Ugh. This game was such a mess. Full disclosure. I played this singleplayer. And while I know this game was built around multiplayer, I still want to judge this as a singleplayer expierence. A good co-op game can handle both.
I think it was slightly better than I expected. But my expectations were pretty low going in.
First off; looks decent enough, sounds pretty good. And feels good to play. Physics and controls feel good.
And every once and while the level design is kinda clever.
There were ideas where I was like "oh nice! I like that"
But those moments were far too rare. Most of the time the level design was fiiine. Not as bad as Sonic 4. But not even close to the heights of games like Sonic 3, or even the Advance series. And FOR SURE not as good as Mania.
It all seems pretty forgettable.
Same goes for the new mechanics. The powerups you get from the emeralds are so pointless in my experience. I just forgot I had them most of the game, until the game forced me to use them. Pretty lame.
The game really fell apart during the boss fights for me. They're obnoxious. Lots of waiting around for openings. Lots of instant kill traps that give you the pleasure of redoing those patience tests over and over. Especially the final boss. This is such a shame because the boss fights were Mania's x-factor in my opinion. That game's boss' were excellent and such a golden standard for 2D sonic design.
To see the game take such a massive nose-dive is, once again, so disappointing.
Lots of stuff was just sorta happening as well? Like sometimes it'd give me an option to play as another character for a stage. Those specific stages felt made for those specific characters, but the main stages I was playing did not feel specifically designed for Amy. So are there just randomly specific stages in specific zones made for specific characters? And there was one stage were you just collect fruit? There's a pointless world-map similar to Generation that I saw only a few times because the game forceably placed me in after some special zones.
Things just sometimes felt they were happening for no rhyme or reason and didn't give me any incentive to figure out what the game is making me do. I played the game like a 2D Sonic game, and felt I was missing what the game wanted from me at times.
Special stages were very NOT fun and I never felt I was in control at all. Just swung around hoping the emerald decided to line itself up with me.
The collectable coins felt pretty pointless when I realized it was only used on a custom robot character that I will probably never use.
Last thing to complain about was the themes they chose for the stages. They all felt SO safe. This may be one of my least favorite things about this game. The identity crisis this series has is almost a staple element of this IP at this point. After all of the talk and critque on returning stages in Mania, to the constant reliance on Greenhill, to see the same ol' song and dance with the level themes was so insanely disappointing. I wanted something that felt was refreshing as Press Garden or Studiopolis. But this felt closer to New Super Mario Bros. Which is NOT a compliment in the slightest, obviously.
Nothing felt satisfying or remarkable. Just all very whatever.
I do feel this had some serious potential with how it feels. But it falls so insanely flat.
I hope this isn't blindly praised by the Sonic fan zeitgeist.
Sonic deserves better. But I feel I say that about almost every Sonic game.