168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Sonic Frontiers has defied expectations, being 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:positively received (almost) across tꦿhe board. As TheGamer’s resident Sonic Defender, it wasn’t a surprise 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:when I♏ gave it a four out of five in my r🦩eview. But wow, ot🍸her people liked it too! It’s weird, and💞 we’re not used to this.
However, there was a price to pay for winning over the masses. As Sonic Frontiers drags the series kicking and screaming into the standards set by other 3D platformers, it 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:loses some of its naff identity in ♔the process. As I run through the Starfall Islands, I can’t help but miss the shit dialogue. When Eggman’s on screen, I kinda hope he’s going to talk about blowing up the moon or some other comically evil Bond-villain stuff. Sega finally learned to feel shame, but I really wish it hadn't.
Sure, it’s nice to have a Sonic game that I’m not embarrassed to recommend to normal people, but where’s the fun in that? We all cringed at Sonic Forces (“None of this is good, Vector. That’s why it’s called war”, says Knuckles), but for better or worse, that was So🐠nic’s identity. Now with the dialogue tame and inoffensive, who even is he? Who is Knuckles if he isn’t dramatically intense all the time? Who is Sonic if he isn’t an annoying little shit? Those are the questions Sega will have to grapple with in a post-Frontiers world, and it just doesn’t have the answers yet.
Sega is at the very least aware that it has to do something, and this is evident through the very stripped-back cast in Frontiers. Spoiler alert, but if you were hoping for any big cameos, you’ll be very disappointed. Sonic spends most of his time running around on his own and talking to himself. When he does come across one of his pals, their conversations are friendly, b⛦ut much more muted than we’ve seen before. Amy isn’t the annoying lovestruck teenager anymore, and Knuckles isn’t a rival. So who are they? I have no idea, and neither does Sonic Frontiers.
Contrast that with what we got in the second Sonic movie this year, and it’s night and day. Idris Elba’s Knuckles may have been a little derivative of Drax from the MCU, but he was full of personality and played off Sonic perfectly. In Frontiers, his scenes don’t differ significantly from𓄧 the Tails cutscenes, and it feels like he’s there out of obligation to the fans rather than to drive the story in a meaningful way.
Old favourites like Rogue, Cream, and Omega are relegated to whatever the listening equivalent of a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it shoutout is, and even the much safer and more obvious Shadow is nowhere to be seen. It’s understandable that Sega is embarrassed by its previous games, but what’s a 3D platformer without a memorable cast of characters? No one ever accused the Sonic gang of being boring, so there’s no reason to be so ashamed.
Sonic Frontiers opts to go all in on the gameplay instead, and while this is working in the short term, you have to wonder if the game will have the staying power of previous hits. Go back and play Sonic Adventure and tell me we all loved it for the gameplay, I dare you. No, we love its sickly too-cool-for-school attitude. It's why Super Mario Sunshine has a place in everyone’s hearts despite being the worst 3D Mario game - it was unapologetically itself, and indulged in showing us a side of the Mario world we don’t usually get. Sonic Adventure 1 and 2 before it did the same, going ham with the lore and taking themselves far too seriously, as every Sonic game should.
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Frontiers often feels like it doesn’t know who the story is for. Its more mature version of the cast is perfect for us weirdos who have stuck with the series for so long, but it only leaves us wanting more. Conversely, its subtle signs of character development and melancholy are appreciated by weirdos like me, but will be meaningless to the new players that it's toned itself down for. What new players will care about 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Sonamy being canon? Or Amy getting really into her fortune-telling? Or Tails being bummed out over being so reliant on Sonic? If Sega 🐟wants to win over new players, it should have spent the game re-introducing them. Bringing each of Sonic’s friends back one by one to show newcomers why they should care. By slimming down the cast, it seems like this is the intention, but it’s contradicted by the fact that none of the characters that do make it into the game are putting their best foot forward. If I hadn’t played a Sonic game in years, I’m not sure if I’d care about any of them.
It’s good to see Sega acknowledge that Sonic has an identity crisis, at the very least. I just hope it has a better plan up its sleeve than what we got in Frontiers. There’s nothing wrong with going back to basics with the characters, it just needs to make sure it's a hell of a lot more interesting next time so it can justify dampening Sonic’s spirit this much. Sonic Frontiers still has a lot of heart, it just needs stronger characters to prop it up.