Iirc they did, and that might have been the case, but from what I remember they were more focused on reorganizing their executives...? Their development team may have been affected though, certainly, which would be a shame... Might explain some people's absences. That said.. Except they kinda didn't. Sure, under the immense pressure of making an anniversary title, they were passable at best, but I daresay they did "well." 30 something levels and many of them are just simplistic linework that barely engage the player and instead rely on in-game story beats and QTEs. That's of course mostly on the game proper for doing/forcing that kind of direction, but that was almost used as a crutch; the level design is less something to actually play in and more a vector for plot points to advance after each other. Plus, regardless of "how well they did," it's pretty undercut by a, shall we say, marginally important detail... This wasn't some experimental sonic game while the company was under stable condition or after some big hit and "lets try something else." This was supposed to be their SMASH HIT GAME. Sure it's not their "30th Anniversary title" but they're still touting it as an important year since sonic can't stand to not celebrate about, idk, existing, every 5 years. This, by the way, happening after a game that nearly killed the series AGAIN had it not been for SEGA USA's excellent marketing on Twitter and Youtube, almost entirely because of Webber. Yes, Unleashed was an entirely new team of people too. SEGA laid off the entire 06 team after that crashed and burned, and they needed to because that team didn't know what the hell they were doing. Except this isn't the same thing. Boom wasn't STeam's fault, it was Big Red Button's. This is a post-fallout situation, but not in a case where SEGA needs to find new talent and fast. They HAVE the talent. They've HAD them for years, talent that was responsible for some of the best gameplay the series has found since Adventure first dropped. They're just not using them and instead decided to reboot the series another goddamn time with mixed results, and then backpedal but with... none of the old staff??? Like did they all just QUIT? That has to be the only reason, or SEGA is just wholly incompetent, or as petty as Konami when it comes to their designers and how much they value them. I would actually NOT be surprised if SEGA didn't think individual designers were actually responsible for the quality of a game, as much as the conglomerate entity of "Sonic Team" being simultaneously the reason for any success or failure the series sees. That's probably exactly whats happening. I wouldn't be surprised at all. God damn. Its worth noting, btw, that from the sound of it, much of the issues with Boom came from SEGA mandating a customized engine port mid-production, and many other decisions taking focus away from the actual game, which, design-wise, probably wouldn't have been good either way. Still, executive decisions that ruin a game's success isn't anything new with this company. So personally, I'm not happy that they keep bringing new people in charge of the games, because there's no guarantee these guys would stay. Plus, if they did, I'm not too confident they would be able to adapt, or even want to, for SEGA's next game, if there even IS a next game at this point, assuming sales don't just tank. I'm not optimistic. I'm fucking terrified. yeah from what ive seen its a lot of " '''important''' stuff happens in video, secondary information in text" kinda deals. A god amount of stuff is actually said in-game, more than Heroes and 06 in fact. The one benefit to Forces design, I'll say, is that it allows this to happen, because the story beats can happen both predictably and, in a sense, the game can be written first and designed later--I wouldn't be surprised if that was the case. Unfortunately this also means the gameplay literally comes second to the plot, which is what seems to be the case here, and unless you really like the plot (and if you do, that's fine, but calling it GOTY material is like, really low standards dawg), this game won't do anything for you. THAT to me is a disservice because its undermining what a game COULD even do, making just an interactive anime at that point, as opposed to letting the game be fun on its own. There seems to not be any replay value to this :x
If ya'll checked my post a few pages ago, you can see I already did a comparison / rundown on Forces' directors and designers and added them to an existing list of directors / designers for past Sonic Team games. :v: I think people are focusing too much on the fact that Forces' levels designers (and game planners, for that matter) are rookies (no pun intended). New staff members wouldn't be a problem if they actually knew what made for good game design--and all of those newbie planners and designers were also working under leads (Kishimoto/Okada/Ootsu) who have been designing Sonic games for roughly a decade at this point. It's a bunch of inexperienced staff who have no idea what they're doing, following the parameters set by a few experienced staff who also have no idea what they're doing. It's like the blind leading the blind in the realm of videogame development. The buck stops at the executive/management staff for the studio, and we all know who has been filling the role of the studio director's chair for nearly two decades now... All the more reasons why I say Sega should just ban Sonic Team from making Sonic games and give the IP to someone else. They're chronically endemic to Sonic at this point, and short of a complete overhaul of the studio structure and staff from scratch, will likely always be that way.
He more or less designed all the levels in Sonic Heroes. Sonic Heroes, where the complaint was that levels were TOO long. Boy have we come a long way from that huh?
