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Anyone have ideas for a Sonic spin-off?


ChaoLaChao

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As in the title. I'd love to be the first:

If recent rumors regarding Project Sonic 2022 are to be believed, it will be a BoTW/Genshin clone, and thus an "open-world action RPG with non-linear player progression". Personally, I don't believe this, as recent games in the series (especially Forces :() have convinced me that Sega may be treating upcoming titles as budget ones, which may not work with Ubisoft-like game design philosophy. But that doesn't change one thing, though: the concept of a "true" action RPG in the world of Sonic the Hedgehog sounds very, very intriguing.

To better understand what I'm thinking about, I'll use Borderlands 2 as an analogy - it's advertised as an "open-world FPSRPG", but underneath the thin layer of vehicular combat is a typical corridor shooter that, despite its linear level design, has an impressive variety of enemies, well thought out character classes, and a phenomenal randomly generated loot system with various active and passive perks depending on the brand [of loot] and skills players have invested their experience points in. Simply put, it's a lovely hybrid of Halo and Diablo, which translates into a lot of replayability with (or without) friends, thanks to the brilliantly implemented co-op mode.

That's how Sonic Quattro was born.

As I wrote, the open world in Borderlands 2 is purely an illusion consisting of dozens of corridor shooter levels (the equivalent of dungeons) connected to each other by several vast areas that can be traversed by vehicles, as well as explored through multiple side-missions (the equivalent of overworlds). However, what if instead of the corridor shooter levels there were... 3D platformer ones? In this case, it could be Sonic/Shadow stages from Sonic Adventure 2, which stand out with their interesting mechanics (Final Chase and its mix of grinding rails and gravity drums), great pace (Green Forest and its default 8-minute limit), but also linearity like the aforementioned dungeons. At the same time, these could be Sonic Heroes style stages, where a lot of emphasis was placed on cooperation between playable characters (almost like an action RPG) and fighting a truckload of enemies that have a certain pool of health (also almost like an action RPG!).

So... hear me out:

Sonic Quattro is a full-fledged hybrid between a 3D platformer (mostly in the style of SA2 and SH) and an action RPG with a heavy emphasis on drop-in-drop-out player co-op (kinda like in Borderlands, Left 4 Dead, and Sven Co-op), loot-based progression and, most importantly, going fast. I won't comment on the eventual storyline, as the most popular games in both genres have a heavy emphasis on good gameplay loop, and I don't have any ideas for it. On the other hand, I'm happy to talk about the four character classes (yes, that's the number that gives this title its name) that could appear in the final release.

Sonic - I wouldn't be surprised if those who play alone choose this character first, so I envision someone whose skill trees are versatile and simple. He's a sort of knight of all four, with a focus on regular self-healing, increasing the power of his attacks, and a special ability focused on temporarily increasing the speed of everything he does.

Shadow - Some of you may feel surprised, but I imagine him in the role of someone fighting at a distance. His special ability is a USP-like pistol, which appeared in most of the promotional material for his (sadly awful) solo game, and the gameplay then resembles something along the lines of Ratchet & Clank rather than Sonic. Could he be our archer?

Blaze - It seems obvious to me that she's ideally suited to the role of tank, whose skill trees aim to increase her resistance to various types of damage (especially fire), the speed of her attacks, and the length of time she can perform her special ability entirely focused on close-range combat.

Silver - Let's be honest: this character never achieved the status Uncle Nakamura hoped for and was forever relegated to being a plot device (with a few exceptions in the comics). However, that doesn't change the fact that he's a born warlock of our team, who regularly helps by healing it, buffing their attacks and nerfing enemies.

The ultimate goal of the game's design is to be as accessible to the casual gamer as Sonic Chronicles was accessible. I wouldn't expect the main storyline to be 30 hours, but more like 5 hours sooner, which would do a lot more to encourage some to try New Game Plus and occasionally experiment on their characters (different loadouts, respeccing, etc). When it would offer a wild trip around Sonic's world, various side-missions (which would increase the total game time) would allow the players to delve deeper into it, often coming from characters like Knuckles, Tails, Amy, Rouge, Team Chaotix, Orbot and Cubot... I hope you know what I mean.

