My partner is a big fan of VNs, so when Sega released this April Fool’s Day surprise a week and a bit ago, we knew we had to take a look. Her and I had a lot of fun playing through it and voicing the characters ourselves, and it took us about 3 hours to play through it.
The Murder of Sonic the Hedgehog is, as the name implies, a story about the murder of Sonic the Hedgehog! Sonic and his friends are all abord a special event train for Amy Rose’s birthday party, and a murder mystery is the event in question! You play a gender ambiguous staff member aboard this train, and it’s your first day on the job, so it’s your duty to make sure everything goes smoothly! But when things start going weird, it begins to look like everything may not be as it seems aboard your murdery mystery train, so you team up with detective Tails to try and solve the case! The end result is a really delightful story! It’s a cute and funny story full of good humor and fun references for those who are big Sonic fans (but still make for fun jokes in themselves for those who aren’t as familiar with it).
The gameplay is a visual novel, but it’s more like a little Ace Attorney-style adventure than a long book with pictures. The mystery itself is far from Ace Attorney-levels of difficult, but it’s still a load of fun either way. Interspersed with those VN segments are parts where you “get your thoughts in order”, which here means an infinite runner that’s themed like the old Sonic 2-style bonus stages (though mercifully without the 3D element). The best part of those action segments is that, while they get pretty damn tough by the end, you have a ton of tools at your disposal in the menu to make them as easy and forgiving as you wish if you’d rather just have a VN rather than a platforming challenge.
The presentation is great! The character portraits do an excellent job of getting across the emotions of familiar characters and they complement the writing wonderfully. The music is also very fun, and the pixel art in the infinite runner sections is very nice and retro-Sonic-y as well.
Verdict: Highly Recommended. A truly excellent game, no two ways about it. It’s not just a funny April Fool’s joke. It’s genuinely a really fun and well-written VN, and one of Sega’s best considered and put together Sonic projects in years. If you like VNs and especially if you like Sonic, this is a free game that is 1000% worth your time and then some.
The Murder of Sonic the Hedgehog is, as the name implies, a story about the murder of Sonic the Hedgehog! Sonic and his friends are all abord a special event train for Amy Rose’s birthday party, and a murder mystery is the event in question! You play a gender ambiguous staff member aboard this train, and it’s your first day on the job, so it’s your duty to make sure everything goes smoothly! But when things start going weird, it begins to look like everything may not be as it seems aboard your murdery mystery train, so you team up with detective Tails to try and solve the case! The end result is a really delightful story! It’s a cute and funny story full of good humor and fun references for those who are big Sonic fans (but still make for fun jokes in themselves for those who aren’t as familiar with it).
The gameplay is a visual novel, but it’s more like a little Ace Attorney-style adventure than a long book with pictures. The mystery itself is far from Ace Attorney-levels of difficult, but it’s still a load of fun either way. Interspersed with those VN segments are parts where you “get your thoughts in order”, which here means an infinite runner that’s themed like the old Sonic 2-style bonus stages (though mercifully without the 3D element). The best part of those action segments is that, while they get pretty damn tough by the end, you have a ton of tools at your disposal in the menu to make them as easy and forgiving as you wish if you’d rather just have a VN rather than a platforming challenge.
The presentation is great! The character portraits do an excellent job of getting across the emotions of familiar characters and they complement the writing wonderfully. The music is also very fun, and the pixel art in the infinite runner sections is very nice and retro-Sonic-y as well.
Verdict: Highly Recommended. A truly excellent game, no two ways about it. It’s not just a funny April Fool’s joke. It’s genuinely a really fun and well-written VN, and one of Sega’s best considered and put together Sonic projects in years. If you like VNs and especially if you like Sonic, this is a free game that is 1000% worth your time and then some.