Sonic Forces | PS4, Xbox One, Switch, PC "The Next Generations"

[Kintor]

25 minutes ago, JezMM said:

Just so you're in the know, Sonic Team has nothing to do with PSO2, it's a common assumption because they made the original PSO, but they've been pretty ball-and-chain'd to the Sonic franchise for over a decade now.  If you knew that and were just implying the staff would be moved over there then fair enough.

Actually Sonic Team does make Phantasy Star Online 2, as has always been the case. Sonic Team's 'brand' just isn't mentioned on their games besides Sonic games but make no mistake Sonic Team is behind Phantasy Star Online 2. It's actually working out quite well for Sonic Team, with Phantasy Star Online 2 being one of the most successful MMORPGs that Japan has ever seen. Frankly, the huge amounts of cash that Phantasy Star Online 2 is racking in probably helped convince Sega to keep Sonic Team intact over the last six years while they worked on Sonic Forces.

25 minutes ago, JezMM said:

See I feel the reasons Generations did so well has far more to do with the nostalgia angle than the boost gameplay.  Most reviewers praised either both equally OR leant towards preferring the side-scrolling.  I feel it's only really within the fanbase that people praise the modern Sonic gameplay as the best part of the game.

Trying to dismiss the technical achievements of Sonic Generations as a mere appeal to nostalgia is a disservice to both Sonic Generations itself and the high quality boost gameplay it championed. Don't forget that Lost World was heavy on the nostalgia as well, with levels inspired by Green Hill Zone and Casino Night Zone, plus the return of 'cuteified' classic Badniks. But few people bought Lost World because the gameplay was terrible, nostalgia alone couldn't save Lost World from its own design flaws. Hence, Sonic Generations and its boost gameplay is a great game on its own merit, nostalgia (appropriately for Sonic's 20th anniversary) was just the icing on the game. This is why Sonic forces, with its own boost gameplay, is also well placed to be a great game in its own right.

 

[Jango]

At this point we're more likely to get Wisp Garden.

 

I'm totaly OK with this. Keep the cute critters out of the main game. My gripe with the Wisps is that I think they're a bit too childish. And since they're telling a darker story in Forces, it is much harder to swallow it with these little space worms flying around... :/

[JezMM]

8 minutes ago, Kintor said:

Actually Sonic Team does make Phantasy Star Online 2, as has always been the case. Sonic Team's 'brand' just isn't mentioned on their games besides Sonic games but make no mistake Sonic Team is behind Phantasy Star Online 2. It's actually working out quite well for Sonic Team, with Phantasy Star Online 2 being one of the most successful MMORPGs that Japan has ever seen. Frankly, the huge amounts of cash that Phantasy Star Online 2 is racking in probably helped convince Sega to keep Sonic Team intact over the last six years while they worked on Sonic Forces.

Trying to dismiss the technical achievements of Sonic Generations as a mere appeal to nostalgia is a disservice to both Sonic Generations itself and the high quality boost gameplay it championed. Don't forget that Lost World was heavy on the nostalgia as well, with levels inspired by Green Hill Zone and Casino Night Zone, plus the return of 'cuteified' classic Badniks. But few people bought Lost World because the gameplay was terrible, nostalgia alone couldn't save Lost World from its own design flaws. Hence, Sonic Generations and its boost gameplay is a great game on its own merit, nostalgia (appropriately for Sonic's 20th anniversary) was just the icing on the game. This is why Sonic forces, with its own boost gameplay, is also well placed to be a great game in its own right.

 

Do you have a source for the PSO2 thing because I was super into that game for a while and have literally never seen anything saying as such.

And like just... Lost World and Generations can barely even be compared in how they played the nostalgia angle.  Generations was literally "LOOK IT'S CLASSIC SONIC, LOOK IT'S OLD LEVELS, LOOK IT'S OLD 2D GAMEPLAY."  The entire game was nostalgia in every form.

