Me vale verga lo que digan a mi si me gusto.
Adoro este juego, aunque cierto que talvez por bias para cuando lo vaya a rejugar hayan cosas que me gusten menos, o talvez las refuerzen.
Adoro este juego, aunque cierto que talvez por bias para cuando lo vaya a rejugar hayan cosas que me gusten menos, o talvez las refuerzen.
jajajaja todos estan daltonicos
- el juego
- el juego
30 MINUTOS DE KNUCKLES VELHO
feels like i played this alongside my six year old self. we did it lil' buddy, we finally beat the one game we had no chance in hell of finishing without a gamecube memory card
as with sa1, there's really no point in arguing about this series since the detractors have long made up their shitty minds. sa2's an interesting beast though because it manages to excel just as much as its predecessor... in very different ways!
the speed stages are great, albeit nothing like sa1's. maybe you prefer these more linearly driven, setpiece-focused levels, but i might be partial to having a spindash that can blaze me across entire courses in a matter of seconds. i like going places i shouldn't and being rewarded for it. there's some of that here, but it's not nearly the same. that said, there's no city escape or final rush in sa1 so we'll call it a draw
treasure hunting is improved tenfold. i definitely prefer the newly limited radar system (it makes finding shards early super satisfying) and the overall increased difficulty. especially after knuckles' previous story was an absolute cakewalk. rouge is basically knuckles on hard mode and i generally prefer her side more for that. love her music too, though i wish it was more lyrically driven to better contrast knuckles
shooting's a more mixed bag. tails reps one of the best stages but also most of the worst. eggman on the other hand for the most part lives up to gamma's gameplay well enough - especially once he gets his booster. there's def a sense of flow to these that i feel a solid chunk of people don't give deserved credit because they just wanna go fast and grind rails
...which is a sentiment i don't completely identify with because i feel sa2 is more than the sum of its parts. the narrative is genuinely great and actively shifts moods and gameplay styles accordingly. you're always listening to a banger, you're never on the same sort of stage for more than a few minutes at a time - and you're always pushing closer to one of the greatest fuckin' finales you'll ever find in video games. the quality of direction really skyrocketed here. the last episode's preview alone completely solos every single scene in sa1
one strange oddity though: there's a surprising lack of shadow gameplay here. maybe the devs weren't so confident in him as a newcomer and didn't expect him to be such a hit?
if they knew what was good for them, sonic team would've just made a whole ass game where you play as shadow the hedgehog...
EDIT: after careful deliberation (replaying the shit out of everything) i've decided that i have 0 significant issues with this game. i'm not even standing by what i said about the speed stages before. they're all fuckin' fantastic and i think i might actually prefer these to sa1's (granted i need to spend some more time with that game too for confirmation)
on top of all of what i've said - i've still barely scratched the surface of the chao world content and that on its own is pretty impressive for being in an already tightly-packed game to begin with. how the fuck did this get made in two years?
i also learned last night via the extra video that city escape was inspired by sonic team constantly receiving parking tickets while living in san francisco. that's worthy of some merit on its own
and maybe this is cheating to mention since it's largely battle rerelease content, but i don't care: the multiplayer is some of the most fun i've ever had with a 2-player game
you know what - fuck it, 10/10
EDIT 2: got all 180 emblems. basically a perfect game
as with sa1, there's really no point in arguing about this series since the detractors have long made up their shitty minds. sa2's an interesting beast though because it manages to excel just as much as its predecessor... in very different ways!
the speed stages are great, albeit nothing like sa1's. maybe you prefer these more linearly driven, setpiece-focused levels, but i might be partial to having a spindash that can blaze me across entire courses in a matter of seconds. i like going places i shouldn't and being rewarded for it. there's some of that here, but it's not nearly the same. that said, there's no city escape or final rush in sa1 so we'll call it a draw
treasure hunting is improved tenfold. i definitely prefer the newly limited radar system (it makes finding shards early super satisfying) and the overall increased difficulty. especially after knuckles' previous story was an absolute cakewalk. rouge is basically knuckles on hard mode and i generally prefer her side more for that. love her music too, though i wish it was more lyrically driven to better contrast knuckles
shooting's a more mixed bag. tails reps one of the best stages but also most of the worst. eggman on the other hand for the most part lives up to gamma's gameplay well enough - especially once he gets his booster. there's def a sense of flow to these that i feel a solid chunk of people don't give deserved credit because they just wanna go fast and grind rails
...which is a sentiment i don't completely identify with because i feel sa2 is more than the sum of its parts. the narrative is genuinely great and actively shifts moods and gameplay styles accordingly. you're always listening to a banger, you're never on the same sort of stage for more than a few minutes at a time - and you're always pushing closer to one of the greatest fuckin' finales you'll ever find in video games. the quality of direction really skyrocketed here. the last episode's preview alone completely solos every single scene in sa1
one strange oddity though: there's a surprising lack of shadow gameplay here. maybe the devs weren't so confident in him as a newcomer and didn't expect him to be such a hit?
if they knew what was good for them, sonic team would've just made a whole ass game where you play as shadow the hedgehog...
EDIT: after careful deliberation (replaying the shit out of everything) i've decided that i have 0 significant issues with this game. i'm not even standing by what i said about the speed stages before. they're all fuckin' fantastic and i think i might actually prefer these to sa1's (granted i need to spend some more time with that game too for confirmation)
on top of all of what i've said - i've still barely scratched the surface of the chao world content and that on its own is pretty impressive for being in an already tightly-packed game to begin with. how the fuck did this get made in two years?
i also learned last night via the extra video that city escape was inspired by sonic team constantly receiving parking tickets while living in san francisco. that's worthy of some merit on its own
and maybe this is cheating to mention since it's largely battle rerelease content, but i don't care: the multiplayer is some of the most fun i've ever had with a 2-player game
you know what - fuck it, 10/10
EDIT 2: got all 180 emblems. basically a perfect game
best 3d sonic game to this day
This game sucks
Another of my favorite soundtracks, also fun
Sonic Adventure 2 is an iconic game that definitely deserves a lot of the praise, and criticism that have been throw it’s way over the years.
Adventure 2’s story is pretty ambitious, and honestly if you just don’t think too hard about it, it’s entertaining. The acting is pretty good and the animation is a huge step up from SA1. But being honest, there are tons of plot holes surronding newcomer Shadow the Hedgehog, the Militatry who killed his creator Gerald Robotnick, and Shadows motive to destroy the planet. But it is entertaining, if only due to how high the stakes get. It’s not taken too seriously though, so its tone is spot on, and the game is endlessly quotable. For those reasons I think it succeeds at what it tries to do.
The gameplay attempts to refine SA1s most popular gameplay styles, Sonic’s Speed stages, Gamma’s shooting stages and Knuckles’ treasure hunting. Speed stages are just as fun as before, though more linear due to being designed for just Sonic and Shadow. This game introduce grind rails to the series, and while a little janky, they add to the high octane gameplay. The shooting levels with Dr Eggman and Tails are okay, I think the levels themselves can be pretty fun, but the control is very stiff and speed isn’t really a thing, which is so wierd as Gamma didn’t have this problem atall. The treasure hunting with Knuckles and Rouge took the biggest hit, as for some reason the you can only locate one emerald piece at a time, and some of these stages are huge.
