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Sonic Forces Thread

Discussion in 'General Sonic Discussion' started by Blue Blood, Jul 23, 2016.

  1. Ell678

    Ell678

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    While it is great to see the US Sonic CD soundtrack get some love...I cannot stand that level of obnoxious dubstep. God it's shit.
     
  2. Mastered Realm

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    If they included (US Ver.) in the title I bet they'll have a (JP ver.) somewhere in the game.
     
  3. Deep Dive Devin

    Deep Dive Devin

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    Okay, tag-team looks like modern Sonic. Neat. I don't know what I was expecting honestly, but it's nice to see the game is more varied than it looked before.



    Metal Sonic's theme ain't awful, it's just too fucking loud. Turn the volume down on that video, guys.
     
  4. Fenrir

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    I'm sure this has been talked about before, but do you guys think the Avatar will become a mainstay? While I'm not against the idea of the Avatar, I AM against the idea of him pretty much replacing Tails and the gang as your partner. That wound of Tails becoming a backseat driver these days still stings.
     
  5. Man, I used to have an optimistic outlook on this game but after experiencing Mania, man this game looks dull. Again with the straight paths, narrow hallways, and bowling pin enemies. I don't know how you can possibly regress the modern formula this much when you also claim to be building off Generations. That game had a good degree of depth to the stages- here its the same level structure with a new coat of paint here and there. Also, where are the gimmicks? Environmental hazards? Anything to differentiate one stage from another? If I describe hitting a spring, flying down a pulley, and reaching a higher path with the grappling hook, I could be talking about any level here. Have some variety!

    In the end, I predict this game will be technically sound but mind numbingly boring because watering down the level designs is a safety measure to make sure they don't fuck it all up.
     
  6. Blue Blood

    Blue Blood

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    You know what I've never wanted in a Sonic game? Myself. There are so many characters to use, and at least a handful of them of them are good. So no, I absolutely do not ever want to see Your Name the Hedgehog again. It's a horrible idea for a character-based series such as Sonic. If this was a spin-off game without the main cast (or at least not with Sonic playable) then I'd be more lenient. But as it is, no. And just as bad is Classic Sonic. Generations was a wonderful, meta love-letter to the franchise, remembering all 20 years of Sonic and fans. Sonic is Sonic though. He's one character. Seeing Modern and Classic established as two entirely different characters in this game just doesn't make any sense. And I hate look at them as different characters.
     
  7. Dark Sonic

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    If it means that Classic Sonic can finally have a subfranchise I'm all for it.
     
  8. Beltway

    Beltway

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    The best things I can say about the Tag Team stage is that it doesn't have any 2D in it, and there is some clear level progression going on, starting with the dried out Green Hill and then ending inside the pyramid. Everything else looks thoroughly mediocre, unfortunately.

    Half of the level is a mostly empty corridor to boost through, with some platforms and more of the same groups of bowling pin enemies to not make it an entirely flat level. The double boost is pretty much the Rolling Combo from Sonic 4: Epi. II in 3D, it's hilariously overpowered and chews through the entire upward climb of the level from the ground to the pyramid top. The second half gets some points for being a bit more open-ended in design, but it's otherwise the stale platform hopping affairs, mixed with enemies being used as lame level progression gates, as seen in Heroes and Unleashed. The trails of rings look like they are nothing more than flashy shortcuts for the Lighting Wispon, rather than any meaningful use of alternate routes; and the Lighting Wispon continues to look janky as hell to use in 3D.  The way half of the entire stage is split between a pure speed section and a pure platforming section looks really amateurish.

    The level design in this game continues to not look professional in any capacity.

    The Metal Sonic Stardust Speedway remix is whatever. It could had been passable if it wasn't dripping in drum and bass / dubstep instrumentals. They kinda make the song come off as just pure noise IMO.

    Speaking strictly about the game's designers and directors, the Nintendo-exclusive games (Black Knight, Colors, Lost World) share a pretty consistent group of staff across those three titles and shared Kishimoto as a lead game designer/game director, with each game having at least one or two exclusive designers. While both Unleashed and Generations shared a few designers, but otherwise had their own staff of designers and their own director. The lion's share of Generations' game designers in particular, oddly enough, hadn't actually worked on the (immediate?) previous games or the subsequent Lost World.

     
  9. RikohZX

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    What is this even?
    Forced fights to emphasize the custom character but you can just sweep them all with no effort since they have no HP, the most automation I've seen in a Boost game, tons of enemies dropped in just to be blown up to make the player feel badass and like a hero? About the only amusing part was the musical theme-boosted superboost section, and that was.. also really just moving about and bowling through enemies.

    It's clear now they don't want this to just be yet another Boost game, but not even the first stages of Unleashed, Generations or even Colors were this damn linear and simple. Was it done this way because the OC is meant to draw in new people to the series?
     
  10. Overlord

    Overlord

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    Once again, Forces produces something that's "ok". Not good, but "ok." The game is pretty bland and pretty inoffensive - it'll not be a disaster in sales I don't think but good god Mania is just SO better presented.
     
  11. It's becoming clear that they're even putting their eggs in Mania's basket at this point. I was hoping Forces would at least attempt to be competitive with Mania but it either just isn't or the footage they keep picking is delightfully unflattering. Like what can they show from this game at this point? I think Mania's kinda sealed this one's fate because it hasn't just set the bar high, but Forces seems to be aiming low to begin with = (.
     
