Sonic: Lost World

[DimensionWarped]

I received this in the mail today. I know it's been less than super-well received by the media, but I'll probably be giving my own feedback a little later on.

EDIT: My first impression is that it's an adequate platform game that may not actually deliver on the Sonic premise, but is otherwise perfectly fun and enjoyable. So far I've fought against a pencil thin Cajun fruitcake, the stereotypical fat tornado, and an elderly fruit ninja... none of the bosses were especially interesting. Some of the regular enemies have been fairly fun throwbacks and some of them are actually provide more than a platform to throw homing attacks at. The game is very visually clean and you really don't know how much you impact the 60fps motion has until you've given it a try... overall I'd say it looks far nicer than Generations did on PS3, though I never played it on PC, so I don't know how that would have looked at 60fps. Overall I'm enjoying it so far though. Challenge is a bit of a mixed bag. I ended up stopping tonight on a somewhat annoying snowball gimmick with things that push you off... always to your death of course. The biggest complaint I think anyone can really levy against the game though is that it just isn't much of a Sonic game. It's more generic platformer... probably more reminiscent of the early Crash Bandicoot games than anything else in particular.

One thing I do find a little exception with is that rings are almost pointless without extra lives and with nothing (at least nothing I've noticed) to accumulate and spend them on.

[Mr. Potatobadger]

I went into this game with low expectations, feeling meh-ish about it yet still excited.

WARNING; SPOILERS (KIND OF SORT OF DEPENDING ON THE KIND OF PERSON YOU ARE)

Never before have I felt so much joy playing a video game. The only other time I can remember feeling as such, was when I played sonic 1 for the first time. I had a genesis and only sonic 2 for it, and when my dad picked me up a copy of sonic 1, I felt SO happy seeing something different than sonic 2, that the disappointment of sonic 1 itself has made me completely despise it to this day. (I was 4, maybe 5, and I thought sonic 1 would be like 2, but it felt "weird" to me ["weird" was theground cap]) As soon as I started controlling sonic, and got used to it, I just started laughing. Sheer hapiness. Sonic just felt SO good to control, I thought this the definitive 3D sonic game. I felt the same joy I felt playing sonic 1 for the first time, except with nostalgia and without disappointment. I might as well have been high. I spent about 30 minutes replaying windy hill zone 1, mastering the parkour stuff. You will get used to it quick. Very quick, it's a lot easier to grasp than I thought it would be. The spindash is absolutely amazing, its very fun to use, and feels just like the generations spindash but in 3D. The parkour can be glitchy and unreliable at times, but I feel as if this game is in the same predicament unleashed was (I'm talking daytime stages here); It was good, but will see improvement in the future. Compare unleashed to generations, and the differences and improvements are laughable, seeing as they (most likely) share the same engine, and are similar. I feel as if this gameplay style has a good future ahead of itself, like colors and generations were to unleashed.

First off, the wisps... I have very mixed feelings about these guys. In sonic colors, I despised the wisps. They felt overused, and they felt forced down your throat. In this game, you have the option to use it or not every time, and it's wonderful. I actually get kind of got excited when I saw a wisp, because they were actually fun to use. I feel as if they are slightly underused, but before I played the game, I thought they would be super underused and rather pointless. Which they still are pointless. I see no purpose to them at all. it's like they're just there to be there. They don't bring anything to the table that's good. If you got rid of the cons from both games and were left with the pros, the wisp system would be perfect. If they can do this, I'm welcome to see the wisps stick around.

The bosses, while still underwhelming and disappointing, were better than I thought they were going to be. Most of the time, the Midboss is more difficult and fun than the actual boss. First off, why do they only take 2 hits? Secondly, why are they pretty much the only thing a "charged homing attack" can be used on? Maybe if the boss wasn't defeated in 2 hits every time, they would be a lot more fun and replayable. The final boss was very cool, yet very underwhelming, because it just was, and because it brought nothing new to the table. It's exactly like the Nega Wisp Armor boss with less attacks and music that is debatably better than the Nega Wisp Armor music. I think there needs to be another super sonic boss, since the last one we got was in unleashed, which was also boring and slightly underwhelming. (Imo, the wii/ps2 version has a better final boss) This has made me realise we haven't gotten a 3D super sonic boss I go back to play frequently, or just really enjoyed, for that matter. Doomsday zone and Dream Dance zone are the only ones I boot up the respective games frequently just to play again.