It leads to a game that is more focussed, but it definitely has more obvious cracks. I still think overall it’s a fun game, and the boss fights are really good this time, except the Biolizard, not to be controversial, but I always thought this fight was super janky and way too long.
The music is fantastic, with every character getting their own style, as well as their own theme, and the main theme “Live and Learn” is one of the most iconic songs in the series.
SA2 is far from perfect, but if you can look past its cracks, I think it’s a lot of fun.
Adventure 2’s story is pretty ambitious, and honestly if you just don’t think too hard about it, it’s entertaining. The acting is pretty good and the animation is a huge step up from SA1. But being honest, there are tons of plot holes surronding newcomer Shadow the Hedgehog, the Militatry who killed his creator Gerald Robotnick, and Shadows motive to destroy the planet. But it is entertaining, if only due to how high the stakes get. It’s not taken too seriously though, so its tone is spot on, and the game is endlessly quotable. For those reasons I think it succeeds at what it tries to do.
The gameplay attempts to refine SA1s most popular gameplay styles, Sonic’s Speed stages, Gamma’s shooting stages and Knuckles’ treasure hunting. Speed stages are just as fun as before, though more linear due to being designed for just Sonic and Shadow. This game introduce grind rails to the series, and while a little janky, they add to the high octane gameplay. The shooting levels with Dr Eggman and Tails are okay, I think the levels themselves can be pretty fun, but the control is very stiff and speed isn’t really a thing, which is so wierd as Gamma didn’t have this problem atall. The treasure hunting with Knuckles and Rouge took the biggest hit, as for some reason the you can only locate one emerald piece at a time, and some of these stages are huge.
It leads to a game that is more focussed, but it definitely has more obvious cracks. I still think overall it’s a fun game, and the boss fights are really good this time, except the Biolizard, not to be controversial, but I always thought this fight was super janky and way too long.
The music is fantastic, with every character getting their own style, as well as their own theme, and the main theme “Live and Learn” is one of the most iconic songs in the series.
SA2 is far from perfect, but if you can look past its cracks, I think it’s a lot of fun.
The music is PEAK!!!!
I HATE TAILS MISSIONS
I'd prefer if the whole game was just sonic/shadow levels
Best 3D Sonic game and one of the best 3D games to come out from the 6th/7th generation of consoles.
This review contains spoilers
The swan song of Sonic Team's time on Sega hardware: Sonic Adventure 2 is truly a one-of-a-kind game. While closest to Adventure 1 in styling and presentation, SA2 is really its own beast in terms of gameplay and storytelling. Instead of being an open-ended adventure RPG-like game, SA2 is instead a cutscene heavy arcade-style score attack action platformer. The combat is very simple just like classic Sonic, but much like Sonic the Hedgehog 2 did to the formula of Sonic 1, it expanded the challenge of the level design while fine tuning the controls to be more expressive. It pains me to imagine how great a true sequel to this game, like Sonic the Hedgehog 3 was to 2, could have been if it stuck to this trajectory.
It's hard to talk about anything other than the story in this game first, simply because the plot is so wonderfully written and presented compared to even the greatest 3D platformer stories around, both back then and today. This game's "story mode" is split between two long campaigns, the Hero Story and Dark Story, and a short finale similar to Super Sonic's in Adventure 1, simply titled "Last Story". Within each story you hop between three gameplay styles: Speed (Sonic and Shadow), Treasure Hunting (Knuckles and Rouge), and Shooting (Eggman and Tails). The plot is told chronologically from the perceptive from each team, with Dark Story starting slightly earlier as Eggman is the one to kick off the plot.
The Hero Story starts with Sonic escaping government capture for mysterious reasons, slowly revealed to be a doppelganger hedgehog stealing Chaos Emeralds for Eggman's plot to force the world into submission to his rule. Tails is quick to help break Sonic out of prison, and eventually Knuckles gets roped in as he is also looking to track the villains to find Master Emerald pieces that Rouge is after. But Eggman is not playing around like in Adventure 1, and he successfully blows up part of the moon in a threat to basically all world governments. So the team goes into space to chase him down to an abandoned space colony that he's using as his mega weapon, and the third act is just absolute bliss. Sonic, Tails, Knuckles, and Amy all get legendary character-defining scenes and this is by far my favorite portrayal of just about every character involved.
Dark Story, on the other hand, has a different appeal. While the heroes worked together and gave each other favors, all three dark members were secretly plotting against each other in some way. Eggman was the de facto ringleader for his boastful personality and legion of robots, but Shadow ultimately wanted to use him for his own goals of complete revenge against all of humanity. Rouge the Bat, my personal favorite of the lot, she assists the two of them just to get information and relay it to the President of the United States (a named and voiced character in this game). Many people make out Shadow to be this painfully edgy character, but his debut storyline is actually extremely well handled. He's been traumatized out of his short life of normalcy, and forced to take on false memories to fuel a desire for absolute destruction.
Speaking of Shadow's story, it crescendos at the Last Story, as both teams put aside their differences and create a temporary alliance to save the world from Gerald Robotnik's auto-crash sequence programmed into Space Colony ARK. As everyone else works together, Amy talks Shadow out of his confusion and he remembers Maria Robotnik, his only true friend, and what she truly said to him as she died instead of his false memory of her anger. In a moment of clarity, Shadow drops his entire mission to help the rest of the team stop the colony, eventually sacrificing himself to finish the job and warp them all back up to safety. The credits roll over the team meeting one last time and remembering the friend they all just lost, as Sonic cheers the rest up he says his final goodbye to someone he trusted the fate of the entire world to. The plot of this entire game wraps up so well and the ride is so fun, it's genuinely one of the strongest stories of any video game shooting for this age demographic.
In terms of gameplay, Sonic Adventure 2 is significantly more difficult and complex than its predecessor, SA1. Speed type characters are put in more precarious and action-packed scenarios than before, and the level design has expanded to become denser with alternate paths, secret nooks and crannies, and fancier setpieces. Though still simple to play and complete as a kid, the game now features a score grade system, in which you are evaluated for how fast you play, what tricks you pull off, finding secrets in the levels and taking optimal paths, et cetera. The gameplay might feel a bit less intuitive to start with, but with practice it becomes very expressive and fun. And with such a large number of levels and alternate objectives, there's always more to come back to here.
Treasure hunting, on the other hand, has expanded to become slower and more exploratory instead. Knuckles could easily find every emerald shard in the previous game in only a minute or two, but now the stages are greatly expanded in size and design variety. An unfortunate change is that the emerald detector now only gives one emerald's location at a time instead of all at once. However, it's not all bad as you get more familiar with the stage layouts and gradually get faster times for A ranks. Though, the final space stages for Knuckles and Rouge border on being a tad too large in my opinion, as casual playthroughs of the stages can easily pass 20 minutes which is rather tedious.
