@softchassis —
Do you mind if I ask you why you think this? Fundamentally I think this is where I'm struggling to see your side of the argument, here.
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the exact combination of buttons is different from how shield abilities work in Classic Sonic, but again, I also think any player with a reasonable set of observational and deductive reasoning skills would know that, hey, this is not a Classic Sonic game, and some concessions had to be made to get things to work in 3D and so the player could have as much total control over their skills as possible.
The below answers the above! It's not that the player is unable to figure out how the Shield Activation works without the tutorial. Just the deductive reasoning logic doesn't follow elegantly or intuitively -- the necessary button combo is unused otherwise, which is counter to the logic used in Classic.
Classic Shields cancel the Sonic jump ability. It gives Sonic more uniqueness in his abilities because the shields provide optional, contextual versatility (since Tails/Knuckles abilities don't change).
It's a trade off. You gain one new ability at the expense of another.
Shield powers having their own unique button combination in SRB2 removes the trade-off in favor of empowering the shields to a higher degree than Classic Sonic. This decreases SRB2 Sonic's uniqueness, since every character can now use shields like Classic Sonic. It also creates the logical snarl of why would shield abilities use a button combination that is otherwise unused, when that's not how shield have ever worked in Sonic?
This post is a little wordy but as someone who holds the opinion that the tutorial is not necessary*, that jump+spin is actually better than jump+jump for shield abilities, and that homing attack is terrible (in all Sonic games, not just SRB2) and Thok is better, I really do want to understand where you're coming from, because I genuinely do not see an issue with SRB2 as it currently is
The Thok and Homing being comparatively "at odds" is illogical, imo, even though that's how the two are always framed, as against each other.
Thok is more of a replacement for "Boost." It's used to gain speed immediately. It's the same as Spin Dash, but aerial.
Homing is about empowering the player to make their jump attacks as accurate in 3D space as they would be in 2D space.
Also... Fun fact! Homing was originally intended as Sonic's jump move in SRB2. It became the Thok by accident / programming limitations and then stuck.
For emphasis:
hey, this is not a Classic Sonic game, and some concessions had to be made to get things to work in 3D and so the player could have as much total control over their skills as possible.
Right. So, is SRB2 "Classic Sonic" or is it making concessions to work in 3D?
It makes the concession for a separate button for Spin roll, just as SA had to, and goes the additional mile of giving "Jump Spin" a function for the shields.
So why doesn't "Jump Spin" have function without the shields? It's in order to keep with the "1 button" ability functions of the Classic 2D games.
@cookiefonster
I see where you're coming from with those arguments a lot more clearly, now that I know your opinion on the Adventure games. I agree with you that those games have some great ideas despite being mostly poorly aged messes. But I also think SRB2's controls as they stand handle the principle of "less is more" beautifully.
Incidentally, it was while playing SRB2 that I came to realize that Adventure did have some good ideas, conceptually, that were just implemented poorly.
For example, I remember having a lot of discussions back in the day when the SA games came out (in the old days of the GHZ message board) about why it felt really wrong for Sonic to be 2-button gameplay at all, and how awkward it felt to press a separate button to roll, and how that affected the Spin Dash and the overall feeling of momentum.
Now I realize that there's just no way around it. The 3rd dimension necessitates the 2nd button. Once that's a given, then it's just what is the most logical / minimalistic / elegant usage of 2 button gameplay that retains the same spirit?
Shield powers requiring the trade-off of ability is just how Classic works. S3K
could've made the design choice to have shields activated by a unique button combination, allowing all 3 characters to use Fire Dash and Bubble Bounce, but didn't. SRB2 changes how the shields work for 3D with the 2nd button, but otherwise keeps jump abilities to 1 button.
So... idk. The SRB2 design choice is based around the shields being both unique and new, and also more important than ever before. It's interesting!
SBR2's having all new shields
and emphasizing them to a larger degree that is out of sync with Classic or otherwise Sonic is a little bit like the game design equivalent of fan-fic that introduces Poochie the Hedgehog, Sonic's cooler older brother, and everything is about him now, and when he's not there, you really wish he was. It reframes everything to focus more on the new totally bitchin unique thing.