Topic: Sonic Frontiers

Please, please, please, take your time to get the egg man memos, they add the salt and peppers to your lord burger, please listen to them.

Also sonic forces and lost world is canon. Do with that information what you will.

@Kermit1 The Guardian have been reviewing games since I was a child (I'm in my mid 30s).

I want to beat Unleashed before jumping to Sonic Frontiers but the last course, Eggman Land is a long nightmare. I often reach a part with lasers, spikes, moving platforms and pits after many day and night difficult sections including another like the one I described, but I always run out of lives. I'm hating this game.

@Banjo- I was trying to play through Unleashed too. It's the one 'boost' game I have yet to beat. The problem is I just can't stand it either. The game drives me mad. The Sonic stages are SO good and some are the absolute best stages out of all the boost games, but I absolutely loathe the 'adventure' sections in between the stages, I hate how you have to find moon medals or something just to enter levels/stages and, although I don't dislike the werehog stages entirely, I just don't understand why they thought they were good idea. Besides that, they're just way too long. People moan that Forces' stages are too short, but I'd take that over 10-15 minute werehog stages any day of the week.

@Reprise All true. It's very confusing. All my playthrough I was wondering, What am I supposed to do? Where are the stages? Where have the doctor and Tails gone? What was I supposed to do with the photos? Souvenirs? Photos? Food? Hidden medals? Hidden levels? No maps? No tracking? No user interface? It's the most confusing and chaotic 3D game I've ever played. NPC speak things that don't help at all, throwing a few stupid quests to your already complicated life. And you can't skip those irritating conversations.

The final stage alternates day and night sections repeatedly for around... 1 hour? And then you run out of lives and have to start again. It's not funny. Where could I get 99 lives? It doesn't seem easy either.

I remember that the early daytime stages are fun like one with loops where you have to find the way forward but you don't die if you don't. The later stages are too long and too complicated, it's not clear where you are supposed to go, the camera doesn't help and "the cherry on the cake" is those jumps with a long button combination requirement to avoid death. Not once, but twice, thrice...

I gave up Sonic Heroes in the jungle stage in a section where the camera doesn't let the player know how to make the jumps. I wanted to beat Sonic Unleashed because I reached the final stage but it's like the game doesn't want me to. Like in Sonic Heroes, you can't just do trial and error because you run out of lives before you learn to avoid the numerous cheap deaths.

@Banjo- All of that is completely spot on and true. It mirrors my experience entirely. It's even more confusing and frustrating when you haven't played in a while too. I tried playing last weekend with my son, after having not played in a couple of weeks, and it was really confusing. I eventually worked out where I was supposed to be going and what to do to progress the game and then we needed to go into one of the stages, but hit a brick wall when it said we didn't have enough sun or moon medals or whatever the hell they are. And controlling Sonic in those adventure sections, trying to find medals so I can actually continue the game, is an absolute ball ache. And why the hell do I lose lives if I fall into water or off some cliff during those Adventure sections? It's an absolute pain.

I don't think I will ever finish this game and it's a shame, because there are good ideas there and good level design in places, but it's buried beneath a mountain of issues.

@Reprise Thank you for your replies. I agree completely. I'm ready to move on and give it up like Sonic Heroes. Have you played Sonic Frontiers? If so, what do you think? I haven't yet but I will, on Series X.

@Banjo- Speaking of Sonic Heroes, I also gave up on that one too. I bought it for the Gamecube either last year or early this year and can't get into it.

But yeah, on topic, I did buy Sonic Frontiers and I am actually really enjoying it. I find a lot of the criticisms (particularly Nintendo Life's review) quite confusing, as it's not my experience at all. This is probably the best Sonic has ever controlled in any 3D Sonic game. The gameplay loop is addictive and fun, exploring the open zones is an absolute joy and although the cyberspace levels are lazy in terms of how they only have 4 aesthetics and reuse a lot of old designs, they are amazing to play (so many alternative routes to explore and they're all very replayable). I love the big titan fights too and the combat is brilliant (yes, a lot of it is still button mashing, but it just works and feels and looks great). It reminds me of Shadow of the Colossus. Obviously it's no where near the quality of that game, but playing as Sonic and climbing up and taking on these gigantic titans is an incredible experience.

