Team Sonic Racing - Upcoming Sonic Racing Game

[Multikaris]

5 hours ago, Wraith said:

The context can't change if they continue to sit around and release download and mobile games. There would be turnout for a great Sonic game. It's better to do it as soon as possible while the IP still has any pull rather than dig in more to appealing to enthusiasts. Enough people have left this fandom already out of sheer boredom to let me know that well is gonna get smaller and smaller without any hook for young or casual players. 

So, something akin to the Storybooks is what’s needed? 

[StellarBlur]

The Sonic Boom initiative failed because the games weren't good and they needlessly created another subseries. What they need to do is invest in a great Sonic game so they can get mindshare back. Something that will impress the masses.

[Liars]

I haven't played the game yet, but from what I heard, it's basically a ASRT but without the transformations, which is ok by me, I enjoy the All Stars series enough. So maybe I'll get Team Sonic Racing eventually.

On 6/22/2019 at 2:16 PM, Miragnarok said:

So, something akin to the Storybooks is what’s needed? 

No, please no...

[Meta77]

What sega needs to do is stop cutting features from games and rushing them. Boom looked decent at that one E3 it was at. Thing is all those graphics and assets were on pc builds way more powerful than the U and If i remember correctly almost half the assets were dropped later.

[DabigRG]

10 minutes ago, Meta77 said:

What sega needs to do is stop cutting features from games and rushing them. Boom looked decent at that one E3 it was at. Thing is all those graphics and assets were on pc builds way more powerful than the U and If i remember correctly almost half the assets were dropped later.

Fair point. 

Say, didn't you mention completing mission mode without mods? How did you handled the Dare Devil stuff down the road? 

[Meta77]

25 minutes ago, DabigRG said:

Fair point. 

Say, didn't you mention completing mission mode without mods? How did you handled the Dare Devil stuff down the road? 

Use tails and constantly hit the red side. A few tracks you have to drift on more than others but long as you "fake a drift" it counts

[Multikaris]

22 hours ago, Liars said:

I haven't played the game yet, but from what I heard, it's basically a ASRT but without the transformations, which is ok by me, I enjoy the All Stars series enough. So maybe I'll get Team Sonic Racing eventually.

No, please no...

Why not? It would provide plenty of new content. 

[DabigRG]

17 hours ago, Meta77 said:

Use tails and constantly hit the red side. A few tracks you have to drift on more than others but long as you "fake a drift" it counts

Huh. Well I guess that means I really am doing the right strategy, more or less.

What is it about Tails that gives him an edge over other Technique type, though?

[Meta77]

39 minutes ago, DabigRG said:

Huh. Well I guess that means I really am doing the right strategy, more or less.

What is it about Tails that gives him an edge over other Technique type, though?

Noting that I know of. Just his karts shape helped me time things better. That plus I just stuck with sonic team the entire match

[DabigRG]

2 hours ago, Meta77 said:

Noting that I know of. Just his karts shape helped me time things better. That plus I just stuck with sonic team the entire match

Ah, okay.

Personally, I rarely touch any of them. Or Shadow, Metal, or even Eggman.

[JezMM]

On 6/24/2019 at 1:21 AM, Meta77 said:

What sega needs to do is stop cutting features from games and rushing them. Boom looked decent at that one E3 it was at. Thing is all those graphics and assets were on pc builds way more powerful than the U and If i remember correctly almost half the assets were dropped later.

The specific issue is that they were building for more powerful consoles, then SEGA shifted development to the Wii U as part of their three-game exclusive deal going on with Nintendo at the time, and the engine being used for Boom (I think it was Unreal?) had next to no documentation or compatibility with being port to the Wii U.  They spent a huge deal of time just trying to get the game to run on the Wii U at all, so if anything major got cut it was likely due to that timesink (although content gets cut from in-development games all the time and it's important to not get too attached to stuff that doesn't show up in the final game - it's often for a good reason or ended up changing into some other content as development progressed).

[Meta77]

4 hours ago, JezMM said:

The specific issue is that they were building for more powerful consoles, then SEGA shifted development to the Wii U as part of their three-game exclusive deal going on with Nintendo at the time, and the engine being used for Boom (I think it was Unreal?) had next to no documentation or compatibility with being port to the Wii U.  They spent a huge deal of time just trying to get the game to run on the Wii U at all, so if anything major got cut it was likely due to that timesink (although content gets cut from in-development games all the time and it's important to not get too attached to stuff that doesn't show up in the final game - it's often for a good reason or ended up changing into some other content as development progressed).

*looks at the pictures from sonic forces being a darker war like game and that one infinite picture in the techno like digital world which was more than likely a final boss fight and sheds a single  tear* TT_TT

[Dejimon11]

On 6/20/2019 at 8:19 PM, Milo said:

NPD May charts are in. TSR barely made the general Top 20 at #19. Nowhere to be seen on any of the top ten platform-specific charts, not even on Switch.

For perspective, Sonic usually fails to make the general Top 10 / Top 20 for monthly NPD charts--this just shows how quiet May was if a Sonic game could even manage to tunnel into the bottom. (For further perspective--TSR was bested by the five-years-and-still-karting Mario Kart 8, which took #11 in the Top 20 and #2 on the Switch charts.)

One can only imagine how June's NPD is going to look with Crash Team Racing...will TSR even appear to begin with? (Spoiler: don't count on it.)

