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

[JezMM]

This is one of the biggest factors behind the whole thing about the OC creator being designed to appeal to existing OC creators.  Appearance, skills, personality - none of this is going to be even vaguely customisable to the degree that traditional fan characters are.  It's the theme park animatronic experience of OC creation, and I REALLY don't think they have existing OC creators truly in mind when they made it.  As adults we jump to that conclusion because that's the connection we have to it, but I think it's more along the lines of "hey, people have always liked making OCs... so let's put that in the game for kids to enjoy since we know they'll be naturally attracted to it" - i.e. kids who haven't made OCs before are having their interests predicted in advance thanks to the habits of existing older fans who have been through those motions already.

[Kintor]

2 hours ago, Blacklightning said:

Not too long ago you were talking about shamelessly pandering to practically any and every audience under the sun if it potentially meant a little extra money. But now, when we're talking about a practical staple of Sonic OCs all across the board, suddenly now we're talking about in-universe plausibility? What the fuck, man. You could at least be consistent about this.

You're the one that’s talking about feeling shame thanks to the inclusion of the character creator; that's exactly the kind of needless prejudice that just pushes OC Sonic fans away from the community. Regardless, the character creator is resonating strongly with Sonic fans and among othe gamer across the internet. The opportunity to create OC Sonic character, in the form of different species with a heap of customisation within those species, is the main draw here. Your argument that 'Chaos power' is is now somehow just misses the point completely. The different weapons customisation recently revealed already offers all the gameplay differentiation that you've been asking for anyway.

[Blacklightning]

Okay, you know what? I've been patient with you, but I'm not falling for this bullshit again.

2 minutes ago, Kintor said:

The different weapons customisation recently revealed already offers all the gameplay differentiation that you've been asking for anyway.

Prove it.

You've been talking about certain things as though they've been established as actual fact. Maybe they have. Maybe they haven't. You know what? I don't actually know, and by the sounds of things, neither do you. All I'm asking you to do is to link something that establishes, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that the weapons customization is actually customization and not just some powerups you find lying around in the level, so we can both continue a discussion like this with informed viewpoints. If this was established by Sega in any context whatsoever, this should be an absolutely trivial task. But if you can't do something that simple, despite being repeatedly asked to on multiple occasions, then I have no choice but to treat this as the intellectual dishonesty it is and assume you're pulling stuff out of your ass again.

You do know how to post a link, right?

[Indigo Rush]

Okay this whole thing is silly; Blacklightning is right, Kintor is not providing a meaningful argument, same old. If I may change the subject?

How long do y'all think this game is going to be?

Comparable to Unleashed and the Adventure games, or Generations and Colors?

[FriendBot]

I would like to have a bit more meat to my console Sonic games like the Adventures and Unleashed but I feel like Forces will be another short game to complete through like Colors/Gens/Lost World. So yeah, placing my bets at the latter.

[Blacklightning]

Well as far as length is concerned, part of me is worried that the very small amount of content they've actually shown us so far is somehow symptomatic of it? Information for this game has trickled in at an absolutely glacial pace, and so far we've only seen the absolute bare minimum needed to justify every playable character so far. That's three stages, arguably two for how much Orginal the Character's section recycles. I'm hardly expecting a huge info blowout the likes of which Unleashed did, which spoiled nearly every level prior to release, but there's a part of me that feels they're only revealing as much as they have because they don't have much confidence in what comes next, which has become something of a running theme whenever... well, basically anything about Forces is concerned.

Am I overthinking this? Probably. Would I like to be proven wrong? Definitely.

[SenEDDtor Missile]

12 minutes ago, Indigo Rush said:

Okay this whole thing is silly; Blacklightning is right, Kintor is not providing a meaningful argument, same old. If I may change the subject?

How long do y'all think this game is going to be?

Comparable to Unleashed and the Adventure games, or Generations and Colors?

I'd imagine it would be better received compared to Unleashed just for Classic Sonic and OC being based on the Modern/Classic gameplay as opposed to a different one altogether like the Werehog, but probably won't be as well received as Generations or Colors because it doesn't really do enough to improve the formula of Modern Sonic and seems to have gone backwards with Classic level design. The latter especially will be noticed due to Mania releasing with 1:1 Classic gameplay and Forces Classic...not being 1:1. Of course this doesn't factor in potential bias against Forces for "daring to sink to the levels of 06 by being dark and edgy", since reviewers frankly seem to be incapable of not dragging that up again the moment anything remotely dark shows up.

[PerfectChaos]

24 minutes ago, Indigo Rush said:

Okay this whole thing is silly; Blacklightning is right, Kintor is not providing a meaningful argument, same old. If I may change the subject?

