Lost World: Discussion, Impressions and Fan Reviews

[Salamander]

It didn't for me, actually.  I spent most of the game hovering around 20.

[Blue Blood]

Likewise. There's plenty of op's for 1ups, and even more for you to die.

[Emmett L. Brown]

It didn't for me, actually.  I spent most of the game hovering around 20.

Same here, but since I died in every single cheap platforming bit in the game, I can totally see how I'd passed 99 if I did a no-death run.

 

I loathe the practice of using bottomless pits as the sole penalty for missing a jump in platforming games. Remember in Sonic 2? You just fell down to a lower path that might take you a little longer to reach the exit. Pit deaths were rare, and Sonic 3 had entire zones without a single bottomless pit unless you glitched out of the map.

 

Playing Sonic Lost World in the 3DS feels like playing an NES Castlevania when it comes to platforming. You either get it perfectly right or you die. There is no middle ground. I freely admit that Sonic Heroes wasn't much better, but hell I complained about it back then too. Darn tightrope marathons over level-spanning bottomless pits.

 

I had the same feeling getting to Sky Road as I did with getting to Egg Fleet in Heroes. "How is this sky-high level supposed to be different from every single level so far?"

[Salamander]

That is my complaint exactly.  The game is all bottomless pits and if you mess up even slightly, you die.  It's really rather tedious.  Sonic Team / Dimps should challenge themselves to include no bottomless pits whatsoever in their next game.

[Blue Blood]

That is my complaint exactly.  The game is all bottomless pits and if you mess up even slightly, you die.  It's really rather tedious.  Sonic Team / Dimps should challenge themselves to include no bottomless pits whatsoever in their next game.

 

Actually, bottomless pits were one of the main criticisms of Rush, and come Rush A they said they were aware of this and did away with them for the most part. But they were still there in really silly places. Take Plant Kingdom, with the giant trees that throw you. If you accidentally rush past one of the trees, you'll usually end up running into a pit. Or many of the games grind rails would be suspeneded over pits. They weren't there as obstacles, but if you happened not to play the game exactly as you were supposed to, BOOM you're dead.

 

The edges of the stages in both versions of SLW could do with short fences and invisible walls in many places, just to stop you falling off where the edge isn't design as an obstacle. Sky Sanctuary in Generations did that pretty well.

[MegasonicZX]

Same here, but since I died in every single cheap platforming bit in the game, I can totally see how I'd passed 99 if I did a no-death run.

 

I loathe the practice of using bottomless pits as the sole penalty for missing a jump in platforming games. Remember in Sonic 2? You just fell down to a lower path that might take you a little longer to reach the exit. Pit deaths were rare, and Sonic 3 had entire zones without a single bottomless pit unless you glitched out of the map.

 

Playing Sonic Lost World in the 3DS feels like playing an NES Castlevania when it comes to platforming. You either get it perfectly right or you die. There is no middle ground. I freely admit that Sonic Heroes wasn't much better, but hell I complained about it back then too. Darn tightrope marathons over level-spanning bottomless pits.

 

I had the same feeling getting to Sky Road as I did with getting to Egg Fleet in Heroes. "How is this sky-high level supposed to be different from every single level so far?"

Really? It was pretty easy not to die on here except in some locations and I ended up hitting 99 around the 4 stage or so without backtracking, you guys sure we're playing the same game here. Sure I will admit putting bottomless pits everywhere is kind of lazy in terms of design but if a majority of them aren't even that hard to avoid anyway then its not that big of an issue. Though I will agree with one thing that sky road itself is one of those "whats the point if I've already did it before type scenarios".

[Emmett L. Brown]

Really? It was pretty easy not to die on here except in some locations and I ended up hitting 99 around the 4 stage or so without backtracking, you guys sure we're playing the same game here. Sure I will admit putting bottomless pits everywhere is kind of lazy in terms of design but if a majority of them aren't even that hard to avoid anyway then its not that big of an issue. Though I will agree with one thing that sky road itself is one of those "whats the point if I've already did it before type scenarios".

No, I'm definitely sure we're playing the same game. I fear this is a user problem: There's a high probability that we're different people, which would explain a lot.

 

Actually, can I borrow your brain for the weekend? I'd much rather enjoy playing this game than get frustrated at it.

[MegasonicZX]

No, I'm definitely sure we're playing the same game. I fear this is a user problem: There's a high probability that we're different people, which would explain a lot.

 

Actually, can I borrow your brain for the weekend? I'd much rather enjoy playing this game than get frustrated at it.

Yeah, sorry if that sounded rude.

