That shit was soooooooooooooooo much fun. The spritework, music, and goofy Saturday morning cartoon story really packs a nostalgic punch while showing you a peak you're likely looking for if you adore a more modern version of classics. Think something akin to Sonic Mania from the classics instead of Sonic Generations. With a few tweaks here and there, this feels like the peak of what Mega Man should aim to look like and make you feel in comparison to the classics. Truly a whole 'holy shit, two cakes!' scenario for me.

6.5/10
Not gonna lie, hurts my soul a bit as a die-hard Sonic fan.

The game presents you with a very hot-and-cold presentation.. the whole time. The beautiful preview trailers? Meet the in-game cutscenes where the quality is half of what those drawn trailers had before, filled with random cartoon sound effects whenever an action or emotion is displayed. The insane Tee Lopes music? Only about 5 tracks, most of which are used for the first few levels, and most of the rest of the soundtrack ends up being the beautiful shitfarts Sonic 4 brought. The level design that the critics, fans, and all the preview demos showed off? Pretty much gone after the first two or so zones, where the game becomes Sonic 4 once again and makes everything about weird, annoying gimmicks that change up the game - and also falls in love with block platforming. Sometimes you get peak Sonic, other times you get Sonic 4. No, not Episode 2.

The gameplay -
It's great. Classic Sonic physics with movesets that suit all the characters. Sonic controls perfectly (miss the insta-shield tho), Tails is cool and can kinda? fall faster while holding down during his long, laggy flights. Knuckles has a little too much endlag with his glide, and jumps off the wall randomly when trying to climb stuff, and Amy... is simple but fun - double jump is nice, but that grounded hammer walk move is beyond useless. She should have came with that mini-dropdash she had in Sonic Origins' S3K. Point is, they all control fine. (Trip, the unlockable character, is really fun too! Can climb walls in a cool way, and has a great double jump. Great addition - design-wise not so sure though).
The Emerald Powers are okay. I don't like the random prompts they give you to use in level designs, feels a little too forced and gimmicky, but they're useful for cheesing certain parts that give you trouble. Getting them all is a bit of a hassle though, since the Special Stage rings aren't that easy to find, and the Special Stages themselves are a bit wonky to master - chasing the emerald feels inconsistent and unfair at times. I ended up never using them unless I was upset or trying to get past an annoying part of the game, since running around as Sonic is normally fun enough when the level design is good.
When playing the well designed stages (Speed Jungle Act 1, Carnival whatever acts 1 and 2, and Bridge Island), the game is REALLY fun. The music is killing it, the platforming isn't too blocky, with SO many ways to travel and keep moving forward, and you get to use the physics of classic Sonic gameplay to the highest degree. Bridge Island is nearly a perfect Sonic zone to me!
Unfortunately, the game dips in quality in the later levels, with shitfart music all over the place, block platforming level design, constant walls you run into, gimmicks that prevent going fast (Speed Jungle's lowered vision gimmick, 0 gravity sections in the final zone, the auto-scroller sections in Golden whatever, etc), and obstacles that murder you like bottomless pits and crushing blocks. These are EVERYWHERE, making up most of the last 7 or 8 zones you have to go through. and what are you rewarded with at the end of these acts/zones? Bosses that throw the most obvious patterns at you, but make you wait 15 seconds every time until you can actually hit them. They end up being a chore more than a challenge that you get bored/lazy and accidentally get hit and die, resetting the process and making you wait to beat the boss again. Yes, I said WAITING to beat the boss, because it really isn't a challenge... until you meet the last few bosses. These become a little challenging, while wasting even more of your time! An average Sonic Mania boss will take you about a minute to two, whereas an average Sonic Superstars boss will take on average 3 to 7 minutes. They hide around way too much that it just drags on way too long. Definitely the worst part of the game for me - especially when it plays the dogshit shitfart music that they clearly held onto from Sonic 4: Episode 3 before they canceled it. All three final bosses took me over an hour each simply because dying makes you spend so much time retrying to get back to the same spot, only to die to some bullshit you had no way of knowing was coming at you, killing you instantly (Yes, fuck you Fang!). Waiting this much has never been an issue for Sonic games, so I hope they really patch some of these and compare and contrast to similar bosses in the series that do this archetype correctly (Sonic Mania's Studiopolis Act 1 boss, most of Sonic Advance 2's bosses, 3D Sonic bosses). I cannot express how much sadness these boss battles gave me - it really felt like my time was being wasted, and I won't be replaying this game unless the bosses get fixed or I use a mod to outright remove most of them.

