Maybe the localizers got the controls mixed up with the Wii version? IIRC you do drift with B in that version.
No, you can definitely drift with B/Circle in Unleashed according to everything I've read. The Japanese manual says to use B/Circle as well, so it's not a localisation thing. I guess I just don't remember playing it for the first time if that's how the game communicates it to you. I always remember using the triggers, but that could be from going from Generations back to Unleashed. The button-less drift is super intriguing to me though. Can you link the forum post you found regarding it?
Near at the cliffs, at the very top of the monstrously high depths approaching the primordial seas of fairies, greets your eyes of the fantastical jungle in this wondrous land that is... GameFAQs. Buried deep in the ancient GameFAQs forums, someone by the name of Detha mentions the alternate method for drifting using the analog stick.
Oh, I saw that while searching. He says he’s using the triggers to do it, not that he’s doing it with only the analogue stick. Or at least that’s how I’m reading it. This seems like he’s saying, “Don’t use the B button because the triggers do the same job.”
...okay, re-reading that post more closely, it describes not one, but three alternate methods? I gotta check back on Unleashed again, what in the world?
I know for a fact that you can drift using the triggers and the B button, and yeah the button-less drift is a very real thing. Opened up unleashed on emulator with an input visualizer to demonstrate this, here's the video. Seems to have something to do with the stopping animation when at high speeds but I have no idea if it's intentional or what's causing it. It's absent in generations, but then again, generations did remove a bunch of intentional moves like the sweepkick and crawl, so I'm clueless to this even though I love unleashed. Doesn't seem to be in any official material teaching you the controls though, so it may be unintentional.
Okay, came back with a recording of whatever weirdness this is. Apologies for the crusty quality: I don't have a capture card and I only have a CRT. Edit: ninja'd It's quite baffling to see it in action: I can't figure out how or why braking and then turning causes Sonic to drift. I've been playing this game for a couple of years, and while I'm aware of glitches like M-Speed and the X Y Y clip I don't know how this works exactly. Thanks for the clear video oliver!
Ok. I did a little more testing, and apparently with this bug you can drift in quickstep segments of levels, which disable drifting via the triggers or the B button. Happens about midway through this video, I could only manage to do it for a split second, its really really precise in quickstep segments for some reason. Pretty much cements this as a bug in my book. Normally you can only drift in these segments by entering them while drifting, and for good reason, too. Sonic gains absurd amounts of speed by drifting against walls in quickstep segments, and it's utterly insane that we now have a way to start drifting in these on the fly, even if it is stupid precise.
OH DEAR GOD THIS FEELS SO FORBIDDEN SONIC DRIFTING IN THE QUICKSTEP ROADS???? HELLO???? I know this game in and out for years, I know what does and doesn't work and this feels so cursed what the actual fuck Did I just accidentally discover a forbidden strat what applications does this have? Someone forward this to the SU speedrunners
I love how we came full circle, the thread started with Sonic's drift and ends with an accidental discovery about Sonic's drift
It's odd that Sonic manages to grind in his normal shoes. It made sense for him to be able to grind in Sonic Adventure 2, but in games since it shouldn't be possible as those shoes aren't designed for grinding. inb4 someone says 'he's a fast blue hedgehog it doesn't have to make sense'
I'd always imagined that the constant gunk, debris, and dust that he runs through in every level effectively lubes and greases his shoes like those old school rubber rainboots to such a staggering degree that sparks start flying off every time he grinds. Just look at how his shoes start spraying sparks on Eggmanland in SU holy crap If he'd actually tried doing anything else with those makeshift rails something like this would happen
I always suspended my disbelief with this one because it's always been my personal headcanon that sonic's shoes are made of patent leather, but the soles themselves are made of some sort of metal, so then when he would grind on rails it would actually work and the sparks flying would make sense. Although metal soles would be very uncomfortable to run in, but looking at the design of sonic's shoes they arent practical running shoes in the first place so whatever. Real reason is that the mechanic made sense with the soap shoes, but it was a good enough mechanic that they kept it for 06 even if it didnt make much sense.
You got it wrong: Sonic is the avatar of speed and is allowed to do anything cool involving speed by divine right.
The colors of the four chao stats have always been pretty unusual to me. Fly is purple, and clearly a reference to Nights. Power is red, which makes sense--it's both Knuckles' color, and a fitting color for strength in general. Swim however is yelllow, and Run green. You'd think Swim would be blue, but I can see the catch there: blue would make people think of Sonic, and thus it'd be Run. But blue also makes people think of water...still, yellow is an odd choice for Swim. Is it because of Tails? But Tails' color should be used for Fly if anything. Green for Run I guess is because green is a common color for wind.
I'd guess none of the stats were assigned the color blue because regular Chao are blue in their original form. Therefore blue = no stat alignment.
The colours of the Chaos Drives correspond to the small animals. Notably, there are animals which are assigned a blue colour, which the wiki describes as "random".