This is not the place for this. But I cannot think of another place where it would not fit even worse. And I really want thoughts on it. I’m halfway adjusting the way I think of level design. I previously thought of level design as providing reasons for a player to move in the way you want them to, enforcing a path you want them to follow through use of terrain and hazards and such. I am now starting to consider a slight alteration of that. Less about providing reasons for a player to move the way you want them to, and moreso thinking about what they can do, what tools for movement they have and what resources they need to do it, and then providing them opportunities to do that. What I mean by resources and opportunities is like you can’t wall run without a wall to run on, for example. Can’t slope jump if you don’t have rising terrain to slope jump off of. I am trying to think about how they provide opportunities for players to like “come up” with their own paths and ways to traverse the level (or at least for them to FEEL like they’re coming up with their own paths and ways to traverse through the level.) And I think thinking of level design this way might better allow for that. Because then you just put in place level pieces that allow for all these different movement mechanics in the same area, providing different options for making their way through, and they have to look at all the options available and figure out what they want to do. And then you call for… PRECISION by actually considering the distances all these allowed movement mechanics can take you and then placing the next rest area, the next safety area at varying points before that. Like two platforms spread apart, to where you need to jump and air dash off the first but the second platform is just shy of the full distance a jump > air dash combo can take you. So you have to either somehow cancel the air dash part way through or, before you reach the full distance just the jump can take you, go ahead and start the air dash so you don’t overshoot.
I agree with the sentiment that we don't need a full explanation for the Chaos Emeralds and the Master Emerald. BUT. I do believe we need something telling us that they were created together (or else they wouldn't have such connection). Now more than ever, since Frontiers revealed they weren't on Earth together at first. And we do need explanations for the other gems (Time Stones, Phantom Ruby, etc.). The Chaos Emeralds are special, thus they should remain a mystery, but the others are not.
yeah, it is absolutely satisfying being able to ignore attacks and hazards in Sonic 3 bosses with the right shield, for instance, and the game teaches you that mechanic within literally the very first boss of the game. I actually don't even recall if Mania brought that forward in any meaningful way, despite still having the elemental shields.
That was a neat video, kind of covered all of my issues with the first few levels of Advance 3 I played on my revisit. For more unpopular opinions, I have a soft spot for Sonic Heroes, which as far as I gather is also pretty divisive (also based on version; I'm talking about the PC version). Fun enough, I think Heroes might just actually go under this "flawed favourite" moniker for me. I think it's the only 3D Sonic game out of the ones I've played that truly nailed down the surreal vibe of the 2D Classic games in a 3D environment. I love the level themes, level design philosophy and tone of the game because I much prefer the more light-hearted cheese to the awkward hyper-drama (another unpopular opinion might be that I actually really enjoy the story of Sonic Colors), but unlike the more extreme, tonally dissonant version of that light-hearted cheese Forces ended up being, Heroes also does know when to get "serious". I so distinctly remember how people *hated* the more light-hearted tone of Heroes, though and I never got it because I always thought the same spirit permeated the Adventure games. And history seems to agree because Heroes seems to now be bunched in with the Adventure series as "better times for Sonic stories". There is a Monkey's Paw element to the level design: the alternative ways to play with all of the characters creats some really cool substance, but later levels get really long. Egg Fleet is *awesome*, but it's way too long, doubly so with the Team Dark "hard mode". The design element of needing to complete all of the essentially different difficulty settings for the final story also really takes the enjoyment out of the game as a result because the default Team Sonic story already has the levels last too long. Looking at all of this, Heroes actually looks like a great game with some issues, but the caveat really is just the general control and all of the glitches. In fact, I'd argue the game would get marginally better just by fixing all of the glitches and adding some of the QoL features from the boost games because dying at the end of a 10-minute stage for reasons out of your control really is the worst feeling. Add an actual homing attack reticle, the ability to homing attack rails and one button rail switching and you already fix a bunch of the frustration in my eyes because I think you can actually play around the stiff controls because they're in their own consistent microcosm. It's why I was so persistent on still trying to beat all of the stories (never did and only saw the final boss because I looked for a 100% save file, might go for a revisit), you could have a lot of fun if you got a good run with as few glitches as possible. I was initially surprised to find out Heroes hasn't had any rereleases because it straight-up has a PC version, but I suppose it makes sense for it to be in the same boat as all of the other games stuck on their initial consoles because of its milder reception (to loop back to the above discussion for a bit, considering the overall positive reception, though, it makes no sense for the Advance and Rush series to still be stuck on their hardware). Whilst I see an 06 remake idea being floated around, if I personally were to pick a remake over a completely new game, it would be Heroes. It would be a good test bed because it is not as beloved as the Adventure games, so people wouldn't be upset if it ended up imperfect, but if all of its issues were to be resolved, I think it could be one of the best Sonic games ever. Unlike 06, it wouldn't double down on any kind of infamy if it didn't end up good. They could even line it up with Sonic movie 4 for relevancy. Putting it into perspective like this, I think the circulating rumours about a remake at least make sense on all levels. (And I personally think 06 doesn't have nearly as much "potential" as people make it out to have – the hyper-realism it went for isn't that aesthically interesting, the level design, while occasionally neatly open, still doesn't look that good to me and I don't see any of the character potential for Silver so many seem to, he just felt like the most unfun version of Future Trunks to exist that made Blaze a disposable item box. I haven't played it, but I'm not even interested in the supposed fan remake because even at its best-looking, it looks like a watered-down, blander Adventure game).
