Sonic doesn’t need an open world game, it needs focus

Since its debut in 1991, Sonic the Hedgehog has released 31 games on consoles. So far, Sega’s famous mascot has yet to put his signature sneakers into a fully open game. At first, the concept of an open-world Sonic game got me excited, and I started imagining what that might entail. The idea of ​​running freely in a vast world filled with different kinds of challenges, enemies and puzzles sounds great. The series has delved into somewhat free-roaming central worlds before, but the fluid exploration is a whole new area.

But then I saw the initial gameplay of Sonic Frontiers, and ofmy thoughts shifted from excitement to seriously wondering if the open-world game Sonic the Hedgehog was the right call.

I couldn’t stop focusing on how empty the world looked. Under the island’s floating bars and rings, there is nothing unique or special in the landscape; Instead of a giant stadium, it looked like a barren rocky island off the coast of Scotland. Once you get to the top of the tower and defeat a few enemies, what else can you do? While there are puzzles that unlock more parts of the island, we still don’t know how abundant those other parts are, but you would have thought that if it were more exciting, Sega would have featured it a little bit more.

There may be more enemies, but there may also be pastures devoid of green grass. Sonic Frontiers is set in a large open world, obviously, but that first look didn’t direct the excitement of its fast-paced predecessors. Sonic open world game sounds Nice, but its implementation and development is not a great start.

The new attacks at Sonic’s disposal look interesting, but part of me is still thinking about going back to Sonic Unleashed where the combat segments really slowed down the gameplay. As the poster child for “Blast Processing,” Sonic will always rely on one primary thing: speed.

I don’t mind jumping around and fighting multiple enemies, but with Sonic’s open world game, the main selling point should be quick through populated areas and not having to stop. Sonic Frontiers features a skill tree that allows players to upgrade Sonic’s skills while also giving them a sense of progression. It sounds cool until I remembered that what I loved about Sonic Adventure games (when you weren’t breaking down) was collecting items to improve my characters. If all you can search for in the game are Chaos Emeralds, it will take a lot of fun exploring.

Imagine if in The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild you couldn’t collect items, only abilities. It will take away the wonderful sense of adventure while discovering and pulling the Master Sword from the stone. Skill trees can be great in games when used correctly. In the Batman Arkham series, for example, you can increase Batman’s health and toolkit, but you can still collect tools and Riddler trophies to boost your sense of accomplishment.

The Sonic Frontiers footage has yet to show any of that. While it was possible to feature side quests and non-jeweled items prior to their release, the lack of features outside of the new skill tree and combat moves was a concern. This is supposed to be an open world where we can play with pins or spin through trees and collect trophies in the form of chili dogs to unlock new skins. If we can’t do that then there is no reason for one to exist.

The open world means that developers have to have an open imagination. If you want Sonic to have a skill tree, create one, but show that if you maximize his speed, he can run through certain enemies without having to use the spin dash. If we’re going to have an empty world with just a few enemies strewn across it, it’d be better for the people on Sonic Team to focus on making a new 2D Sonic game or spend the time making something more sandbox. .

Sonic doesn’t need an open world game, it just needs a nice long development cycle, some mods, and better bug protection. There’s nothing wrong with 2D Sonic, especially when they give us great new stages, a soundtrack, and a great blister speed.