[Narukami07]

Oh come on. You know those things were largely overlooked by the reviewers, and the game would have been received much more favourably without the Werehog bogging it down. Yes those factors were detrimental to Unleashed, but even collectively they weren't as much of as issue as "the slow, boring fighting and puzzle gameplay based around a character with a stupid design and story, which takes up at least 50% of the game that's otherwise incredibly fast and fun".

 

I'm not saying it still wouldn't have been much better received unless those factors were removed, heck even i agree that Unleashed would have resonated more positively with most fans if not for that cheap GoW knock-off ruining the game's potential. Just that it still would have been pretty flawed (BUT VERY FUN!) with those factors put into it, whether reviewers mention it or not. 

 

I personally hated the Medal collecting as much as the Werehog by the way. 

 

I'd have been much happier with another boost game, or Sonic Rush 3 (if we can just pretend that Sonic Colors DS doesn't count, kthanks) or Colors 2, even. 

 

Just remove the boost mechanic itself and make enemies more threatening, then i'll be cool with it. As for another Rush game, i fear for what Dimps will actually do with it, because after Sonic 4 and the 3DS version of this game, they've pretty much squandered my trust once more.

[Autosaver]

The edges of the stages in both versions of SLW could do with short fences and invisible walls in many places, just to stop you falling off where the edge isn't design as an obstacle. Sky Sanctuary in Generations did that pretty well.

They probably could have expanded the gravity mechanic to make it so you don't fall off.

[JezMM]

For my personal experience, anybody saying they had 99 lives before half way through the game feels like a gross exaggeration, but it is easy to rack them up.

 

Regarding the pit deaths though, I actually found myself able to save myself from them with parkour and the much friendlier Colours-style double jump way more often than not.

 

 

Most of the bits that killed me were cheap enemy/object placement or specific portions of level gimmicks (such as the Drill Wisp water vortex in Tropical Coast or the rocket riding in Sky Road).

[MegasonicZX]

For my personal experience, anybody saying they had 99 lives before half way through the game feels like a gross exaggeration, but it is easy to rack them up.

 

Regarding the pit deaths though, I actually found myself able to save myself from them with parkour and the much friendlier Colours-style double jump way more often than not.

 

 

Most of the bits that killed me were cheap enemy/object placement or specific portions of level gimmicks (such as the Drill Wisp water vortex in Tropical Coast or the rocket riding in Sky Road).

Yeah, the parkour really saves you alot in this game if you happen to make a mistake, I can't tell you how many times I tried to sidestep while running up a wall and everytime I kept jumping off on silent forest act 3 since it wasn't used much up to that point so I had to get used to it but jumping back to it on the side normally saves me.

[Zaysho]

For my personal experience, anybody saying they had 99 lives before half way through the game feels like a gross exaggeration, but it is easy to rack them up.

 

I found it hard to rack up lives, personally. It doesn't really help that you no longer gain a life from collecting 100 rings. I could probably go to a handful of areas that have plenty of them lying around (Desert Ruins 2 or the hidden level on Sky Road), but I lost them just as quickly when I'd head back to levels giving me trouble.

 

So I just finished Lost World. Well, the main story anyway. I still have some Red Star Rings to collect and the Hidden World to explore, but it's effectively cleared.

 

Honestly, I liked it. It has its frustrating moments, but more often than not, I felt like I was playing a real platformer starring Sonic. The Boost trilogy was fun in their own ways, but they're of a completely different pedigree and designed around Sonic's core trait--speed. What Lost World does well, is slow him down and return a lot of that control to the player. It's more of a successor to the Adventure games (well, everything before Unleashed) in that regard. And the controls feel just fine. I've read some reviews that complained about them, but Sonic works perfectly for my taste. The controls do take some getting used to, particularly the Parkour moves, and the game doesn't do much to actually help you understand them (there's a lot of trial and error that lasts throughout the game, I feel), but for general platforming, attacking and running around, they feel great to me.

 

Of course, then there are the Wisps, which are such a mixed bag and typically just feel tacked on. The Wisps that require you to use the Gamepad, especially for movement, are particularly frustrating, as you're expected to have been holding the controller a certain way the whole time, otherwise they won't move the way they're supposed to. While I sort of got the hang of them, these controls, much like the Wisps, felt tacked on for the sake of making use of Gamepad's unique features. Asteroid and Bomb are especially annoying and difficult to use. And again, the game doesn't do much to help you understand what it is you're supposed to.

