21 replies to this topic

[Scar]

One thing has been bugging me since I joined up on these and other Sonic forums.
What defines a quality Sonic game, and what makes it so? What results in a bad Sonic game, and what makes it so?

I've seen many people make aribtrary claims, that "It isn't good enough", or "Its very basic platforming". What I want to know, is what defines good, or complex platforming. Especially in 3D games. Saying that something is basic means nothing, unless there is a frame of reference. The same is true of the reverse.

So the question here, is what makes a good Sonic game. The answers cannot be "wide open spaces, and more platforming". I want an answer that is less vague. More platforming doesn't necessarily translate to a good game. How can/should wide open spaces be used, and what kind of platforming should there be, and what features does it need to be deemed "complex and deep", with an example.
I also need an explanation as to what "basic and shallow" platforming is by comparison, with an example.

Visual examples best explain what you're talking about, obviously with a little (or a lot) of text explaining what it is I should be seeing.

Side note:

Answers in the vain of: "See <<insert Sonic game that you're a fan of>>" are not valid. I need some explanation. I need to know what it is about the thing I'm looking at, that makes it so good....or bad.

Use of counter-examples is ideal. Show something you believe to be good, and show what you believe to be comparatively worse to support your conclusion.

Don't mean to be rude, or patronising. I'm just curious is all.

[Soniman]

I want the game to be fun. I frankly dont give a shit if it dosent emulate some 20 year old games. What we have now is fine beacuse its fun, therefore, I think quality is pretty much on the good side.

Can it be better? Yes, definietly. But for what we have now is more than satisfactory, beacuse its fun.

[DudeManGuy]

For me, I like when Sonic games are linear, but still have places for exploration, and levels are varied. Basically, a similar formula like Sonic Adventure and Sonic Adventure 2. Not exactly the same, but more like that than the recent Sonic games, but actually Sonic Unleashed had some exploration in the 3D segments which i liked. For example, in the 2nd act of Apotos(not sure what the actual level is called) there is a clear part where you can go straight and just keep going, but there are other parts to explore, and there's even moon medals to find. This is the reason i like Unleashed more than Colors, and Generations seems a bit more like unleashed, even if it looks really linear it doesn't necessarily mean it is. Also, I like 3D platforming. With colors, Sonic Team took the safe route by making the platforming be primarily in the 2D segments. Basically, I kind of said what everyone else seems to say: I like fully 3D sonic games(2D sections are fun though) that also are linear (it's almost impossible to make a nonlinear speedy platformer like sonic) but have exploration that is OPTIONAL but is there for fun. 3D platforming is great too.

[Azure Yakuzu]

When people say they want more complexity, I can kind of see what their talking about; In the Genesis games you're: using shields, insta-sheild, finding switches, going down different paths, searching for Sp. stages, running through loops, etc.

The problem? Most of the modern 3D games have been doing almost all of that. The genesis games are probably just as linear as something like Generations, with the only difference being in 2D; alt. paths in 2D look a lot more expansive than from a top down perspective as would be seen in 3D. I've played Sonic 3 & Knuckles a million times over, and while there are different paths to take, I find myself mostly on the same path in almost everyone of my playthroughs.

Every path you take is just as linear as the one you would've taken had you not taken had you not gone down that path.



tl;dr: Aside from physics and a spin dash, games like Generations and the later levels of Unleashed are as close to the Genesis games as possible.

[Scott]

I want the game to be fun. I frankly dont give a shit if it dosent emulate some 20 year old games. What we have now is fine beacuse its fun, therefore, I think quality is pretty much on the good side.

Can it be better? Yes, definietly. But for what we have now is more than satisfactory, beacuse its fun.

