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TGC's Sonic Advance Series!

Discussion in 'General Sonic Discussion' started by Josh, Apr 22, 2019.

  1. MainMemory

    MainMemory

    Kate the Wolf Tech Member
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    Never forget the part in Route 99 Act 1 where you run into a wall, and then a platform which is solid on all sides for some reason comes down and crushes you. That same act also contains a section where you come off of a ceiling run and straight into a set of spikes on a raised platform. Maybe I'm supposed to be rolling to avoid them?
     
  2. Sid Starkiller

    Sid Starkiller

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    They're simple to avoid, but definitely NOT intuitive: just let the momentum of the nearby spring carry you without pressing a button.
     
  3. Sir_mihael

    Sir_mihael

    DON'T TRUST THIS MAN Member
    Glad so many people remember this part because it always stuck with me. It's almost Advance 3's own version of the Red Barrel in that it's some sort of rite of passage that you have to be given this "fuck you" moment as part of the game experience.
     
  4. Nova

    Nova

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    I actually watched the Advance 2 video the other day and I have to say - great, on-point analysis! Thorough, and I don't think there's anything more that I can add about the game. I heard the criticism years ago about the game feeling like a bunch of floating racetracks in the sky and it really is accurate.

    Can't wait for the SA3 video!
     
  5. Josh

    Josh

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    [youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4tqWZ6il7_s[/youtube]

    The third and final episode of the season is out now! I always hated this game... until I actually played it long enough to make an episode about it.
     
  6. So.....Sadv3 was actually the first I played in the advance series back in 04.

    I think Sadv1 is the best but i enjoyed my Sadv3 playthrough the first time around. I think this is probably because theres a wider gap between it and the classic series and by that time it was obvious that Sonic Team was moving further and further away from the classic formula. My expectations were not that it would mimic the classics much at all except on a surface level. And with that, I was able to have a good time despite knowing what I prefer.

    Some of the music in the game is quite good. Like you TGC, i really enjoyed the chaos angel vibe. I think the only level i didnt care for, ironically, was the green hill level. Just did nothing for me that the many reimaginings hadn't already done.

    I also don't mind difficult challenges as long as I have fun controlling the character in the process. Finding the emeralds was annoying but I trudged through and got it done. I'd say it wasnt worth it though. I didnt know SS was only a final level exclusive since I hadn't played adv1 and 2 yet by this point.
     
  7. Laughingcow

    Laughingcow

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    I disagree with a good deal of this review. I could tear into this at length but I think the acronym "K.I.S.S." sums it up best:

    Keep
    It
    Simple
    Stupid!

    If the levels need arrows to point you where to go then you have bad level design. Multiple characters are a novelty and exist to justify excessive deathpits (hi Knuckles) and cheap uninspired bosses (hi Cream). And a personal pet peeve of mine being foreground objects which made me at times think I couldn't go places only to find out I could walk through them. The major peeve was the change in physics (momentum building is too fast) which caused me to die in some of the platforming sections. Sure the level design and emerald gathering has improved over Advance 2 but they are still far inferior to Advance 1.

    Now I'm gonna stop before my negativity creates an all consuming black hole of misery.
     
  8. Josh

    Josh

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    [youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4tqWZ6il7_s[/youtube]

    I managed to post the video at the very end of a page again, so I'm just gonna stick it up here again. :P

    Regarding "KISS," yeah, I definitely see where that's coming from, and I felt it much more in my second playthrough than my first. But I don't mind the series going off in more iterative, experimental directions, especially with smaller spinoff games like this. I just know I'd never want my mainline Sonic to always be weighed down with team-based mechanics and exploration, no matter how well-executed it was.
     
  9. Chibisteven

    Chibisteven

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    The first Sonic Advance is something I go back to play from time to time on the go. I haven't really gone back to the 2nd and 3rd other than for their musical scores.
     
  10. corneliab

    corneliab

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    So happy to see somebody give Sonic Advance 3 some love. I've been replaying it for the first time in years over the past week and my appreciation for it is still fully intact.

    I have fond memories of biking to my local game shop in the early evening to pick this up. It sort of blew my mind that it sort of made no splash at all on release, and more than that, some were just writing it off entirely. It's a beautiful GBA game with some of the best music on the system, the levels are massive, and players can really get creative with the abilities granted through the partner system. The Knuckles/Amy wall spindash remains one of my all-time favorite abilities in this series.

    and echoing that chaos angel appreciation as well. what a cool fucking final sonic zone.
     
  11. Xilla

    Xilla

    I fail to understand....I begin to see! Member
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    Advance 3 is one of the titles I've never played since beating it (Well minus the emeralds) mainly due to, as mentioned in the video, that horrible first zone! Something seemed really off about the physics to me too and some of the bosses really dragged (especially the Toy Kingdom one).
     
