[Hukos]

Most of the time, the Sonic series has well, had a reputation for being quite simple and easy to complete, that being a somewhat common criticism of the franchise (A nitpicky one of course). Of course, there have been the occasional exception to the rule (Sonic 2 Game Gear for example) but those games are more cheap than having actual legitimate difficulty. From what I've seen, difficulty in Sonic games seems to fall inbetween these two extremes (Piss easy or incredibly cheap). I've question before if it's even possible for the series to have legitimate difficulty without going into being cheap.

For instance, the ring mechanic essentially allows Sonic unlimited health assuming you can continue to pick up rings. Not to mention the ability to spam invincibility frames while picking up rings makes certain that almost everything you face will become a joke. Now, other games have countered this by throwing in a lot of cheap enemy/bottomless pit placement, but that's just being cheap. Green Hills Zone Act 3 in S2 GG is one of the hardest levels I've ever played in a Sonic game, and the only reason it's hard is that it's filled to the brim with spike pits and no way to see them coming (Not to mention you don't get any rings throughout the entire level). It's just not legitimately hard, because once you know where all the pits are, it's suddenly a lot easier to breeze through.

My question to you, Sonic Retro, is it possible to be difficult in a Sonic game while making it legitimately difficult? I'm leaning towards no, for the reasons I listed before. But I'd like to hear your thoughts.

[Caniad Bach]

I think a fairly simple way to do it, is with decently designed multiple routes, if you know the level well enough to be able to drift off the path, you could bypass harder obstacles for the reward of getting a better time if you do it well.

[steveswede]

Hukos, on 22 May 2012 - 10:37 AM, said:

Most of the time, the Sonic series has well, had a reputation for being quite simple and easy to complete, that being a somewhat common criticism of the franchise (A nitpicky one of course). Of course, there have been the occasional exception to the rule (Sonic 2 Game Gear for example) but those games are more cheap than having actual legitimate difficulty. From what I've seen, difficulty in Sonic games seems to fall inbetween these two extremes (Piss easy or incredibly cheap). I've question before if it's even possible for the series to have legitimate difficulty without going into being cheap.

For instance, the ring mechanic essentially allows Sonic unlimited health assuming you can continue to pick up rings. Not to mention the ability to spam invincibility frames while picking up rings makes certain that almost everything you face will become a joke. Now, other games have countered this by throwing in a lot of cheap enemy/bottomless pit placement, but that's just being cheap. Green Hills Zone Act 3 in S2 GG is one of the hardest levels I've ever played in a Sonic game, and the only reason it's hard is that it's filled to the brim with spike pits and no way to see them coming (Not to mention you don't get any rings throughout the entire level). It's just not legitimately hard, because once you know where all the pits are, it's suddenly a lot easier to breeze through.

My question to you, Sonic Retro, is it possible to be difficult in a Sonic game while making it legitimately difficult? I'm leaning towards no, for the reasons I listed before. But I'd like to hear your thoughts.

Just so you know the Game Gear version of Sonic 2 was practically a port of the Master System version which was designed at that native resolution which is much bigger and you are able to see more ahead of you.

As for the whole "unlimited health with having a ring", ask yourself this. How many times do you get hit by an enemy or a hazard in the originals if you are not careful? Can you get through Scrap Brain act 2 without getting hit once, a level that's not even cheap, in fact for how deadly it is, the level design is incredibly well thought out. Sonic compared to other platformers is a bit unforgiving without careful playing and if you had a power up system like Mario in a Sonic game, I can imagine people would be saying that the originals are unfair hard. The balance the classics have are just the right amount for those types of games. It throws you a bone if you keep making mistakes but to achieve perfection like not being hit takes decent practice and patience. To me that's good difficulty and the right amount to have in them.

With the later games, blame companies like DIMPS for their idea of difficulty which falls more in line with your idea of cheapness in the GG version of Sonic 2. They've turned the 2D games into cluster fuck of QTE with an instant death pit instead of taxing the player at how to dodge hazards to save themselves from being punished. That's what's wrong with difficulty in Sonic games of today though I can only comment on 2D gameplay, others can give their thoughts why the 3D games are really easy because that side of Sonic doesn't interest me.

