I buy the leak largely based on the fact that it sounds weird and not very fun. I remember Unleashed and Forces getting similar leaks that turned out to be completely accurate. I'm interested in it though. Maybe Sonic won't ever be "great" again, but interesting Sonic games are way more entertaining than boring ones. Using some kind of Boost adjacent mechanic to draw out crop circles sounds like something they'd come up with if they wanted to try something new with a degree of familiarity. It's not the in-depth physics I wanted but it's something different at least. Some speculation based on the trailer+leak. -The focal point of this game thematically seems to be contrasting the natural forests and ruins of this world with some sort of technology. We'll call that an affectionate send up to Breath of the Wild, but you could also read it as a return to the core themes of the series ala Colors if you define that stuff broadly enough. Other things about the leak actually remind me of a lot of the classics, like going into another dimension to grab the emeralds. Maybe this is just a game about Sonic taking a trip to a new island and unlocking it's secrets, like the old days. - the subtitles in a Sonic game usially refer to it's narrative instead of it's mechanics. The 'rangers' are probably a completely new set of characters, and unlike the last couple of games they don't sound like obstacles or functions. If the ghost girl the leaks keep referring to is a "ranger" it might be taking more from BOTW than I thought at first. Maybe it refers to this world's protectors and how Sonic has to take on the role in their absence. - I don't think the gameplay will be anything to write home about since the boost features in the trailer instead of rolling, but I do wonder how they managed to make drawing lines as Sonic easy in that format. They had to have at least slowed him down, but how do they keep it from being a mess, visually? An overhead camera like in the trailer, maybe? Maybe holding "Boost" in the overworld unlocks a more lenient turning mode and even slows the game down so that you can easily draw out shapes. - How, exactly, do they expect to release a fast paced open world game on the switch? Botw and Mario Odyssey manage with Mario and Link's lower base speed, but they tend to have problems beyond that. I'd hate for the artstyle to be hampered by having to accommodate for every platform.
Okay, now that I think about it: this spincycle move, as its described, actually sounds interesting, at least in concept. It's the first combat technique in the 3D games I think that is directly contingent on momentum-the point is to string together a circle presumably without stopping, meaning that the challenge in using it is maintaining momentum and dancing around enemies to complete a chain. Whether it works in actuality is something else, but I think the idea is intriguing. It feels like they took Sonic's 2D spin and implemented it in 3D, almost? The thing about spinning was that in 3D it feels awkward to use because you have to aim directly into enemies. I am a diehard fan of all these big 3D Sonic fangame projects, and even I will not deny that spinning is usually the worst way to take out enemies in them. But taking that idea, and extending it to an AoE attack that relies on momentum...that sounds interesting to me. But we'll have to see.
Could this new game be related to Prime, in some way? It wouldn't be the first time such a thing happened... ^^"
Almost no chance. The mainline Sonic games have never concerned themselves with the side material like the shows and games, in fact, the mainline games actively avoid even acknowledging that material in any way whatsoever. Which is also why I am baffled some people kept expecting a movie tie-in game. Sonic Team does not give a single hoot about anything non-game Sonic stuff.
Some were wondering if his face was hidden on purpose (myself included) so I checked the frames after the closeup running to see if his face is visible and it is. I guess he’s a tad shorter than the usual Modern design but he looks to be the same.
From what i can see his quills are returning to be larger and more spiky instead of being small like in forces and it seems sonic's shade of blue is back form generations.
All but the closest English word it actually resembles. "Up" My second guess would be ”ひや” Which can be translated from Japanese as "Chilled/Cool".
FWIW, his legs also looked tiny in Colours' intro: And the Forces teaser even: It wasn't until Lost World, Runners and Forces that his design actually changed somewhat. And even then, I think they only had his legs thicker without actually shortening them (unlike his spikes). The way that he's running in the 2022 trailer just seems to be fairly standard for Marza's animations where they zoom in on his feet from a side angle; they make his legs look a bit shorter, particularly the leg that he's striding forwards with, so that they can keep his body in the shot and use some squash and stretch. The only clear difference this time is that his back leg bends/curls up instead of going straight backwards. His legs maybe look a bit shorter overall in 2022, but I genuinely think that's just because we're slowing down a visual effect and looking too closely at something we're not supposed to see like this. I've seen other people claim that they were obscuring his face in this teaser so that they could hide the fact that they've redesigned his face to have two separate eyes, ala the movie. At first I thought you were going to say the same thing, and I'm glad you didn't. That's obviously not the case, and I find it almost maddening that people think it is. As far as the CGI footage and promotional renders go... I actually think that Forces and Lost World's CGI and promo renders looked identical to Unleashed, Generations and Colours. The in-game models differed, for sure. But this teaser isn't representative of what we'll be seeing from Sonic's appearance in the game itself. I too hope that he's looking more like his Unleashed/Colours/Generations self, or better yet that he had an entirely new model. I don't like his shorter spikes and lighter shade of blue in the newer games. He'd benefit greatly from just some minor redesigns to recapture the "cool" side of his design that's been lost since Unleashed (and especially since Last World), and to better animate his face. That's a discussion for another thread though.
Yeah that's a nice addition i also really like the change in color from Force's "baby blue" to the good old sonic adventure/unleashed/gens "SEGA blue"
Ya I was thinking the exact same thing. That he looks really similar to the Colors intro and his legs might just look shorter due to the running effect. I just thought it was a little odd they’d focus on his lower half instead of a full body shot running towards the screen. I know they’ve done it before but there’s no pan out with this teaser.
It's funny you say this because there were a significant amount of people who critiqued Forces for having too many animals and no humans in the world Personally I'm fine with this ghost girl character. As long as she looks more like Lah from Night of the Werehog and less like Elise, it's all fine by me I think it could help to finally put that Two-Worlds theory to rest
I would actually much rather see some signs of life from humanity this time. Every new Sonic character has been either an animal or some kind of weird alien since 2010
Personally I don't think "ghost girl" = human, I would like it to be true as it may finally clear up the two worlds thing but I would also definitaly describe Tikal as a "ghost girl" in her orb form.
I feel like it'd be a point of interest to be mentioned if she wasn't human though. I imagine being a floating ball of light would draw comparisons to Tikal or Navi, and if they're an animal, the poster likely would've tried to guess their species.
My main worry is how long they've been working on the game. Are we looking at a game that's been in development since Forces, or are we looking at a game that's gonna be made in 2 years or such? Then that raises the question of, if it's a longer cycle, do they have the management to ensure the time usage is worthwhile? Or, if it's a shorter cycle, do they have the time to pull off the ambition required? Anything they are working on has the potential to be good or bad, but I don't know whether I trust Sonic Team enough to think it's going to be the former.
I'm not expecting this game to do all that well critically or even with the fanbase (because some will never stop crying until we get Sonic Adventure) but I really hope Sega don't get cold feet when that happens and they just default back to something else. No new style of Sonic ever does well on its first try, not even the classics. Take the hit with this game and use it as a learning experience. That happened with Lost World and they never ever explored those concepts again.
If we believe the alleged leaks, this game was focus testing as early as March of 2020. Whatever they had, it must have been relatively enough to show off something playable, and it'll probably be released in winter of 2022, so that's around 2 and a half years that we (if we believe the leak) can be certain of. Obviously, if there was any semblance of quality on the alleged demo (leaker wasn't impressed but that doesn't really determine much), it'd have to have been around for some time already.
