"The game that should've come bundled with the Dreamcast"

Sonic Adventure. When I first picked this up, I wondered if the Sonic Team could continue the Sonic series in 3D? The answer is a resounding ''YES!''

Audio: 10/10> The Audio is probably one of the best things in Sonic Adventure. Classic remixes of the Completed Level theme, the Underwater Countdown jingle, as well as rockin' new songs too adorn this game. I turn on my Dreamcast _just_ to listen to the music. It's that good. Of notable exception are Sky Deck part 2, Lost World part 2, Tails' theme, Sky Chase theme, and Knuckles' theme..

Control: 10/10> The control is very very simple. Use the Analog pad to move around, digital pad to look around, L/R pan the camera view around the character, X performs the character's special move, Y picks up things, A jumps.

Gameplay: 7/10> The game's collision detection engine could use work. Sometimes, when you're snowboarding down a hill or fighting Perfect Chaos, or running in a level or whatever, you'll find yourself either plummeting to your death, wedged between two polygons, or the screen will be shaking rapidly as your character attempts to gain a foothold. Additionally, bad camera angles plague some portions of the game, especially in Sky Deck..you'll find yourself dead due to a bad camera angle more than one time. Other than that, the characters handle perfectly fine..You earn emblems for completing stage objectives. The emblems are there for a 'feel-good' purpose, or to show off to your friends. In other words, they're useless, for the time being, until Sega gets their Black Chao market up, which should be Summer 2000.

SONIC: His stage objectives vary, but it's usually the same as the original Sonic series: free the egg capsule and rescue the animals; usually he has to do it with a certain amount of rings or within a certain amount of time. Tails will follow faithfully behind him, gathering stray rings and such.

TAILS: One and clear goal: to beat Sonic to the above-mentioned capsule. Since Tails is slower than Sonic, you must take advantage of his faster flying (read: cheating) Note that, when Sonic is the main character, Tails cannot pick him up like he could in Sonic 3. Tails' Spin Dash is abandoned for the Tail Swipe, which is even better than the spindash once the Rhythm badge is obtained.

KNUCKLES: Knuckles finally gets violent in this game, as he can finally use his fists to smack enemies around in exchange for his Spin Dash. His stage objective is to find the 3 pieces of the Master Emerald utilizing his wall-climbing, gliding, and running skills.

AMY: Formerly known as Sally or Rosy or whatever from Sega CD's Sonic CD, the pink hedgehog makes a return in Sonic Adventure. Her quest is very short, and involves evading an indestructable enemy robot.

E-102: New to the Sonic series, E-102 is programmed by Dr. Robotnik (which everyone calls Eggman for some odd reason) to destroy Sonic & Co. A glitch turns it against its master. In E-102's stages, the main objective is to eliminate one of E-102's counterparts while blowing up everything that stands between E-102 and the counterpart. Lots of fun.

BIG: New to the Sonic series, Big's so retarded, it's hilarious. His stages all involve fishing for his Pollywog Pal, Froggy. The fishing engine is kinda flawed, but it's fun nonetheless.

Video: 10/10> For a first-gen Dreamcast game, the graphics are absolutely stunning..and if you'll try it out at your local videogame store, you'll see what I mean.

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 04/05/00, Updated 04/05/00