  12. Laughingcow

    Laughingcow

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    It's worth noting that Sonic Mania doesn't have to outsell Sonic Forces. The cost of development in Forces (given they're still going with stupidly large levels) far outweighs Mania (with its humble pixel graphics) meaning Forces will have to sell far more units to regroup its development costs than Mania. Granted, I think it'll do okay sales wise (Switch is selling gangbusters and doesn't have much of a library yet, PS4 is too, Xbone something, and it'll be on steam).

    I'd also like to point out that Super Cloudbuilt came out not to long ago. A game I highly recommend for being an excellent high speed parkour platformer.
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7PwXpNLiDSs
     
  13. Blue Blood

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    Please no. It's just Sonic.

    Release some games with Classic designs, release some other games with Modern designs. Just do whatever is right for the game, and treat them as the same character. The Sonic we see in S1 through K is the same one as the one we've seen from Adventure through to Lost World. And the next game chronologically could use the Classic designs because that's just the type of game that it is. There's so much forced division in the Sonic franchise.
     
  14. Zephyr

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    I can't say I'd mind if Fred Durst stopped showing up in my Sonic games. :v:
     
  15. Dark Sonic

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    Maybe, but Sega's pretty much made them 2 separate things at this point. They have their own lines of merchandise, their own designs, even their own characters now (Pretty sure Fang, Bark, and Bean are part of the Classic Universe now, and I don't see Shadow, Blaze, Rouge, etc showing up in any game with classic designs any time soon). Maybe it'd be better if they didn't show up in the same game, but at this point they're just different. Boom may have been an intentional subfranchise, but like it or not Classic Sonic has become one as well.

    Hell this game even points that out. They say Classic is from another Dimension (Mania :v:). Besides it makes more sense that they're separate. If they're not then you get into a bunch of time line nonsense and they tend to play so differently that they're hardly the same at this point.
     
  16. Zephyr

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    Iizuka said the same of the Super Emeralds, and I believe Mighty as well.
     
  17. /dev/sr0

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    Pretty sure the "Classic dimension" is confirmed with Mania and Forces.

    And I think that's a good thing. There's so many shitty retcons in the main dimension. Only male hedgehogs can be super. The Super Emeralds never existed. They didn't even stick with the moon being blown up, they just had some shitty excuse.
    If forces doesn't have a good story I'm done with the main canon. Just bring more Classic dimension games.
     
  18. I guess my general problem with Modern Sonic (or how Sonic Team handles him) is that he simultaneously tries to be everything and yet accomplish nothing at the same time. Modern Sonic may as well be named "Focus Group Sonic". In 15 years, Modern has changed styles so many times trying to appeal to different groups of people, that he never really gains the gameplay depth and polish that almost any other platformer gets. Unleashed-Gens was the only time they'd gotten close to that and yet they've managed to retroactively fudge that right up, which didn't seem possible.

    Even if they had done a straight up Generations 2, with the exact same gameplay and gimmicks but all new, improved, levels, it would be received better than Forces, considering the graphical/engine updates. I do understand why they made the decision to leave the Boost formula behind to attempt a fully 3D Sonic platformer...but after they missed their mark with Lost World, they threw up their hands and said "Well, nope we can't do it", went back to what sort of worked for them before...but built on all the bad decisions from their previous work. And its apparent they haven't really sorted the strengths and weaknesses of that formula.



    They're stuck. Its abundantly clear. They didn't know where to go before Unleashed. They found a bit of success but ran themselves into a niche corner with it. Made the move (I'd argue correctly) to try to find something more developmentally sustainable and widely appealing. But then that didn't work out...and now they've regressed to where they were 10 years ago with Unleashed.

    Its just...I don't want to be rude or seem like I can do nothing but spit vitriol towards Sonic Team but, under any other normal circumstances, isn't this usually where significant changes in vision begin to happen? Do Sonic games have to be unmitigated disasters like '06 or Boom for SEGA to hold anyone accountable? You know, they'd really convinced me two years ago that they were serious about ensuring trust in the Sonic brand would be restored. It really feels like they've had a few boardroom discussions while sitting on their hands, for the bulk of four years.


    I've reached the point where I'm starting not to care what Sonic Team does anymore, as long as a more trustworthy, independent party is simultaneously allowed to work on the games. Thankfully, we have the Mania group to ensure the Sonic brand doesn't once again return to the "bargain-bin" dump.
     
  19. Snub-n0zeMunkey

    Snub-n0zeMunkey

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    Absolutely agree, I think it would be a really stupid decision considering how Generations managed to bring the two sides together (wow, Forces really is undoing all the progress they made with Generations). It doesn't help that in interviews when asked why characters like Mighty haven't been seen in any of the new games Iizuka will say something along the lines of "oh, uh it's cause he's from the classic world, not the modern world innit"

    Like, what are you doing with your brand...? This is not how you fix your already fractured fanbase. It's just a minor stylistic change... it doesn't mean that you have to come up with some contrived backstory about alternate universes.

    Cloudbuilt is a pretty good example of how parkour could've been done in Lost World. I hope Sonic Team revisit that idea one day.
     
  20. 360

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    Looks bland and uninspired at best and outright boring at worst. Not a good look for a mainline Sonic game. As disappointed as the rest of you.

    The game's primary problem is it's basically "Sonic Generations but worse" and everything they reveal just reinforces that notion.