Sonic Boom

[kirbychu]

This is a pretty good showcase of a lot of the problems with the Wii U game.

[Nester the Lark]

I've never actually watched Game Grumps before, so I assume that their unnecessary micro-analysis wasn't actually meant to make any points that weren't already apparent (ie. the game is broken), and it was just part of their shtick.

On a side note, I finally watched the first four episodes of the cartoon, and wow, it is pretty good! The short form and focus on comedy really makes it feel like a successor to The Adventures of Sonic the Hedgehog, except it's better in essentially every aspect. I'm looking forward to seeing more of it!

[Shrikeswind]

That is literally the first time I've seen them rail that hard into a game, and I've seen them do Home Alone and Dennis the Menace for the SNES. For that matter, I've never seen them do an intro either that long, nor that analytically. It is clear that they hate the game.

[kirbychu]

Nov 19, 2014 15:54:57 GMT -5 Nester the Lark said:

I've never actually watched Game Grumps before, so I assume that their unnecessary micro-analysis wasn't actually meant to make any points that weren't already apparent (ie. the game is broken), and it was just part of their shtick.

They don't generally analyze games, or even talk about the game design at all unless it's particularly amazing/terrible. Their shtick, for the most part, is playing video games while doing improv comedy occasionally related in some way to the game.

The part at the start of the video is something they've never done before, but apparently felt the need to do because the game was THAT bad. It is pretty amazing. It's like the cutscenes have jumped back to something around early-Dreamcast era quality. Bearing in mind what they're showing there is a PRE-RENDERED cutscene... Even SA1 had better polish on its pre-rendered stuff than this.

[Nester the Lark]

I'm sorry if I came off sounding like a jerk in my previous post. Unnecessary nitpicking is a pet peeve of mine, even if the game "deserves" it.

As much of a disaster as Rise of Lyric has turned out to be, I'm really interested in knowing what went on behind the scenes. It's all rumors right now, and we only have kind of a fuzzy picture.

How ironic that so many people thought that a Sonic game from a different developer would breath new life into the series, and now I find myself relieved at the thought of the next game coming from Sonic Team.

[kirbychu]

You didn't come off sounding like a jerk, sorry if my reply came off sounding like I thought you were. XD

I'm not a fan of unnecessary nitpicking either, but I don't think the stuff they pointed out there was overly nitpicky. I'd maybe forgive some of that stuff if it was a real-time cutscene on the Gamecube, but for a pre-rendered cutscene on the Wii U in a full-price game, it's totally unacceptable. Even for a pre-rendered cutscene on the Gamecube it's pushing unacceptable.

I mean, for comparison, here's where Sonic cutscenes were at five years ago. A console generation before Sonic Boom. Compare that to the stuff the Grumps were showing at the start of that video... It's hard to believe that's a real game and not a no-budget fan project.

[Nester the Lark]

I didn't meant to imply that you came off sounding like you thought I sounded like a jerk, so I didn't mean to come off sounding that way in my reply, and you certainly didn't seem to imply that in your reply to my reply, and... aw, forget it. I just reread my original post and thought maybe what I said could come off the wrong way and wanted to keep the air clear.

[kirbychu]

Haha, well, we could do that dance all day! I'm just trying to be more careful with how I type things, since I think I tend to come across pretty angry and abrasive. Which is ironically the opposite of how I usually am. XD

Anyway, this is a pretty interesting read. A lot of it's just hearsay and conjecture, since we don't really have any official word on what happened yet, but some interesting stuff there anyway.

[Nester the Lark]

That's an interesting read.

I suppose a little bit of a silver lining to the Sonic Boom debacle is that I always find the cut content from the Sonic games really fascinating. I remember when I first realized that there was an extra music track in Sonic 2's sound test that didn't appear anywhere in the game, and I remembered reading about the Hidden Palace Zone. Then later I found out about the Sonic 2 Beta. And then Michael Jackson's supposed involvement in Sonic 3. And unreleased games like Sonic X-treme and that one based on SatAM. And so on.

But it's also disappointing. That first teaser for Sonic Boom really captured my imagination. It's unfortunate that the original idea got derailed.

[Nester the Lark]

A demo for Rise of Lyric is out on the eShop in both North America and Europe today. I'm gonna have to check this out for myself. Hope I survive.

