Sonic Forces- Classic GHZ Gameplay

[Wraith]

I defended Colors and Gens and praised the new direction of Sonic team and then they gave me Lost World, probably my least favorite 3D Sonic game to play. It was like karma, and it even had all of the stuff I was defending in it like wisps and lighter stories and Sonic only...except done way worse. Most of my arguments about modern sonic fell apart for me when that game came out and it feels like the people who were still holding out are gonna have similar feeling once this game is out.

Truth is, Sonic Team gonna Sonic Team. Doesn't really matter what idea you give them work with or what arbitrary rules you set about what they can and can't do. There's no amount of time you can give them. They must improve mechanically as a studio. They must learn to anticipate and build their games up instead of stagnating when they get to a safe zone. 

[McGroose]

I have to hand it to Sonic Team, they both impressed and disappointed me in ways I didn't expect. The visual improvement from the last build we saw is obvious, with much richer colors and more developed background, the graphics for this game look great. Should've known that Sega would never let us down on the graphical department. What it seems like Sonic Team fucked up with is the Music. I'm honestly not sure what to think about it. I keep leaning back and forth between thinking it sounds like utter ass and considering the track decent. The level design is just mediocre, not terrible or great, just mediocre. I've seen far worse. What irritates me is how there seems to be a speed booster that gives you temporary momentum now. Is Sonic Team so convinced that their level design sucks that they believe placing a speed booster every couple or so times throughout the level, especially in the most unnecessary places, will impress the player somehow? This is probably the most irrelevant complaint I have, but I really dislike hidden springs. I'd just prefer if the springs were always visible instead of seeing a path lead up to a brick wall. 

Is it bad that seeing this gameplay only wants me want to play Sonic Mania more? It's so strange to see Sonic Team fix some mistakes and fuck up other things they already fixed.

[Captain Fun]

9 minutes ago, Indigo Rush said:

That's the point. WHY IS IT THERE. WHY IS IT NEEDED. IT'S NOT.

Of course it's not needed. Maybe my post came out wrong, but when I said "I don't get it" I mean "I don't know why that booster is there. They could easily just lock Sonic's speed like they do anyway and have it not look as stupid.

6 minutes ago, Celestia said:

Maybe this unintentionally revealed how they did that in Gens, they were placing dash pads and then making them invisible.

In fact....maybe that's why the sound effect for the pads in this footage has that noise that's associated with the S-tubes. Oh my god

 

[Jango]

Well, of course Indigo, but c'mon, don't ya think using someone's else name as an insult is kinda rude?

you're a Jun Senoue

The music sounds bad, Sonic 4's music sounds bad, they sound similar, it sounds like he made it. the end.

 

Stahp, or I'm gonna tell ya mom >

 

It sounds bad right now. RIGHT NOW. LET'S WAIT AND SEE. PREASE LOOK FORWARD. ARIGATOU.

[Cyrus]

Just as I thought, it's Classic Sonic gameplay in Lost World level design... Huh... I liked Lost World's 2D levels, but they're not for classic Sonic, unless he plays differently this time, which seems to be the case cause I see lots of weird shit going on with the momentum. It kinda looks like they've given classic Sonic Lost World movement. Odd choice and bound to piss a lot of people off but I'm not gonna lie and say I wouldn't personally get a kick out of it.

The graphics look a LOT better this time, thank god, and I like the music, it's cute. I get the feeling it's stylistically simplistic to exaggerate the Genesis sound font and to set up a bait and switch situation, having the rest of classic's music fit the tone of the modern Sonic music we heard. I feel more of a self awareness in it than Sonic 4 Episode I's "let's not bother to change the decay settings on this synth preset and pass it off as 16 bit music" thing.

[Shaddy Zaphod]

I don't get "Lost World 2D" vibes from this at all, actually (which is good because the 2D sections were the worstpart of that game). Lost World had very cramped, simplistic-feeling 2D, whereas this would almost have too much going on in it's design if it weren't trying to push you down the standard route the whole time.

[BlueFlare]

I feel pretty damn disappointed. If that was the opening level then it is very bland, though it may not be final. I don't know. Sonic's momentum and physics seem weird, maybe it is the more zoomed out view. I know Generations Classic sections weren't as spectacular as the Genesis cousins, but I was hoping them get it a bit closer to them this time. Actually, it's gone the opposite way.

[Red Hot Jack]

I'm gonna disagree again and say the 2D stages level design in Lost World sucked and this is an improvement. What's bothering me is that there is sand in the background for no reason at all.

[BubbleButt TV]

35 minutes ago, Marcello said:

Oh, right. OK, then. I was confused by the sad face.

