Sonic Unleashed

"Whatever Sonic Team is doing, they're doing it right."

I remember back when Sonic 06 came out. I read a preview, I can't remember where. It said that the game was hopeful, and that it needed some flaws fixed. I didn't read about the mass hysteria before I picked the game up, worst decision of my life. I got it home and played it, finally expecting a good Sonic game.

By the time I had gotten into the game play, it felt like a little part of me died inside.

When I first saw the preview for Sonic Unleashed I was bitter, not hopeful at all. I was thinking Sega would screw it up like usual. Then the werehog was revealed, and I KNEW they screwed it up. I stopped looking at previews, stopped reading articles. I didn't give Unleashed a chance.

Luckily for me, I stumbled across the E3 preview video.

Both the previewer and the representative were honest. I remember a couple of things they talked about.

The previewer noticed some lag, and the representative told him honestly that there was lag, and it was being worked on.

As I saw more gameplay and ads, I was foolish enough to give into my excitement.

Was Sega to disappoint me once again? Short answer, no.

Pros:
Little did I know that when I put this game into my 360, it would revive my hope for Sonic.

As with my wii review, the gameplay will be split up into two parts. The first part being the day stages. Ah the day stages. I was skeptical about controlling Sonic going this fast, camera issues, bugs, unwarranted deaths. Boy was I wrong, EVERY single death, including in eggmanland, was my own fault, my own mistake. I picked up the controller and tried again until I got it right. One thing the wii stages were lacking was platforming in these levels, and the 360 version makes up for that in spades. Spikes, moving platforms, different paths, and even stuff that Sonic trips on if you're not on top of your game.

The werehog stages were extremely fun in the 360 version. Combat is tighter, platforming isn't such a pain anymore, and the levels have much more variety. It plays very much like God of War to tell you the truth. I don't know what to say other than they were much more fun than I had anticipated.

Graphics are absolutely beautiful, especially in the daytime stages and hub worlds.

Sound and music. Again, the 4kids voice actors are improving, especially Jason, but they still need some fine tuning. As for the music, amazing and extremely nostalgic. I've had several tunes stuck in my head ever since I started playing. And if you still LOATHE the 4kids people, you can always tweak the options to have the Japanese dialog, which was a definite bonus.

Cons:
There are a few things that keep this from being on top. One of those is the coin collecting. It never really annoyed me so much, but it was still a pain in the butt, especially with how much I was looking forward to Shamar. Could have went without the coins Sega, that's for sure.

The frame rate slowdown in Adabat was almost life threatening for me. I am hoping that Sonic Team releases a patch to fix this problem, as it is one of my favorite levels to play, and the music is awesome.

Hub worlds, c'mon. I loved feeding Chip stuff and getting the extra scenes, but I've always hated the hub worlds since SA1.

Final score: 8/10

It was worth every penny to me, and I'm glad I didn't listen to the professional reviews. I hope other people have enjoyed this game as much as I have, and I hope that Sega continues to crank out decent Sonic games.

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 11/26/08

Game Release: Sonic Unleashed (US, 11/20/08)