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Is it safe to say that the franchise as a whole is picking itself up?

Discussion in 'General Sonic Discussion' started by Solid SOAP, Dec 19, 2011.

  1. Vaiyt

    Vaiyt

    Oglio p'ru çeu Member
    I think that Sonic got past the point of open derision and is now in the "irrelevance" phase. People just don't think Sonic is worth mocking anymore. Its days as a cultural phenomenon are well and truly over.

    I hear that the franchise has been "picking itself up" for a whole bunch of years. Every shitty outing we got, there were people saying "oh, they're getting there". Every time SEGA released a game that showed they cared fuck-all about the classic gameplay principles, we got a bunch of fans trying their best to rationalize that the next game would be the one to "get it right". I've turned my back on that mentality around 2005 and never came back.

    Classic Sonic is dead, even if SEGA insists on dragging its rotting corpse around as bait.

    I play Sonic Generations. It's a ho-hum game. The Unleashed-style Modern gameplay is a definite improvement over the Adventure/Heroes/06 model, in the sense that it plays to the strengths of the franchise's current designers. Too bad I hate the style. The Classic part is anything but, feels like one of those fangames people made before faithful reproductions of the classic mechanics became available. Hall of fame material it isn't, but hey, not being shit that was shat on by the villain's horse, like many of the previous games, is already something. That's the only foreseeable hope I see for the moment: that Sonic will live on as something other than a butt monkey.
     
  2. muteKi

    muteKi

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    Classic Generations is not horrible. Instead of homing attack chains now I just hold right while hopping onto a string of enemies, but the margin of error is definitely narrower.

    I think I'd like Generations if not for the modern half of the game, which is about as boring as I figured and not very fun. Still leagues above Unleashed though.
     
  3. Overlord

    Overlord

    Now playable in Smash Bros Ultimate Moderator
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    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=otKSOn72mRI

    This was 2 and a half months ago, dude. He's nowhere near finished.
     
  4. Lambda

    Lambda

    Member
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BY_H4d68IUc&feature=related

    *Ahem* Within a month ago.

    And also, the fact that SEGA is still MAKING Sonic games means he's still relevent. If they didn't think he'd make money, they'd put our spiney blue friend out to pasture. Call it a "cash cow" move if you'd like, but if that cash cow is making that green milk, I think he's still a cultural phenomenon.
     
  5. Soapbox

    Soapbox

    Member
    Sales figures can paint a thousand words...

    [​IMG]
     
  6. Lambda

    Lambda

    Member
    Was there really that much of a sales difference between Sonic 2 and Sonic 3? I find that really hard to believe...
    Sources, please?
     
  7. Soapbox

    Soapbox

    Member
    As you wish:

    http://vgsales.wikia.com/wiki/Sonic - For sales (Excluding Generations)
    http://uk.games.ign.com/articles/121/1217953p1.html - Generations Sales Data

    Obviously those are estimated at the time of each individual article but seem to be fairly accurate.
     
  8. Azookara

    Azookara

    yup Member
    I find a lot of that hard to believe, actually. Especially since a lot of it consists of games put in the wrong order, four irrelevant games (two of the same compilation game, one portable, one party game, and one spinoff), and no Sonic Colors.

    I am also having a horribly hard time believing that Sonic Nextgen sold more than any other Sonic game ever.

    EDIT: Wait, you got your sources for every other game off of an incredibly out-of-date Wikia page. Wasn't a very good idea. Also, it seems that's actually just Sonic 1 again but combined with it's mobile phone sales.. yeah, that chart is pretty bogus.
     
  9. Vaiyt

    Vaiyt

    Oglio p'ru çeu Member
    So... Sega should make more games like Sonic 2006?

    Where did those sales come from anyway? VGChartz gives Sonic 2006 2 million copies, counting both versions, and puts about a million extra copies on Sonic Advance.
     
  10. Soapbox

    Soapbox

    Member
    Okay, here you are updated with figures from vgchartz.com.

    These are global sales, and I didn't do the counting so please take up your beef with vgchartz.

    1 Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games Wii 2007 - 7.82m
    2 Sonic the Hedgehog 2 GEN 1992 - 6.02m
    3 Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games DS 2008 - 5.97m
    4 Sonic the Hedgehog GEN 1991 - 4.34m
    5 Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Winter Games Wii 2009 - 4.25m

    You can view the rest of the list here.

    Mario and Sonic seems to have wiped the floor with the others.
     
  11. Metal Man88

    Metal Man88

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    Given those games are out of order and used as points instead of sales over time (a far more reliable indicator of performance, as companies are evaluated on their quarterly performance, not by all-time sales of any one game), that graph is about as meaningful as a wadded up ball of toilet paper.
     
  12. Soapbox

    Soapbox

    Member
    Yes but this isn't a thread about a companies performance is it? It's not even about which game sold more. The actual exact to the decimal sales figures are somewhat irrelevant.

    The quesion asked refers to the Sonic franchise as a whole, which keeps failing to compete in a much more competitive industry than the golden days of old.

    I personally hate the Olympic games, but whoever decided to make them is a genius.
     
  13. Metal Man88

    Metal Man88

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    In this case, Sonic's performance as a whole could be extrapolated by showing his games, over time, rather than haphazardly arranged with incomplete data.

    From there it would probably also be best to try and get information on how much it cost to make them.

    Since it is possible to statistically figure out Sonic's popularity/profitability over time; however a bunch of mismatched data sandwiched out of order gives an incomplete picture.

    Furthermore, 'failing to compete' is irrelevant. To you or I, as Sonic fans, we might accept nothing more than Sonic beating all challengers.

    To SEGA, all they see is profit margins. Who cares if he's #2, or even #5? If he makes them lots of money, they're not going to even need to bother to beat the other ones.

    This is what I see, anyway, as a software engineer. Part of the reason Sonic 'fails to compete' is he isn't meant to win; he's meant to make money.

    He only 'won' before because the market was very small, and only had room for one or two major platformers. Now it is large, and 'winning' is prohibitively expensive and may lead to phyrric victories.
     
  14. Lambda

    Lambda

    Member
    Also, the industry has moved away from platformers. The big blockbuster games are mostly First Person Shooters now.

    I mean, there are lots of platformers out there, but besides Sonic and Mario, and maybe Little Big Planet, most of them are just digital download stuff for consoles, PCs, and mobile...
     
  15. Soapbox

    Soapbox

    Member
    I agree, ignore the shoddy data; lesson learned.

    I do however think there is some prestige attached to being the summer sellout, and I long for the day Sonic finds a way to get back up there without shamelessly jumping on a sporting bandwagon.
     
  16. TimmiT

    TimmiT

    ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ Member
    Their sales data is made up. They are about as reliable as The Onion.