For me, I like when Sonic games are linear, but still have places for exploration, and levels are varied. Basically, a similar formula like Sonic Adventure and Sonic Adventure 2. Not exactly the same, but more like that than the recent Sonic games, but actually Sonic Unleashed had some exploration in the 3D segments which i liked. For example, in the 2nd act of Apotos(not sure what the actual level is called) there is a clear part where you can go straight and just keep going, but there are other parts to explore, and there's even moon medals to find. This is the reason i like Unleashed more than Colors, and Generations seems a bit more like unleashed, even if it looks really linear it doesn't necessarily mean it is. Also, I like 3D platforming. With colors, Sonic Team took the safe route by making the platforming be primarily in the 2D segments. Basically, I kind of said what everyone else seems to say: I like fully 3D sonic games(2D sections are fun though) that also are linear (it's almost impossible to make a nonlinear speedy platformer like sonic) but have exploration that is OPTIONAL but is there for fun. 3D platforming is great too.

Basically these two, I will play/love/defend ANY Sonic game I find fun, that I get enjoyment out of, Story may be cheesey, but it's a kid's series that happens to appeal into the child in us all, no matter how old we get gameplay may be bogus for you, but depends on the game, I don't crave for a Sonic game to play like the originals, I want the originals to play like the originals, Sonic Adventure to play like an Adventure game, the modern Sonic games to play..well, modern!

But I do have a preferred playstyle, which is the Adventure styleed gameplay present in Sonic Adventure 1/2, Heroes, 06 and Shadow the Hedgehog.

Quality means nothing to me both in looks and gameplay, If it's fun it's fun!

But I will say Generations is a brilliant example of SEGA putting masses of amazing care, love and quality into a Sonic game, which will make it funner, but damn, I'll find it fun regardless it's fate.

[Azure Yakuzu]

Another thing that should be considered when playing a 3D platform game, do you want to explore, or get from A-B? That is the question.

[Diogenes]

To repeat myself from the topic that birthed this:

Imagine a fairly wide path (not open-world; the wider sections of Unleashed are about enough) of valid playable space (that is, no invisible walls or huge bottomless pits sectioning things off into narrow hallways) with a network of paths (that is, defined routes, but not solely sectioned-off catwalks; routes don't need to be so rigidly defined) winding, twisting, and curving (emphasis on curves, as this is Sonic we're talking about) around it and around each other.

I also made a picture a while back (not to scale):

Modern games are as if you took the above and erased almost all the black. The only way to go from one path to another is where the paths themselves meet; the space between them is invalid, either because of walls (invisible or visible) or pits (which might be crossable with a good jump, but not in a natural manner). I want to fill in a lot of that space, tie those paths together, allow the player to move between them naturally (both intentionally and unintentionally, such as missing a jump and falling to a lower level).

Regarding platforming, here's another picture:

This is basic platforming, straight out of 1-1. Flat ground, platform A (where you are) and platform B (where you want to be). You run, you jump, and either you make it or you fall (with modern Sonic games, most likely to your death, as in the latter case). While Sonic games certainly can and should have this (and have had it in the past), this is not the end-all be-all, and considering that the Genesis games had a more complex system that supported all sorts of ground angles and proper interactions with them, this should not be considered sufficient. I want the terrain to be varied enough, and the physics nuanced enough, that I can and must use Sonic's unique way of interacting with the level to progress. I want abilities designed for more complex platforming tasks, like a walljump (that's actually usable in 3D). I don't want to see one flat platform next to another flat platform and be told that the problem of 3D platforming has been solved.

[T-Man]

I don't have any single idea of what makes a Sonic game good. It's a franchise that pretty much changes drastically game by game and has been such since the Dreamcast days, even when the gameplay style has been similar. Sonic Colors featured platform-based level design that revolved around a power-up gimmick with some satisfying speedy sections sprinkled here and there, whereas Unleashed focused on thrilling gameplay that required you to memorize the level design in order to properly speedrun it and get good at it and featured little conventional platforming. You can even observe this with Sonic Adventure 1 and 2. Adventure 1 is pretty much what happens when you take the classics and put them in 3-D, whereas Adventure 2 almost feels like a precursor to Unleashed's style of gameplay albeit without the boost and it features more diversity. Each of these games are a lot of fun for different reasons, and I'd like to take this moment to quote what Scar has stated before: well-designed straight lines should not be faulted for being straight lines.

