Sonic Forces

Sonic The Hedgehog is a series that is very close to my heart. Sonic 2 was the first video game I ever played and from that moment I have forever been a fan of the blue blur through good times and bad. Sadly in recent years the bad times have been more frequent than I would have liked but with titles such as Sonic Generations & Sonic Mania bring the series some much needed credibility I was extremely hopeful for Sonic Forces to be a title that I would long remember for many years, unfortunately that is not the case. Sonic Forces is an ok game, but not something that I’d rave about. Thankfully it is much better than the absolute dumpster fire that was Sonic Boom: Rise of Lyric. It’s by no means at all a bad game, in fact it’s quite the opposite, but Sonic Forces never quite lives up to the lofty expectations I had for it. Sonic Forces takes place in a grim future where Sonic was defeated by Eggman who then takes over the world with the help of his robot army and a mysterious new villain known as Infinite causing Sonic and his friends to form a resistance to fight back.

The gameplay is very similar to Sonic Generations with players controlling Classic and Modern versions of Sonic. With Classic playing like a 2.5D side-scroller reminiscent of the original Sonic games on the Sega Megadrive. Whereas the Modern stages use 3D gameplay similar to that found in Sonic Unleashed and Sonic Colours. In addition to the two Sonics, Sonic Forces also introduces a third gameplay mode featuring the "Avatar", the player's own custom character. I remember when the game was first announced at Sonic’s 25th Anniversary Celebration in 2016 and seeing that initial trailer got me really excited as I thought we were going to be getting a gritty or at least semi serious Sonic game but it didn’t turn out how I expected. I wanted higher stakes and more drama. And as terrible as Sonic 06 was (it’s the worst Sonic game ever made) I thought that story was pretty solid & somewhat compelling (minus the stupid Sonic/Elise plot point). Although 12 year old me may have appreciated the story a lot more than 23 year old me. That being said Sonic 06 made a very bold decision to “kill” Sonic off. It was at the time quite shocking and it’s a dramatic moment like that which I was hoping to get in Sonic Forces. In saying that, I loved the references to Sonic Mania and how those two games connect to each other and wove into the story here in Forces. That was a very interesting plot point that got me hooked into the storyline up to a point. I knew from playing Mania that Classic Sonic and Mania Sonic were the same Sonic so to see those two games flow from one to the other was fantastic. And the little musical nods to Mania such as the Mania & Phantom Ruby themes were very enjoyable as well because they made me stop and go “Heyyy where have I head that before? Ohhhh it’s Mania!!” I can’t say I was much of a fan of the avatar character. Their controls felt clunky at times and often my momentum would come to a crashing halt because I needed to take out a horde of enemies in order to progress. Overall I felt like the character was unnecessary and the plot could have been driven without it. You’ve already got an expansive core cast of character, why not bring one of them to the fore front and further flesh out their character instead of introducing somebody’s DeviantArt fantasy for a single game who no one will even remember after this one game. There was far too much of a focus on the character in terms of the plot. I don't care about some random character I cooked up, I play Sonic games to see Sonic and there was too much friendship this and friendship that which made the plot so trivial.  And with this large ensemble cast making a return in Sonic Forces, it would have been nice to see characters like Shadow and Silver team up at the end to defeat Eggman in their Super forms once again like in Sonic 06. While on the subject of the large roster of characters featured in Sonic Forces I feel as though this should probably be Classic Sonic’s final appearance in a 3D title along side Modern Sonic. With amazing games like Sonic Mania fully realising and utilising Classic Sonic to his full potential I reckon there isn’t much of a need for him to be along side his modern counterpart any longer. Keep the two formulas separate and continue to make two kinds of games, 2D and 3D. And I’m not saying I didn’t like any of the classic stages, I just feel as though he is much better suited to the 2D style of gameplay, it performs much more smoothly and the experience was overall a better one. Classic stages such as Green Hill, Chemical Plan & the Death Egg should have their original music instead of the strange new music that was used. I know that it’s the nostalgia talking but for me these iconic levels need to have the music that made them great to help them reach those amazing highs that previous games have achieved. I really believe that remixing the original tracks would have helped makes these classic levels much more enjoyable and memorable. I also must admit that I really miss my homeboys Crush 40 doing any sort of music for the game, although I t was nice to hear the small musical motif of All Hail Shadow when Shadow arrived in the story. In terms of vocals, Jun Senoue and Johnny Gioeli have provided some of the most memorable and iconic songs in the whole Sonic fanchise. So I think this game would have really benefited from having them back on board and I hope that SEGA does utilise the band again for future Sonic titles.  