Review Slew: Sonic Unleashed (Xbox 360)
Ryan Bloom | December 5, 2008
Too little, too late?
It was difficult to suppress my optimism when the first material on Sonic Unleashed was accidentally leaked to the internet. Though the framerate was questionable, it was undeniably a very different direction compared to the last “canonical” Sonic game: (the now infamous) Sonic 2006. The gameplay footage for Sonic Unleashed, evoking the best elements of Sonic Rush and Sonic & The Secret Rings, had many people declaring that Sega had finally “gotten it right”. There were some, though, who warned the rest: There would be a catch. There’s always a catch. Some would call this progression of events a “Sonic Cycle”. Too many Sonic games have come and gone where initial media impresses, only to find out weeks or even months later that, “Oh yeah, did we mention? You have to go fishing as Big the Cat.”
Sonic Unleashed’s catch, as it turned out, was Sonic the Werehog, a mutant transformation of everyone’s favorite blue hedgehog. Immediately, hopes were dashed as the Werehog clawed and punched his way through massive crowds of enemies with his long, bizarrely rubbery arms. The Werehog, as most people would tell you, did not belong in a Sonic game. Initially I agreed with these statements, but over the months I began to realize that the Werehog wasn’t any more or less unfitting of the Sonic franchise than E-102 Gamma was in the original Sonic Adventure; if a new Sonic game today announced the ability to play as one of Dr. Eggman’s robots – armed with a gun – most people would probably reject it, much like they reject the Werehog. To me, E-102 Gamma’s section in Sonic Adventure actually turned out to be an unexpected surprise that was really fun. Would it be possible that the Werehog might not actually be that bad?
Or was this simply my bias towards the Sonic franchise speaking? When faced with the prospect of a game that might be better than one of the worst games of 2006, would I over-exaggerate the quality of the game simply because it was not total garbage? As the game’s release date drew near, my expectations for the game were all over the map. Depending on what day of the week you would ask me, Sonic Unleashed was either going to be really awesome or just another in a long line of embarrassments.
I can now say that Sonic Unleashed on the Xbox 360 is probably the best 3D Sonic the Hedgehog game we’ve had since the era of the Sega Dreamcast.
The game is split in to three distinct portions: Daytime gameplay as regular Sonic, Nighttime gameplay as the Werehog, and visiting various towns located in continents across the world. Daytime levels are predictably fast, with Sonic the Hedgehog reaching speeds of nearly 300 miles-per-hour. These levels are an absolute blast to play, with plenty of detours and shortcuts to encourage replaying in order to find that “perfect route” leading to the ever-elusive S Rank. To help you achieve this, the game’s controls have been redesigned with Sonic’s extreme speed in mind: At faster speeds, Sonic’s controls gradually smooth out, avoiding the twitchy analog stick sensitivity of Sonic 2006 or Sonic Adventure 2. Should you need to dodge oncoming obstacles a little bit faster, Sonic has been equipped with a brand-new “Quick Step” ability that allows you to easily strafe around hazards. Rather than try to group the rest of Sonic’s moves around the two face buttons, Sonic Unleashed marks the first 3D Sonic game to use all four face buttons. Functions are grouped naturally – for example, “downward” actions like sliding, stomping and crouching are bound to the B button, while “boost” actions such as the homing attack and Sonic Boost are on the X button. For fans of the previous games, adjusting to the new button structure can take some time, but eventually it all clicks. In the original Sonic Rush (and the Sonic Advance games), a great deal of frustration arose out of going too fast to avoid an obstacle or a pitfall, resulting in numerous cheap deaths. Sonic Unleashed makes an effort to correct this by flat out telling you what buttons you need to push at certain points in the level. It’s a little bit cheese-ball, and there were times where I found these button prompts lingered on screen a little bit too long and managed to cover up the action. Though they do get less frequent as the game progresses, they never quite vanish entirely and the game has no option to turn them off.
