Sonic Games That You Enjoy... Despite Their Flaws.

[Briraka]

Have you ever played a Sonic game where you know that the game you're playing isn't exactly the best put together, but you can't help but enjoy it for some odd reason? Well, here's a topic where you can express your fondness for these not so great games that you can't help but enjoy. and so that me and me mates can hunt you down when you pick unleashed

 

"Well, Mister Opening Poster, what flawed Sonic title do you like?"

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=etYxWVun34Q

 

 

Sonic Lost World!

 

Mmhmm... the blue pincushion's latest entry leaves a lot to be desired. Clunky controls, a poorly explained parkour system, and the plot's climax is a bit unsatisfying. However, I can look past these issues and have a good time with this one.

 

First off: the story! I really, really enjoyed it. Sonic is actually affected emotionally by what his actions caused in this game's plot, unlike in previous entries where he kinda just brushed off whatever consequences came from his mistakes. "Eggman split the world apart because I just stood there being cocky and now I'm a werewolf? Ah well, I'm too pure hearted to let these silly things get to me!"

 

I also found the Deadly Six to be refreshing compared to the other Monsters of the Week. They have distinct personalities, unlike the other MotW, who were all the same "I'm going to destroy everything because I am a big dumb ancient monster!" or "I really like the colour black..." Sure, the D6 are stereotypes, but they were done alright and they bounced and worked off from Sonic's personality quite well. They were killed off unceremoniously, but uh... hey, the Sorceress in Spyro 3 got the same treatment, but that doesn't mean I didn't enjoy the rest of that fantastic game.

 

The gameplay itself has a few issues. Turning makes Sonic slow down for some reason, it's kind of jarring being able to go from zero to thirty when pressing the run button, and the jumping is really stiff. But I was able to get the hang of it eventually, even the gimmick stages where they would throw a new control scheme at you. I hope that Sonic Team can learn from this and deliver a more focused game with the 3D parkour segments.

 

Then the graphics. I remember Lost World's stylized visuals were criticized for being "too Mario". I can get this from the Worlds being similar to a New SMB game (grass-desert-beach-snow-forest-sky-lava), but each World had different settings for each of the zones and there was usually something to make them different from the usual generic settings. Aside from Desert Ruins there was the windmills in Windy Hill, the giant fruit in Tropical Coast, the machinery and casinos in Frozen Factory, the construction and temples in Silent Forest, the robotic dragons in Sky Road, and Eggman's Metropolis Zone castle in Lava Mountain.

 

I've always liked games with a more stylized approach with their graphics, so I wouldn't be too displeased if the Sonic 1/CD esque graphical style of Lost World came back for the next game.

 

EDIT: OH SHIT I FORGOT THE SOUNDTRACK! DON'T TAKE IT THE WRONG WAY, IT'S NOT A FORGETTABLE SOUNDTRACK!

 

... It's pretty good stuff. Each stage's song fits the area it's in, the Deadly Six's theme gets more and more dramatic as the story progresses, and it gave us the best Eggman final boss theme since Sonic 3 & Knuckles:

[Hero of Legend]

Sonic Unleashed Wii.

 

Shocked at how much I like it despite it being world-known as the inferior version (though I tried the 360 demo and didn't like it).

 

It's not that polished, look at the water in the 2D section of Adabat Day, it flickers, yeesh. And it's kinda ugly and washed out.

 

But damn I had fun pretty much the whole way through, even the Werehog sections were fun and I used the Wiimote!

 

Music was great at times, overall I liked the music more than Colors'.

 

What's a shame is that even though it used the Zero Gravity engine and was by the same team (make no mistake, Dimps only had Day design assistance, but O-Two and Xeen worked on it as they did with ZG), and yet ZG is much more polished and prettier (ZG is in flawless 60fps and even does look better in someways in raw graphics to boot).

