Jump to content
Awoo.

How does the Sonic fanbase feel about Sonic Heroes?


8ther

Recommended Posts

I meant Heroes, because of the way how the game is structured. I cited Knuckles because he's extremely slow to play as for a full level, and the majority of players would stick to the Speed character for that reason.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I mainly stick to speed to get though the longer parts until I encounter enemies blocking my path, in which case I stick to Knuckles unless there's a clear reason I need to use the flight character.

 

It's not really possible to stick to the power character throughout the level anyway since there are specific sections that require the use of the other two teammates.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Sonic Heroes is one those games I've always liked (not loved), which is about how I feel about Sonic Unleashed (I liked Unleashed a little more)

For me the game goes like this:

Pros:

  • Good levels (Seaside Hill, Ocean Palace, Grand Metropolis, Bullet Station, Frog Forest, Hang Castle, Egg Fleet)
  • Great Soundtrack
  • Good Gameplay (For the most part)
  • Interesting "Team" gimmick
  • Return of Metal Sonic 
  • Good voice cast (outside of Tails)
  • CG cutscenes

Cons:

  • Bad levels (the Casino stages, Rail Canyon, Lost Jungle)
  • Slippery controls (Admittedly still better than Shadow and Sonic 06)
  • The Bosses (none of them are what I would call "fun")
  • The Special Stages
  • In-game cutscenes (introduced the "plastic" graphics)
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I'm physically unable to hate it due to nostalgia, but it is a pretty crappy game, with a bad story and horrible gameplay. Pretty much sums it up.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Heroes was the last good game before the nose dive of Shadow's game and the cratering of Sonic06. However, compared to the high quality Sonic games before it, it is mediocre. The team gameplay over-complicates the signature simplicity of Sonic gameplay, the controls are slippery, and the character models are terrible.

Edited by Darth InVaders
Link to comment
Share on other sites

The last thing I would call Heroes' gameplay design is overcomplicated. Press either buttons 1, 2, or 3 for X, Y, or Z obstacle. If you can understand how Pokemon starters work against each other, then you've already mastered Heroes. Heck, I would think Unleashed was more complicated considering how many different systems of prompts you had to work with.

Edited by Necropenthe
  • Thumbs Up 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

The last thing I would call Heroes' gameplay design is overcomplicated. Press either buttons 1, 2, or 3 for X, Y, or Z obstacle. If you can understand how Pokemon starters work against each other, then you've already mastered Heroes. Heck, I would think Unleashed was more complicated considering how many different systems of prompts you had to work with.

There are 4 used buttons (jump, action, 2 character switches - not counting camera and rarely used Team Blast buttons) which is further complicated by the character switching buttons changing depending on which character is active. Compare this to the classics which only used 1 button, and the Adventures which technically only used 2 (not counting the shoulder triggers that control the camera). I feel Unleashed is also overly complicated too, but those character switching buttons that keep changing are just worse. Edited by Darth InVaders
Link to comment
Share on other sites

The last thing I would call Heroes' gameplay design is overcomplicated. Press either buttons 1, 2, or 3 for X, Y, or Z obstacle. If you can understand how Pokemon starters work against each other, then you've already mastered Heroes. Heck, I would think Unleashed was more complicated considering how many different systems of prompts you had to work with.

Well Unleashed is a genre shift from blazing fast platformer to beat'em up, warranting a complete change in the way you play.

 

Still pretty telling how people can understand how Pokemon works, yet do anything more than run, jump, and maybe attack in a Sonic game and it's somehow overcomplicated for the series.

Edited by CreepySpiritSonic
Link to comment
Share on other sites

The last thing I would call Heroes' gameplay design is overcomplicated. Press either buttons 1, 2, or 3 for X, Y, or Z obstacle. If you can understand how Pokemon starters work against each other, then you've already mastered Heroes. Heck, I would think Unleashed was more complicated considering how many different systems of prompts you had to work with.

Heroes tends to do a rather atrocious job actually explaining how it's systems work, though. You find an enemy that you can't defeat as Sonic, and "let's let Knuckles handle this." Except the handful of times that Sonic or Tails can handle it fine, which throws you off when the game goes back to kicking you in the ass for doing it.