Level design was fine, the parkour was good enough to make me not notice if it was good or bad. I want it to stay that way as well. Why does everyone complain about the snowball level? I freaking loved the snowball level, I had so much fun. I only died 5 times or so. You didn't have to go fast, it wasn't hard to stay on the ledges. Plus, the miniboss was very fun and neat, and provided a good challenge. I really enjoyed the snowball level over all. Desert Ruins Zone 1 is my favorite level in the whole game, it has a lot of variety and sums up Lost World on a fun platter. I enjoyed the rail-tube stages, even though the second one was unbearingly hard. Sky road I felt was uninspired, but in the end came out as one of my favorite zones, because of the challenge and throwbacks to the previous levels. Speaking of which, Frozen Factory is to Windy Hill, as Hill top zone is to Emerald Hill. Some of my friends have complained about that, while I personally like the nostalgia of "WTF Blue Emerald Hill" from back in the day. I almost want to do that in my fangame, but I doubt it will happen. The extra levels here and there, the circuses (which I personally enjoy), and the whole bonus world were nice, and kind of unexpected.

I have nothing to say about the art style other than the fact that I think it really fits Sonic, and I hope they keep it up. I think it's the best 3D style in the series, and it keeps it at that smooth 60 fps. Speaking of which, going back to 30 fps games is a chore, but not bad.

The story... It was good, I really liked the humor. I liked the fact that I didn't feel embarrassed when a household member walks by, like I did 5 or so times with sonic colors. In simpler terms, the dialogue is the "BSSE, or Best Sonic Scenes Ever", said as I drag out the words and karate chop the air. If you get that, make not of it. On point now, the cutscenes were good, they kept you watching and the humor was actually good this time around.

Oh, and the nights DLC completely sucked. I don't regret pre-ordering the game and getting it, but come on.

Plot Holes: In the first cutscene, the tornado's wing gets shot off. As you start Windy Hill Zone 1, you see tails in the Tornado flying around with a perfectly good wing and going rather fast, and without a trail of smoke. Sonic said he got the capsule eggman dropped, but where? If it was the capsule at the end of windy hill 1, then why didn't it break from the fall? If it is, how did it manage to land on the Lost Hex when sonic and tails were a good distance away when they discovered it? Why did they bother showing tails fixing the plane when they wont be leaving until the end of the game? If it was so tails can point out he reprogrammed a supercomputer with a toothpick and dishwashing detergent for the roboticizing scene, why didn't he just point it out to himself exactly like he did in the scene where he gets turned into a robot? Why are knuckles and amy in the game? They serve no purpose other than to show that sonic and tails knew that the life was getting sucked out of the earth (which they knew already because of eggman), and to show that amy is an annoying whiny fartface. Oh wait... How did sonic get the exhaust hose when he didn't know eggman saved himself with the jetpack until he told him, and the fact that it's inside eggman's shirt? Where the heck did Cubot's body go? There was no explanation, just bam, Cubot now has no body, we now get comical relief and eggman saving tails just to make a small story point.

This is what happened to the "deadly" six, who just happened to disappear: * = Canon, ** = Non canon

Zazz, Purple dude with Murdoc Niccals' tongue - ** Couldn't "pound sonic's sorry blue butt", so went to vegas, got AIDs and died instead. (gosh, that was awfully dirty)

Zomom, Yellow dude, Sounds like Patrick Star- ** Tried to eat himself but istead impaled his hand by doing a facepalm. He missed his mouth by a few inches and bled to death

Zik, Blue dude, Stereotypical Elderly Fruit-Ninja Kung-Fu Guy - **Gets Cataracts and falls in one of the fans oddly placed among the small beach planetoids

Zeena, Green chick, Only there so lonely people do what the internet sadly does best - *After getting jumped on twice by an anthropomorphic blue hedgehog that can run faster than the speed of sound, she lays down and just blows up.

Zor, Gray dude, Sickeningly Emo - *Burns in a pit of lava whilst contemplating the meaning of life.

Zavok, Red dude, Obvious leader because of the demanding ponytail - *Gets advice from Boswer and stocks up on super mushrooms and grows huge for no reason. Dies by drowning in his own lava trap.