Shooting is an interesting case, as it's a continuation of the gameplay style e-102 Gamma had in the first Sonic Adventure. However, it's been retooled to fit a clunky Eggman mecha and then later to Tails' new mecha plane as well. Movement is a bit slower and more restrictive, and the focus is on racking up combos for points (and therefore achieve an A rank) as opposed to outpacing a level timer. It pains me that the movement took a hit as Gamma was actually quite nimble and fun to move with, though it does allow for some great new shooting gallery-style levels that take the concept further than Gamma ever could while he mostly reused Sonic stages. As far as platformer-shooter hybrids go, this one plays quite well and has great replay value, though it doesn't quite hold up against the PS2 Ratchet and Clank games. It has a similar feel to an on-rails shooter as well in the presentation of levels.
While those are the core gameplay styles, the game also has a couple more tricks up its sleeve. A couple highway driving levels are included, and they control more like a quick and dirty arcade racer than the kart racers most kids are familiar with. The controls are acceptable but rather strange feeling, but it's a short distraction for the most part. There's also the Chao Garden, which was greatly expanded from its limited options in the original Sonic Adventure. Chao can now have affinities for good or evil that lead them to becoming either Angel or Devil Chao, each with their own garden zone to hang out in. The races are longer and factor in more stats, and the VMU Chao Adventure game has also been greatly expanded in content (though it's still a Tamagotchi clone that will give you bad luck at random).
Chao raising is a long term process that takes longer than a full playthrough of the story mode, which encourages replaying the action stages for more animal buddies and chaos drives to boost stats for races. And the more you play the stages, the better you get and the higher your ranks trend. Every stage also has four side objectives, which also give letter ranks but only for completion time. All of this combined makes this game downright addicting and very hard to put down. Sonic Adventure 1 was a game that had me craving more, but Adventure 2 delivers on content just on the level of how replayable just about every part of it is. I was looking to get 100% completion on this playthrough but technical difficulties lead me to drop the task before finishing it. I'll give it another go one day, perhaps on Steam or with a more consistently working Dreamcast.
One thing I first got to appreciate with this replay has been the original Japanese voice acting, which is just as wonderful as in the previous game and is better timed to the cutscenes' animation than the notoriously poorly paced English dub. The Japanese cast really nailed every role out of the gate, and this game solidified their sound in a story more serious than ever before. Newcomers Shadow and Rouge have standout performances here just as they do in English. And luckily, both the American and Japanese discs are identical and include dual audio so you can choose which track you like more or switch as you feel like it. Just a head up: the Japanese version is much, much, much cheaper.
On the subject of the English cast, this is Ryan Drummond's best work on the character by far. Tails' voice (Connor Bringas, family member of previous Tails actor Corey Bringas) is an improvement, and Scott Drier as Knuckles is a different vibe but fits the character in this story extremely well. Deem Bristow's Eggman is an absolute treat and he's just lovely here as always. Much like almost every other character, Shadow (David Humphrey) and Rouge (Lani Minella) have this game's voices in my head and never the replacement actors they've had over the years. Jennifer Douillard as Amy isn't popular but I personally think she does a great job portraying the character's young naivety. The voice direction here is a lot more solid than before, with the drama coming out much more naturally as the characters emote more properly for their given situations. And given the strong cutscene direction, it all adds to a wonderful presentation, even as characters talk over each other unusually at points.
Of course, we cannot forget this game's absolutely legendary soundtrack. Running with the rock-electronic fusion sound Sonic Adventure is known for, SA2 expands the sound by giving each character their own distinct flavor of music. Sonic's stages are action-packed rock songs, Tails' more complex and on the progressive and synth-heavy side. Knuckles, on the other hand, has exquisite hip hop backing every stage for the slower nature of the gameplay. On the dark side, Eggman's tracks start dipping into metal sensibilities with heavy and menacing guitar and bass riffs. Shadow's music is mostly from an electronic post-grunge angle with some punk rock to spice things up. Finally, Rouge jams out to smooth and light jazz, perfect for the classy spy archetype she fits in the story.
Finishing thoughts: This was the final truly coherent Sonic the Hedgehog game. From Sonic 1 all the way until here, there was a clear progression and logical thread to the overarching series storyline. Some may feel Adventure was a grand departure from the classics, but in my opinion the jump isn't all that large. Sonic and friends simply moved onto life closer to people, and they factor more into Eggman's plots than before as he now wants to rule over people as well as nature. And a hollywood-style blockbuster story like this was a perfect capstone to Sonic Team's greatest years in my opinion. The hedgehog lives on in our hearts and continues to put out great games from time to time, but he will never be the same as that starry eyed hero who left us with the words "Sayonara, Shadow the Hedgehog".
It's hard to talk about anything other than the story in this game first, simply because the plot is so wonderfully written and presented compared to even the greatest 3D platformer stories around, both back then and today. This game's "story mode" is split between two long campaigns, the Hero Story and Dark Story, and a short finale similar to Super Sonic's in Adventure 1, simply titled "Last Story". Within each story you hop between three gameplay styles: Speed (Sonic and Shadow), Treasure Hunting (Knuckles and Rouge), and Shooting (Eggman and Tails). The plot is told chronologically from the perceptive from each team, with Dark Story starting slightly earlier as Eggman is the one to kick off the plot.
The Hero Story starts with Sonic escaping government capture for mysterious reasons, slowly revealed to be a doppelganger hedgehog stealing Chaos Emeralds for Eggman's plot to force the world into submission to his rule. Tails is quick to help break Sonic out of prison, and eventually Knuckles gets roped in as he is also looking to track the villains to find Master Emerald pieces that Rouge is after. But Eggman is not playing around like in Adventure 1, and he successfully blows up part of the moon in a threat to basically all world governments. So the team goes into space to chase him down to an abandoned space colony that he's using as his mega weapon, and the third act is just absolute bliss. Sonic, Tails, Knuckles, and Amy all get legendary character-defining scenes and this is by far my favorite portrayal of just about every character involved.
Dark Story, on the other hand, has a different appeal. While the heroes worked together and gave each other favors, all three dark members were secretly plotting against each other in some way. Eggman was the de facto ringleader for his boastful personality and legion of robots, but Shadow ultimately wanted to use him for his own goals of complete revenge against all of humanity. Rouge the Bat, my personal favorite of the lot, she assists the two of them just to get information and relay it to the President of the United States (a named and voiced character in this game). Many people make out Shadow to be this painfully edgy character, but his debut storyline is actually extremely well handled. He's been traumatized out of his short life of normalcy, and forced to take on false memories to fuel a desire for absolute destruction.
