Sonic Frontiers was the first Sonic game I've ever bought on release date, and as someone who first got into Sonic around the time Generations was the newest game and Lost World's trailer soon dropped, I was excited to have the chance to play a Sonic game on release. I missed my chances with Lost World and Forces (luckily for both) since I didn't have a Wii U at the time of the former and I didn't have the money at the time of the later, and when I heard of the bad reviews I decided I didn't want it. This game though? I played it one launch and loved it to death, and it became my favourite Sonic game of all time. Recently on my quest to play every mainline Sonic game (which turned into doing it within 2023) and ranking them, I can say it's not my favourite, but it's damn close to being there. I think open world Sonic is just such a good formula, and while it may not be perfectly executed, I still had a blast. Finally playing a Sonic game with a good story since when I became a Sonic fan feels really good. Everything from Generations to Forces was really lacking in the story department, which sucked because I grew up with Unleashed (and Generations but kid me didn't care for story). I really like how the characters were portrayed and their relationships with Sonic felt really organic, something that hasn't been in the series for quite some time. The controls are fine for the most part, but not the best in the boost formula. I'm mainly talking about the turning, which is really highlighted in The Final Horizon, but I'll mention that in my review of that mainly. I'll mainly talk about the base game and not The Final Horizon, but my only critique of the main game is that Ouranos Island feels super rushed and you can tell. Kronos Island was a decent introduction that I enjoyed exploring, but Ares and Chaos Islands were the highlight, especially the former. I normally don't like desert themed levels, but Ares Island (along with Shamar/Arid Sands in Sonic Unleashed) is easily one of my favourites and it's impressive that a theme I usually hate was executed so well enough here. Chaos Island can be a little confusing to navigate at times, but I really like the overall theme of the area aesthetically. Rhea Island was really good because I love the platforming challenges, and even though that and Ouranos are aesthetically just Kronos Island, Rhea has the excuse of being a mini challenge section. Ouranos is underwhelming as a result and the amount of Memory Tokens you need is quite a bit as well, which slowed down the pacing for me. I love the new combat system, while the Guardians can be a little annoying to fight if you don't know their gimmicks, the new moves make combat so much more fun (as opposed to something like the rooms in Sonic Rush requiring you to kill x amount of enemies with the two moves available). The Titan battles are the highlight of the game and are some of my favourite moments in the series, which amazing music to go with it and it gives me chills with each boss going forward. I would be super excited to go through the next island to get to the next boss in my first playthrough, and I still love them now. I'll talk about updates 1 and 2 here so I can dedicate The Final Horizon to that page on here, but I adore jukebox mode not only for the great song choices, but also for adding a lot of additional exploration, especially in Rhea Island which desperately needed it. As for update 2, I actually did this run on New Game Plus, which made leveling up Sonic a lot easier and made beating up enemies super satisfying since I was an unbeatable force to be reckoned with. I still need to put more time in to check out some of the other features that I didn't use in my rush to get to The Final Horizon, but other than that, I'm really satisfied with the final product.

Edit: Forgot to mention the Cyber Space levels. While they probably are nostalgia bait since they take parts of previous existing levels in the series, I think it gets a pass (as opposed to Forces) because not only is there a lore explanation as to why these are returning, but I feel like considering this game is basically a tie in to literally every other mainline game, I think this actually works in favour of the game and its themes. The callbacks to other games are great, though some feel like reaches (mainly the Dark Gaia one which was kind of weird, but appreciated). I only wish they used more themes for the levels instead of the same four especially since most of those are pretty overused.

Overall, I would say while Frontiers is not a perfect game, I would say that this is easily one of my favourites in the series, working well to create a baseline for what could be the perfect Sonic formula in my eyes.