SEGA launches the Sonic 2020 project, promises to release Sonic news on the 20th of every month

Well it could be a Sonic game and a Persona game.

 

Time to retire sonic I thinks, yeah I’m going to get some hate for saying it, but for me anyways, with the past so many games, it’s like Sega has been beating a dead horse by releasing subpar games with broken physics and poor level designs that are not very memorable or inspiring. Really love sonic, but not going to hold my breath waiting for the next “big?” hit any longer. Sigh, good bye Sonic.... Was nice running with you since 1991. Sucks you couldn’t have run a little more consistently Quality wise....

 

Nah. You sound like these crappy game journalists that make articles about how Sonic "had a rought time since he went 3d" and how Sega should sell Sonic to Nintendo.
There’s been more good Sonic games than bad Sonic games as far as I’m concerned.

 

I genuinely don't believe any notable game franchise has completely died, ever, because it's not really possible to prevent more being done with them. Even when they don't get any new releases for years, there's always attempts behind closed doors, like how there were prototypes for Jazz Jackrabbit and Battletoads games on the GBA. Sonic couldn't die even if Sonic Team wanted it to happen.

 

Reminder to self: this is Retro, leave any kind of positivity for the franchise at the door. No it doesn't matter whether Mania was the best game in years, the franchise is definitely dead/dying/should die and no news from Sonic Team could possibly be good news because they're perpetually incompetent even though Mania literally wouldn't have happened without their blessing.

Okay, I think I've adjusted.

 

I am so fucking done with this attitude.

There is an abundance of positivity and optimism on here surrounding every new Sonic game pre-release. Everyone here wants the next Sonic game to be a good one. Look at literally any Sonic game from this last decade and you'll see people expressing positive thoughts about it in the run-up to the release because they either think it will be good or just want it to be. That goes whether you are talking about Sonic 4 and Sonic Boom, or Sonic Mania and Sonic Generations. And let's look at Forces too whilst we at it, seeing as it's the most recent 3D Sonic game from SEGA and another instalment in a long series of Sonic games met with mixed reception from just about everyone. After Generations was such an objective high for the franchise in 2011 in terms of reception, we were treated to the vastly different and generally disliked Lost World in 2013. And then after waiting for four years to see what the next 3D Sonic game would be, there was a metric fuck ton of positivity surrounding Project Sonic 2017 when it was first unveiled. There was a lot of caution and trepidation, but because we're not a fucking hive-mind everyone had their own opinions and what was positive for some was negative for others and vice-versa. Now that we're in 2020 and both Forces and Mania were released around 3 years ago, everyone has reflected in their own way.

Sonic Team and SEGA have proven time and time again that they cannot consistently put out Sonic games that will be well-received by fans and critics. When it comes to members of this site, many are old enough to have been around since the very beginning or at least the days of the early 3D titles if not. People here have bore witness to the inconsistency of the series and its many shortcomings over the years even if they genuinely do love everything that the series has put out. The series has been mishandled and garnered mixed reception for so long. It's objective. Much as I dislike referring to it Mania such, it is essentially a glorified fan-project that exists precisely because of said shortcomings and mishandling. SEGA at large sure as hell wasn't interested in doing justice to the franchise, so it took a group of indie developers to make a pitch that SEGA, fortunately, picked up. It was an entirely different team that developed it. Members of Sonic Team and SEGA may have overseen it, but it wasn't developed by them.

The negativity is warranted. The cynicism and pessimism are warranted. I've got no reason to have high hopes about the next mainline Sonic project, and the unbridled optimism I see sometimes comes off as willfully dishonest. Or, at best, it seems naive. Why can't people be involved in discussions about the future of the series when they've got negative thoughts? Especially when we've been through this song and dance about SEGA promising to make better games multiple times in the past? It's relevant to the discussion when we're talking about what we'd like to see. Part of the reason for the mixed reception that Sonic's received is the fact that he's been pulled in a dozen different directions and not one of them has been consistently good.

I would love to see remakes of the Adventure games. Or better yet, I'd love to see entirely new Adventure-style games. I'd like to see any new Sonic game honestly. But I've got no faith in Sonic Team and SEGA delivering something that I'll want to play. Their track record is shocking, with their latest attempt being the biggest gut-punch I've endured since joining the online Sonic community at the turn of the millennium.