 

They should've just built the Wii version keeping it as close to ZG as possible, granted the Werehog sections are larger in scale, but still, dat 60fps. The Day stages to me are compatible to ZG when you think about it.

 

Overall? Zero Gravity is my fav Sonic game last gen, THERE I SAID IT! And I played all but Secret Rings on Wii! Note as I said I played the Unleashed 360 demo and tried out Gens a little on PS3 and 360, wasn't impressed either, hated how the screen blurred when you moved... and I'm not in the camp who likes blasting like a rocket. Unleashed Wii did it brilliantly with the Mini Boosts so you had to strategize, that was really slick, likely was a Dimps idea I would think.

[Shaddy Zaphod]

Okay, for one thing you're completely wrong about Lost World and it's a fantastic game, but to answer your question...

Mundane gameplay, a story that's beyond drawn out, and the most guard robots to fight for no reason in any video game ever made. I love this game so much. Being able to have Shadow the hedgehog beat the stupid out of Amy Rose just fills me with glee! I feel positively giddy playing this game, customizing the crap out of Emerl to make the most powerful murdering machine in the world. It feels fantastic.

[-Mark-]

Can I be cheeky and say "Most of them from 1998-2011"?

 

Seriously though, not wanting to rant on it again, Lost World is pretty much the first time I haven't enjoyed a Sonic game, at least on my first playthrough. Hell, Secret Rings and Riders are two fairly widely-lambasted games, yet are two of my most fondly remembered. I even have a huge squishy soft spot for Sonic R.

 

Admittedly, in some cases I can't really enjoy them any more going back to them (most of the games from 2003-2005 falling into this category), but there have been very few Sonic games I haven't got genuine enjoyment out of, even if said enjoyment doesn't always stand the test of time.

[DC111]

Sonic and the Black Knight. Not just for how well written it was, but I actually genuinely enjoyed the gameplay itself. The sword fighting was addicting to me, I dunno. There's something satisfying about making combos into the 50-somethings, and the sound of the sword's impact getting higher and higher in pitch the more attacks you strung together. Plus I loved the setting, thought it was perfect, even if not as flashy and varied as its predecessor. 

 

I also really like the in-level dialogue, for some reason. Makes it feel like the level you're playing is actually significant to the sequence of events in the story, not just a 'point A to point B because it's a video game' kinda thing. This is also true of Secret Rings, Heroes, and probably some other games I'm forgetting about. I know some folks find it annoying but I like listening to characters talk.

[E-122-Psi]

Sonic Adventure 1 is practically a half finished game, the engine is glitchy, the cutscenes are practically placeholder quality and many of the levels seem half complete. All in all however I actually found the experience very fun. Gamma's story in particular seeps of potential and is a lot of fun to roam around in despite how absurdly short and easy it is. I especially adore using my Action Replay to seep out new potential that might have been put into the game properly developed.

[Salamander]

I know a lot of folks hated Sonic Advance 3 and aren't much keen on Sonic Rush Adventure either.  But I really liked the way Sonic Advance 3 tried to have a flexible team-based mechanic where you can play as any pair of five different characters, and how it bucked many of the trends for level tropes in the series (the first zone isn't a grassland, the last isn't a techno paradise).  For Sonic Rush Adventure, while in retrospect it probably takes too long to get to the normal gameplay, the slow-moving boats weren't a wonderful addition, and the one hundred missions are incredibly repetitive and unrewarding, then on the plus side it also had plenty of unusual level ideas, world map exploration would've been perfect if it had stayed with the jetski but reskinned it to be Sonic running across land, and it actually tried to have a plot with events and characterisation.  I don't think any of the subsequent handheld games have been as conceptually bold, or as well-executed, or as original.

[Indigo Rush]

 

 

Meow meow-meow meow murrr mew mew mowwww. Merr meow murrr mew-mew nyaaarrrrooowwwww meow meow mew-meow.

 

Mew meow nya? Myaw! Meow mew mew meow mrow merrrr. Mrow mrow mrow. Mew meow mewo... 

