Pray for Sonic Team everyone because on June 25th it was announced that we’ll be getting a new Sonic the Hedgehog game, are you less than thrilled? Historically you should be, but try reserve judgement for when the game comes out.
President of the Sonic Team Takashi Iizuka revealed at Sonic’s 25th Anniversary Party in Tokyo on Saturday that 2017 will see a brand new title release for Sonic. The game comes in the wake of the disastrous “reboot” Sonic Boom: Rise of Lyric on the Wii U which was developed by the studio Big Red Button.
By now everyone who has an interest in Sonic – or just likes to watch a good train wreck – has seen footage of Sonic Boom in action. The choppy game-play, numerous bugs and terrible writing plagued the game. It’s been universally panned by critics as one of the worst games imaginable. Almost every Sonic game to find their way on to a 3D spatial platform has seen mixed reviews, it’s arguable that none have been memorable or even – dare I say it – good.
Now I do love Sonic, he holds a very nostalgic place in my heart. Playing Sonic as a kid was always what I looked forward to most when I got home from school. Upon recent inspection however, it turns out those games I loved so much were mostly terrible; its not just Sonic Boom that had issues with game-play, plot and dialogue. Every Sonic game has it’s glaringly obvious faults and after replaying Sonic Adventure DX it became clear to me that Sonic Team is going to need a big overhaul to consider this new game a win. Ultimately it will be interesting to see – as sad as it may be – if Sonic can even be salvaged at this point. We’ve had almost 20 years of bad games, can they turn it around now?
I guess we’ll have to put our faith in the Sonic Team and hope that 2017 brings us the redemption that has been a long time in the making.