Presentation, Music and Narrative -
Just a classic Sonic game. The cutscenes being made by two different teams (one good, one bad!) made things very jarring and inconsistent. Otherwise, it was okay. The stage themes were great - but the presentation was not. Very good ideas, but it just looked pretty bad. Game looks like a 3DS game and that shit died in like 2018 (peak 3DS, at least). The water zone was really cool! But it looked like blocks and shit because those are just easier to make and model. Makes me wish the game was fully sprite-based again, because this was certainly not their strong suit.

Some of the music was phenomenal. Sand Sanctuary, Lagoon City Act 2, Speed Jungle Act 1, both Bridge Islands and Pinball Carnivals are INSANE bops! They fit their environments well, and paint a beautiful picture for you as you run through the zones. and then the rest of the game either goes from acceptable to Sonic 4 shit... aka inconsistent again! Wonder why? Those zones and act songs I listed were done mostly by Tee Lopes... the rest? Jun, and a list of 20 other composers. All to create a bunch of songs that have no purpose - they don't fit the environments, and bank on the Genesis drums to give you that feeling of nostalgia that we are LONG passed on with the Sonic series. Why did they spread this project between this many people, when it should clearly have been headed by Tee Lopes (and following his design philosophies) and Tyson Hesse (art department, cutscenes, etc). Well, I know the reason, but it makes me upset regardless. Feels like the staff paid a few very talented folks to make sure the stuff they presented in the demos and to the public were phenomenal, and then outsourced the rest of the game that the public didn't see. Not only did they do that, but they reused many things as well. While playing, I got an invincibility theme and the new tune was super catchy! I wondered what the end of act theme would be afterwards... and was met with Sonic Mania's EXACT SAME end of act theme. No remix, no alterations, nothing. This also applies to menu sound effects, other weird things like Tails' flight sound being modern Tails' one from newer titles, the WISP BOX SOUNDS playing after getting a FRUIT from the lottery capsule in the end??? Why??? So inconsistent.
The story was... fine, better than 1 and 2 (because they are primitive and the first ones lol), but really doesn't do anything special with the multiple new characters we get to see. The huge animals? They're just huge. That's it. Trip? Story doesn't really give us much reason to like them much besides cute animal that we helped and now recruited and can fucking spindash lol. Fang? Just a henchman to the doctor, who strangely enough outshines the doctor, but that's because both offered so little to the game's that I hardly noticed them when playing. Sure he shows up one more time in Trip's story, but he didn't really make a presence there in the game. In the animated short and the comic though - he's great! Guess they don't know to translate that well to the game... even though that's the thing that'll be what people actually buy and see. and the last fight? for Super Sonic? Literal random dragon, coupled with ANOTHER bossfight of CONSTANT waiting! and if you die, have fun replaying that 10 minute boss fight every time! shit man I am so sad about some parts of this game.

If you want to try and play the game, I suggest waiting for mods to fix up it's glaring issues, or to stop after the first few zones and return it before you get 2 hours in on Steam. Sonic Superstars is super inconsistent. I'm sorry if my review upset you - I hold the Sonic series very dear to my heart and want the best for it. I know when it can be really incredible, and seeing them trip and fumble on this golden opportunity saddens me. This game can do so much better.

still had fun tho lets go sonic

Really cool take on the Sonic formula. I know every has mentioned the Kirby/Megaman/Sonic influence already but DAMN it's really cool taking such phenomenal aspects (Kirby moves and abilities, Sonic movement and speed, Megaman... x abilities kinda?) and putting them altogether for a playground to blaze around in.
The tunes were godlike, the boss fights are some of my favorite in a Sonic-like game, and the gameplay was really fun and satisfying. My only gripe is the dialogue (a lil iffy, sometimes weird) and the enemies in the second half of the game. The enemies especially hamper the later half since they're everywhere and stop the flow. I just want to run through things but it's constantly stopping me to fight enemies that have a lot more HP or are just too hard to fight without taking a hit (since your moves can be pretty slow). I think it slows down the pace of the game, whereas the first half is pretty great with when it wants to stop you with enemies.
Worth a shot if you're a Sonic fan!

SEGA's response to the Zelda series. It's quite charming in its own ways, and while the gameplay has it's similarities to A Link to the Past, it expands on it in ways that differentiates itself greatly from the SNES' masterpiece. Thank you Nintendo for putting it on Switch's Genesis online!!

