Opinion: What Modern Sonic can learn from Classic Sonic

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Like most long suffering Sonic the Hedgehog fans I have a love/hate relationship with the Sonic series. For every step forward Sonic takes, he takes two steps backwards or worse. I’m sure we call all agree, we’d like to see our beloved Sonic series shine again. Unfortunately we don’t all agree on how to achieve this goal. By creating various ‘generations of Sonic’ with a variety of differently play style,s SEGA have built a polarized, multifaceted fan base who all want something different from the series. From classic Sonic fans who like 2D side scrolling to Adventure fans who enjoy a varied play styles and a story driven experience and not forgetting the Rush fans that just want a good bit of fast.

Is any one group of the Sonic fan base more correct than the other? No, of course not- it takes all sorts. Though I do love the classics, I am no stranger to the modern Sonic games and I believe both have plenty to offer. I enjoy both Sonic Colours and Sonic Generations. I routinely return to Sonic Rush and it’s incredible OST. I spent an unhealthy portion of my teenage years in a stuffy dark bedroom playing the Sonic Adventure titles.

So is it possible to cater to the entire multifaceted Sonic fanbase? Probably not! But is it possible to create a Sonic game the majority of us can enjoy without it being a bloated hot mess? Maybe! Here are some of my suggestions.

Round Table: What direction should Sonic Adventure 3 have taken?

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Sonic Adventure was the best selling Dreamcast game of all time, so it’s no surprise that we would want to discuss the game on this week’s Round Table. The Sonic Adventure series had two main entries that were both on the SEGA Dreamcast, and both had a very different approach when it came to story and gameplay progression. As the series continued, SEGA took the blue blur in a various directions with titles like Sonic Heroes, Sonic Generations, Sonic Colors and the latest title Sonic Lost World. Despite the long gap between Sonic Adventure 2 and today, a very vocal group of fans still ask SEGA for a third entry in the series. The question we posed to our writers this week was would we want a Sonic Adventure 3? If so, what direction should the third entry take?

Like always you can tell us your own opinion on what direction Sonic Adventure 3 should take in the comment section.

Sonic Unleashed and Other SEGA Titles Now Available on PlayStation Store

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If you have a PlayStation 3 system and still haven’t got your were-hog action going, the PlayStation Store now carries Sonic Unleashed in the US for $19.99 USD, and EU/AU territories for £15.99 GBP / €19.99 EUR / $29.95 AUD, with of course the usual complimentary PAL price gouging for no extra product!

Unleashed joins this week’s store update along with Persona 4 in the US for $19.99 USD as well as Football Manager Classic on PlayStation Vita for EU/AU territories £29.99 GBP/€39.99 EUR/$54.95 AUD. Xbox 360 owners have been able to purchase a digital copy of Unleashed for quite some time, and is now providing benefit to those who want to do away with their physical library.

HUGE Sega/Sonic sales on LIVE and PSN

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Time to transfer your titles to digital and save some money while doing it! Both PSN and X-Box LIVE have big savings on some of your favorite Sega titles. On PSN, you get the “Sonic Master Collection”. It’s 7 Sonic titles and their DLC for $29.99. This includes Sonic Adventures 1 & 2, Sonic CD, Sonic 1 & 2 and Sonic 4 Episodes 1 & 2.

But X-Box LIVE has even bigger sales! Get Sonic Unleashed, Sonic Generations, Sega Superstar Tennis or Condemned for only $9.99! Sonic 4 Episodes 1 & 2 are 400 points ($4.99) each while Space Channel 5 Part 2, Sega Bass fishing, Guardian Heroes, Sonic 1, 2, 3 and Knuckles plus Sonic CD are a mere 160 Points ($2) each. Sonic Adventure 1 also comes in at 160 points while Sonic Adventure 2 is 400 points. Virtua Fighter 5: Final Showdown, Crazy Taxi, NiGHTS, Daytona USA HD and Jet Set Radio Come in at 400 points. Also, check out The Cave and Renegade Ops coming in at 600 and 320 points respectively. There’s big savings on the DLC as well, so hurry up and don’t miss out!

Unleashed Project Mod out now for Sonic Generations


Sonic Generations already had one of the daytime levels from Sonic Unleashed (Rooftop Run), but what if you want more? Well, thanks to Sonic fans you can now play eight more redesigned stages in 60fps and any resolution your rig can handle!

No console limitations. This means support for unlimited resolutions, high-quality texture filtering and 60 FPS gameplay as long as you have the hardware for it. Stages that had performance problems in the original game now work perfectly (with a proper setup). Just features you’d expect from a regular PC version!

Eight Modern Sonic stages completely readapted from Sonic Unleashed. Lots of layout improvements, recreation of gimmicks, and fixing various bugs/glitches.

Want to know more and how to install it? Check out the Moddb page on it.

Jimquisition discusses Sonic trying too hard to be cool


The new Jimquisition is being posted here because one of the characters he discusses on this video is Sonic. How Sonic’s way of being cool is outdated, thus is lame in new games when he walks around going “Dude, totally awesome Tails!”

In an odd way, I agree with this part. I disagree with what he says after. He suggests that SEGA make Sonic a joke, you know, a character that doesn’t try to take himself seriously. I think this is a mistake. The whole “Dude I’m totally cool” was basically marketing stuff and I think a silent Sonic is the best medicine.

Sonic’s design is timeless. It will always look awesome. His attitude is best left like it was in the classics, a silent picture.

Sonic levels that should be in Sonic Anniversary


Picking out your favorite Sonic levels is like picking out your favorite child, sometimes its easy because someone failed math and other times its difficult to do, because you hate them all equally.

We have decided to take a crack at compiling a list of Sonic levels we would like to see in Sonic Anniversary (If the details turn out to be true and they seem like they will). I will only go through the main console series, way too many Sonic games to go through spin offs and handhelds.

This is our opinion, if you have some stages not mentioned, give us a comment letting us know how wrong our opinions are.

GameStop sale = cheap SEGA games

GameStop is having their yearly “Game Days” sale, where you can get brand spanking new titles for cheaper than they usually go. Some of the SEGA deals are hit and miss, especially the Wii titles.

Sonic Unleashed (360, PS3, Wii) – $14.99
Sonic’s Ultimate Genesis Collection (360) – $17.99 – (PS3) $14.99

SEGA having another PSN sale this week


SEGA has announced that they will be having a Valentine’s day sale on their PSN content; the games listed this time are the same as their New Years sale it seems. They promised that this time they will have bundles, something that was missing from the last sale.

Crazy Taxi, Full Auto 2, Sonic Unleashed DLC, Valkyria Chronicles DLC, and Sonic Rivals 1 and 2 have all been confirmed to be in the sale. Maybe SEGA will make a really nice Valkyria Chronicles DLC bundle for us.