Sonic Colo(u)rs Ultimate released for Switch, Xbox One, PlayStation 4, and Epic Games Store

I mean I guess that's fair we shouldn't expect anything, but I bet enough people will be interested that somethings will happen eventually.

From a level perspective alone this game provides us with a pretty decent Modern Sonic base, especially with all the wisps, unlike Lost World where the physics aren't useful in most non Lost World levels or Forces where Sonic's moveset is stripped down so much it makes certain things hard to do. I watched someone hacking this game yesterday and they back ported the test level into the original, it was interesting to see. Fun fact, apparently the cube wisp works in 3D, they just never found any reason to use said feature. They also ported over Tropical Resort into Lost World PC.

If nothing else Blind Squirrel Game's decision to leave a wealth of development tools in there will probably serve useful

 

I actually think Rival Rush is really fun. It’s challenging even if you’re already good at the game - it forces you to think about which routes to take, which Wisps to use, and where to use them. I’ve been playing the game for over 10 years and even I found it sort of challenging. It’s a small change that doesn’t add much but I appreciate it.

 

It'd be great if modders found a way to expand Rival Rush mode, either by adding more levels to the feature or somehow getting multi-player to work in normal stages and player 1 is Sonic and player 2 is Metal Sonic.

Make your own Rival Rush lol

 

I beat the game and I am currently red ring hunting on Series X, honestly Colors is a better game than I remember. I really liked it when it came out mind you, but after Generations released I felt no reason to return to Colors, and I've barely played the game since then because of that. Upon beating Ultimate, I actually forgot that Colors isn't nearly as repetitive or bland with its platforming compared to Lost World or Forces. To be honest, the level design is leagues better than either of those games, in that the levels are pretty meaty and lengthy without being tiresome or overly linear. The Acts 3-6 weren't nearly as short or uninteresting as I remember either, once all of the wisps are unlocked most of them are genuinely fun levels with lots of interesting ideas. I had a lot of fun revisiting Colors, and I can't wait to unlock Super Sonic again!

As for the actual port... on Series X the only bugs I ever encountered were audio bugs (like the red rings not making any pickup noises, wisp music not playing, etc), but other wise it was a fine remaster. I know the Switch version is a mess, but the Xbox version appears to be mostly stable. I like the remastered visuals way better than when the reveal trailer released, and playing Colors in 60fps without the game-breaking bugs (in Dolphin) was a treat. This is NOT really a SADX situation, that game completely ruined the aesthetic of the original Dreamcast version with the overly dull lighting and hideous character models (imo). Colors Ultimate is a few patches away from being the definitive version of Colors, it really didn't break, ruin, or remove anything that made the original so great, its just a bit unpolished and could use a patch or two.

 

I don't know I'd say it is very comparable to SADX as far as lighting goes specifically, with bloom being turned right up and everything else being made really oddly dark?

 

From my general understanding; this port isn't anywhere near as bad as its been made it out to be, but it's also nowhere near as optimized or good as it could have been. Would I be correct in assuming that?

 

This is my guess of what happened

SEGA wanted to remaster colors so they chose to outsource it because it would be mostly an upres and it would be a waste of in house resources considering it SHOULDN'T be too much work. They then went shopping around to smaller companies to do it on the cheap.

Blind squirrel pitches using Godot as the engine for the game saying it has natural c++ support and should port over smoothly with little time and money. Out of all proposals this seems cheapest with still good results so Sega goes with it. They try porting it and it doesn't work out. Things break during the attempt to move it to Godot and it's too much for any simple fixes.

They have already sunk enough time and money into BSG that they let them finish it and fix it as much as they can before they HAVE to release it to appease shareholders and get Christmas sales.

Of course there is more going on behind the scenes but this makes the most sense to me.

 

Well I'm getting the PS4 version this week, and from what I gather, that's the least problematic version. Of course the version that everyone would be most likely playing is the one with the most problems though, just that Sonic luck lol.

 

That noisy-ass perfect homing attack really IS a substantial mechanical change for Colors Ultimate. Mainly because it generates a little boost energy. This means that in the many "bonus" stages that didn't have any way to boost, you'll actually HAVE it, and in regular stages, you'll have a lot more of it. Personally, I think it's a nice change. De-emphasizing the boost was one of Colors' biggest departures from all the other boost games, and this nudges it back toward a speedier, more spectacular Sonic, without going SO far overboard that it loses what makes Colors unique.

It's nice to have the option to take a speedier approach to the platforming sections.

 

Putting aside my "Muh uh I don't like it" rants about this game for a second, this is the one thing I've been really, REALLY looking forward to experiencing in this re-release.
Colours' lack of boost was always one of my main complain with the game, so for the devs to actually address it, and in a way that requires skill to pull off instead of just having rings give you boost? Hell yeah.

Honestly the homing attack in 3d Sonic games was always an excuse to have mindless button mashing sections imo, so I really hope this mechanic is brought back in Sonic Rangers.

 

I get the physical switch version in 2 days. Nobody so far has played any physical versions, correct? How much you wanna bet that without updates, the physical switch version is somehow even worse than what we've seen so far, emulator fraud aside?

 

Apparently, the discourse on Twitter was enough to get a response from Katie.

https://twitter.com/KatieChrz/status/1434622601284915202

 

I'd really hope that if the 'perfect' Homing Attack is for Rangers too or something that it uses a far less obnoxious sound. That noise genuinely hurts hearing it repeatedly.

 

I mean, yeah, but who's stupid enough to purposefully skip day 1 patches?

EDIT: Besides Egoraptor, because fuck that guy.

 

I was thinking the same thing when playing last night. I suspect that we'll see this Dash/Rainbow Ring design/sound, perfect homing attack, and maybe even the token system with customization in Rangers. Reminds me of how Mania has small connections to Forces.

 

One little difference I caught: Sonic taunts the Starlight Carnival and Asteroid Coaster bosses upon defeating them now. He says "Sorry, I got bored and broke your robot!" in SC, and "That should put a stop to this wisp-draining insanity!" in AC.

These lines actually are in the Wii version but aren't used for whatever reason. It doesn't appear that any of the other unused Sonic boss banter lines got used either. Interesting.

 

Apparently Sonic & the Black Knight textures were found in Colors Ultimate files - were these in the original game's code?