And that wraps up my review of this game. I would give this game a buy, given you have a wii u (I don't know about the 3DS version, haven't played it), X or Y, and enough money to get both it and the Zelda game when it comes out on the 22nd. For me personally, I think a lot of enjoyment was from the nostalgia factors.

[DJ espeed]

You there, you mix of a common subterranean vegetable and a rodent! Yes, you! I'm not certain if you are aware, but we have this fancy little device called the spoiler tag! The spoiler tags hide your text so you don't forcibly reveal the spoils to those looking to avoid said contents! How do you use it? You simply input your spoilers between the tags, like this!

[ SPOILER ]Spoiled stuffs.[ /SPOILER ] (Sans the spaces, of course)

Your resulting spoiler will look like this!

Spoiled stuffs.

Hopefully our wonderful device will help you in the future!

[Mr. Potatobadger]

Wow! I already knew that! Did you know that you could have just PMed me if you felt the need to share that instead if clogging this thread with common knowledge? And did you know that if you dont want to be spoiled, you probably shouldnt go to the thread dedicated to the thing you dont want to be spoiled from? Oh, and judging by the fact that this entire website is dedicated to sonic, i think the general populous knows enough about the game to not be spoiled.

Jokes aside, I didnt spoil much, and i split the reveiw into sections and breifed the reader about what they will be reading so i do dont spoil anything.

[Highwire4]

I have the 3DS version of the game and my overall experience was alright. The controls were solid. I haven't had this much control over sonic since colors and its precision doesn't stop when he's going at top speed. The parkour system is super fun and I love how it can be used. While going up a while slows sonic down a bit, I think its fine since there is some precision platforming elements going on that require a bit more time to react to. The bosses were enjoyable (cept for zone 4 that boss can fuck off) and while it is super annoying that the final stage is nothing but bosses, they were at least enjoyable. The bosses were an actual challenge at times which was nice to see compared to how ridiculously easy and lame the Wii U version's looked. The final boss, while not difficult, was actually a lot of fun and lasted for long enough to feel like a proper final fight.

The one thing that I though brought done the game as a whole though, was the level design. It starts out pretty good and is just a blast to play for the first few zones, but as the game goes on it gets progressively worse. The main problem with the levels isn't that its super hard or overly gimmicky (which happens quite a bit), its how badly designed they are.

The levels are designed so that you have roughly a 4-6 minute level thats divided up into 3-5 different sections. This is largely due to it having to load stuff but it helps when it comes to trying to memorize the levels when doing speed runs. The problem with the mid-game levels (not so much the later levels) is that they'd take a gimmick, like say rolling a snow ball around an obstacle course to solve puzzles, and make it work great for one segment. Then for the rest of the level, they throw in ridiculous and silly stuff to make it the most unfair and frustrating level ever and drag it out for as long as they can. This didn't really happen in zones 6 and 7 that often, but when it happens it just kinda really kills the whole game. Srsly limits replay-ability by making most of the level just not fun to play through or pointless to speedrun due to bullshit which leaves only a handful of levels you'll find your self going back to again and again.

The other bad thing about the game is the special stages. While they're creative and new, their over use of the motion controls makes them just not fun. It uses the gyro scope to steer sonic through space and while that sounds cool on paper, I found my self almost throwing up on more than one occasion. I never get motion sickness from games. Never. Yet I get so damn dizzy during these special stages its ridiculous.

The 3D in this game is ridiculous too. In that its super powerful in a way that doesn't hurt your eyes so its actually kind of awesome.

I didn't really understand the point of Tails' lab or the RC thing. I guess thats if you have it on wii u but I don't so yeah.

Overall this game was alright. You won't miss out on anything if you pass it by.

[Mr. Potatobadger]

I didn't really understand the point of Tails' lab or the RC thing. I guess thats if you have it on wii u but I don't so yeah.

My friends birthday was this past weekend, and he got the 3DS version, and we had a lot of fun using that feature, so its not useless. The co op is actually very fun and useful, especially for getting the red rings in laval mountain zone 3.

[Serephim]

sigh

the game is one big collage of iphone minigames and overused gimmick schemes that offer nothing past face value. Sanic's new moveset is basically the same way, neat at first with no emergence to anything. You can run on walls now, something never expanded upon or used to its advantage, probably because of how little time you spend actually controlling sonic in the fashion where its even avaliable.