 

Meow mewo meeeeooooow. Nya nya nyow. 

 

...meow murrr-mow. Ma.... myow. Meow mew-nya-mew meow mrow merrrr. Mrow mrow mrow. Mew meow mewo meow meyaaaawwww nyar.

 

Hiss.

 

 

 

ftch ftch

 

 

*purrrr*

 

I do thoroughly disdain the fact that it's called "Sonic 4," but truth be told I actually rather like it for what it is.  Physics issues and all. Episode 2 fixed a lot of that, actually. Same with the plasticy visuals.

 

See, I like the pacing in this. It isn't what I'd call "classic," but it focuses more on 'pressing the right button at the right time' to keep the flow going, and I think that can be fun in the right context.  It's just addicting, I guess. Sonic 4 is by no means a "great" game.

 

I guess, to me, it's just a guilty pleasure. When I stop playing it as if it were a classic game, I have more fun with it.

 

(And yeah the music is really annoying.)

[MamboCat]

I don't mind Sonic 4 Episode 2. It plays much better than the first Episode and it has its moments such as the Metal Sonic fight on the rollercoaster tracks!

 

That being said, I hate how it's cynically regurgitates Sonic 2 and yet calls itself Sonic 4. Sonic 3 and Knuckles didn't do that; it had it's own ideas, level tropes, bosses etc. And with Sonic Generations being released at a similar time, why did they feel the need to appeal to nostalgia so much?

 

I also love Unleashed and I know it's a bit of a Marmite game. Sure, the werehog levels annoy me a bit and the fighting theme is far too prominent when they could have used the nice Night themes instead... but it's well constructed and has some very nice ideas. I just wish they could have built on that in the following games.

[JezMM]

It'd be faster to name the Sonic games I enjoy NOT despite their flaws lol, which would consist of Sonic 3 & Knuckles and... uhh... yeah.

 

 

Sonic 2 8-bit is seen as overly hard by many, but it being my first Sonic game meant I trained hard at it.  However a major flaw would be how guide-dang-it the emerald locations are on some zones, a design choice I never defend and kept me from 100% completion for the entire duration of my childhood.

 

 

Sonic Adventure 2 has more alternative gameplay than regular Sonic gameplay, but I still like all of it, especially in retrospect because through playing so much I now know what the hell the emerald clues are going on about in the hunting gameplay.

 

 

Shadow the Hedgehog I still enjoy enough.  There's plenty of really fun platforming-heavy levels to distract from awful ones like The Doom and Lost Impact, and I've pretty much pinned down a fun route to play through every level/ending when I play that allows me to avoid quite a few tedious missions.

 

 

Sonic Unleashed of course, I utterly adore, but I understand many of the criticisms against it.  I don't agree with them and think not enough people give the game a second chance, but there are some flaws I definitely agree with, namely just how many vital elements are left for the player to figure out but increase the enjoyability of the game immensely once known (i.e. that there's a giant medal paywall near the end, that you can quickly level up the Werehog for efficiency by focusing on Strength and Combat, that you can hold down B to grab stuff, that you don't need to boost all the time etc).

 

I also enjoy the Wii version enough to play it through about half as often as I do Unleashed.  It's lesser in every way for me, but, especially since unlocking all the secret Day Acts and shifting the ratio of Day to Night a bit better, I can still enjoy it in the same way I can enjoy regular ice cream despite knowing real gelato is better, etc.

 

 

Guess those are the big ones that I really really like, but just to give some mention to lesser games:

 

Sonic Adventure still has some good gameplay and level designs even though it's aged horrifically

 

I enjoy Sonic's gameplay in Sonic 2006 and occasionally replay all of his levels from the stage select, as well as Egg Genesis coz that's a fun boss.

 

Sonic Advance 2 and the DS games are pretty damn fun despite fairly unmemorable level designs and focus on speed over platforming and physics.

