This was awful wtf

So, Mania's strengths come from being a celebration of Classic Sonic's greatest hits, and then building off that. I had this expectation in my head that Superstars could be similar, but not from standpoint of celebrating Sonic itself, but the people who contribute to it - a new title across two developers with a soundtrack featuring old and new artists across the series. Even if the weak links refused to bring their best game (cough cough), there would be something creatively valuable about the grab-bag nature of the final product. And even if it wasn't complex or cinematic in the way 3K and Mania are, it could still be a nice comfort food game, like the 8-bit titles.

The first four zones of Superstars are good, with only a few hangups. And then Lagoon City hits, and the money runs out HARD. The visuals lose all their post-production VFX and lush topology, leaving a naked 3D tilemap and a ugly blurry skybox behind. The level design drops from that golden balance of rolling hills to fangame-tier boxy rooms with nothing but moving platforms and instant death crushers. The 2.5D loops from Bridge Island disappear for the rest of the game until Frozen Base for some reason. The already-sluggish bosses turn into auto-scrollers, the already-terrible boss theme gets replaced with the most embarrassing try-hard drivel I've heard in my life, level mechanics that were already stolen from other Sonic games start getting re-used in later levels (there are FIVE acts in this game with pinball mechanics), and so on.

And I have a right mind to blame Arzest for this side of the shit, cause everything in this game that feels miserable is a flavor they would've saved for whatever shovelware Nintendo would commission them for. The auto-scrollers, earthquake effects that are visually disconnected from the foreground playfield, the re-using mechanics across zones to pad out time, the random shmup section (i say this out of hyperbole but fr the fantasy zone reference is really cute), a final zone that makes you play the same act twice in reverse - tell me this isn't shit that would pop up in a no-name Yoshi outing. I'm a firm believer Sonic needs to diversify its inspirations if it wants to keep flourishing as a franchise, but all of these ideas feel totally incompatible with the structure, expected length and flow of a Sonic game, let alone one with consistently middling/bad level design. The only thing I can't hold against them, is knowing that even if they had better ideas, Sega-Sammy wouldn't have given them the resources to fully-realize it anyway.

If I can be generous, I'll rapid fire a few things I like:
+The snake that weaves across all of Sand Sanctuary is super cool, def my favorite new stage gimmick
+Emerald powers are a great new concept, they just need to replace the overly-context-sensitive ones. Fire/Timestop/Clones/Vines can stay, Vision/Water can go
+Trip's cute and really fun to play as and I look forward to fans injecting her into a better game

(side note - out of all of Jun's songs, most songs with good melodies are arranged mostly fine here (i like sky temple and press factory 1), and the ones that sound like ass aren't good compositions in the first place, so, my condolences to fan remixers trying and failing to salvage them)

Maybe I would've liked this more if I played it at a different time. I'm working on a vaguely Sonic-styled platformer as I write this, and who's to say that's not making me pickier about what 'belongs' in a game like this. I look at 3K, and I look at the sense of impact and propulsion that goes on in the balancing act of automation and platforming, and I really want to replicate that in a different structural context - so when I play this, and that philosophy is absent, it pisses me off. I could easily see myself replaying this in 2-3 years and coming out with a glowing smile.

But on the other hand, everything I liked here is done equally good in other Sonic games too.

And sixty fucking dollars holy SHIT-