Sonic Colors Thread

[Sockman]

Those cutscenes weren't completely terrible. I might've actually smiled at a few points. Granted, it's still cheesy as hell, but this cheesiness has been fully embraced with gusto by the writers and voice talent. I felt that warm-fuzzy feeling I used to get when watching Saturday Morning Cartoons.

Damn it all. I wish I still had a Wii to play this on.

[OverbounD]

I haven't played colors yet but I've been watching videos and reading reviews and have come to the conclusion that its not worth my money. I was hopeful for a while but I think I was just fooling myself. Because the truth is I'm not happy with the race track style levels and a control scheme that punishes you for slowing down. I don't think I'll be happy with 3D Sonic until I see vast open levels instead of just a race to the end.

[DJ espeed]

But 3D Sonics** in the past have been (sans the open hub areas in some games) just been Point A to Point B, much like their 2D forefathers, granted the execution in the former has never been done on the same level as those in the latter. To each his own, but making Sonic open world would kind of defeat the purpose of a Sonic game being a Sonic game.

Edit: **Specifically, 3D Sonic titles excluding the Riders, Olympics, Chronicles, Shuffle, Sega All-Stars, and R.

Edit 2: Mario has had success in transitioning from point a-to-point b to open worlds type gameplay. I just don't see Sonic having success in that realm. :/

Edit 3: Jeez, I know someone's going to chew my ass out for this post as soon as they read it, not that it was the intention. (please spare me?!) :/

[OverbounD]

I don't see why Sonic wouldn't have sucess with more open levels. Why is it you think he wouldn't?

Imagine a game where 90% of your deaths weren't caused by falling. Because instead of a track you stood on real ground. To your left out a little ways is a mountain you can run to at full speed and when you get there you slow down and do some platforming to get to the top. To your right is a factorish looking building you run into it the door slams shut behind you the factory is like a maze and it starts going crazy and exploding from the inside out make your way through the maze asap and find an exit before the facorty falls on your head. There's a river running through the middle of the level fall in and you'll sink to the bottom and have get out before you run out of air. But if your running fast enough you can run ontop of the water and grab that emblem under the bridge. Ememies twice as big as Sonic no need for the homing attack the enemies are big enough and Sonic controls well enough to *gasp* hit it by simply jumping or hit x to curl into a spin on the ground with real physics hit x again to go back to running without losing speed.

OK so maybe that's a bit much and its easy enough to describe it in a post rather than make it. But you can't tell me that doesn't sound fun.

[DimensionWarped]

Open levels go against the formula. They went against the Mario formula too of course, but when everything is about times and records and scores and whatnot, the changes are a little more severe than that. And going along with the Mario formula, these days that also has been returning to form with the 3D games consistently going more towards obstacle course stages and less with the open world exploration which was at its peak with Mario 64 and at its minimum with Super Mario Galaxy 2.

I believe the obstacle course formula is a necessity for the franchise to be successful, but what it needs to keep that working are exciting courses that don't blur together like they do in most of the 3D games. Of course the best way to keep that from happening is extreme variance of features... of course you already know how I feel about that.

As for falling, that's always been the biggest hazard in just about every platform game from Mega Man to Metroid. Ok, not Metroid so much, but tell me that you didn't die just as frequently to slipping on spiky things and acids as you did to monsters if not more so? Of course the risk becomes ridiculously high in Sonic games what with the track nature usually causing there to be no barrier against it and minor slips being able to lead you off the track easily...

[OverbounD]

Openess and the idea of an obstacle aren't in conflic. The reason SWG feels more like an obstacle course is because of the way the gravity works. It would be hard to utilize their gravity gimmick much if you weren't jumpimg sphere to sphere. But besides that SM64's levels are the right combination of openess and obstacles (Banjo & Kazzoie too) without the gravity gimmick. What they lack though is speed and I think fans of New Sonic fear that Sonic wouldn't be able to retain a sense of speed with more open levels. I don't see this as a problem. For one I want Sonic to slow down a little the speed he goes in current Sonic games just isn't praticle for a decent platforming game. As too much control is lost. Classic Sonic games where never about constant speed they were about moments of speed and creating your own speed to get past obstacles. There are ways to bring these ideas into 3D for example building speed down a hill and onto a loop that launches you up a cliff that was otherwise out of reach.

[Kirs]

Ashura Dark Reign is really cool...

