Sonic Unleashed

"Calling upon the powers of the Day and the Night, can Sonic be able to unleash his might?"

It's hard to imagine that when it comes to waiting in anticipation for a new Sonic game, the feelings that one has in expectation is a combination of fear and hatred, rather then an exciting and joyous one. Fear, because you want the game to be good, only to be met with disappointment. And hatred because you are getting fed up with all the disappointments in the first place. So it comes to as no surprise that the mix feelings rose up once again when we began to wait for Sonic Unleashed, and with such fine examples like Sonic '06, many fans felt the game's end result would be an inevitable disaster.

Now that Sonic Unleashed is available, is it a game worth trying? Is it the game that fans have waited all these years for? Before I get into the rundown and break the game and explanation into pieces, I'll be very straightforward. The game is fine, but it's not enough to turn people's heads. As decent as the game is, a lot of what kept the past games from being anywhere near average still rises up, and although a lot of attention to details managed to fix some problems, it paved the way for some new problems. With that said, let's move on to Sonic Unleashed, the review.

PRESENTATION
We've known Sonic for so long, that we are at the point where we know his likes and dislikes, personality, etc. etc. And one of the things we know a lot about Sonic is that he loves to travel and visit all parts of the Planet. He's a fast hedgehog, and with that speed, who wouldn't want to run and see the world? This is the first Sonic game where we actually get to do just that. In past games, a lot of the events always took place around one, two, or three spots, coupled with a forest nearby, and then sometimes we took to the sky, and then space.

To see that we can actually visit areas inspired by our Earth really gives off a new feeling. Of course, this isn't the first time we've seen Sonic running through a Snow based stage or a City based stage, but at least it makes more sense to travel the world to get there, then to live in a city that just so happens to be conveniently built next to a snowy mountain and a hot jungle.

And every village and continent feels what it should, and nothing out of the ordinary stands out. While the cities and culture look absolutely gorgeous in their own unique way, rather then trying to mimic the real world, everything is designed more around inspiration, and thankfully, it's an inspiration that was truly given much more attention to. China, Italy, New York, and much more.
You'll know the city it was inspired by, once you step foot into each village.

Rather then trying to go for a realistic approach, all of the citizens of the world were given a cartoon look, something many people would compare to the likes of Pixar's latest human characteristics. While some may like the new approach, others may have a hard time getting adjusted to some of the "over the top" characters. To me, it fits well. Each world and the people who live there were designed in such a way that it doesn't make Sonic look out of place. In fact, it feels more like it gives open arms for Sonic to just walk around and enjoy the view. Overall, it's amazing.

Not only that, but any world you visit can be seen during the daytime and nighttime. Why is that? Oh, yeah, that's right. During the nighttime, you become a totally different being. While Sonic is all that we know and love during the daytime, at night, things turn a little dark and scary. Sonic becomes a Werehog. Yep, a Werehog.

In what is perhaps an accidental nod to the classic B films of the horror genre, Sonic goes through a Lycanthropy state. Not only is he given a face lift, but his gameplay is also dramatically changed. While Sonic is all about the speed and dizzy loops and tricks during the day, the Werewolf is all about slow, combat platforming during the night. And with the ability to stretch his arms, it makes for good use on attacking multiple enemies as well as swinging around the stages like a monkey. Perhaps the number one aspect of the game that everybody is talking about.

STORY
When it comes to Sonic games, a story isn't really necessary in my own opinion. It's there to entertain us, extend the game's length, and explain any reason for why we have to go here and there. And no matter how cheesy or epic a storyline can be, it really shouldn't be the main aspect for us fans to concentrate on. So with that aside, let's get to the story.

The game starts off with Eggman in space with his space fleet, about to conquer the world, or something. Just when things get bad, Sonic jumps in to the rescue. Eggman tries all he can to stop Sonic, but of course, our high speed hedgehog gets the best of him. Eggman at one point grabs on to him with his machine, prompting Sonic to go super, unleashing hell on his machine force, and destroying several of his ships. This leaves Eggman to retreat, but Super Sonic traps him. Eggman then goes on to beg for mercy, leaving Sonic to let his guard down.

