Anybody play the Sonic games with a slow.. exploratory style?

[WCP]

I listen to alot of gaming podcasts, the vast majority about modern gaming, and in alot of these podcasts, they've been talking about the new Sonic 4 game thats coming out on Xbox Live and PSN, etc. Anyways, in these podcasts alot of times they will mention that the main problem with doing a Sonic game in 2010, is that the only way to make a good sonic is for it to be all about speed, and that people just don't care about that kind of game in 2010. They argued that if Sonic was more like a Super Mario game, more exploratory in nature, and not all about speed, that those kind of experiences age better, and the game could be very popular like New Super Mario Bros. Wii. They don't think a modern Sonic 4 could be good, or popular, because Sonic is all about speed, and that kind of game is more of a gimmick nowadays. (according to them)

While I listened to these podcasts, I started to get really frustrated, because I wanted to shout out that Sonic isn't all about speed, dumbasses. I know that when people think of Sonic, they think of him going super fast through the loop de loops, but when I play the old Sonic games, I don't play them that way. I play them more slow and methodical, trying to find every secret, trying to get every single gold ring. Once I feel like I've turned every robot bug into a bunny rabbit or bird, and found every ring and secret, then, and only then, would I blaze through to the end of the level before the timer expired.

Does anybody else play Sonic games this way? Or am I freak?

[Zthun]

Anyways, in these podcasts alot of times they will mention that the main problem with doing a Sonic game in 2010, is that the only way to make a good sonic is for it to be all about speed, and that people just don't care about that kind of game in 2010.

That's pretty much what all the sonic fans have been begging for for years now. The REAL gimmick is giving sonic a sword or some other piece of shit that makes no sense.

What most sonic fans wanted was either a rehash of Sonic Adventure 1 (this is the only 3d sonic where they got the camera correct), or a 2d sonic game like it used to be. Not sonic with a sword, not sonic who can now turn into a werewolf, not sonic and his human female lover, and not sonic and his (insert anything else you can think of). Sonic rush was a good sonic game. That's the direction the majority of sonic fans want it taken. Long live sonic side scrolling platformers.

[Orion Pimpdaddy]

Does anybody else play Sonic games this way? Or am I freak?

I don't play the way you do. I'm always trying to get to the boss as fast as I can. If I spend time trying to gather rings, I only end up hitting a bug and going from 100 rings to five rings in an instant. The powerups aren't worth it either (compared to other side scrolling games).

I do agree that it's not ALL about speed, but it IS a very large part of it. Most of the early Sonic games have a thrill-ride aspect to them, and I think they better keep that aspect.

Perhaps they should have different exits on each level, which branch off into different paths you can take through the game. If they did that, I would slow down and look for those secret exits. Maybe they already have them, I don't know.

[kupomogli]

I've never been a fan of Sonic because of the games speed aspect. Majority of the time you'll be jumping blindly forward because you know as long as there's no pit there, you'll take out whatever enemy you come across. In two seconds the stage is completed and you have no idea what the middle of the stage looked like or whether it had good level design or not.

[Aussie2B]

I played the first Sonic like that, but I've always made the argument that the whole speed aspect is exaggerated in that one. Most of the stages aren't designed to encourage or even allow fast navigation.

But I know what you mean. Something feels kind of empty about zipping through a stage and not even getting a real sense of its layout.

[Game Freak]

Perhaps they should have different exits on each level, which branch off into different paths you can take through the game. If they did that, I would slow down and look for those secret exits. Maybe they already have them, I don't know.

Yeah that'd be nice, like Star Fox 64

I only have the Genny sonics so i cant relate but I agree that agmes today tend to be a lot about speed. I wish it would go back to the good ol days. Then again, who doesnt?

[mobiusclimber]

Yeah the original Sonic games really were all about exploration. I think it's hilarious that people seem to think that the original Marios were about exploration when in reality all you do in Mario is move from left to right and maybe go down a few pipes once in awhile. Levels in Sonic games tended to have at three paths through the level: one is a lower level, one in the middle and one up top. There were always tons of secrets to find on every level. AND the game was fast as well when it needed to be.

[j_factor]

I play them both ways. Sometimes I like to play them for "time attack" and see how fast I can zoom through the stages. Other times I like to go a certain route, that isn't necessarily the fastest. I wouldn't say I "explore" them anymore, because I know them too well. But at first, I certainly did play them that way. I only played them fast after getting a handle on the games. You don't speed through on your first play (or at least, that's not the "right" way to do it, IMO).