I suppose, then, what makes a Sonic game good is when its elements come together well and help craft the experience, along with an acceptable level of polish. The classics and Adventure 1 blended speed and platforming well and featured impressive level design. Adventure 2 and Unleashed, on the other hand, featured thrilling gameplay that offered more replay value especially for those interested in ranks or speedrunning, and though they were more linear, they utilized their linearity well to craft similarly impressive levels. Colors features clever platforming and a fun power-up gimmick that work well with the speed we know and love.

Taking a look at some of the "bad" Sonic games, namely Sonic Heroes and Shadow the Hedgehog, they both seemed to encourage speed while at the same time you would be punished for going fast. This was partially thanks to poor control, although Shadow's missions generally required you to constantly stop to kill or get something. The levels also tricked you into thinking that they are open-ended while in reality they were even more linear than before. In and of itself, this wouldn't be a bad thing, but in Shadow's case it almost seemed like they forgot to put anything interesting in the levels. Sonic Heroes' team gimmick would often slow down the pace, especially when you are forced through beat-em-up sections that aren't even that good anyway, requiring nothing more than mashing the "B" button. This is to say nothing of how unpolished both games were. In fact, I would say that they were, to an extent, broken; the homing attack would often backfire and the auto-aim for the guns was very inconsistent.

Of course, I can't go through this entire post saying nothing of the alternate gameplay. While having alternate gameplay does not make a Sonic game bad, it definitely shouldn't be there. To me, a game is of higher quality when it is consistent. I would still tell you that both Adventure games are very good, but they are still inconsistent due to featuring genre roulette. There are much better ways of obtaining gameplay variety than by changing up the genre completely, especially considering that said genres in the Adventure games didn't always have much to do with Sonic.

[ChaosSupremeSonîc]

Immersion.

Nothing defines quality in any game than how much in immerses you into it's world. But that alone is vague as hell, because there's no set way to do it. You could give the player more control and have them not know how to start off the game if you give them too much; give the player too little and it becomes restrictive to the player who has ideas of doing more in the game he/she's playing.

And it's also the immersion that makes you replay the game after several years. I've been playing Jak II since early 2000s, and I just recently booted it up to day on my old PS2, as the game gives you quite a lot to do.

For Sonic's case, that would be hard to define. A lot of us have already started to catch on to the current formula's limitation, and some of us are voicing it a lot more apathetically than others. And I think I know what part of the problem might be: Gameplay and Story segregation. In the cutscenes, we see Sonic pulling all sorts of acrobatic maneuvers and attacks on his foes that make us wish the game would let us do it, but all we're currently left with is the impression that all we are able to do is plow straight through enemies with a boost and run really fast through the stage while the cooler stuff is stuck to automation. Now naturally that isn't fully true, but it's not to hard to see where these people are coming from.

I'm not sure how to go about making a quality Sonic game that can last for so long at this period. I'm one of those people who advocate a complete reinvention of the formula, but I recognize how such a thing would take a lot of time and money to do and is not a full guarantee to pull off. So it's kind of at a great stalemate here.

[Dark Qiviut]

Immersion.

Nothing defines quality in any game than how much in immerses you into it's world. But that alone is vague as hell, because there's no set way to do it. You could give the player more control and have them not know how to start off the game if you give them too much; give the player too little and it becomes restrictive to the player who has ideas of doing more in the game he/she's playing.

And it's also the immersion that makes you replay the game after several years. I've been playing Jak II since early 2000s, and I just recently booted it up to day on my old PS2, as the game gives you quite a lot to do.

