Sonic Generations Megathread

Classic Sonic's off ramp behavior is rather strange. It seems a lot like when you jump out of the water in Sonic Colors, it kinda just shoots you up. Also at one point I thought I saw Sonic spin dash but never actually roll, perhaps he was running into a prescripted loop? (They really should fix the whole loop thing it's been a problem since Sonic Adventure)

Did anyone notice the beginning of the classic Sonic level was the same as the beginning of GHZ Act 1? Nice touch

 

Don't see a reason for them to keep the scripted loops in 2D sections, both Unleashed and Colors can handle real loops well enough.


*EDIT* Wait, is this true?! Sonic Colors writers coming back for Generations? *EDIT*

 

One thing that bothered me when watching the Classic Sonic gameplay was when Sonic hit a spring that shoot him up or diagonally. It looks really awkward, heh. In fact, I think at one point Sonic is actually upside down after he hits a spring.

It's really hard to be a critic of the gameplay since it's really early to be honest. Hopefully they actually do fix obvious problems like these and don't push them off to the side like they did with Sonic 4.

 

Well they may not be scripted but Sega never seemed to have figured out proper 2D loops in the 3D era.

But yes I do expect changes, at least with blatant things like crappy textures. All the Sonic games have pretty good model textures for the playable characters, for them to not in this game would be very out of character... then again this whole game is out of character, but in a good way.

 

Not true 3D loops, but I guess they are happy enough with "3D" loops switching to 2D control scheme seamlessly.

There's this "3D" loop on Planet Wisp Act 1 that has 3 boost pads there, if you jump over the first one the loop will behave normally, though with a 2D control scheme, until you hit the 2nd or 1st boost pads that trigger the control lock.

 

Truthfully, a lot of small things irked me about the way Classic Sonic functioned in the footage. I really didn't want to bring it up though, I'm sick of bringing this kind of shit up. I just want to play a fun game, but I really can't ignore the little annoyances that still present themselves in the games today.

The way C. Sonic jumps looks kind of heavy and not as smooth as I was hoping it to be, and I noticed a lot of random moments where he would suddenly gain a lot of momentum/speed off as soon as he touched the ground, it reminded me of Sonic 4 a bit.

Everything else looked fine though. For all we know SEGA could have shown off a rather old build of the game and these issues have already been addressed.

 

I guess now we wait for E3 to see the new hated gimmick of the week Navi of the week gameplay footage.

About 3 weeks left until that.

 

This is... wow.

I'd really like to see more levels outside of Green Hill though. Also, I can't help but wonder how "modern" they're going with this, going through anything from Sonic 2k6 with Classic Sonic would be kind of hilarious.

 

Thank you, Trakker.


I'm with everybody on the sudden speed gains and uncurling. But the physics are still tons and tons better it would appear. I am soooooooooooooooooooooooooooo —o o o oo-oooo happy right now!!

 

Alright, I saw the gameplay video, and there are a couple of things that immediately create some concern for me. This is another take on the classics, so SEGA has to be a bit careful of how they implement Classic gameplay, so things I noticed are as follows:

1.) There is no score. Maybe it was time attack mode, but I saw a lives counter on the top right.

2.) In the very beginning, Sonic is running and immediately goes into his 2D (crouch-spin) position where he revvs up. He lost all of his momentum and crouched immediately. I thought momentum was going to be a big concern in this game?

3.) Sonic uncurls when he is launched into the air

4.) Modern Sonic gameplay is a lot, and I mean a LOT of linear platforms. This isn't the Green Hill that was in Sonic Adventure 2, this is like a Sonic Unleashed version of Green Hill. It's like every stage is Final Rush. This has sort of annoyed me. The dreamcast games had Sonic stages that were intricate, that involved platforming. Need I remind anybody about Sonic's stages in the adventure series? They are nothing like what we've been seeing with Modern Sonic lately. How the hell do they plan on implementing decent platforming with all this Final Rush gameplay we're seeing here?

 

Nah, most of the hilarity of Sonic 06 came from the glitchiness, if Sonic Team and SEGA are serious about it then a Sonic 06 level would play perfectly and be relatively glitch-free, thus, devoiding it of its glitchy charm...

Then again, I'd love to run through one of 06's Mach Speed Zones as post-Unleashed Modern Sonic, Radical Train's or Kingdom Valley's.