 

As for the level design, while I see some people complaining about things like cheap deaths and all that, it really isn't anything I haven't seen or dealt with before. I've been playing platformers since before I could read, cheap deaths are practically a staple of the genre and the industry has no intention of fixing that. For the most part I think the level design is solid, though sometimes between not knowing what to do and the designers occasionally throwing you a curveball, can result in said cheap deaths. Other times, I more than likely brought it on myself. I have a tendency to "pull back" on a jump, causing me to "just" miss a ledge and fall to my doom. Though the ratio between player error and the game's difficulty is pretty even. In just as many levels that I brought death onto myself, the game could be merciless in others. Lava Mountain 2 in particular requires a ton of finesse, and it's really easy to mistime a jump and go screaming into a bottomless pit or a cart carrying explosives. There's little room for recovery and it's made worse by the fact that the "bomb carts" are an instant death instead of just taking rings away.

 

And I've already ranted about how much I hate Frozen Factory 3 (or at least the lousy pinball tables), so I'll leave that alone.

 

But all that said, I think Sonic Lost World does a lot of things right. Going back to the controls and how Sonic handles, it gives me some hope that SEGA may actually try to reintroduce other playable characters in the future. This playstyle could lend itself very well to allowing characters like Knuckles and Tails (and others) to return to the spotlight. Sonic no longer feels like a car when he moves in a three-dimensional space, and this new found freedom in the controls should be mined for all its worth. This is definitely an engine I think SEGA could stand to revisit and improve upon. It's already pretty good, a little more tweaking could make it golden.

 

While the controls take some getting used to and the game is certainly harder than past games; I admit a lot of the difficulty is brought on by the constant feeling of "now what do I do?" and the need for much trial and error to make any progress, though. I think some times the difficulty can feel more in line with the classic Sonic's too though.

[JezMM]

I found it hard to rack up lives, personally. It doesn't really help that you no longer gain a life from collecting 100 rings. I could probably go to a handful of areas that have plenty of them lying around (Desert Ruins 2 or the hidden level on Sky Road), but I lost them just as quickly when I'd head back to levels giving me trouble.

 

Oh I uhh... was talking about the 3DS version.  And now I'm looking around confused because I'm sure I posted that in the 3DS thread.  I guess we were talking about the 3DS version exclusively for a little while there.

[Zaysho]

Oh I uhh... was talking about the 3DS version.  And now I'm looking around confused because I'm sure I posted that in the 3DS thread.  I guess we were talking about the 3DS version exclusively for a little while there.

 

Oh sorry... I wasn't really following the conversation very closely and I came to write up some more thoughts and just happened to see what you posted. I probably should've read the thread more closely.

[Jolt_TH]

Got to play lost World at Birmingham Bullring today, they have some Nintendo On Tour event going on, I'll be going back tomorrow to play a different level. But honestly after reading all these impressions and reviews I was a bit scared to play the game (even though I have a copy but no Wii u) but honestly after actually getting to play it...I really loved it! Sonic didn't feel too fast or too slow, I liked how he handled and I liked the parkour, took about 30 seconds to get used to the homing attack/kick buttons but all in all i really enjoyed it, the lady on hand was really good at explaining the controls to others ( there were a few kids who had a go before me) and she said I was the fastest run she had seen all day (given this was at like 1pm so hardly much of the day had gone.

Also got to play the 3DS version, and again I really enjoyed it, still not sure how to do a spindash on that version (probably my fault I didn't want to do the tutorial level) but again I found it really enjoyable to play and had a lot of fun, didn't find the asteroid wisp to be too bad at all but it was only a small quite linear bit.

Seems like I'm in the minority who likes both versions of the game xD (well so far anyway)

[JezMM]

Seems like I'm in the minority who likes both versions of the game xD (well so far anyway)

 

Key words.  Pretty much everyone's first impressions of either version are positives, but the further through you get, that's likely to dwindle (due to increasing difficulty and a punishing lives system on Wii U, and unorthodox level design choices on 3DS).

 

How much so varies from player to player though.

Edited November 9, 2013 by JezMM

[MegaMan_EXE]

I'm in the middle when it comes to Lost World. I love that SEGA and Sonic Team went with a new idea, and while I do like the park-our action, the level design is a bit flimsy and loose, and the game does have its bullshit moments (God damn snowball...). Getting the Red Rings is a pain in the ass, but I also love the exploration factor, since I felt Colors and to an extent, Generations, needed that. The story, while sub-par (who are the Zeti and where did they come from and why are Amy and Knuckles there if they do didley), has excellent writing. I love the characterization of Eggman, and it establishes that he needs Cubot and Orbot. I actually do get a kick out of the Zeti, despite them being generic, with my favorites being Zeena and Zor. The soundtrack is outstanding, with Sky Road Act 1 being my favorite Sonic song in a long time. My major complaints are the lack of help and conveyance, and the odd structure of the level design, but apart from that, I'd say Lost World is a decent game, and I hope that this gameplay style gets improved later down the road. 