That is not at all the same thing as simply using Green Hill aesthetics for the first level again.

Hell, even Forces is playing up the nostalgia angle more than "it's boost gameplay again guys!", or Classic Sonic wouldn't have been the focal point of the teaser.

[Kintor]

1 minute ago, JezMM said:

Do you have a source for the PSO2 thing because I was super into that game for a while and have literally never seen anything saying as such.

Like I said in my last post, Sonic Team doesn't put their name on their games anymore; with the notable exception of Sonic games. For a while every individual Sega of Japan development team had their own name but that has changed again and now all the teams generally operate anonymously. Only Sonic Team has retained their individual name, owing to Sonic Team's greater worldwide recognition with the Sonic franchise itself. So we can no longer tell which staff at Sega is working on a particular game anymore. We can only infer when a famous director is promoted as part of that game's PR, based upon the staff they have worked with previously.

1 minute ago, JezMM said:

And like just... Lost World and Generations can barely even be compared in how they played the nostalgia angle.  Generations was literally "LOOK IT'S CLASSIC SONIC, LOOK IT'S OLD LEVELS, LOOK IT'S OLD 2D GAMEPLAY."  The entire game was nostalgia in every form.

That is not at all the same thing as simply using Green Hill aesthetics for the first level again.

Hell, even Forces is playing up the nostalgia angle more than "it's boost gameplay again guys!", or Classic Sonic wouldn't have been the focal point of the teaser.

You're oversimplifying things to discredit the popularity of Sonic Generations and that's just muddling the issue. Yes, as the 20th anniversary game Sonic Generations had a lot of nostalgia but the success of Sonic Generations is owed to its high quality gameplay - especially the continuation of Sonic Unleashed’s boost gameplay. later Lost World tried its own take on nostalgia, by using reimaged classic themes and Badniks, but it didn't work because the gameplay was terrible. Next we will see Sonic Forces become a success because of its boost gameplay, as the long awaited spiritual successor to Sonic Generations that Sonic fans and other games have been waiting six years to play.

[RictalRose0]

I don't know about that Phantasy Star 2 thing but I do know the credits for Sonic games are kinda weird lately. They tend to leave a lot of stuf out. 

1 hour ago, Detective Kaito said:

Going by this and what IGN said about the game, I think it's safe to assume that the whole dark and edgy tone of this game is a fluke and only the first level has the tone I mentioned. Can't wait for more Baldy McNosehair jokes.

please let the people who wrote sonic unleashed write the story for this game

I wouldn't really call it dark and edgy tbh. No one says that about the comics and they usually deal with stuff like that. Taking a more serious aproach is not edgy. That word is really overused these days. Dark yes possibly. Edgy? Eh, don't think so. The only "edgy" Sonic game is Shadow the Hedgehog, and only some parts like the beggining and the evil paths. But yes I would like to see something like Unleashed but more ambitious and with more cutscenes (The animated ones, they are a delight to look at).

[JezMM]

1 hour ago, Kintor said:

Like I said in my last post, Sonic Team doesn't put their name on their games anymore; with the notable exception of Sonic games. For a while every individual Sega of Japan development team had their own name but that has changed again and now all the teams generally operate anonymously. Only Sonic Team has retained their individual name, owing to Sonic Team's greater worldwide recognition with the Sonic franchise itself. So we can no longer tell which staff at Sega is working on a particular game anymore. We can only infer when a famous director is promoted as part of that game's PR, based upon the staff they have worked with previously.

You're oversimplifying things to discredit the popularity of Sonic Generations and that's just muddling the issue. Yes, as the 20th anniversary game Sonic Generations had a lot of nostalgia but the success of Sonic Generations is owed to its high quality gameplay - especially the continuation of Sonic Unleashed’s boost gameplay. later Lost World tried its own take on nostalgia, by using reimaged classic themes and Badniks, but it didn't work because the gameplay was terrible. Next we will see Sonic Forces become a success because of its boost gameplay, as the long awaited spiritual successor to Sonic Generations that Sonic fans and other games have been waiting six years to play.

