My opinion so far is this. Let's expect the worst, so we'll either be pleasantly surprised or not surprised at all.
But open world isn't a new genre. I don't even need to explain GTA's how popular has been since the noughties.
https://twitter.com/Dededaio/status/1562823565631664128?t=l_I_sWQAmZAqrPcG1hYP9A&s=19 Full video of the intro cutscene. There is a stark difference between this and all the in-game cutscenes from Colors on. His movement isn't stilted, the dialogue is good, there are little details like him twiddling his fingers and tapping his foot. I am very on board with this.
I said no such thing, I simply brought up GTA's popularity in the noughties, as it's often seen as the quintessential open world game. Going further in the past you have popular open world games like early Zeldas, or many old RPGs. Though a person currently in their 30s would have been in their teens during the noughties, so their main exposure to open world would most likely have been GTA and Elder Scrolls.
Don’t worry I’m sure they got plenty of shot/reverse shot cutscenes of the characters just standing around talking and doing nothing else.
I don't think the in-game cutscenes had good animation and dialogue BEFORE Colors, either. The CG scenes have always been where Sonic's looked his best, with the in-game stuff coming across as pretty stilted and awkward. Regardless, I agree with your broader point, this story scene is definitely a HUGE step up from what we've had before in terms of production value! I especially like that close-up of Sonic tapping his fingers impatiently.
Oh my god, they actually learned how to animate properly again. That was like my last major worry for the game, a plot written by Ian Flynn didn't mean much if the characters moved around like some shitty sfm animation like they did in everything since Colours. Of course this is too early to say for sure, but it looks like we're back to Unleashed-tier animations...when the characters stand around and speak, at the very least. The action scenes are going to be the moment of truth, but I'm hopeful. Literally can't wait to play this game lol, it's surreal we're finally getting a Sonic game like this after all this time. I really hope this is the fondation for the next 10 years of the series like Izuka said, I know he has an history of talking out of his ass but this is the one time I really want him to be sincere. (I also hope we'll get games a little faster, because "the next 10 years" really just means 1 or 2 more games at this rate lmao)
You guys must've played a different version of Unleashed than I did or something. :P And I *love* Unleashed! But I don't see where its in-game story scenes are staged or animated any better (or worse) than the games that came after it.
I mean its all subjective but yea, Unleashed's animations are miles ahead of Colors, Generations, Lost World and Forces.
Can count maybe one or two cutscenes where there's actual movement and not just characters talking in Lost World.
I feel like it looks on par with the last games to me. Sonic's a weird radioactive color, his model's face looks flattened like a pancake (still dunno why Sonic's in-game model is any different from Marza's CG at this point), and most of the acting is still Sonic standing in place, emoting with his eyelids (???) and doing hand waves. I... don't know what's so impressive about this compared to past titles, lol.
You know, Breath of the Wild had all the little shrines, but it also had four big "actual" dungeons to offset them. If Frontiers had a Generations Modern-tier level for each island, I could easily forgive the Forces-style, unoriginal cyberspace levels, in fact I might actually appreciate them. But on their own, they just don't cut it. If the Divine Beasts hadn't been there, and the shrines were all Zelda fans had when it came to classic dungeon-crawling, I think they'd be pretty upset too.
Well I’ve already seen footage of one of the titans pimp-slapping Sonic through a tower, DBZ style. I won’t square this as a positive by design because I think the unmitigated wholesale copy pasting of past levels is indefensible, but I will be very interested in seeing how the eventual mods for the game explore the most diverse Sonic moveset ever in the context of the action stages. Given the additional control options on top of a repertoire of moves like the bounce and drop dash, I wouldn’t be surprised to see fans make stuff in the vein of Adventure’s level designs.
Yeah but they don't just stand still in static. They don't move any less than Sonic does in that Frontiers cutscene. Nor are there no camera movements.