 

Absolutely, the physics look like a gigantic improvement compared to Sonic 4's.

The things I listed off were just tiny annoyances that will probably be fixed later on.

 

Yeah, look it's not going to have the same physics as the classics, not in terms of matching things value for value, algorithm for algorithm etc. Common sense dictates that since this game is an evolution of Sonic Unleashed's engine (most likely Colours and Generations forked from the same source), it will inherit some of the physics traits from these games (like the weird floaty-then-heavy jump).

So there probably will be some things that us die hard peeps will pick up on and not like, but overall this game gets a huge YES in terms of what's being brought to the table.

 

Now that I think about it, the 'Hold X/B to spindash' has existed in all of the 3d games since the adventure series (except the games that didn't have it). It has been a one button spin where you could pretty much cancel your momentum to spin.

It irks me that Classic Sonic seems to also have this ability to cancel all running momentum to enter a spindashing action with a single button, as evidenced by the very beginning of the Classic gameplay video.

 

I imagine an end of act score is still very likely. Expect ranks. I highly doubt this game will have level to level transitions, unless there is a Colors challenge mode kinda deal.

Perhaps spindash is added as a button, kind of like in Sonic Adventure, where no matter what speed you were running you start revving up.

I noticed that. Rather odd

That's what classic Sonic gameplay is for. This IS modern Sonic gameplay, they picked a formula and ran with it after Unleashed, and judging from the overall praise they received from the formula for the most part with the Day stages of Unleashed and Colors, I doubt you're going to see the Adventure gameplay style ever again UNLESS they make a Sonic Adventure 3. The Dreamcast formula was dead and buried once Sonic 06 sucked balls, and now that they found something that kind of works, expect to see more Unleashed day stages.

Which honestly doesn't bother me in the slightest this combination is just perfect IMO. Much as how I don't really see there being much of a bonus to Sonic Rush gameplay when that games formula works much better in 3D, I don't really see how there is much of a bonus to SA2's GHZ, which is just like what a 2D version would be only you get to go in all directions.

 

weren't you the same guy who told me not to judge sonic 4 before it was released, when I was pointing out flaws in its previews?
turned out I was right about sonic 4, previews looked like trash. and the game turned out to be trash. if I recall I said it looked just like a fangame, and I stick to that to this day.


Also seems I was correct with pointing out unleashed and colors flaws before they came to be released as well.
its easy to pick flaws out of gameplay clips no matter how short they are,.
it really helps if you are working on a 2.5D fangame that hopes to capture the original essence of sonic's physics from the classics.
(3D modeling and animation experience also helps have a good eye for these things)
to me Generations looks like it lacks heart,,,, at this point sonic is just sega's cash cow, I don't expect anything to be turned around with this game.
From a modeling perspective, after seeing stills of the levels,, I really feel that they were built by armatures or it was a real rush job. there are just so many little mistakes I'm picking out in the models.

yeah it looked pretty stiff, doubt they will address the issues,
just like unleashed and colors looked stiff in there previews.
nothing was fixed in there finals.

 

This is a terrible idea but I'm putting it out here anyway.

What if—and bear with me here--what if, instead of a new classic-style rendition of Shadow, we get Mighty?

It will never happen but I would be all for it.

 

That doesn't make sense. With Classic Sonic we're expecting to see 2.5D gameplay all the time, so there should be no need to restrict spindashing to a single button. The reason spindashing was restricted to a single button in the first place was because you can't "hold down to crouch" in 3D gameplay. With 2.5D, we can hold down to crouch again.

Of course, this won't be the case if A.) Classic Sonic has 3d gameplay here and there, B.) The existence of Modern Sonic is holding back Classic Sonic's gameplay as far as controls go.

Well, maybe not yet. However, if we just keep seeing Unleashed-esque stages in City Escape or any of the dreamcast-era levels with zero 3d platforming that the dreamcast games were renown for, that would be a problem that reviewers will pick up on.

 

It's too bad that it doesn't look like there'll be any severe improvements to the Unleashed formula, I think that that is what is really going to make this a good 3D Sonic game.

Did not expect how good the classic physics look. So excited.

And if friends will be playable (Knuckles, Tails, etc.) I'll be curious to see if the classic versions will operate as they used to and the new ones will operate like their 3D counterparts. Specifically Knuckles, I may be in the minority of people who would want to see SA2-style hunting stages implemented.