At this point, Eggman manages to trap Super Sonic, something we've never seen. And as Super Sonic stays helplessly trap, Eggman uses his energy to crack the Earth into pieces, unleashing the Dark Gaia, so that Eggman can build his empire, dubbed Eggmanland (just go along with it). While all this is happening, Dark Gaia's energy gets the best of Sonic, causing him to revert into a Wolf state. It's here that Eggman decides to get rid of him by dumping him out into space, towards Earth.

As Werewolf Sonic lands back on Earth (safely somehow) he meets up with a flying animal named Chip. Unfortunately, because Sonic landed on Chip, Chip lost his memory, so now Sonic must not only restore the Earth back into one solid planet, he must also help find Chip's history. And thus, we begin our adventure.

Not a bad story to be honest. Certainly not epic, but it's OK. A lot better then the multiple branching storylines of Sonic '06 that left us scratching our heads. This game's storyline is basically short, sweet, and to the point, and won't leave you confused or dumbfounded.

GAMEPLAY
Alright, the most important and crucial aspect of this game (every other video game too, but this one needs to be stressed). How exactly is this game played out? Well, since the game is split into 2 parts, I'll have to divulge into 2 complete explanations.

Sonic's Daytime Gameplay.
When it comes to Sonic's gameplay from past titles, it was hard to pinpoint exactly which kind of gameplay was at its best, and which was at its worse. Many argued that the games have to be 2D to be perfect, and others have said the 3D aspect that reminiscence that of Secret Rings should be heavily concentrated on. Since there are countless ways to play as Sonic getting from point A to B, it'd be hard to decide what gets in and what gets out. For this game, Sonic Team decided to attempt and establish all of Sonic's past gameplay and combine it all into one completely unique style of gameplay.

The end result is actually surprising. What we have here is a gameplay where at one point, we'll be playing as Sonic as he scrolls from left to right in 2D form, then in one quick and seamless change, Sonic will run forward in 3D, very similar to what we saw back in Secret Rings. All of this is combined with several new features as well. Sonic is now able to quickstep left and right, as well as drift around tight corners. Although you won't do this at every chance you get, it's there when you run through various specific sections.

With all of that combination, Sonic's gameplay has also been sped up. This game is fast. insanely fast. Perhaps it's the first Sonic game where the speed is really emphasized, and it doesn't actually have you running into walls from time to time. One of the biggest arguments behind the Sonic series is that speed isn't always the answer to his games. If you've heard this argument before, you're probably hearing the name "Marble Zone" in the back of your head. And while it's true that Sonic is a combination of platforming and velocity, with more emphasis on the platforming, simply designing a game heavily concentrated on that isn't exactly going to bring instant gratification. Any kind of style can work, if it's properly created.

Now that isn't to say that Sonic's gameplay is perfect. While the game is fast and furious, you'll soon start to realize that Sonic's stages are heavily focused on memory. This isn't a new thing to be honest, but the problem here is that sometimes, not even memory will help you finish the stage. Some segments will have running through narrow paths where you must sidestep through it flawlessly, and if you fail, you'll stop abruptly, and it's simply annoying when that happens. A lot of times, you'll find yourself landing into a platforming section, but because you came running in so fast, you'll most of the times accidentally leap off the section and into your doom.

Sonic controls fairly well. His turning is responsive, but he will feel very gluey. A lot of times, you'll want to make a quick curve around an object, but Sonic just isn't fast enough to do it, and you'll sometimes keep tapping that quickstep button. Speaking of quicksteps, a lot of times, you'll be running on the side of the walls, and every once in a while, when you try to tap that quickstep, Sonic won't actually go as far in that direction as you'll want him to go, and if try to do this too late, you'll find yourself hitting against objects and slowing down.

