Inevitable after they were found in Dash. Still crazy to see some actual coordination with the extended universe.
Apparently, IDW Sonic takes place after the games. I'm shocked that these two characters from IDW are allowed. Who approved this?
Blaze wasn't in Forces, and where the fuck have the Babylon Rogues been? This game isn't canon, so I don't see the harm.
The Tangle event started yesterday. At the moment it looks like you can only get her cards through the event missions, but both Tangle and Whisper are categorised as "Rare" characters rather than "Special" (the movie characters, Halloween characters and so on were "Special") so it seems that they'll be permanent additions.
If Forces received continuous updates for characters and levels, I probably would have bought it . But yeah this is a good time waster.
This stunt suckered me into getting Speed Battle and I even chucked £20 into it, though I can't say I plan to spend anymore. Core concept is solid, being a more basic yet elegant take on the Rivals gameplay, but the balancing is pretty whack and there's some serious jank in some areas. From what I gather a relatively small amount of characters were added post launch (compared to games like Fire Emblem Heroes or Mario Kart Tour) so it's somewhat irksome that some characters are practically straight upgrades to others, with characters like Blaze having basically nothing to offer in comparison to someone like Metal Sonic, which in part stems from item imbalance. Characters like Zazz, Big and Metal Sonic have very powerful loadouts that in effect punishes you for using almost anyone else (ie how Zazz can drop stars all over the track without any additional input from the player after activating the item). I find Tangle to be the gold standard for how characters should be balanced, as her lack of speed and ranged attacks are offset by all her attacks being boosts, encouraging you to string them together at the risk of not having much protection when at the front of the pack. Unfortunately, the existence of less balanced characters makes her seem mediocre by comparison. Matchmaking is also something I have an issue with. Once you get to the upper echelons of the scoreboard (upwards of 4000 points), progress becomes very inconsistent as not only does the game match you with players whose characters and profile may have many more levels than yours, but it also matches you up with players who you'd expect to be out of your scoring bracket (I broke into 5000 the other day and still see players with points in the lower 4000s in my matches, or players with 5300+). I don't know whether this issue comes from a potentially small playerbase but it's a little frustrating to lose points for coming second and gain only a paltry amount when I do finish first. Otherwise my complaints mainly factor from a lack of polish. As pointed out by others, certain animations are either unfitting for the context or just straight up seem to break the model (see Classic Sonic's race intro animation), and some of the renders seem rather off-model. When this game first released it only existed in my periphery as a non-player but I got the impression it was a much bigger platform for the brand, and I think it could be with more regular support on the level of what Runners got. There are still plenty of characters they could add from the main series alone (Gemerl, Gamma, Marine, etc.) and I think the game could greatly benefit from more track locales, as well as tracks with music outside of Forces. I'd love to see more obscure Zones such as Ice Paradise and Machine Labyrinth reimagined for this format, especially if they were to arrive with new music arrangements, but given the precedent so far these idle thoughts seem to be pipe dreams and nothing more. Nevertheless, it's a fine time-killer that I can see myself continuing to player after the IDW hype has died down, just hope the intake of new players convinces SEGA to integrate these characters into the main games in the future given that they both fit the established world and character conventions of the series very well.
And they still haven’t nerfed Zazz... Still, from what I can tell there seems to be an increase in the frequency of new characters so there must’ve been a rise in new players from Tangle and Whisper. Gemerl soon I hope.
Yeah, except for when you've been clawing your way up the rankings with small victories before you lose all you progress from one unlucky match. Really, what the hell is with the points system? You get minimal amounts for winning and are penalised heavily for losing, which becomes really frustrating when coupled with the game's dreadful character balance.
I'm sitting in the low 5000 and I honestly am not experiencing what you're putting down. Yeah, it sucks to lose 17 points in 4th place, but that's only when you enter a match favored to win and eat it. I've always gained more than I lost when the situation is flipped. As for the balance, I mean, of course the super rare characters are going to have an advantage, especially when they're fully leveled up/player level is up. But I mean, there's a solid reason why the level 14-16 players rock Knuckles and Sonic - they're usually max level characters and that's often way better than a lvl 7 Zazz. It's better than Mario kart Tour, anyway.
The game somehow keeps pairing me against players who have a far lower score than me despite having higher player and character levels. And rarity is not an excuse because there are still plenty of people with high or max level rares and super rares (particularly Zazz, *who Hardlight really need to nerf*). It’s a shitty experience when I’ve clawed my way up only to lose 26 points because a higher levelled player somehow has a lower score. It’s like I’m being punished for doing well.
I can't help but say "your experiences are not universal," although I do agree that Zazz requires a nerf. It's powerful enough to leave bombs, but to leave five while having one of the best accel/speed combos in the game is nothing short of ludicrous when his boost also acts as a ring magnet. The stars should probably act more like Tikals light screen without the damage, imo. As for the lower trophies/higher level, that's unfortunately how this goes when the end if every season has all players revert back to 4000. So you have people who were trophy level 6200 reverted back to 4000, take a quick break, then come back in the last two weeks and smoke through 5000+ point players as they reach they're average level. It's uncommon, it sucks, but it exists in any game you play online. Plus, it feels good when you beat 'em.
