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Sonic Unleased: Worse Than Syphilis

My husband and I bought a certain game about a certain hedgehog being unleashed. We were playing Tails' Tornado Quick Time Event when suddenly I felt something like a gas bubble travel gently up my spine and pop in my brain. After that, a numbness spread to the tips of my fingers and I thought I would never feel happy, angry or sad ever again.

I realised I was wrong when an acquaintance on Facebook mourned his return to work and I automatically replied with, “Sonic Unleashed is worse than syphilis.”

I've decided it would benefit me to stay indoors until I can be sure I won't respond to greetings/questions from retail clerks, doctors and policemen in the same manner.

I guess I was taken in by the infamous Sonic Cycle, which is interesting because I thought I was aware of the writing on the wall after Sonic Adventure 2. This is the first time in ages I've given the Blue Streak a moment to redeem himself in my eyes.

Sure enough, Sonic ran in and only had time to belt out “HEY, WATCH THI--” before he tripped, hit the ground at 300 MPH and exploded.

Posted Jan 05 2009, 06:54 PM by Nadia Oxford with | with 9 comment(s)

Filed under: sega, sonic the hedgehog, retro, sonic team, sonic unleashed, nadia oxford, broken promises

Sonic Unleashed is Filled With Lies

This is a lie: “Sonic is all about speed. Without it, he is not Sonic. So we needed to put absolute priority on the sense of speed.” – Yoshihisa Hashimoto, Project Lead, Game Director, and Lead Game Designer on Sonic Unleashed

This is also a lie: “Yes, I think this will be the game Sonic fans have been waiting for. Sonic will be reborn in the state he always should have existed in with a new control scheme, fresh new gameplay elements, all while simultaneously returning to Sonic’s roots.” – Yoshihisa Hashimoto

Yes, Sega has pulled quite the switcheroo with Sonic Unleashed. The very first screens and video that leaked last spring showed only the gorgeous 2D/3D platforming levels in Sonic Unleashed and, since then, Sega has placed all emphasis on these portions in their promotion. It’s classic Sonic play in 3D! It’s a return to Sonic’s roots! It’s what people want in their Sonic games! Even just two months ago, when I sat down to demo the game, I was allowed to watch and play a number of Unleashed’s platforming levels. But only a portion of one werehog brawler level was shown and I wasn’t allowed to play that. Wasn’t ready, they said. Based on what I played then, Unleashed really was the perfect 3D Sonic. It was fast, gorgeous, and you actually had to play the game; pressing right to sprint through Unleashed’s pan-continental levels wasn’t enough to win.

Well, I finally sat down with the finished version of Sonic Unleashed last night. Turns out Yoshihisa Hashimoto is big liar. He lies to people. He obscures the truth behind honeyed words. He is not a nice man.

Posted Dec 03 2008, 01:00 PM by John Constantine with | with 6 comment(s)

Filed under: john constantine, xbox 360, sonic the hedgehog, sonic team, sonic unleashed, Yoshihisa Hashimoto

Sonic Unleashed's Silver Lining

The reviews for Sonic Unleashed are out, and they ain't pretty. It seems that the enthusiast press is showing a lot more skepticism about all of the recent hedgehog reboots, too; Sega's claim of "This time we did it, guys!" has been used so many times that I honestly can't see what angle they're going to approach the next Sonic game from. Really, the only way that they could save face would be to include a formal apology signed by every member of Sonic Team and a crisp, new one-hundred dollar bill inside every copy of Sonic 2: Unleashed Further.

But recently, a magical thing happened: something of moderate to good quality related to Sonic the Hedgehog has been released to the public. Obviously, this is big news. The item in question, Night of the Werehog, is an animated short which I assume was made to promote Unleashed. This CGI cartoon may star a character I've grown to hate and a new character I hated immediately, but it's also cute, clever, and, most importantly, tells an interesting story without a single line of dialogue. We can only hope Sonic Team can learn from this:

Posted Nov 25 2008, 02:00 PM by Bob Mackey with | with 5 comment(s)

Filed under: sega, sonic the hedgehog, sonic team, sonic unleashed, bob mackey

Sonic Unleashed Wii: Should Dimps Be Trying Harder?

Sonic the Hedgehog has the pull of a train wreck: no matter how tired you think you are of his lacklustre 3D adventures, you can't help but take a good long stare whenever one is announced.

Sonic Unleashed, for example, exists only as a handful of screenshots and a couple of trailers, but gamers who insist they're thoroughly tired of the hedgehog are still finding plenty to mouth off about. The August issue of Nintendo Power created a stir with some new screenshots for the Wii version of the game. When compared to the preview material for the Xbox 360 and Playstation 3 versions, Sonic Unleashed for the Wii looks very...well, last gen.

Posted Jun 30 2008, 01:00 PM by Nadia Oxford with | with 3 comment(s)

Filed under: wii, street fighter 4, playstation 2, sega, sonic the hedgehog, nintendo power, xbox360, sonic team, sonic rush adventure, dimps, super mario galaxy, sonic unleashed, playstation3, graphics, sonic and the secret rings

about the blogger

John Constantine, our superhero, was raised by birds and then attended Penn State University. He is currently working on a novel about a fictional city that exists only in his mind. John has an astonishingly extensive knowledge of Scientology. Ultimately he would like to learn how to effectively use his brain. He continues to keep Wu-Tang's secret to himself.

Derrick Sanskrit is a self-professed geek in a variety of fields including typography, graphic design, comic books, music and cartoons. As a professional hipster graphic designer, his recent clients have included Nerve, Pitchfork and MoCCA, among others.

Amber Ahlborn - artist, writer, gamer and DigiPen survivor, she maintains a day job as a graphic artist. By night Amber moonlights as a professional Metroid Fanatic and keeps a metal suit in the closet just in case. Has lived in the state of Washington and insists that it really doesn't rain as much as everyone says it does.

Nadia Oxford is a housekeeping robot who was refurbished into a warrior when the world's need for justice was great. Now that the galaxy is at peace (give or take a conflict here or there), she works as a freelance writer for various sites and magazines. Based in Toronto, Nadia prizes the certificate from the Ministry of Health declaring her tick and rabies-free.

Bob Mackey is a grad student, writer, and cyborg, who uses the powerful girl-repelling nanomachines mad science grafted onto his body to allocate time towards interests of the nerd persuasion. He believes that complaining about things on the Internet is akin to the fine art of wine tasting, but with more spitting into buckets.

Joe Keiser has a programming degree from Johns Hopkins University, a tiny apartment in Brooklyn, and a fake toy guitar built in the hollowed-out shell of a real guitar. He writes about games and technology for a variety of outlets. One day he will stop doing this. The day after that, police will find his body under a collapsed pile of (formerly neatly alphabetized) collector's edition tchotchkes.

Cole Stryker is an American freelance writer living in York, England, where he resides with his archeologist wife. He writes for a travel company by day and argues about pop culture on the internet by night. Find him writing regularly here and here.

Peter Smith is like the lead character of Irwin Shaw's The 80-Yard Run, except less athletic. He considers himself very lucky to have this job. But it's a little premature to take "jack-off of all trades" off his resume. Besides writing, travelling, and painting houses, Pete plays guitar in a rock trio called The Aye-Ayes. He calls them a 'power pop' band, but they generally sound more like Motorhead on a drinking binge.