That's kind of how I play almost all platformers, though. I find replaying to be the most fun when I'm trying to get through it quickly. Even if there's no timer or anything, it's just more fun that way and holds my attention better. When I play a game like Super Mario Bros. or Donkey Kong Country, I'm holding down the run button the entire time. I guess that's one thing I like about Sonic, they eliminated the run button as redundant, and you just run by holding the direction.

I did like Sonic Rush, but to me it has a whole different feel. Sonic Rush really is just speed, speed, speed (well, and tricks). The real object of Rush is to play for score, and your score is half time and half trick points. I think when people say Sonic was all about speed, they're definitely missing the mark. On the other hand, the speed thing can be fun too. As far as recent efforts go, the Sonic games have been at their best when concentrating on speed.

[Gameguy]

With the early Sonic games, you still had to find the bonus levels to get the chaos emeralds. You could try to just blow through the game, but you'd be missing stuff. If I'm remembering correctly, it was Sonic 2 were you had to collect 50 rings just to enter that bonus level, and in Sonic 3 you had to find hidden rings to enter it. It was fast at times but not for the entire game. With Sonic 3 you had different powerups compared to previous games, I remember the various shields/bubbles that helped you through various areas.

I did recently play Sonic Advance 2, it's decent but the levels here felt different compared to the early Genesis games. For most of the early levels in SA2, you could just hold right to get through most of them. You didn't have to worry about running into spikes, pits, or enemies. It was mostly too easy, then it just got way too hard on one of the levels and I lost all my lives on the same spot. I bought the game used, and I died on the same level as the last owner, it just went from super easy to near impossible.

I really don't know how to describe what was different about the early Sonic games compared to the later 2D ones, there's just something different about the level designs and the way it plays that feels different.

[Haoie]

That's me to a T.

Always avoid the speed boots.

[crazyjackcsa]

There is the speed factor to be sure, but it was the multiple routes to be found and explore that really got me.

I was a Sonic guy for a long time and after moving to the Nintendo camp, let me tell yoy. It's hard to make the change from 2D Sonic to 2D Mario. Mario is the more methodical game that's for sure, but having only one real route through the game? No where near as much fun.

[DigitalSpace]

I've done that a few times, but rarely when it comes to most of the water levels. I just want to get through those as fast as possible.

[PentiumMMX]

I play the Sonic games like that on occasions; especially Sonic 3 (I like to try and get all the Chaos Emeralds early)

[skaar]

This topic sounded dirty, then it wasn't.

[mobiusclimber]

I don't even think it's really possible to speed through certain "zones" in the Sonic games. The second zone in the first game springs readily to mind (I always call it the "ruins" zone cuz that's what's there, but I know that isn't the actual name).

[PresidentLeever]

Does anybody else play Sonic games this way? Or am I freak?

Sure, I play Sonic 3 /S & K just like you described it. I don't see how else you'd play it if you're going to get the Chaos Emeralds since the bonus levels have to be searched out. It's not my favourite Emerald system in Sonic though, I think Sonic 2 got the right balance between exploration and speed with the alternate paths but relatively low cost for bonus levels.
Sonic 1 is just slow all around with all its elevators, boat rides and such. The Marble Zone mentioned above is one example.

[scooterb23]

I like playing Sonic games fast. All this exploration nonsense was for the replays. The first time through, I'd play to just finish the game...then I would replay the game, trying different levels, trying to find the best way to get to the end with the most coins, and still fast.

When Sonic becomes about "exploration" that's when you get Were-hedgehogs *shudder*

[WCP]

I like playing Sonic games fast. All this exploration nonsense was for the replays. The first time through, I'd play to just finish the game...then I would replay the game, trying different levels, trying to find the best way to get to the end with the most coins, and still fast.

When Sonic becomes about "exploration" that's when you get Were-hedgehogs *shudder*

Well, maybe, part of it is my OCD nature of just trying to collect every little thing possible in a level. I'm like this with pretty much all the platformers. I feel I need to go thru a level and eliminate every single enemy, and collect every single coin, and discover every single secret passage way. If I were to just blaze thru the levels, I would be missing so much of the beauty of the stages. Of course, having said that, sometimes when you go thru it really slow and methodically, you waste so much time, that you have to end up sprinting thru the last 1/4th of the level, to beat the timer, and you basically end up missing the last part of the level cause you're just trying to beat the clock.

I will sometimes occasionally just play it for pure speed, and try to zip thru the level as fast as possible, but that's usually after I've been playing it the other way for awhile, and just want to try to switch it up.