You're arriving at the conclusions Yasuhara arrived. That's his thinking, basically, as expressed by his interviews and his lectures. I'd say "Level design as providing reasons for a player to move in the way you want them to" is essentially manipulation, and any accomplishment will be more about the level designer than about the player. I don't think a game can be satisfying like that at all.
If that was that dude’s mentality to level design, I think he forgot the last part as far as how to implement precision a lot of the time, outside of stuff like the odd slope jump at speed and the irregularly occurring stage gimmick in a pinball level. Kind of fell off with that after Sonic 1. lol No, what I had in mind when I was saying that was actually Cloudbuilt. I mean, Celeste was one of my favorite platformers ever at some point. And while there is a LITTLE wiggle room as far as carving your own path when implementing stuff like wave dashes and wall bounces and such, essentially speedrunning the game, for the most part outside of that you are basically just kind of doing what they say. And what they say is pretty fun a lot of the time and satisfying to play simply due to how demanding it can get, at least for someone like me who was not at the time used to a platformer challenging you directly. This is neither the hardest nor best level in this game but I think it is one of the levels that best gets across well what I am trying to say there. Probably the most literal interpretation of it and also the most focused. So focused to where it doesn’t even concern itself much with stage gimmicks or level theming or the like, and it could be argued that it isn’t that great as a level. Lol It also showcases the wall bounce at the beginning, necessary in this level but generally just a thing you can do when you see the opportunity that may allow you to move upwards in a way alternate to what the stage lays out. I found it stupid fun because of the precision required, it’s flow when you are nailing the stuff properly, and the near constant tension as there aren’t very many places in the level you can just pause and “rest,” because if you cease your input you’ll just fall to your death. Lol this also gets it across pretty well. But because of the auto scroller section that you can’t really speed up very much, it can get pretty boring and annoying to keep playing if you keep failing. Megaman is also pretty fun, from what I have played of it. And with the legacy/original/non x or zero stuff the platforming challenges at least are quite specifically structured. Generally.
You'll notice I didn't quote that part, and that's because as far as I'm aware he never talked about precision so particularly or especially. And that's because precision isn't the only thing that can stand between a player and the opportunities they see to do something they can do. Laser-focusing on that is kinda restrictive, I think? Besides, he wasn't the only person involved in determining how the games would go. Surely all sorts of other people gave their input on the general philosophy the game would take (especially Naka), so. Even if he was very keen on precision, it doesn't mean he'd always get the final say on things. Were you asking me? And, if so, do you mean the positive example or the negative example? (For the negative example of a game that feels manipulative, I really fucking hate Shovel Knight for this very reason, but that's just me. Personal tastes and experiences and all.)