How long do y'all think this game is going to be?

Comparable to Unleashed and the Adventure games, or Generations and Colors?

I am concerned about length. Classic Sonic's reappearance is surely at least partly down to wanting filler content again, and I doubt the game's budget is as big as Generations' was... so in my opinion the length may be similar to Generations, or if it's longer it'll be due to extra filler related to the custom character or something. I really hope we don't get anything like "play the same stage over and over to unlock enough doodads to proceed in the game"

[Bobnik]

28 minutes ago, Indigo Rush said:

How long do y'all think this game is going to be?

Comparable to Unleashed and the Adventure games, or Generations and Colors?

If it's somehow shorter than Mania, I'll be mad

[ChikaBoing]

I think it will be longer than Generations because Mania will also be. And this game has been longer in development. By all logic, this game should be big. No handheld versions and so on, so more resources etc. 

And how is Classic Sonic filler? 

[Detective Kaito]

I do think it's going to be longer than Generations but not by much, but only because there's a third gameplay style and there seems to be more story than there was in Generations.

[Kintor]

1 hour ago, Blacklightning said:

You've been talking about certain things as though they've been established as actual fact. Maybe they have. Maybe they haven't. You know what? I don't actually know, and by the sounds of things, neither do you. All I'm asking you to do is to link something that establishes, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that the weapons customization is actually customization and not just some powerups you find lying around in the level, so we can both continue a discussion like this with informed viewpoints. If this was established by Sega in any context whatsoever, this should be an absolutely trivial task. But if you can't do something that simple, despite being repeatedly asked to on multiple occasions, then I have no choice but to treat this as the intellectual dishonesty it is and assume you're pulling stuff out of your ass again.

Now you're just narrowing the focus of the argument, to the extent that you're claiming you'll be unhappy if Sonic Forces has customisation because it's not specifically the customisation you want. From the information provided we already know that Sonic Forces will have weapons customisation, that allows OC characters to return to previous levels and play through them again in new ways. I don't see how finding extra weapon upgrades or other forms of unlocking new weapons somehow diminishes the quality of the customisation offered by Sonic Forces. You wanted more varied gameplay and as it turns out, in light of further information, Sonic Team is already providing exactly what you wanted. This is in addition to the character creation itself, which will always remain the primary appeal of the OCs, beyond any variations within the OC gameplay.

[Indigo Rush]

9 minutes ago, Kintor said:

 

My problem with using them for customization is that Wisps are shallow and uninteresting items. If the extent of customization is getting to choose between Laser and Rocket, then that's really dumb.

But here I stand again: how long do you think Forces will be, or how long should it be?

[ChikaBoing]

Using only one wisp for an entire stage does sound shallow. Imagine playing a Zelda game where you just use one iteam througout a dungeon?

[Salamander]

1 hour ago, Bobnik said:

If it's somehow shorter than Mania, I'll be mad

I suspect Forces will probably have fewer zones than Mania, but possibly more acts and very likely higher average completion time.  Mania is projected to have a minimum of eleven zones, which is pretty generous and will probably exceed the Forces sum - but Forces will probably have an extra act per zone, which fills it out a bit.

[ChikaBoing]

Just now, FFWF said:

Mania is projected to have a minimum of eleven zones, 

Where did you hear that?

[Detective Kaito]

10 minutes ago, ChikaBoing said:

Where did you hear that?

Well, if Mania's gonna be longer than Sonic Generations, then Mania would have more zones than Generations.

[Roger_van_der_weide]

44 minutes ago, ChikaBoing said:

Using only one wisp for an entire stage does sound shallow. Imagine playing a Zelda game where you just use one iteam througout a dungeon?

Ohh, but imagine a Sonic game with a full Zelda inventory where you have to stop in your tracks, open a menu, select the metal Wisp boots, close the menu, solve a puzzle, open the menu again....
Hah, thanks for creating the worst case scenerio a Wisp game would be in my head.

Anyway, hyperbolic sarcasm aside, for the "one Wisp per run" concept, it would make sense if levels have multiple pathways you can choose, depending on what Wisp you use.
So it's less "use several Wisps per level" and more "pay attention to the level design, so you know what equipment to pick for the second playtrough." That sounds like it makes more sense for Sonic, Pace wise.
Plus it's a cheap tactic to increase the play time. You have to replay the level several times to figure out which Wisps will get you the goodies.
Exciting.

Personally, I'd hate this stuff and would mostly ignore it, but at least from a game design perspective I could see the point of it.

