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

[Wraith]

Sonic CD's opening and ending are pretty much the best sonic cutscenes ever and they were from 1993. They convey so much about his personality with nothing but visuals. The way he uses his momentum to roll and vault over obstacles, taunting robots into attacking eachother, only ever stopping to admire a piece of nature he just restored. Sega needs to start by looking at those if they ever want to bring more energy back to their scenes.

[StaticMania]

 

 

Quote

Solid characters and a strong context can often carry scenes much further than any physical action could.

That's nice and all, but Sonic the Hedgehog has to have flare and style.

 

And in that regard, less is not more. It's just less.

[Sega DogTagz]

Well, while we are just throwing around Sonic doing cool stuff for the sake of cool stuff, The Riders series is pretty snazzy.

 

 

[Kintor]

4 hours ago, Indigo Rush said:

No, we're not.

You should be though when you're playing semantics like that. If you want to waste your time denying that Sonic 4 is actually 'Sonic 4' then you can't rely on Sonic Advance as a stand in. After all, Sonic Pocket Adventure was released in 1999, years before Sonic Advance, making it the true Sonic 4 by your logic.

...

Anyway, as for cool Sonic cutscences how about this:

I'm sure that just about everyone has seen this cutscence multiple times but it's still iconic. This is Sonic's sense of style in a nutshell: he doesn't just escape from a military helicopter - he uses it as an opportunity to take up sky diving while snowboarding!

[StaticMania]

Seeing as Pocket Adventure is just a mash of old levels with mismatched music, it's more like...a "best of" of all the original trilogy's levels.

 

Not really a Sonic 4.

[Kintor]

8 minutes ago, StaticMania said:

Seeing as Pocket Adventure is just a mash of old levels with mismatched music, it's more like...a "best of" of all the original trilogy's levels.

 

Not really a Sonic 4.

There's more to it than that. Sonic Pocket Adventure is a reimaging of Sonic's 2D gameplay on Neo Geo hardware. It laid the foundation of Dimps understanding of how a 2D Sonic could work; which when you think about it isn't so different to how things like Freedom Planet, Spark the Electric Jester and even Sonic Mania all have their heritage in earlier efforts to replicate the classic gameplay. For this reason Sonic Pocket Adventure has as much right to call itself Sonic 4 as anything else, if for some reason you don't want to actually call Sonic 4, 'Sonic 4'.

[Blue Blood]

I honestly thought that the Lost World intro CGI was fairly cool.

Three-point landing, spindashing past the Deadly Six and under Zomom, slow-mo dodging Zavok's punch and cartwheeling up a wall into stylish flip with a cheesy grin on landing. It was short and not nearly full of the the attitude of SCD's intro, but it was good. The rest of the game didn't even try to follow suit though.

EURGH...

I can deal with Sonic cracking one-liners and making a few puns here and there, but Sonic's brand of cool in the games these days is generally of the ironic 'so bad it's good' variety rather than actually being at all awesome. And even then it frequently misses the mark. It's just just down to the Sonic's brand management by SEGA these days. It's all considerably tamer that it was even just a decade ago and focused more on comedy than action, so the definition of cool has changed from "badass" to "funny". 

This is actually something that I just don't know how to judge in Forces yet. If all we'd seen was Modern Sonic, the theme tune and War Zone, I'd be saying it lookslike they're going squarely for the badass angle once again. But we've got Classic Sonic appearing, and SEGA seem to think he's just a cute little baby Sonic and have no idea that he was always portrayed as being totally awesome back in the day. Classic Sonic = Modern Sonic; It's just one character drawn differently. Generations could get away with it because it was a game made to celebrate the entire series. Forces inclusion of Classic Sonic speaks of total brand confusion though.

I hope that we to see both Sonics being badass cool in the game, but I can't say that I'm hopeful. Funny and cute moments are great too, because there's got to be something to counterbalance the tone and stop it from being monotonous. And I'm fairly certain that, save for a few people who suffered aneurysms from Lost World's announcement, nobody past the age of 13 actually thinks that this is cool. Sonic just needs a bit of cheese, and should be doing stuff both because he think it looks fun and because it'll be fun for the player to see. Moments like hitching a ride on a passing airship, escaping from a helicopter in San Francisco on a snowboard and jettisoning off a whale's water spout are the sorts of thing I'm talking about. Just going to have to wait and see how Forces delivers on this front both in gameplay and cutscenes.

Oh hey I forgot LEGO Sonic:

Whoever wrote and storyboarded those cutscenes got Sonic. They had style, they had humour, they had reference and they had badassery. The humour is the brand we've had since Colours, but actually funny. And then he's constantly in action too, both with his words and his actions. He's not sterile. God damnit now I'm angry that a bloody LEGO game is the best portrayal of Sonic in years. 