I keep writing about this loot, and I haven't even gotten to the actual system I'd like to see in my game! Following the spirit of accessibility, I'd expect something along the lines of Destiny (too bad it's still awful), where most loot is "somewhat hand-crafted" but offers various random perks that change its rules and points (on a scale of 1 to 100) that affect player stats such as immunity, regeneration, strength, speed, etc. So I could divide the entire inventory into the following parts:

Gloves allow you to modify your character's attack, often modifying its passive skills and elemental affiliation (e.g. legendary-tier Silveresque Gloves guarantee to temporarily freeze enemies in place when used).

Bracelets add bonus experience points to specific abilities from the skill trees (e.g. legendary-tier Chip's Bracelet has a guaranteed 5 points for any few skills from all three 30-point trees).

Shoes are responsible for the character's maneuverability, often modifying their jump and speed, and somewhat less often their active skills (e.g. legendary-tier Air Shoes allow you to glide through the air by holding down the jump button).

The main source of acquiring new loot are various Badniks found in the many action stages, and somewhat less frequently in the overworlds that connect them. An interesting mechanic for the former type of world would be the importance of time: the sooner players complete any action stage, the better the loot will be in the chest at the end of the level; those usually consist of a traditional stage ending with a boss fight exclusive to that location (something like the mini-bosses from the classic-era games), but level designers are encouraged to experiment a bit.

...and that's pretty much it! I hope I'm not the only one with some interesting ideas for a possible spin-off... :D

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Isn't one of the appeals of games like this a variety of characters/builds to choose from. Why not have more Sonic characters for people to play/roll for? Then you could have cosmetics for each one and let players truly express themselves online. A Sonic online RPG where I can play as anyone I want sounds a bit more appealing to me than just sticking with the hogs, though the only game I've really played like this is Genshin so my perspective might be skewed.

The classic Speed, Flight, Power setup probably gives you the classes you want better than breaking up the 3 hedgehogs into them. Knuckles can be your Tank and Tails has a lot of ranged weapons and attacks so he can be a ranged/support character.

That way, there can be some variety as to who the player can play with in each wider class. The Speed Class( basically your DPS) can have Sonic, Shadow, Espio, Blaze etc all playable. Your support class can have Tails, Rouge, Silver, Cream etc and your tank class can have Knuckles, Omega, Big, Vector etc.

 

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I love Team Chaotix, couldn't you tell? Their interactions in Heroes and Shadow the Hedgehog were gold. But I always wished they could have their own game.

I think a L4D/Vermintide type game with some more platforming elements could suit them well. You get to play as Vector, Espio, or Charmy with your friends. Because it just makes sense to have four players instead of three, you unlock more characters to choose from as you play through the campaign. Firstly, only a little ways into the first level, you unlock Mighty, and the fourth person picks up the controller.

You fight off hordes of badniks with conventional wispon guns, and other goofy weapons and objects, and your character's special abilities. There's a heavy emphasis on co-op, where you can use "co-op moves" to cross a gap, blast through a horde, or what have you. For example, Charmy can carry someone upwards, Vector can throw his teammates, Espio can make them all invisible. Your unlockable characters also have special abilities too. Unlocking characters is part of the story as you grow the Chaotix Detective Agency. For example you might meet Ray, Heavy, Bomb, Knuckles, and others. But the focus should be on those more forgotten characters - Sonic shouldn't just be thrown in there just because.

It would be a very similar feeling to Left 4 Dead, but with more puzzle and platformer elements. The plot could be them... well, solving a mystery. I don't know, doesn't matter.