The gameplay never got dull, with a much higher difficulty curve (imo) than A Link to the Past thanks to the enemies being on the more aggressive and elusive side. The puzzles had me genuinely stumped, although some solutions were a lot more tedious than others (single tiles to jump on, mashing A/jump at every corner) and required you to dissect an NPC's dialogue to the highest degree. Though the more simple puzzles were a treat - thanks to the game's engine upping the typical rate these kind of games would play at. A faster run speed (and upgrades!) coupled with a jump really helps put more inputs, decisions, and optimizations that help you speed up the gameplay to a degree other top-down games wish they could. I felt really engaged the whole time while controlling my character, compared to Link starting his boot/sword dash every time he entered a new loading zone whenever he wanted to be a bit speedy.
The dungeons were ok. It felt like the whole world itself was more of a dungeon, since the overworld is pretty well designed and heavily connected. There were puzzles at every step of the game, with combat being usually solved by the animal buddies you pick up (which were this game's equivalent to Zelda equipment). The combat itself was smooth, with the sword having decent range and cooldown, and a really cool charge attack similar to Mega Man X's charge buster... but for every direction. Had a lot of cool puzzle applications as well! The bosses could usually be cheesed, but that didn't make them a pain to avoid whenever they started to move. Overall had fun with the gameplay aspect.

Presentation was phenomenal. The sprite work was crisp and detailed, showing the full power of the Genesis near it's end, while having really cool sprite rotations to wow the player. I could make out everything the game was trying to describe to me, and the colors popped. It suited the game's aesthetic with the light-hearted adventure that was starting. And the music? Incredible jams all over the place. While it has an OST of under 20 tracks, many of them were so catchy and fitting to the game's atmosphere. I definitely copped around 10 or so of the songs haha. When I first booted up the game, I found myself chilling at the save select screen for a solid 10 minutes, jamming to that 20ish second loop. So raw

Story was interesting. It's pretty standard at the start, then near the end of it it starts to unravel what the theme of the game was. It somewhat makes you question why you're doing any of it and if what you're doing is really the right thing to do. I hear the English translation that I played (NSO) is a bit wonky, but I think I got the message. It's an interesting thought to leave the players with, but in the end it only goes as far as to give you that thought and that's it. Imo I don't really feel the impact as much as I would like to. Good idea tho

cool game glad I played it

If this were to release instead of Breath of the Wild, I would have given the game a 4.5. As a sequel, I'm left unsatisfied by what it could have been. I'm sure the game had a large development time, but there simply wasn't enough changes in the game to wow me. I know it sounds silly to say so, but Tears of the Kingdom feels like it could have been a huge DLC story to Breath of the Wild, like Torna to Xenoblade Chronicles 2.

The original exhausted me of the open-world gameplay loop, so being placed into a familiar, yet not exactly the same Hyrule didn't really excite me. However, the beginning sky island was pretty cool! I thought - if the game kept me up there for a while, I would be in for a treat. After the tutorial island ended, you're plopped back into Hyrule, open to do whatever you want. Well, I wanted my glider, so I went with story progression.

Things started to feel a bit too familiar, so I journeyed for any new experiences my eyes peeped. I saw the depths and went straight there - and for the first 20 minutes, I was enthralled. It was so cool! It gave me the feeling of entering the nether in Minecraft for the first time. We know it wasn't a challenging, scary part of the game, but it FELT like it since it was so new. Well, that feeling lasted just for a tiny bit, and while the high was great, the low came swarming back, as it was just a lot of walking around and spamming the glowing plant stuff to see where you're going. Just climbing up and down, avoiding enemies, finding nostalgic armor that ended up being mostly useless, and that's really it. I realized there wasn't a lot of reward in it for me besides finding more land.

The same can be said for the sky islands. Some decent shrines/puzzles here and there, but it took way too long to get to these areas, and the payoff for doing so just wasn't enough for me. I realized I was in for BOTW 2.0 here, and I get that it's not for me.

I decided to tackle the dungeons and get the game over with. Following the story... was laughable. Another sad attempt at a 'story' by modern Nintendo. There feels like no stakes, the cutscenes can be laughably bad (Link, say that isn't Zelda, this is the 4th time you've seen her ghost like that), and the cutscenes at the end of the dungeons... pretty much repeat, because you can do any dungeon in any order. ????????? Well anyways, the dungeons themselves are pretty mediocre. I'm not sure why they couldn't go with traditional dungeons, but what we got are pretty much the divine beasts, but a little more lackluster. The theming is just basic rock/land, with a little smudge of fire/water/sand/ice in the corners here and there. While some of the gimmicks were pretty cool (zero gravity was very fun), the impact they made on the dungeon was non-existent to me, since the solutions they were looking for were all saved with making something as simple as bridges or ascending to another floor. When there are a million keys to a single door, creativity can work well, but things can end up being very... simple? Easy? Huh? Why is this game so easy?