Not to mention, most of Sonic Colors levels focused on one type of Wisp per level too, if my faulty memory can be trusted.
At the very least I don't remember them ever creating clever set pieces where 2 or 3 Wisps had to be used in combination of each other, so unless Forces is more fluent in how you can use Wisps in tandem of each other, I don't see why having more then one Wisp is all that important.
 

And yeah, I think Forces will have less Zones/ worlds then Mania too. It's way more expensive and time consuming to create those 3d stages.
Then again, if we get more levels with the simplicity of Green Hill Zone, they might do the Lost world thing where the zones have more then one visual theme to them.
But in terms of level real estate, pretty sure it'll be smaller.


Also, if Mania having more zones then Generations is the argument for the amount of zones, shouldn't the minimum be 10? Or does the Time Eater boss battle count as a 10th zone?

[Indigo Rush]

I think 10 Zones is a safe bet for Mania. Sonic 3&K level design is meatier than people give it credit for: plus the replay value with Tails and Knuckles. Bruh.

If there are more Zones than that, I'd be very, very happy. Even if 10 is more than enough.

Wow. I'm happy in the Forces thread for once.

[Indigo Rush]

Can't wait to spam the X button for 2 hours.

[Kintor]

1 hour ago, Indigo Rush said:

My problem with using them for customization is that Wisps are shallow and uninteresting items. If the extent of customization is getting to choose between Laser and Rocket, then that's really dumb.

But here I stand again: how long do you think Forces will be, or how long should it be?

The way I see it the Wisps are something different to weapons customisation, more like fuel or ammunition. This raises the possibility that each weapon type could react differently to the Wisps. Which in turn presumably means that some weapons would be more useful in certain levels, depending on the quantity of specific Wisps available throughout that level.

As how long Sonic Forces will be? No idea but I guess a similar link to Sonic Generations if not a bit longer. We do have three gameplay styles (and accompanying levels) this time instead of two.

[Salamander]

1 hour ago, ChikaBoing said:

Where did you hear that?

The silhouette image of the Hard-Boiled Heavies is widely agreed to show five of them, a statement has been made indicating that Hard-Boiled Heavies will be exclusive to new zones, and it has also been stated that there will be more classic levels than new ones.  Therefore, minimum five new zones, minimum six classic zones, minimum eleven overall.

"Acts" is probably a better figure to draw from, though, as that allows us to factor in things like boss acts and other single-act zones - but in general, they're all a shortcut to try and determine what average or minimum total playtime might look like, where more = more.  After all, it's hard to factor in things like missions and cutscene length, so it's all just educated guesswork, really.  Classic, Custom Hero, and the reported presence of 2D platforming segments in Modern Sonic zones suggests Sega will be trying to squeeze out more playtime from Forces rather than just frittering it away on rapid Boost experiences, so I don't think Forces will play as too short a game, but it will be interesting to see how it compares to Mania overall.  I suspect that Forces will be longer, but not by an order of magnitude.

[Chris Knopps]

52 minutes ago, FFWF said:

The silhouette image of the Hard-Boiled Heavies is widely agreed to show five of them, a statement has been made indicating that Hard-Boiled Heavies will be exclusive to new zones, and it has also been stated that there will be more classic levels than new ones.  Therefore, minimum five new zones, minimum six classic zones, minimum eleven overall.

"Acts" is probably a better figure to draw from, though, as that allows us to factor in things like boss acts and other single-act zones - but in general, they're all a shortcut to try and determine what average or minimum total playtime might look like, where more = more.  After all, it's hard to factor in things like missions and cutscene length, so it's all just educated guesswork, really.  Classic, Custom Hero, and the reported presence of 2D platforming segments in Modern Sonic zones suggests Sega will be trying to squeeze out more playtime from Forces rather than just frittering it away on rapid Boost experiences, so I don't think Forces will play as too short a game, but it will be interesting to see how it compares to Mania overall.  I suspect that Forces will be longer, but not by an order of magnitude.

I think we will get five or six "new" acts featuring the heavies and the same amount of "old" acts featuring Robotnik and his various creations as the mid-boss and main boss.

Then you will have the "true" final zone as well.

I'm expecting somewhere between 11 and 13 new zones, then again 13 is a bad number...

11 and 12, that's good.

Though... It would be nice if the game was much longer...

Anyone up for DLC?

[Zers Editor]

4 minutes ago, Chris Knopps said:

Anyone up for DLC?

I will be, if it's good. Hoping in this case for another character to play and a pack of levels.

Edited May 28, 2017 by Zers Editor

[Clewis]

8 minutes ago, Chris Knopps said:

Anyone up for DLC?

Unless it's something small (e.g. adding Amy or Metal as playable characters), I'd rather they just go ahead and start development on a sequel.