Sonic Superstars: A New 2D Sonic Game (Fall 2023)

I have always defaulted to "Eggman thinks mystical powers are stupid and would rather use emeralds of any kind as power sources to what HE thinks is useful i.e.: machines", which is thematically sound and coherent but stops at the random black dragon. Which is why I don't like it.

"But that was the plan for Sonic 3 too" who cares

 

I guess I mistakenly picked Trip to play through the main story again. Damn it.

 

I find it hilarious how a seemingly simple plot ends up being so obtuse and cryptic anyway. Even Mania didn't spawn this many debates about what the hell was going on.

 

The only thing that truly confuses me is the metal fighters. They suddenly appear in Sky Temple and seem like they are going to be a huge deal, but they only make a difference in Cyber Station.

I thought they were going to be related to the fruits, the big critters, or something else related to the island, but I guess they were just shoehorned in to justify their existence for battle mode.

Did Eggman want more than just Mecha or Metal Sonics for this adventure?

Another thing I would like to clarify is whether the events in space had an effect on the Black Onyx and Black Dragon.

It seems that once Super Sonic weakens the Black Dragon's red spot, Trip is able to seal it again. So maybe the Onyx was actually found and taken to space? Eggman reversed time, and like the station, it reverted to a time when the Dragon was strong enough to break free. The station blows up, the Onyx falls into the ocean, and finally the Dragon emerges?

 

Hahaha! Whoops! I can see how you would make that mistake. You unlock Trip for user the main story, but also unlock an entirely separate campaign that's only marginally different from the main story.

Trip's story is such a waste. They don't do anything interesting with the levels and it doesn't have any more plot that the main game either. It's a very phoned in affair. I guess that's on par for Superstars, but still.

 

Cyber Station's really out of place in general. If I remember right, it's the only zone without a transition, either in or out. Trip just wrecks Fang's mech and reveals her dragon form, we recover the Chaos Emeralds, and... now we're in a computer with no explanation. I suppose the Information Superhighway was the fastest route to get from Golden Capital to Eggman's launch site in Frozen Base.

I know Mania was missing some level transitions when it launched too, so maybe they just ran out of time here.

They don't? The level design is completely different and the boss cycles are a lot more challenging. Because they were built just for her, the layouts make great use of Trip's abilities, and unlike the main game, emerald powers are actually required in some areas.

It is EXTREMELY punishing, and I know that won't be everyone's cup of tea, but as someone who loves games like that, I thought it was a fantastic value-add and I really enjoyed playing it.

 

I enjoyed some of Trip's additional challenge. Speed Jungle Act Sonic was pretty cool with her, and Press Factory --being the best level in the game -- delivered too. But I dislike how much of the extra challenge is just more static purple badniks laying around in most levels, and in some they outright made emerald powers mandatory.

 

Again, I honestly didn't find much of Trip's campaign to be very difficult. Also, I honestly don't remember being required to use the emerald powers in Trip's campaign. Maybe I should play through it again.

 

The actual level design is exactly the same as before, except now it spams more obstacles like spikes and Egg Robos without rhyme or reason. The boss in Superstars are already dreadful in the regular story, so the last thing I want to deal with is longer cycles and more excessive attack patterns. Trip's story basically just bumps up the difficulty in a very cheap, frustrating way. I similarly disliked Endure Mode in Mania for leaving the level design basically untouched. I'm not playing Sonic games for challenge, I'm playing them for a casual fun ride.

One thing made that Knuckles' campaign in 3K a nice divergence from Sonic's is that his base moveset slightly adjusted how you played the game. His weaker jump was a hindrance for a lot of existing platforming challenges, but Trip has no such draw backs. She's got Amy's overpowered double jump and an improved version of Knuckles' climbing. This wouldn't necessarily be a bad thing if the levels threw new layouts her way ala 3K Knuckles, but that's not the case. She just retreads old ground. Additionally, for Knuckles in 3K bosses became more aggressive without being drawn out.

And finally, Trip's story has no unique story elements whatsoever apart from the very beginning and very ending. Egg Fortress and Frozen Base make absolutely no sense in her story, which is again something that 3K mostly addressed in comparable areas.

So yeah, no. Trip's story is a waste that does nothing interesting. It's just Superstars, but worse.

 

I don't think the story implications have ever really occurred to me. I dunno, I never really came to Sonic for that, so Superstars being light on plot isn't something that bothered me.

But eh, I guess we just have different positions on what qualifies as "interesting," haha. For me, part of the appeal of Sonic is the challenge, and I loved Superstars anyway, so I thought the fact that it had its own built-in hard mode expansion was honestly really cool. But I'm clearly a bit of an oddball in that regard. I hope the next game hits better for you!

 

For me, the main appeal for sonic (or at least what i latched onto as a kid) was the story. I mean, it's not all that impressive now, but compare the classic sonic games to stuff like mario. The sonic games, at least early on, obviously put a lot of thought into its world and that was something you didn't see in any other platformers at the time.

I mean, compare Knuckles' backstory, the last surviving member of an ancient tribe and sole guardian of the magical floating island they used to live on, to a character like toad, whose just a funny little guy that says bup.

If the seven billion five nights at freddys lore recap videos on youtube have taught me anything it's that children love meaningless lore, even if it's not all that good. That why I think so many people care about "sonic continuity" nowadays, because for a lot of them that was there first encounter with anything that could be considered 'lore'.

Yes I am saying FNAF is Sonic for zoomers.