Difficulty is a huge problem in this game. Why on earth can I pause the game to insta-heal whenever I want? Even mid hitstun?! Let me be punished for bad gameplay - we have autosaves now! I'm not sure why this game needs to reinvent the whole way Zelda is. The current battle system, with Zelda style of HEALING alone, would make quarrels so much more enjoyable because I don't have that security of knowing I already won the battle. Running around and avoiding attacks to get hearts for healing is such a nice accent to the way of combat. If they don't want that, at least disable pause when I'm in the middle of combat. and why is the only Zelda combat thing you retain is the obvious boss philosophy of classic Zeldas?! No more big eyes to shoot man, the little mini boss guy is enough...

I'm railing on the game too much now, so I'll just list what I liked and be done with it.
- Zero gravity water dungeon was hype, let you do a lot of unique gameplay platforming/tricks
- Boat/rising section before the wind dungeon was so atmospheric and enjoyable
- Zonai devices were cool, but were a pain to set up/use for long times as they disappear after a timer
- Fuse ability was great solution to the durability problem - I had no issues with durability in this game thanks to that. That did not solve the problem of feeling rewarded when I opened chests or explored cool areas though lol
- Ascend was neat and helped speed up some things, but kinda broke the dungeons and difficult segments

Potential semi-spoilers below btw

So Pikmin 4. Another decade waiting for the newest Pikmin sequel on the block. Was it worth the wait? In many ways, absolutely! However, it unfortunately comes with some jarring gameplay choices that really hinder the experience... depending on the type of player you are.

I will preface this with the fact that I am a HUGE Pikmin 1 and 3 fan. 2 was pretty good, but I didn't like the changes they made to the game (too many caves, random difficulty spikes, absurdly overpowered purple stuff). When 3 was the newest sequel, I felt that was the direction they would take for the future of the series. Pikmin 4 completely flips that expectation.

Pikmin 4 is a wonderful sequel to Pikmin 2. It comes with packed with enemies, caves, themes, mechanics, and more that fill you with that nostalgic Pikmin 2 that hooked you. The caves are fun, atmospheric, and sometimes pretty satisfying to do! The enemy variants that came with 2 were also a great welcome back to the series since they came with a more.. spicy difficulty. When Pikmin 4 clicks, it goes hard. It has a very satisfying gameplay loop that will keep you from putting the controller down, with surprises lurking around every corner to keep you motivated. The fun treasures, the new collectables (onions, flarlics, etc), and returning enemies will have you shocked for a moment before you return to the game, thinking 'they brought that back?!' It's pretty cool... but that's how I mostly can think of Pikmin 4 in it's current state. It's pretty cool, but comes with many flaws.

The story
Holy SHIT dog it is so lackluster. The NPC dialogue is a chore to read through, with Nintendo tainting another franchise with it's quirky, friendly humor. I get that I'm not the target demographic now... but I was when Pikmin 1 and 2 came out! Even 3! The dialogue of those games were so different; charming, atmospheric, moody, and a few funny moments here and there. I can go back to the old games writing so easily, and so can many others of the series that are just hopping into it through the Switch versions of Pikmin 1 and 2. At least the Piklopedia/Treasure entries are solid... as long as you read the ones from the returning captains. Anyways, the story is yet another rehash of Pikmin 1's ship crash (I get it), and the reason to collect after you land... is so basic. Collect stuff to expand your range to go to other places and yada yada yada. Pikmin 1 started it all so that gets a pass (and passes with flying colors). Pikmin 2 revisits the land to pay off a debt (funny, and honestly very unique). Pikmin 3 crashes and has to collect fruit to stay alive, while finding the captains that scattered from the crash. Pikmin 4... just crashes and has you get stuff to fix your ship/rescue castaways. No debt to fix up, no day limit ala fruits or Pikmin 1, just crash, land, collect, leave. Super bland and lazy, but sure, it's a Nintendo game, it doesn't have to try.

The ATMOSPHERE
It's okay. They nailed the grassy/sandy/fall areas, and the caves are all what you would expect. So they nailed... the very basics. Their biggest success was the house environment, which was my favorite to explore! But that was the only treat to me. Feels like they got the New Super Mario Bros team on this game's atmosphere. Incredibly normal and predictable environments, with one to shake it up a little cause they're Nintendo! They're so quirky!!!! no man bring back my snowy areas and beaches, and try something else out like a swamp! They tried with mud, but all it looked like was a forest with some mud scattered around here and there. A swamp would fit soooo well! Maybe some rocky mountains??? They just... played it so safe. Also, the music took a huge dip in quality, and followed the more atmospheric approach the other Switch first party titles followed (Zelda, Mario, Pokemon). It got a bit better with Olimar's side story, but still felt goofy rather than charming and memorable compared to Pikmin 1/2/3. Title theme is god-like though.