Speaking of Shadow's story, it crescendos at the Last Story, as both teams put aside their differences and create a temporary alliance to save the world from Gerald Robotnik's auto-crash sequence programmed into Space Colony ARK. As everyone else works together, Amy talks Shadow out of his confusion and he remembers Maria Robotnik, his only true friend, and what she truly said to him as she died instead of his false memory of her anger. In a moment of clarity, Shadow drops his entire mission to help the rest of the team stop the colony, eventually sacrificing himself to finish the job and warp them all back up to safety. The credits roll over the team meeting one last time and remembering the friend they all just lost, as Sonic cheers the rest up he says his final goodbye to someone he trusted the fate of the entire world to. The plot of this entire game wraps up so well and the ride is so fun, it's genuinely one of the strongest stories of any video game shooting for this age demographic.
In terms of gameplay, Sonic Adventure 2 is significantly more difficult and complex than its predecessor, SA1. Speed type characters are put in more precarious and action-packed scenarios than before, and the level design has expanded to become denser with alternate paths, secret nooks and crannies, and fancier setpieces. Though still simple to play and complete as a kid, the game now features a score grade system, in which you are evaluated for how fast you play, what tricks you pull off, finding secrets in the levels and taking optimal paths, et cetera. The gameplay might feel a bit less intuitive to start with, but with practice it becomes very expressive and fun. And with such a large number of levels and alternate objectives, there's always more to come back to here.
Treasure hunting, on the other hand, has expanded to become slower and more exploratory instead. Knuckles could easily find every emerald shard in the previous game in only a minute or two, but now the stages are greatly expanded in size and design variety. An unfortunate change is that the emerald detector now only gives one emerald's location at a time instead of all at once. However, it's not all bad as you get more familiar with the stage layouts and gradually get faster times for A ranks. Though, the final space stages for Knuckles and Rouge border on being a tad too large in my opinion, as casual playthroughs of the stages can easily pass 20 minutes which is rather tedious.
Shooting is an interesting case, as it's a continuation of the gameplay style e-102 Gamma had in the first Sonic Adventure. However, it's been retooled to fit a clunky Eggman mecha and then later to Tails' new mecha plane as well. Movement is a bit slower and more restrictive, and the focus is on racking up combos for points (and therefore achieve an A rank) as opposed to outpacing a level timer. It pains me that the movement took a hit as Gamma was actually quite nimble and fun to move with, though it does allow for some great new shooting gallery-style levels that take the concept further than Gamma ever could while he mostly reused Sonic stages. As far as platformer-shooter hybrids go, this one plays quite well and has great replay value, though it doesn't quite hold up against the PS2 Ratchet and Clank games. It has a similar feel to an on-rails shooter as well in the presentation of levels.
While those are the core gameplay styles, the game also has a couple more tricks up its sleeve. A couple highway driving levels are included, and they control more like a quick and dirty arcade racer than the kart racers most kids are familiar with. The controls are acceptable but rather strange feeling, but it's a short distraction for the most part. There's also the Chao Garden, which was greatly expanded from its limited options in the original Sonic Adventure. Chao can now have affinities for good or evil that lead them to becoming either Angel or Devil Chao, each with their own garden zone to hang out in. The races are longer and factor in more stats, and the VMU Chao Adventure game has also been greatly expanded in content (though it's still a Tamagotchi clone that will give you bad luck at random).
Chao raising is a long term process that takes longer than a full playthrough of the story mode, which encourages replaying the action stages for more animal buddies and chaos drives to boost stats for races. And the more you play the stages, the better you get and the higher your ranks trend. Every stage also has four side objectives, which also give letter ranks but only for completion time. All of this combined makes this game downright addicting and very hard to put down. Sonic Adventure 1 was a game that had me craving more, but Adventure 2 delivers on content just on the level of how replayable just about every part of it is. I was looking to get 100% completion on this playthrough but technical difficulties lead me to drop the task before finishing it. I'll give it another go one day, perhaps on Steam or with a more consistently working Dreamcast.
One thing I first got to appreciate with this replay has been the original Japanese voice acting, which is just as wonderful as in the previous game and is better timed to the cutscenes' animation than the notoriously poorly paced English dub. The Japanese cast really nailed every role out of the gate, and this game solidified their sound in a story more serious than ever before. Newcomers Shadow and Rouge have standout performances here just as they do in English. And luckily, both the American and Japanese discs are identical and include dual audio so you can choose which track you like more or switch as you feel like it. Just a head up: the Japanese version is much, much, much cheaper.
On the subject of the English cast, this is Ryan Drummond's best work on the character by far. Tails' voice (Connor Bringas, family member of previous Tails actor Corey Bringas) is an improvement, and Scott Drier as Knuckles is a different vibe but fits the character in this story extremely well. Deem Bristow's Eggman is an absolute treat and he's just lovely here as always. Much like almost every other character, Shadow (David Humphrey) and Rouge (Lani Minella) have this game's voices in my head and never the replacement actors they've had over the years. Jennifer Douillard as Amy isn't popular but I personally think she does a great job portraying the character's young naivety. The voice direction here is a lot more solid than before, with the drama coming out much more naturally as the characters emote more properly for their given situations. And given the strong cutscene direction, it all adds to a wonderful presentation, even as characters talk over each other unusually at points.
Of course, we cannot forget this game's absolutely legendary soundtrack. Running with the rock-electronic fusion sound Sonic Adventure is known for, SA2 expands the sound by giving each character their own distinct flavor of music. Sonic's stages are action-packed rock songs, Tails' more complex and on the progressive and synth-heavy side. Knuckles, on the other hand, has exquisite hip hop backing every stage for the slower nature of the gameplay. On the dark side, Eggman's tracks start dipping into metal sensibilities with heavy and menacing guitar and bass riffs. Shadow's music is mostly from an electronic post-grunge angle with some punk rock to spice things up. Finally, Rouge jams out to smooth and light jazz, perfect for the classy spy archetype she fits in the story.
Finishing thoughts: This was the final truly coherent Sonic the Hedgehog game. From Sonic 1 all the way until here, there was a clear progression and logical thread to the overarching series storyline. Some may feel Adventure was a grand departure from the classics, but in my opinion the jump isn't all that large. Sonic and friends simply moved onto life closer to people, and they factor more into Eggman's plots than before as he now wants to rule over people as well as nature. And a hollywood-style blockbuster story like this was a perfect capstone to Sonic Team's greatest years in my opinion. The hedgehog lives on in our hearts and continues to put out great games from time to time, but he will never be the same as that starry eyed hero who left us with the words "Sayonara, Shadow the Hedgehog".
Not much to say about it, I just really like it, although I feel that its legacy has done it more favors than it deserves. The thing is, I only ever wanna replay the sonic/shadow levels. Oh and prison island. Oh and pumpkin hill. Third best soundtrack in the series.
