Sonic feels like a totally different character when he's moving like this, like when Smash Bros. just independently decided Star Fox and Captain Falcon were martial arts masters. It looks really cool, honestly. They finally found a way to inject some of that snappy Sonic CD FMV juice into the games. If only we hadn't learned 20 years ago that platformers with combat encounters longer than 8 seconds were completely unfun
It looks less like the Sonic CD FMV and more like a Hannah Barbera cartoon with the way he reverts into a standing pose midair, the bizarre static animation of the sonic wind attack and whatever that janky arrow attack is supposed to be.
I think complaints like that are pretty trite, honestly! As if I won't be able to suspend disbelief because they haven't fussed over every frame of every junction in the state machine. The gesture and the intent are there, and it's cool. Not to excuse poor craftsmanship, but if it's a choice between something bold and expressive over something clean and rational, I'm going to crank the slider to the left every time. So much of the juice in games has run dry lately when we no longer permit characters to just snap to key frames. Every movement is belabored, every procedural footfall has to be correct with respect to the incline of the slope and the model's center of mass. Boooooriiiiing I'm just hoping they invested that attention elsewhere. Like, are the animations this rough because he's got 100+ attack animations in some massive skill tree they're padding out? Because I'll allow that. I want them whipping his stupid little hedgehog ass around the screen like a DBZ ragdoll. Remember that Sonic and the Secret Rings interview where the director said he got inspired by God of War and wanted to include a scene where Sonic was ripping the feathers out of a giant bird, and the team looked at him like he was crazy? They should just cram the game full of that.
Can I also say that until they demonstrate something that doesn't look so janky and unfinished, I firmly believe there is no real level flow from this game design yet? I've said it before, Sonic loses his momentum after like a second from any booster, but there's so many empty rail-to-spring outcomes where you grab one of these heart things and then.. just drop like a rock. One of the best things about even the Boost games is that there's a flow, and once you get it you feel awesome just tearing through the stages in one non-stop motion. Every attempt at making a little divergence here results in Sonic flying off to some random direction, losing all momentum, falling to the ground and finding some other spring or distraction to mess with. I know I should "have different expectations" because it's open game design, but Sonic's mechanics are all Boost design, so he's a playstyle that doesn't gel with the actual lack of proper level design. And while Forces was weird and borked in how it tried to repurpose Lost World code, this looks like they sharpened up his slow movement for sure -- and destroyed his speed and faster movement to compensate. Tricks? He does janky little half-second motions and resets to neutral like his animations break when previous games emphasize the animations hanging for a moment on purpose. Combat? His animations look unfinished and just floats there slapping baddies in all flash, no substance as we all note the broken standing. When he does the "perfect dodge" moment, he's stuck and even 180s in a single pose as he floats through the air, somehow dodging in the complete wrong direction before his animation fully plays out. Slamming into the ground after each mini-boss limb like he got hurt, not to mention how janky climbing up the limb looks and so forth. Forces had some level layout tweaks in its final months of development, but I can't remember any inherent visual or gameplay issues out the wazoo, just Forces being Forces. This looks like a game that needs a delay because it sure as hell doesn't look like a game that has had upwards to 4 years of development time, much less something that should be considered release quality for this Winter with all those graphical issues, pop-in and so forth. And while one can try to say COVID-19, there's only so much that can cause before this is just pure mismanagement. There's just so many problems, so many issues, that I can't even inherently list them all without forgetting something or making too big a post for my tastes.
Seconded on the flow state of the boost games, that seems like something that would carry over wonderfully to open world sonic, yet they seemingly somehow screwed it up. Sonic's movement is nowhere near good enough to achieve any sort of flow state from what we've seen so far, and the animations, even if they don't technically affect the gameplay itself, it just makes it feel all the much worse. That's not even to mention the button mashing combat that lasts for minutes on end. I guess my hopes for a good and fun sonic game have been squandered completely. SEGA knows that after these ultra popular movies kids will buy anything with sonic's face on it. God, I'm just so fucking disappointed.
Sonic is almost completely handled by SoA… the same SoA that stuck a 3 button controller in the Genesis Mini. Unless you have some insider info, this is so baseless. And I’m not sure what better job marketing the SoA guys do besides posting memes on SoMe.