When the sun goes down, the dreaded Werehog comes in to play. The Werehog’s gameplay focuses more on slower activites like combat and platforming, a move most likely done to try and diversify from Sonic’s somewhat one-dimensional, speed-focused gameplay. Combat largely borrows from the template of Insert-Your-Action-Game-Here; most notably God of War. Attacks are bound to the X and Y buttons, and the B button is used for grabbing objects. Defeat enough enemies and hit the right bumper to execute “Unleash” mode, where the Werehog moves faster and hits harder for a short period of time. Initially, the Werehog starts out with almost no combos whatsoever, making combat feel relatively shallow. It’s not until much later in the game, once you’ve sufficiently upgraded the Werehog’s Combat and Strength abilities using EXP gained in levels, that fighting enemies starts to become more fun. Even then, enemies feel like they take one too many hits to defeat – most likely to entice you to use the cumbersome “Critical Attack” finishing moves. To make matters worse, later Werehog levels punish you for exploring secret areas: it’s common to get trapped in a dead end until you defeat a certain number of enemies, or find new enemies have spawned in an area you’ve already been to. The addition of a greater focus on platforming is definitely a welcome, although clunky addition. The biggest problem with the Werehog’s platforming mechanics involves the fact that the game never once tells you how to properly grab on to ledges and wall pegs; initially, I thought you just had to be quick enough to tap the B button when the lock-on icon appeared by a ledge. This, obviously, resulted in a lot of unfair deaths as sometimes the lock-on icon will only appear for a split second before you fall to your doom. It was not until I was near the end of the game that I was told, via an easily-missed hint, that I could simply hold the B button and the Werehog would instantly grab on to nearby objects. All things considered, though the Werehog has its fair share of gameplay problems, it was nowhere near as bad as what I was anticipating – and dare I say it – I might have actually enjoyed it a little bit in spite of myself.
Unlike Sonic 2006′s City of Soleanna, which was a unnecessarily large ghost town, the town areas in Sonic Unleashed are often very small with a few local residents (NPCs) populating them, making it quick and easy easy to get where you need to go. NPCs are pleasantly stylized like a Disney cartoon, and every single one has a unique name and a unique appearance. Over the course of the game, these NPCs will eventually do things like visit other towns, and form relationships with each other. It’s a small touch, but it gives the game some additional personality, and it needs it. From a gameplay standpoint, towns in Sonic Unleashed are relatively useless, offering up no actual purpose outside of talking to these NPC characters and taking a few side missions. Shops located within Towns only exist to purchase items that do nothing but net you achievements for buying them all. Fortunately, their small size and simple layouts means you can run through most towns in under a minute – unless you really want to stop and take a look around. “Entrance Stages” are a little more interesting, often requiring you to complete mini-platforming-challenges to access the gateway for the next level. This can get frustrating, as in addition to reaching the entrance to the next stage, you must have the required number of Sun or Moon Medals to play the level. I, personally, had no problem with this: The majority of Sun and Moon medals are usually sitting in plain sight, and if they aren’t, their “hiding places” are extremely obvious. In a way, the medal requirements almost feel like SonicTeam nudging you to slow down a little bit and take time to appreciate all the detail that goes in to a typical Sonic Unleashed level. Though you never see it as you whiz by at 300mph, there are a lot of cute little touches within levels that most people probably won’t notice.
In many ways, Sonic Unleashed feels like an overt apology for the disaster of Sonic 2006. Gone are the numerous, melodrama-bathed, faux-mature cutscenes preceding and following every level. In comparison, the plot in Sonic Unleashed is not only fairly simple with fewer cutscenes overall, it’s also considerably more light-hearted, fitting of the cartoon characters that populate the world. Though Tails and Amy Rose do make brief appearances, they might as well be non-existent. Amy is literally just another town NPC with a couple of cute lines of dialog and you almost never see Tails after the first few levels. The newcomer “Chip” is tolerable, hamming it up with cute dialog in cutscenes and dispensing hints during levels if you really need them. There are a few times where Chip will give you a hint even if you don’t need it, and these sequences can definitely be annoying – but they are infrequent enough to be a non-issue. The graphics, something that has not really impressed me in a 3D Sonic since Sonic Adventure 2, look amazing. Sonic Unleashed’s Hedgehog Engine truly delivers on its promise of graphics that approach the level of Cinematic-quality CGI. Unfortunately, the game does suffer from framerate issues. The closer you get to the end of the game, the more the framerate problems begin to rear their ugly heads – to the point where significant portions of the next-to-last level are spent running at a choppy 15 frames per second. The music, as always, remains diverse and enjoyable – each region in the game has its own musical style that reflects its nationality while still keeping the catchy, up-beat pop-music tone Sonic games are known for. There is one snag: The Werehog battle music. This jazzy horn piece eventually wears out its welcome as I found myself straining to hear a level’s original background music only to have it constantly interrupted by blaring trumpets every few seconds. English voice actors put forth some of their best performances in a Sonic game yet (which probably isn’t saying much), but the option to switch to the Japanese voices exists for those purists out there. Though some remnants of the old Sonic Adventure style of games still remain, you get the sensation that effort was put in to this game to fix problems that have been broken in 3D Sonic games for many years.