The world map felt a little unorganised and all over the shop. Visually it was very dull when it should be colourful and vibrant to set each of the stages apart. Instead everything is presented in a dull grey colour that is pretty uninspired & blends together making it hard to distinguish anything, forcing you to read the name of the stage to know where you are. The stages are also presented in quite a disjointed fashion with you hoping all over the place. I understand that it was integrated within the story but I just didn’t think it gelled all that well. And speaking of the story, it failed to really grab me and I felt that the cutscenes were few and far between, replaced instead by text and vocal dialogue between character before the start of a stage which felt very cheap. And the whole resistance fighters plot reminded me a lot of the Freedom Fighters from the Adventures of Sonic cartoon and Archie Comics. It was a cool idea in theory but would have been executed better. The opportunity was presented to make this plot a little bit darker but instead it was just as vanilla as majority of the previous games have been with the exception of Adventure, Adventure 2 and Heroes who’s stories were compelling and had elements to them which were quite dark which made them edgy and memorable. Here in Sonic Forces there was none of that. The big final boss is as predictable as ever and was quite frankly disappointing after all the media hype over a certain character which really ended up amounting to nothing. And with the addition of the Avatar character, Sonic Forces story just felt like a giant piece of fan fiction. It's silly and clumsy, but for a very brief period it's a fun distraction. I’m still not a fan of the new voice cast. Especially for Shadow and Rouge. They sound so distinctly different from the voices who originally portrayed them and I’ve just found it so jarring the past couple of games. I know it’s my own personal taste but I think it was silly to change the voice cast to begin with. Sonic Adventure 2 had the best voice acting in any of the Sonic titles in my opinion.  Majority of the stages felt extremely short when compared to previous games. Just as is feel like I was getting into the groove of a stage, it would abruptly end. I’ve come to expect Sonic stages to be lengthy with multiple checkpoints but here I felt like I was just blinking and it was all over. There were also little to no big, grand set pieces that have become a main stay in 3D Sonic titles. Things such as the giant killer whale in Sonic Adventure or the massive sections of running down the side of a building or grinding down rails like in Sonic Adventure 2 and Sonic Unleashed. Sadly here in Sonic Forces there was none of that and nothing that made me go “wow that’s pretty amazing” like in previous titles.  Level design was awkward in places and I found myself dying of cheap deaths very often. Platforming portions should have been a fun and enjoyable experience but for the most part were annoying and frustrating with many tedious deaths frequently occurring. Often in the side scrolling sections your character was made to look so small that it became extremely difficult to even see where you were going, making for unnecessary difficulty. In particular, the final portion of the game was frustratingly difficult to complete with ridiculously unforgiving platform sections and it made me feel real anger at how much the game was needlessly punishing me. The final boss was also a massive let down due to these factors and also because *SPOILER ALERT* you don't even get to become Super Sonic which is a staple for final boss fights in Sonic games. I was sitting there waiting for it to happen and it didn't. Such a letdown. I really enjoyed the Modern Sonic Death Egg stage. It really reminded me of Crazy Gadget from Sonic Adventure 2 with all the grinding in space. I wish that I could have felt this more throughout the game. In saying that, the city level was designed very well and reminded me a lot of Rooftop Run from Sonic Unleashed. It was really cool to see the massive Egg Robos in the background when you were flying across the stage, giving everything a lot more depth and context to the world you’re in. Another highlight for me was the Classic Sonic Mystic Jungle stage. The music felt really retro and the level design gave me vibes back to Casino Night Zone from Sonic 2.  The game looked very nice but not much has improved visually since Sonic Generations & the gameplay is also very similar as well, which is not a bad thing at all because Sonic Generations was a fantastic game. I just feel as though Sonic needs to try and be a little bit bolder like Mario has been in his latest adventure instead of essentially rinsing and repeating the same formula as before.  

Sonic Forces is not the best Sonic game released this year. That's Sonic Mania, but that's not to say Sonic Forces isn't good either, it just doesn't live up to the standard that was set earlier in the year. Sonic Forces isn’t a bad game, but it’s not groundbreaking in any way, shape or form which is really disappointing. I expected so much from this game and it fell so far below my lofty expectations. The story was bland, the gameplay while still pretty fun to play was messy and not as polished as in previous games and all around Sonic Forces missed the mark in my book. That being said, I have and always will stick by Sonic through thick and thin in hopes that he will one day return to his former glory. 

Sonic Forces is now available on PlayStation 4, Xbox One & Nintendo Switch

3/5

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