Do people still think Sonic Adventure's a good game?

[Komodin]

 

Sigh, I'm not claiming he's doing it deliberately I'm claiming that I think he's doing it deliberately. There's a difference.

Well, either way, you are accusing him of being dishonest with this. Just because the guy stated at some point that he dislike the game, doesn't mean the game doesn't have genuine issues going against it.

[ThePrinceOfSaiyans]

 

Oh really?

So what exactly do you have to support this opinion?

In regard to wanting to prove how bad Sonic Adventure is or proof that he's deliberately trying to break the game? If it's the former, the video I provided shows how adamant Arin is about proving to Jon that Sonic Adventure is a bad game, and that it's just like Sonic '06. If it's the latter, it's just the way he approached the loop that makes me think he did it on purpose. If you watch the video he clearly slows down, the first time BTW, while approaching the loop. It's not hard evidence, but it's enough to make me doubt that it was an accident. 

Well, either way, you are accusing him of being dishonest with this. Just because the guy stated at some point that he dislike the game, doesn't mean the game doesn't have genuine issues going against it.

Oh, for sure. Sonic Adventure has plenty of issues. 

Edited July 20, 2015 by ThePrinceOfSaiyajins

[Osmium]

 

In regard to wanting to prove how bad Sonic Adventure is or proof that he's deliberately trying to break the game? If it's the former, the video I provided shows how adamant Arin is about proving to Jon that Sonic Adventure is a bad game, and that it's just like Sonic '06. If it's the latter, it's just the way he approached the loop that makes me think he did it on purpose. If you watch the video he clearly slows down while approaching the loop. It's not hard evidence, but it's enough to make me doubt that it was an accident. 

By slowing down, do you mean the part where he starts walking sideways right before the loop? That's a glitch in itself. He is obviously being pulled into that wall and there was not much he could do about it. I think it's pretty obvious that part wasn't on purpose at all. 

Edited July 20, 2015 by Osmium

[Badnik Mechanic]

it's just the way he approached the loop that makes me think he did it on purpose. If you watch the video he clearly slows down while approaching the loop. It's not hard evidence, but it's enough to make me doubt that it was an accident.

I think you're just grasping at straws to try and discredit someones video or someone you clearly have an issue with. 

I just watched the clip again, I have no idea what you're talking about, the only reason he slows down is because the glitch occurs and he's pushed through the wall, it happens every time you play that section unless you're holding the right buttons down. 

Also if your theory as to arin deliberately slowing down was right, Sonic would change the direction he's facing before he encounters the glitch, which doesn't happen once in the video.

 

[ThePrinceOfSaiyans]

 

I think you're just grasping at straws to try and discredit someones video or someone you clearly have an issue with. 

I just watched the clip again, I have no idea what you're talking about, the only reason he slows down is because the glitch occurs and he's pushed through the wall, it happens every time you play that section unless you're holding the right buttons down. 

Also if your theory as to arin deliberately slowing down was right, Sonic would change the direction he's facing before he encounters the glitch, which doesn't happen once in the video.

Eh, I take issues with some of Arin's opinions, but I think he's a funny guy, and I do enjoy most of his content. I'm really digging the GG's playthrough of Super Mario Galaxy right now for example, so no, I don't take issue with the guy. Anyway, I have encountered the glitch before, and it would seem you have to deliberately slow down and hold left on the control stick(which Arin seems to be doing, as Sonic is facing a little toward the left) to even make it occur. I've tried making it happen while going fast, and it just never worked. Maybe I'm just lucky, but based on my own experience, I had to try to make that glitch happen, and every time I had to deliberately slow down. If Arin isn't doing this, I apologize for claiming he's dishonest, but truthfully I wouldn't be surprised if it was deliberate. 

