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Sonic Heroes
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Sonic Heroes
Doomed?
As today was a snow day at school, I decided to go on down to Walmart (otherwise known as Walart to the elite) since the only game I’m playing now pretty much is FFX2. Going through the games section, no game really caught my eye except Sonic Heroes for Gamecube.
Now, I like to consider myself a Sonic the Hedgehog fan. I’ve played and beaten most of the mainstream Sonic games, of course not counting the countless Game Gear games and spinoffs (although I have played a few). Most of the ones I’ve played I’ve enjoyed, Sonic 3 & Knuckles being my favorite if you must know. Many people think the Sonic series has gone downhill because the 2D games such as the main three and Sonic CD were clearly the best ones and now they’ve decided to go 3D, so it will obviously never be good again, right? I don’t like to look at it that way, though.
Sonic Heroes I’d venture to say steers away from even the past 3D Sonic games, going for a different perspective with the “team” system. The way this works is – imagine the characters from Sonic Adventure 1 and 2, with all their previous abilities, but working in teams of three each. For instance, Team Sonic consists of Sonic, Tails, and Knuckles, which is of course the basic team (there are four teams in all). Each one of them has a basic role (although they’re not limited to these roles). And so, Sonic is the speed character, running at a top speed easily surpassing Tails or Knuckles, and he can also use his homing attack and such. Tails is the flyer, and can carry Sonic and Knuckles up ledges and such. He can also use a missile-like attack to attack far away or high-up baddies. Knuckles is the power character, who easily has the best fighting ability and can glide as well.
The levels are pretty straightforward. They’re fast as always in Sonic games, and all require the use of all three of your characters (with some exceptions like boss fights). There are rings, speed shoes, and all the other power-ups from the previous games of course as well, including the new aspect of leveling up your characters each level, extending their abilities (three times per level, and it resets once you complete it). The bosses provide a decent challenge, although not overwhelming.
Now that you know how the game works, you obviously have realized this game is unique to the Sonic series. Many people, including good old Penny Arcade have said this as if it were a bad thing. What I have to say is… you can’t look at this game in comparison to the older, clearly better games. Look at it as if it’s an evolution of the genre – maybe not permanent, but still a nice treat. The game play is fresh; it provides a unique challenge. Does this make it a bad game because it’s different than other games from the series?
Give Sonic Heroes a chance. Even I was skeptical as I bought the game, but I’m always willing to try something new. Myself, I knew I wasn’t going to like Metroid Prime the second I bought it. I still gave it a chance though. I definitely didn’t enjoy the game as thoroughly as I’d liked to, I didn’t hate it as much as I thought I would either. And even those of you who are easily swayed by reviews, I urge you to rent this game before you judge it. All in all, it’s an entirely different experience, just one you have to look at from a different perspective. My rating:
8/10
Nice work, Sonic Team.
SkullWorm
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Nothing says "Sonic Heroes" is actually a good game better...
THAN UNCLE PHIL FROM "THE FRESH PRINCE OF BELL AIR"!!!
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