This post has been edited by steveswede: 22 May 2012 - 12:28 PM

[Joltanz Mantis]

Sonic games are easy to play, hard to master.

For the classics, if you imagine that the time limit is Eggman running away, well every time you get hit, Eggman's chances of fleeing increase. The difficulty is not about killing you, it's about slowing you down, unlike other games. GHZ-1 is easy, but getting a 35 second time takes skill. Same thing with A ranks in SA1. For SA2, they want you to have fun and do tricks to look cool. This is an interesting challenge
The difficulty in Sonic is much more interesting than the difficulty in other games like the classic Castlevanias because you can easily complete the acts albeit very slowly. Sonic usually dies from bottomless pits / crushing / drowning. Not often do you die from badniks. This means that Sonic games are more accessible, for newcomers and pros alike.

How difficulty should be handled? Well obviously it shouldn't be solely based on your reflexes. Second, you shouldn't die when you fail an obstacle, you should simply be sent to the slower lower path. On the lower path, the platforming should be simple and slow, while on the high path it should be more speed-oriented, and speed must be earned, so it should be hard. However, in the more linear SA2, as previously mentioned, they found a way to give some challenge by promoting tricks and giving us multiple OPTIONAL opportunities to get points (ramps, rails, enemies)
The badniks need intelligent patterns. Examples are most of the classic badniks. Counter examples are the enemies in Generations 360 / PS3. They have no counter. My favorite 3D enemy is the Egg Fighter with the Shield in Unleashed PS3 / 360. It actively tries to block you, forcing you to manually direct your homing attack to kill it. We need more enemies like it..

In the end, I don't think the difficulty needs to be ramped up to give us a hard time. My biggest problem with Generations is that they hand out S ranks for ho-hum runs. Bring back the SA2 trick system (for 3D games only) and a decent ranking system!
As for 2D games, bring back intelligent enemies and platforming!

[SpeedStarTMQ]

Yeah, the games are easy to beat but hard to master. When I was young I used to struggle with certain levels- often the final bosses, but as you get older you hone your skills and get better. Sonic is always ahrder for younger audiences, but still difficult to master for older people. I think they need to stop throwing lives around as much nowadays personally, but other than that I'm fairly satisfied with the difficulty and how they've dealt with the games themselves.

[RuRi]

Rings allow bad players to still get through some of the tougher stages, while good players try to keep all their rings for the special stage at the end. This means that it's easy for bad players, and challenging for good players. It's why Sonic 1 has a good balance of difficulty.

[Mike Arcade]

I agree with the balance in difficulty, I think they did really well with Generations, as the later levels were pretty challenging, though they did usually hand out S Ranking like candy, that they should have fixed a bit, but in said later levels I had to work for it. For 3D games I'd say SA1, SA2, and Generations have good difficulty balance, been awhile sence I played Heroes, and I have yet to play Unleashed so I can't comment on them in terms of difficulty.

As for 2D games I have yet to play any episode of Sonic 4 so no comment on them, though Episode 1 looks pretty easy, but since those are the first levels of Sonic 4 as a whole that should be obvious. The Classics (1 - 3K and CD) are good examples of difficulty balance, it can be easy to finish with practice, but hard to master if you want the best ending, now for DIMPS, that's a bit tricky to explain. Pocket Adventure had a good balance, though it can be more challenging then other games I found that a good quality in the game, everything was handled well. The Advance games, despite being good games, have some drawbacks, mainly reaching the Special Stages, they made that WAY too hard in those games, Advance 1 I can bare as they were always in the same place, but for 2 and 3 you have to go a certain way or you can go to those stages, 3 doesn't have that problem TOO bad, but the hunting was a little too much in that game. As for the gameplay overall, they did it well. I didn't see a problem with pits in 1 or 2 though 3 did have a few of them. Overall they did good, as for Rush they did push pits a little too much, not so bad in the first game but Rush Adventure did have more pits then they should have at some areas, as for the special stages they fixed that problem Advance had, much to my enjoyment. Layout wise they can be weak and got a little weaker over time overall, but for difficulty they weren't that bad, just in those problem areas.