Plus lots of Heroes level design essentially boiled down to quicktime events in spirit if not outright in practice.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

To be honest, the last time I played Heroes was in 2004. What I remember about the enemies is that Sonic and Tails could handle the smaller scale ones just fine, especially when leveled up, but when it came to those hulking big guys that blocked exits and the bird gundams, Knuckles was needed. So it was sorta kinda consistent? I'unno.

 

Regardless, I still wouldn't call the game "complicated," even for a Sonic game (granted, I don't think Sonic games "need" one or two button allotments anyway). A hot mess in the design department? Sure. But then again so is CD and that's simple! xP

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I, myself, have fairly fond memories of Sonic Heroes. However, I recognize that most, if not all, of those memories are based on a case of nostalgia blindness.

 

Sonic heroes was one of the first games I ever owned with my gamecube at age 9. I remember having lots of fun, especially whenever I played with Team Chaotix. Looking at it today, though, I see that it was a mediocre game at best: The voice acting is sub-par, level design is very gimmicky and above all linear, and the story... well, stories* are pretty childish and uninspired, even for a simple Sonic game. The game really falls apart when you compare to a game like Sonic Adventure 2, which excels in all those categories, in my humble opinion. To be frank, the only think that I enjoy to this day about Sonic Heroes is it's soundtrack. (However, if I hear one more remix of Seaside hill I think I am going to be Seasick, for goodness sakes!)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Like a lot of us here, I feel somewhat nostalgic when I think about Sonic Heroes. Though I would never go back and play the game now, there are a few things about it I liked (and still do). Oh course, I was also one of the unfortunate suckers who had the PlayStation 2 copy of the game, so that didn't help matters at all.

 

I remember back when I bought the game, I was still on a high of sorts from playing Sonic Adventure 2, so I was really happy to see Rouge's return as well as Shadow. This led me to start playing the game with Team Dark first, which was not the brightest idea on my part. None the less, I stuck with it until the story was over despite how painful it was. I was pretty frustrated when I couldn't get any of the Chaos Emeralds from the Special Stages but I didn't feel so bad when I discovered it was due to a shitty port. The graphic glitches got on my nerves too. The story was meh. I really disliked that all the teams shared the same levels and bosses. The whole team mechanic thing had great potential but it could have been executed better.

 

What I did like about the game was this: music (mostly), return of the Chaotix, Shadow's return (despite how rushed it seemed), Neo Metal Sonic, voice acting (mostly), and the CG cutscenes. That's... about it actually.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Personally Sonic Heroes had an interesting idea but didn't had a good execution regarding controlling 3 characters at once, sort of like Chaotix with the banding however it is easier to control than that game even though the last time I played Sonic Heroes was 2004 so this is going by memory (never managed to complete it fully but did do Team Sonic and Rose until the end with a bit of Dark and Chaotix).

 

Anyway the game actually put me off from Sonic games for a while and put me off of the 3D games until Sonic Unleashed/Colours/Generations due to that it was buggy from falling off the floor to failing homing attack (the homing attack during that time is iffy) to buttons weren't responding in time to the special stage and didn't feel pleasant to play especially playing the game 4 times to complete it with only 2 really different types. Thinking about it Team Sonic was Normal difficulty, Team Rose was Easy, Team Dark was Hard and Team Chaotix was a Mission mode that had to do tasks to clear a stage.

 

There are some positives to the game; the actual stages (not the level design but more of a trope) were a bit different than the other Sonic games and the ones that used the tried and trusted (Seaside Hill, Grand Metropolis) were actually a joy to look at due to bright graphic design that was used in the game. Seaside Hill had a cartoony Green Hill look, Ocean Palace had more of a structure look, Bingo Highway actually tried to impliment the rules of bingo into a stage, the Hang Castle/Mansion stage felt like Luigi's Mansion mixed with the Toyland Stage from Castle of Illusion and Frog Forest was more like a zoomed in forest with hints of Mushroom Hill and Froggy frogs. The instrumental music were okay even if after hearing it on a soundtrack rip prefered the upbeat Beta Casino Park song compared to the more Merry Go Round Broke Down feeling of the final. The voice actors again were okay and actually learnt the lessons from the previous games (Sonic Adventure 1 having bad lip sync and not the best in terms of emotions, Sonic Adventure 2 having a rushed delivery) so it felt more natural.

