Sonic Adventure DX Director's Cut

"There are some minor graphical glitches!...... I'll live"

Perhaps you've heard that this game has a low frame rate. The graphics aren't as updated as they could be. Sometimes your characters animations go a little weird when you walk straight into a wall. The game is four years old. The characters lip movement wasn't changed to accommodate them speaking in English.

WHO CARES!?

This is a great game and a few minor things don't ruin, contrary to ''professional'' reviews that feel a need to pick apart every little problem. The gameplay's great, so are the gameplay related extras, therefore this is a great game. Enough said.

Ahem. Okay, enough about what other people have told you about this game, from now on nothing but my review.

Sonic Adventure DX is an enhanced port of the Dreamcast classic Sonic Adventure. SA introduced multiple playable characters with their own play style and levels, plus a much larger emphasis on story to the Sonic series, in addition to being the first 3D Sonic platformer. SADX takes everything from the original, slightly polishes the graphics, adds in 2 big extras, and puts it all on GameCube.

Story:
As I mentioned, SADX has a much heavier emphasis on story than the 2D Sonics. The basic story is fairly simple, Dr. Robotnik AKA Eggman has unleashed an ancient water based monster named Chaos who appropriately enough gets power from the chaos emeralds, 7 magical emeralds (which aren't all green, I don't know why they're called emeralds either) that have been a power source and target for Robotnik throughout the Sonic series. No longer confined to optional bonus games, the emeralds tie into the main plot, since every time Chaos gets an emerald he changes form, giving him 8 (he has a 0 form with no emeralds) different forms, although unfortunately you don't see every form (he is often given two emeralds at once). Robotnik thinks he can control Chaos, and plans to use him to rule the world once he's got all 7 emeralds.

What makes the story cool is it's actually 6 intertwining stories plus a final part. That's right, you get six completely different views of the story. Each of these comes from a playable character. The characters are Sonic, of course, a heroic hedgehog who wants to stop Robotnik and Chaos; Tails, a young two tailed fox who looks up to and helps Sonic; Knuckles, the guardian of the master emerald who Chaos burst from, scattering the pieces, meaning Knuckles must collect them; Amy, who was once rescued by Sonic and wants to go on an adventure again; new character Big, a big cat who's frog is possessed by Chaos; and another new character E-102 Gamma, a robot servant of Robotnik who manages to rebel against his master. Each character goes through their own scenarios, which makes the story very interesting to watch. Chaos is also a very well done villain, and you'll want to see just how powerful he can get. The story isn't that great on its own, but the unique presentation and likable characters make it entertaining.
Story score: 8/10

Gameplay:
Sonic Adventure DX takes the classic Sonic gameplay style, constant speed through varied and exciting levels, and translates it faithfully into 3D. Or, it does for Sonic. In addition to their own story, each character has their own playing style. They are:
Sonic: straight forward 3D platforming with an emphasis on speed.
Tails: races against Sonic or Robotnik through Sonic style levels.
Knuckles: more open 3D levels where you use radar to track down 3 master emerald pieces.
Amy: Slower straight forward platform levels with an invincible enemy stalking you.
Big: Fishing levels where you must catch Big's frog.
E-102: shooting/platform levels, the only levels with a time limit.

All the character's levels except Big's are fun to play (although some more than others (Sonic is the best, and he has many more levels than anyone else)), and those thankfully end quickly and are few in number. There are 32 levels between the characters, with boss fights (usually Chaos or Robotnik) in the adventure fields. The adventure fields and are visited between levels and are overworld like areas where the plot cinemas happen. Some like them, some don't. But not much actual playing time is required in them, only a few ultra simple get the item puzzles to find the next action stage, so you should be fine either way, exploring if you like them, rushing through them if you don't.

Gameplay overall is very good, with lots of replay in the form of additional goals in completed levels and a chao (cute little somewhat cherub like creatures) raising min-game some like more than the main game. And that's not even counting the extras that weren't in the DC version.

There are two main extras. The first is a mission mode, where you search the overworld for mission cards, which give you hints on how to fulfill secret missions that could be anywhere in any part of the game. This can get a little annoying with vague hints, but it will last awhile (60 missions). The second extra, and the main reason I bought SADX despite having SA, is the inclusion of every single Game Gear Sonic game! (12 in all) These complete games originally released for Sega's 8-bit portable are the real extra, a compilation worthy of its own game. You unlock GG games by completing missions and extra challenges in story mode, which is a great incentive to complete the whole game.
Gameplay score: 9/10

Graphics:
You may have heard about many graphical problems, but the graphics are still quite good. The backgrounds are lush and vibrant and varied, and the character models got big upgrades for SADX and look fantastic. There are occasional frame rate problems, and sometimes the graphics look a little dated, but they still look great overall.
Graphics score: 8/10

Sound:
Sonic Adventure had one of the best soundtracks of any game, and SADX didn't change anything. Trust me though, it's fine the way it is. The background music is very good, but it's the themes for each character (complete songs with lyrics) that really shine in this category. I would often turn on the DC version just to listen to the soundtrack and wouldn't play at all, it's that good! voice acting unfortunately isn't as great as the music, some characters have annoying voices, and some have bad voice acting. It (usually) won't interfere with the experience though, and considering the music I couldn't bring myself to lower the sound score.
Sound score: 10/10

Story: 8/10
Gameplay: 9/10
Graphics: 8/10
Sound: 10/10
Overall: (not an average) 9/10

Conclusion:
Sonic Adventure DX is truly an exceptional game. If you don't own SA, run out and buy SADX this instant. If you do, you'll have to decide whether the extras are enough (I thought they were, obviously). Either way though, it's a thoroughly great game overflowing with replay value.

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 06/23/03, Updated 06/23/03