I own the PS5 version by the way. I haven't played it on Switch.

@Reprise All of this, I agree with.

@Reprise So we basically agree about Sonic Heroes as well! I'm glad that you're enjoying Sonic Frontiers. It's next in my Sonic list.

In the final stretch, tomorrow I’m going to beat it, I hope the ending is good because I’m really enjoying the story and a bad ending can sour a good story.

Having now finished the game, I think this is both the most pleasantly surprised, as well as the most disappointed, I've been in a game in a while. I didn't have high hopes for the game before release, so I was pleasantly surprised to find I really enjoyed it. That said, there's so much wasted potential here.

The positives

• Sonic in an open world works really well.
• The boost is excellent and complements the open world gameplay perfectly.
• Characters are generally well-written, including the new character Sage.
• Tying the chaos emeralds to open zone progression was a neat idea and led to a lot of hype around the boss fights.
• Performance on Switch is acceptable (I never noticed any drops below 30 fps).
• Mini-bosses can be pretty clever, and combat has a decent amount of depth (more than expected from Sonic, at least).

The negatives

• The graphics are a little disappointing on Switch, with character models and environments arguably looking worse than games over a decade old (e.g. Sonic Unleashed).
• Controls can be quite clunky. In particular, Sonic can be imprecise to control and he lacks realistic momentum, grinding to a halt when you let go of the analog stick. This feels especially bad for the Cyber Space stages.
• While I personally don't think the Cyber Space levels are that bad, they are definitely the worst part of the game, not working particularly well with Sonic's new control scheme. Level designs range from okay to mediocre, and there's a lot of reused of old stage tropes and designs.
• Open world design drops off a little towards the end. In particular, World 3 relies a lot on 2D segments, and World 4 relies too much on standalone platforming challenges rather than open exploration. In general, the same starts to feel a lot more "gamey" than like an organic open world as the game progresses, which is a shame. The repetitive structure of the open zones also began to feel a little tiresome. The first zone is by far the strongest IMO.
• Navigation can be a pain, with no fast travel, and sometimes rails and boost pads can send you in surprising directions, diverting you off your path.
• Combat can be janky, particularly with large enemies where you might find yourself clipping through them.

However the most exciting thing about this game is the potential. Some things I'd like to see in the future:

• Better controls
• Higher quality "Cyber Space"-type stages, reflecting the quality of e.g. Generations or Adventure 1/2.
• Other playable characters. It would be great to see how e.g. Tails and Knuckles change navigation of the open world and puzzles. A way to instantly switch a la Heroes might be interesting, but I think having the characters as group might detract from the overall tone of such a game.
• A more involved story
• Just generally more polish, particularly in the world design and presentation

Overall I really enjoyed my time with this game. It's definitely the best 3D Sonic since Generations, and potentially in the top 5 3D Sonic games. Most of all, I think this formula has potential, so for the first time in a while I'm excited to see where the series goes next.

So tell me everyone. Do you consider Sonic frontiers worth 60 dollars? I'm heavily debating this as i really haven't enjoyed many 3D sonics besides maybe a tiny fondness for the adventure games. Sonic heroes was alright too. I just got paid and I'm thinking I'll get this or go with kirby and the forgotten land.

Also is sonic frontiers really as sloppy and buggy on switch as I've heard?

@Truegamer79 I enjoyed the game (see above), but it's hard to put a monetary value on the experience IMO. Would it help for me to bounce the question back to you: would you buy Sonic Adventure 1 / 2 / Heroes for $60, assuming that they're brand new games? Basically, I think this game has as much to offer as those titles in terms of content. And you'll definitely get a lot more out of this game if you're already a fan of 3D Sonic.

