Sonic Dream Team (New 3D Game from Hardlight, coming to Apple Arcade December 5)

Looks like it has 8-directional movement ala Mario 3D World or even Sonic Forces. I want to be annoyed, but don't mind it entirely considering this game has to be fully playable with a touch screen.

 

Yeah it looks like 8 way movement, maybe to accommodate for phones. Still, I hope analog movement is an option.

 

Eeh, I don't see how 8-directional movement accommodates phones? Touchscreens can have virtual analog sticks; many games feature them. I'd even say that they're more natural than virtual D-pads, at least for 3d games.

Anyway, they posted this:
https://twitter.com/sonic_hedgehog/status/1723022892210774195


Which goes with people's assumption that the characters will be treated as parallels based on their abilities.

 

Tails’ render looks really weird, he looks too tall and I’m getting certain vibes of him sitting on a bench, let’s just say that.

Doesn’t help Cream is there either lol

 

It makes precision much easier to handle, when having full 360 degree control on a small touch screen (especially at high speeds) can result in some movements feeling pretty awkward.

 

Polygon’s impressions: https://www.polygon.com/platform/amp/23954423/sonic-dream-team-preview-release-date

The Tony Hawk/skate park inspiration is encouraging.

This quote is also exciting:
“Sonic Dream Team is not combat-focused, developers say. Instead, the enemies scattered throughout levels are designed to help players maintain their momentum, as they dash and smash into them using characters’ boost attacks. The developers want to put players in a flow state, where they can chain together jumps, slides, and boosts of speed to get through levels smoothly.”

This game seems to be using the boost as an opportunity to incorporate/simplify momentum-style gameplay for touch screen controls. Given this it makes sense that base movement isn’t momentum based but boosting allows the player to take advantage of the skate park terrain. This is my personal impressions from less than 1 min of gameplay so I could be wrong… but I’m optimistic. Unleashed’s Daytime stages felt like an evolution of Sonic’s levels in SA2. I thought there could be a middle ground between SA2 and Unleashed and dream team seems to be exploring it

 

Again, amazing this game is allowed to exist, but it's also great that this isn't particularly removed from what Sonic Team attempted with Frontiers. It's nice to see a form of cohesion even with different games by different teams.

 

Yeah that all sounds fine. My favorite thing from Frontiers was the Title Update 2' challenge mode. This is sounding like a better version than that.
I personally don't think "I HAVE NO UNDERSTANDING OF THE SONIC ENGINE" is absolutely necessary for a 3D Sonic game. It's nice to have, but I rather just have a game with a smooth flow. Almost every 3D Sonic game has some bullshit where they just pull the brakes on you. Like bro, stop giving me homing attack chains.

Sonic Speed Simulator is a pain with its virtual analog stick. I spent at least 100 hours playing that thing and it wasn't pleasant. I had to buy one of those little suction cup analog nubs to make it more precise.
We're also not talking about a virtual d-pad, we're talking about 8 way movement itself. You can do 8 way movement that on the virtual sticks too. Having it locked into 8 fixed directions makes it more reliable to control since you know what you're going to get every time.

 

You know, this show we can get "not so main" 3D Sonic games being smaller than the main ones from Sonic Team. We can still have something good that are "traditional" 3D Sonic game while wait for the main meat from Sonic Team. A very good reason to have Hardlight for consoles and PC.

 

I have to ask what this is even supposed to mean.

 

I think it’s a reference to the phrase/concept of “pinball physics” which used to be auto-replaced by the phrase think "I HAVE NO UNDERSTANDING OF THE SONIC ENGINE" on Retro.

 

That's a deep cut

 

I know right, it reminds of a cereal mascot render, but most of all, Pillsburg Man. Looks like if S O N I C® Cereal was a thing lol

Yeah, Digital Trends also made a review very similar to this, but since they rated Sonic Frontiers a 2/10, and given that they have a bad track record, it seems kind of weird... They even compared this to the Adventure games! I also feel like the Tony Hawk influence isn't going to be a necessarily good thing.

 

Bro, I think I know this guy:

They smell delicious.

 

I'm pretty sure retro still has a word filter, just not for most words people actually use.

 

Bold of you to assume it would be as little as a year. ChuChu Rocket was a three year deal.

 

This what we’ve been asking for years. They never should have left Adventure format in the first place. Just make the stages bigger with multiple paths and give all the playable characters action stages. It was that simple. 24 years later.

 

But this is a boost game

 

I can't believe you tricked me into clicking a SonicTuber video.