[DimensionWarped]

Openess and the idea of an obstacle aren't in conflic. The reason SWG feels more like an obstacle course is because of the way the gravity works. It would be hard to utilize their gravity gimmick much if you weren't jumpimg sphere to sphere. But besides that SM64's levels are the right combination of openess and obstacles (Banjo & Kazzoie too) without the gravity gimmick. What they lack though is speed and I think fans of New Sonic fear that Sonic wouldn't be able to retain a sense of speed with more open levels. I don't see this as a problem. For one I want Sonic to slow down a little the speed he goes in current Sonic games just isn't praticle for a decent platforming game. As too much control is lost. Classic Sonic games where never about constant speed they were about moments of speed and creating your own speed to get past obstacles. There are ways to bring these ideas into 3D for example building speed down a hill and onto a loop that launches you up a cliff that was otherwise out of reach.

I didn't say openness and obstacles are in conflict, what I'm saying though is that you can't have an obstacle course without some degree of linearity. And what I'm speaking of in SMG has little to do with the gravity. Most of the stuff in SMG consists of clearing small areas and then moving on to the next area. It's a very linear affair most of the time.

I don't care if they slow down, that's fine. But they last couple times they tried to introduce open-world gaming into the mix, we got completely irrelevant hub worlds.

[shadowgoten]

yea, do you seriously want Sonic 06 again?? I thought we were done with this.

[Felik]

yea, do you seriously want Sonic 06 again?? I thought we were done with this.

The fact that Sonic 06 was a bad game doesn't mean that it has a bad concept.

[Serephim]

I just dont see Open World sonic happening. The speed that he moves at now (very fucking fast) isn't going to decrease very much now that they've started doing it. An "open world" for Sonic the Hedgehog would be very different from an open world for any other platformer, seeing as Sonic covers ground very fast. An open world that actually felt "open" and not like a little box would have to be significantly larger to actually let you...well, run around in it. Sonic has never felt like an "open world" game, anyway. Original Sonic the Hedgehog gameplay has always involved gaining momentum and using it to get places, which usually involves you starting from a point of high potential energy and unleashing it...which usually involves lots of slopes, hills and loops....which usually involves alot of open space to achieve this kind of thing. After finally using this ground to gain the speed, you have to kind of go somewhere with it.

Open World sonic game would have to be really, really, really big. In a way, i kind of agree with the idea of speeders and boost mechanics in this sense. If they struggled creating the stages for Unleashed, an open world stage would be alot of work. Doing the whole "SM64" thing with Sonic would be fun, but i think it'd be better achieved by just using a track like their doing now. Allowing you to branch out in a game where you move 300MPH easily creates a shitload of work.

The only criticism i can pull from these videos that's really bothering me is that although the 2D sections actually look like platforming segments now, I think the 3D sections capture the feeling of the game alot better. Instead of using 3D sections just as a cinematic outlet, i'd like to see alot more 3D platforming that doesn't rely only on the Homing Attack (which the 2D sections seem to have deviated away from.)

I think if they were to alter the physics engine just a little bit more toward gaining and using momentum, they would be able to pretty much recapture the Genesis titles and translate it into 3D as well. Remove a couple speeders, and give him back the Spindash. (which would kind of require them to put a damper on the boost mechanic.) At the moment though, i think they've finally gotten somewhere decent with the whole Sonic Rush style thing.

In all truth, i dont know which direction they should take, because no one choice really is going to be better than the other in the case of Sonic. Trying to fit Speed and Platforming in the same sense just isn't very easy to achieve. As long as they keep it fun and interesting, though, they're doing it right. They can use different titles in the series to switch it up and experiment though.

[shadowgoten]

Actually some of the 3d segments (the ones where you can hop between lanes) I've played through actually have a couple of high ground parts you can reach through the use of powers and well timed boosts/jumps, which has led me to retry stages quite a few times just to explore those segments that require clever maneuvering to reach

[OverbounD]

By openness I do mean levels more akin to SM64 and not those awful hub worlds or something like Jax and Dexter where the whole world is just one bit open world. Just levels where left, right, back, and forth are options. In 3D Sonic today its almost impossible to move backwards and you can't move very far left or right due to the limited size of the track. This could even be done without creating multiple objectives like you see in SMG or 64.

[Djawed]

Easily best 3d sonic game ever made. I finished it, got 180 medals. Now it's S ranking time and still love it.

Normally I can determine wether I like a game or not based on how I feel about it after a few days. Well, unlike sonic 4, I want to replay it so much.

S ranking is gonna be tough since it's not just mindlesly running to the goal.

It's most telling that getting good ranks in Colors is more a matter of finding secrets than getting to the goal really fast. The time remaining bonus is usually insignificant compared to the points earned using wisps and reaching bonus areas.

[DimensionWarped]

Arrived via Amazon today. Full opinion coming some time after I play it.

But I do have other priorities right now.

Realization 1:

Space is like this... infinite vast nothingness, almost completely unlit blackness. How ironic is it then that both Mario and Sonic at their most colorful and symphonic take space as their theme? When i say symphonic... I'm referring to how the opening riff when selecting the channel is quite a bit like the one from Mario Galaxy.

