[Josh]

[Dark Sonic]

I love how for the most part, everything except the games is just pure gold for Sonic.

Just, ya know, the games suck. Which is ironic considering that's the foundation of the series. It's like they built a mansion on twigs.

[Irixion]

This is just terrible. They should abandon the Boom thing. The characters have terrible design, and both games are so...they're not fun. It's like playing Tetris except worse. I dunno...even if it's momentum based this just stinks like nasty cheese right now.

[ICEknight]

Strife, on 10 June 2015 - 06:58 PM, said:

At least their social media presence is right on the money, as usual.

https://twitter.com/...354712149237760

https://twitter.com/...718532529037312

Man, this game looks like it's going to suck again--Oh hey! Funny people in their social media! HA HA HA.

[Nova]

Ruby doing God's work.

[TimmiT]

Some more details from Ruby:

Quote

Yes - level length has been reduced in order to make sure the flow feels much faster. The exploration elements, extra paths, and collectibles are still there, but they're totally optional now and you won't be required to gather them to move on to another island. (And there was much rejoicing!)

Quote

The enerbeam loading-sections are out, and springs that instantly take you to the fore/background are in. It should look and feel much more natural as you play a level - if you don't even notice it, we've done our job!

http://www.neogaf.co...6&postcount=476

Those actually are some pretty good improvements.

[The KKM]

So everyone's just admitting the Enerbeams were BRB's desperate attempt at making Ratchet and Clank (amongst other desperate attempts) and ignoring them? That's good news to me

[SpeedStarTMQ]

Jen, on 10 June 2015 - 03:19 PM, said:

Maybe I'm just being really fucking cynical, but that's what being a Sonic fan does to you after almost 25 years =P There's been so many massive ups and downs with this franchise that it's not even funny any more.

It's not being a Sonic fan that's the problem, it's the way SEGA go about doing business and making games nowadays. It's not even just Sonic, it's just the company as a whole. They don't have a clear direction to head in, so they just do whatever they fancy at the time. Everything is a massive experiment to them. There's no real acknowledgement of heritage, and it's not patriotic.

Whilst they do release retro titles now and then, they're completely disparate from the modern SEGA. Even their UK website has NO acknowledgement of SEGA's history as a company, or the brands they own the rights to. All they have is acrappy little section titled "Brands", which list the following:

1) Sonic The Hedgehog
2) Total War
3) Football Manager
4) Aliens
5) Company of Heroes

I mean, what the fuck? Where's the history of SEGA in the 80's and information on their arcade divisions and titles? Where's the information on their Home Consoles of old during the late 80's and 90's, which they heavily live off today through various ports and emulated Plug 'N' Play consoles? Where's the information on other more recent titles like Crazy Taxi, Super Monkey Ball, Bayonetta, Phantasy Star Online?

I actually hate SEGA of today. They're a bland, boring company, who I imagine employ people who sit around empty, boring boardrooms in black suits with no idea of their past, clinging to the more recent series they have purely because they literally don't have any staff left who know much about anything else.

They could do great things. They have acquired excellent outside help recently via the community, like RubyEclipse, Stealth and Taxman, and they have a following of extremely talented fans, some of whom should really be head hunted to help produce new ideas and projects. Pelikan13 is a prime example. How his 90's Arcade Racer hasn't been picked up by a large company is beyond me.

They could axe the crappy clones and release a fully functioning, high quality Plug 'N' Play Mega Drive at little cost and live off the vast library of excellent retro titles they have. They could do what other premium brands do and make their history interesting and novel. People buy in to brands - look at Apple. Hell, there's even high-quality fan books out there about SEGA, and officially endorsed items such as the Mega Drive Collected Works - people are looking for interesting stuff about the brand, but get little from SEGA themselves.

They could release an up-to-date multi-platform compilation of updated and enhanced older titles to play 2P over the internet. I've wanted to do this for a while but don't have Xbox Live.

I could list a hundred things SEGA could do to make their brand stand out and make it viable and interesting for consumers nowadays, but I think I've got my point across.

Sonic is just a metaphor for SEGA nowadays. Trying to be hip and interesting, whilst doing the minimum to achieve the results.

[High Fidelity]

@SpeedStar - I think your right. It really pains me to say it but Sega kinda remind me of Atari now.

IMO I think what's really needed for Sonic is a MUCH much stronger art direction and focus on keeping things simple. That would be a good start.

I applaud Sega for listening to the fans in regards to Sonic games but are they listening to the right ones? I mean just looking though most YouTube comments and the majority of fans haven't a fucking clue on what would make a good Sonic game.

[Caniad Bach]

SEGA don't give a shit about 'the fans'. There aren't enough of us to make it worthwhile, which is why they are always trying to reinvent the wheel. They couldn't care less about what a handful of nerds on Sonic Retro think, because the kiddy demographic they're targeting is much larger. Therefore they do whatever they think might work, claiming it's for the 'fans', and then blame 'the fans' when it all goes tits up.

Sadly the audience they're targeting are all screaming "faggotnigger" at each other on CoD and GTA.