There is no gameplay direction to this game. Every gimmick feels like an annoying control-hampering filler to your playtime clock that offers more ways to kill you than actually provide enjoyment. Same thing with the Wisps, which dont give Sonic an extra ability as much as they transform him into yet another stupid minigame.

Level design is meh and naturally about as un-sonic as it could be. There's little classical influence here. Hell, there's apparently little influence from any sonic games either, other than the Colors' Wisp feature and "nostalgic" rehashed art and badnick elements. And...of course, speeders and springs.

The bosses are meh, they all follow the Mario Galaxy sphere node setup (something even Mario Galaxy used less of than this game did) or some other slightly removed mario minibosss setup. The final stage was yet another stupid collage of minigames and oh look, what a surprise, its the same final boss from Sonic Colors, i cant contain my nostalgia.

It's like Sega is basically throwing darts blindfolded when it comes to Sonic these days. This game just takes everything wrong with the last generation of sonic games and expands upon what made them wrong. This game is desperately trying to look, feel, and play like something its not (SMB, Galaxy, Sonic 2). The developers obviously put more time into copy-pasting Mario concepts masked over with nostalgic 1992 sonic crap than actually designing and developing a videogame. I honestly doubt Sega is even trying anymore.

The only reason i can fathom this game gets good reviews is because Sonic was good 19 years ago and everything in this game has design elements plucked straight from 19 years ago.

[Light The Hedgehog]

Serephim, are you so right. I mean from what I've seen It looks exactly like you explained. I just don't see the appeal in this game. My interest can't be held on this game for long. While I wish I could test it for myself, I still think this is. Well. A disappointment. Such build up, for this. I was already kicking myself when I saw Sonic had a run button. Then I saw spindash and super peel out and I was all like Sweet! Then I watched a Mario Galaxy playthrough, and was like O_O because up until that point I've never seen SMG and was completely stunned by how much Sonic Lost World, had been "inspired" by it. I don't know. This is a basic platformer in my opinion, not a Sonic game. Sorry for my down talk about the game, but they could've done better.

[Serephim]

The only thing I can notice from playing Galaxy before or after Lost World is how bare-bones Sonic Team was in their copycat routine. They emulate Mario about just as well as they emulate Sonic. The artists pull through, the musicians pull through, and thats about it.

[DimensionWarped]

So I completed another world's worth of levels today and my opinion of the game is dropping in some respects. I think everyone who has read some reviews will be aware of the physics being off, but it's a deeper problem than that and it really begins to reveal itself when precision becomes a focus and the ability to understand how your character works becomes necessary. One of the biggest problems of the game is that the rules just aren't consistent and there is sort of an active attempt to punish the player for using the run button.

I'm just going to cover one particular instance because I found it truly frustrating, but while running on ice, Sonic starts going into a skating animation similar to Mario Galaxy (or just Shadow the Hedgehog). The slipperyness of the ice is itself awkward and you really don't have the efficacy of control that Mario Galaxy had while on ice (which is odd since Sonic feels like he moves a bit slower on ice in this game than Mario does in Galaxy). But the real kicker is that while in this motion and you jump, Sonic will do a sort of Ntuple salchow jump and during this jump you will completely lose air control as well as the ability to double jump and it's just plain infuriating when you have a need to use your double jump or make a minor adjustment for this ability to just suddenly be locked away for no reason. This sort of problem pertains to a lot of the normal jumping stuff as well. Why should the character unspin simply because he double jumped? Why is the ground spinning motion not something that can attack enemies instead of just a strangely derpy way of moving around? Why is it that when I do my bounce attack that Sonic can no longer use homing attacks? The game is plagued with these instances where controls that seem like they should be available to you are just yanked away without reason and it feels very unfair at times. Couple that with physics that just continually deliver a different effect than what feels like should happen and the game gets very frustrating when the action piles on.

I'll give it a while longer to see if stockholm syndrome can set in and I get used to the strange mechanics, but right now I'm thinking my review is going to be in the lower half of the spectrum. There are some things about this game that I really adore (the game has a great variety of gimmicks and enemies even if they are sometimes implemented less than full-assedly, not to mention it provides more classic Sonic throwbacks than you can shake a stick at) and the visuals really shine when they shine, but the problems are glowing brighter right now.

