I woke up this morning and the first thing I did was finish Sonic lost World and now I want to talk about it. This is not a review, but just my overall experience with the game. No build up, This is a mostly well made Sonic game but the amount of brick wall's Sonic Team extends and the amount of times your going smash into them will bring the fun factor down to a crawl. That is just it, I did not have alot of fun playing this game. Most of time I was frustrated or annoyed, never outright hate though but I did come close. I going to talk about things I did like and didnt in a simple bullet point fashion.
The Good( or things that didnt annoy me too much)
1. PRESENTATION - Great, the only problem I had is that it is not as lively as Genrarations. GEN had shit happening everywhere.So the more simplistic look of LW can be kinda boring. Sometimes it looks like the levels are hovering over screen savers. Outside of that I enjoy it.
2.MUSIC - Not as memorable as any recent Sonic games, but it has its pieces. Still great though
3. BADNICKS - Return and are just awesome in there use. Enemies have never been this threatening in a 3D Sonic game and thats my most like feature about them. They can kill you.
4. LEVEL DESIGN - I generally like the level design in the game. Some are better than others, but as whole there greatish. I wasnt bored on any zone. Lots of alternative routes that ranked from easy to hard that lead into fun exloration and a test of skill.
The Bad( or thing's that were overly annoying)
1. ON YOUR OWN - First thing right off the bat is that there is no tutorial so you will have to learn the full potential of Sonic's new and old moves on your own. Most of this potential is not needed to beat the game but will be needed to S rank the level's and collect ring red's. It is entirely possible to play through most of the game and not know you can do some stuff.Example's are Charging the Homing attack. You will most likely figure this out during a boss fight when you beat the boss in 2 hits not 3-5 it usaully takes. If you dont figure it out then you will by the first appearance of the Slicer or the 2nd Zavok fight( cant beat him without it). Another is Sonic can wall run around corner's but a certain input has to be done for him to do it other wise he'll run straight off the wall. That input is never told to you. I figured it out by trail and error and lot's of game overs. You can also spindash on the wall, which again is never told to you, to gain altitude. Again I figured it out by mistake in a 2D section where I was still getting use to the controls.
2. CONTROL - Sonic has ton's of moves at his disposal and for most part they work. The other 20% they dont or do when you dont want them to and there is no way to stop it. Examples are homing attack(HA), the lock on reticule does not always show up. There have been more than a few occassions where I am standing right in front of an enemy or a gruop of enemies.. no lock-on reticule, so I have to leave range and re-enter it for it to appear. The charge feature does not always happen. Sometimes it charges quickly and then next time very slowly.Is it only certain enemies? Final problem with HA is the auto lock on. Sonic will lock on up to 5 target's at a time then unleash his attakc. This is cool when your not trying to get to a precise location as multi lock on HA will most likely send to you to area's you dont want to be. Sonic has a double jump(DJ) and it feels weird to me. I find myself over/undershooting my jumps alot with with main because once you use it you have very little control of sonic . So trying to get Sonic on those tight platforms can be a pain like in Dusty Desert 2 where that tornado is chasing you and you got do some very tight precise platforming to get that red ring. DJ and homing attack also share the same button soif you wanna ust jump past enemies and move on its not gonna happen if the that retiucle locks on.
Sonic has his Parkour stuff. It works but goes both way's in effectiveness with me. Sonic can grab ledges thank god! and I have been saved many times by this..but also killed. These deaths happen alot of times in 2D sections and involve times where sonic is being chased by some instant death trap and grabing ledges slows you down( last Zavok fight, Dustry Desert 2) or grabing platforms that break after a few seconds. Then Sonic will automatically run up walls when he has any type of speed this gets annoying running wall's that have nothing to do with getting to where you need to be. I wish these 2 moves mapped to a Parkour button so I grab and run walls only when I want too at all times.
The controls need to be cleaned up. They are not bad, but need to work 100% of the time and I when I need or dont need them to. I hated fighting the controls in this game.
WISP - They suck in this game. They are nowhere near as versatile or fun to use. The control for all not drill and laser is horribad because you have to use the gyroscope for all of them..sigh. I believe that wisp are suppose to be this games superglide as they allow you to bypass challenging area's and stuff but I found myself just taking the foot route becuase they are so unfun to use. Hover wisp pissed me off, trying to get the fucking thing to light speeddash in Lava Mountain 4 cost me a few lives. Stay away from these.