The button layout is very odd. For one thing, Sonic's homing attack has always been the jump button. Why they moved it over to a different button is beyond me. And to make it fairly worse, it's the boost button that it's attached to, so sometimes, you'll accidentally make a boost instead of an aerial attack, and it really throws you off balance.

All of the stages were designed to have branching paths, so many fans will come back and play in order to find new paths and shortcuts to get across. Stages like Chun-Nan are good examples of how a stage should be designed. It's full of insane amounts of branching paths, and it's pretty easy to run through it. Stages like Adabat, will have you helplessly on your toes as you try to expertly time your moves, and sometimes you'll run into areas where you are left completely confused as to where to go. It's mostly the stage designs themselves that hurt Sonic's gameplay and will leave the players with frustrating moments.

The learning curve for this game is significantly different from past Sonic games. No matter how fast you were able to adjust to past Sonic games, Sonic Unleashed will have you learning at a slower rate. It won't test your patience too far, but believe me when I say it's drastically different.

When it comes to enemies in the stage, you'll find too many or too few generic robots along the way. I really wished we would have had badniks that were designed to fit each stage, but unfortunately, all the robots are the same, and they are all so generic looking. I would've been happy if they used the robots from Sonic '06, because they at least look more menacing, but these fat little doodads look more like they are sightseeing the world, and Sonic is killing them for no reason.

With all of that, I have to say that Sonic's gameplay is surprisingly great, and it's the best example SEGA/Sonic Team can use to move the Sonic games forward. It's not flawless, but if we can have stages that work very fluent alongside Sonic, we may be looking at the brainchild that helped redeem Sonic. But for now, we have Sonic doing what he does best as we try and get the best score countless times. Small frustrating moments that shouldn't push your head down in shame.

Werehog's Nighttime Stages
What we've feared the most. While Sonic's daytime stages really show off what Sonic can do, we also have a drastically new type of gameplay, in the form of Sonic the Werehog at night. Playing as the Werehog will have you running around the stage, beating up countless enemies senselessly into a pulp. Believe it or not, the Werehog is not as bad as many people have assumed it will be. It's not exactly the worse type of gameplay we've seen before, but it feels so dragged on, especially when we finally get a game where Sonic does what he does best, and that's all we really wanted.

When you start off early in the game, you'll be having a rough time beating up the enemies. No matter how hard you'll try, punching the enemies won't have that "umph" to it. That's because you actually start off weak in the game, and in order to strengthen your Werehog, you got to level up. How do you level up? Well, the more enemies you kill, the more experience points you'll earn, and thus, these points can then be fed to Werehog's several abilities. You got inclusions such as: Combos, Unleashed, Shield, Strength, and more. By the way, you can also level up regular Sonic in both speed and boost. That's about it.

Combos are perhaps your first choice to go with, because the more combo points you add, the more abilities you'll be able to learn. At first glance, your only combos will be pressing X,X,Y or Y,Y,X, but as you continue to learn, these button combinations will begin to expand, and then the Werehog will be able to do more then just punch and kick. Soon, you'll start pulling off cartwheels, pinwheels, uppercuts, and random assorted ground smashes, complete with a bullet time effect that's pretty cool, but not really necessary.

You also have finishing moves that are nothing more then fancy ways of killing off your enemies (unless you are trying to go for the S Rank). If you are able to weaken your enemy, you'll be able to grab your enemy, then go into a quick time event, were you must press the button that is displayed on screen. Do it right, and you'll execute the last move on your helpless foe. Each enemy has its own special finish, so you don't have to worry about which attack to do your your enemy. I find it pretty cool that you can also use the enemies themselves in order to attack the enemies. You can either throw them at others, use them as a hammer, or sometimes use their weapons, like fire, wind, and ice.

Alongside your usual beat-em-up, you'll also be going through several platforming and puzzles. This is where the Werehog gameplay is at its worse. While it's pretty cool to see the Werehog tightrope walk across long balance beams, it usually always feels so tedious, challenging, and above all, completely unnecessary. You can opt to jump down and hang on to the balance beam with your hands, but later stages will force you to walk slowly over it, especially in stages like Empire City. The camera doesn't help.