I can't comment on Generations 3DS but that's my view on the difficulty on both 3D and 2D games, if they get rid of more of the infamous pits they have increased over the years (which they have when it comes to Generations) and not have Special Stages being nigh impossible to reach then they would have a good thing going in the future.

EDIT: I'll say this though, in Generations the bosses died too quickly, they should have at least 8 hits to kill them.

This post has been edited by Mike Arcade: 22 May 2012 - 02:29 PM

[XCubed]

The control lockout at the end of Sonic 4 levels piss me off to no end. I sometimes over or under shoot jumping through the giant ring and before I know it Sonic is running off the damn screen! This is the cheapest of shots and want my Sonic 2 or Sonic 3 method back! ...or you know, don't lock me out of the controls 2 milliseconds after running past the signpost!!!!

[Master Emerald]

Quote

The control lockout at the end of Sonic 4 1, CD, Pocket Adventure AND 4 levels piss me off to no end. I sometimes over or under shoot jumping through the giant ring and before I know it Sonic is running off the damn screen! This is the cheapest of shots and want my Sonic 2 or Sonic 3 method back! ...or you know, don't lock me out of the controls 2 milliseconds after running past the signpost!!!!

Fix'd.

[Chaos Fusion]

Difficulty in a Sonic game really depends because we get games like Unleashed with some well designed Daytime stages with some difficulty & levels like Eggmanland that are pit fests and then Generations which gives you an S rank no matter what because the levels aren't a challenge in any way without cheap deaths.
As for the 2D, the advance games had some balance to the difficulty with Sadv2 leaning towards pit deaths due to some decent level design where as the rush games that are spammed with pits and the boost mechanic that removes enemy threats.
If there should be difficulty in a Sonic game, probably use the rank system to tell the player how they performed (Difficult levels mark the player harshly if they perform poorly) and use the levels design efficiently to create challenges that don't result in cheap deaths. (Chemical Plant' moving blocks with the rising water work fine as a challenge.)

[Sik]

Master Emerald, on 23 May 2012 - 12:00 AM, said:

Quote

The control lockout at the end of Sonic 4 1, CD, Pocket Adventure AND 4 levels piss me off to no end. I sometimes over or under shoot jumping through the giant ring and before I know it Sonic is running off the damn screen! This is the cheapest of shots and want my Sonic 2 or Sonic 3 method back! ...or you know, don't lock me out of the controls 2 milliseconds after running past the signpost!!!!

Fix'd.

Don't you get some grace period, though, long enough to try a second jump? The lockout doesn't apply until the signpost stops spinning (no idea how Sonic 4 handles this but it's the case of all the other games you listed). Not to mention that in Sonic 1 there's the whole "don't lock if not on the ground" bug (and yes, I say it's a bug, it's two pieces of code that when put together cause it - lockout doesn't happen until Sonic lands, but if Sonic is off-screen then the score tally kicks in so the game assumes lockout is already set).

[Master Emerald]

It's the same as the others games. He's just bitching 'cause he doesn't want to go through the zone again probably hahaha.

[Hukos]

Sik, on 23 May 2012 - 11:46 AM, said:

Master Emerald, on 23 May 2012 - 12:00 AM, said:

Quote

The control lockout at the end of Sonic 4 1, CD, Pocket Adventure AND 4 levels piss me off to no end. I sometimes over or under shoot jumping through the giant ring and before I know it Sonic is running off the damn screen! This is the cheapest of shots and want my Sonic 2 or Sonic 3 method back! ...or you know, don't lock me out of the controls 2 milliseconds after running past the signpost!!!!

Fix'd.