Every day that passes I legitimately get more concerned about the future of Sonic games. I can't tell if this game will bomb or not. I think it'll do okay but it doesn't have to bomb for SEGA to justify stopping production. And I'm more concerned that it will do well! Because then I will have no reason to support Sonic anymore given that inspired direction, unless SEGA allows independent developers to use the IP. I'm not even sure who the idiots in the room are between SEGA and Sonic Team with the development of this game. Maybe the idiot is me for patronizing this franchise for this long. Well, probably yeah. Is Sonic "Too Big to Fail"? I don't want Sonic to fail. If independent devs are allowed space on this series, I'll be content with it. That may even be best case scenario because I currently don't trust anyone at the company who isn't Tax/Stealth and co. If not, I will legitimately be furious with the company and...um... write a letter. Does anyone even know for sure that the Mania Team would be interested in handling the franchise after the stories we've heard with this company? Ugh. What's next guys?
It's easy to say that, but then you only have to look at Sonic Ep 4 / Dimps and Boom / Big Red Button to realise this isn't the golden answer. Should this discussion be split from this thread? I feel a lot of talk is regarding the team structures of Sonic Team rather than specific Forces discussion. On the subject of Forces, are we aware of the dates for the Review Embargoes? They will be the first tremor of shock to SEGA if this leak hasn't proven that enough already.
Dimps are second hand Sonic Team. They can replicate aspects of Sonic's gameplay better, but when it comes to applying this in an actual game environment, they fucking suck.Plus Sonic 4 was never supposed to be Sonic 4. They basically had an entirely new project thrust on them. BRB could have made a "decent" game, not a good Sonic one but still. The problem was that Sega (of America) screwed them over at ever turn, which basically forced a rushed and shitty project. Not to mention they had to work with two other teams to consolidate a single idea for the direction of the spin-off, and each one wanted to do something different. (and yeah, that's a good point, probably best to move this to the Sonic Team thread that's already active)
So this got posted on Sonic Stadium by Hogfather: Full post here: https://board.sonicstadium.org/index.php?/topic/22999-Sonic-Forces-Development-Speculation-(Spoilers)#entry1173645 I wonder if we'll ever get the full story on what happened.
This somewhat makes me think that Sonic Team might have doubled down on Sonic to appease SoA and SoE by adding Classic Sonic in it. Probably wrong on that, but an idea anyways. This also seems to de-confirm the whole Boom Sonic being planned, doesn't it?
It's not Sonic Team's fault the restructure happened. The new guys will learn. Which is why I said "In my opinion" Sure, a step down from Colors and Gens, but not nearly a "shitty" game like people are making it out to be.
No, I'd say it was a step down from '06, that game had many problems, but the level design I didnt think was one of them.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=23RxLYn0rrg Tpot, one of the programmers for Utopia, put this together in two days with only a bit of help from me. It is running in Unity and does not rely on PhysX, though it just as well could. It uses 3d for movement and collisions and the assets could just as well be swapped out for models. He is not even 20 years old and he did this, on his own, in two days, without a budget. It handles 2d Sonic movement and physics properly and is already very efficient, modular, and ready for multiplatform. Just a few more days and it could be polished much more. I want to understand why whole development teams with over a dozen older professional programmers with years and years time and the multimillion dollar company that owns Sonic are incapable of producing anything close to this. Not just Forces, but Generations, Lost World, Sonic 4, everything. Someone, explain this to me. Give me some sweet excuses. Tell me how Sonic Forces "classic gameplay" featuring the same Sonic from Sonic Mania "is not trying to be like the classics" that's always a good one.
- The story is poorly written and paced, and the script and delivery are absolutely cringe-worthy - The controls for every returning character are butchered, and the newest character is somehow worse - The level design not only doesn't meet the standards established by the three previous boost games, it's more linear, contains less obstacles, is easier than the other titles, and the stages are still too short - less environments and content than two of the boost titles, and more than half of that content (including boss battle, enemies, stages, ect.) reuse assets from other games, rather than being 100% original - The music is noticeably lazier, reusing the same instrument set for almost every song for each character. May not be "shitty", but it's way more than a step down. It's a tumble down the steps.
Perhaps, maybe Classic was part of it but also taking a backseat to the avatar. I don't really agree with the Boom Sonic theory, but this doesn't outright make it not true. I do feel it does make it a little bit more unlikely to have happened.
From the perspective of someone that thinks the Boost formula has too many negative aspects tacked on to be the future of the franchise: 1. Good engine /= good game. The Retro Engine with Forces' level design, aesthetics, etc. is still meh. On the other hand, Generations made bank with a pretty inaccurate and flawed engine because it delivered everywhere else. Why put in effort if it doesn't always produce results? 2. Sonic Team has other issues in making a quality engine that fans don't. We don't have to convince higher-ups of why this is worthwhile (see 1), or actually figure out what makes a good engine. "Taxman's in the phone book" isn't an excuse, because it would admit Sonic Team's weaknesses... which leads to no more Sonic Team. This doesn't justify the results, but look at Forces. Sonic Team needs all the selfishness it gets going forward- it has literally no self-respect right now.