Edited July 20, 2015 by ThePrinceOfSaiyajins

[Kuzu]

 

Eh, I take issues with some of Arin's opinions, but I think he's a funny guy, and I do enjoy most of his content. I'm really digging the GG's playthrough of Super Mario Galaxy right now for example, so no, I don't take issue with the guy. Anyway, I have encountered the glitch before, and it would seem you have to deliberately slow down and hold left on the control stick(which Arin seems to be doing, as Sonic is facing a little toward the left) to even make it occur. I've tried making it happen while going fast, and it just never worked. Maybe I'm just lucky, but based on my own experience, I had to try to make that glitch happen, and every time I had to deliberately slow down. If Arin isn't doing this, I apologize for claiming he's dishonest, but truthfully I wouldn't be surprised if it was deliberate. 

You have no proof, plain and simple :V Its not like you were there with Arin when he was playing the game and you're making an assumption based on your own personal experience to draw to your conclusions, which means nobody here is inclined to believe. 

 

So yea, can we stop trying justify bad games plz, really would appreciate that.

[StaticMania]

Sonic Adventure is a bad game?

 

It has it's problems, very obviously, but still.

Edited July 20, 2015 by StaticMania

[ThePrinceOfSaiyans]

 

You have no proof, plain and simple :V; So yea, can we stop trying justify bad games plz, really would appreciate that.

I know, that's why I'm not stating my opinion as if it were a fact. I guess... There's really no point in trying to justify these glitches. What matters is if the game is still fun, and I believe it is.

Edited July 20, 2015 by ThePrinceOfSaiyajins

[Kuzu]

Sonic Adventure is a bad game?

 

It has it's problems, very obviously, but still.

Its a game from over a decade ago that has graphical and texture glitches throughout and more than a few design flaws. Its not broken or unplayable and I still enjoy playing it now and then, but its far from being a good game, especially by today's standards.

[azoo]

Yeah that glitch is pretty unexcusable.

It kind of makes me want to say that he should've played the DC version though, since it's very infrequent that I've ever run into that bug before the loop in the original game, but even the demo of DX had this glitch.

DX is pretty buggy even by Sonic Adventure standards, and it's got some slight differences to the visuals that IMO make it look worse than the original (glossiness, Sonic's new model, outright texture changes to make it look less colorful and more dull). 

[Nepenthe]

 

You have no proof, plain and simple :V Its not like you were there with Arin when he was playing the game and you're making an assumption based on your own personal experience to draw to your conclusions, which means nobody here is inclined to believe. 

 

So yea, can we stop trying justify bad games plz, really would appreciate that.

While he has no proof of his claims, the implied conclusion that Arin is being honest and is thus right isn't logical. Player A plays a game and only encounters a glitch when they actively attempt to recreate the conditions necessary for that glitch to occur. Player B plays that same game and encounters that same glitch without discernible effort. Both Players decide to go online to discuss their experience with the glitch. If we have no proof that either Player is lying about the ease of encountering the glitch as is the case here, and yet we have two anecdotes that directly contradict each other ("the glitch has to be consciously encountered" vs "anyone can encounter it without effort"), then neither Player is believable until further information is gathered, and subsequently the glitch's impact on the game's overall quality is up in the air. Not that it's good for a game to have such a glitch, but that the difficulty of encountering the glitch is going to impact people's play experiences and thus their impressions. If I go through a game and never encounter a bug that could drop me through the floor in a specific area, even if the bug is demonstrably there, I am justified in downplaying its impact on the parts of the game I actually interacted with consciously and often. It's why any game is allowed a positive reception. They're not actually technologically perfect- they're just good enough to not break under most circumstances.

[Tornado]

It should also be said, though,  that it isn't Hogfather's job to disprove a theory that you raised yourself. 

[PKGaming]

Okay, so I decided to do a little test on that wall loop part to see just how easy it is to run into that glitch. I tried two methods of approaching, both to me seemed like logical things a player would do when in this situation. One method is simply holding the analog stick forward to continue going forward. The other method is to turn the analog stick in a similar way to how the road itself curves; so holding forward, then tilting left and then right. I tried each three times.

1. Holding forward: All three times, I made it through just fine. Sonic jittered a bit a few times and it looked like the wall was trying to suck him in, but he made it out fine.

2. Holding the analog stick in the way that the road curves: Two out of three times, the wall glitch got me. It basically looked exactly like how it did when Arin got the glitch. Sonic slowed down, got sucked into the wall, and died. 