I've come to make an announcement; Shadow The Hedgehog's a bitch ass motherfucker, he pissed on my fucking wife. Thats right, he took his hedgehog quilly dick out and he pissed on my fucking wife, and he said his dick was "This big" and I said that's disgusting, so I'm making a callout post on my twitter dot com, Shadow the Hedgehog, you've got a small dick, it's the size of this walnut except WAY smaller, and guess what? Here's what my dong looks like: PFFFT, THAT'S RIGHT, BABY. ALL POINTS, NO QUILLS, NO PILLOWS. Look at that, it looks like two balls and a bong. He fucked my wife so guess what? I'm gonna fuck the Earth. THAT'S RIGHT THIS IS WHAT YOU GET, MY SUPER LASER PISS! Except I'm not gonna piss on the earth. I'm gonna go higher. I'M PISSING ON THE MOON! HOW DO YOU LIKE THAT, OBAMA? I PISSED ON THE MOON YOU IDIOT! YOU HAVE 23 HOURS BEFORE THE PISS DROPLETS HIT THE FUCKING EARTH NOW GET OUT OF MY SIGHT BEFORE I PISS ON YOU TOO.
YOU FAKE HEDGEHOG
They simply just do not make them like this anymore.
Wishes are eternal.
Wishes are eternal.
A decent follow-up to the previous title, but it loses a bit of the charm of the original. The two story structure is a bit easier to follow, but less creative. The game is easier to navigate than the first and a lot more straightforward, which means less time spent wondering around and more time spent doing important stuff.
Team Hero=Great with the exception of Tails mech stages
Team Dark=Quite lame with the exception of Rouge Treasure hunting stages. Game is very much half and half. Honestly though most of the game is perfectly fine, asides from Eggmans stages...which are barely stages.
Team Dark=Quite lame with the exception of Rouge Treasure hunting stages. Game is very much half and half. Honestly though most of the game is perfectly fine, asides from Eggmans stages...which are barely stages.
Shadow is a real ass nigga
elden ring but cool and edgy and awsome and rad and
Excelente! Foca ainda mais na narrativa e interação de personagens, algo que na minha opinião é o ponto forte de Sonic, e é o melhor jogo fazendo isso! História muito marcante e com uma maturidade que combina com a franquia. O fato da gameplay com os personagens diferentes de Sonic e Shadow ter um ritmo diferente e mais lento, atrapalha um pouco. É muito comum ver pessoas jogando as partes com os outros personagens às pressas para chegar logo nas fases com o Sonic, que de fato são as mais divertidas. Foi onde a SEGA mais chegou perto de fazer algo grandioso com a franquia dando certo, e gosto bastante do rumo que SA2 tomou. Aliás, as músicas desse jogo, são absurdamente boas
rollin around at the speed of sound
Sonic Adventure 1 and 2 were the first Sonic games I ever personally owned since I never had a Sega console prior to the Dreamcast, and let me tell you - I loved these games.
Sonic Adventure 2 specifically kicked ass.
But my fondest memory of Sonic Adventure 2 isn't the gameplay, Shadow, or any of other characters. No no. My fondest Sonic Adventure 2 memory is the Chao Garden and being able to play with my Chao on the VMU. That shit ruled. Loved my Chaos.
Sonic Adventure 2 specifically kicked ass.
But my fondest memory of Sonic Adventure 2 isn't the gameplay, Shadow, or any of other characters. No no. My fondest Sonic Adventure 2 memory is the Chao Garden and being able to play with my Chao on the VMU. That shit ruled. Loved my Chaos.
Only through time and experience can one gain the sagacity to realize they are a dope with worthless opinions. For four years, when asked the worst video game I've ever played, my default response would usually be this. I loathed it, based mostly on the fact it pissed me off. I remember finding Sonic and Knuckles unplayably jank, the levels all sloppily designed and the rest just generally unfun. The biggest problem in retrospect is that I went in with years of hearing every YouTuber I grew up with disparage the series. In my head, it was nothing but a disappointment factory from a failure company in the years where the Mario Galaxy brothers were collectively still my favourite game of all time. Hell, I don't think I'd have ever even played the damn thing if it wasn't for that Snapcube fan-dub. My opinion, as much as I hadn't realized it, was psychologically pre-emptive, established on experiences which weren't my own. Naturally, the one Sonic game I've played had to reflect that mediocrity. Then, now that I had a position, I found it bombarded by fans of the games or witnessed joy over a game I detested. Eventually, I began to respect the music and, having not touched the Chao garden my first time around, always heard that it was the best part and had to respect it. Originally despising the cast, I came to concede that most of them are quite lovable after playing Murder of Sonic the Hedgehog (though I still sort of detest Sonic's character). I watched videos by hazel and KingK, conceding more and more while still holding arrogantly on to my view out of mere tenacity and the gripping comfort of having a scapegoat. Something in me needed a game to be the worst, to be a 1/10 point of reference by which all could be weighed in displeasure.
Recently, I've been holding off on purchasing games, instead completing or achievement hunting in games that have sat on the backlog long enough to be fatal. Having only the achievements for the Hero Story and First Level, the scent of the burning witch beckoned me. I'd dip my toes in the Chao Garden, perhaps give a couple of the Villain Story levels the old college try. Out of what I can only assume to be trauma from my first run-in with Miss Adventure 2, I looked into graphics and physics mods, admittedly indulging in a few cheats to hasten and make less punishing my return. After some troubleshooting amidst which I complained of the game's awfulness, off I went. While feeling out the Chao Garden, I began to come to a realization. Immediately, the little details charmed me as I scanned the setpieces in the Chao's kindergarten. The mistranslations echoed the charm of the obscure B-titles I'd been playing. The music, textures and skyboxes encapsulated this perfect childhood feeling. The Chao system shocked me in it's complexity, and the damn things were so cute it made me uncomfortable. Between all that and my character of choice, Eggman, hobbling at mach 10 between the homely Japanese schoolhouse and serene Windows screensaver, I was having fun. Not planning to wait around for 3 hours for my two unleveled Chao to develop into an angel and devil, I tried my hand at the Villain Story. I constantly found myself stuck by odd or misremembered mechanics (seriously, why does this game have a power-up system instead of having all the moves from the start?), but it wasn't as unplayable as I remembered. At the very least, getting to bring little treats and creatures back to my baby Chao's after each stage made it all feel worth it (like a true parent enduring the hardships of capitalism, or in this case, Sonic gameplay). On the level White Jungle, however, a change took hold. I was... having a blast. The level flowed incredibly smoothly and intently. The shortcomings of the game began to feel like my own. I began resetting the stage when I died to keep my ring count up, feeling each mistake was my own. I zipped through the stage, tasting each alternative path and feeling out the little secrets for the most rings possible. After finally clearing it, I was awarded with an A-rank. My first playthrough, I got all D's and E's, but this... this felt good. The level felt good. The game felt good. I stayed up until 8AM not only clearing the rest of the Villain story, but clearing the whole Hero story again (no cloud saves, thanks Sega...), collapsing before reaching the final part. Meanwhile, my Chao were around level 40 and I was fueled by an urge to play more and more of the game, weighing whether I would watch my Chao into adulthood or chip my way up to 90 emblems. The last level stunk, and the last boss wasn't nearly the Pinnacle of Gaming hypefest I'd seen it sold as, but what I must note is this itching desire I have, even now, to keep playing. I want to play more, see everything this game has to offer, to love my Chao through each racing cup and to hoard those A-ranks. While a lot of the game is rough to play through and quite often unfun, these alone are not the marks of a 1/10 game.