 

And finally after S3&K which I have next to no criticism for (honestly, I only prefer Sonic 2 8-bit, Adventure 2 and Unleashed for nostalgia and other aesthetic/personal reasons I think) Sonic 1 is my second fave classic 16-bit era platformer despite the awkward early years differences and slow stages.

 

 

 

EDIT: Oh, almost forgot, I like Sonic 4!  I feel they should have had a modern soundtrack to match the modern visuals and the bosses are a bit ehhhh for a number of reasons but the stage designs are fun enough.  A good Sonic platformer with varied ideas and gimmicks, just not necessarily a good classic Sonic platformer... at all.

[StaticMania]

I enjoy Sonic Heroes a good amount despite its glaring flaws...

 

Nothing in the game is all that bad to me. The only things truly annoying to me are the forced 4 playthroughs and the Special stages.

 

Disregarding those, I think the game is great. It has great music, it has decent control, decent level design. All of those are enough to make this game enjoyable to me at least. On my top 5 Sonic games, I think it deserves its place in 3rd.

 

...and Sonic Adventure too.

 

That game has not aged well, but I still like it.

 

The game does enough right to where I can over look the things that it did wrong. Sonic, Tails, Knuckles, Amy, and Gamma's game-play are all fine. Even in this "Aged" game, they're still enjoyable to even someone who had played the game in a much more recent time than most others.

[MamboCat]

Oh yeah, I forgot Sonic Heroes! XD Yeah I kinda like that game; it was nice to see Sonic on other platforms and it's cool to play as teams... although the Chaotix missions can fuck right off. So annoying!

[Dizcrybe]

Despite the latter half of the game being mostly crap, I still get enjoyment out of Lost World.

 

And even though the game is buggy and only four of the six characters are fun to decent, Sonic Adventure is still a fun game to play. As long as it's not Big. Gamma is eh.

[Indigo Rush]

*sigh*

 

I also have another confession.

 

 

It's true.  From what I demo'd and played at a gaming get-together at college, I... still kinda had fun with this. Despite my frustrations.

 

I... hm.

 

How can I put this...

 

 

SSMB, do you trust me?

 

 

 

I can show you Lost World

 

Bright and colorful, splendid

 

 

Tell me fanbase, now when did you last let the art decide

 

I can broaden your mind

 

Take you color by color

 

 

Eagle, Rhythm and Asteroid

 

Through a highway in the sky

 

 

Sonic Lost Wo-orld

 

A new fantastic way to play

 

 

Parkour to climb up walls

 

Or run through halls

 

 

More deep than merely boosting

 

Sonic Lost Wo-orld

 

A wondrous game I never tried

 

 

But when I parkour here

 

It's really clear

 

 

-that- wait, I slipped and died...

    (That was your fault don't you li-ie!)

 

Unbelievable style

 

 

Indescribable power-ups

 

 

Lasers, Drilling and Rockets

 

Through a pastel-colored sky...

 

 

Sonic Lost Wo-orld

   (On Nintendo consoles only...)

 

 

It's on the 3DS as well

  (The Wii U version is better...)

 

 

I'm like a spinning ball

 

Right up the walls

 

 

I can't go back to when I used to bo-ost

 

 

Sonic Lost Wo-orld

  (Every Zone a surprise...)

 

 

With new gimmicks to try out

  (Why exactly am I in a snowball...?)

 

I'll beat the Deadly Six

 

 

They're kinda dicks

 

So let me share this divisive game with yo-ou...

 

Sonic Lost World

  (A crazy world...)

 

 

That's what we'll play

 (It's kind of lame...)

 

 

The perfect game

 (what? okay dude, you're being a bit generous here)

 

 

For you and me-eeee.....

 

[Chili Dawg]

I love Sonic and the Black Knight a lot.