I then tried a method that DOESN'T make sense. I tried slowing down and stopping at that part like many are claiming Arin did to make that glitch happen on purpose. When I tried this, Sonic just slowed to a stopped. The wall didn't pull him in, he just stopped. Then when I held forward and got him moving again, he made it through just fine. I tried this twice.

With this, I really don't think Arin slowed down and tried to get the glitch on purpose. He likely tried the second method of holding and tilting the analog stick in the direction that the road curves, which makes sense for a player to do that. I tried all this on the Steam port of the game. I wish I could test it out on Dreamcast, but sadly my old Dreamcast won't read discs anymore.

Edited July 20, 2015 by PKGaming

[ThePrinceOfSaiyans]

It should also be said, though,  that it isn't Hogfather's job to disprove a theory that you raised yourself. 

I agree, but there's no way actually prove or disprove my assertion. I can use my experience with the game to hypothesize that Arin might be doing things on purpose, but ultimately I can't prove it, thus why I said I think, not that I know. Hogfather asserted the contrary was in fact the case, but how can he be sure of that? 

[Nepenthe]

Saying you "think" something isn't a get-out-of-jail-free card. You were nonetheless asserting that Arin was lying, and assertions presented without evidence are not to be taken as true at face value. The state of truth concerning Hogfather's own assertions is actually irrelevant too as I detailed above; no one is obligated to disprove something that hasn't checked out in the first place, but merely to refute or poke holes by presenting other viable options or actual facts that contradict the argument. In short, you don't have to believe Hogfather to conclude that your statement doesn't pass the burden of proof on its own anyway.

[Badnik Mechanic]

I agree, but there's no way actually prove or disprove my assertion.

PK just did in the post before yours.

He showed that if you play the game and do not do anything malicious, but normal gameplay operations, you'll get the exact same results.

[ThePrinceOfSaiyans]

Odd, I got it to work by slowing down and holding the control stick slightly to the left... I am playing it on the HD port, though, so that might be the problem.

[Shaddy Zaphod]

Well, to be fair, this is a porting problem that wasn't there in the DC version. I'm guessing that's already been mentioned, but still.

 

Now, Arin HAS played this game before. In his Zelda sequelitis video, he mentions it and, surprise surprise, shows a glitch I've never even seen before, and acts like it's something that happens to everyone. He has also outright stated his hate for it on certain occasions, like the Jazz Jackrabbit steam train video(s?) or the 06 and Shadow videos (although apparently he likes Open Your Heart). So it's not even a first-time problem. More importantly, this glitch, while not excusable, isn't exactly hard to avoid. Yes, everyone encounters it on their first time. I did. And then you know what? They usually get it afterward. Again, I did. This isn't like some bad puzzle in a graphic adventure game, where you have to hit the fish with a cricket bat to sing a tune to put the robot to sleep so you can walk past. You just hold up. Every time you can clearly tell where Arin lets go of the stick, which is not only obvious, but it contradicts his prior experience about this sort of Sonic game. In Sonic Adventure, you only sometimes have to hold forward in most scripted sequences. In Sonic 06 however, you HAVE to do it for almost ALL of it, or else you get Sonic stopping standing on the underside of the loop, for example. At no point has any Sonic game told you to let go of the stick on a scripted section. What mentality do you have to have to think that playing Sonic well is about slowing down? But then, even after all that, he purposefully starts fucking around with the loop in the exact same way. I've never even seen this happen to other people on video before, let alone myself.

Now, this wouldn't be a problem if Arin wasn't actually popular or influential (Mariotehplumber notwithstanding). But he is, and you know what Danny says after all this?

"Sonic Boom WISHES it could be this terrible!"

This is exactly what's going to happen for the rest of this LP, and the example Danny sets is exactly the reaction all of those commenters and watchers are going to have. Anyone who likes this game or Sonic is now going to have even less attention or thought given to them because "Oh...you like Sonic? Eugh".

