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

Amazon had the game for $30 for 2 months. Best buy did too. And Walmart. With Best Buy they even dropped it to $20 for a few days because that's when I rebought the game.

Edit : Amazon actually lists the normal price of the game at $30 now and they've been selling it for $20 for Christmas sales. Now that's interesting.

 

Regardless of the price, the game still sold units in the West and it had enough legs to last up until January. This fact can't be disputed no matter what reason you want to give over the fluctuating MSRP. It was a top 20 chart topper among other million dollar sellers on its release month before sales, and it remained there for 3 more months. I really don't know what's to dispute here. The real conversation we should be having is what went wrong in the Japanese market outside the usual surface level stuff like "well, Sonic was never popular in Japan ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)". I think the only impact Superstars will have on the future Classic Sonic games is to keep it western focused and pricing it appropriately. The brand itself is safe. To think otherwise is just stupid. If a mediocre game can still chart, why wouldn't they take another swing?

Also, I think we're owed something

 

Just occurred to me that I never posted my thoughts on Superstars. For someone who adores (and is rather obssessed lol) with the classic Sonic games; Superstars was really disappointing. The physics were close to being as good as in the classic games, but good physics doesn't guarantee a good/successful game.

It's basically a boring medicore 2d game which is not fun to replay despite levels being massive with multiple routes and there being multiple playable characters. Yeah the bosses go on way too long. The levels also quite frankly out-stay their welcome and yet another Sonic game with a rubbish final-boss. The story feels half-finished and the soundtrack is good apart from the crap composed by Senoue.

I haven't played Superstars again since it came out. It will lay forgotten like Sonic 4. I'll just stick to playing Classic Sonic Simulator or Origins to get my classic Sonic fix.

 

I like your YouTube videos but I'm the opposite on where I stand with Superstars. I like the obnoxiously long levels like Sky Temple, Sand Sanctuary, and Cyber Station. The bosses are also not my favorite. I get what they were doing because of the multiplayer but they could've made it more fun by making the bosses difficult without taking away the ability to hit the boss multiple times in a row. Furthermore, you have to wait on the boss which does not help at all. Despite my issues with the bosses, I still replay the game quite a bit. I use the emerald powers or Super/Super Powered abilities to get through some bosses faster which is still not as fun but at least I can get through it and transition to the next stage or just do Time Attack. But man it was a missed opportunity. They could've had bosses like Heavy Shinobi but cranked it up a bit to keep it up tempo.

The story is not bad to me. It's simple like most Classic Sonic games. I think most of us would agree S3&K is the best Classic Sonic story, with Mania not being far behind. Both of those stories are still very basic and simple.

It was "just another Classic Sonic game" but there's a lot us that appreciate that at the very least instead of getting an effort like Sonic 4. It's a step in the right direction. Now if they make another one like this and not fix the bosses, the bounce physics, music, then I will have an issue.

 

I wouldn't call any level in Superstars "obnoxiously long". I was only ever annoyed that those longer levels only had one act.

 

I posted this interview on the last page:

https://www.eurogamer.net/putting-t...ame-rock-roll-compared-to-nintendos-pop-music

Superstars is specifically cited as being a disappointment. Whether we have numbers or not, the perception at SEGA is that it didn’t make enough money for them for it to be considered a success.

I highly recommend reading this article btw. It’s very telling of how SEGA function and the people there think

 

Christ I forgot about this

I will accept my punishment in the coming days

 

I wouldn't. Just because Sonic Mania has level transitions doesn't mean it's telling a story. In fact, it's not saying much of anything. Eggman has the Phantom Ruby, and... that's it.

Why was he after it? What did he plan to do with it? Why is the Little Planet involved?

 

Sonic 1, CD, and 2 all have far better 'stories' than Mania.

 

I just want to know why SEGA consistently has no problems telling us when other Sonic games, or games of theirs in general, crossed a million but refuse to give anything close to exact numbers for this game.

Even saying it cleared a million or 1.5 million wouldn't be so bad now with Frontiers selling 3.5 million and Shadow Generations selling 2 million (so far). But they've said nothing.

Just glad Mario Wonder and Spider-Man 2, that same week, sold 10+ million something each and we know that from the company themselves. Especially when people in here were claiming Superstars sold millions with no proof because "Sonic sells on name alone" well clearly not like Spider-Man and Mario.

 

Fanservice for some reason...

Sonic CD I get, but the first two? Not so much.

 

Probably because the game did not sell well. SEGA aren’t like obligated to report hard numbers, so if they feel that reporting the sales of the game would negatively impact their bottom line they have a right to abstain from doing so, I’d wager.

 

Sonic 3 & Knuckles' story is simple, but its storytelling is sophisticated for a 1994 platforming game. Mania's mechanic narrative is one of its (few) weak points, and Sonic 1 is much more carefully put together in this sense. Sonic 2... less so, but I still think it progresses better than Mania, level-by-level. It makes sense to go from most levels to the next ones, so they allow you to create a little story in your own head. Mania just potpourries its way to Titanic Monarch.

 

I'll take Mania's "story" over Superstars one. Not that it matters.

 

It was more of a rhetorical question but thanks

 

I agree with this take to a point, when the game is good it easily touches upon the greatness of the classics, but those moments are too inconsistent to make the whole package work, and that's immensely offputting. Sonic CD has mediocre and weird bosses due to Ohshima's design philosophy, but they are not quite as bad pace disruptors as what you see in this game. Often being too easy if anything. And Sonic CD's weirdness is oddly consistent throughout the whole package to the point where it has a totally unique identity, whereas Superstars mirrors Sonic 1-3 a lot more at other points before going back to Sonic CD's oddness.