[mobiusclimber]

Usually the first time I play a Sonic game I play it a little slowly and explore stuff. Once I know the layout I'll zip thru it while getting all the goodies (I skip stuff like the red shoes or if I have to backtrack to get things). There are certain "secret" areas that you need the momentum of speeding and bouncing/rolling/richoceting to get to.

[baraka]

Does anybody else play Sonic games this way? Or am I freak?

No, in fact I used to play the old Genesis Sonic games EXACTLY the way you described. Back in the days it never seemed to me that Sonic was only about speed. The games had a lot of atmosphere and secrets in every stage. And although I havent played a lot of Sonic games since, I did check a couple that were released on the GBA and those were actually ONLY about speed. It felt like the designers completely misunderstood what the originals were about to me.

However, the new Sonic 4 episodes that will be released look very promising!

[Nebagram]

I've always been a speed freak Sonic-wise, always trying to shave milliseconds off my pb for a level. One of my proudest gaming achievements was beating Sonic 3, start to finish, in under an hour without losing a life. That kind of twitchy gameplay is what truly defines Sonic, leave the exploration to games like Metroid.

[shopkins]

I kind of have to by default. I was never good enough at them to blaze through them, when I try to go fast I just end up going fast into a pit and dying.

[mobiusclimber]

I think the beauty of the early Sonic games was that you could pretty much play them any way you wanted. As this topic seems to imply.

[Gentlegamer]

I've never been a fan of Sonic because of the games speed aspect. Majority of the time you'll be jumping blindly forward because you know as long as there's no pit there, you'll take out whatever enemy you come across. In two seconds the stage is completed and you have no idea what the middle of the stage looked like or whether it had good level design or not.This is the "secret" of why Sonic was never as good as Super Mario: while the original games are fun, they have limited "depth" of gameplay. This is why subsequent games that try to add other aspects can't recapture the "magic;" the "magic" wasn't really very magical to begin with.

[ShinobiMan]

I did the most exploration in Sonic CD... what with all the time travel events and machines you have to destroy in order to change the future. There's a reason why some consider it the greatest Sonic game, and that's because it was highly innovative without changing the formula too much.

[houstonlibrarian]

Never realized there was a strategy to Sonic. Just push to the right and have at it.

[WCP]

Never realized there was a strategy to Sonic. Just push to the right and have at it.


It's not really a strategy per se.... it's just a play style. For example, if I play Sonic with the idea of just blazing thru the level in record time, then I'm going to miss out on collecting tons of rings, and finding secrets, and killing (saving) all the enemies. Usually, in alot of the early Sonic games, there would be a lower part of the level, an upper part of the level and a middle part of the level. The only way you can see the entire level is to use an exploratory style. If you blaze thru the level you're most likely going to only see the very top part of the level, or the very bottom. You're going to completely miss out on 2/3rds of the level design.

I'm not trying to say that blazing thru the level is wrong, and that anybody that plays that way is playing the game wrong, but I really like the level design, and the art, and finding all the secrets/powerups/rings, etc, etc, and if you play the speed way, it's impossible to find all that stuff. My favorite way of playing is trying to get every single ring, every single secret and powerup (except the red shoes), and killing (saving) every enemy, and then because I took so much time doing all of that, I would almost be running out of time, so I would then have to speed as fast as possible thru the rest of the level to beat the timer before it ran out. Playing it this way, I could basically get the best of both worlds. I could explore the levels and appreciate all the effort that was made in designing the levels, but I could also experience the speed method. The big downside to playing this way, is that I would basically get to the end of the level with only a couple of seconds left, so I wouldn't get any bonus points from finishing the level super quickly. Still, I feel the tradeoff is worth it.

[j_factor]

This is the "secret" of why Sonic was never as good as Super Mario: while the original games are fun, they have limited "depth" of gameplay. This is why subsequent games that try to add other aspects can't recapture the "magic;" the "magic" wasn't really very magical to begin with.

What "depth" does Mario have, that Sonic doesn't? Mario has the warps, but the levels are almost always completely linear, aside from the occasional pipe.

[SegaAges]

For many of the classic Sonic games, going fast is just an evil trick.

Sure, you can run through some levels, but most levels, you will just jump into some lava or something from just running and jumping.

It all depends on what kind of mood I am in. If I am after all the chaos emeralds, I will slow down a little bit.

If I am just playing it to waste some time, I will plow through the levels.