For Sonic's case, that would be hard to define. A lot of us have already started to catch on to the current formula's limitation, and some of us are voicing it a lot more apathetically than others. And I think I know what part of the problem might be: Gameplay and Story segregation. In the cutscenes, we see Sonic pulling all sorts of acrobatic maneuvers and attacks on his foes that make us wish the game would let us do it, but all we're currently left with is the impression that all we are able to do is plow straight through enemies with a boost and run really fast through the stage while the cooler stuff is stuck to automation. Now naturally that isn't fully true, but it's not to hard to see where these people are coming from.

I'm not sure how to go about making a quality Sonic game that can last for so long at this period. I'm one of those people who advocate a complete reinvention of the formula, but I recognize how such a thing would take a lot of time and money to do and is not a full guarantee to pull off. So it's kind of at a great stalemate here.

You make a good point here. Personally, I rather play Sonic-like levels if they are semi-linear like Sonic 2, Sky Sanctuary from S3&K, and levels from Sonic Adventure because they are more streamlined and have a sense of direction rather than having to go left, right, up, and down all the time. One big problem I had with S3&K's level design is how tiredly convoluted many of them are and how I just seem to zigzag all over the place.

However, there are levels that are absolutely linear, but seem to absolutely work due to the immersion of many other well-executed concepts like graphics and atmosphere. City Escape from SA2 is linear to the core, but it's one of the most iconic level in Sonic's history.

How people seem to perceive quality Sonic games is a problem because there are too many speaking loudly simultaneously, and Sonic Team can't quite answer the problem due to all the noise. Saying, "Just make a damn good Sonic game" isn't enough. ST HD doesn't have the guidance it needs, and that's very problematic.

Edited by Dark Qiviut, 14 September 2011 - 11:42 PM.

[T-Man]

EDIT: Sorry. Misread Diogene's post and diagram. I'll edit it.

EDIT: LOL. Same here.

Still, it would probably a better idea to make things more expansive gradually. The levels start out confined, but open up more and more as the game progresses.

Edited by T-Man, 14 September 2011 - 11:39 PM.

[sonfan1984]

It's seems like most people will claim a Sonic game is bad when they see something they don't like, like when one of Sonic's friends pop up on screen for example. Like alot of people were excited for Generations but as soon as they see Shadow a few day agos then alot of them say that it sucks now and they don't want to buy the game anymore.

[Dark Qiviut]

EDIT: LOL. Same here.

Still, it would probably a better idea to make things more expansive gradually. The levels start out confined, but open up more and more as the game progresses.

Don't worry about it.

Honestly, I agree with you nonetheless. Make it confined and eventually expand it. Too much at one time each time would make the levels overwhelming and a waste of time. S3&K's level design showed an absolute lack of discipline in displaying how much is enough. They went overboard and put in too much for each zone.

[Azure Yakuzu]

Dio you make some very decent points, with Unleashed the problem was the linearity, how restrictive the game was, and the only exploration you had was over bottomless pits, now while I don't that particularly terrible design, it is something I can do without, but this is where I disagree and we start this song and dance again.

I want the terrain to be varied enough, and the physics nuanced enough, that I can and must use Sonic's unique way of interacting with the level to progress. I want abilities designed for more complex platforming tasks, like a walljump (that's actually usable in 3D). I don't want to see one flat platform next to another flat platform and be told that the problem of 3D platforming has been solved.

You see that's just it though, the unique way that Sonic interacts with the environment is different from the Genesis games, but just because its different doesn't mean its not there; In the Genesis games the way you interacted with the environment were through the physics that propelled through the level, rolling, acceleration, etc. and the level design was accommodated to use said physics. Now with the Modern games, you have a different moveset; The physics from the Genesis games are gone, but in their place are all new moves to use and level design designed for those moves; Quick Step, Drift, Stomp, and sliding are those moves, they're akin to the physics of the genesis games basically as they're the main way you interact with the environment around you, and the obstacles are designed with these moves in mind, just like how the Genesis games through obstacles with their physics in mind.