It also helps that we can play better, heavily modded versions of CD to improve the experience now. I've worked on some of those mods personally. And Origins attempted their own version which... all things considered, is not too bad either. So you can get a better experience both officially and unofficially.

We can't do that for Superstars yet, perhaps because of the complexity of the unity engine (I've heard injecting mods is more difficult in that engine), perhaps because of problems with Denuvo, or perhaps because of a lack of interest, and certainly not on consoles where mods would never be possible.

This is why I hate to see the game abandoned in a very flawed/controversial state. It would take some fairly minor QoL changes to fix parts of it, at least balancing the last 2 Trip bosses and final boss a bit.

I don't want this game to be the whimper that ends the classic era, I really don't. But I'm genuinely worried that will be the case, no matter how hyperbolic that may sound to some of you. The circumstances that led to Mania/Superstars existing are not normal for Sonic Team. If the game did not impress them saleswise, and receives mixed critical consensus among fans, that makes the efforts needed to create more of these titles harder.

Maybe Azrest is working on the next one now. Who knows? It's not like we know about it before their announcement, but I can't help but worry. And I'm not sure what should be done to say to SEGA we'd even like more classic games, or whether or not they'd listen.

 

I always heard it was in both the Series X and PS5 versions and I've got the former, where it's still noticeable. At one point there was talk of it being reduced or fixed, so maybe whatever that was only addressed it on PS5, but every time there's been a patch, I've booted up my Xbox to check and yep, still there. I've tried it on at least two different TVs that I've never had input issues with, and directly compared it to the Switch and PC versions (as well as Mania on the same console). I get the game is sorta low priority for SEGA, and that since the SX version is still totally playable, the input delay just didn't become a big enough problem to warrant fixing, but this particular issue really stuck with me I guess. I got the Series X version first, and while I did complete it, it just felt like a slog to play, and didn't leave the best impression. I got it on Switch "just to see" and honestly, the game being more playable on lower end hardware didn't remove the bad taste from my mouth.

I grabbed it on Steam during the summer sale after not having touched it since last Fall, and had a great time going in somewhat fresh. It's a solid game, it's just... why not make it play the same on all platforms? It's like Sonic not jumping as high as he should in the Switch version of Colors.

 

Yeah I read that interview already. Shuji Utsumi is mainly talking about quality and reviving SEGA and it's IPs as quality brands. Superstars was not of quality which lead to its lukewarm response.

I think you guys are interpreting my claims of it selling well against whatever forecast SEGA came up with for this game. I'm comparing this game's performance with the general US market. So far none of you have argued against the Circana/NPD charts. I haven't even gotten someone telling me they're lying or they're all made up numbers. They're just straight up ignored.

Let me put it in perspective here. On Superstars debut month, the #20 game had a confirmed 1 million sales. That's the floor here. Superstars debuted at 9th place. The game sold at least a million units in the US.

October
Lol I don't know. Thanks for deleting your Twitter Mat

November
Falls to 13th place
The following games debut

• COD MWIII (1st)
• Super Mario RPG (7th)
• Naruto x Borutu: Ultimate Ninja Storm Connections (12th)
• Star Ocean The Second Story (17th)

December
Rises to 12th place
The following game debuted

• Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora (6th)

January
Falls off the list
The following games debut

• Tekken 8 (2nd)
• Suicide Squad: Kills the Justice League (3rd)
• P3: Persona 3 Reloaded (4th)
• Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth (7th)
• Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown (13th)
• Jujutsu Kaisen: Cursed Clash (19th)

Over in the Japanese side, here are the Famitsu debut numbers for the last 3 games.

Sonic Forces (2017)
10./00. [PS4] Sonic Forces <ACT> (Sega) – 5,960 / NEW
13./00. [NSW] Sonic Forces <ACT> (Sega) – 4,899 / NEW

Sonic Frontiers (2022)
04./00. [NSW] Sonic Frontiers <ACT> (Sega) - 26,067 / NEW
07./00. [PS5] Sonic Frontiers <ACT> (Sega) - 11,111 / NEW
08./00. [PS4] Sonic Frontiers <ACT> (Sega) - 9,098 / NEW

Sonic Superstars (2023)
09./00. [NSW] Sonic Superstars <ACT> (Sega) - 4.128 / NEW

Superstars sold less than Forces in 2017. The Switch version charted, but both Playstation versions didn't even make the chart. Forces at least sold over 5k on Playstation. And that's just the debut number. The legs were worse with Superstars falling off after the debut week. Frontiers was in the Famitsu charts for over a month.

With the information available out there, for a game like Superstar, it sold well enough. The only data that I can extract from SEGA's perspective is that their forecast were off due to the high they got from Sonic Frontiers. Still, if a lukewarm game like this can still reach over a million units, why wouldn't they take another shot?

 

Why has this thread been so consistently weird about Superstars sales. Even when it came out there was someone lauding it as a failure. Who is pushing this and why is it only ever this game.

 

I do think he was talking about sales. I’ll pull the quote up:

I could be interpreting it wrong, but the wording of it indicates to me that it didn’t meet expectations. “The outcome” was bad (sales) compared to what they “delivered” (game).