 

The story implications of Trip's are minor. It's just the lack of care with regards to it that really bothers me. I'm not looking to Sonic games for a compelling narrative, definitely not with regards to the Classic games, but I do enjoy a coherent plot that is clearly conveyed to the player. It adds an extra layer to the experience. The characters should all have their own motives for behaving in certain ways and the levels they visit should ideally be more than just a series of video game zones. Superstars really fails at this. It sets up a premise with Eggman working with Fang to explore North Star Island, kidnapping the giant animals and forcing Trip into working for them but then the plot basically just falls apart after that. Trips story then compounds the issue by having her campaign offer zero follow up to the events of the main game.

Although not ideal, I'd much rather they just not bother with a plot and premise at all if they're going to put absolutely no effort into delivering it whatsoever. Superstars lays lots of things out and then proceeds to ignore all of them. That is the problem with its story. Do you understand where I'm coming from if I say that from a narrative, immersion and world building angle, Superstars falls flat? Either fully commit, or don't bother.

Superstars disappointed a lot of people, myself included. That said, I'm firmly on the side that greatly enjoys the game on the whole. I genuinely do enjoy the game an awful lot. But its narrative suuuuucks. And its gameplay related shortcomings (such as repetitive level design, tedious bosses that outstay their welcome by several minutes and general mantra of quantity over quality) are only highlighted by Trip's story.

That entire second campaign is a blight on the game. I absolutely hate it. My opinion of the game briefly nosedived when I played Trip's story for the first time immediately after beating the main story. The transition from the main story to Trip's story is relatively minor on paper, which is probably why it took me so long to notice what had changed. In practice, all the little changes and adjustments are subtle and add up to make fire a truly miserable experience. As far as hard modes go, it ain't a good one. The level design in Superstars is adequate, not remarkable. Shitting over it with cheap obstacles sends it tumbling off a cliff.

Different strokes

 

I still maintain that Trip's Story shouldn't have been a Super boss prerequisite and shouldn't have been called Trip's "Story", if it even had to exist at all. It's a tedious replay of the game you probably just beat that doesn't really reward you with added narrative like the name implies, and I imagine simply having an "Act Trip" toward the end of the normal campaign would have left a better taste in many people's mouths. A true final boss that actually felt built up to wouldn't have hurt, either.

 

oh also it doesnt get said enough but the credits sequence for this game suuuucks

it feels like it takes genuinely forever and you have to watch them three times? Lame

 

While never outright stated anywhere, so admittedly personal headcanon...
It isn't a huge leap to think that Eggman's goal was to use the dragon itself as a powersource.
Eggman fails, and the dragon gets loose without us ever actually knowing what his intentions were, but we see him utilizing "Big Animals" for Super Badniks throughout the game and the Dragon falls into the category of "Big Animal" as well, just with phenomenal cosmic power~

 

So then where does the time reversal power come from if Robotnik couldn't use the dragon? Why would the dragon attack Sonic?

 

Because Superstars.

Spoiler

Literally I hate both of these things so much. Both are narrative elements that exist without foreshadowing, purpose or consequence. It's awful awful awful

 

I like Superstars on balance but the story is an abomination. It feels incomplete but to be honest it could just be lazy nonsense.

 

TIL people cared about this game's story

 

Posted this like 50 pages ago, but now less spoilered :P

- It's on the Northstar Islands, kind of moon shaped, yet not particularly space themed, or have anything to do with the moon
- The Big animals. They're neat but not really explored. Why are they big?
- I like that the Golden Capital Zone is them making a pinball-ish area make some sense, but then we already had Pinball Carnival, so we have two Pinball stages?
- Why is Cyber Station here? What it making that a thing that's happening on this island?
- Most of the Chaos Emerald abilities are kind of useless, kind of just duplicates of each other (Fireball & Vine are kind of the same thing)
- Most of the stage gimmicks (Death clock in Press Factory) aren't that fun.
- Egg Fortress' gimmick of time going back through a level is neat.. but that's not what the game is about at all! This has nothing to do with time!

Even with a game like Sonic 3 & Knuckles having a wild variety of stage designs, it still seemed to have a better read on what's happening, or what Eggman's goals are.

Compared to a Super Mario Wonder, it has a simple premise (Wonder Seeds do weird stuff, everything is themed around the Flower Kingdom). I would have liked to have seen a more cohesive, thought out set of stages

I feel that the premise could have been simplified by focusing on the Fruit that does weird things to people, and make that the gimmick of the game.

Eggman is trying to discover the ultimate Dragon Fruit, which is meant to make things grow huge / turn them into a dragon when eaten. There are huge animals everywhere, they must know!

Eggman is picking the Fruit Trees that grow across the land into monitors, that have various effects. Make you grow big, make you grow small, make you turn into water, or grow trees, etc. Emeralds don't have power, instead the gimmicks are the "Color Power" shields of this island.

- Pinball Carnival is more about Eggman turning these foods into Candy.
- Lagoon City is more about the water source for all these plants.
- Press Factory is more about canning and smushing fruit into cans for export.
- Switch Cyber Station to be more a way that Eggman is taking stuff off island, via Trains / digital transfer.
- Egg Fortress could be that he's using time manipulation to make the Fruit grow faster, if you really want that gimmick.

Final Boss of the main mode is an ACTUAL Giant Eggman, and final FINAL boss is him having eaten the Dragon Fruit. The true Egg Dragoon!

Other stages, like Sky Temple and Sand Sanctuary could be changed in some other fashion to make sense of the world too.