 

Like everything about it is awful save the soundtrack. But I dunno, something about Sonic and pals playing medieval fantasy is appealing to me, and despite the level design being lazy, repetitive, bland, and all around lame, something about running through these levels swinging the remote like a bitch and taking down knights just works for me. I dunno, it's a game I can go back to kill an afternoon every once in a while, even though it is very much not "good."

[baba_944]

"Sonic 3d Blast" (Saturn/PC), "Sonic Lost World", "Shadow The Hedgehog", "Sonic Heroes", "Sonic Riders", "Sonic R", and "Sonic 4".
 
"Sonic 3D Blast": The "SEGA SATURN" and "Personal Computer" versions have an amazing soundtrack and visuals. The game play in "Sonic Blast: Flickies Island" is so simple, yet so challenging due to the isometric 3D game style. You're going around the zones and bopping badniks and saving the island. The only downside I have with the game is that the Chaos Emeralds does nothing besides gives you the good ending. No Super Sonic.
 
"Sonic Lost World:" I love the new parkour system and the old badniks returns. The comedy in the game is pretty humorous. Especially the dialogue between Zazz and Sonic:
 
Zazz: "I know a perfect spot to beat you"
Sonic: "I know a perfect spot to KICK you"
 
"Shadow The Hedgehog": This game is not meant to be a Sonic game. but rather a Shadow game that concludes the Shadow trilogy. The guns are 100% optional, so if you don't want them, don't use them. The game is so much better without them IMO. The only gun I like was the omochao gun. Blasting baddies with an annoying Chao robot since 2005. 
 
"Sonic Heroes": The teamwork mechanic actually worked so well in this game. Also the entire game reminds me of the classic games. Also, the music. My favorite music & zone is "Frog Forest".

 

"Sonic 4". Never had an issue with physics in the first episode at all. The soundtrack was great, but forgettable. The zones could've been more creative like episode 2, but still fun nonetheless. I wished I can play as only Sonic in episode 2, but still fun. Stupid Special Stage 7. Also, I love how the first boss in episode two tricked you by thinking it's a remake of "Aquatic Ruin Zone" boss, but it turns out to be a newly created boss. The ending was stupid though.

 

"Sonic Riders": This game is great. The Extreme Gear is great, excellent single player content (never played multi-player), the cut scenes were hilarious, the music's great and the unlockable tracks were fun.

 

"Sonic R": This is a cute game. This game marks the first appearance of Metal Knuckles and Puppet Tails. Also the second time Metal Sonic was playable ("Sonic Drift 2). Funny enough .they're both racers. The music is great actually.

[FriendBot]

......

 

Oh boy.....

 

This is going to be a big one.....

 

Okay, let me take a breath......

 

*breathes heavily*

 

I enjoyed playing Sonic 06.........

 

.........

 

Well, no gunshots yet, so let's continue.

 

 

I am fully aware that this game was bad and is the absolute worst 3D Sonic game ever.

 

But despite that, I got some nice kicks out of it, especially Sonic's levels. The graphics do look pretty good and music is an absolute joy to listen to. I even liked certain aspects of the story, like Silver's development from a wannabe hero to an actual hero or the relationship between Team Dark. Me and my sis had absolute fun with the multiplayer in this game. Like I just can see myself hating on this game, like yeah it's not good at all but I don't find it an absolute turd compared to a lot of shitty games.

 

So yeah, I'll run along before something messy happens.

 

*runs away*

[Vertekins]

First off: the story! I really, really enjoyed it. Sonic is actually affected emotionally by what his actions caused in this game's plot, unlike in previous entries where he kinda just brushed off whatever consequences came from his mistakes. "Eggman split the world apart because I just stood there being cocky and now I'm a werewolf? Ah well, I'm too pure hearted to let these silly things get to me!"

 

Are we playing the same game here?

 

Because I don't recall one single instance where Sonic ever said or acted anything akin to this. This is pure hyperbole.