  12. Yeah, the first zone was really bad. It was my reason for putting the game off for the longest time as well. Totally agreed about the hubs, too.

    Random thought, but I wonder why they hid the Sonic & Tails mode in Advance 1 behind a cheat code. That seems like the kind of thing you'd want to have readily available in the game, at least as an unlockable...
     
  13. Overlord

    Overlord

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    Maybe because it isn't fantastic in how it works? Certainly seems Tails fucks up more than he does even in Sonic 2.

    Can't say I agree with you on the hubs, Josh - they're not that hard to navigate, and I enjoyed the Chao hunting in 3 because of the fact you only ever need to find each one once. The keys are a lot more simple, there's multiple, and you can just get one and it works too. Area 99 is not a great zone though, agreed on that.
     
  14. JaxTH

    JaxTH

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    Jack shit.
    Since no one said it in this topic:

    Turning on easy mode in Sonic Advance also makes bosses take six hits instead of eight. Also true nitpick, Mecha Knuckles is in Advance, not Metal. :v:
     
  15. Covarr

    Covarr

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    Personally, though I never found them hard to navigate, I did find them annoying. They always struck me as padding, as extra hoops to jump through before I got to play the actual game; they don't provide enough actual fun to justify themselves, which IMO makes them feel on par with glorified loading screens in a game that doesn't need 'em.

    The way I see it, a great level hub is dense. The example in Josh's video, Kirby's Adventure, achieved this by keeping the hubs small so that all the level and minigame doors were fairly close together. Super Mario Sunshine's hub, another one of my favorites, was jam packed with secrets, as well as teases for FLUDD abilities Mario wouldn't get until later. Heck, even Soleanna was loaded with people to talk to, passive storytelling, and bonus challenges around every corner (betrayed mostly by bad controls and load times, which aren't flaws in the hub itself). By comparison, Sonic Advance 3's hubs are fairly sparse, and the labyrinthine structure makes them slow to navigate even if you know your way around, because there's so little opportunity to gain any momentum.

    In a way, it has a lot in common with Skyrim, a game whose world is unreasonably large relative to the amount of content. Yes, there's a TON of game in there, but there is an unreasonable amount of time spent just travelling from point to point, with little to make it interesting. Sonic Advance 3 doesn't get that nearly as wrong as Skyrim does, but ultimately a hub should be more about discovery than transit, and IMO Sonic Advance 3, though it has both, gets that balance wrong and makes the game more tedious than it needs to.
     
  16. corneliab

    corneliab

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    Sonic Advance 3's hubs are tiny. It takes almost no time at all to go from one level to the next, and the platforming and puzzle elements that seperate levels are very brief and basic. they work just fine as spaces to test character combinations and strike me as harmless at worst.

    above all else though I like their chill remixes
     
  17. Ravenfreak

    Ravenfreak

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    I never took the proper time to play the Advance trilogy but your videos are making me want to grab my GBA and play through Advance 1 and 3! (I don't own 2 yet...) I did play Advance 2 and 3 a bit on a emulator back when I first joined the community but I didn't really get too far in either game. I will say though, getting the chaos emeralds are a pain in the ass in all three games, why the hell did they have to make it that much of a pain for such a small reward? :v: I always wondered how to enter special stages in these games...
     
  18. FollOw

    FollOw

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    I always find it amazing when a review will make me want to go back and replay a game. I'm gonna be playing SA3 this weekend now hahaha....
     
  19. Nova

    Nova

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    I'll agree with people saying the hubs really weren't that bad, I kinda liked them the first time through at least. I'm also apparently in the minority of quite liking Route 99? I never knew people disliked it that much and you do raise a lot of valid problems with it, but I still enjoy it for the energetic music and the fact it feels like the first time we got to run through the middle of a city during the day in a 2D Sonic game. Despite those minor subjective differences of opinion, the actual review itself was highly entertaining and well presented and you should be happy with the work you did on it!

    Like others I kind of want to grab my GBA and play it again to satisfy my nostalgia. :v: One of my earliest memories of something big happening in the community was the Sonic Advance 3 leak, actually. Kinda hilarious that it was literally months in advance. Still, I loved the game then and I love it now.
     
  20. I don't think I've commented here yet? This is another great video series, I love it! It's been awhile, but I think I mildly disliked the stage hubs back in the day. I remember someone (Marc?) made a Sonic 1 hack that used hubworlds as they were the new thing and I came around on the concept. I really didn't like Sonic Advance 3 back when I first played it, but I may have to give it another try. I just need to find where I put the cartridge; it's been over a decade since I last even thought about the game, let alone played it.