NOTE: I've only played the Wii U version, so I have no clue how the 3DS version fairs. I'll get to that during Christmas. 

Edited November 9, 2013 by Hub Hikari

[NiGHTS]

Im getting kind of sad because I feel like im in the minority that would give this game like 8 or even 9 out of 10.

I just feel like its so much fun to play to me. Colors felt WAYYY too linear and got boring pretty fast. Generations helped a bit but

I still felt like I was being pushed forward way too often.

Im gonna be making a video review later but on another subject...

If your frustrated about lives, you can rack up 99 lives pretty easily if you just go to the honeycomb level (desert ruins act 2)

and right before the boss when your running there is a section where you go through a honeycomb hole and there is like 5 lives.

Just keep collecting these lives then purposely dying over and over and you will have 99 lives in a matter of minutes.

 

I think its up there for me in terms of... im going to remember this game for a long time and many years down the road. Unleashed- Generations. They all felt so..."the same" Just straight line boost. Luckily Generations had Classic Sonic, and bringing back the history of Sonic to pull me in to like it. I don't think I can handle another game like that.

Sadly this game DOES have its share of problems just like any other Sonic game. Luckily, it has more pros then cons for me.

[Tails spin]

Finished Tropical Coast Zone 1 and tried Tropical Coast Zone 2. So I will continue where I left off after Desert Ruins 2

 

Desert Ruins 3:

I HATE, HATE this level. If I was alone in the room I would have been cursing more than a sailor. The beginning portion and ending portion was fun and interesting to play with. But those f***ing Sandworms. I hated them in Desert Ruins 1 but tolerated them since some I could skip. But that middle portion where I had to fight 3 of them before moving on totally killed this level for me. No matter how many times I would attack them the darn buggers would die. It wasn't until I spindash them like 10 times each before I could move on. This level is going to be a pain to S rank and collect red rings.

 

Desert Ruins Boss:

Zomomon ( I think that's how its spelled) was a very entertaining and slightly more challenging fight. I love his quip of saying " Your the worst meal ever!". I also liked the use of the asteroid wisp here. By using it I was able to S rank the stage. Overall I really enjoyed this fight like I did with Zazz.

 

Tropical Coast Zone 1:

I love the music here. A pretty entertaining level overall. The big underwater monster here wasn't as annoying as Desert Ruins Sandworm and was fun to destroy. The drill wisp has some very interesting usage here that I like. There was also a portion where there was a grind rails near two walls that reminded me of Water palace in Generations 3DS. I saw this level borrowed some of Windy Hill Zone 3's upside down level design portions and I liked it to be honest.

 

Tropical Coast Zone 2:

I played a little of this level before quitting for the night. First impressions is that I like it. The little apple puzzle thing is fun.

[Mando-Whirl-Wind]

so of what value are the RC's in the wii-u version? can they be an aid or just a hinderence? or should they have done tails instead?

[Captain Fun]

so of what value are the RC's in the wii-u version? can they be an aid or just a hinderence? or should they have done tails instead?

The RCs are kinda handy for some levels but they seem REALLY sluggish and overall not that useful. I was hoping for something like Co-star mode from Mario Galaxy. A lot of the time they're just kinda distracting.

 

EDIT: Speaking of RCs, what exactly does the Omochao one do? 

Edited November 12, 2013 by Captain Fun

[Jolt_TH]

I'm not sure, the way the preorder DLC spoke about the shopto one was that it sounded like it could collect rings for you, not sure how though

[Doctor MK]

I'm not sure, the way the preorder DLC spoke about the shopto one was that it sounded like it could collect rings for you, not sure how though

 

The Omochao RCs can collect rings, yeah. Player 2 can press the action button which brings up a crosshairs, aim it over some rings at Omochao goes to get them for Sonic.

 

To be honest they're pretty useless and just get in the way, though thankfully they don't talk so all is well.

[- Eternal Paradox -]

Woo I wrote a fan first impressions review. Woo.

 

FINAL CONCLUSION:

Fun Factor: 3/5

Gameplay: 3/5

Graphics: 3/5

Sound: 5/5

Story: 3/5

Replayability: 2/5

Sonic Lost World is a fun game, but that sadly one that comes with a fair share of flaws. But grin and bear it, it’s worth putting up with for the roller-coaster ride you’ll enjoy playing most of the time.
 

Final Score: 63.3 %

 

If you'd like to read the whole thing you can catch it over here: http://twongamereviews.blogspot.co.uk/2013/11/sonic-lost-world-first-impressions.html

Edited November 12, 2013 by -Paradox-