[ila]

Reading your thoughts DW has me glad that I bought a second copy of Pokemon over Lost World on my 3DS. I can't imagine that it would be an improvement over the Wii U version.

[BlitznBurst]

Basically, this game is fun when it's being a platformer, but it shoves so many arbitrary gimmick levels down your throat that it drags the whole experience down. Either Iizuka or someone else over at Sonic team is obviously paranoid that people will get bored of any sort of "core gameplay" and so tries to add variety by throwing in new mechanics that completely break the pace, and taht person needs to be fired immediately. Even after fifteen fucking years they still cannot grasp that all anybody wants is a consistent gameplay experience that we can look back on and say "yeah, that was a fun game" without having to add "except for [[insert overbearing gimmick here]]." People complained for years about the shitty out-of-place characters, and then SEGA decided that it was the characters themselves that were the problem. When people started complaining about turning Sonic into a generic Brawler, they decided that people just didn't like turning him into a Werewolf and brought back Classic Sonic for LOLNOSTALGIA. And when people still called them out for it, they just went "fuck it" and turned him into a giant fucking snowball instead. No. That's not how it fucking works. Over a decade of this shit and they still haven't been able to figure out what the problem is.

Also the story was great up until the last world where all just sort of fizzled out

[OverbounD]

I've kind of felt that way about the controls in Colors and Generations too DW. For instance in Generations some jumps allow for the trick moves to gain boost while others don't. But trick moves are a triggered event so it just turns on and off without any indication as to when and why.

[Serephim]

Basically, this game is fun when it's being a platformer, but it shoves so many arbitrary gimmick levels down your throat that it drags the whole experience down. Either Iizuka or someone else over at Sonic team is obviously paranoid that people will get bored of any sort of "core gameplay" and so tries to add variety by throwing in new mechanics that completely break the pace, and taht person needs to be fired immediately. Even after fifteen fucking years they still cannot grasp that all anybody wants is a consistent gameplay experience that we can look back on and say "yeah, that was a fun game" without having to add "except for [[insert overbearing gimmick here]]." People complained for years about the shitty out-of-place characters, and then SEGA decided that it was the characters themselves that were the problem. When people started complaining about turning Sonic into a generic Brawler, they decided that people just didn't like turning him into a Werewolf and brought back Classic Sonic for LOLNOSTALGIA. And when people still called them out for it, they just went "fuck it" and turned him into a giant fucking snowball instead. No. That's not how it fucking works. Over a decade of this shit and they still haven't been able to figure out what the problem is.

Also the story was great up until the last world where all just sort of fizzled out

I agree totally. They have this terrible "patch it" mentality about every criticism, and it never works. Sonic is just an advertisement exploitation at this point. Every new Sonic game is just a copy-paste of whatever nobody complained about in the last game stretched the width of a full-blown title.

Instead of trying to critically analyze why their games are so shallow, they're forever taking popular concepts and "REBIRTHING" sonic into some glorious, nostalgia soaked "return to form", where everything is magically going to be amazing again. But instead in this latest installment, we get what appears to be a mix between Sonic 2 visuals, NSMB stage layouts, Sonic 06 mach speed, Sonic Colors powerups, Mario Galaxy "UNIQUE" factor, and just a shittruck full of gimmicks to fill in the gaps with.

It's like they all sit around a table for a few hours, put together a giant puzzle of stuff that "works", go off into their corners and meet up 12 months later with 26 different games they can slap a sonic motif over.

People bitched about Heroes, Shadow and Unleashed alot, but at least those games were actual, fully realized videogames from start to finish.

[Light The Hedgehog]

I agree totally. They have this terrible "patch it" mentality about every criticism, and it never works. Sonic is just an advertisement exploitation at this point. Every new Sonic game is just a copy-paste of whatever nobody complained about in the last game stretched the width of a full-blown title.

Instead of trying to critically analyze why their games are so shallow, they're forever taking popular concepts and "REBIRTHING" sonic into some glorious, nostalgia soaked "return to form", where everything is magically going to be amazing again. But instead in this latest installment, we get what appears to be a mix between Sonic 2 visuals, NSMB stage layouts, Sonic 06 mach speed, Sonic Colors powerups, Mario Galaxy "UNIQUE" factor, and just a shittruck full of gimmicks to fill in the gaps with.