5 hours ago, Kintor said:

There's more to it than that. Sonic Pocket Adventure is a reimaging of Sonic's 2D gameplay on Neo Geo hardware. It laid the foundation of Dimps understanding of how a 2D Sonic could work; which when you think about it isn't so different to how things like Freedom Planet, Spark the Electric Jester and even Sonic Mania all have their heritage in earlier efforts to replicate the classic gameplay. For this reason Sonic Pocket Adventure has as much right to call itself Sonic 4 as anything else, if for some reason you don't want to actually call Sonic 4, 'Sonic 4'.

Do you just not understand jokes and sarcasm, or what? Because like, none of this discussion has been serious. It's just lulz. 

[JezMM]

1 hour ago, StaticMania said:

Seeing as Pocket Adventure is just a mash of old levels with mismatched music, it's more like...a "best of" of all the original trilogy's levels.

 

Not really a Sonic 4.

This might've been exactly the joke and your tone made me uncertain but... didn't you just describe the actual Sonic 4.

[Marcello]

On the topic of coolness, I've always loved the Excalibur Sonic transformation scene:

He doesn't really do much, but it looks cool.

[Indigo Rush]

6 hours ago, Kintor said:

You should be though when you're playing semantics like that. If you want to waste your time denying that Sonic 4 is actually 'Sonic 4' then you can't rely on Sonic Advance as a stand in. After all, Sonic Pocket Adventure was released in 1999, years before Sonic Advance, making it the true Sonic 4 by your logic

who hurt you

[Meta77]

2 hours ago, Indigo Rush said:

who hurt you

I'm guessing Sega or the neo geo.

[Milo]

7 hours ago, JezMM said:

This might've been exactly the joke and your tone made me uncertain but... didn't you just describe the actual Sonic 4.

Almost. Sonic Pocket Adventure had more accurate physics/gameplay to the original games than Sonic 4 did, but that kinda goes without saying.

[Sonictrainer]

13 hours ago, Kintor said:

You should be though when you're playing semantics like that. If you want to waste your time denying that Sonic 4 is actually 'Sonic 4' then you can't rely on Sonic Advance as a stand in. After all, Sonic Pocket Adventure was released in 1999, years before Sonic Advance, making it the true Sonic 4 by your logic.

 

 

I'm pretty sure the logic was that Sonic Advance manages to keep the classic gameplay and physics while having 4 characters (like Tails in Sonic 2, Knuckles in 3, and now Amy), new zones, enemes, and bosses (none of them which are remixed like in Pocket Adventure except for 2 Bosses in the Final Zone), a new special stage (no Halfpipe Highways here), and other features.

Even the boxart looks like a Sonic 4 game.

Sonic Pocket Adventure is like a Handheld Generations of the Genesis Triology only but with Classic Sonic having Green eyes, Sonic 2 got too much love, and someone decided to change the names of some levels to hide the fact.

There's nothing new there except a few Bosses.

11 hours ago, Kintor said:

There's more to it than that. Sonic Pocket Adventure is a reimaging of Sonic's 2D gameplay on Neo Geo hardware. It laid the foundation of Dimps understanding of how a 2D Sonic could work; which when you think about it isn't so different to how things like Freedom Planet, Spark the Electric Jester and even Sonic Mania all have their heritage in earlier efforts to replicate the classic gameplay. For this reason Sonic Pocket Adventure has as much right to call itself Sonic 4 as anything else, if for some reason you don't want to actually call Sonic 4, 'Sonic 4'.

 

 

Sonic Advance and Sonic Mania still have original levels and Tails and Knuckles playable, though.

Also, a true Sonic 4 should never copy and paste all of its Zones from Sonic 2.

[Nepenthe]

I honestly can't believe a joke between me and Blue Blood devolved into a fucking argument.

Christ, guys.

[Blue Blood]

26 minutes ago, Nepenthe said:

I honestly can't believe a joke between me and Blue Blood devolved into a fucking argument.

Christ, guys.

The sad thing is, I can believe it.

We're a classy bunch.

[Shadowlax]

6 hours ago, Meta77 said:

I'm guessing Sega or the neo geo.

Sega hurt a lot of people

[Kintor]

5 hours ago, Sonictrainer said:

Sonic Advance and Sonic Mania still have original levels and Tails and Knuckles playable, though.

Also, a true Sonic 4 should never copy and paste all of its Zones from Sonic 2.