As someone who has never played it, seeing someone express vitriolic loathing for Shovel Knight is really freaking funny to me. It almost seems illogical. Palas, I view videogames as challenges, things that ask you to do a task that takes some skill and makes it fun and rewarding to do so. While precision and mechanical skill isn’t the ONLY skill a game can test, it is one I find really fun and it is also what I think is most fitting for a platformer like Sonic and what I come to it for. I don’t know all the skills a game can test cuuuuuuuuuuuuz I’m not that smart. But I do have stashed among the hundreds of notes I have saved to Google Keep a brief list of skills they can test. A d looking through them, I’m really not seeing much else that Sonic should be doing. Logic and inference challenges test the ability of the player to consider information and decide the best course of action. For example, chess. You are aware of the state of the board and the position of all the pieces—both yours own and your opponent's and what those pieces can do. Pattern recognition is another. Either you have all the information needed to identify what it’s pattern is, or you have to guess some of it. Knowledge challenges require you to give the right answer, based on experiences in life or in game. Like a characters favorite color or something to give them the shirt they'd want. Lateral thinking challenges are when you need to recall past experiences or knowledge from real life or in game and not just give an answer but combine them in a new way. Like if you know what ingredients do what, you could figure out the recipe for a thing you’re called to make.Or if you know that repeated rapid heating and cooling of a metal object causes it to become brittle, and see something around that can do that, you can use that information to break a barrier. Memory challenges are self explanatory. Maybe you may need to remember a sequence, like up, up, down, down, left, right, energy. And then input those correctly. Personally, I look at stuff like this… And the only one I really want to see is the logic and inference one. For a Sonic game at least. I don’t want to stop and do any of this other crap. Like I finally got Frontiers running proper recently and got to that puzzle where you have to point the lights for Amy and I was like, “OH MY GOD. NEVER, EVER DO THIS AGAIN! THIS IS TERRIBLE!” But honestly… it wasn’t terrible. It was kind of interesting. That is a type of gameplay I can and have found fun… …IN ANOTHER GAME. That is not something I want to stop playing a Sonic game in the middle of a Sonic game for. And so even with those logic and inference challenges, I want that to stay limited to what it already is, figuring out best paths and stuff. And I want it to be something done to the limited degree that it actually is in these games. What I mostly want from this is Coordination challenges. That’s what I find most fun in these games. That’s what I feel fits Sonic. Stuff like timing, precision/accuracy, and the ability to do long sequences of actions like combos.
No, I get it. I don't mean to say you're wrong? I just pointed out that the rationale you used sounds like the ideas Yasuhara expresses when, for example, he says this: When he outlines the way game design (and by extension level design) is all about giving the player a chance to match desire and outcome, and through that relieve tension, I think it's close to how you moved away from getting the player to "execute something fun" to, as he says, "giving the player a time to forecast" -- starting from what they want and what they can do. That's all. What I think of Celeste or Shovel Knight isn't really important.
lol. Hey, Palas. Where in that video does he say that? Retro doesn’t accept links to specific parts in YouTube videos.
OH. Damn that's a shame. Well, from 22:20 on, and more specifically from 23:30 on. The whole section lasts about 4 minutes, if that. But the whole thing is worth it!
Two pages late to the SA2 soundtrack discussion but figured I'd chime in with what probably is an unpopular opinion - Fumie Kumatani's tracks are easily my favorites in the game and it sucks she doesn't get the same level of recognition as Jun Senoue and Tomoya Ohtani. The latter two are great in their own right but I'm looking at her credits for SA2 and if I were to make a top 10 list of my favorite songs in that game she'd be credited for at LEAST half of them, if not more.
I feel this way for pretty much every soundtrack she contributed to. When I was first getting online and seeing who made what, most of my favorite tracks were always from her.
I'm glad it's not just me! I vividly remember being a little kid in my uncle's living room, playing SA2B, and being absolutely floored by the entire final boss sequence in the Hero story. The music elevated that cutscene and (low-key kinda ass) final boss battle so much.
Idk about anyone else but in the case of the adventure games I've just never known who specifically composed what, but I also like almost the whole soundtrack personally
Fumie Kumatani is the goat, her song is always a hard hit and always gets stucky in mind. She has a very distinct style that you know its her, and yet, at same time, she can compose in some many different ways that it's genuily impressive. Hope someday she will return for the franchise. I think Kenichi Tokoi and Mariko Nanba are also very great and underrated composers that deserves more credits by the community. If Rintaro Soma and Hidekuni Horita keep their consistence like that, they have a chance of becoming my favorites too.
She made supporting me, which is hands down my favorite sonic song. Most of her music is top tier. Chao theme, gamma theme, most of shadows memorable songs. List could go on. Too bad she’s pretty much vanished after colors.