By the by, it kinda seems as if making Sonic games that are even cheaper in budget / content / presentation and less advertised than before isn't helping sales. Time to give the game series a honest break on the shelf for the next several years? Total War: Three Kingdoms, another Sega game, had a better debut (#3 in general Top 10) than any Sonic game, probably to date; so it's not like you don't have other franchises (active or dormant) to lie back on. You're not rushing out two/three/four Sonic games a year like what was going on in, say, 2009 either.

Meanwhile in the UK Crash Team Racing has already sold four times as many copies of Team Sonic Racing within 3 days.   Ironically even tho both games have similar issues(Online, the method of unlocking stuff, brutal A.I. etc) I guess that shows what good marketing will do. 

[Conando]

It kind of also helps that CTR is the only Mario Kart Clone, that I can think of, fueled little kids’ console wars. Nostalgia is a powerful thing.

[Dejimon11]

I'd argue that the previous two Sumo racing games especially transformed helped filled the void as the "Mario Kart alternative." I don't want to use the nostalgia as an excuse considering that Sonic within the last God knows how many years has been using nostalgia as it's main selling point. 

[DabigRG]

Oh boy....

[Liars]

On 6/24/2019 at 3:10 PM, Miragnarok said:

Why not? It would provide plenty of new content. 

The storybook games were pretty bad and forgotten, except maybe for the soundtrack.

But I'm open to the idea if they include stuff from these games in a creative way or maybe as a reference in TSR (if they didn't already, I haven't played the game yet).

[thumbs13]

2 hours ago, Liars said:

The storybook games were pretty bad and forgotten, except maybe for the soundtrack.

But I'm open to the idea if they include stuff from these games in a creative way or maybe as a reference in TSR (if they didn't already, I haven't played the game yet).

Are they forgotten? By fans, everybody always talks about loving Black Knight's characterization and voice direction, and the "I'm not a rat, I'm a hedgehog" scene was memed a lot.
By Sega, it got referenced in Generations and the Comics, runners gives it love, Knight of the Wind and Seven Rings in hand are in both mario and sonic and smash, and the Sonic Movie twitter referenced it.
Bad is arguable, but the games aren't really forgotten.

[LukA8]

The thing is CTR deserved a much higher sales debut than TSR, I won't compare budgets since it's different companies but it's obvious how much passion and care went into the former, while Sumo were forced to take several shortcuts with the game to the point it ended up as a Sonic compilation of All-Stars content with half a new game built around it. If TSR was moving just as many copies Sega would get the wrong message from, getting away with not putting any effort into their titles.

However it wasn't "murdered by CTR" either the way some made it out to be. The game rose six places up to #12 on the UK charts this week after a full month, so if it won't continue doing well in the long run then that's not because kart racers are unable to coexist but because Sega are unwilling to patch and support it at all. The online mode is still awful despite potentially being a blast thanks to the team gameplay, but my guess is they'll move on to a sequel instead for 2022/23, just like the jump from All-Stars Racing to Transformed. Iizuka talking about Dodon Pa returning for future racing competitions pretty much confirms this.

[Cayenne]

8 hours ago, Liars said:

The storybook games were pretty bad and forgotten, except maybe for the soundtrack.

But I'm open to the idea if they include stuff from these games in a creative way or maybe as a reference in TSR (if they didn't already, I haven't played the game yet).

I'm not a big fan of Secret Rings and Black Knight's gameplay or characterization (I simply adore their art direction, though), but I wouldn't put them in the same level of awful games like 06 or Shadow the Hedgehog. Actually, if i'm not mistaken, Secret Rings was the most well-received 3D Sonic game after the release of both titles.

Also, as thumbs13 said, SR and BK are still very popular among the fandom thanks to their plots and soundtracks.

[Autosaver]

A big warning came from the announcement that the B team of Sumo was heading this project while the A team (ASRT) was working on bigger projects. I believe the main team as working on Crackdown 3 for the longest time, and have quite a few other projects in the pipeline.

I didn’t have as much faith in the B team especially because the game looks like the budget was severely restricted. The game also took out a lot of beloved features and focused on recycling Sonic assets. The performance issues also seem like they didn’t have as much time to optimize, or were just not as good as the previous teams when it comes to refining the game.

Overall not sure why this game was even made when it seems like an afterthought. My only guess is they need another game to close the gaps while also pushing sales of Sonic merchandise.

[DabigRG]

26 minutes ago, Autosaver said:

 

Overall not sure why this game was even made when it seems like an afterthought. My only guess is they need another game to close the gaps while also pushing sales of Sonic merchandise.

Eh, ultimately, I'd say it was decent choice. 

[Autosaver]

Just now, DabigRG said:

Eh, ultimately, I'd say it was decent choice. 

Poor sales and mixed reception critically wise? If they’re trying to turn the series around, they need to prioritize correctly. Mania was a good restart, Forces/Team Racing is just taking steps back. Sonic deserves better.

also I’m totally not mad that Sonic Riders is dead.

[DabigRG]

Just now, Autosaver said:

Poor sales and mixed reception critically wise? If they’re trying to turn the series around, they need to prioritize correctly. Mania was a good restart, Forces/Team Racing is just taking steps back. Sonic deserves better.

also I’m totally not mad that Sonic Riders is dead.

Wait, poor sales? I thought this reached a decent place on a chart or whatever?

[Ryannumber1gamer]

Team Sonic Racing isn't a bad game though, certainly not one that's gonna knock Sonic's rep down. If anything, the team mechanic was done very well despite sounding utterly idiotic. It plays distinct enough to separate itself from MK and Crash too.

That said, I think what ultimately caused it's downfall is just it's budget. I think if it got the budget of All-Stars Transformed, this could've really been fantastic.