be used, more akin to Speed Break. Maybe different characters would have different styles of Boost? Like one character having the Secret Rings boost, another the Rush boost, another the Unwiished boost... However, I personally feel that Boost actually limits the level design of games, with levels having become made long stretches of horizontal areas to boost across, with death traps rather frequent. To me, it has become clear that any attempt after Unleashed to prolong a game with the Boost-reliant formula is inadequate, with games still being rather short. Most games are padded with at the very least a higher number of 2D sections, with the first game in 3D’s favor in years being the infamous Rise of Lyric, which incidentally, wasn’t a Boost title. Other examples include Lost World’s puzzle and gimmick stages, the Werehog, Classic Sonic & the Avatar, etc. The continued absence (and decreased emphasis overall) of other characters (until Forces) doesn’t help. Hmm… maybe I’ll do a topic on the hardware-based gimmicks that were once frequent in the series.

Reviews are starting to drop for Sonic Colours Ultimate: Currently sitting at 77 for PS4 based on 18 reviews: https://www.metacritic.com/game/playstation-4/sonic-colors-ultimate Here's some of the review scores: According to this IGN review the first 3 acts of each world play the remixed music and the last 3 acts plays the music from the original 2010 soundtrack. You can't choose which version you want to listen to for each act: Edit 1: Also here's TSS review with a score of 7 Edit 2: The TSS review has been updated with the following information regarding the games music: Edit 3: (2/9) Metacritic score is currently 76 based on 31 reviews of the PS4 version. Switch score is 80..but that's only had one review so far. Edit 4: (7/9) With today being the official release of the physical version more reviews have been added to Metacritic: The switch version's had 5 reviews and currently sits at 65 Xbox's had 4 reviews and sits at 75 PS4's had 46 reviews and is holding steady at 76 Meanwhile the PC Epic release hasn't had any reviews so far.... Opencritic has a score of 74