 

As for the question of the topic itself, yes, the game is flawed, but it's still fun. As a Sonic game, it succeeds thematically and in art design, along with Sonic, Tails, and Knuckles levels being good on a speed-platforming blend scale. As a platformer, everyone except for Big is decent enough, and from there it's just preference. I think this game is more in need of a full remake than any other Sonic game. There's so much potential here.

Edited July 20, 2015 by Shaddy

[ThePrinceOfSaiyans]

Yeah, I tried this on the DX port, and it's definitely easier to pull off. 

[StaticMania]

Are you sure...because I'm also trying it, and it doesn't ever happen unless you intentionally slow down near the loop and stop, you never not have enough speed to get past there from my experience.

I know it happened the first time I played the game unintentionally, back in 2010...but it never happened since.

[Badnik Mechanic]

Are you sure...because I'm also trying it, and it doesn't ever happen unless you intentionally slow down near the loop and stop,

I know for a fact that this is not the case. 

It will always happen unless you hold a specific button down.

[Indigo Rush]

Sonic Adventure is special to me, but I will say that it's glitchiness and poor camera is indefensible in this day and age. Even when it originally came out, it had marks against it for poor camerawork. It's easy for me to overlook those issues after years of replaying it and thoroughly enjoying the experience, but I can't deny that it has serious programming flaws. It has not aged well, and even back then it shouldn't be acceptable.

What's interesting to note, in my opinion, is that unlike Sonic 2006 which many wrongly claim would be "good" if they only fixed the glitches and loading screens, Sonic Adventure could actually get away with that statement, at least for the most part. If the code was better optimized for collision detection and splining for the loops and set paths, even if you didn't remove the awkward gameplay roulette with Big the Cat's fishing, Gamma's shooting, Knuckles' treasure hunting and Amy's... general awful slowness... I argue that you'd still have a solid and straightforward game that stays largely consistent throughout, despite said controversial design choices. (though you may want to make playing as them optional for accessing the final story, just an idea)

Either way, Sonic Adventure is in serious need of a reworking, and I think it's one that could be re-built from the ground-up with about 90% of it's design concepts intact (the other 10% being visuals and cutscene remastering, and how) and come out as a fairly quality product for this day and age. Honestly, had the game been taken better care of between ports and "remasters," we wouldn't be in this mess trying to defend Sonic Adventure's legitimate strengths in the wake of garbage programming and glitches and dated cutscene animations.

tl;dr: I want Sonic Adventure HD Remastered ala Wind Waker HD. Rebuild everything from the ground up, high quality graphics and sound, tighter controls, modern game design sensibilities and new cutscenes that aren't embarrassing to watch, all the while keeping the bulk of the level design and story the same.

 

...also, Chao Adventure for mobile phones, pls.

Edited July 20, 2015 by Indigo Rush

[ThePrinceOfSaiyans]

I know for a fact that this is not the case. 

It will always happen unless you hold a specific button down.

If, I may ask, which button is that, on the gamecube controller anyway? I ask because I was able to fall through the floor by simply holding the control stick to the left before the dash panel. Maybe there are multiple ways to exploit this glitch?

[StaticMania]

No, it's just that in that specific area, the wall just pulls you into it.

[FriendBot]

I've only managed to play SA1 through the PSN port, which is apparently one of the worst ports of the game, but I still had plenty of fun.

Quality-wise, nowadays it's pretty poor.

Entertainment-wise, it's still really good.

It has some of the best controls in a 3D Sonic game ever, simple but fairly challenging levels, lots of ambition and heart was put into it and it does like like an Adventure!

The thing is with me that I won't consider a game a bad game if there's still a good chunk of the game that's legitimately good. If it's both a poorly-made game AND isn't fun to play at all, then that's what I consider as a bad game.

Since Adventure 1 is still fun game to play, it's not bad. 

As Komo has said, it's a product of its time so atleast it kind of has the excuse of being what it is since it is probably the most ambitious 3D platformer at the time. It wanted to do different things while most games like Banjo-Kazooie or Super Mario 64, where it has a clear focus in its design but Adventure 1 says fuck that noise, we're gonna be bigger and more awesomer than that.

So yeah, SA1 still one of my favorite Sonic games so yeah.