ITEMS - Power ups are back and I bet you wont use them because they are so out of the way. Sonic can store 5 power ups he can use at anytime and with a tap atthe bottom screen can use them at will. I forgot they were there the whole way through. Why cant they be incorpareted into the levels?
STORY - Story has never been Oscar worthy in a Sonic game but that is ok, they dont have to. What they are though is entertaining. Say what you will about SA1, SA2, SH,SthH,Unleashed and even 06. They are least interesting . Starting with Colors we get boring uninteresting episodes about how Sonic foils Eggman today. Seriously, they way Sonic is written nowadays completely kills any tension in the story. They tried to fix this in Lost World but mostly doesnt work . Each character has a little self story going on. Sonic is kinda..kinda responsible for Zetti rebellion, it is not like it wasnt going to happen anyway looking back a Eggmans track record. They try to paint him as doubtful or regretful but the VA of Sonic just doesnt sell it,probably because he sounds like a surffer with his mouth full all the time. Tails acts like a little bitch in game. He is butthurt that Sonic wants to rely on Eggman to shut his malfunctioning machine down. Maybe Sonic choose Eggman because he built the fucking machine. Then we have the Zetti that are here..just to be villians. Nothing special about them. Who are they, where they come from, what is the lost hex is never explained. The first time they open their mouths and what comes out is waht you will get for the rest of the game. They can give a chuckle a few times but 99% throwaway villians. Oh!!! Knuckles and Amy are here.. why? I dont know.
GIMMICK LEVELS - You spend a good chuck of this game doing not Sonic stuff. Sonic decides to to turn into a snowball where you have to roll him through a overly long level while enemies try to knock you off the map..why? Level would work just fine with normal ole Sonic. One overly long level has Sonic flying through the air in a Sky Chase style level....without plane. Yep Sonic is just flying..why? Your guiding fruit to a blender in another..why. They are not that bad just slow and boring ... why? Sonic the Hedgehog is fast paced platforming. We have established for years now that people generally hate playing Sonic games that dont play like Sonic.
DO OR DIE - Without a doubt my most hated feature of this game and the one that nearly drove me to putting this game down permantly. In a effort to increase difficulty in this game SONIC TEAM has decided to infest this game with Do or Die task or insta death trpas. It happens as early as Dusty Desert and becomes the real Final boss by the second half of the game. You can play thorugh a good chuck with only having to put up with it a few times but its when Red Ring hunting happens it becomes a nightmare. RR's,especially towards to end are put in location's where if you dont get it you will die trying OR if you attempt to get it and mess up you will have to die as there is no way to go back and try again. Just in Genral, if this snake gets you your dead even with rings, If this Owl sees you your dead even with rings,you touch these FUCKING CARTS FULL OF BOMBS that scattered through out the level your dead..even with rings, If you run into a wall your dead, you didnt see that pit coming up during auto section your dead, you touch that lava that is somehow diffrent from the other lava that doesnt kill you, your dead,.. There is so much if you touch this your dead in this game it is madness. EVEN SUPER SONIC WILL DIE TO THESE. It is such a cheap way to make the game difficult. Combine this with fact that you do not get an extra life on 100 rings,the game is stingy with giving them to you and checkpoints can be few You will be playing the same part over and over and seeing the Game over screen alot! I have NEVER seen the game over screen this much in a sonic game ..EVER!
SUPER SONIC - ......... All those Red Rings for THIS!!!??? Super Sonic blows in this game mainly because he is barely game breaking(The point of Super Sonic). You get invincibility, and a Dash and that is it, no ability upgrades like higher jump or insta all run. HE STILL DIES BY DEATH TRAPS LIKE THE CART OF BOMBS..WTF!?
I think that is it. I honestly have not been this stressed out by a Sonic game before. Eggmanland sucks! playing Shadow 7 times sucks! but they never had me considering the idea of shelving the game. I still dont think this game is horrible but would rather play SA1,2,Heroes,Unleashed, and colors before this. If I could go back in time I would not collect the Red Rings as I played through and would wait till after the I beat the game. The annoyingness and Super Sonic is not worth it.That is what I recommend.
I do think that this game design has the elements of the Greatest 3D game ever and Its more exciting because it does not cock block other playable characters from happening. SEGA just needs to work out the issues for a more fluid game.