 

Sadly there are a bunch of negatives. Already mentioned the buggy state of the game (played the Gamecube version, considered the best imagine that the PS2/Xbox/PC versions are worse) so while there are bugs in every game, it doesn't feel safe. Not as bad as some games that are out there where they feel like late alphas/betas though. While I did praise the voice acting, the same can't be said for the storyline or the dialogue in the game. The lines that were said are pretty cheesy (not completely a bad thing but it does sound embarrassing in this game) and the storyline felt a bit under-developed. It is true that a game can have no storyline or a very basic one but here they tried to have one and wasn't sure how to handle it. From memory, the Chaotix storyline started off strong compared to the others (Sonic it was a letter from Eggman, can't remember Team Rose or Dark) but when it got later into the game in general it felt rushed and not explaining points or just suddenly out of nowhere. Speaking of which, the vocal songs aren't to my cup of tea with We Can sounding like a bad Grease song, This Machine was okay.

 

As for the level design, there had quite a fair bit of bottomless pits and a few of the stages felt a bit samey in terms of having a Tails/Rouge/Cream/Charmy only jump due to being too high for the others to jump, a loop that didn't feel much in control even though they had gimmicks to try to make them different. There also doesn't seem to be as much enemy variety in the game mainly with Egg Pawns and variations of them (they started with this game, later games reintroduced the animal badniks to give some more variety than just Egg Pawns) with only the Cameron turtles, the Rhino (like Sonic 3), the Klagen and another robot keeping them from being repetitive. Graphically the models of Sonic and Knuckles look a bit funny, there aren't badly modeled it is due to the design that Sonic Team used especially with the Nike ticks of their mouths and the character models are shiny which is a shame since the stages looked quite good.

 

One day I will give the Xbox version a try (it came with the system and easier to check than the GC version in storage) to see if it changes the opinion from years ago, whether it is better than the time or even worse than my memory where I see it as a decline of the Sonic games (SA2 had signs of a decline while Shadow and 06 was a personal no-go). Strange since if Sonic Heroes was polished and not as repetitive, it would have been more enjoyable to play and seemed really promising before release.

 

In general in terms of the fanbase, it really depends since for some people Sonic Heroes was their first Sonic game so they would have pleasant memories even with the PS2 version. Overall it is an okay game, not being the best but not being the worst in the Sonic series.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

To me Sonic Heroes is on the same level as Shadow the Hedgehog as far as my desire to replay it goes. And by this i mean that if i have a clear save file, i'll make a single run through a story mode, maybe play the Final Story afterwards but then i'll leave it for a long time afterwards.

 

For the absoulte longest time, i refused to play Heroes if it meant that i had to go collecting Chaos Emeralds again, i seemed to have remembered the special stages being retardedly hard for some reason but i went back and played it not long ago and discovered the only hard thing about them was getting into them in the first place.Granted they still aren't special stages i like very much but they aren't as hard as i remember them being when i first played them.

 

Other then that? Team Heroes, Team Dark and Final Story were fair game but Team Rose and ESPECIALLY Team Chaotix were no-gos for me, it'd take a special kind of bordem to make me play either of those two again.

 

On the other hand it'd take quite a large sum of cash to make me play through all of Shadow the Hedgehog again, especially if it contains any mention of computer rooms.

Edited by Rayl
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Decent/Mediocre.

 

I play Sonic Heroes every now and then, but I honestly nowadays I can't play through one team story all the way because of how boring the game will get. Looking back on the game now, it was tiring having to play through all the stages all over again, but with a different team. Yeah, the lengths of the stages varies for different teams, but still it was quite annoying since it was the same gameplay style in the end. I'm also not really a fan of the enemies having health bars in the game. I'm more use to quickly taking out the enemies and continuing on with the levels, but when so many enemies come out, and none of my characters are maxed out with the orbs, it can really take awhile to take enemies out, unless I'm switching to the power character, but sometimes I just like to try and take enemies out with the speed character (or flying character, but only if their orbs are maxed out.) I did at least enjoy the last story, but that mostly since I was fighting Metal Sonic and listening to his lines that I really enjoyed. 