That still wasn't a source and in fact gave me less confidence in the idea that the Sonic Team we know of currently, the one the Forces trailer considers to be "the makers of Sonic Colours and Sonic Generations" dabbles in PSO2 development.  If Sonic Team has split off into new teams around SEGA well... that isn't really Sonic Team anymore is it lol, just SEGA in general.

And I'm not trying to discredit anything really, I love Generations but I'm just saying, we won't know for sure if that gameplay holds up without the nostalgia decoration until... well, this game, frankly.  And even then it has Classic Sonic holding it up since as mentioned, Modern Sonic content is incredibly costly to create.

And even if it's a success, it still doesn't mean it was the ONLY choice that could've been made, which is all those against the return to the boost formula are really arguing.

Look at Zelda, Skyward Sword went a bold new direction and was considerably less well-recieved.  Nintendo COULD have just tried to "make OoT again", basically refine what they tried to do with Twilight Princess, and it could have been a great game but instead they did ANOTHER totally different thing for the series (bonus points: they also used the original game as a starting point, as Green Hill Paradise Act 2 and Sonic Utopia did, and many Sonic fans want SEGA to do with 3D Sonic) and it was an unprecedented success.

Likewise Lost World was lukewarmly recieved, they could've just tried to "make Sonic Generations again" or gone for something new... and they chose the easy one.  I'm not saying either route is better, just saying going back to boost wasn't the only option, even if it's one that personally I'm fine with.

Though I say that... in Generations, I found the modern gameplay more fun than the classic gameplay.  And this game apparently has a 3rd style too which may or may not be minimal in scope but yeah.  Either way, once again I am going to get a game where potentially I will enjoy some gameplay significantly more than another, and wish the whole game could be my preferred one.  Meanwhile most other platformers I play manage to have a consistent experience from the first to the last level.

[Meta77]

I agree with Jim Sterling.  I like when companies take risk. It may not always work out but it can. Instead what it seems some want for the series is call of duty syndrome.  where they want to keep making the same safe bet game without trying new things and becoming more stale than a 6 month loaf of bread.

[Nuggets]

1 hour ago, JezMM said:

And even if it's a success, it still doesn't mean it was the ONLY choice that could've been made, which is all those against the return to the boost formula are really arguing.

Look at Zelda, Skyward Sword went a bold new direction and was considerably less well-recieved.  Nintendo COULD have just tried to "make OoT again", basically refine what they tried to do with Twilight Princess, and it could have been a great game but instead they did ANOTHER totally different thing for the series (bonus points: they also used the original game as a starting point, as Green Hill Paradise Act 2 and Sonic Utopia did, and many Sonic fans want SEGA to do with 3D Sonic) and it was an unprecedented success.

Likewise Lost World was lukewarmly recieved, they could've just tried to "make Sonic Generations again" or gone for something new... and they chose the easy one.  I'm not saying either route is better, just saying going back to boost wasn't the only option, even if it's one that personally I'm fine with.

Though I say that... in Generations, I found the modern gameplay more fun than the classic gameplay.  And this game apparently has a 3rd style too which may or may not be minimal in scope but yeah.  Either way, once again I am going to get a game where potentially I will enjoy some gameplay significantly more than another, and wish the whole game could be my preferred one.  Meanwhile most other platformers I play manage to have a consistent experience from the first to the last level.

I've seen this line of thought pop up in this thread before, and while I get where it's coming from, from a business standpoint I don't really think there was any other choice for SEGA. 