You’re right, that was just speculation so I apologize. It’s aggravating that Sega still can’t figure out how to make a good 3D Sonic game and I allowed myself to think out loud potential explanations on how this shit keeps happening... that’s clearly not helpful for having a productive conversation
To post a more serious post, I'm honestly just completely bewildered by this game. There are things I like. It's more open. The OST sounds nothing like Sonic but it's nice. But they are minor things. I haven't actually bought a 3D Sonic game since Lost World. I skipped Rise of Lyric and Forces. I'm honestly probably just going to skip this too because when it comes down to it, it just looks bad. I think the jank and poor animations are qctually the least of the games concerns. I just don't like the concept of the game. I don't want a Sonic game with a bland Dynasty Warriors 9 open world (even if it is more beautiful). I know people got tired of the reused Sonic staples but this really does just look like a terrible Unreal fan demo. I've never had a problem with a Sonic game's aesthetic before so this seems like a really weird shot in the foot. Maybe the Cyberspace levels will look better, but presumably the open world will be a big focus of this game. I don't want the game to focus upon what looks like a terrible combat system. Sonic has a lot of moves but so far they all seem to serve mostly the same purpose. You have a spin cycle which defeats shields and loads of other damaging moves. It's a step up from homing attack spams but it still looks well below par. But also, just why? Make a good platformer. Or make a spectacle Boost game. Who thought this was a good idea? I don't consider myself hard to please. I loved Generations despite its flaws. I don't even hate the Boost and am forgiving on the lack of momentum. But I look at this trailer and just see a terrible looking game. If this wasn't Sonic how would I view it? Would I be interested in it? I know for a fact that I'd think it's a terrible looking game. The SF6 comparison was a bit blasé but I think it does drive home just how amateurish Frontiers looks.
Hmmm. Just watched the new combat video. Not sure what to make of it really. The big issue I have with the game is the open world artstyle, it's fucking dreadful. So bland and devoid of any character. If you take Sonic out of the world, then what would tell you that it's a Sonic game? (I'm talking about the environment here, not the enemies/structures, which I quite like the surreal nature of) But then again I remember a majority praising the artsyle when the initial trailer dropped, which I thought was mad seeing as it's so generic. So maybe it's just what people want. Also I don't want this to be delayed, getting fed up of games getting delayed. And if it does release on time and it's absolute shit, then we get lots of funny let's plays & stuff a la Sonic 06. As weird as it sounds I'd rather it be absolute shit than just OK
Wasn't this and the movie being developed during the same time frame? Besides, Sega only started to embrace the movies after the positive reception of the redesign; we would still be in this exact situation no matter what would have happened.
This (the original Secret Agent Man theme) was one of the first songs I learned on guitar like 20 years ago lol. Surprised to see it used for a parody like this.
To engage with this point because I think it's interesting, I think SEGA and Sonic Team were in the headspace that this looks incredible and we would all be floored. It's the only explanation for why they have decided to unveil the game in this way. The idea that they can just show Sonic running about in an open world and we'd be blown away just by the concept with no story context. To be honest it's very much in the vein of Sonic Team's modern design philosophy. It is superficially impressive: it's open world and it is very impressive visually (the one thing Sonic Team are typically good at). It's just that everything of substance looks very poor (aesthetic, gameplay and performance). And it is addressing common complaints, just in a very superficial Sonic Team way. It's not corridor linear, it's gone for a more serious tone, it's entirely in 3D with no Classic Sonic. They are even showing a good chunk of actual gameplay rather than doing weird thirty second trailers like before. It's not brought back Sonic's friends and the Chao but we'd have to go through the gates of Hell for Sonic Team to do that. So they probably thought "yeah, we'll show the fans this gameplay and they'll just be so thrilled by what we are doing and that we are listening to feedback". It's why I can never really get mad at Sonic Team and call for them to get fired like some other people do because they genuinely seem like nice people who work hard and have fan interests in mind but just keep fucking up. Iizuka and Hoshino are both reportedly really nice and they are both really committed to fans. Each new game tries to respond to feedback but in the most boneheaded way imaginable. They are like a team of lovable incompetents who never know what to do. I always hope beyond hope that they can pull a Generations again and actually make a good game. They always showcase some talent in their games (Colors and Gens are fun, Lost World had some good levels, Forces eeh well it had that one fun Modern level). They just can never make it work.
