Sonic Boom: Fire and Ice

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I will remind you that Sonic 2K6 sold well enough to be a part of the Platinum Hits line on 360. I don't know who is buying so many awful Sonic games, but they clearly sell well enough to continue making them.
 
I will remind you that Sonic 2K6 sold well enough to be a part of the Platinum Hits line on 360. I don't know who is buying so many awful Sonic games, but they clearly sell well enough to continue making them.

*cough*I bought Rise Of Lyric*cough*


Anyway, this isn't because the first games were failed attempt that the new one will be one, even if it's still to except.
 
Oh look, they're actually trying to improve the damn thing and maybe we're all overreacting like every other bloody topic about this subseries because god forbid Sega try to keep something they put a lot of effort into going.

You know, I'd be more pressed to give this the benefit of the doubt if it wasn't for SEGA's track record, but I honestly have no emotional investment in a game that plasters button indicators all over the screen like I'm incapable of putting the pieces together myself.

This game is for young children, as far as I've witnessed.
 
This game is for young children, as far as I've witnessed.
Honestly, I don't know which crowd SEGA is trying to please. They make the game easy as fuck for newcomers, but expect the old veterans to be happy with an effortless title. The real people buying these games are veteran sonic fans/reviewers, not children, which by the way, are introducing them to what they thought was a blue hedgehog running really fast, to a Sonic the Mummy that relies only on his teammates and gadgets to defeat anything. They truly need to get back into their right minds and TRY to listen to someone that has sense in SEGA's company.
 
This game is for young children, as far as I've witnessed.

See this has me conflicted. On the one hand, if I ever had kids I'd only ever expose them to games I enjoy or know are very well made. On the other hand, if you forced your kid to play exclusively Sonic games, eventually teen rebellion would kick in and they'd defect to using a Playstation and/or Vita.

On the third hand, nostalgia is a hell of a driving factor until you learn the hard truth that maybe that game you liked isn't as good as you thought (play it again after a decade). Maybe the best solution for future generations is to try to convince them that Sonic falls under the same umbrella as movie tie-in games?

On the fourth hand, there's probably a previously stated group of people playing games they know are bad as comedy experiences. I wouldn't put it past them to show these such games to another person only for it to backfire into that person thinking the game is, in fact, excellent.

So, uhm... boycott Sega?
 
On the one hand, if I ever had kids I'd only ever expose them to games I enjoy or know are very well made.

But in reality, that's you being the parent. The average parents of now don't really care what their children play, as long it's the appropriate age rating. By that case, it'd really be the kid's decision on what s/he is picking, and whether s/he knows the quality of the game, beforehand or not.
 
Question time! How many of you people have actually played Sonic Boom: Shattered Crystal? Most fans probably didn't bother to try out this game. The only things certain fans (including me) know is that Shattered Crystal has waaay too much exploration, and that it wasn't made by BigRedButton.

Since I didn't play SC, I won't judge. But I feel SEGA will be like, "Oh, these people only hate Sonic Boom because of Rise of Lyric. We'll barely have to improve on Shattered Crystal, because it's not like anyone actually played that anyway, right? Muhahahaha, more money for us!"

I won't be surprised if Sonic Boom: Fire and Ice ends up like shit, but I'm cautiously optimistic. Though I can PROUDLY say this; once I get a Nintendo 3DS, SB:F&I will NOT be my first game.
 
Well regardless of what the game's actual quality is the majority of the hate is still going to come from the fact that it has the Boom theme. If this used the normal designs and was called "Sonic Rush: Fire and Ice", there would be no complaints.
 
Sure, and it'd probably be a different game entirely. I don't care for Rush's gameplay, so it doesn't even matter to me, but what I think some of you don't get is that this isn't a Sonic game, it's a Sonic Boom game. It exists strictly because SEGA needs to capitalize on the popularity of the show.

I won't say that the game will be terrible, but it's important to understand that the quality of the gamplay isn't going to carry the sales. The PR statements that are going out are simply so SEGA can try to extend beyond its target audience.
 
I'm not convinced you read past the first sentence of my post, so I won't even justify that with an argument.
 
Question time! How many of you people have actually played Sonic Boom: Shattered Crystal?

I did buy the game out of curiosity after trying out the demo. So far, it's been the only Sonic game I've ever deleted from my game system's memory before beating it.

