Its pretty much everything I was pointing out with the game.
That being said, if the game is great on a first playthrough then that will probably still earn it some good scores since most people are going to play this game once anyway and move on.
But oh man is that going to be a problem for hard-core Sonic fans who love to replay their games a lot. Don't be surprised if we start getting those "Sonic Frontiers: An overrated mess" videos in a few years after thr game's settled and the hype has worn off.
A lazy millennial who's good at what he does.T He thing is, are the flaws bad enough or not?
"Cynicism is not realistic and tough. It's unrealistic and kind of cowardly because it means you don't have to try."I'm talking about the prospect of the hardcore fans, on whether their evaluations later on may be valid or not.
Especially if the story is good enough to balance those flaws out.
Like, it's not like there's a perfect game anyway, everything can have their flaws but doesn't always mean they were overrated.
"Cynicism is not realistic and tough. It's unrealistic and kind of cowardly because it means you don't have to try."I don't value Sonic storytelling anywhere near as much as most of the fanbase does. Most Sonic stories are just ok, even the best ones that the fanbase loves to venerate. The most Im looking for from Frontiers are just some nice character interactions as I don't expect the plot to be anything to write home about.
I primarily care about how much the gameplay is going to hold up in the longterm.
Edited by BlackYakuzu94 on Oct 15th 2022 at 7:03:42 AM
A lazy millennial who's good at what he does.I think the point Courier is trying to make is that whether those traits will impact replay value is up in the air. The replay value itself is what's YMMV.
The reviewer himself was aware of this: all the things that the reviewer worries will undercut replay value in the game are things that aren't really uncommon, which is why he makes the concession that they're all mainstay concepts in open world games. There are absolutely players who often experience and will like those kinds of mechanics, and for whom their replay value will be enhanced rather than diminished by having them there.
Edited by KnownUnknown on Oct 15th 2022 at 9:15:12 AM
In that case then, then its simply a matter of me not really liking that direction personally even if its going to be insignificant in the grand scheme.
I've kind of resigned myself that what I want out of Sonic games isn't necessarily what everyone else wants.
Edited by BlackYakuzu94 on Oct 15th 2022 at 12:29:49 PM
A lazy millennial who's good at what he does.In lighter news, here's a comic of Tails vs. Blaze.
https://twitter.com/TheNovika/status/1580972330511368195?t=AeYpEPnV17FfpQPktcb98g&s=19
I'm most concerned about the Cyberspace stages. Like, those controls problems sound bad. Really bad. The only showed it, but that point where he jumped and his momentum just stopped looked frustrating as hell to deal with.
It'd hardly be the first time a Sonic game had bad Special Stages that were frustrating to play while the overall game was better, but there's supposed to be tons of these things.
Yeah, and they sound like an important part of the game as well.
Considering Sega has made it clear they're working to make the game high quality (and trying to avoid previous issues like 06) is it too much to hope they heard about the problem and worked to fix it?
This sounds like an issue they need to fix up right away, because they don't have much credibility. Even the dude who's review was meant to be positive found a lot of things to dunk on, and....well...it's Sonic.
You want to give people as little meme potential as possible, cause if they find something to latch onto, they'll tear the game apart. He doesn't have the popularity to survive big mistakes.
He barely has the popularity to survive small mistakes.
If this is something others have talked about, Sega needs to get to work fixing it as soon as possible.
One Strip! One Strip!What the hell do you mean Sonic doesn't survive big mistakes?
Almost Sonic's entire career has been built on mismanagement and mistakes.
Despite that, the series still sells on the name alone. 06 sold over 2 million copies despite its reputation.
You're really underestimating how iconic Sonic is. Please remember that while the series may not have the best reputation online, it does in fact outsell franchises like Zelda and Smash Bros in revenue alone.
This is why I'm not worried about Frontiers as far as critical reception is concerned; because it really doesn't look much worse than the last decade of Sonic games, that alone is enough right there...even if that personally annoys me.
If you check the comments under all of the latest Frontiers content on Twitter and You Tube, the reputation of the game has flipped and people have more or less forgotten that awful first impression despite not much changing about the game itself.
Edited by BlackYakuzu94 on Oct 15th 2022 at 1:40:22 PM
A lazy millennial who's good at what he does.I'm not sure if they can fix it. The problem seems to be that there's one set of physics Sonic uses for motion, made to fit the overworld portion, and that it doesn't perfectly align with the gameplay needed for cyberspace. To fix it, they would need create/alter in new physics for cyberspace, maybe even do things like tweak and change animations, and the game comes out in less than a month. We might just be stuck with it.
That said, I believe him when he says the game is good despite the way he's talking about it. I tend to dunk on things a lot when reviewing things too, primarily because I feel like bad things are worth talking about and letting people know about more than good things, but if and when I say "this is still good and you'll probably enjoy it" amidst the dunking I mean it. The review seemed to be going more for a "temper your expectations of perfection" vibe than a "this game is actually bad" vibe.
And in the end it's also just one review, from a reviewer who admitted there also just stuff about the mechanics they chose he doesn't like in general. We'll probably see more in the upcoming weeks.
Edited by KnownUnknown on Oct 15th 2022 at 10:50:06 AM
Daily reminder Sonic Boom flopped not only because of the reception, but because it was on the worst selling console of the generation. Lost World, by contrast, sold well because it was also on Steam.
Sonic sells, no matter the quality.
To win, you need to adapt, and to adapt, you need to be able to laugh away all the restraints. Everything holding you back.Or they could make the improvements while rehashing the game until we get sick.
See. Now we both win.
Realistically speaking, if they find a winning formula and working on fixing the kinks, I wouldn't be surprised if they stuck with it. I've said that the open world format has room to let them use a lot of gameplay options. They need to be willing to do the work though.
One Strip! One Strip!Worst case scenario based on Sonic Team's previous behavior: they immediately either backtrack back to a previous design style, or suddenly re-reinvent the franchise again with an entirely new one, never improving the one they've just made.
Best case scenario based on their previous behavior: they play around with this design for few years until it's refined to comfortable and enjoyable state... and then reinvent the franchise anyway.
Edited by KnownUnknown on Oct 15th 2022 at 1:54:58 AM
Honestly? I'm guessing a Sonic 1/Unleashed esque situation where, while rough in certain spots, Frontiers will have really solid formula that will get improved in subsequent titles. It feels like the game's trying too many things to get them all right, but there's enough interesting ideas present that if the release is successful, most will get better polished in the future.

Just the first island, though it seems there quite a lot of content in just that part (several bosses, lots of area and activities, several cyberspace levels, etc). He notes he can only makes inferences about the rest of the game, but is more worried than certain that some of the issues he had with the first region won't go away.
Edited by KnownUnknown on Oct 14th 2022 at 11:46:53 AM