[Nester the Lark]

Stephen Frost, producer of Sonic Boom: Rise of Lyric (and one of the unfortunate Sega employees who was laid off recently), was interviewed on Sega Nerds' podcast, and he said a few things about the game. Here are the bullet points from Sonic Stadium:

- Suggestion that Sonic had to re-invent itself because the fanbase was getting smaller. Gives Call of Duty as an example/comparison.
- Boom was made to appeal to non Sonic fans. — This is stated multiple times.
- Suggestion that people/retailers are bored of Classic – Dreamcast era Sonic. States you can only do so much with these eras/characters. He does go on to suggest this is from a retailer standpoint.
- Claims multiple times that Boom (franchise) is a big success.
- Admits Boom (franchise) could have been better.
- “Could the games have been better… yes, any game can be made better.”
- Suggestion that part of the reason why Boom (game) isn’t that good is because the team didn’t know what Sonic was about/lack of experience.
- “In focus tests, we heard all the time, people were sick of speed, Sonic was too fast, they wanted to slow down.”
- “People really liked the Co-Op” — Hopes Sonic Team will do that in the future.
- “The biggest mistake in Boom (gaame) was adding too many features to it.
- “It was too much to ask of the/any development team” — In terms of different characters, combat, features etc.
- “I was tasked (by Sega) with creating an experience that appeals to an audience which doesn’t play Sonic.”
- “If I could do it again, I would remove features and speed would be the main focus from the start.”
- “Speed was shelved because we were under the impression people didn’t want it.”
- “Speed is always a Sonic thing, we didn’t focus on that.”
- “The goal of Boom was to reach new people.”
- “As a branch of Sonic, Boom is a success in many ways.”
- Suggests that due to how much content you need to make for a Sonic alone game, it’s too much work. You need additional characters to spread the burden of content.
- “Multiple characters resonate well with people”
- “Solo Sonic games, I don’t know how long that can last there isn’t enough variety to sustain it.”
- “The future of Sonic games needs to be Co-Op, it worked really well in Sonic Boom, community and online play, that sustains it.”
- Say’s he’d love to see a Sonic level design game.
- “In general, you need to do multiplayer and add online multiplayer aspects, that will sustain and keep the franchise alive.”
- Says that the reason for the change in release date was likely a number of reasons, cartoon air date, Nintendo release dates, Sega release dates.
- When the decision was made to change Boom’s release date, Sega did not know when Smash was coming out.

Man, so many misguided things in there. I haven't listened to the actual podcast yet, but I think I will.

My thoughts for now:
- Appeal to non-Sonic fans? I thought that was what Lost World tried to do.
- Needs multiple characters to spread out content because Sonic, alone, requires too much work? Sonic Team used that excuse years ago. They still managed to make better games with Colors, Generations and Lost World.
- Sonic should be slow? They thought people didn't want speed? Are you kidding me? This is why you don't let focus groups design your game for you!
- I always get a bad feeling when a franchise is compared with Call of Duty.

Still, kinda interesting to hear insight as to what went wrong. I suppose there's still something impressive about recreating a Sonic '06 magnitude disaster.

[Shrikeswind]

Given all the things he's saying ("We slowed Sonic down because that's what the fans wanted," "We need multiple characters to spread out the content because Sonic alone takes work," "Boom's been a big success," "Sonic needed to reinvent itself because of a shrinking fanbase, like with Call of Duty," "People are bored of Classic/Dreamcast Sonic,") it sounds like Sega laid him off for good reason. I don't want to be too harsh on the guy, but this game failed something spectacular, and it doesn't sound like he's learned anything.

[Manspeed]

He also seems blissfully unaware that this "franchise" consists of two games and a cartoon, and the only thing people actually like is the cartoon.

[TV Eye]

Yeah, it was like they focused more on making a marketable product and not necessarily a good game. Poor Sonic, he's been abused for too long.
Though, I can see what they're saying about reinventing the brand. There was Genesis Sonic which focused a lot on nature and Sonic basically destroying machines to bring his peaceful home technology-free (especially evident in stages like Oil Ocean), then came Dreamcast Sonic which had cities and humans and everyone got a taller, sleeker redesign.

Now they've kind of gone back to the original idea...but more, I dunno...tribal. It wasn't a good direction. I like how they took the humans out and brought nature back, but the nature they put in was so plain and lifeless. Where's the Green Hills? The Mushroom Forests? The Spring Yards? They could've gone all out with the designs, but they focused more on the story. Not good for a Sonic game.

[Nester the Lark]

Mar 19, 2015 4:47:11 GMT -5 Shrikeswind said:

it sounds like Sega laid him off for good reason.

To be fair, he wasn't laid off because of Sonic Boom. He was one of about 300 people that lost their jobs when Sega shut down their San Francisco office in January.

Also, Sega Nerds seems really concerned that the "bullet point" versions of the things Frost said were taken out of context, and will be posting a full transcription later today.

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EDIT: Here's the video of Frost talking about Sonic Boom on the Nerdcast. It's pretty lengthy, and some things don't sound as bad in context: