LogFAQs > #969978170

Sonic Frontiers

Man I have so many thoughts on this game, it's the type of thing that makes me want to start a YouTube video essay channel to put them all together.

Overall, I really enjoyed it. I couldn't care less for the story and find it hilarious so many video analyses I've watched talk extensively about it. But I guess that's the Sonic fan base! I would much prefer Sonic not take itself so seriously but that's kind of become the thing of 3D Sonic; it's never going to change. It's charming in a weird way, but most of it's incredibly dumb and cringe. The ending and Sage's sacrifice did nothing for me emotionally and just made me laugh. The callbacks to previous games are awesome though. And they tried to do some character development but again...I just don't care. I don't hate the story or anything though and there's some decent, interesting lore stuff in there.

The gameplay works! There's some classic 3D Sonic jank, but not near as much as usual. Running around Sonic speed on these big masses of land is as fun as it sounds. Having an RPG-like upgrade system for your attack, defense, speed, and rings is great.

But the open world is really just a series of different mini obstacle courses. Some take 10 seconds, some are entire levels on their own and those shine a lot. They needed more areas like that. A lot of these areas that feel like mini levels are to get to an emerald, and it works. But the game is fun when you can break it too, when you use boost to grab a floating memory token that you're supposed to go through an obstacle course to get. More open-ended design like that would go a long way.

I was surprised by the variety they threw in these obstacle courses though. They hit some creative high points with some of these, even if it gets repetitive in the end.

Combat is 'okay' and I think they could improve upon it a lot in the future. Keep the new mechanics like cyloop and just do a lot more with it. Make you actually have to use your abilities more on enemies. Guardians like the Ghost on the final island that do this (even simply) are awesome.

Maybe my biggest issue with the game is it's cool shitless* (coining that term for my YouTube essay that will never come to fruition!) The open world in Breath of the Wild is the best open world ever made because it's filled to the brim with cool shit to find. Sonic Frontiers needs this. There are volcanoes in this game and you can't even explore them. The cool shit is mini levels you'll come across, but there's just not many of these and there's nothing interesting in the world to explore.

I want a secret Eggman base, an underground cavern area, I want to go inside that damn volcano. Heck, throw some tornadoes on the final island and let's go inside the storm, Sonic Adventure 1 style. Just give me interesting shit. Besides a few emeralds that are off the beaten path and make you play mini levels to get to them, there's little that's intriguing. The game is held up by its inherently fun gameplay.

I really enjoyed the cyberspace levels and wish there were more of them, and that there were more longer ones. Some are so short, which is cool, but gets disappointing that so many are so short. And the fact that there's only four types of environments in them is a letdown. Then the same thing happens with the islands environmentally - the last two islands have the same aesthetics as the first island. In fact, the final island is just another part of the first island if you check the map. What's up with that? I do love the fourth island tower segment though. All those towers were were great fun and a nice, short little change up. It seems like it might be divisive, but the game got me with that one.

They can do so much more with the ideas in the game. I almost wish cyberspace and the open world were reversed environmentally. Imagine exploring an open world Green Hill Zone and Chemical Plant Zone. Yes please!

The bosses...ugh. The hype factor is there. The classic 3D Sonic rock music with cheesy lyrics and vocals - that's my sweet spot. I love that dumb stuff. But the bosses fail so hard gameplay-wise most of the time. They're confusing, glorified cutscenes with no sense of direction. No gameplay mechanics to master as Super Sonic. Just fly straight, hope you don't get hit by stuff and hold parry down (which I didn't find out that all you do to parry is hold the buttons down - no timing at all - until I was about to beat the game). Watching Sonic fans go nuts over these dumb fights in reaction videos is hilarious though.

Ultimately, it's a flawed game that's inherently fun. It's got creative ideas and a surprising amount of variety in its mini obstacle courses strewn throughout the open zones. This game almost feels like an experiment, a test to see if the formula works. And it does. There's so much potential here that can be realized. I hope Sonic Team continues with the formula and improves upon it, rather than throwing it all away for something new like they always do.

7.5/10