Which is the better (ie: least painful) way to play Sonic 06?

@Sir_mihael @Nova If you guys like that run, you should check out his speedrun of the latest demo too:

It's pretty wild that we're living in a timeline where Sonic 06 might be redeemed, at least to some extent.

 

My opinion used to be that the game couldn't be redeemed at all and I still hold to the fact that it's flawed and misguided to the point it can't be fixed, but that is a pretty damn fine crack and at least makes the gameplay look pretty fun. I'm all for it.

 

Yeah, even if the story is still hot garbage, if the gameplay can be fixed and even made fun, then that's the part that truly matters. Then the story can be there to laugh at. :p

 

Whilst the stoy is indeed a mess, there's still a lot of underlying game design issues with 06 that hold it back from being truly 'redeemed'. The story is just the cherry on the garbage pile.
Things such as starting the game and having to jump through hoops to buy the Light Chip just to reach the first stage...
NPC's that look like they're straight from The Sims...
I know that starts to go beyond the scope of one person fixing the gameplay, but if I was making a wishlist of how I would truly fix 06, it would definitely involve a lot more reworking of the other aspects outside of the action itself.

Still, getting way too hypothetical at this point, and I don't want to sound like I'm dissing on such a brilliant project. Having something that actually feels good to play and makes you think "fuck me, this is pretty good!" is a real miracle considering this is Sonic heckin' 06 we're talking about.

 

If it were me, I'd implement boost mechanics and trash/replace any level design that didn't fit with them, at least for the Sonic sections. Not sure what I'd do about the other characters, though.

Of course, that probably wouldn't satisfy people that enjoyed the original release despite its flaws, but I figure at some point you say "you can't fill this wall, it needs replastering".

 

The 06 project for Generations is a good example of why the boost gameplay in 06 wouldn't work. It's really..not fun..to play.

 

That's why I'd trash or replace a lot of the level design, beyond the aesthetics. It'd be a lot of work, but I figure you lose less than you'd gain.

I mean, it's all just pipedreaming on my part anyway. I don't like the game enough to put in the effort myself, and you'd probably need a professional team with corporate backing to make what I have in mind. Somehow I doubt that Sega cares enough about redeeming the game to do that.

 

Yeah but at this point you'd just have a boost game with a 06 skin, no?
I'm not the biggest fan of the boost gameplay, so I'll admit I'm kinda biased. But I don't see how boost mechanics would improve the game, the Adventure gameplay would've been perfectly fine if the levels didn't keep shiting themselves due to poor coding.

 

If I remade ‘06, I would completely ditch most of the existing structure in favor of one more similar to Sonic Colors/Lost World. There would be a few acts in each area and a boss fight at the end connected via a map. I would only leave a 3D hub in Soleanna, and even then it’d be much smaller, like the ones in Sonic Unleashed for the Wii.

 

To me the game reminded me more of what we saw in the Fifth Phantom Saga previews than a Sonic game. Maybe that's the kind of art direction the team had around that time?

 

I feel that may be true for SA2, but not SA1. The latter may have had more realistic environments than previous games, but its levels still had lots of character, and it still featured various fantastical or surreal environments, like Windy Valley, Casinopolis, Twinkle Park, or the second Red Mountain section. I believe SA2 was when Sonic Team first tried to see how realistic they could get with the environments.

 

I feel like '06's story wouldn't be nearly as controversial if they'd used Princess Sally instead of Elise. It'd still be completely illogical, but that'd clear up a huge problem.

 

What bugged me the most when I first played the demo of Sonic 06 was that Sonic felt “heavy” in comparison to SA2 and that the special effects made the game look “slow”, just like in Shadow the Hedgehog of which I thought was a mistake at that time. Aren’t there are a few people who like Sonic 06 the way it is? If we cut out all the brokenness, what’s left of the title that the developers originally intended to make? I’ve got this weird theory in my backlog that Sonic 06 was never meant to be an actual video game but an alternative to Microsoft’s Cortana… but let’s save that for another time!!

 

I wanted to come back to this forum after completing Sonic 06. This topic led me to Xenia. The emulator fixes vanilla 06's loading screens just by being an emulator, most loading screens are almost instantaneous now, and for the first time I completed the game from end to end. (Before anyone asks, I do own the game on 360) Some thoughts about the whole thing:

• This is probably now the best way to play 06, as it's the most 'authentic' but without loading times. Grab a mid October 2019 build of Xenia (newer ones have random crashing atm, and the October builds let you fix any graphics glitches by pressing F4)
  • The Sonic 06 Mod Manager comes with a handful of patches that fix the biggest issues. There's an optimized renderer patch that fixes any slowdowns in xenia. For me, i used this tool to turn on debug to pass the last 8 ball puzzle in silver's story that is just a nightmare. But you can toggle patches as you deem required.
    
• I've been replaying all the modern Sonic titles in a row, what I found was that 06 really gives you complete control of your character, sometimes even to your detriment, but as you learn how the game reacts you'll get a good handle on characters. There may be invisible walls in the town areas, but there's almost total freedom in the action stages. Being able to pull off risky jumps or fling yourself around certain areas to bypass what you're supposed to do can give you a great feeling of control and satisfaction, something that's impossible in the follow up game Unleashed.
  
  
• The game didn't feel nearly as buggy and the issues felt less exaggerated when the quick loading got you right back into the game. Suffering a game over is just a few taps on the start button to skip the cut scenes and you're back in the level. Obviously the bugs still remain, but being able to get back to the level with almost no punishment helps immensely. (aside from the first action stage, if you die there you have to start the entire game again, which is extremely unfortunate and should have had a save point)

So yes, the game is playable from start to finish in Xenia, 60fps, no hiccups really.

If you've got a computer that can run Xenia and like SA1 / SA2, i'd highly recommend the game. I'd unironically play this through again, I had no idea how much of a blast i'd have with it. It really is just SA3. As a note: I avoided all side town missions and only did the ones that were required to complete the story, aside from racing Sonic man, because of course you should do that one.

 

Didn't realise Xenia was so far along now! I've got a pretty good rig and there's a few titles I can't access anymore (AFTER BURNING FRKKING CLIMAX), so that's good to hear.

Also glad to hear you did your duty and raced the best character in the entire franchise.

 

Sorry to bump, but just wanted to ask: does P-06 work on Mac? Or is it Windows only?

 

I think it's Windows-only. You can try running the demo and see if it works, though.

 

I actually didn't mind Sonic 06 that much, I played it on PS3 but the 360 version seems more smooth. I tend to be very patient with flawed games, so the glitchiness and cumbersome load times never bothered me that much.