[FanGameRevolver]

got teh DS version.

Haven't heard much about it yet. Opinions and shit no ones going to take seriously coming when I play enough of it.

Also, the case is holographic.

[DimensionWarped]

So far so good. The first zone was filled with a good bit of boring nonsense, which is a shame since zones are six levels and a boss now. Some stuff has been kind of boring, but every zone brings some new twists. Been playing some Sonic simulator stuff, and I must say... suddenly Sonic is capable of moving around in the water like a dolphin. It's shocking. I guess he's been training with Echo in the off-season.

[Duckboy]

Despite some flaws (goddamn pits!) the game ruled. The final boss is just ridiculous. I died so many times in this game. A lot of them bullshit deaths but whatever. It's better than Kirby's no-death way.

[Sparks]

Friggin Motobugs trying to side swipe me.

The little bastards grew some balls.

[FanGameRevolver]

Played and beat the DS version. The final boss against eggman was pretty sweet. The wisps are pretty fun to use. But I still would argue Sonic rush adventure is a more enjoyable game.

Colors DS is ok. Nothing really great though. Level design feels all over the place, but its not terrible or anything.

It does have a lot of levels and missions though. (63 total counting acts, missions, bosses, versus stages, and special stages) Almost as many levels as the wii version (66?) There aren't as many red rings to collect (96 to 180), nor are they necessary to unlock the emeralds. You'll spend more time racing around anyway to be looking for the damned things.

I really did find myself enjoying the versus stages, even though I only raced against the computer. Those levels proved to be pretty challenging even without the computer throwing hazards your way. I thought this was the was one of the high points of the game. Lots of cool platforming bits here, and you could find creative ways to use the wisps to put yourself in the lead.

The game was arguably easy, even the final boss was pretty laughable. I think I ended the game with about 20 extra lives lol. I wasn't ever frustrated with any cheap deaths. Two of the missions had me struggling against the clock for a bit, but the level itself wasn't hard...just the timed factor.

I also got all the chaos emeralds. Unlike colors you can't go super in any level, and you get a SS level instead. The level makes use of these really flashy 3D effects...which are more of a mess then anything. Now I've just got S-Ranking and ring collection.

Funny I beat every act already in colors in about 5 hours or so. Rush Adventure took much longer to complete all the missions and find all the hidden islands and whatnot. If you don't have rush adventure get it instead of this.

[Djawed]

^I don't know exactly why you are recommending rush adventure because it's a longer game. If you ask me, it's basically the same but it feels longer because of those tedious boat sequences. Calling the game longer because some weird stretching mechanic that doesn't belong in a 'sonic game'(just like how some people call colors short because of the werehog) is silly tbh. Rush adventure in the end is a 'hold right to win' game in it's purest form. The missions are rather frustrating than they are "fun". I am a perfectionist so I complete everything I can so whenever there are things I dislike doing I still force myself to, that was also the case with rush adventure's mission mode. The bosses are the only thing i'd agree with to recommend them rush adventure instead. But I'd say overall sonic rush 1 and now colors are the better two.

[FanGameRevolver]

It had more variety. Im not really a fan of the rush games, But I found myself enjoying the minigames in rush adventure, because it felt more eventful, where colors is just a mindless blur most of the time. The wisps are there, but you move so fast its easy to miss them, sometimes you can get a better score by avoiding them even. There are a few really good levels in the game though. (The fist zone and the last zone come to mind) They don't add much. The special stages and the bosses are excellent though, some of the best bosses honestly. But I did find myself much more entertained with the Last rush title then this.

That's my opinion.

Then again I find myself playing the werehog stages more often in unleashed. I'm not much of a fan of the actual speedy sonic levels anymore I guess.

[Djawed]

I guess I do understand where you're coming from. I don't like the DS version of sonic colors at all tbh . Just don't think sonic rush adventure is that much better is all.

[Scarletdark]

For some reason I appreciated this game for giving me some well-needed respect for modern sonic. The respect he lost from me when his lips touched princess wierdo, is back. The game's not perfect but it sure is a freakin huge step in the right direction.

[FanGameRevolver]

I've managed to get most of the red rings in the stages. But two zones in the DS version give me a lot of trouble.

The sweet mountain zone requires you to pilot this rocket and the burst wisp is an asshole to pilot between the bombs that are everywhere in this zone. It's a mess.

The other one I cant get the rings on is the starlight carnival zone. It's a classic example of 'modern' sonic levels, nothing but speed and twitch reactions-I mean level memorization.

The last three normal zones in the game are actually pretty fun when you start looking for the red rings though.