I grew up with this version (Wii) of Unleashed, and it's always been a goal of mine to come back and beat this thing since I never did as a kid - I think I got stuck on Shamar - and man, it held up. I always thought, in retrospect, that that shorter bursts of speed from this game's boost was really disappointing compared to the continuous boost of the 360/PS3 game and later Sonic games in general, but actually playing this, I kind of like that it makes you think more in the moment on if you want to boost or not. You're pretty much always going top speed in other boost games, but here you have to think "is this a good time to boost? Will I accidentally launch myself into the stratosphere?" Though there are other times where even if it seems fine to boost, you'll suddenly come up on some enemies you couldn't see before and now you can't take an upper pathway, or a boost pad will rocket you into the skybox because they didn't want you to boost there. Overall, though, it's kind of an interesting dynamic.
I like that the settings of this game are more varied than other globetrotting adventures in games. Yeah, Italy and China based areas are typical, but you don't tend to see levels in games based off Greece, southeast Asia, Inuit settlements in the Arctic, or, hell, even the Middle East is often underrepresented, but they're all here and it's really nice. They even got Michigan in here - thanks Eggmanland!
Easily the most controversial part of Unleashed is the main gimmick of the nighttime stages where Sonic gets a bit fluffier, stretchy, and way slower. People really don't like the slower paced platforming, and the very obviously God of War inspired combat. But I've always loved these parts so much. First of all, the vibes are incredible. You're often accompanied by smooth jazz as you romp through the local towns, and while the graphics aren't top tier or anything, I think it's pretty pleasant in the nighttime stages. The combat is pretty shallow, but I think it's fun enough to bear throughout this game.
I made it my mission to go for 100% completion in this game, and it was a blast for most of it. I mostly got all S ranks in the nighttime stages barring a few fumbles, so those were one-time deals. Daytime stages were definitely more troubling, but learning the levels and mastering the movements of this game was really satisfying; the time limits to get S ranks were just low enough to need to work for but not so low that it was frustrating.
But that's just talking for the main levels' goals. The more I looked into 100%, the more annoying it became. In each area of the game (except Eggmanland), there's a shrine that contains 3-4 rooms opened by collecting Sun Medals and Moon Medals, each of these rooms are more or less puzzles where you switch between Sonic as a hedgehog and as the Werehog. These rooms aren't too bad (except on that was particularly annoying), but I eventually found that I needed 69 Moon Medals (that's not a joke, they just happened to go with that amount) to open somewhere around 5-9 rooms - don't remember the exact amount. But I had beaten every level possible. Well, it turns out that you need to collect every single piece of concept art, music, cutscenes, and tips in order to do everything. And the game is really bad about telling you where these are, vague hints of where they are. They don't tell you specific levels - hell, they don't even state the continents by name you just need to know that, say, Chun-nan is the third continent (despite being the fourth on you visit). The game doesn't tell you if you've gotten all the items in a level. It doesn't tell you if a villager in the town has an item for you. It doesn't tell you if a new Gaia Gate has opened up. You just gotta figure it out yourself or find the surprisingly sparse guides people have made out there.
I think the worst part is your reward for doing everything. The level you unlock is the worst one in the game. It's in Adabat for no real reason, you're running on winding paths that make boosting nigh impossible, there's almost nothing on these paths, and getting hit one time makes your restart. You ultimately unlock the special short films which are neat but... c'mon, no one wants to go through all that effort to get those one Wii quality. I don't really expect games to have great completion rewards, but if the path to those rewards are tedious and full of poor menuing, then it's a sad day.
I always knew that if I went back to this game, I'd still like it, but I really didn't expect to get as much out of it as I did. I still haven't played the HD (for lack of a better term) version, but I've always thought it looks fun as hell and cranks up what like about the Werehog and daytime stages tenfold, so I'll be happy to get around to that eventually.
it's almost three in the morning as i finish this up. i started the cleanup at ten p.m. if that goes to show how bad the collectibles are
I like that the settings of this game are more varied than other globetrotting adventures in games. Yeah, Italy and China based areas are typical, but you don't tend to see levels in games based off Greece, southeast Asia, Inuit settlements in the Arctic, or, hell, even the Middle East is often underrepresented, but they're all here and it's really nice. They even got Michigan in here - thanks Eggmanland!
Easily the most controversial part of Unleashed is the main gimmick of the nighttime stages where Sonic gets a bit fluffier, stretchy, and way slower. People really don't like the slower paced platforming, and the very obviously God of War inspired combat. But I've always loved these parts so much. First of all, the vibes are incredible. You're often accompanied by smooth jazz as you romp through the local towns, and while the graphics aren't top tier or anything, I think it's pretty pleasant in the nighttime stages. The combat is pretty shallow, but I think it's fun enough to bear throughout this game.
I made it my mission to go for 100% completion in this game, and it was a blast for most of it. I mostly got all S ranks in the nighttime stages barring a few fumbles, so those were one-time deals. Daytime stages were definitely more troubling, but learning the levels and mastering the movements of this game was really satisfying; the time limits to get S ranks were just low enough to need to work for but not so low that it was frustrating.
But that's just talking for the main levels' goals. The more I looked into 100%, the more annoying it became. In each area of the game (except Eggmanland), there's a shrine that contains 3-4 rooms opened by collecting Sun Medals and Moon Medals, each of these rooms are more or less puzzles where you switch between Sonic as a hedgehog and as the Werehog. These rooms aren't too bad (except on that was particularly annoying), but I eventually found that I needed 69 Moon Medals (that's not a joke, they just happened to go with that amount) to open somewhere around 5-9 rooms - don't remember the exact amount. But I had beaten every level possible. Well, it turns out that you need to collect every single piece of concept art, music, cutscenes, and tips in order to do everything. And the game is really bad about telling you where these are, vague hints of where they are. They don't tell you specific levels - hell, they don't even state the continents by name you just need to know that, say, Chun-nan is the third continent (despite being the fourth on you visit). The game doesn't tell you if you've gotten all the items in a level. It doesn't tell you if a villager in the town has an item for you. It doesn't tell you if a new Gaia Gate has opened up. You just gotta figure it out yourself or find the surprisingly sparse guides people have made out there.
I think the worst part is your reward for doing everything. The level you unlock is the worst one in the game. It's in Adabat for no real reason, you're running on winding paths that make boosting nigh impossible, there's almost nothing on these paths, and getting hit one time makes your restart. You ultimately unlock the special short films which are neat but... c'mon, no one wants to go through all that effort to get those one Wii quality. I don't really expect games to have great completion rewards, but if the path to those rewards are tedious and full of poor menuing, then it's a sad day.
I always knew that if I went back to this game, I'd still like it, but I really didn't expect to get as much out of it as I did. I still haven't played the HD (for lack of a better term) version, but I've always thought it looks fun as hell and cranks up what like about the Werehog and daytime stages tenfold, so I'll be happy to get around to that eventually.
it's almost three in the morning as i finish this up. i started the cleanup at ten p.m. if that goes to show how bad the collectibles are