It's like they all sit around a table for a few hours, put together a giant puzzle of stuff that "works", go off into their corners and meet up 12 months later with 26 different games they can slap a sonic motif over.

It's sad to say, but it's so true. I was so excited for a new Sonic Game after generations and gave that game a "pass" because it was celebrating Sonic history but sheesh. Ever since, say Heroes, everything is trying to revive the things that worked before. While in everything before Colors it wasn't as INTENSE in your face with it, it was subtle, which is good. But now their almost flat-out ripping old titles of the "glorious" parts and saying, "hey it works, it plays remotely well. ITS GREAT!" I just wish they'd actually sit down, and make a new game. I'm tired of having Sonic 1 shoved in my face and Sonic 2 down my throat. I mean at the least they could pull from say Sonic the Hedgehog 3, they haven't pulled much from that yet, right? Better yet, make something new, to the best of their abilities. Ugh. I don't know.

Also while the werehog may have suck concept wise, if they'd changed it to say Knuckles bam, a step in the right direction. That's why I'm not so hard unleashed, because, I view it as a "graphical" error, hehe. Unleashed as Serephim said was at least fully cooked.

Okay Edit: I think I was a little too, attacking on that so, lemme calm down. I think if they intentionally re-hashed something it could work well. Like Really polish Sonic Adventure 1 and 2's gameplay, and made Sonic The Hedgehog 3:Dx ? I don't know Sonic Adventure in Sonic 2? I think that'd work out well. No SA3 no new "Adventure" game, just a classic tittle beautifully made in 3D. It'd be playing the nostalgia card, but it definitely wouldn't be playing it safe. And if excuted would be really cool in my opinion.

[Candescence]

From what I can tell, one of Lost World's problems is that it suffers from what seems to be Sonic Team's irrational paranoia that a single 'core gameplay' will cause players to get bored partway through the game, regardless of how varied you make level design and enemies. It's been happening since the original Sonic Adventure in some shape or form, with the exception of, surprisingly, the Storybook titles, which were were actually consistent with their core gameplay. After 06, when Iizuka started his idiotic 'Sonic only' thing from misinterpreting the fans who wanted an end to this bullshit, we got the Werehog in Unleashed, the Wisps in Colours (though at least they were integrated into the core gameplay as 'powerups') and Classic Sonic in Generations (who was tolerable by virtue of being way more fun than Modern Sonic), continuing their obsession with gameplay roulette via Sonic himself rather than other characters.

In this case, it comes in the form of overly gimmicky levels that override the core gameplay in favor of something 'different'. Sonic Team really need to get their heads out of their asses and focus on making the parkour gameplay work with momentum-based mechanics. They had the right idea with the speed tiers and the parkour, but they completely missed a fantastic opportunity.

[Light The Hedgehog]

Exactly. There's instances in which adding one of Sonic's pals could have been switched out for a wisp per say, or a level gimmick. Tails' Flight could have been used over say adding a billion springs to bounce me everywhere to look]/b] "Cool!" and "Awesome!" But it just gets repetitive and boring. Knuckles glide and climb. While Sonic can now scale walls with parkour, Knuckles climb is way more efficient for exploring and scaling walls. The wisps in this game are near useless. Yes, useless not, "I can choose to use them when I want." Because while you can, they still don't serve a purpose more than a couple instances where they're force.

I mean they add parkour, okay cool sounds fun. Now add some momentum gameplay. Sweet, sounds better. Implement Tails and Knuckles with the same core gameplay as Sonic. Bam! Now all that time you would have spent on designing gimmicks over implementing characters is now free'd up! I'd much rather "hover" with Tails, over a time limit Wisp. C'mon.. They need to get over their fears. I'm tired of seeing that blue hedgehog and no one else, gameplay wise. I'm fine if they don't have shadow, rouge, espio, and mighty. As long as I can have someone else to play as.