You can be optimistic. As I said at the start, we all want Sonic to be good. But being blindly optimistic is as bad as being blindly pessimistic. And I don't think it's blind pessimism for the reasons I've already outlined. People can chime in with their own thoughts and tell me if I'm wrong, but I'd hazard a guess that there's a lot of negativity from people it's difficult to feel optimistic when looking at everything we've got to go on. It's difficult to get much mileage out of talking about what you want to see when all you want is literally anything that's not garbage.

 

And I am equally fucking done with discussing Sonic with the members here. I had to take a break for a few weeks about a month ago just because of the (IMO) excess negativity here. I'll stick to engineering and transgeneral for my own health.

 

Sonic is not dead/dying. He never has been, and more likely than not never will be. Have the past few years been rough for him? Yes, absolutely. But that doesn’t mean he’s dead. It’s good to be cautiously optimistic for the next game. Our support for this franchise gives it a reason to continue.

 

Yeah was just venting my feelings on the franchise, sorry for coming off as negative about a character that I love deeply. Forces was the last straw for me after so many dissatisfying outings, I really do want to be positive about official Sonic games ,but how can I force myself? I think that If ppl post positive stuff about poorly designed games than Sega will continue to make poorly designed, unrefined and unpolished Sonic games...

For me anyways, official Sonic is pretty much dead , even if Sega pumps out Sonic games for the next 50 years, I don’t find myself waiting for the next game like I used to. I Used to consider myself a Sonic super fan, I’m slowly losing faith At every new release. At each new announcement I would get super hyped that the next game is going to be that break threw I’ve been waiting for, for the past 10 + years. But it never seems to be that game.

 

I've thought about it, and maybe Sonic just needs a Donkey Kong/Metroid-style break. Sonic Team clearly doesn't know what they should do with the franchise right now, so perhaps a break is best. Just release fun spin-offs occasionally (like Donkey Kong Jungle Beat; I just got this game and it's some of the most fun I've ever had with a video game) while the franchise recuperates in the background. Then, when Sega's ready, they can revive the series guns blazing. There's a reason Nintendo chose to include the word "Returns" in its Donkey Kong and Metroid revivals, and both were fantastic.

A break would allow Sonic Team to cool down, get back on track, and be prepared when they're ready to give Sonic another go. Of course, we all want new Sonic games, but I think we can deal with a hiatus.

 

I rarely login or post on Retro but I have lurked for many years.

The "This is Retro - All negativity" opinion is not a fair judgement on all the members here after observing over the years. That's the sort of sentence I've seen people on Reddit say regarding political issues.

There's such a diverse set of people and opinions here. It is why I keep returning to these forums to read what you guys/gals have to say.

When there's generally more negativity, there's a reason, and in this thread's case I think (as others have pointed out) it's because it's the same pattern that happens every couple of years, before a Sonic game is announced/released. This has happened so many times and people are burnt out. Everyone still has an shred of hope at least, otherwise they would simply not be posting here. Even so, there's still a few people in this thread that maintain positivity despite knowing this (Maybe they are overall more optimistic than others, maybe they haven't experienced the burnout feeling from the past). Personally I'm VERY eager about the idea of a Sonic Adventure remake or new Adventure style game, if that happened, it will be the first time I would pre-order a video game, even if it was just an announcement and knowing how I've been burnt out in the past (I was excited about Sonic 4 teaser stuff before it was officially released).

If something great happens, for example an amazing game from Sonic Team was released, then this forum will most definitely be exploding in positivity (Most recently, the Sonic Movie thread was overwhelmingly positive for instance). A hacking thread would appear with many passionate excited people working together, it'll be a great time if it eventually happens! The Sonic Generations hacking thread is enormous.

Discussion of positive and negative opinions is very educational for readers to see both sides of an argument formulated by people that intimately follow this franchise.
I hope that there's no uprising to censor negative opinions or anything.

 

3 "good" official Sonic games, maybe (I'd now comfortably place Colors and Generations in the "mediocre and forgettable" box, myself tbh). But, really, why the hell does that even matter anymore, now that we're not small children who are beholden to what we see on TV and on store shelves?

Games are structures of rules, which interact with one another, and which ostensibly facilitate fun when followed. Games are defined by their mechanics, regardless of the presence of a computer and/or a video display. So, in categorizing games, it makes more sense to classify them by how they feel to play, by what kinds and combinations of actions are demanded of the player in order to extract the sensation of "fun" from them. It's very unclear why we should classify play-structures by what they are superficially called, by which studio has their name slapped on the box, or by which cartoon character's face is plastered on it.