Be it absolutely drinking up the aesthetics and music, my friend mocking me in Steam DMs or the powerful maternal instinct I developed for, now admittedly, probably the cutest video game character of all time, the "worst game" has merits that I feel like a cretin for trying to take away from people in outputting and arguing my hatred. The moral of all of this self-indulgent rambling is that rating games sucks (hence my lack of stars, though if I must put a number to it now, 3 stars, but that's far too vague given the range of quality). It's a practice locking our value of an object on one experience in one place. I detested Evangelion until I rewatched it at the height of my depression and loneliness, and now it's in my top 5. I dislike very few games, so unless the game is irredeemably degenerate (like I judged the lone king of my half-star rankings, Nekopara), games are art and art is always worth protecting no matter it's quality. A reading for my Moral Philosophy class has taught me that rose-tinting the interior world often extends its effects into the external world, and no doubt this ought to be applied each time a beloved game gets us heated. Give me your buggy, your jank and your low-budget and may we dance the nights away not as enemies, but hand-in-hand for this limited life we have.
Recently, I've been holding off on purchasing games, instead completing or achievement hunting in games that have sat on the backlog long enough to be fatal. Having only the achievements for the Hero Story and First Level, the scent of the burning witch beckoned me. I'd dip my toes in the Chao Garden, perhaps give a couple of the Villain Story levels the old college try. Out of what I can only assume to be trauma from my first run-in with Miss Adventure 2, I looked into graphics and physics mods, admittedly indulging in a few cheats to hasten and make less punishing my return. After some troubleshooting amidst which I complained of the game's awfulness, off I went. While feeling out the Chao Garden, I began to come to a realization. Immediately, the little details charmed me as I scanned the setpieces in the Chao's kindergarten. The mistranslations echoed the charm of the obscure B-titles I'd been playing. The music, textures and skyboxes encapsulated this perfect childhood feeling. The Chao system shocked me in it's complexity, and the damn things were so cute it made me uncomfortable. Between all that and my character of choice, Eggman, hobbling at mach 10 between the homely Japanese schoolhouse and serene Windows screensaver, I was having fun. Not planning to wait around for 3 hours for my two unleveled Chao to develop into an angel and devil, I tried my hand at the Villain Story. I constantly found myself stuck by odd or misremembered mechanics (seriously, why does this game have a power-up system instead of having all the moves from the start?), but it wasn't as unplayable as I remembered. At the very least, getting to bring little treats and creatures back to my baby Chao's after each stage made it all feel worth it (like a true parent enduring the hardships of capitalism, or in this case, Sonic gameplay). On the level White Jungle, however, a change took hold. I was... having a blast. The level flowed incredibly smoothly and intently. The shortcomings of the game began to feel like my own. I began resetting the stage when I died to keep my ring count up, feeling each mistake was my own. I zipped through the stage, tasting each alternative path and feeling out the little secrets for the most rings possible. After finally clearing it, I was awarded with an A-rank. My first playthrough, I got all D's and E's, but this... this felt good. The level felt good. The game felt good. I stayed up until 8AM not only clearing the rest of the Villain story, but clearing the whole Hero story again (no cloud saves, thanks Sega...), collapsing before reaching the final part. Meanwhile, my Chao were around level 40 and I was fueled by an urge to play more and more of the game, weighing whether I would watch my Chao into adulthood or chip my way up to 90 emblems. The last level stunk, and the last boss wasn't nearly the Pinnacle of Gaming hypefest I'd seen it sold as, but what I must note is this itching desire I have, even now, to keep playing. I want to play more, see everything this game has to offer, to love my Chao through each racing cup and to hoard those A-ranks. While a lot of the game is rough to play through and quite often unfun, these alone are not the marks of a 1/10 game.
Be it absolutely drinking up the aesthetics and music, my friend mocking me in Steam DMs or the powerful maternal instinct I developed for, now admittedly, probably the cutest video game character of all time, the "worst game" has merits that I feel like a cretin for trying to take away from people in outputting and arguing my hatred. The moral of all of this self-indulgent rambling is that rating games sucks (hence my lack of stars, though if I must put a number to it now, 3 stars, but that's far too vague given the range of quality). It's a practice locking our value of an object on one experience in one place. I detested Evangelion until I rewatched it at the height of my depression and loneliness, and now it's in my top 5. I dislike very few games, so unless the game is irredeemably degenerate (like I judged the lone king of my half-star rankings, Nekopara), games are art and art is always worth protecting no matter it's quality. A reading for my Moral Philosophy class has taught me that rose-tinting the interior world often extends its effects into the external world, and no doubt this ought to be applied each time a beloved game gets us heated. Give me your buggy, your jank and your low-budget and may we dance the nights away not as enemies, but hand-in-hand for this limited life we have.
Sometimes , you hate everything about a game in an unresonable ammount and don't feel like changing that because you can't be bothered to play another bad rouge or eggman stage just to finaly play as shadow .
It's funny, despite being somewhat of a hater of this game, I find myself disagreeing with a lot of the criticisms thrown at it. It's a perfectly functional game. Nothing about it makes it hard to enjoy for what it is. My take is that it's just too dumbed down from the first Adventure game and/or forgets a lot of the core ideas the series was built on from the beginning. A more casual fan or someone who's new to the series, likely will have an ok time at worst with this game. I'm just in too deep with this franchise to honestly enjoy much of what this game offers anymore. I don't dislike this game, but as a genuinely huge fan of the series as a whole, this isn't even in the top half of my personal Sonic tier list. Less "it's bad" and more "I've outgrown it". This is a game I find myself both adamantly defending, and also thoroughly tearing apart. I certainly will never understand how people say the camera is this game's worst enemy. Like bruh you may as well be saying you can't see what's coming in Crash Bandicoot. The game's a bunch of hallways with preset camera angles that give you the best possible view 99.5% of the time.
A lot of people say the game's 1/3rd good, referring to Sonic/Shadow's stages being the only good part. But imo they're the worst part by a long shot. There's nothing that makes the levels hard to play or poorly designed, they're just VERY straightforward. Not in a It's linear and therefor it's bad kind of way, but in a I feel like I'm playing a precursor to Sonic Forces kind of way. Goodbye to the idea that you can play at your own pace, speed being a reward for mastery of a level, with the core gameplay being about using momentum to your advantage. Hello samey empty hallways that shove you through at full speed with little to no effort. The varied landscapes of SA1 stages are nowhere to be seen. The ranking system added in this game is a great addition to the series, but in this case it feels like a bandaid solution. Ranking systems in Sonic are meant to really push the idea of replaying stages to get better at them, they're a seamless addition to the appeal of the Sonic formula. But in SA2 the system is skewed so hard to just killing enemies and hitting tricks. This is because your first playthrough of a SA2 stage is going to look VERY similar to your 20th and beyond. There's not really any mastery to be had, you can't really run down an empty path filled with dash pads and automated loops any better if you tried. And while getting an A rank is inherently satisfying to an extent, it's not enough to change the fact that SA2's speed levels are some of the most bare bones in the series. And every level is designed the same way.
Keep in mind this is coming from someone who REALLY values replay value in Sonic games and has replayed every single game in the series to a probably unhealthy degree. The average person will likely find no issue in how SA2's speed stages are handled. But for the same reasons Forces is a very limiting and uninteresting game to replay, SA2's levels do hit an expiration date. You can only run down the same shallow pathways so many times, hitting the same tricks for bonus points before you'd rather just play literally any other game in the series. This game's more boost to win than half the actual boost games are.
Mechs are inherently a bit more engaging and getting a higher rank is more satisfying as the gameplay style is designed entirely around getting higher combos for higher scores. Stretching your lock on as long as possible to aim as close to a perfect combo as you can is fun enough. It does get pretty repetitive really fast though as besides a very select few exceptions, there's very little in the way of level gimmicks to make many of them stand out. And platforming is mostly an afterthought. Any challenge really just comes from enemies with obnoxious placements. Still this segment of the game fares a bit better than the speed imo as it's more than just watching sonic run down a hallway. The Mechs just aren't even as satisfying to play as Amy from SA1 let alone Gamma who's their direct counterpart. The mere fact that you play as Eggman during half of these stages is enough to carry them for the first playthrough at least.
Treasure hunting is an interesting one. On paper it's a huge improvement over the ones from SA1. They get their own stages instead of piggybacking off existing Sonic stages. They get progressively bigger and more complex. Knuckles' movement and combat is now more acrobatic and fast than before. But they decided to use these levels as hard padding unfortunately by gutting the radar to only being able to find 1 emerald at a time, in a strict order. I understand nerfing the hint system from SA1 but they could have just made it a stationary arrow or SOMETHING, because the hint system is completely worthless to 99% of players now. Let alone later in the game when they put the text given to you by the hints in reverse...noissap ym si ngised emaG. Like they were just trying to be as annoying and unusable as possible seemingly on purpose here. Despite my complaints though these are definitely the best levels in the game. There's actually a lot of nuance to these stages not really present in the rest of the game. It's the only style that feels rewarding to master because of it. Simply optimizing how you're navigating the levels and its obstacles, and finding a quick route to check the most areas as fast as possible, feels great! I never memorized many of the hints, as there's so many different emerald locations and so many of the worst hints ever written by man that it's beyond me. But, unlike the speed stages, your rank is largely determined by...your speed. This makes consistently getting A ranks actually satisfying since it's not just about I pressed A in the right spots and killed enough enemies like in the speed levels, and more about actually getting good at the stages. (Since there's ROOM to get good at these ones) but also leads into the problem that the treasure hunting stages are honestly best without worrying about your rank. They're such an RNG nightmare and the stages quickly get WAY too big for the radar they give you. Just flying around Pumpkin Hill and vibing to the music and aesthetic is enough to make Knuckles' portion enjoyable. But this game's entirely built around you wanting to get A ranks and rewarding you for doing so. I think more people would enjoy the treasure hunting stages for what they are, if they didn't feel like anything other than an A rank meant well gee now I just have to play it again It goes against the entire appeal of the style I think.
So speed has very lacking, repetitive, mostly unengaging level design. Mechs are the most unfun to control things in this series and also too repetitive to be replayable in the slightest. And treasure hunting has room to be a really fun portion of the game but is still held back by flat out bad design choices. Story presentation is honestly the ONLY area that was objectively improved over SA1. Sonic doesn't make goofy faces while delivering his goofy dialogue that means the game's better I suppose? Eggman has a mouth that can open this time around so that's huge.
It definitely feels like a more polished game from a presentation standpoint, but if you go for 100% it honestly pushes the engine REALLY thin for what it can handle. Every level has 5 missions and really the further I get into doing these the more exhausted I get by the game. Hunting for the mystic music flute for every character with very little idea which level it might be in and hunting for the chao gets really obnoxious in a lot of these stages. I just don't think most of these stages were good enough to warrant having 5 missions in each one. You'll quickly blast through all the decent ones and be left with the worst stages getting worse and worse with each mission. Gotta love doing 100 ring missions in a game that spawns enemies on top of your head. Or the chill vibes of the treasure hunting stages getting even more obliterated by having a time limit as one of the missions. The missions are all the same across every level and gameplay style, it gets so exhausting by the end of getting 180 emblems. And for what? An extra average level unlocked once you get all of them?
This game's got it all, a complete lack of depth leading to boredom and no replay value, and total frustration through trying to 100% it at the same time! As well as a Chao garden that's more charming than it is actually fun. Sonic fans will really hold a grudge for literal decades on perceived "non-sonic" gameplay ideas like Big the Cat, or Amy...And sit there watching their chao do 30 really slow races for hours. Not to talk too much trash on chao, I do really like them and have had my fun with them, especially on Dreamcast where there's a bit of a Tamagotchi angle from the VMU's. And the depth in raising them is super interesting and the exact kinda thing I love out of classic niche games. I just don't understand Sonic fans. I feel like this game is given a huge pass given it's what introduced a LOT of people to the series. But to me it doesn't really feature much I love about this series. Seems to me a lot of people fell in love with this game and proceeded to hate almost every game after it despite (imo) those games being more faithful to the Sonic Formula and therefor more engaging than this one. To make a probably weird correlation... SA2 is to Sonic what Skyrim is to Elder Scrolls/rpgs in general.
This game's kind of the start of people preferring the dumbed down route for sonic games. The series even 20+ years later struggles to escape the shadow of the obscenely undeserved and double standard ridden pedestal SA2 is sitting on. SA2 being one of the most popular games in the series puts Sega in an unwinnable position. Trying to make a game more engaging than SA2 filters a LOT of people. But making a game as shallow as SA2 gets SA2 elitists scoffing and pretending their game is the Smash Bros Melee of Sonic when actually it's the Brawl at best. I don't mean to trash on other's opinions, I could just as easily talk about why I have a good time with this game. This is just my perception of SA2's place in the series and why despite me not actively disliking the game I find it doesn't hold up to much scrutiny.
It's fine but it's not even in the top 13 best sonic games available on the Gamecube alone. Still I've managed to get all 180 emblems on both Xbox360 and Steam, as well as beating it on the Dreamcast. Lotta highs lotta lows, more lows the more I play it though as I've honestly just outgrown the level design long story short.
A lot of people say the game's 1/3rd good, referring to Sonic/Shadow's stages being the only good part. But imo they're the worst part by a long shot. There's nothing that makes the levels hard to play or poorly designed, they're just VERY straightforward. Not in a It's linear and therefor it's bad kind of way, but in a I feel like I'm playing a precursor to Sonic Forces kind of way. Goodbye to the idea that you can play at your own pace, speed being a reward for mastery of a level, with the core gameplay being about using momentum to your advantage. Hello samey empty hallways that shove you through at full speed with little to no effort. The varied landscapes of SA1 stages are nowhere to be seen. The ranking system added in this game is a great addition to the series, but in this case it feels like a bandaid solution. Ranking systems in Sonic are meant to really push the idea of replaying stages to get better at them, they're a seamless addition to the appeal of the Sonic formula. But in SA2 the system is skewed so hard to just killing enemies and hitting tricks. This is because your first playthrough of a SA2 stage is going to look VERY similar to your 20th and beyond. There's not really any mastery to be had, you can't really run down an empty path filled with dash pads and automated loops any better if you tried. And while getting an A rank is inherently satisfying to an extent, it's not enough to change the fact that SA2's speed levels are some of the most bare bones in the series. And every level is designed the same way.