All in all, Sonic Unleashed still might not be as good as the old Sega Genesis games, but I feel it is the most progressive foot forward the franchise has had in almost ten years. Unfortunately, it may be too little, too late. Given the backlash from most professional reviewers, it would seem that the mainstream at large simply does not have the patience for a flawed Sonic game anymore. It will most likely take nothing short of a perfect game for this franchise to regain the respect it has lost, and I am not so sure the Sonic franchise will ever have another game on par with his former glory. That being said, in the grand scheme of things, what really matters is if you yourself enjoyed the game – and I most certainly got some fun out of Sonic Unleashed. However, given the nature of this franchise and how different your expectations might be, your mileage may vary. Rent it first.
Filed Under Microsoft, Review Slew, Sega, The Next Sonic
wow
Hm, wow. When there’s something about a negative “4/10 review” thing on TSSZ, comments range anywhere from 60-100. When something positive is finally said about it, there’s like-what-2 comments. Interesting.
Please, anyone who reads this, I’m not trying to provoke or get anyone mad. Not in the least. I’m just making an observation.
Let’s hope Black Knight is a good game. Also with Knuckles as a boss, it kind of reminds of Sonic 3& Knuckles and SA1, which were great both great games.
@ Mark Chao
IMO, I believe that Black Knight will be a superior title. I have faith in the development team, and after reading some interviews, they know what was wrong with the Secret Rings and past Sonic titles.
The sword gameplay doesn’t bother me as much as it used to. One of the developers stated that they used dozens of gameplay styles to find the one that worked best and was most intuitive.
I also loved the level design for secret rings. It made a whole new Sonic experience which was very challenging.
~Michael Bonawtiz~
I love the sword game-play, it’s better than guns I think.
Wow, I’m actually surprised with the positive feedback in your review Oliver-sama.
It’s just that a lot of the media is bias towards Sonic now ever since Shadow the Hedgehog in 2005, which personally loved by the way.
We’ve got IGN, Gamespot, Gamespy, Game Informer, Nintendo Power, Electronic Gaming Monthly, GamePro, X-box Magazine, Official Playstation Magazine, Eurogamer, Official Nintendo Magazine, Gametrailers, and the list just goes on and on.
I’d say 3 or 4 are bias towards Sonic. Some like Nintendo Power and Official Nintendo Magazine may seem a little loose with their reviews time to time, but the things is that they have Sonic fans playing the game.
Nintendo Power once responded to a letter asking if they only had non-RPG fans review RPG’s and the like. There response, though not exact, was similar to
this:
“We wouldn’t let those who aren’t fond of a genre review a game they aren’t fans of.”
Electronic Gaming Monthly, possibly the fairest of all game reviewers today, used to have 3 reviewers for one game. Now, they only do that for certain releases. But they too had a Sonic Expert like Nintendo Power’s Steve Thomason. I don’t exactly remember his name, but he was pretty damn fair to the Blue Blur during previews.
And of course IGN, who I now choose to ignore, not wanting to torture myself listening to their Video Reviews, who are absolutely horrific thanks to their reviewer’s terrible speaking voices, are just people who think they are gamers and try to act “hip” and “spicy” like G4′s X-Play, who I also hate.
And let’s not forget us Sonic fans. Everyone has their faults here, and the fans are no exception. It’s something called “Fan-Dumb” or “Unpleasable Fanbase”. A perfect example would be playable characters regarding Sonic Heroes and Sonic and the Secret Rings. In Sonic Heroes, fans complained there were too many playable characters, and during Sonic and the Secret Rings’ release, fans complained about not having enough. And of course, the problem of new characters with each new game. So the Sonic franchise has a bunch of characters. It may seem like a lot, but think about Mario, who has, counting enemies who do indeed appear frequently, 1000+ characters. How many of Sonic’s characters actually reappear? Maybe 16 to 20 maybe, while Mario has about 50 returning in each new Mario Party?