 

I enjoy SatSR quite a bit despite it's terribad controls, questionable aspects of game design and the sheer frustration caused by a lot of it's missions. Especially the "Perfect" and "No Pearl" ones. I still think it has gorgeous, imaginative settings and drips with eye candy, has an appealingly unique skill and level-up system, has the most competently-told story with the best balance of tones I've seen in a Sonic game to date, not to mention has fantastic Sonic characterization much like it's successor. The game's a firm favorite of mine.

[Dizcrybe]

Are we playing the same game here?

 

Because I don't recall one single instance where Sonic ever said or acted anything akin to this.

 

Nope. Chip did, though. Said himself that Sonic was too strong to lose himself, or something along those lines.

[Vertekins]

Nope. Chip did, though. Said himself that Sonic was too strong to lose himself, or something along those lines.

 

Which is a large difference to Sonic acknowledging it himself and therefore shilling his own awesomeness. That's the vital detail. And it establishes Sonic as a character who is oblivious to his own strength.

[DarkLight]

EDIT: Ninja'd. Ignore this.

[RustyRick]

Sonic games that I enjoy playing despite it's flaws?

Sonic Drift despite it being incredibly short, I do enjoy the music and cute ending animations.

Tails Adventures is a game you'll need getting used to, but I think Sean covered that game pretty decently in his old topic. Playable if annoying for the fact you can only carry 4 inventory types with you at a time.

And Tails Skypatrol is a nice rail shooter with incredibly cute music, that really shows off Tails' cute badass appeal.

That's all I can think of right now...

[Aero]

I'm pretty sure it's obvious by now, but for those who don't know...

 

Sonic Chronicles: The Dark Brotherhood.

 

Sure, it has flaws. Lots of flaws. Bad music, some OOC dialogue options, weird-looking sprites, doesn't have the best battle system...I get it. I'm willing to admit all of these flaws that caused everyone else to hate it. But to be honest, none of it really phased me. The backgrounds were nicely drawn. It does a decent job at storytelling. Characters such as Big and Omega were written surprisingly well. Also the aliens. I kinda liked them for whatever reason; especially the Voxai.

 

And, if anything, I would really enjoy a sequel. I mean, you can't just leave us on a cliffhanger like that. (Not to mention--if this sequel does get made, can we have better composers? Please? For the sake of everyone's ears?)

[Briraka]

Are we playing the same game here?

 

Because I don't recall one single instance where Sonic ever said or acted anything akin to this. This is pure hyperbole.

Yes I was using hyperbole. A better explanation I can give is that I generally don't like it when a story goes out of it's way to show how great their heroes are by telling the viewer how "they can't lose themselves to the darkness". To me, a good hero is someone who can go into the abyss and emerge a stronger and better person, rather than side stepping around it.

[Enesephus]

Shadow the Hedgehog for me. Maybe it's because it's one of the first 3D Sonic games I played (along with Sonic Heroes), but I actually enjoy the game. Yes, the story was poorly written and corny (and the alien blood plot twist was atrocious), the graphics were crap compared to just about any other PS2 game, most of the levels were so dark you couldn't see the sky, the cursing was used poorly (I feel it possibly could have been used effectively in the hands of better writers), and the voice acting was embarrassing.

 

The gameplay, though? To me, it's no worse than average. I thought Shadow controlled better than the characters in Heroes (besides the homing attack), the guns auto aimed and were mostly optional, the vehicles were almost entirely optional (and arguably controlled better than the crap-carts in SA2), and the missions, to me, mostly ranged from okay to pretty fun (even the "kill all enemies" missions, except for the ones in the first level, funnily enough). 

 

I'll also have to go with Sonic Heroes and Sonic Lost World, two flawed yet very fun games that get way more hate than I think they deserve. My main problems with Heroes were the unnecessary extra teams, Metal Sonic betrayal "twist" and chaos emerald challenges. With Lost World, my main problems are with the lack of sound test and movie viewer, the lack of option to restart a level (outside of time trial), forced wisp power ups and overly easy bosses (with a couple exceptions).