I was trying to do a surprised face but it came out weird 'cause I'm doing all this on my phone, cut me some slack here haha ?

But yeah I just thought it was cool considering the fact that we didn't get shields out of item boxes in both Generations and Lost World, so this is pretty neat.

[Ellipsis-Ultima]

The yellow springs just pop up and then go back down again after being used. That is kinda irritating and ruins the speed momentum to be honest.

[Nepenthe]

1 minute ago, Chameleon94 said:

I'm gonna disagree again and say the 2D stages level design in Lost World sucked and this is an improvement. What's bothering me is that there is sand in the background for no reason at all.

I mean... does there need to be a reason for weird environmental gimmicks in a series that is now entertaining candy planets?

[Badnik Mechanic]

So here is something amazingly stupid and I would not be surprised if this is the same for every single 'tube' in every single level.

How the speed tubes appear to work in this game... you 'run' into them, at a key point close to the start of the first 'drop' when the curve begins, the game automatically puts you into a ball mode... this automatically boosts your speed. So in other words... these become automated sections.

This in itself is really poor... but this is where things get even more stupid.

Ladies and Gentlemen... The Green Hill Zone.

This is the first speed tube, at the start of the bend, Sonic gets an artificial speed boost regardless of the speed he is going at. Here is how this tube ends.

With a booster... what isn't pictured is that you exit this towards a vertical loop, now this booster might be ok or justifiable if there was not enough space or a door shuts which can trap the player and there's no possible way for momentum to get up that vertical path... however, there is... it's called the spin dash.

For info... this was a design choice from Sonic 2's metropolis zone, however there was no booster... the player had to use the spin dash to escape...

For more stupidity points.. the time between these auto boosters is less than 1 second.

Here is the next tube.

Booster right at the start of the automated section... again no reason for this other than to hand hold and point a direction... there is doubly no reason for this because...

Again, the player gets an auto boost (very hard to notice because of the booster being less than a second ago, virtually no loss in speed, but it is definitely there. So we have 2 boosters literally right next to each other... in an automated section...

Here is the next loop... .. ... which is less than a second at the end of the other...

Again, automated moment, players speed is set to max... This drop is a double drop, so gravity plays a part in increasing the players speed... So why does the loop end with this.

Another max speed booster... for a small incline hill... there is no reason for this, the momentum of the loop drop is more than enough to get up this incline... furthermore, there are no hazards here to even justify artificially increasing the players speed to this level.

 

So... anyone even want to try to defend/apologise for these design choices?

[Red Hot Jack]

3 minutes ago, Nepenthe said:

I mean... does there need to be a reason for weird environmental gimmicks in a series that is now entertaining candy planets?

I mean they added sand but it's not used in the stage at all outside of background. Also, some people are saying the music is a placeholder, at least I hope the quality of it is a work in progress.

[StaticMania]

3 minutes ago, Fusion Ellipsis said:

The yellow springs just pop up and then go back down again after being used. That is kinda irritating and ruins the speed momentum to be honest.

It doesn't really matter that the springs cancel momentum, most of them are right next to the ledge, that would stop you anyway.

 

They're just automated again.

[Sonikko]

3 minutes ago, Mayor D said:

So here is something amazingly stupid and I would not be surprised if this is the same for every single 'tube' in every single level.

How the speed tubes appear to work in this game... you 'run' into them, at a key point close to the start of the first 'drop' when the curve begins, the game automatically puts you into a ball mode... this automatically boosts your speed. So in other words... these become automated sections.

This in itself is really poor... but this is where things get even more stupid.

Ladies and Gentlemen... The Green Hill Zone.

This is the first speed tube, at the start of the bend, Sonic gets an artificial speed boost regardless of the speed he is going at. Here is how this tube ends.

With a booster... what isn't pictured is that you exit this towards a vertical loop, now this booster might be ok or justifiable if there was not enough space or a door shuts which can trap the player and there's no possible way for momentum to get up that vertical path... however, there is... it's called the spin dash.

For info... this was a design choice from Sonic 2's metropolis zone, however there was no booster... the player had to use the spin dash to escape...

For more stupidity points.. the time between these auto boosters is less than 1 second.

Here is the next tube.

Booster right at the start of the automated section... again no reason for this other than to hand hold and point a direction... there is doubly no reason for this because...

Again, the player gets an auto boost (very hard to notice because of the booster being less than a second ago, virtually no loss in speed, but it is definitely there. So we have 2 boosters literally right next to each other... in an automated section...

Here is the next loop... .. ... which is less than a second at the end of the other...

