Sonic X Shadow Generations announced, releases Autumn 2024

You're right. That is pretty shitty, but it doesn't change my point, which is that control options are important. They used to be far more commonplace before the modern era of gaming. Which is ironic, considering every other accessibility feature under the sun is now commonplace.

I'll give SEGA the benefit of the doubt on whether the option will be present, but if it's not, my reaction isn't going to be "oh well".

 

I think it’s probably good they’re trying to make the controls consistent between the recent games, provided they have options.

Also… you all move your fingers between X/Square on Playstation? I always just sort of rested my thumb across both.

 

I'm so glad that the series has been doing away with lives since Rise of Lyric. And it's especially fortunate considering how Superstars (especially Trip's story), from what I've seen, and pre patch TFH ramped the difficulty up to HD Eggmanland levels, and maybe even Unleashed DLC if you really want to stretch it. I love HD Unleashed more than anyone, it's my favorite in the franchise, but I'll be damned if I ever go through the hell that was Eggmanland again. Just imagine if those games did have lives. Then again, in the case of Frontiers a lives system would not work in the slightest.

 

Colours Ultimate was made by Blind Squirrel on their own version of the Godot Engine. It was the first, and so far only game in the series with remappable controls. It's probably not the best comparison, especially since Frontiers came out after CU and didn't let you remap controls.

 

The funny thing is that, as much as I played Gen throughout the years, when I returned to it after Frontiers, my muscle memory got screwed big time, actually preferred Frontiers control scheme and it felt more natural even though i spent less time with it compared to Gen

 

fwiw, system wide remappable controls exists for Steam, Xbox, PlayStation 4/5 and Switch. It sucks if it's not available in game, but it's possible to work around it. An ingame option is always preferable though.

 

Sticking with Frontiers' control changes is an interesting choice, and one I'm kind of glad they're willing to make (though a legacy option for those who want it would be cool). Ease of continuous boost aside, it's nice to have the double jump, air boost, and that targetless-homing-attack-dash-thing as separate, non-overlapping functions... even if Sonic's on-again off-again double jump has never been all that great. And so far I haven't noticed any worryingly un-Generations quirks.

Though I do have some (probably pretty silly) mixed feelings on the Drop Dash. I love the move, but it feels odd to me when they toss it into old games' base movesets like it was always there. I'd rather it feel like a bonus or an unlockable. Maybe SxS Generations could've made it into one of the equippable skills you can unlock. (Though, that could also be my headcanon talking - I always liked to think Classic Sonic came up with the Drop Dash after going home post-Generations. And then I guess Modern did the same thing but later. Like convergent evolution. )

 

I wonder if they'll do something with that weird trophy room from the original. In-game achievements? That'd be nice.

 

On the topic of lives, I don't understand why they're being removed. Generations, besides being fairly short, is also not even all that difficult from what I can recall. Moreover, between the absurd difficulty spikes showcased in Frontiers' Final Horizon DLC and Superstars; I just get the attitude (and if I was dead set on buying the game, the fear) that the removal of lives is being used as a path to allow the designers to be sloppy with the difficulty curve; rather than a genuine re-assessment of the existing game design. A lives system probably would had done wonders for Superstars in the playtesting phase, because you'd quickly run out of lives with how much garbage the game forces players to trudge through with the bosses. Watch this space for if/when people end up complaining about the Shadow sidegame turning stupidly difficult out of nowhere.

Drop dash being included kinda feels whatever at this point because Sega's gone out of their way to backport the mechanics into a lot of the other recent classic projects (Superstars, Sonic Origins and --IIRC-- the NSO ports of Sonic 1/2); and from what I've read, they're apparently not even implementing the mechanic properly in the first place. Additionally, as other people have said, I'm also guessing it's not going to be a character skill you can add or remove to Sonic's moveset (like with Twin Spin Attack/insta-shield, or with the Super Peel Out as in Mania), it's just going to be pasted onto Sonic's moveset as a default.

I'd probably also be more excited about C. Sonic being updated with the Drop Dash, if it also meant that the developers (on a broader scale) were re-working C. Sonic's classic physics/mechanics to be more accurate the original games (which the various game mods of Generations, and even the vanilla game's "Athleticism" and "Sure Footed" character skills, have shown is absolutely possible to do). And also, in turn, doing necessary tweaks to his levels to accommodate for the more accurate physics. Unfortunately I'm largely expecting the same-old from 2011 but with a broken drop dash slapped on top of it. (Guessing it's probably just another way to activate Generations' also/already broken spindash.)

 

God I hope the Drop Dash is as broken as Generations Spin Dash, that would be what Marty would describe as cinema

 

Legacy controls confirmed, thank god:
https://x.com/SSF1991/status/1799951784502493555?t=jSIdSr-bGyp534H-yton7Q&s=19

 

Since save files were invented, the life system is pretty much useless. You run out of lives, you run out of continues, then you go to your save file and load the game again.

The life system is nice if you're playing a no-save mode, like Mania had.

 

I wonder if they'll give Modern Sonic the double jump as an unlockable skill. Never really cared for the double jump personally but I guess people seem to like it. I think I'd like it more if Sonic did a cool little flip when you double jump, like Viewtiful Joe or something lol

 

New interview with Iizuka revealed the director of SxS

Where was this guy when they were hyping up Forces as "brought by the same team as Colors and Gens". Frontiers coulda used him too.

Edit: image isn't working, director is Katsuyuki Shigihara, he was a game designer for the OG Generations, worked on level design for Colors, and directed Sonic Origins.

 

That's implying it isn't possible to limit saving or that going back a level can't be an adequate punishment regardless of the game's challenge. It's still more of a punishment than just going back to the checkpoint. It still makes a difference.

 

Lives were just annoying, if you mess up an A/S rank attempt and want to restart it costs a life and it's really stupid and annoying. You could just not have restarts cost lives but then what is the point of lives?? The only merit I can give them is that it pushes players to get better instead of effectively save scumming there way through a game, but the ranking system already does that :/

 

You're still "save scumming" (as you put it) just without getting A/S ranks. It's not the same thing at all.

I guess my point is that just because Sonic Generations maybe works fine with infinite lives doesn't mean we have to set in stone that finite lives have no place whatsoever.

 

I like the videos so far. It's pretty much what we all have been asking for except no Knuckles. Lol but if they put out content this good I'll make an exception.

 

I didn't mean incentivizing A ranks and the risk of running out of lives are the exact same, obviously lives are better at pushing people to play better. It's just seems to me that the two systems are contradictory. Why are you both encouraged to restart to get a perfect run but also punished for needing to restart? They just seem to be at odds with each other. Both systems are fine but together they just don't work.

 

Maybe losing a life when you restart means you aren't encouraged to restart. Maybe it's incentive to do better without needing to restart a bunch of times.

I always had plenty of restart tokens in SA2 anyway if that's the hypothetical game we're talking here. This is all relative to how good you are at the game and how easy lives are to get etc.