Sometimes, I wish I could just have the camera aligned with my beam so that I can just hold up and not worry about falling. Instead, most of the time, the camera moves on its own, trying to make the shot of the game look dramatic. This absolutely hurts the game because of the lack of depth perception. Sometimes, I want to jump across to a platform, but I'll end up either jumping too far or too close. Other times, when I'm carefully walking on a beam, the camera will suddenly shift in direction, and since I'm still holding up, the Werehog will walk in a completely different direction.

Then you have puzzles. Some of them range from obviously easy, to downright stupid hard. Some puzzles left me thinking for about an hour or so, trying to figure out what to do or where I went wrong, and usually these are the puzzles where the hints are never even spoken. Why have a game where they tell you the supremely obvious, and then enter a room with a new difficult puzzle, where no one even bothers to tell you the first step? It doesn't help when the stages are designed in such a way where you think you have to go that way, but no, you are left to guess which way is right.

If it wasn't for the platforming and puzzles, I would be enjoying the Werehog more. It's tons of fun to beat up a lot of enemies, especially once you've learned a new move that will have you eager to try out. I'll admit it's cool to swing around poles, but it gets highly frustrating when you have to stop pummeling enemies and start concentrating on surviving the actual stage. You'll die more from jumping across the stage then from the actual damage the enemies will try to dish at you, which is a shame, really.

Just like Sonic's enemies, you'll find yourself fighting off the same kind of enemies all of the time. Again, I wished they would've used a set of themed badniks to fit each and every world, but once again, you are stuck fending off the same old little monsters in any stage you play. Sometimes, the monsters will do different moves, but I can't pinpoint where and when that happens, so that's pretty much out of the question.

The Werehog is fun for what it is. When you start early in the game, it will feel too repetitive. But once you've learned all the moves and skills, you'll have lots of ways to kill the enemies, and this will come into play when you reach the last stage. The only disappointing aspect is that this gameplay has to be shared with the Daytime Gameplay, so to some players, they'll only be getting half of the enjoyment out of the game, and that will really turn off a good several amount of players. Platforming and puzzles kills the Werehog gameplay.

Gameplay in General
In combination with Sonic and the Werehog, there are several things you also have to be doing. In this game, you'll be searching out these Sun Medals and Moon Medals. These Medals help unlock the next stage on whatever continent you are currently walking in. This is fine and all, but the problem begins when you have to talk to people in order to find out what to do. Sometimes, it's required that you talk to some people before actually heading off into the stage. Sometimes, you'll be lost and you'll wonder where the heck you're supposed to go, and it doesn't help when Tails or Professor Pickle (your main go-to-guy) give you such a vague description of your next task. Thankfully, once you've unlocked any stage, they can be selected at the main menu, so you don't have to be running all the way across the Hubs to play that stage.

You often need to collect a certain amount of Medals before running into the stage, so that means you'll have to go and backtrack through the stages you've played in order to find these Medals. Some of these are so well hidden, you'll spend hours trying to find just one. The most you'll need by the time you beat the game is roughly 130 each. There are a total of 200 each, and the only reason you'll want to collect all of these are for the Achievements.

In every Hub, there's a hotdog stand. These are kindled with missions that you can complete, and they range from Time Trial, Ring Collections, Destroy Enemies, and many more. Each task has 3 difficulties, and they get progressively challenging. This isn't required to finish the game. It's there if you want to find new things to do in the game. The game certainly has a good amount of replayability, but it's mostly if you want to test your patience, endurance, and skills, and a lot of that is needed. Overall, the game is fun and challenging, but the challenging aspect can range from cheap deaths to frustrating stages.

GRAPHICS
Perhaps the best aspect of this game. The most beautiful looking Sonic game of all time, and I hardly ever get to say this. Every world is designed very well, and all of the details, the textures and particles and the colors, help bring all of these worlds and villages alive. It's hard to find a fault in this game, and I've yet to even nitpick something negative in this game in terms of visual aspects. The colors of the daytime shine ever so lovely, and the nighttime stages really shows how vibrant the world can reflect from the moon. I just love how the water can perfectly shine the light of the moon.

The game is beautiful in its own way. It won't be able to rival that with games like Gears of War, but for a Sonic game, it's nothing short of amazing. The special effects and small detail really helps this game stand out from the countless other past Sonic titles. Even the camera effects ain't too shabby. Any object that gets too close or too far from the camera will be blurred out of focus, a detail not many other games do, and it's the kind of details only photographers will notice, and that's a good thing mind you. It won't get in your way at all.

And even Sonic's model is perfectly built. No longer does Sonic look sharp or jagged. He's smooth. Really smooth. It's like it really feels you can pat him on his head, and you'll feel a relaxing coat of fur. His design is perfect. he no longer looks tall or angry looking. He's got a combination design of his past days and recent days. A detail many fans will love. They finally managed to make Sonic look exactly the same as many of the CGI clips we've seen in Sonic '06 and SA2. Pretty damn cool.

The Werehog's model isn't too bad either. Lots of fur, but on closer glance, you'll realize it doesn't look too real. It feels like the fur is plastered on, but this is if you see it too close, which will usually be during cutscenes. The special effects and motion blur that the Werehog creates are cool, and does not detract out of the game. The game manages to look real, in a cartoony sort of way. Truly a magnificent Sonic game in the visual department.

SOUND
When it comes to the music, no longer did they go with the Guitar tracks. Instead, we get worldly music (which I guess is much more fitting). Every stage's soundtrack is played out with instruments that is much more acknowledged in that village. From accordions and bass in Spagonia, to Congo Drums and a bit of Salsa for Adabat. I do miss the Rock of the past games, but these songs are fine. Unfortunately, even though the music fits well with the stages, you'll hardly find not even a handful of songs that you would consider memorable. It has few good tracks, but the majority of them are mostly forgettable.

It's ironic that Sonic '06 had many more memorable songs then what Sonic Unleashed supplies for us. I wished they would've gone for the S'06 approach, but I guess they tried their best to make sure the songs fit with the world. It's just that you won't find many catchy tunes for you to keep in your MP3 Player.

The sound effects are all action packed, as expected for a Sonic game. Going deep into the technical aspect, I must say this game actually takes complete advantage of the Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround Sound. You will feel immersed into the world, with the sounds of ocean waves, windy breeze, and chilling chimes, all mixed well in real time with Surround Sound. I hardly get to see games that take full advantage of the Surround Mix, and I 'm happy to see Sonic Unleashed be one of those games. If you are able to play the game with the 5.1 settings, do play at night in the dark with the sound up. It's an experience that rivals the HDDVD mixing. Thumbs up.

I won't dwell much with the voices, since that's all up for debate, but personally, it feels like the 4Kids actors have gotten better. It's still not any good, but it isn't as bad as the first episode of Sonic X. Yuck.

OVERALL
This game is decent, and quite a lot fun, but unfortunately, a lot of details in the game kept it from being anywhere above average, and it hurts me to say this, because it's almost a bad thing when we have to accept an average Sonic game in order for us to to have fun with to begin with. High speed Sonic stages suffer from bad stage designs and strange button layouts, and the Werehog suffers from poor use of platforming and puzzles. You'll find yourself lost many times, and getting frustrated many times. As I said before, this game is decent, but not enough to turn everyone's heads around. Haters will most likely hate it, and Fans will most likely fan it.

But with all the of the mistakes and problems the game suffers through, I do want to say that this game is actually worth a try. If it were any worse, I'd say don't touch it, but because I've had a good time playing this game, I encourage anyone who reads this review to try the game out. And that's why I give this game a 7 out of 10. It's a good start, and I'm very confident that in the future, Sonic will manage to have a perfect game once more, but for now, we'll settle with an average title.

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 12/02/08

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