Sonic: Genesis (Or how to fix a franchise) · 3:36am Oct 30th, 2019

PREMISE The central thesis of both this and my inspiration to write this, Antony C’s What to do with Sonic? is that 3D Sonic games are starting from a faulty premise, and that they only adapt the more superficial aspects of what made Sonic great. I’m not trying to say all of them bad, because any premise can be made into something good with enough hard work and skill. Hopefully there’s plenty of people who can list their favorite Sonic game, and there’s usually something you can praise. Even Sonic ‘06! (Killer soundtrack!)

What I am trying to say is that this formula doesn’t deliver consistently good results, and I don’t expect a lot of pushback on that point. Developers constantly say they want to bring Sonic back to his roots, and I’m proposing we actually do that. Instead of falling back on a simplified version of something we know will sell kinda-okay, we take the whole line back to formula.

Okay, check this out: Mario actually has a faster running speed than Sonic in their original games. The reason Sonic feels faster is because Sonic is one of the first, if not the first games to have a proper physics engine. To quote the Geek Critique:

"Platforming heroes up to this point had been static. Megaman ran at this speed, every time. Mario could jump this high. Sonic had a sense of mobility and weight to him that mimicked the controlled chaos of a pinball machine. Nothing about Sonic is static. You can accelerate to be ‘this’ fast, but you can be faster.”

Emphasis mine.

The classic Sonic games weren’t good because you went fast. They were good because of how much fun it was to get good at the game, and then you got speed. This means that the most Sonic 3D games are built on a faulty premise. While there is skill involved, there are also a lot of places where the player is reduced to a mere spectator. A Sonic game should be good because of how good you are, not how good the cinematics are.

PLOT
It’s briefly a normal day in rebooted version of Green Hills, where local hero Sonic the Hedgehog is running around helping his adoring public. He’s still got that arrogant swagger, but unlike the more… I’ll limit myself to just saying 90's cliche versions, he’s pretty grounded. He’s not just running around to look cool, we see him helping people with tasks with his incredible speed and taking the time to talk to the local kids who look up to him. He still enjoys being looked up to, that’s always been a part of his character. But his inflated ego doesn’t lead him to look down on anyone else. If anything, he’s driven to share his love of life with those around him.

But anyway, mysterious glowing cracks begin to form all around them. The laws of physics go utterly bonkers, and maybe we get a tutorial saving some civilians from peril. There’s a huge explosion, and when everyone comes to, they find that Green Hills has been thrown into this mysterious alternate dimension. The Zone immediately around them is familiar, but surrounding them are four other places that no one has seen before.

There are five of these Zones total: the lovely Green Hills, an ancient flooded ruins called the Chaos Keep, a science-fiction cityscape called Central City, a frozen mountain resort called Ice Paradise, and the floating Angel Island. After ensuring that Green Hills can look after itself, Sonic sets out to explore the surrounding Zones for answers.

It turns out that Doctor Robotnick (nicknamed Eggman by Sonic, to the doctor’s annoyance) is trying to invade Angel Island and steal the Master Emerald. In the fight with Knuckles, the thing containing the Master Emerald gets broken. It shatters into multiple Chaos Emeralds and fall into different dimensions, and are responsible for connecting the Zones together. Sonic has to collect each of the Chaos Emeralds to return each Zone to their respective places in Time and Space.

Most story missions center around Eggman wrecking havoc as he tries to get the Emeralds. He’ll have his robots go on a rampage, kidnap people, build specific bosses to kill Sonic— I don’t want him to repeat schemes, but I’m... trying? Trying to keep this concise. Point is, Sonic VS Eggman, we’ve seen this song and dance.

But after Act 1 of the Chaos Keep, we start to get a few missions pointedly different from the norm. We find some kind of creature made from water, skulking around the Zones but staying out of sight. People it touches are turned into monsters that attack Sonic, and as it gets bigger it distorts reality itself. The plot is split between mysterious missions where we try to uncover this mysterious beast, and more traditional Eggman shenanigans.

