Sonic Heroes

"There's one thing you should do with this game: Stay away from it."

Sonic Heroes was announced for all three systems, and the Sonic fans were happy. I was one of these fans, expecting a good Sonic game. I was like “Yes, finally on PS2”. However, I wasn't very happy with what Sega did.

Storyline: It's the same old storyline. Eggman is the enemy. He's after the chaos emeralds. You have to make sure he doesn't get them. I didn't play that much, seeing how bored I got, so if I'm wrong about the Chaos Emeralds, then excuse me. I'm not saying this is a bad storyline, but it just doesn't seem that good, in the way it was put in this game. 6/10

Difficulty: Sonic Heroes isn't meant to be hard, just like the other Sonic games. Sonic Adventure 2 got harder after you got the normal ending, and were going for the true ending. I haven't been to the ‘true' ending yet, so I wouldn't know. In Sonic Heroes, the enemy has to be hit three times to die, instead of once. Now, this is a problem to me, since I'm used to hitting the enemy, and continue going at max speed. However, your partners sometimes hit before you, resulting in no hits from you, or one hit. 8/10

Control: The control isn't good. On the menu selection screen, the O button accepts selection, and the X button goes back to the last thing. This was something Sega skipped when the game was being made ready for North America. It's real annoying, but fortunately, the gameplay didn't have this issue, which was a relief. The control hasn't taken many major changes, so I won't rate the controls for this game so low. 5/10

Fun: The game isn't very fun at all. You have to switch teammates a lot. Sometimes, you're forced to, since you need to clear some parts of the stage. This seems fun, but is in fact not. Sega should've stuck to the classic one character mode. 3/10

Length: I don't have a clue on how long the game is overall. One thing I can tell you is, because you have to switch characters all the time, it takes a few seconds away from you trying to finish the level as fast as possible. 6/10

Graphics: The graphics aren't that great either. They're even better on the Gamecube. Sega didn't do a very good job on the PS2 version. The text you see when the characters talk is big and blocky. It's not a very good font. They should've stuck to the old font. 3/10

Sound/Music: The sound is the same as old Sonic games. Same old jumping, charging, and homing attack sounds. I haven't really listened to the music. It might me because it wasn't so loud. The SF sounds are louder than the BG music. At least it was when I played, with default settings. The music for the first boss wasn't good either. The music is nothing like the first two Sonic Adventure games (awesome). I loved the music so mush in SA2, that I bought the soundtrack. The last thing I'd do for this game would be to buy the soundtrack. 2/10

Replayability: I haven't seen any ‘standard' Sonic game that has a high replayability. You may enjoy playing it again, you may not. But seeing as how this is Sonic Heroes, you probably wouldn't. There are four different teams to play with, so that increases the replayability a bit. However, the stages are very similar to the others. 4/10

Overall: Sega didn't to a very good job on making this game. Of course, it's best for GCN or Xbox, since the PS2 version is the worst. 4.6/10 (rounded to 5)

Buy/Rent?: Rent it first, and see if you like it. DO NOT rent it for PS2. Try to rent the GCN version, if you have a GCN. If you have an Xbox, but no GCN, rent the Xbox one. Just stay away from the PS2 version at all costs.

This review is full in opinion. Please do not take any of it as fact, and think I'm bashing the game. I'm just rating it on how I like it, based on the actual game facts.

Reviewer's Score: 5/10, Originally Posted: 06/07/04