I think the game is technically a well-made for a 3DS game (especially aesthetically), but it had several systematic flaws that completely ruined the entire experience. First, the level structure prevents backtracking after certain points, which is asinine in what is essentially a collect-a-thon. More fundamentally, however, your typical Sonic-y sprawling and curving level design just doesn't lend itself to targeted item-seeking very well. Were it not for the map at the bottom of the screen (which you have to access by first shuffling through other menus), it'd be damn near impossible to find anything.

So I think Sanzaru has their hearts in the right place when they say that they want to simplify and streamline the level design in Fire and Ice, but if they still have collectibles-gates like they did in the first game, that really isn't going to make much of a difference...

The only other fundamental flaw of Shattered Crystal is that the controls are too fucking complex. All four letter buttons on the 3DS do something different, all four characters have unique abilities, and the solutions for puzzles and navigating obstacles are incredibly situational. This translates into approaching a new section of level, stopping to assess what needs to be done, switching over to another character if necessary, and then performing the action needed. Contrast that to the original Genesis games, where one can simply jump over most obstacles. Much less stopping and thinking is needed, and the games have a much better inclination towards flow as a result.

That's why I'm concerned about the inclusion of the new fire and ice powers and Amy's debut. All these are are additional layers of complexity to an already overly-complex system.

Take away these two problems and Shattered Crystal is an incredibly mundane 2D platformer. Sure, there's technically Sonic's trademark momentum-based physics in the game, but the level design isn't really conducive towards that, especially because the more complicated setpieces are all automated.

MrBreada said:
Since I didn't play SC, I won't judge. But I feel SEGA will be like, "Oh, these people only hate Sonic Boom because of Rise of Lyric. We'll barely have to improve on Shattered Crystal, because it's not like anyone actually played that anyway, right? Muhahahaha, more money for us!"

IIRC, the recent handheld counterparts to the Sonic console games always sell better than the console games themselves. I'm guessing that Shattered Crystal doesn't have the notoriety Rise of Lyric has because it isn't so clearly a technical trainwreck, and because the game is fairly inoffensive if you're not wanting it to be more like the Genesis Sonic games / not going for 100% completion.

Mystic said:
I will remind you that Sonic 2K6 sold well enough to be a part of the Platinum Hits line on 360. I don't know who is buying so many awful Sonic games, but they clearly sell well enough to continue making them.

I'll grant you that. But isn't there a world of difference between how Sonic '06 sold and how the Boom games have sold? I mean, my impression was that Sonic '06 had good sales for a Sonic game. The Boom games sold well as videogames, and had sales figures that practically any other studio or franchise would kill for. But they sold abysmally as Sonic games. If I recall correctly, this has been a trend that started with Generations and then hit Lost World and the Sonic Booms especially hard. Although to be fair, maybe the fact that the Sonic franchise is no longer under that stupid Nintendo-exclusivity contract will finally turn things around.
 
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I'll grant you that. But isn't there a world of difference between how Sonic '06 sold and how the Boom games have sold? I mean, my impression was that Sonic '06 had good sales for a Sonic game. The Boom games sold well as videogames, and had sales figures that practically any other studio or franchise would kill for. But they sold abysmally as Sonic games. If I recall correctly, this has been a trend that started with Generations and then hit Lost World and the Sonic Booms especially hard. Although to be fair, maybe the fact that the Sonic franchise is no longer under that stupid Nintendo-exclusivity contract will finally turn things around.
I'd argue that the reason there is a poor choice of platform. Sonic 2K6 was a multiplatform release for two well-established systems at the time. Imagine you're a parent with multiple kids and you're looking for a game for the younger child, and you already own one of those two systems. That's the target market for Sonic, after all, so it's no surprise 2K6 did pretty well.

Sonic Boom and Lost World were on the Wii U. The Wii U does not have the market penetration the PS3 and 360 had in 2006. Also, the Wii U's demographics are generally Nintendo fans, who are often adults: http://www.gamasutra.com/view/news/224449/Wii_U_eShop_audience_is_93_percent_male_18plus.php

Hence, it's far less likely that a young child would have access to the system, and therefore parents buying games for their children wouldn't be buying it. Since the adult gamers who own a Wii U know Sonic is pure rubbish, of course their sales are down.
 
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Nothing to say.
 
The only way to save the Sonic franchise now is to get SEGA Japan back on their asses and back to work, these filthy Americans don't listen to their fans unlike SEGA Japan, I mean how do you think Sonic Generations was made?
 
The only way to save the Sonic franchise now is to get SEGA Japan back on their asses and back to work, these filthy Americans don't listen to their fans unlike SEGA Japan, I mean how do you think Sonic Generations was made?

Is it really necessary to call them "Filthy Americans"?
 
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