Imagine that some company (somehow) trademarked the game "Tag", and then they announced a sequel, called "Tag 2", which actually played instead like Tetris, for some stupid reason. It's not "Tag 2" in any real meaningful sense. Sure, it's "officially" called "Tag 2", but that doesn't mean anything. Calling a duck a hedgehog doesn't make it a hedgehog, and when these companies are banking on people picking it up because of that superficial name-familiarity (and they do; I did for years), the dumb trick feels gross to even begin to dignify.

People really over-inflate the importance of the distinction between "official games" and "fan games". Every game designer gets their start iterating on existing games that they enjoy playing. Every game is a "fan game", with "home rules" of some kind, in the same way that every biological organism alive today has parents, whose replicated genetic codes were slightly modified during reproduction. Descent, lineage, genealogy, etc. "Hide and Go Seek + Tag" directly mechanically descends from "Tag" in ways the hypothetical official "Tag 2" never could.

And, so, by that same token, one would think that games which actually mechanically descend from Sonic 1 (the original, definitive, Sonic the Hedgehog game, which synthesized rules from Super Mario Bros., pinball, and vert-skateboarding), are worth prioritizing over games which play quite differently (and like shit) but happen to have a familiar studio name slapped on the box and stars a familiar cartoon character.

What about people who care more about Sonic's world, and the characters, than "playing games"? I mean, fair enough, people should like what they like, but even then, the distinction between "official" and "fan-made" art is still bunk peddled primarily by people trying to get money out of you.

If one wishes to classify and categorize games based on corporate shit, rather than by the way that they play, that's fine. However, as soon as one starts to get disillusioned with blind corporate loyalty, concern for "officially-licensed" art begins to lose its point.

tl;dr:
yes, and?

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After reading further replies in the thread, I'd genuinely like to challenge everyone to try to stop using the word "franchise" when thinking about or discussing their favorite art and media, for like a week, and see if that changes how, why, or if even at all, they continue to think about and discuss said art. Because I think a lot of people are a lot more invested in this corporate nonsense than they probably realize (for effectively no reason other than nostalgic emotional attachments to brands which actively prey on that nostalgia, which they fostered in the first place, for money; "free" market my ass) which is both psychologically unhealthy, and really obfuscates the Beauty of the craft.

But most importantly, it renders one complicit in whatever bad shit that happens to get done with the money they gave (look up Haim Saban and Palestine if you want to join me in feeling permanently-gross for ever having given money the Power Rangers brand, for instance). Which isn't to say that every company will lobby for the election of politicians who wish to support ongoing genocide, but the moral compass of people who devote their lives to maximizing their net worth over any and everything else (executives of any big company, essentially) is already enormously compromised, and so the "benefit of the doubt" is the last thing they deserve.

---

Anyway, once Lapper finishes his level-creator, someone needs to send it Hirokazu Yasuhara's way (along with some drugs of his choice) for a month or two, and see what he makes (if anything).

 

That was some deep philosophical nonsense there. I tip my hat to you.

The difference between official games and fangames is mostly the fact that official games get finished because there is monetary incentive. And we like playing finished games.

 

If I'm reading right, your issue is that others still care about the franchise and Sega's Sonic games, and support games that play differently from the MD classics?

 

I don't really care about anything else you said here, I just think it's wild that you're reframing "developer taking their works in a different direction for any number of reasons--noticing players feeling the gameplay has gotten stale, themselves feeling the gameplay is stale, new ideas in response to new hardware, literally anything" as "developers intentionally maintain use of their IPs while making vastly different games with them because they think you're stupid". This is the kind of logic used to invalidate Super Mario Bros. 2 as a Mario game, which is what Mario 2 is.

Going by this, Zelda 2 and every 3D Zelda aren't "true" Zelda games because they're not iterations on the same game feel as Zelda 1, which... that's a stance you could take, it's just a very stupid one that helps nobody.

This is very much like the time a Capcom rep was interviewed about MvC Infinite not having any X-Men characters and said "when you think about it, all fighting game characters are just functions ... we made sure all of the characters not returning from MvC3 had their playstyles represented in another character", a statement which ignores that people get attached to the look and personality of characters along side their gameplay and have lowered interest when the gameplay returns without the look and personality.