Eventually we destroy Eggman’s lair in Central City and find that the monster has achieved its final form. It’s a living being created by the Chaos Emeralds, that only understands destruction named Chaos Perfect. (Personally, I think a being of true chaos can’t have a personality, as a personality is a series of emotional patterns and order that the mind uses to function. As long as Discord has opinions about things that he holds for more than a few seconds, he’s not a full embodiment of chaos. But anyway.) The final stage is a race to get to Angel Island before it does. Once you do, if you’ve found all the Chaos Emeralds you’ll go Super Sonic and fight the creature. If you haven’t, then Knuckles is forced to send Green Hills and whatever other Zones you have collected back, leaving himself and the remaining places destroyed, a grim reminder of the pain unfinished side-quests.

GAMEPLAY
Basically, I feel like the focus should be less on simply being fast and more on the cool things you can do once you’re going fast.

One of the things I’ve noticed in the Flash Mods for GT:A (though I can’t remember which ones show this issue best) is how hard it is to control a character going at a certain speed through anywhere that isn’t flat and open, which is probably why the 3D Sonic games use really gamey track layouts.

To combat this, I’m thinking that Sonic has a default cruising speed that you maintain as you push the control stick, and then holding the R button lets you go accelerate depending on how well you maneuver and how hard you press down. You can slow down by letting go without having to lose your momentum.

The L trigger curls Sonic up into a ball. While you're curled, you can tap the A(jump) button to rev up a spin dash. You can't accelerate while curled (you can't use the R button) but you take less and inflict more damage to and opponents.

The faster you move, the further you go when you jump, right? Well, think about how fast Sonic moves! You're leaps carry you further and higher depending on how fast you're moving when you jump. Once in the air, you can dash in different directions using the R button, or home on any enemies or obstacles nearby. You can also click the L button to divebomb the ground. Simply clicking it will stop your momentum cold, but holding it down keeps you're speed up as you roll along the ground.

Building on that, the L and R bumbers introduces a completely new mechanic I’m also taking from the Flash GT:A mods: Bullet time. You can slow the game down without losing your speed at all for roughly four seconds, and there’s a very short recharge time.

Neither of those are the focus, though. I really have one central goal: making the intro to Sonic CD playable. (I haven’t played that game, but good grief! It’s been around twenty years and it’s the best intro for anything ever!)

You can slow time down and click the action button (It was B in Adventure, so why not?) to do a parkour action most obstacles in the game.While you're in bullet time, anything you can parkour across will be highlighted. You can also use the homing attack to target a parkour-able object as long as its within a certain distance. So that kick-ass moment where Sonic ascends by bouncing off all the rubble to reach the giant robot moon? You can do that. No quicklime, 100% player controlled. And then we get to the city, and our options open up!

Picture a wall. If it’s shorter than Sonic, then you can just vault hold B and vault over it. If it’s taller than Sonic, you can either (1 Hold B and run into it, grabbing the ledge and hanging there so you can either pull yourself up, inch along the sides or have a moment to look around. (2 Use A to Jump and target the top of the wall, bouncing off it to gain height. From there you can slow time down and look for more things to home in on or just head back to the ground.

Another idea I like is leaning harder on the ability to run up walls. This is the definitive speedster trick, and I’m annoyed at the lack of focus it’s gotten in Sonic. If you’re going a certain speed and run into a wall while holding B, you can run up the wall in any direction. If you’re falling, you can drift into a wall while holding B and regain control. And of course you can leap from one wall to the next, as long as you maintain the same velocity.

This opens up an amazing plethora of fresh things to do with Sonic, and there’s still plenty of Zone specific options you can play with. Maybe you can run across water, but if you slow down you’ll sink. You can parkour across enemies, maybe trick them into destroying themselves. Maybe a certain kind of enemy has a shield you have to move around, or you can parkour on the shield itself. (Parkour can be a verb, right? Eh.)

The point is to give the player as much agency as possible.

Report Crack-Fic Casey · 248 views · #Sonic the Hedgehog

Comments ( 2 )