Not sure you can rule that out. Remember Lego Dimensions with it's big hub made up of different Sonic zones? Could be that. It probably won't be, but it could.
Ya but that was cartoony this isn't. The closest the series got to rehashing prior 2008 was GHZ in SA2 or Wave Ocean in 06 being essentially Emerald Coast 2. They can't recreate the classic aesthetic as easy in a realistic style, but honestly if they can? I'd like to see them try. What's a realistic Green Hill look like in open world?
I mean, does Green Hill's appereance in the Sonic movie count? Aside from that, has it been confirmed if Sonic is fully in the hands of Sega of America? As if, maybe we are dealing with a different Sonic Team?
Ya it kinda counts, but even that GHZ was pretty linear. It wasn't an open field or anything but there were huts, unless you're referring to Green Hills the town and... no that was just a suburb lol
I agree, though I worry the lack of interesting movement is why reception for the game wasn’t so warm from the testers, lol..
Open world Sonic game with movement that feels as stiff and bland as Forces lol I'm actually pretty excited! This could either be a beautiful disaster or by some luck, something really special. Will be interesting to see it unfold I will say though, I like how Sonic subtly tilts as he runs. I hope that's in the actual game and not just the CG trailer
don't forget that this year they made the yakuza director the creative director of Sega, so there's already someone new at the helm in general. and who knows who else got moved around with less fanfare?
I for one think that the possibility of an open world Sonic title is just the thing the series needs. Even if the game is awful, I think it might inspire some degree of innovation for the series.
A Sonic game with an open world to explore that has traditional levels within it doesn't sound bad. SA1's Adventure Fields weren't a problem, and I would hope that this game would let you just select the "real" levels from a menu when you've cleared it, just like the other Sonic games with hub worlds. However, it's not knowing how much they're going to focus on the "open world" aspect of the game that has me somewhat concerned. One thing that I enjoy about every Sonic game from SA1 forwards is that they have all been based around a very pleasing "select a course" structure (after the first playthrough) that's very similar to other (mostly Sega) games I love. Nights, Jet Set Radio, Top Skater, Sega Water Ski. Pick a stage and basically be as cool as you can in a single session. Get the best score or fastest time possible within either a set time, or over a single or multi-lap course. Being able to just pick a single stage makes these games perfect for any kind of play session. I could just play one or two stages, play a whole variety of stages, or spend a lot of time playing a single stage repeatedly. If this new game keeps this structure for its' "real" levels, that will be perfect, no different from SA1's structure. It's just that when that supposed leak is talking about completing puzzles and gathering orbs and a skill tree, it sounds like a kind of completionist-focused game design that seems very antithetical to Sonic, or at least what I love about Sonic. I don't want the structure of this series to go from "master the levels" to "do all the stuff and then it's over" like so, SO many other games have in the last ten or so years.
Aaron Webber's new job position at SEGA also makes me very curious about the Sonic series going forward. I'm kinda hopeful (Perhaps against my better judgement.) that some real, long-lasting positive change will happen / is happening here, with consistently good quality between each and every Sonic game from this point onwards. I'm very cautious though, due to SEGA's track record of inconsistencies with Sonic. An earnest, hand-on-heart attempt to execute a more open-world Sonic game well does sound refreshing, and a potential return of some serious ambition, but I've got to see actual, substantial uninterrupted gameplay (Without tons of jump-cuts in a trailer, for example.) which looks genuinely promising before I can get excited.
One thing I'm a little concern about is, if that forest in the trailer is representative of one of the game's biomes, then we're gonna be running Sonic through a forest. What happens if we bump into one of the trees? Will it slow Sonic down? How much? Will it alter his trajectory? How much? How focused do I have to be on threading the needle through all those trees? Maybe I'm over-thinking it. The boost games were pretty good about how it felt to brush against the sides of objects. And the leaker said exploration was boring, not tedious/frustrating.
That's the thing that leaves me truly wondering...as I said earlier, a control system like Forces, or even Generations or Unleashed would just literally not function in an open-world environment. As in, the game would be unplayable, not just control badly, and I cannot see even Sonic Team just blindly charging ahead with that kind of thing. So the overall physics and handling of Sonic have to be necessarily looser, more robust, and less automated--or basically not automated at all--but how? I cannot see the boost gameplay framework being loosened up that heavily. it is so hyper-specialized towards the linear, highly-scripted/automated rhythmic gameplay of the boost games that changing it to work in an open world would basically require completely replacing it. And with what...well, that's the exciting and worrying question.
I have too many questions with what we were given.. What is the art direction for this game? Will everything be extremely samey in visuals, or will the map have different biomes and tropes throughout? Will the environments be imaginative and filled with crazy stuff like loops etc still, or will it be a standard open world map? What about the human girl ghost character, or whatever she is? Is it Lah, or some expy of her? Is it a return to Sonic having a human girl companion in the SatSR/BK anime style, or will she remain cartoony like the standard Sonic Unleashed and onward humans? And who are the “Rangers”? Are they the Wisps we see a glimpse of in the Rise of Wisps trailer, or are they new characters altogether? Are they a group Sonic joins? Are Tails, Knuckles, Amy etc involved with this? Is this even in a world Sonics been to before? Korok like rock creatures implies something possibly alien.. And does any of this have to do with Eggman? Is he even in this game? The boss mentioned seems to be completely unrelated to Sonic standard, and combat might imply non-robot enemies. Speaking of, what are we talking for combat? The return of homing attack shenanigans like in LW, or something like Boom was, or something new altogether? How the fuck does a skill tree work in Sonic? And what kinda gameplay style even is this? Do we boost? Do we spin? Do we both? Do we neither? This is the most fascinating and baffling thing to happen to Sonic in a long time. I’m not complaining btw, I’m more than happy for a shakeup. But also holy shit, dude, who knows how long we’ll be in the dark on this. Could be for just a few weeks, could be til next March like it was with Forces. There’s so much to wonder..
Oh yeah for the record I don't like the idea of a human character...for the love of god Sonic Team please just make more animals how hard is this shit lmao why has IDW introduced characters like Tangle and Whisper but the mainline series is deathly afraid of making a new animal character (besides Infinite). As you can no doubt imply from my avatar I'm not a big fan of humans in Sonic (besides Eggman)
If the leak is true, then this game sounds like a true Spiritual Successor to Sonic Adventure. I mean, Unleashed tried things too, but... Well... Medals and werehogs. I'm not impressed... Yet. But optimistic.
Just an idea: What if Switch version is an entirely different version of the game, like the Wii version of Unleashed? I doubt they will make a Super Switch exclusive, the base console sold like crazy.