Now, I’m not putting down Mario. I love Mario, but I grew up with Sonic first. I always used to argue with my older brother who was better as kids. Even now, where Sonic and Mario are no longer mortal enemies, but more as friends (Yes, two separate fictional characters can be friends) we still argue once in a while, but definitely not as often. Both characters are timeless, no matter how many struggles they’ve had, while all imitators have fell. Bubsy, anyone?
Okay, I’m gonna just shut the hell up now.
The fairest comment I saw was from a guy at Retro. In essance, he thought Unleashed is a good game that came out of bad or mediocre ideas. I’d say it’s a well polished and fun title with flaws that are inherant in IDEAS not execution. This is a good thing. The hedgehog engine works, this team can program and design levels. They just need to refine the actual concepts.
Sonic Unleashed is fun. Reviews that review it as is look upon it favorably…wheras bad reviews seem to be criticizing the concepts instead of the gameplay itself. The Werehog is well designed and plays well, but it was a bad idea. I enjoy it…many others do as well. But it is not the right approach when reviving a franchise. The town stages are also unpopular, but I think that’s nitpicking. They work well kept to a minimum like SA and SU. Ultimately, if a title uses the gameplay in SU and expands the daytime element(even to the point of having a shorter game) then this game is well worth it. If Sonic Team either listens to overly impressed fans or overly pessimistic media…that could be a bad thing.
If SU was all day levels, it would be getting 8′s. Guarenteed. Sega should take the criticism well, but not overreact to the negative bashing of some. They have a nice engine, run with it.
Oh, and use the hedgehog engine to bring back Ristar. k thx.
Well I’m sure as hell enjoying it! To me it really is an excellent game, I’ve had pretty much no stupid deaths (most if not all my own fault instead of silly level design) and I woop for joy whenever sonic…… You know its all just indescribable, if you’ve played the game you know what I’m talking about.
THE WERE-HOG WASN’T THAT BAD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! IT WAS SEGA’S FISRT TIME PLATFORMING FOR SONIC AND ALL OF YOU EXPECTED THEM TO GET IT PERFECT????????????!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! WILL YOU RETARDS STOP COMPLAINING ABOUT ALL OF THE LITTLE CRAP???????????!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
@SatBK:
…Wow.
SatBK, please take a few chill pills and call me in the morning.
@SatBK: It was Sega’s first time platforming for Sonic? Really? Aside from that not making sense, you realize he’s been in platforming games since the early 90s right?
Soap Scum: Yeah, none get angry when the make new Mario characters but when they make one new Sonic character everyone is like:OH NO! A NEW STUPID UGLY CHARACTER! I HATE HIM/HER!
That’s so weird.
Crazee: Yeah, I agree! I want a cool new Ristar game too!XD
Anyway, good review!
Now I’m going to play Sonic Unleashed! XD…Sorry I really love that smile.
[...] di tssznews.com, sito sonicaro, quindi recensione abbastanza completa: Review: Sonic Unleashed (Xbox 360) | tssz|news Too little, too late? I can now say that Sonic Unleashed on the Xbox 360 is probably the best 3D [...]
SATBK, I’m assuming you mean first time platforming for the Werehog?
Because, well, if it’s the first time platforming for Sonic in your eyes, then you need to RESEARCH, man. >__>;;
lol Criticism of the Werehog is valid.
But reviewing a game as terrible when 40% of it is mediocre at worst seems odd, which is why I think bad reviews are against the CONCEPT and not just the gameplay.
Mechs and shooting don’t belong, treasure hunting doesn’t belong, fishing doesn’t belong, and Werehog doesn’t belong. These all may be fun in their own ways, but seriously, they shouldn’t even be developed for the Sonic games to begin with. It’s a waste of time on the developers’ parts. They need to focus on Sonic-styled stages only. I wouldn’t mind playing as extra characters if their gameplay and objectives were extremely similar to Sonic’s like in S3&K and Sonic Heroes.
Fair enough…but stages where you fly through the air don’t belong either. And everyone loved Doomsday zone.
I think if we had alternate play styles that were 5-6 levels each max…that would provide variety and a longer game…but wouldn’t compete with Sonic levels.