The difference between Zelda and Sonic is that Sonic has had a (to say the absolute least) a spotty history with his reception. While fans have kinda soured a little bit on Skyward Sword, that game still got massive critical acclaim and a couple perfect scores from some publications. Maybe not to the degree of others, but still, pretty good. But Zelda has a history of success, so when Nintendo said, "yeah, let's make a game the exact opposite of what we just did", they have the freedom and stabillity to do that, because it's most likely going to do numbers critically and commercially (Zelda could release a game where the gimmick was "Link shoots ROCKS out of his ass to attack now!" and it'd probably get some 10/10s) because Zelda has history like that - it has a 3D blueprint that works, that the team can deviate from or stick to whenever. 

Sonic is sort of just fucked. The only things that have sort of worked for this franchise 3D wise were the Adventure games, and the style for those continued to falter until eventually crashing and burning in the swamp fire that was 06, and the Boost games. It's not like the team hasn't tried to branch out - besides things like Secret Rings and Black Knight, even following the success of the Boost games, Sega did take risks with Lost World and Rise of Lyric, and one didn't do so hot, and the other... Yeah. So the predicament here is that while fans might be burnt out on Boost, for Sega, this is really the only thing that has remotely worked for them in the past 10 years, and they've certainly tried other things. They didn't work. And like you said, obviously that doesn't mean that NOTHING will work, but if you were at the crossroads of trying something new (after two back to back failures) at the risk of making your character an even bigger laughingstock, or going back to the style that critics seemed to love, would you ever choose the first one? And I say this as someone who groaned when Classic Sonic showed up in the original trailer, but, yeah. I dunno. I feel bad for the people that don't like the boost (and I have my fair share of problems with it as well), but I don't think it would've made sense for Sonic Team to do anything else - the track record is just too iffy and too much is at stake to not play it safe.

And that's a very shitty dilemma to be stuck in, from the standpoint of a developer or a fan. At the very least, they're doing something new with the 3rd gameplay style (although that could very well be ultra-shit too). But I think I'd prefer what we have now to some game with an all-new stupid gimmick that could fuck the series even more than it has been, if that makes any sense.

although a game where sonic shoots rocks out of his ass doesn't sound half-bad tbh

[RictalRose0]

Well there is a rocket Wisp in Colors right? That's close enough to Sonic having a rocket come out of his ass.

[Mark1]

Definitely safe to assume following this thread that this fan base really is divided with their choices of gameplay. 

Really don't understand the full hate towards boost style gameplay, feels like the adventure gameplay, but more refined and speed focused. Really good fun, especially some of the levels from Generations. 

The gameplay style clearly has its fans too, take it away and the backlash from those fans and critics would be real. Just as much as the incredibly high demand for a true sequel to the classics, which probably wouldn't have happened if fans weren't vocal about the style.

[Wraith]

54 minutes ago, Nuggets said:

I've seen this line of thought pop up in this thread before, and while I get where it's coming from, from a business standpoint I don't really think there was any other choice for SEGA. 

The difference between Zelda and Sonic is that Sonic has had a (to say the absolute least) a spotty history with his reception. While fans have kinda soured a little bit on Skyward Sword, that game still got massive critical acclaim and a couple perfect scores from some publications. Maybe not to the degree of others, but still, pretty good. But Zelda has a history of success, so when Nintendo said, "yeah, let's make a game the exact opposite of what we just did", they have the freedom and stabillity to do that, because it's most likely going to do numbers critically and commercially (Zelda could release a game where the gimmick was "Link shoots ROCKS out of his ass to attack now!" and it'd probably get some 10/10s) because Zelda has history like that - it has a 3D blueprint that works, that the team can deviate from or stick to whenever. 