This whole idea of looking for a 'true' Sonic 4 is something of an embarrassment for the Sonic fanbase. Naming conventions have never been that important or consistent for the Sonic franchise, otherwise we'd be up to (what?) Sonic the Hedgehog 95-ish by now. When it comes to naming Sonic games: sounding cool has always trumped sequential numbering. Trying to deny that the game called 'Sonic 4' isn't the real Sonic 4 just makes us all look petty, it's frankly not that big of a deal.

Still the naming conventions for Sonic's first multiplatform handhelds games do make sense in their own way.

Sonic Pocket Adventure - on the Neo Geo Pocket Colour

Sonic Advance - on the Game Boy Advance

At the time it was more important to convey the message that these Sonic games were available on non-Sega consoles. Wasting the Sonic 4 moniker on either title wouldn't get that crucial piece of information across.

[Milo]

When people (unironically, anyway) say "Sonic 4 is not the real Sonic 4" they're not trying to literally dispute the fact that the game called Sonic 4 is actually not Sonic 4. They're just using that to say the game doesn't live up to its intended title/purpose/principles/whathaveyou as a sequel to the Genesis games. I thought that was pretty obvious by now, and trying to argue semantics on it is a weak rebuttal that got burnt out a long time ago.

If Sonic 2006 was actually called Sonic Adventure 3 I can guarantee several people would also respond to it the same way, due to how it would be perceived as a shoddy sequel to those titles in addition to being perceived as a shoddy game on its own terms.

[Chris Knopps]

Sonic 4 is literally a case of some guys making a game, no particular title likely in mind at the moment, then another guy shooting faster than a bullet with an "IT'S SONIC 4 EVERYONE!!" headline, making the guys working on the game let out an "aw F@$K!!" heard around the world.

And whats with all this stuff anyways? Sonic Forces people.

[Kintor]

29 minutes ago, Gabe said:

When people (unironically, anyway) say "Sonic 4 is not the real Sonic 4" they're not trying to literally dispute the fact that the game called Sonic 4 is actually not Sonic 4. They're just using that to say the game doesn't live up to its intended title/purpose/principles/whathaveyou as a sequel to the Genesis games. I thought that was pretty obvious by now, and trying to argue semantics on it is a weak rebuttal that got burnt out a long time ago.

If Sonic 2006 was actually called Sonic Adventure 3 I can guarantee several people would also respond to it the same way, due to how it would be perceived as a shoddy sequel to those titles in addition to being perceived as a shoddy game on its own terms.

Denying Sonic 4 its name, literally or not, is itself an act of semantics; that's why I pointed to Sonic Pocket Adventure to refute that claim. It's not a nuanced approach, when all anyone remembers is that some Sonic fans are still freaking out over the name 'Sonic 4' seven years later. Personally, I don't particularly care someone thinks Sonic 4 is worthy of title or not, because that misses the bigger picture completely.

Sonic 4 is just a name, it has no real significance because the Sonic franchise itself has never placed much importance on naming conventions. Using 'Sonic 4' was useful to convey the point that the game was a retro revival of sorts but it doesn't mean anything important beyond that. It's far more useful to focus on what new 2D Sonic game do to learn from the experience of Sonic 4, regardless of what name they are finally given upon release.

[Monkey Destruction Switch]

Wow er...this tangent is pretty irrelevant gang. How about we talk about Sonic Forces or something.

[Radiant Hero Ike]

2 minutes ago, Monkey Destruction Switch said:

Wow er...this tangent is pretty irrelevant gang. How about we talk about Sonic Forces or something.

Sure.

Do you think the lyrics to the main theme will go with the tune of the main guitar or will it replace the guitar? Dunno much about music, so I'm thinking it might be the former... Or maybe it'll have its own melody. Not sure.

[ProfessorZolo]

I mean, if we're really going full-on with the semantics, then technically, Sonic 3 is Sonic 4.

...What?

[Chris Knopps]

If the final boss is another Death Egg Robo revisit and/or redesign...

No more... No more Egg Robo's...

Did it in Genesis, did it in Heroes, did it in S4, did it in Lost World...

They're ALREADY all over the place in Forces...

Done with those things. And yes, I consider the bosses a bunch of Egg Robo redesigns in Heroes.

Give us something that doesn't look like Eggman again. Put him in something...

Original

[Polkadi~☆]

4 minutes ago, Chris Knopps said:

If the final boss is another Death Egg Robo revisit and/or redesign...

No more... No more Egg Robo's...

Did it in Genesis, did it in Heroes, did it in S4, did it in Lost World...

Done with those things. And yes, I consider the bosses a bunch of Egg Robo redesigns in Heroes.

Give us something that doesn't look like Eggman again. Put him in something...

Original

So you're telling us to have a self-centred and extremely egotistic doctor controlling something that doesn't look like the doctor?

He names things with the prefix "Egg-", if you aren't convinced.