Again, automated moment, players speed is set to max... This drop is a double drop, so gravity plays a part in increasing the players speed... So why does the loop end with this.

Another max speed booster... for a small incline hill... there is no reason for this, the momentum of the loop drop is more than enough to get up this incline... furthermore, there are no hazards here to even justify artificially increasing the players speed to this level.

 

So... anyone even want to try to defend/apologise for these design choices?

Totally agree with that.

There were these issues in Generations too, but at least we didn't have boostpads in the tunnels, there's really no use for that. Just go all the way and make the whole section automated, since your physics system is not working as it should.

What bugs me is that as soon as the scripted sequence is over, you lose all momentum, like it happened in Lost World. It didn't happen in Sonic Generations though, you could keep the speed you gained, or at least some of it. This in particular looks really bad, I can't get over it.

To those who are saying that this is just the first level... This clearly shows what direction they are going with, how they are approacing level design and how the physics system plays. We might have not seen the whole game yet, but I, and many others, predicted these very issues from the 7 seconds footage we got in the Nintendo Direct. Don't expect the rest of the classic levels to be much better than this, because they won't.

[Nepenthe]

6 minutes ago, Chameleon94 said:

I mean they added sand but it's not used in the stage at all outside of background. Also, some people are saying the music is a placeholder, at least I hope the quality of it is a work in progress.

It'll probably be explained in the actual narrative. Maybe Eggman's messing with the water supply or climate or something; I dunno. He's always fucking up the environment in some way.

[Badnik Mechanic]

1 minute ago, Sonikko said:

To those who are saying that this is just the first level...

It absolutely won't just be the first level. That speed tube is almost certainly going to have the same code behind it for other speed tubes...

It's possible for this to not be the case but I would be very surprised if they did anything to the physics and behaviour of the S bend other than textures/decoration of it. 

[TheOcelot]

Noticed a weird moving platform at 0:30 in the video:

Seems kind of pointless as Sonic is bounced up automatically at the bottom right corner (of the screenshot) when he hits the invisible spring. Sonic could probably use it to backtrack but once he bounces up he could use the spindash to get back to the previous area. The moving platform just seems like an unnecessary design.

The design of this stage as a whole really doesn't impress.

[Ayliffe]

Literally every time I see an invisible spring in this I get the urge to punch a member of Sonic Team in the face.

 

Like seriously, IT IS NOT GOOD DO NOT DO THIS

[The Deleter]

Tbh I'd much rather have visible dash pads inside the S-loops than invisible ones; at least then people know what to blame for the section feeling off in that case, rather than being fooled into thinking that they were doing a thing with momentum and it's all good because of it.

Hidden (and scripted) sections just mask the much larger problems with the momentum overall.

[StaticMania]

6 minutes ago, OcelotBot said:

Noticed a weird moving platform at 0:30 in the video:

Seems kind of pointless as Sonic is bounced up automatically at the bottom right corner (of the screenshot) when he hits the invisible spring. Sonic could probably use it to backtrack but once he bounces up he could use the spindash to get back to the previous area. The moving platform just seems like an unnecessary design.

The design of this stage as a whole really doesn't impress.

The spring is the pointless part. Having actual necessary platforming would've been fine.

[Cyrus]

It looks like Lost World to me cause it's got the same long platforms with mininal slopes and at most two pathways thing Lost World had. I'm getting heavy Windy Hill Zone 2 vibes from it.

[JezMM]

1 minute ago, OcelotBot said:

Noticed a weird moving platform at 0:30 in the video:

Seems kind of pointless as Sonic is bounced up automatically at the bottom right corner (of the screenshot) when he hits the invisible spring. Sonic could probably use it to backtrack but once he bounces up he could use the spindash to get back to the previous area. The moving platform just seems like an unnecessary design.

The design of this stage as a whole really doesn't impress.

I think the tradeoff is that if you take the moving platform, you get rings but... honestly generally, speed is more valuable, and the stage hurtles you into the spring anyway?  Guess the moving platform only really matters if you come from the bottom path.

It's not a big deal though, Sonic games, especially 2D ones, are full of platforms that only offer a very VERY brief "choice" on how to move forward in a tiny area.  You can find examples in all the 2D Sonic games.

[Cyrus]

I see a lot of Sonic 4 comparisons but I don't hear Sonic 4 at all, it doesn't have the constant squelch (dying cats) those soundtracks had. It's got its own chiptuney thing going on. Are the comparisons just solely based on it being chiptune?

[Ayliffe]

2 minutes ago, Cyrus said:

Are the comparisons just solely based on it being chiptune?

Nah, the comparisons are because they both sound really naff :V