Sonic is sort of just fucked. The only things that have sort of worked for this franchise 3D wise were the Adventure games, and the style for those continued to falter until eventually crashing and burning in the swamp fire that was 06, and the Boost games. It's not like the team hasn't tried to branch out - besides things like Secret Rings and Black Knight, even following the success of the Boost games, Sega did take risks with Lost World and Rise of Lyric, and one didn't do so hot, and the other... Yeah. So the predicament here is that while fans might be burnt out on Boost, for Sega, this is really the only thing that has remotely worked for them in the past 10 years, and they've certainly tried other things. They didn't work. And like you said, obviously that doesn't mean that NOTHING will work, but if you were at the crossroads of trying something new (after two back to back failures) at the risk of making your character an even bigger laughingstock, or going back to the style that critics seemed to love, would you ever choose the first one? And I say this as someone who groaned when Classic Sonic showed up in the original trailer, but, yeah. I dunno. I feel bad for the people that don't like the boost (and I have my fair share of problems with it as well), but I don't think it would've made sense for Sonic Team to do anything else - the track record is just too iffy and too much is at stake to not play it safe.

And that's a very shitty dilemma to be stuck in, from the standpoint of a developer or a fan. At the very least, they're doing something new with the 3rd gameplay style (although that could very well be ultra-shit too). But I think I'd prefer what we have now to some game with an all-new stupid gimmick that could fuck the series even more than it has been, if that makes any sense.

although a game where sonic shoots rocks out of his ass doesn't sound half-bad tbh

I also feel like it depends on what kind of risks you take. Nintendo always "risks" with the Zelda franchise that are so calculated I hesitate to call them that. Skyward sword adds in a bunch of motion controls but it's basically a new way of doing stuff you were already doing in the other games. A lot of things, even down to the structure and the pacing of the plot, are the same. 

Breath of the Wild was a lot riskier, but it's just going back to what put the franchise on the map in the first place, so you're still doing a lot of the stuff that makes Zelda Zelda. They've thrown a lot of stuff out and rethought a lot of concepts, but this was all to improve the core Zelda experience of exploration, puzzle solving and combat. Even keeping all this in mind, they felt the need to test a lot of their ideas in a 3DS side game first.

On the flip side, what does Black Knight have to do with momentum physics? Fighting robots? Speedy platforming? Hell, even something simple like sonic curling into a ball is largely absent. It pretty deliberately is almost nothing like the Sonic games that came before it aside from having Sonic and friends in it. It tries to work a hack n slash into the engine for fucking Sonic and the Secret Rings. That's a insanely risky idea that obviously didn't pan out.

[Jovahexeon Jax Joranvexeon]

8 minutes ago, Mark1 said:

Really don't understand the full hate towards boost style gameplay, feels like the adventure gameplay, but more refined and speed focused.

Speaking as someone who likes all the gameplay styles that the series has sported, I'll be quite honest in admitting that Boost gameplay while certainly fun for spectacle could stand to be tinkered with so that it doesn't feel like something that you absolutely need to use just to cross a long hallway!

I mean sure, the boost gameplay isn't THAT simple, but you'll notice how in Generations, there's all mainly reward but nowhere near an equivalent of risk to using the Boost unlike in say, the Rush games.

And on personal pet peeve, using the boost some much does kinda suck when it takes the air from the themes for so long. At least in Colors, the restraint and usual of the boost was to be used more conservingly, so there it felt like a fun little side effect hearing the music while breaking the sound barrier whereas in Generations, it sadly became the normality.

Bottom-line, my biggest hope is that the game, Sonic Forces, as a whole, first tutorial level be damned, balance out boost and the usual of skill more so like in Colors, but without as much reliance on 2d gameplay of course.

[Crazy_Diamond]

I think that the blame can be placed squarely on SEGA for this dilemma that we are having. The Adventure formula wasn't perfect certainly, but Sonic's gameplay was probably the closest you can get to translating the 2D games to 3D. I've seen Sonic Utopia, and that game looks great, but Sonic Team would need to make wide open non-linear levels in order to accommodate that kind of gameplay style. In terms of creating linear levels with a balanced combination of platforming, speed, and multiple paths, the Adventure style would be the best way to do this. You have the ability to slow down and accurately platform when the level demands it, but you also have the ability to speed up through the use of the spindash or continuous running when the ground becomes more level. In that sense, it is very similar in design to the 2D games, which also had sections where you slowed down for accurate platforming, and then had sections where you could speed through quickly. 