Don't you get some grace period, though, long enough to try a second jump? The lockout doesn't apply until the signpost stops spinning (no idea how Sonic 4 handles this but it's the case of all the other games you listed). Not to mention that in Sonic 1 there's the whole "don't lock if not on the ground" bug (and yes, I say it's a bug, it's two pieces of code that when put together cause it - lockout doesn't happen until Sonic lands, but if Sonic is off-screen then the score tally kicks in so the game assumes lockout is already set).

Wait, that's a bug? In all my years of playing Sonic 1, I had no idea, I thought that was intentional. Guess you learn something new everyday!

steveswede said:

Just so you know the Game Gear version of Sonic 2 was practically a port of the Master System version which was designed at that native resolution which is much bigger and you are able to see more ahead of you.

As for the whole "unlimited health with having a ring", ask yourself this. How many times do you get hit by an enemy or a hazard in the originals if you are not careful? Can you get through Scrap Brain act 2 without getting hit once, a level that's not even cheap, in fact for how deadly it is, the level design is incredibly well thought out. Sonic compared to other platformers is a bit unforgiving without careful playing and if you had a power up system like Mario in a Sonic game, I can imagine people would be saying that the originals are unfair hard. The balance the classics have are just the right amount for those types of games. It throws you a bone if you keep making mistakes but to achieve perfection like not being hit takes decent practice and patience. To me that's good difficulty and the right amount to have in them.

With the later games, blame companies like DIMPS for their idea of difficulty which falls more in line with your idea of cheapness in the GG version of Sonic 2. They've turned the 2D games into cluster fuck of QTE with an instant death pit instead of taxing the player at how to dodge hazards to save themselves from being punished. That's what's wrong with difficulty in Sonic games of today though I can only comment on 2D gameplay, others can give their thoughts why the 3D games are really easy because that side of Sonic doesn't interest me.

I've honestly never played the Master System version, so that explains some things and why Green Hills Zone Act 3 gave me such a hellish experience.

I have gotten through SB2 without getting hit, though it takes a bit of being careful to pull off. I will say that trying to do a no-damage run of Sonic 1 in one sitting is quite a difficult experience! Even moreso if you try to do it while fighting Robotnik in Labyrinth Zone.

When I was talking about Sonic essentially having unlimited health, I was referring to using everything that's available to you (Like invincibility frame spamming!) Its like playing FF6 and someone arguing that it's hard if you don't spam the endless amount of ways you can exploit it's programming or design issues (Like Max Magic Block % or Wind God Gau, or Vanish/Doom, or Economizer + Ultima, etc.). Sure, it might be challenging if you do that, but I don't think that's a valid way of measuring difficulty because you're not accounting for everything that's at the player's disposal. Or a more valid comparison (As both are platformers) would be Mega Man 2 w/Metal Blades. With them, the game is a complete joke but others insist that it's still hard as long as you don't use them. That's the thing, they're available to me, so I'm going to use it unless it's a challenge run of some kind and even then, I don't think a challenge run is comparable to the main game's difficulty because in one you're intentionally limiting yourself and the other you are playing normally, using everything to your advantage. Maybe it's my inner optimizer, but if you give me an inch I will take a fucking mile and have no qualms doing so.

[Kampfer]

I think part of the difficulty drop in the newer Sonic games (especially Generations) is the ring loss programming. Many time in Generations, when I am actively trying to suicide because I have 0 lives and want to start a level over for speed running (with skills), the rings don't bounce far away and I don't lose all of them. Thus, suicides are actually kinda lengthy if there isn't a pit around. The same sorta thing happened in Sonic Adventure 2, where if you have 20 rings, they don't shoot to far away from you, and then stay in a neat little circle. This is different from the old games where rings are liable to bounce through walls or disappear pretty quickly.

[Jayextee]

I reckon something like this should be implemented: the longer the player has gone without losing their rings, the shorter the period of time before they disappear when lost. Obviously with certain maximum/minimum caps, but this could balance it so that stronger players have a harder time. I'm all about that kind of thing.