So, I've actually been enjoying this game. Time Eater seems a lot better than people had been saying. Did they patch this up in an update or something, or what? They still can't do endgame bosses for shit though (ask me how I feel about the final stage in Sonic Colors) -- in this case coming in the form of the godawful Egg Dragoon battle. The slippery controls are generally manageable throughout the game, but here they're impossible (largely due to how large an area to drift around there is), and the lack of mobility in the falling sections makes landing the last hits near impossible to do. Aside from that there are lots of opportunities to hit him (generally coming in the form of the wall-jumping attack), but since they come along fairly infrequently the boss is just slow and tedious. I mean, yes, the previous Egg Dragoon battle is pretty much MODERN GAMING DOT EEE ECKS EEE but it's definitely more palatable. I guess aping old designs is good because that way they can provide an iterative approach to them, while the most original aspect to the game (this entire fight has probably the least in common with the boss battle it's based on) is clearly the worst. Of course, the other bosses are hardly spectacular examples of game design either -- the death egg robot has a tendency to glitch up going into the bomb-triggering phase. A real shame. Even if very little of the game is innovative, it's at least decent.
My only issue with Egg Dragoon is I can't seem to figure out how to consistently hit it at the beginning of the tunnel before he starts chucking ice comets from the background. It usually won't give me a chance to home attack when he's clearly vulnerable, and many times when it does Sonic wants to go into the background and attack but it doesn't connect. Otherwise, I have to say its actually my favorite boss of the game. The other bosses in the game are too easy. Perfect Chaos is just a race to the finish, and none of his attacks really connect or pose any meaningful threat. I think DER could have been better by having it shoot out the little Eggman Mines from the backpack during the first part of the fight like it does in Sonic 2 (and make you earn the rear attack). I (and most other people) almost forget those exist because once you get behind him in Sonic 2 and get killed by those, you know its better to do frontal attacks and never really see them again.
Perfect Chaos honestly feels more like a short level based on the original boss fight. And I really liked that.
Heads up for anyone who hasn't purchased this game yet, or wants to gift it. It's $7.49 on Amazon Digital, cheapest it's ever been.
HAHAHA! That just made my day! Anyways the all the boss battles to me were OK except Time Eater, I dreaded that one, I still refuse to go back and get an S rank. My favorite one was Perfect Chaos, Egg Dragon would have been so much better if quick step mode and auto run sections didn't exist ( I really like the concept of quick step ) so I could move around more freely. The Death Egg Robot was pretty good, kinda bland but good. The Rival Battles were awesome, Metal Sonic could have been better if it was an actual race. Shadow was excellent except I didn't really like the idea of getting the purple orb, simply trying to hit him would have been good enough. The Silver Battle could have been AWESOME, if he was just a bit harder. I loved the fact that he shot telekinetic strips at you that had could quick step or short hop over, though the fact that you could just quick step like a madman and you could easily get away from him kinda took away the point.
I'm going to PAX East on the 6th (only day I go). I'll check the SEGA booth, so I guess I'll have some impressions of Episode II when I get back. :v: I'll tell you dudes how it is but, I'm kind of shitty at that kind of stuff.
You'd be surprised how easy it is to give impressions on something after playing it. Just remember to be more descriptive than saying something was "good" or "fine" or "poor". It's all in the descriptions. "Sonic controlled like a shopping trolley with greased wheels," as an example of describing Sonic Heroes.
Finally got to play this on an HDTV. Looks great. Getting button lag on 480p. Glad I haven't upgraded.
So... I love the 30 Second Trial mode. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r6UK455GNq4 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wzwOPl1UFdo I'm only allowed to embed two videos in a post so here's a link to the 3rd one http://youtu.be/IObqUEz3zF0
I finally found a mechanism in which to play this game (I am without Xbox 360) via downloading the demo on Steam. I enjoyed it but my laptop basically chokes on everything that isn't a 2D platformer meaning I had performance issues. From what I played after tweaking the settings to get a stable frame-rate the game was good (miles ahead of all recent efforts bar Colours) but I still wasn't really loving the Unleashed-style gameplay or rather modern Sonic. Obviously this opinion is rather useless since I've only played GHZ and not the full-game. Sonic Colours on the other hand I actually did manage to play to completion and I absolutely loved it. I haven't had so much fun with a Sonic game since SA2. It felt like an evolution of that game but was better in a way since it returned to fantastical worlds and pure hardcore platforming. Thus far I'm rating Colours higher than Generations though again I still need to play through the full-game of the latter (on an actual games console with a decent frame-rate) before this really means anything. PS. The core reason I am without a console is mainly due to lacking a television here. Anyone know if it's possible to hook an Xbox 360 to a laptop screen?
You can get VGA cables made specificly for that purpose~ I had to get one because my TV years ago didn't actually have the red blue and green needed~
Remember when SEGA asked for questions for the composers? The results are in. http://blogs.sega.com/2012/05/08/sonic-generations-music-answers/ There's actually some rather neat and interesting answers to the questions.
Oh yeah, drats, thought there was a glimmer of hope for DLC then. On another note, I'd be interested in hearing what Alex could do with the Sonic 4 soundtrack as he seems to have a decent grip on the feeling of how Classic should sound.
This sounds quite amazing....except for the recycling of the drums (and beat) from the City Escape Classic Mix.
So apparently the 360 version's been updated recently, unless it's really been that long since I've played it.