However, the Adventure games suffered from some camera and control problems that prevented it from reaching it's full potential. It also incorporated alternate gameplay styles that you needed to play to get to the end of the game. These are not inherent problems to the gameplay, all of these could have been fixed. The camera and control could have been refined, and the alternate gameplay styles could be changed to resemble Sonic's gameplay more. Instead of doing this, SEGA kept making games without thinking and the problems became worse and worse. Eventually we got 06, which was the climax of the problems. SEGA could not longer simply solve the problems that were plaguing the Adventure style, because 06 was so bad that anything that resembled it would turn people off. So they made a different style of gameplay, and the fanbase became even more fractured than it already was.

[Meta77]

People really got to stop using we. While some may be turned off by another game with 06s visual body I got one would sure as hell welcome it. 

35 minutes ago, Mark1 said:

Definitely safe to assume following this thread that this fan base really is divided with their choices of gameplay. 

Really don't understand the full hate towards boost style gameplay, feels like the adventure gameplay, but more refined and speed focused. Really good fun, especially some of the levels from Generations. 

The gameplay style clearly has its fans too, take it away and the backlash from those fans and critics would be real. Just as much as the incredibly high demand for a true sequel to the classics, which probably wouldn't have happened if fans weren't vocal about the style.

Close to adventure??? What serious they are noting alike. For me boost gameplay is restricted and bland. Oh want to explore a certain part of a city wellllllllll you can't. Well back to holding the boost button to zip through the stage.  the reason adventure was fun was unless being chased by a boulder you could wonder around and actually explore or choose to dash though stage. I enjoyed exploring casiniopolis and crazy gadget

4 hours ago, JezMM said:

Just so you're in the know, Sonic Team has nothing to do with PSO2, it's a common assumption because they made the original PSO, but they've been pretty ball-and-chain'd to the Sonic franchise for over a decade now.  If you knew that and were just implying the staff would be moved over there then fair enough.

See I feel the reasons Generations did so well has far more to do with the nostalgia angle than the boost gameplay.  Most reviewers praised either both equally OR leant towards preferring the side-scrolling.  I feel it's only really within the fanbase that people praise the modern Sonic gameplay as the best part of the game.

Unleashed, obviously had a very mixed reception, most people loving the daytime gameplay COMPARED to the Werehog but also often finding it too fast and unfair etc.  Also the important context that it was a bit step in a better direction after 2006.

And while Sonic Colours was also a success, it can't be ignored that THAT was a boost game that severely neutered everything that Unleashed introduced, focusing instead on fun-but-misguided blocky 2D platforming and power-ups and an overall reduced difficulty and lack of focus on speedy 3D platforming that I personally don't want to see again.  And like Unleashed being considered favourably after 2006, Colours was considered favourable for it's lack of Werehog.

 

That is to say I feel there isn't enough evidence to suggest that any of the boost games are beloved BECAUSE of the boost.  They all have too much extra baggage to assume their success came from the boost gameplay at it's core.  Even now I'm seeing LOTS of articles that are praising Forces simply because it's not Lost World or Boom again.  Praising it with full awareness that SEGA is not so much doing great things but "it's good to see them taking the only direction so far that's actually somewhat worked" without being particularly escatic for it either.

 

As said, maybe this'll be the boost game that changes everyone's minds, but we still need to remember that likely only 50%, or possibly even 33.3%, is gonna be boost gameplay anyway, so even this one isn't gonna have boost gameplay judged in a vacuum.  We're still dealing with a franchise whose flagship platforming style is the inability to settle on one.