In lost worlds case it would have really benefited from having 3 ways to explore the levels. That also helps them out as they don't have to add the accursed Spring sections, just add Tails, and flying and we're good. Sonic can spin dash jump his way up there or perhaps USE HIS PARKOUR... to make it a different experience each time. I know it's harder than I say but c'mon they had it right in SA1, they almost had it right SA2. And heck even heroes had multiple characters (well, play-styles) If heroes had each person tackle a stage independently it would have had multiple characters. Which is fun when done right. Not trying to bash them into the ground, but ugh.. There was a lot of frustrating things they did because they were paranoid.

[Light The Hedgehog]

EDIT: Can someone delete this post. I don't know why it double posted.

[Jassbec]

This pretty much sums up my opinion about Sonic Lost World

[Stritix]

I have the Wii U version. It's an alright game. It does feel a little slow and clunky, but they'll most likely fix those issues for the next game. If they are keeping the parkour gameplay style, that is.

[Serephim]

From what I can tell, one of Lost World's problems is that it suffers from what seems to be Sonic Team's irrational paranoia that a single 'core gameplay' will cause players to get bored partway through the game, regardless of how varied you make level design and enemies. It's been happening since the original Sonic Adventure in some shape or form, with the exception of, surprisingly, the Storybook titles, which were were actually consistent with their core gameplay.

The funny thing about this is, Sonic Team already addressed this issue in probably their most intuitive response to criticism ever (at least in concept) when they made Sonic Heroes. Sonic Adventure had split gameplay among characters, mixed response. SA2 had mixed gameplay among characters, mixed response. Sonic Heroes had SA2 Action Stage gameplay, lets you use the entire Hero-Side story from SA2 and switch in real time, no side gimmicks other than a special stage and the occasional coaster ride.

Thinking about it, if they removed the forced team mechanics from Heroes and made some more modern quality enhancements to the physics engine, you'd be left with basically the closest thing to the original sonic gameplay in full 3D. Perhaps you could swap out shitty Wii-U co-op play for the option to actively control more than one party member during the levels.

Anyway, Sonic Heroes had some aggravating issues (most glaring for me being the amount of time wasted on artificial lengthening), but following it was the death of Sonic-style level design. In retrospect, I think it was probably the biggest attempt to innovate the series while keeping to itself. I actually liked Sonic Wind.

[Light The Hedgehog]

Yes indeed. A heroes two would be awesome. Doesn't even have to be a hero 2. Get some better control and physics, add the parkour, the ability to switch characters and have their special non-nerfed abilities and we have a game that, like Serephim said, would be innovative and still play like the original but in 3D! I just can't help but remember so many missed opportunities. But I will change my opinion on lost world. It is now "Okay"..

[ila]

I'm inclined to disagree with you Sereph since I believe Shadow the Hedgehog had the closest design to Sonic levels in 3D... you know... just with guns and vehicles occasionally.

[Serephim]

Well they were basically the same game and engine, one was just significantly stupider than the other. Judged on its own merits I wouldn't call Shadow a bad game, it was just lazy and misdirected as fuck. If they approached Shadow with the same mindset and effort as they did with Heroes then it probably could have been one of the better sonic games. Some of the levels in that game were really clever.

Regardless I hold Shadow in way higher respects than Lost World because even when it was trying completely stupid shit, with entirely broken mechanics, it still never ripped me away from its core gameplay. Nor did it build the entire game off watered down gimmicks from Heroes, the game that came directly before it.

[Mr. Potatobadger]

Well they were basically the same game and engine, one was just significantly stupider than the other. Judged on its own merits I wouldn't call Shadow a bad game, it was just lazy and misdirected as fuck. If they approached Shadow with the same mindset and effort as they did with Heroes then it probably could have been one of the better sonic games. Some of the levels in that game were really clever.

Regardless I hold Shadow in way higher respects than Lost World because even when it was trying completely stupid shit, with entirely broken mechanics, it still never ripped me away from its core gameplay. Nor did it build the entire game off watered down gimmicks from Heroes, the game that came directly before it.

You are completely right. A few months ago, I got bored with my few Wii U games and whipped out my gamecube. I noticed shadow the Hedgehog, (a sonic game which i never bothered to complete nor will I) and after looking at the cover, I thought, "wow, why didn't I finish this game, it's such a good idea, it looks fantastic! (I actually enjoyed the idea of sonic with guns) Popped it in and... Oh... Thats right. This game is lazy and misdirected as fuck.