 

jesus that was profound

 

I no longer feel optimistic or pessimistic about Sonic related games, at least not before they show something. About the situation, I think is a good sign overall, let's see:

1) Sonic Mania is an unexpected success, they say they'll take notes from it.
2) Not sure if this belongs to this list, but Evening Star is born and IIRC, Sega invited part of the team to visit Japan and who knows what more.
3) Focus on developing Sonic games is moved to USA.
4) Aaron Webber is prmoted to the team dealing with the Sonic brand there.

In my eyes, it seems like Sega really acknowledged what happened with Mania and are acting serious about it. I'd say the lack of game news it's because they're sorting out things before developing anything, or, if any development has started, it's a really slow one to pay attention to what they're doing. Maybe, probably, they still won't get it enough, but at least it seems this time they could be trying. The year is long enough to make announcements and the anniversary is the following year, so, if anything is in development, I think that will happen in october or november, a whole year before what it would be its release.

But yes, in the meantime, we're a bit bored around here.

 

Re: negativity, there's some personal context I'd like to lay down given that it seems like I was the first person called out for it.

Mania was literally the first Sonic game I bought since Heroes. In the time since I bought Heroes for the GCN, played it, hated it, cleared it anyway when I was 14, I: finished high school, moved across the country, went to college for six years, had three surgeries, dropped out of college, moved to another state, got a job, left that job, and got ANOTHER job, and Mania came out in the middle of what was my current job. So, a sum total of close to thirteen years. Not just that, throughout 2005-2010, I was a prolific poster on the Sega of America forums, and I was there when the Sonic 06 hype was real, before the game came out and just shattered each and every one of those hopes in a way that ensured that I very likely would not touch another new Sonic title. I have the day-night cycle Kingdom Valley demo etched into my brain to this day, because I followed that game so closely before release.

I bought Mania three times - Steam, digital PS4 when PC was delayed, and I literally imported a Japanese copy of Mania Plus to get the physical soundtrack, AND I have the Data Discs release on vinyl (and I don't even have a working record player). I 100% that title, gold medals included. It is legitimately the most fun I had with Sonic since 100%ing Adventure 2: Battle in high school, and easily one of the most joyful times I had playing a game in a long while.

If I was so pessimistic about Sonic, felt that there is nothing positive to talk about about it, I would not be here - I have a bunch of other series I could be discussing instead if that was the case. I have no faith in Sonic Team to make a good game anymore, because clearly they have management issues that have survived repeated relocations and decades of staff changes somehow, but I hold Sonic close to my heart - the archival, the OSTs, the older games (ran through all of Sonic 3 AIR recently, which was great), the YT animations, even the memes. When I post in here quizzically expressing surprise over people wanting a new game and assuming it'd be good given the track record of the past several years, it's because I know how this cycle goes, because I've experienced it, and I'm confused as to how, after seeing it firsthand with Forces, people can still have anything higher than very cautious optimism.

I also am confused about being excited over a game that....we simply don't even know exists? There isn't even a breath of a rumor of a new Sonic title, it's just wishful thinking, I'm not sure how that even merits discussion outside of "well [x] event is coming up, could be announced there, think it's a boost game?". Anything more than that and it's basically just posting wishlists.

Oh right and I'd also like to point out that while Mania indeed couldn't have happened without Sonic Team, it doesn't change the fact that there were still management issues behind the scenes, such as Stealth straight up calling out having to delay the game on PC in the Steam discussion forums, various basic things like level transitions that needed to be put in in a patch, the bugginess of the Switch and PC ports, etc..

 

While I am that old and maybe even a bit more, I reached that point in the last year, so age doesn't seem to be the only factor to develop that point of view. In fact, it was people trying to work against this forum's supposed negativity that opened my eyes a bit, so I understand why wafer feels that way, even if the situation isn't that negative.

My particular example: I also started getting mad thanks to Heroes, yet I reached to about an 80% of emblems completion before quitting. Probably the game wasn't that bad to me if I managed to replay it that much despite what I was feeling. Had the game not been a Sonic game, I probably wouldn't have given a damn about its quality, the real issue being that was the first time they promised to go back to Sonic's roots, an evident lie (and a haunted castle is Mario stuff). A team of non-anthro cartoon animals like an eagle, a monkey and a leopard (fly/power/speed) fighting industrial machinery like excavators and drills would have fit the game mechanics mostly the same, and the game wouldn't have had the duty of living up to Sonic's name.

And then, there's the fanbase, which is not truly a single fanbase, so I shouldn't expect to get what I want everytime. Someone told me our sister fandom is the one for My Little Pony, which is far from true here on Retro, but there are places (*cough* deviantart *cough*) where that can be sooo true.