A good game appeals to everyone (See: recent Rayman games), but SEGA are too risk averse to spend the time and money to make something decent.

[SpeedStarTMQ]

The problem is that they're not going to break the cycle until they release something worthwhile, like they did with Sonic Generations in 2012.

I look forward to seeing what they've got under their sleeve for the main series.

[Blue Blood]

The KKM, on 11 June 2015 - 07:21 AM, said:

So everyone's just admitting the Enerbeams were BRB's desperate attempt at making Ratchet and Clank (amongst other desperate attempts) and ignoring them? That's good news to me

You can still see them being used as nothing more than swinging vines in some of the footage. But yeah, they've taken a backseat and aren't even present on the character designs. The cartoon has used them all of twice, showing them to be more like one of Tails' devices than anything else. And in SC, Sticks had one for no explained reason. They've be better off scrapping them outright because they're just a kind of lame mechanic that's never taken off.

That said, having a lasso to perform tricks with in speedy gameplay sounds like it could be really fun. But nope; Sonic Boom.

This post has been edited by Blue Blood: 11 June 2015 - 12:29 PM

[Nova]

They do look like they're genuinely learning and Aaron is doing a great job of communicating this. If you're reading, great work Ruby.

As usual I'll wait for reviews to come in, but if these promises ring true it might be worth a buy.

[Yeow]

Caniad Bach, on 11 June 2015 - 11:38 AM, said:

SEGA don't give a shit about 'the fans'.

No disagreements there.

Caniad Bach, on 11 June 2015 - 11:38 AM, said:

Therefore they do whatever they think might work, claiming it's for the 'fans', and then blame 'the fans' when it all goes tits up.

Unfortunately.

Caniad Bach, on 11 June 2015 - 11:38 AM, said:

There aren't enough of us to make it worthwhile, which is why they are always trying to reinvent the wheel. They couldn't care less about what a handful of nerds on Sonic Retro think, because the kiddy demographic they're targeting is much larger.

To the first point, I'd argue the contrary; their intention reinvent the wheel with every other damn game is the result of not enough existing fans to "make it worthwhile", namely because all that does is drive away a lot more longtime fans than it does pick up new fans. To the second point, while the kiddy demographic they're aiming for may be larger than the fanbase, that doesn't seem to have done them any favors, as Sonic games are now failing to even crack one million units nowadays (even if one points out the elephant in the room that is the Wii U install base, you'd think the 3DS Sonic games would be hauling in much better sales than they have been currently doing). Maybe instead of trying to keep fishing for new fans at the expense of pushing away older fans, they could adhere to basic marketing principles and actually make an effort to meet the needs of their existing base, lest they end up pulling more Rise of Lyrics and produce games that appeal and sell to absolutely nobody.

...

Oh right, this is a topic about the Boom 3DS sequel. Hmph.

I really don't particularly care for it and I really doubt it will be any better. than the first 3DS game. The previous game was released only seven months ago, and this game literally looks like the first game with a new character and a very gimmicky powerup theme tacked onto the existing base design. I find it hard to believe that the game will tote the improvements it made to the gameplay and level design, when it literally looks like Shattered Crystal: The Hailfire Peaks Remix, featuring Amy from the Sonic Boom series.

This post has been edited by Yeow: 11 June 2015 - 04:39 PM

[Blue Blood]

Nova, on 11 June 2015 - 01:33 PM, said:

They do look like they're genuinely learning and Aaron is doing a great job of communicating this. If you're reading, great work Ruby.

As usual I'll wait for reviews to come in, but if these promises ring true it might be worth a buy.

I'll be real cynical right now - remember how much they learned after S4E1 and how Aaron did a great job of communicating it? And remember how that turned out? Hard to argue that E2 wasn't better, but not still not easy to argue that it was actually good. Aaron is simply too good at his job. He's actually got me thinking that F&I will be halfway decent, and really I should know better.

They've clearly fixed up some things about SC already. No more in-level loading, streamlining the gameplay and increasing the number of levels are all marked improvements. I'd say the graphics look better too (apart from whatever the fuck this is). Plus there's the fact it now looks like a proper TV tie-in, rather than the weird middle-ground that SC was between RoL and the cartoon. But gameplay still looks at it's heart like it's mostly the same experience as SC. There's some janky run button and you just switch characters to tackle the specific obstacle the game throws at you, except now there's the arbitrary fire and ice thing thrown in too. And I have to use the term "obstacle" loosely, because it's very much just "press x to continue". The whole fire and ice thing looks really, really unnecessary on top of it all. "This obstacle is fire, therefore you must press ice". Maybe they'll get creative with it? Probably not. Not once during SC did they attempt to do anything interesting with any of the four characters' abilities. If that trailer is anything to go by, they've gone so far as to plaster symbols like flames, snowflakes and hammers on top of every obstacle telling you exactly what you need to do. They've fallen into the easiest, biggest pitfall of any game where you control an entire team at once... again.

But it's for the kiddies. I doubt SEGA is all too bothered, because if we all like the game it's just a bonus compared to if it actually sells to it's target market.

This post has been edited by Blue Blood: 11 June 2015 - 05:25 PM