I can't even say it's impressive visually because visual and performance are interwoven on "why is everything popping in all the time when Sonic moves at all?" Like, not even when he's going fast, either. I want to see under the hood, know if they reinstated that long-missing level streaming code Lost World stripped out, or if they mangled some new equivalent on top.
What I’m about to say doesn’t by any measure excuse the shortcomings we’re currently seeing, but if this does end up being the final state of the game, I think patches are certain. Of course, Colours Ultimate got them. Not to the extent where everything was fixed (I believe the borked intro animation in Starlight Carnival still exists, no?), but clearly an effort was made to do something. Meanwhile, Frontiers is a far more significant release for Sonic and SEGA as a whole, especially if this is to be the format which will serve as the foundation for the next 20 years of Sonic, or whatever Iizuka was saying there. At the very least, I expect stuff like janky animations (i.e. Sonic standing in the air during his melee combo and after certain animations) to be fixed in patches if it’s not already done by launch. I maintain that rolling and general field momentum is out of the question and wouldn’t add as much to the game as people are saying it will, but I think further increasing Sonic’s non-boosting speed and adding momentum to rails to make them look better to use are reasonable asks. Enemy health bars could be tweaked and automation removed in certain areas (particularly almost every dash panel we’ve seen so far). I do think everyone working on this project really does want it to be something special. Of course, none of us can definitively say at this point why things seem to be in this state (I personally think it is adapting to a new format and that creating these worlds would’ve been time consuming), but if this footage is indicative of launch gameplay quality, then our best hope is a No Man’s Sky situation, where SEGA sees how much backlash this has caused and dedicated themselves to fixing the game up to better represent the vision behind it. Perhaps it’s a long shot, but damn, if I can’t believe that the best of intentions went into this, then what’s even the point? On a lighter note, combat and button mashing. I think Frontiers combat is going to be characteristically similar to BotW and Kirby combat. Both are button mashy, but BotW focuses on how your small repertoire of core combat actions interacts with a variety of enemy types (which Frontiers already seems to be doing), while Kirby enemies and bosses almost never require you rethink your approach (beyond timing your openings to whale on the bosses for a bit), but make combat itself fun through the variety of what you *can* do, just for the sake of dicking around. I don’t think Frontiers will have anywhere near the variety that almost 30 copy abilities can bring, but I don’t think we’ve seen the full extent of Sonic’s combat abilities yet but they already look varied and distinct in their function and effect, unlike Unleashed’s Werehog. I honestly think the combat is the strongest part of Frontiers so far - it looks genuinely fun despite the presentational jank and if we are only scratching the surface, it has the potential to become really engaging.
it being DMC5 makes a stronger point, cause it's great game, has really excellent and fun combat, and yet when someone play it like that it looks so unfun and boring. that's why the joke works, in fact, before the game released, a lot of journalists played it in similar ways and we made fun of them too Not to say that Frontiers looks anywhere close to DMC5 in terms of great combat or quality lol , but it's just true how the player either just sucks, or deliberately play it in a way that make it more incompetent, like dodging into nothing when the enemy didn't even attack just to shows "oh look! a dodge!",or getting hit by some really obvious attacks which makes the encounters last longer, a competent player could make the game looks even a bit better but i guess that's just normal gaming journalism skills in effect
To be fair, I think it's pretty reasonable to show what these enemies can actually do, but yeah we didn't need to see more than once that you can't attack the armoured enemy without a spin cycle first, and it would've been nice to see a short montage of how fights with these enemies go when playing at high competency.
Some guy on reddit kind of did this: I mean, he didn't play the game obviously (and added audio so you get the lovely discordant sounds of two songs playing over each other), but just cutting around all the fucking about doing nothing helps a bit. That flower enemy or whatever is still probably too spongy, but I dunno, maybe some of the upgraded moves can let you single-cycle it. Obviously I don't think stuff like this would convince people who were already skeptical on principle, but it does go to show just how bad the footage itself is, and I guarantee a lot of the general crowd would be less put-off if SEGA has just done this from the start.