In general I would love to see more spinoffs for the other characters, and a Team Chaotix co-op shooter/platformer sounds really fun to me. What about a Silver game with physics/shooter elements like Half Life?

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6 hours ago, Wraith said:

The classic Speed, Flight, Power setup probably gives you the classes you want better than breaking up the 3 hedgehogs into them. Knuckles can be your Tank and Tails has a lot of ranged weapons and attacks so he can be a ranged/support character.

I also tought about that, but it made the whole thing strikingly similar to Sonic Synergy, which became... that game.

Bummer! :(

 

6 hours ago, Wraith said:

Isn't one of the appeals of games like this a variety of characters/builds to choose from. Why not have more Sonic characters for people to play/roll for?

Diablo and Borderlands fix those issues by releasing new expansion packs to the base game and/or DLCs. Not sure if our poor lil' Sega could pull one of those off.

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This one is easy for me. As anyone following me knows, I'd kill for a new standalone game starring one Miles "Tails" Prower. Everyone's favorite two-tailed-fox is supposedly just as strong/fast as his bigger bro and ten times as intelligent... skills we unfortunately never see reflected in the games themselves after 2006's failure benched his Eastern interpretation for good.

The setup wouldn't even be that hard to do. Let's suppose that Sony's Insomniac Games somehow nabs a Sonic license from Sega, with the presumption that the finished product releases on PlayStation 5 and PC through Steam/Epic. (I know this would never happen, but bear with me here.) A perfect Miles Prower would combine the open-world and traversal of Spider-Man PS4 and the weapons system of the new Ratchet & Clank into a massive free-roaming adventure set in the United Federation of, well, Sonic Adventure. (Yes, this means Station Square is back; it is now based off of both Boston and Tokyo to set it apart from Sony's own Spider-Man series.)

As with most of Insomniac's work, the plot isn't that hard to comprehend. After a massive falling out between the two brothers, Sonic goes it alone on his next mission and pays for it with his life... or so it seems. With Eggman reviving him as a cocky, calculating, and unpredictable weapon of mass destruction, its up to Miles to step up to the plate and lead his friends to find the Chaos Emeralds and prevent Sonic from destroying the world. Simple enough to explain for seven-year olds, but still deep enough to be plenty compelling.

I don't know about you guys, but I'd buy that Sonic game in a heartbeat.

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I think I have an idea, There might be a Spin-Off featuring Knuckles the Echidna in the style of Spyro Games, Another SEGA Developer might develop and
SEGA will release the Game, The Game might be on Nintendo Switch and Next Gen Game Hardware.

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Eggman strategy game. Release it on mobile.

He could have an antagonist in a rival scientist and fight GUN. Wins the game by taking over a country and setting up a powerful nation (that could appear in the next main title.) Also defeats his rival and seizes all their assets. Maybe the rival could also appear.

Any rate, I think it'd be fun to send off buzzbombers and Egg Pawns to capture cities.

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i have rather out there idea...

an Action-Turn Based hybrid RPG developed by Atlus that takes place in an AU where Robotnik gets finally defeated and everyone moves on with their lifes, the chaos emeralds get sealed by G.U.N and 10 years pass, Sonic becomes a washed up hero with nothing to do until strange events start occuring involving technology going rouge, with the pressence of a mysterious person claiming to be Eggman's Number 1 fan, and the Emeralds scattering once again.

taking elements from Mario & Luigi, Persona and modern Square Enix RPG's, mixing overworld platforming with speedy momentum, dynamic action commands for attacks, free roam during battles with Sonic Heroes-esque team work and social links, and the sake of a more experimental soundtrack id have the persona composser doing grundge-rock, with a extremly stylised aesthetic ala Persona 5 taking inspiration from the Japanese Sonic boxarts, all with a darker tone, not akin to something like Shadow or 06 but more akin to that of a Persona-light mixed with Sonic cheesyness.

oh and maybe a Sonic Battle sequel or a Sonic R spiritual succesor, that would be nice.

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