Keep in mind this is coming from someone who REALLY values replay value in Sonic games and has replayed every single game in the series to a probably unhealthy degree. The average person will likely find no issue in how SA2's speed stages are handled. But for the same reasons Forces is a very limiting and uninteresting game to replay, SA2's levels do hit an expiration date. You can only run down the same shallow pathways so many times, hitting the same tricks for bonus points before you'd rather just play literally any other game in the series. This game's more boost to win than half the actual boost games are.
Mechs are inherently a bit more engaging and getting a higher rank is more satisfying as the gameplay style is designed entirely around getting higher combos for higher scores. Stretching your lock on as long as possible to aim as close to a perfect combo as you can is fun enough. It does get pretty repetitive really fast though as besides a very select few exceptions, there's very little in the way of level gimmicks to make many of them stand out. And platforming is mostly an afterthought. Any challenge really just comes from enemies with obnoxious placements. Still this segment of the game fares a bit better than the speed imo as it's more than just watching sonic run down a hallway. The Mechs just aren't even as satisfying to play as Amy from SA1 let alone Gamma who's their direct counterpart. The mere fact that you play as Eggman during half of these stages is enough to carry them for the first playthrough at least.
Treasure hunting is an interesting one. On paper it's a huge improvement over the ones from SA1. They get their own stages instead of piggybacking off existing Sonic stages. They get progressively bigger and more complex. Knuckles' movement and combat is now more acrobatic and fast than before. But they decided to use these levels as hard padding unfortunately by gutting the radar to only being able to find 1 emerald at a time, in a strict order. I understand nerfing the hint system from SA1 but they could have just made it a stationary arrow or SOMETHING, because the hint system is completely worthless to 99% of players now. Let alone later in the game when they put the text given to you by the hints in reverse...noissap ym si ngised emaG. Like they were just trying to be as annoying and unusable as possible seemingly on purpose here. Despite my complaints though these are definitely the best levels in the game. There's actually a lot of nuance to these stages not really present in the rest of the game. It's the only style that feels rewarding to master because of it. Simply optimizing how you're navigating the levels and its obstacles, and finding a quick route to check the most areas as fast as possible, feels great! I never memorized many of the hints, as there's so many different emerald locations and so many of the worst hints ever written by man that it's beyond me. But, unlike the speed stages, your rank is largely determined by...your speed. This makes consistently getting A ranks actually satisfying since it's not just about I pressed A in the right spots and killed enough enemies like in the speed levels, and more about actually getting good at the stages. (Since there's ROOM to get good at these ones) but also leads into the problem that the treasure hunting stages are honestly best without worrying about your rank. They're such an RNG nightmare and the stages quickly get WAY too big for the radar they give you. Just flying around Pumpkin Hill and vibing to the music and aesthetic is enough to make Knuckles' portion enjoyable. But this game's entirely built around you wanting to get A ranks and rewarding you for doing so. I think more people would enjoy the treasure hunting stages for what they are, if they didn't feel like anything other than an A rank meant well gee now I just have to play it again It goes against the entire appeal of the style I think.
So speed has very lacking, repetitive, mostly unengaging level design. Mechs are the most unfun to control things in this series and also too repetitive to be replayable in the slightest. And treasure hunting has room to be a really fun portion of the game but is still held back by flat out bad design choices. Story presentation is honestly the ONLY area that was objectively improved over SA1. Sonic doesn't make goofy faces while delivering his goofy dialogue that means the game's better I suppose? Eggman has a mouth that can open this time around so that's huge.
It definitely feels like a more polished game from a presentation standpoint, but if you go for 100% it honestly pushes the engine REALLY thin for what it can handle. Every level has 5 missions and really the further I get into doing these the more exhausted I get by the game. Hunting for the mystic music flute for every character with very little idea which level it might be in and hunting for the chao gets really obnoxious in a lot of these stages. I just don't think most of these stages were good enough to warrant having 5 missions in each one. You'll quickly blast through all the decent ones and be left with the worst stages getting worse and worse with each mission. Gotta love doing 100 ring missions in a game that spawns enemies on top of your head. Or the chill vibes of the treasure hunting stages getting even more obliterated by having a time limit as one of the missions. The missions are all the same across every level and gameplay style, it gets so exhausting by the end of getting 180 emblems. And for what? An extra average level unlocked once you get all of them?
This game's got it all, a complete lack of depth leading to boredom and no replay value, and total frustration through trying to 100% it at the same time! As well as a Chao garden that's more charming than it is actually fun. Sonic fans will really hold a grudge for literal decades on perceived "non-sonic" gameplay ideas like Big the Cat, or Amy...And sit there watching their chao do 30 really slow races for hours. Not to talk too much trash on chao, I do really like them and have had my fun with them, especially on Dreamcast where there's a bit of a Tamagotchi angle from the VMU's. And the depth in raising them is super interesting and the exact kinda thing I love out of classic niche games. I just don't understand Sonic fans. I feel like this game is given a huge pass given it's what introduced a LOT of people to the series. But to me it doesn't really feature much I love about this series. Seems to me a lot of people fell in love with this game and proceeded to hate almost every game after it despite (imo) those games being more faithful to the Sonic Formula and therefor more engaging than this one. To make a probably weird correlation... SA2 is to Sonic what Skyrim is to Elder Scrolls/rpgs in general.
This game's kind of the start of people preferring the dumbed down route for sonic games. The series even 20+ years later struggles to escape the shadow of the obscenely undeserved and double standard ridden pedestal SA2 is sitting on. SA2 being one of the most popular games in the series puts Sega in an unwinnable position. Trying to make a game more engaging than SA2 filters a LOT of people. But making a game as shallow as SA2 gets SA2 elitists scoffing and pretending their game is the Smash Bros Melee of Sonic when actually it's the Brawl at best. I don't mean to trash on other's opinions, I could just as easily talk about why I have a good time with this game. This is just my perception of SA2's place in the series and why despite me not actively disliking the game I find it doesn't hold up to much scrutiny.
It's fine but it's not even in the top 13 best sonic games available on the Gamecube alone. Still I've managed to get all 180 emblems on both Xbox360 and Steam, as well as beating it on the Dreamcast. Lotta highs lotta lows, more lows the more I play it though as I've honestly just outgrown the level design long story short.
The vibes were on point but they forgot to make like 60% of the game fun
Pour la maniabilité et les niveaux knuckles et rouge... Je ne peux pas mettre plus même si c'est un grand nom.
literalmente a ápice dos jogos de sonic (3D) e vocês não estão preparados pra essa conversa