the black sheep of SEGA | Sonic '06 (Sonic's Episode)

Channel:

andynomical

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Published on March 15, 2023 8:33:34 AM ● Video Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HvhAc6D7QsU

Game:

Sonic the Hedgehog (2006)

Category:

Show

Duration: 3:01:19

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4

there's no juice!111!!11!!

REVIEW
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Ah yes. Sonic The Hedgehog, the 2006 title. A very meme'd on game, and to little surprise. Although it shares the same feel as past titles (notably Adventure 1/2), this time around it presents an uninspiring formula of an incredible amount of poor decisions made regarding the plot, gameplay and other technical aspects. It may have its moments that I smile at but like I said at the beginning, they're often a result of an opposite effect SEGA intended.

I only got so much of the story from Sonic's perspective so I can only go off from there. It's yet another continued cliché of Eggman's desire for world domination and Sonic's determination to stop him. New characters get introduced yet are immemorable to pre-existing characters and even they don't really have much weight to them either, being casted as filler or as a means to an end (as opposed to better utilization like in Sonic Heroes). On top of that, the notion of time travel trivializes the impact of anything substantial as threats/failures get overwritten by simply going back in time. Chalk this all up with cheesy voice acting, ridiculous pacing, typical plot-armor for protagonists and antagonists alike, and you get a pretty meh plotline.

(Apparently there's a "final ending" to the game if I were to engage in all 3 episodes but truth be told, I think I'm done with the game. ~3 hours of sporadic gameplay and storytelling is enough for me.)

The cutscenes were pretty good for a mid 2000's title but that's only a small positive in a land of many negatives.

Gameplay for the most part wasn't too bad surprisingly. Sure, there were moments of it being rough around the edges (the 3 trials, the fire tornado highway, etc.) but it held the same feeling as past games. The camera and lack of a settings menu to deal with the inverted controls was often the biggest headache. The bosses left a lot to be desired as their gimmicks were often telegraphed and dragged out for longer than they should've. Hell, that could be argued for the majority of levels I came across as well since everything was often "ctrl c, ctrl v".

It was weird how you could purchase power-ups that gave you unique abilities to use in combat but the game (as far as I saw) did not inform you in how to use said abilities. Considering the game had plenty of pop-ups narrating the controls as well as characters themselves reminding the player of the obvious, this was a weird oversight. If it was in fact a pop-up somewhere, it should've been made a lot more clear to the player upon purchase.

I didn't mind the open-world hub aspect of the game where you interact with NPCs and immerse yourself in the world of Soleanna but it kinda felt flat to me. Reminds me of Deadly Premonitions in a "so bad it's good" way but is not shared in '06 unfortunately.

I could not fathom how a game is riddled with so many loading screens. Thankfully through the power of emulation and much more effective hardware, it was not a concern but I don't envy Sonic enthusiasts having to deal with that during the X360/PS3 era days. How SEGA did not pause for a moment and take a few steps back at the overabundance of load sequences (which were never a problem in previous titles) is beyond me.

Hopefully this game serves as a reminder of what not to do as a developer because holy smokes, it's quite amazing that this unironically got published, even more so from a notable IP. Again, the game can be enjoyable but it is a fine line between that and either boring or annoying. Maybe from the wise words of a certain somebody, you could even argue.....

iT's nO uSE!

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