I wouldn't be surprised if they had a hand in pso2 seeing all the sonic items we get. But also people assume Sega struggles I mean they make quite a bit with pso it's one reason besides branding why they stopped working on us version. Also between arcades. Vocoloids. I think hey have some cash revenues

[Spooky Mulder]

5 hours ago, BlueFlare said:

 

Anyone else wishing for some sort of hub areas like Unleashed has? For me, aside from the actual story, content like this is really a big plus. Maybe there could be a chao garden type of mini game included in a hub area. Chances are those won't probably happen , but I would greatly enjoy wandering in a place like Adabat's hub.

Pass. Hubworlds themselves can be okay, but Unleashed handled them pretty terribly in my opinion. I'll admit I got some nostalgia out of watching that video, but it also reminded me of all the reasons I hated those hubworlds at the time.

Unleashed's hubs were sooo small that they felt totally out-of-place in a game with such a focus on speed. The slippery controls were so much more apparent when trying to navigate those tiny hubworlds than they were during the rest of the game. Plus, there was so little of consequence to actually do in the worlds. Most of the items you can purchase in the hubworlds have no purpose except to give you something to buy with your rings.

I would be fine seeing some sort of hubs again, but not like Unleashed's. I'd be much more interested in a reimagining of the SA1 Adventure Field's which seem more appropriate in a game based around getting from place-to-place quickly.

 

[Lady Soniko]

I think come to release for the games is really going to test the waters and relationship between SoJ and SoA, even if Mania doesn't go physical and remains a digital release only, the inclination of it outselling Forces is definitely going to cause some level of friction, since PagodaWest/CannonHead is a tiny dev team compared to Sonic Team. Not to mention I think Iizuka san has already made the decision to front SEGA of America as he's literally moved to the US to keep a close eye on Mania and it's progress.

I think Forces will sell like any other 3D title in last 10 or so years, and I think Mania is probably going to set Sonic back on track and CannonHead/PagodaWest will be upgraded to either a bigger team or higher position for future content from SEGA, and if a smaller team make a better game than Sonic Team's triple A department then I think you can see where they'll likely start putting more of their money into the winning side.

So if you don't think this is a East vs West situation then you need to open your eyes, because even with 2 different games coming this year, depending on how they do is going to shape the future of Sonic, I don't think they'd ever retire modern sonic... But I do think they need to re-evaluate their situation and figure out what the hell they want to do with the Modern/3D games unless they just keep him as SEGA's experimental fodder or if they just keep playing it safe and stick to one gameplay style and find a way to make it work.

It can go 2 ways, SoA continues making 2D games and pushing their way back to the top and staying relevant with social media and feedback, whilst SoJ continue to fumble in the dark, and experiment whilst losing money every time they take a gamble because I doubt SoJ would fold and agree following the West is their best solution.

Or they both find a way to coexist with each other, taking ideas and feedback and there's no pride involved because essentially, SoJ can't survive without SoA and vice versa.

[Maxtiis]

I'd be fine with hubworlds returning if they were structured more like a level themselves with multiple ways between areas including shortcuts between level entrances that take advantage of Sonic's abilities to traverse them.

Basically just make the hubworlds fun to run around in. They can keep all the npcs and such provided the things they say is interesting.

And bring back the spindash in 3-D for fuck's sake. Abusing that on inclines in Sonic Adventure was fun as hell, especially in Mystic Ruins.

[Meta77]

If they had hubs I'd prefer adventures format.

[Jango]

It's amazing how much discussion we're having here considering we know now as much as we knew in July, save for the name of the damn game. ? This thread doubled its size.

[Blue Blood]

17 minutes ago, Jango said:

It's amazing how much discussion we're having here considering we know now as much as we knew in July, save for the name of the damn game. ? This thread doubled its size.

It's a bigger thread than Mania's. 

Basically we all know Mania is going to be GOTY and have simply run out of ways to gush about it, so discussion has died down. There's only so many ways to say you love something. But nobody gets bored of circular arguments about the boost and Modern Sonic, no siree!