I enjoyed this game. I never paid attention to any professional reviews and I really enjoyed it. Beat it yesterday, best game in like 7 years. Although the only Sonic game I’ve had a problem with was 06. Others didn’t bother me much.
Probably the most fair, balanced review I’ve encountered thus far – good work.
The reviews for this game are mixed but more fans say this game is great than others. I hope SEGA sees that we enjoyed the game. Though I like Werehog, they do need to try to make the next game more fast paced (EXCLUDING the spin off Black Knight).
It’d be cool if they had like 7 Stages w/ 2 whole acts and some extra acts. Then have other characters that play very simmilarly. EXAMPLE:
Tails (PS3)
X- Jump. Jump again in the air to fly and it’s like a boost for Tails in the air. When he lands on the ground, he still boosts on for a while, being half as fast as Sonic when he boosts. His boost meter comes up as a small gauge when he’s in the air. Double tap jump quickly to just boost.
Square- Tail Attack. Can be used while running. He can break through things but can’t slide. Press this to fly upwards while attacking.
Triangle- Tails Cannon (Fanboy: OH NO!). Relax. I thought it out. Basically, he has a gauge for that and it powers up via rings. It simply is like E 102′s system. Tails can target enemies in the sky without slowing down by holding Triangle and releasing. Now it’s limited by rings. 20 Rings= 5 enemies. Also, at certain parts that are more SA-ish, you can use this to trigger doors open by locking onto them. When you don’t have rings, you can only target one enemy at a time, but this never makes a simple puzzle difficult. His stages take place in the areas Sonic goes through but for Tails, they are reworked for his powers.
Oh yeah, circle is ring charge. Allows you to gain rings to use your Tails Cannon but it takes a bit of time (Doesn’t drag on to long, 5 rings every two seconds) and takes away from your current score. The puzzzle elements aren’t going to be longer than a minute and a half TOPS, minus the last stage.
[...] you’ve read our reviews. You’ve read their reviews. With all the crazy nonsense being said about Sonic Unleashed, [...]
i got one thing to say:
sonic unleashed is a damn good game….but sega could have truly done more….they know that sonic has potential…WE know sonic has a lot of potential…
looking at SU, he’s getting pretty damn close…
so…already…im waiting for a “sonic unleashed 2″…(doesn’t mean im not getting black knight..)
The fairest comment I saw was from a guy at Retro. In essance, he thought Unleashed is a good game that came out of bad or mediocre ideas.
http://www.sonicstadium.org/features/review/sonic-unleashed-the-tss-review more like.
“…I have faith in the development team…”
True Sonic fan right there. Although I’m sure that it’s going to be a great game, even though Luiz Prower said at least one level was full of glitches. I DON’T CARE ABOUT GLITCHES!!!
[...] is Fang Wolf’s resemblance to the recent Werehog transformation Sonic underwent in Sonic Unleashed, what with the cobalt blue fur and long, muscular arms. From certain angles, the shoulders on Fang [...]
In your opinion Ryan (if you are going back to read this question XD), do you reckon this is what a Jak & Daxter and Sonic crossover would feel like?
No. This doesn’t feel anything like Jak & Daxter.
1. Looks at peoples comments about SatBK and laughes till he’s on the floor.
2. I haven’t gotten to try the 360 version but based in videos, it’s the same issues I had with the PS2 version, just worse.
3. It’s obvious by now that with SatBK and other games that Sonic Team doesn’t care about the enjoyment of their customers and the only people that still play new sonic games are the obsessive diehards, ignorant and reviewers who have no choice. I’ve waited far too long for ST and the fan base to get their heads out of their rears and they can all forget it!
Well I kind of figured, what with Jak and Daxter being a combat/platformer much like the Werehog, altho it may not be anywhere near as similar to God of War or the Werehog, is that if they WERE to try it out, this would be a pretty good example of what it would feel like (not entirely). And I say this from the Werehog combat/platforming and Chip being similar to Daxter in a way.
But then S/J&D is one of my dream platformers (next to an actual Mario/Sonic platformer). Anyway, thank you for responding. Excellent review BTW. Alot better than the Backlash SU’s been getting anyway. You had your doubts, yet you enjoyed it anyway and you listed both positive and negative points of each part of the game and posted… well you did post your feelings, but not in your video review you didn’t which I thought was wrong with other reviews.
This is a review I’d like to see more often.