Kirby and the Forgotten Land is certainly the more polished game, but personally I found Frontiers to be the more noteworthy experience. That said, I am personally more of a Sonic fan than a Kirby fan so...

Also I wouldn't say Frontiers is necessary "buggy"...it's mostly just unpolished, with a few janky controls and camera angles here and there. I didn't notice any bugs that had any significant impact on my experience.

It is a risky purchase. Is it an option to buy it, and sell it if you're not so keen? This was my original plan as I wasn't sure about the game at all before I played it.

I have it on PS5 but I'll try to help as best I can.
I'm a huge fan of 3D platformers, particularly collect-a-thons, of which I feel this game somewhat fits the bill. But having put a few hours into it, it's not a game that's kept me coming back so far. Been over a week since I last played it.
The game itself is solid enough without being anything outstanding, but I have found it to be a bit repetitive in terms of combat (button mashing) and gameplay with certain missions/quests and collectables. Travelling across the open world is a bit of a pain in the arse as well. It's not a game I'd spend hours at a time on.
It's a shame because I played the demo at PAX Aus and it got me hyped for the game to release - but I suppose with the 15 minutes or whatever it was you get with the game at the booth, it never got repetitive.
As for the Switch version - I've heard it's best to avoid. The NintendoLife review also implored readers to try it out elsewhere, which is pretty scathing.
I'll jump back in soon enough as I've made considerable progress, but I don't hold out as much hope of it holding my attention to the end.

The Nintendo Life review genuinely makes me quite angry. It was clearly written by someone who either doesn't like Sonic games, or didn't give the game enough time.

• Controls are mostly fine if you bother to learn how to use them. One of the reviewer's biggest gripes was the game taking away control at points, but this is during the collectible challenges where it's almost like a rhythm game, in that you have to time your boosts and jumps right in order to cover great distances and reach the collectibles. It's a mini challenge. The game merely helps steer the player in the right direction, it doesn't "constantly wrench control from the player".
• The mini challenges are mostly intelligently placed. If you complete one, it will often springboard you to a new one. You're free to try that next one, or run off on your own and go where you want. I believe this is the "open zone" idea Sonic Team were on about.
• It runs really well on Switch, even if the graphics do take a bit of a beating.
• Cutscenes are really interesting for long-term fans of the series (reviewer called them boring).
• I've honestly no idea what all these supposed glitches are they mentioned. There were a couple of small nothings on the third island where a spring didn't activate a few times, but they weren't game-breaking.
• You can extensively customise Sonic's physics in the options to better suit the player (no mention of that in the review).
• The bosses are quite exciting and mostly well-done. You really need to learn the parry mechanic for them.
• The small puzzles/challenges that you do to unlock more of the map teach the player mechanics of the game very well.
• Combat is a bit button-mashy on the first couple of islands, but gets much more challenging later on, especially if you up the difficulty to hard. Remember, kids will be playing this too. I assume Sonic Team didn't want to make the combat too hard on easier difficulties.
• The music is great.

So, overall, I thought the game was well designed, if a little unpolished in areas. Certainly deserving of a solid 7/10 at least. I enjoyed it a lot, and honestly wanted more when it was over. I'm looking forward to the free DLC and whatever is next for Sonic games.

EDIT: List fixed. Thanks, @iLikeUrAttitude !!

@RainbowGazelle
It's just an asterisk and you put a space between the words, no brackets required.

wrong:

*this

correct:

• this (it has a space)

@iLikeUrAttitude Cheers! I guess I was over-complicating everything.

@RainbowGazelle No problem, and for the record I share the sentiment about what you said earlier, nintendolife has a heavy bias towards platformers that aren't made from nintendo, their Crash and Sonic Frontiers review shows that.

@RainbowGazelle It’s written by someone who rushed through the game in like a day and a half, it’s a vary unfair review.