[Muscles Maximum]

12 hours ago, Sega DogTagz said:

Sega has gone on record on this issue multiple times. Building boost stages by their very design is exceedingly inefficient. They lead to criminally short games and force the devs to pad the content by including "other" play-styles. Its been like this in every 3D game that uses the boost. Gens, Unleashed, Colors, Forces - they all have additional baggage piled on because the developmental burden of building a full on Modern Sonic experience is too great. Its Unsustainable.

I've seen this statement thrown out there a lot but I've never actually seen or heard SEGA/Sonic Team/Aaron/Ken, whoever talk about this issue before.

Is there an interview or article, anything someone can send my way, I'd love to actually learn more about this. Not calling you out or anything, I've seen other people mention this so many times before, I believe it 100%. I just missed out whenever it was this happened and I've never actually been able to find a source.

[Meta77]

25 minutes ago, Blue Blood said:

It's a bigger thread than Mania's. 

Basically we all know Mania is going to be GOTY and have simply run out of ways to gush about it, so discussion has died down. There's only so many ways to say you love something. But nobody gets bored of circular arguments about the boost and Modern Sonic, no siree!

Nah goty is nioh or breath of wild

[RictalRose0]

You guys act as if like Sonic is the only thing Sega of Japan does. They're literally the people keeping the company afloat. They purchased Atlus and a couple of other developers, Vocaloid project, the Phantasy Star 2 MMO, and used to do a lot of Arcade (i'm not sure if they're doing that anymore though). Besides, to think that Sega would really be able to keep themselves afloat doing nothing but 2D Sonic games for current gen consoles in this day and age is quite foolish UNLESS we're talking mobile, in which case of course that could happen.

Konami might have dumped Metal Gear and Silent Hill but they've been keeping themselves afloat doing pretty much the same amount of money they used to make by doing mobile games (mostly gambling stuff for mobile, and of course, Yu-Gi-Oh, which migh as well be gambling too) among other things. You really wanna see 2D Sonic only? Fine, but don't be surprised if we end up the way of Konami and others, doing nothing but mobile games. Because at the end of the day, that is totally economically viable and a option Sega could do. The Mobile market is pretty reliable if you know what you're doing. 

[JezMM]

3 hours ago, Nuggets said:

I've seen this line of thought pop up in this thread before, and while I get where it's coming from, from a business standpoint I don't really think there was any other choice for SEGA.

Tbh, good post, I can't disagree really.  In a sense you are pretty much making the same argument Kintor did so I won't let that go unappreciated for their sake, but it's easier to stomach without the all the frequent praising of the boost gameplay as being great purely on virtue of Lost World and Boom not being so.  There's no real way to phrase that without sounding like a personal dig at Kintor's argument, so I apologise if it feels that way Kintor, just, have to be honest, that angle wasn't selling it to me.

1 hour ago, Meta77 said:

I wouldn't be surprised if they had a hand in pso2 seeing all the sonic items we get. But also people assume Sega struggles I mean they make quite a bit with pso it's one reason besides branding why they stopped working on us version. Also between arcades. Vocoloids. I think hey have some cash revenues

Really doesn't mean anything, almost every relevant SEGA franchise has items in the game, and Sonic doesn't even have hugely interesting ones considering he actually gets his birthday celebrated in the lobby every year.

[Meta77]

24 minutes ago, JezMM said:

Tbh, good post, I can't disagree really.  In a sense you are pretty much making the same argument Kintor did so I won't let that go unappreciated for their sake, but it's easier to stomach without the all the frequent praising of the boost gameplay as being great purely on virtue of Lost World and Boom not being so.  There's no real way to phrase that without sounding like a personal dig at Kintor's argument, so I apologise if it feels that way Kintor, just, have to be honest, that angle wasn't selling it to me.

Really doesn't mean anything, almost every relevant SEGA franchise has items in the game, and Sonic doesn't even have hugely interesting ones considering he actually gets his birthday celebrated in the lobby every year.

My sonic statue collection and mag would like to disagree on that lol