 

I will admit that I really like how Heroes tried to be just like the Genesis games, heck, it even had special stages. I originally owned the gamecube version of Heroes, so I really didn't have any problems collecting the chaos emeralds, but goodness gracious when I ended up getting the PS2 version from my cousins to add to my Sonic collection... Talk about terrible. Anyways, levels looked quite good, with my favorites being Seaside Hill, Grand Metropolis, and Egg Fleet. The music in these stages are fantastic, but I overall enjoyed Heroes soundtrack. My favorite piece of music ended up being the final boss music when facing against Metal Sonic. 

 

In the end, again, the game is just decent/mediocre. Right there in the middle for me. I wouldn't place it higher than the the classic Genesis trilogy, Adventure games, Colors, or Generations, but I certainly wouldn't place it lower than Shadow, 06, or any of the Storybook games. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I've never played sonic heroes but always wanted to. Can anybody recommend this game to me?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Never played it, but probably will soon.

 

It's a very mixed game among the majority of the fanbase, the team-based gimmick seems to get a lot of praise, but I've seen a lot of people criticize the control, finding it to be very slippery. 

 

In shorter words, I think the majority of the fanbase liked the premise, but thought the execution could have been handled better.

The fanbase either loved the gimmick for the characters especially or hated it. The controls are universally hated.

I've never played sonic heroes but always wanted to. Can anybody recommend this game to me?

Nah. Not missing much. Unless the closest attempt to recapture the feeling of the classic games yet on 3D games, pre-Sonic 4, appeals to you. It is colorful, but the story's weak and controls, sloppy...  But Metal Sonic is relevant for once. It's a decent twist. 

Edited by Sky Hedgehogian Maestro
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I've never played sonic heroes but always wanted to. Can anybody recommend this game to me?

 

If you can handle the weird controls, the corny script, some annoying VAs and the uninspired story (at least compared to the Sonic Adventure series) I guess you could give it a go. Some of the stages can be really fun to play and it can be quite challenging, too. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 3 weeks later...

Sonic Heroes is my favourite 3D Sonic Game. I just have alot of great memories with that game.

Edited by SuperSonic2015
  • Thumbs Up 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I enjoyed it a lot more than a lot of people here, that's for sure.

 

I'd say that Sonic Unleashed is my favourite 3D Sonic game (yeah, I said it). I thought that Sonic Lost World would be, but it kinda fell short and is hard as golf balls sometimes. Sonic Unleashed just oozes with passion from the team and it really shows, and blasting though stages occasionally is still fun. The Werehog is not that bad either. Sure the level design could've been a lot better but fighting enemies can be pretty fun if you know what you're doing. Having a massive list of moves (in the HD version at least) also helps and you can chain some pretty sweet combos...but it's not The Wonderful 101 either.

Edited by KrazyBean
  • Thumbs Up 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Heroes was one of my first Sonic games, and holds a very special place in my heart because of that.

Edited by Wil348
Link to comment
Share on other sites

What's with all the sonic heroes topics lately? Did this game suddenly get popular or something?

 

But yeah, it's not may fave but it's ok, like i've said before, not having a saturn, dreamcast or gamecube, it was the first Sonic game iu got to play since the megadrive so it hasa special place in my heart.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I had to get Heroes when I was younger. Cried in the store until I got it, and I loved it quite a lot, but as I got older the game became...ok/decent. I still play it every now and then, but it certainly wouldn't hold the title of "favorite 3D Sonic game" for me. My favorite 3D Sonic game would have to be Sonic Generations, with Lost World and Colors right behind it. 

  • Thumbs Up 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

This was my second 3D Sonic game (the first was Sonic Adventure DX demo). I saw a commercial for this game when I watched then new, "Sonic X". I wanted it so badly. The first game I got for the "SONY PLAYSTATION 2" is "Sonic Heroes" (I rented it on my Uncle's "XBOX (original)". I loved it. Amazing graphics, some slippery controls, amazing music, and now funny voice acting. People compain about "Sonic Heroes" story, but I love it. Metal Sonic HAS to hide himself from the main characters due to his evil plan to copy their moves and use it against them.

Edited by baba
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
×
×
  • Create New...

Important Information

You must read and accept our Terms of Use and Privacy Policy to continue using this website. We have placed cookies on your device to help make this website better. You can adjust your cookie settings, otherwise we'll assume you're okay to continue.