The graphics
I expected a bit more. I look at Pikmin 3 in comparison, and I kinda prefer how 3 looked. It had a more realistic, glossy finish to the game. Pikmin 4 still looks great, but if you put the fruits of Pikmin 3 next to the fruits of Pikmin 4, there is a clear difference. The environments look good, but I just expected a bigger leap for the series. Pikmin 3 is 10 years younger than Pikmin 4.

The gameplay
Here we go. I'm a sweaty Pikmin player. I love 3's mission mode, and 1's time limit. I hate how easy 2 was due to the Purple Pikmin and spray, and how you just have to run around caves to avoid the dumb, artificial difficulty added by random bombs and enemies dropping from the sky. 1's gameplay is peak, but is dated by now. So if they just re-did 3, I'd be okay with that.
They took a wild approach and introduced auto lock-on. An assist to gameplay that you CANNOT turn off. You walk next to anything, it will AUTOMATICALLY lock-on to it, and make it hell to choose to fight anything because the game decided to lock-on to. But that doesn't really matter in fights because the enemies are all braindead easy anyways. Everything gets 1-shot by Oatchi's charge, the captain's charge, just freezing them or spamming items. Traditional Pikmin gameplay (think 1 and 3) is so difficult to find in the game because it keeps feeding you new options, while nudging you there every waking moment (due to auto-lock). Even so, why risk any Pikmin loss with normal Pikmin gameplay, when you can just ram with Oatchi? I feel like I'm just not playing Pikmin. I'm walking and dodging enemies and just mashing A. I'm not aiming at them, it does that automatically, locks-on, and I'm just mashing A and the occasional charge. They chose a different style of play for the game, and it certainly worked, but it didn't for me. I'm sure plenty of others will not bat an eye, especially new players, but it really hampers my experience with the game. I want to feel like I'm aiming at them - that's Pikmin to me!
I played Pikmin 1 and 3 right after 100%ing 4 (Platinum ranking everything as well, finishing all quests, getting all items, etc) and it felt so much better. Natural gameplay, with some skill in aiming and movement at the same time, and not having auto-win buttons like Oatchi's charge, or bombs in my bag. THAT'S Pikmin gameplay. I tried my best to enjoy 4's, but I just do not. Still enjoyed the game enough to 100% it though. Huge Pikmin fan lol

Other Random Stuff
I liked Pikmin 4. It had some great ideas. Ice Pikmin are very fun to use, and the freezing gimmick is honestly incredible. Just wish it was used more.
The night gameplay was pretty lackluster. It was just a glorified tower defense... but all the enemies just lose to the same combat loop of charging and auto lock-on. It's just a constant combat loop, but the enemies are all the same but with a different model and MAYBE a gimmick coupled to them. That's how I view all the enemies in the game though lol
SPEAKING OF ENEMIES - great returns from Pikmin 2, and some cool new ones, but they all just die too easily. Bosses shouldn't be able to die in less than a second lmao. The final boss is pretty okay, a little too much waiting for me personally, but I wish they had a few more BIG bosses like Pikmin 3. The Pikmin 2 bias is just way too strong here.
Jumping and platforming in a Pikmin game is god-like. We needed more of that.
Oatchi should not be able to hold all the Pikmin on him either... takes away an aspect of Pikmin where you feel like a leader and are protecting/leading your pack. There is no reason to play as the captain aside from his climb gimmick & charge, which isn't common.
The dandori missions (not the combat ones) were pretty great. Thank you Pikmin 3 mission mode.

In the end, mods can save this game from a 3 star to a 4 star to me. Remove Auto Lock-on, nerf Oatchi, and change up how the item inventory works. A rework of the game's story/writing and music can move the game from a 4 star to a 5 star for me. As it stands, I think it's a solid 3 stars.

Knew what it wanted to do and killed it!!!!
Fantastic art - vibrant artstyle that fits the Sonic crew well, coupled with in-character reactions and some pretty hype pixel art for the mini-games.
Charming writing - got the style of the characters down very well, while introducing new ones that fit right in with the cast. Was expecting relatively cringe-y fangame dialogue, got some IDW-tier writing and humor (the guys who write the new Sonic comics).
Decent twists - it's a VN lol so it did what it had to do, without being too predictable
Tight mini-games - gave you a fun pace-breaker to help excite you every so often. Relied on an auto-runner style of gameplay that fits the Sonic gameplay well, all the while delivering on gameplay that soothes that classic Sonic soul.
Phenomenal soundtrack - why on earth did this have better final boss music than Sonic Frontiers