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

I wonder how well this game is gonna sell. That "early access" bonus along with the particularly unfinished state of the game seems like it did it absolutely no favors. Ideally it would be getting a hype push from Sega during that time but the popular narrative was squarely focused on how buggy the game is (aka hype poison).

It officially came out yesterday and the reaction generally seems pretty quiet. Although I guess it also doesn't help that many people still have to wait for their physical copies.

 

Yeah, I've worked heavily in social media/digital content creation and marketing so I can appreciate the need to make content stand out. It's just a little annoying how quickly YouTubers who are trying to hop on a trend start dictating public opinion amongst those who haven't even played the game (Balan Wonderworld is a pretty good example of a game that, while definitely not great, does not deserve the hate spewed against it). I don't want to bash KingK at all and was just marathoning some of his vids yesterday in fact, I just doubt he would enjoy seeing similarly titled videos against things he enjoyed.

Anyway, your videos never went for that outrage angle! Though I've found our opinions are almost identical so I doubt it would annoy me much haha. Hope you have more videos in the pipeline btw.

 

The optimist is me is wondering if that could work in the game's favor. There'll probably be more patches before the delayed regions get their copies, after all. Although there's also the chance that it'll be too little too late.

 

I'm thinking with the movie tie-in angle and Iizuka's comments on the matter, they're more heavily focused on an audience that is too young to really be swayed by internet opinion. I think Sonic's core-fanbase has already purchased their copies which probably includes everyone who bought Forces. Sega said that Forces was successful enough and the production cost on that was likely much greater.

 

Somebody went and dug up employee reviews for Blind Squirrel and while I can't say I'm surprised given the video game industry, I'm still disappointed all the same. Unsure if these have been verified by actual employees though.

 

It's a budget priced remaster of a well received Sonic game and the first platformer release of any kind since either Forces in 2017 or Mania Plus 2018 depending on how you keep track.

Forces is one of the top 5 downloaded games on PSN ever and we're being honest Rise of Lyric could have been just as buggy and poorly made and if hadn't been a WiiU exclusive it would have cleared at least a million sales. Just like 06 did.

This game is going to be alright sales wise. Especially with Christmas coming up.

 

Pretty sure those Forces numbers are due to discounts, bundles, and even being free in certain circumstances.

 

huh, so, open source engine that has existing tools for it and has a demonstrated set of mods made for it? I actually will probably get this just to get my feet wet in modding (in something that isn't Skyrim that explodes if you look at it funny in the editor). On top of existing bugfix mods, this will probably be the most complete 3D modern Sonic on PC, and I'm looking forward to looking at it.

 

I could understand the possibility of recent negative reviews being an attempt to make Blind Squirrel look worse than it is, due to the problems with Color's early access. However, there are plenty of negative reviews from the 2016-2019 period... sooo yeah, red flags. Unfortunately the Cons mentioned in these are quite common in IT Companies =( The higher ups are clueless and don't really know how to manage their companies outside of micromanagement (e.g. looking over the employee's shoulder and adding pressure for no reason). Workers are exploited to the bone.

Whenever I find myself in one of these companies, I nope the hell out after 3 months. Fortunately not all companies are like this, so I hope those talented folks managed to find better opportunities.

Also, be careful when you write Glassdoor reviews. Obviously, your mileage may vary depending on your country's legal system, but be aware that they may be traced back.

 

Digital Foundry has their hardware analysis for Colors Ultimate up.



Summary (originally written by Lant_War from ResetEra):

- Higher resolution textures and remade assets, more modern effects like bloom, specularity in certain materials, shading, etc.
- UI is redone for higher resolutions.
- These changes definitely make it look differently, and some might prefer the original look.
- Some small visual glitches on PS5, objects popping, effects flickering, distant geometry missing.
- Cutscenes have been upscaled using AI, results are not perfect but still an improvement over the original.
Differences between platforms:

• PS5: 1440p at locked 60FPS.
• PS4: 1080p for the base and 1440p for the Pro, at mostly locked 60FPS with occasional hitches when running through the stages.
• Xbox Series: 1080p on the S / native 4K for the X, with x16 AF applied on the Series X version. Both at locked 60FPS
• Xbox One: 900p for the S / native 4K for the X, also 60FPS but with hitches being longer and occurring more frequently. They note that the actual framerate is fine, since it reaches 60FPS constantly when the hitches aren't occurring.
• Switch: 600p portable / 900p docked, targeting 30FPS but also with occasional hiccups. Lower asset quality and much longer loading times than even the original Wii release.

- John recommends the game on next gen, but recommends waiting for a patch on last gen or Switch.

 

I did make time before work to play Tropical Resort and the starting stages in Sonic Simulator. Basically the same opinion I had at the time: good but not great. I wish the aiming line for Cyan Laser was brighter. Having trouble seeing it to aim. Loading times are longer than Wii, but not horrifying (long enough to put on a sock, but not to put on and tie a boot). The remixes so far are...alright. I feel like, even though the remixes were an advertised feature, they might have benefited from using the originals in the earlier acts and the remixes in the later ones. Having a little trouble getting the timing down for the perfect homing attack, but I'll get it sooner or later.

Any recommendations for what level to do the "no rings" achievement?

 

I'm generally not a huge fan of the "Alice Deejay but in space" style Sonic got so used to recently, but this one really is very enjoyable.

 

Halfway into this vid and it's making me really hope this port gets the official support it needs to polish it up. It's been a long time since I've played Colors and I didn't realize how many level assets had been updated for Ultimate. Feels like there was quite a bit of work put into it on that front that's in danger of mostly going unnoticed.

 

Actually, most of the level assets were apparently just subdivided.

 

So I took a brief look at this, and sorry I have no technical knowledge of this stuff at all so it's confusing to me, but my interpretation is that they used some techniques to smooth out models that results in updating such things more quickly than if it's done manually. And the tradeoff is that it's an inefficient way of pushing polygons that could affect performance?

I hope I got the gist of it. If not I'll stop lol

 

They took the effort to do that but they kept the 2D wisp and jelly bean sprites in a game that runs at 4K.

Nicely done BSG (yes I know they threw this all in a program for the most part and did it automatically but, idk how hard is it to model a bean and ask Sonic Team for the Forces wisp models)

 

I don't remember original Colors being this... buggy and unresponsive tbh. I hope Sonic 2022 is better programmed.

 

Pretty much. When doing high poly model work by hand, you can eliminate redundant vertices and edges to optimize it and keep the overall count lower while still looking the same.

 

Can the title be changed? It already released.

 

It wasn't lol most of the glitches now are new, and the ones that aren't are actually kinda cutely acknowledged by Tails mentioning that you shouldn't be there