Sonic Unleashed - What is it now after four years?

[Hunter Hedgehog]

I like Unleashed a lot. I don't like the idea of Sonic The Werehog, but it wasn't too bad to play. And I love the daytime stages.

 

The game felt so complete and it gives such a sense of freedom. Which to me, Colors and even Generations don't give you. I don't really like the way Sonic feels in Colors. And in Generations he feels a bit too tight and almost feels 'robot-y' in a sense. Unleashed is admittedly loose but that feels more natural to me. In Unleashed you could go practically anywhere, where I feel in Generations there looks like there are many places to explore, but they are blocked off by an invisible wall. I could be remembering incorrectly but I just remember Unleashed being closer to the Adventure games, where you could go nearly anywhere with your abilities, even if it meant death.

 

I still think Generations is the better game by a longshot though. I do wish there were less invisible walls and it was slightly looser in it's controls.

True. I wish someone just took the physics and movement of adventure and put them in these new games as a hack or something.

[azoo]

Looking back after about 7 years later..

 

Unleashed is still a pretty good game. It ain't the best by any means, but a lot of it's content had enough promise in it's presentation to be the beginning of something amazing.

 

To start with the positives, the game had tons of life in it, loads of creativity, buckets worth of ambition and some of the best technical / game design efforts Sega had put out since Sonic Adventure 2, if not moreso than it. The game had heart. It offered loads of content, unlockables to die for, and an atmosphere that oozed the "world adventure" vibe that the Japanese name of the game implied. NPCs were fun to talk to and nothing about the hub worlds felt like too much of a chore to go through. There was so much you could do that it almost felt like you were there. It was wonderful.

 

But while all of those things mentioned sound like they make this game almost worthy of "best Sonic game ever", there's the bad ideas that come in.

 

There's the Werehog (a very bad idea with surprisingly good execution), there's the mandatory medal collecting for game progression (a massive stain on the otherwise perfect pacing of the game), cheap level design in the regular stages, quick-time events (which are never a good idea ever), and a story that (while overall good and heartwarming) has some rather empty and unsatisfactory spots.

 

Because of all of these bad things meshing with great ones, the game just kinda ended up being anywhere from 'okay' to 'pretty good'.. or unless you're looking through the eyes of any critic or outsider, 'absolutely horrible'. The latter's opinion being the loudest one, which also probably convinced Sonic Team to force themselves into a status quo and never leave. It's a damn shame.

[BlackKnightRulez43]

Sonic Unleashed, after seven years, is a masterpiece. Well, at least the HD version is. Fun levels, epic final boss, it's outstanding!

[Jar Jar Analysis 1138]

On 1/12/2013 at 8:28 PM, ChikaBoing said:

A fault I see with the game, is having Hashimoto being moved up as a Director for this game.

 

He's a good tech guy obviously, but his Idea to moving Sonic forward gameplay wise, wasn't quite ideal. Previously established game designers on Sonic games, became directors. But Hashimoto previously only did quasi minigame stuff. I feel that Iizuka (who moved from a game designer to a director in Adventure) and company did a better job with Adventure witha gameplay for Sonic that more people agreed on.

No one commented on this bit so I guess I will. 

I think, like many people, he had a genuine ideal on how to make a good sonic game. Him as a director definitely brought some issues at hand(I’m probably correct that He pushed it a bit more for him to be more race track like) but I believe that the execution of it overall was good. 

But then again, who was a potential candidate? Iizuka? 

I feel like he could have been a co-director along with Hashimoto.

I don’t necessarily agree but you have a valid point here about his credibility.