The only real flaw I found in the modern's design is that you sometimes move so fast that you don't have time to react to oncoming obstacles(granted the Genesis games had this too, but its a bit more pronounced here), and get screwed over because of it, the problem with Colors was that, despite having all of the same moves from Unleashed, the level design barely challenged you to use said moves, and opting for, as you described, basic platforming, other than that, the game throws the appropriate obstacles to accommodate the moves you are given and does a damn good job at it.

Edited by Shadic93, 15 September 2011 - 01:59 AM.

[T-Man]

Dio you make some very decent points, with Unleashed the problem was the linearity, how restrictive the game was, and the only exploration you had was over bottomless pits, now while I don't that particularly terrible design, it is something I can do without, but this is where I disagree and we start this song and dance again.





You see that's just it though, the unique way that Sonic interacts with the environment is different from the Genesis games, but just because its different doesn't mean its not there; In the Genesis games the way you interacted with the environment were through the physics that propelled through the level, rolling, acceleration, etc. and the level design was accommodated to use said physics. Now with the Modern games, you have a different moveset; The physics from the Genesis games are gone, but in their place are all new moves to use and level design designed for those moves; Quick Step, Drift, Stomp, and sliding are those moves, they're akin to the physics of the genesis games basically as they're the main way you interact with the environment around you, and the obstacles are designed with these moves in mind, just like how the Genesis games through obstacles with their physics in mind.

The only real flaw I found in the modern's design is that you sometimes move so fast that you don't have time to react to oncoming obstacles(granted the Genesis games had this too, but its a bit more pronounced here), and get screwed over because of it, the problem with Colors was that, despite having all of the same moves from Unleashed, the level design barely challenged you to use said moves, and opting for, as you described, basic platforming, other than that, the game throws the appropriate obstacles to accommodate the moves you are given and does a damn good job at it.

I mostly agree with you, but for the record I don't see platforming being "basic" as a bad thing. Colors' platforming and level design are part of why I consider it to be the best 3-D game in the series thus far. And even if the platforming is "basic", there was still quite a bit of diversity and even creativity in its level design, or at least I thought so.

Edited by T-Man, 15 September 2011 - 02:09 AM.

[Azure Yakuzu]

I mostly agree with you, but for the record I don't see platforming being "basic" as a bad thing. Colors' platforming and level design are part of why I consider it to be the best 3-D game in the series thus far. And even if the platforming is "basic", there was still quite a bit of diversity and even creativity in its level design, or at least I thought so.

I never said Colors was bad, its just boring. It is indeed a fun game with plenty of replayability, but the lack of any real challenge in the levels, and the fact that most of the extra acts are recycled areas from the previous acts, it really dulls my love for the game.

Edited by Shadic93, 15 September 2011 - 02:17 AM.

[Deaf Guy in Music Plant]

Don't we get one of these threads every week?

[Azure Yakuzu]

Don't we get one of these threads every week?

Its funny how things work out.

[T-Man]

I never said Colors was bad, its just boring. It is indeed a fun game with plenty of replayability, but the lack of any real challenge in the levels, and the fact that most of the extra acts are recycled areas from the previous acts, it really dulls my love for the game.

Meh, the levels weren't exactly "challenging", but I didn't think it was quite "easy" either. And even though most of the acts feature some recycled areas, most of them felt new enough IMO.

But whatever bro. ;D

[Dark Qiviut]

I mostly agree with you, but for the record I don't see platforming being "basic" as a bad thing. Colors' platforming and level design are part of why I consider it to be the best 3-D game in the series thus far. And even if the platforming is "basic", there was still quite a bit of diversity and even creativity in its level design, or at least I thought so.

The platforming is a very nice change of pace from the speed-dominated gameplay we've experienced in the Modern Era. The only exception is that I can't even call it a 3D game: About 70% of SCWii is in a 2.5D plane, and the 3D sections are too simple. Combine that with a boost that's pretty restrictive and its hard speed cap, it makes the 3D terrains uninteresting. It's a great Modern game, on the other hand.