Sonic Forces & Sonic Mania

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Re: Sonic Forces & Sonic Mania

Postby south carmain » Wed Nov 22, 2017 8:12 pm

Riku Rose wrote: See this posted elsewhere and it made me laugh.

phpBB [video]


The footage here is my second play-through of the game with all moments where you can't control the character in 3D edited out. Specifically:
- menus/cut-scenes, of course
- classic sonic and 2D sections of the 3D characters
- long automated sequences (the train in that one avatar stage)
- the boss fights, while most are 3D, they are essentially padding and come out as tedious wait-fests.
- the slide, because fuck the slide

All that's left is about 15 minutes of 3D sonic(and avatar). And even then a-lot of this game-play is grinding on solo rails or just boosting straight with little challenge or player input required. And I didn't even take the fastest routes.

Maybe Sonic fans didn't play boom not because it was a bad game but because it had too much gameplay :-k
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Re: Sonic Forces & Sonic Mania

Postby Mr. Frozen » Wed Nov 22, 2017 10:10 pm

MiTT3NZ wrote: Voice overs were possible on the Mega Drive. And the SNES.


Yep, could even do fully voiced FMVs with the Sega CD, but that is cheating since the Sega CD added extra hardware to help with the processing of movies and audio. Sonic CD actually had some pretty nice videos, but they chose to make sonic a mute until sonic adventure.
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Re: Sonic Forces & Sonic Mania

Postby Kintor » Thu Nov 23, 2017 1:36 am

Mr. Frozen wrote: Yep, could even do fully voiced FMVs with the Sega CD, but that is cheating since the Sega CD added extra hardware to help with the processing of movies and audio. Sonic CD actually had some pretty nice videos, but they chose to make sonic a mute until sonic adventure.

Storage capacity in the 16-bit era was definitely part of the problem, something that the Mega CD helped to solve. Snatcher is a great example full voice acting being used at the time. However, I think that voice acting alone isn't the only thing that made Sonic Adventure more ambitious then past Sonic stories. I mean, Sonic Adventure is not a game that could've run on the Saturn. While development did start on the Saturn it took the power of the Dreamcast to allow Sonic Team to create the story they wanted to tell. People forget now but Sonic Adventure was a real technical showcase of what the Dreamcast could do, a complex multi-character voice acted story is an important technical achievement for Sonic Adventure and the Dreamcast.
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Re: Sonic Forces & Sonic Mania

Postby OL » Thu Nov 23, 2017 11:35 am

^^I'm not sure having multiple characters and voice acting was all that impressive an achievement, when Playstation, Saturn, PC, and N64 games had already been doing that for years.

But yeah, until now I literally hadn't looked at anything for Sonic Forces aside from the announcement gameplay, but seeing that video above... yeah, that looks pretty poor. Literally a series of narrow corridors to press forward in and occasionally jump. That might have been vaguely fun as a Saturn game, but it looks a bit sleep-inducing now.
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Re: Sonic Forces & Sonic Mania

Postby Hyo Razuki » Thu Nov 23, 2017 1:08 pm

To some extent, I can see the thought behind Sonic Forces. The Sonic fan base is still huge and there is apparently a big part of that fan base who are into original character creation. So Sonic Team probably thought it was a good idea to get those people on board. Then there is a part of the fans who prefers the 2-D Sonics which is why they put 2-D parts in the game. But they're with 3-D physics so they don't work.

As I've said before, they need a new team. People at Sonic Team need to get fired. People in charge first, and probably a lot of underlings too. Somebody at Sega needs to finally start up the lawn mower and get the mess which is Sonic Team in order.

While doing that, they should keep catering to 2-D Sonic fans by outsourcing the development to Australia. Nobody at Sonic Team has the skill and competence to make a Sonic game, not even in 2-D. Let Christian Whitehead handle that. That way, we will at least get a good 2-D Sonic every once in a while.
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Re: Sonic Forces & Sonic Mania

Postby Kintor » Thu Nov 23, 2017 6:26 pm

OL wrote:^^I'm not sure having multiple characters and voice acting was all that impressive an achievement, when Playstation, Saturn, PC, and N64 games had already been doing that for years.

But yeah, until now I literally hadn't looked at anything for Sonic Forces aside from the announcement gameplay, but seeing that video above... yeah, that looks pretty poor. Literally a series of narrow corridors to press forward in and occasionally jump. That might have been vaguely fun as a Saturn game, but it looks a bit sleep-inducing now.

You're still missing the point, Sonic Adventure and the power of the Dreamcast hardware is what allowed Sonic Team to finally integrate a higher level of storytelling into Sonic game. Trying isolate specific qualities like voice acting alone is far too reductionist, it's everything from the animation to the 3D landscapes that provide context to that voice acting for multiple characters. That in truth huge and epic stories, where Sonic spoke, have always been a part of the Sonic series. Sonic Adventure simply marks the point when modern technology caught up with what the cartoons and comics had been doing from the beginning.

As for Sonic Forces, you shouldn't pay much attention to such poorly made videos. There are plenty of branching paths and exploration in Sonic Forces, especially when it comes to the later levels. Just take a look at the late game Null Space to consider when Sonic Forces can achieve with its more complex examples of level design:

phpBB [video]
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Re: Sonic Forces & Sonic Mania

Postby MiTT3NZ » Thu Nov 23, 2017 7:00 pm

I think I get it now... other games are irrelevant. Other studios are irrelevant. Hell, the entire industry is irrelevant. Only Sonic and SEGA are, and therefore you've been reading every post out of context. See, to us all of that is relevant, so I see where we got our wires crossed.
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Re: Sonic Forces & Sonic Mania

Postby south carmain » Thu Nov 23, 2017 7:11 pm

MiTT3NZ wrote:I think I get it now... other games are irrelevant. Other studios are irrelevant. Hell, the entire industry is irrelevant. Only Sonic and SEGA are, and therefore you've been reading every post out of context. See, to us all of that is relevant, so I see where we got our wires crossed.

Stop buying in to the anti-sonic media conspiracy.
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Re: Sonic Forces & Sonic Mania

Postby Riku Rose » Thu Nov 23, 2017 7:47 pm

Kintor wrote:You're still missing the point, Sonic Adventure and the power of the Dreamcast hardware is what allowed Sonic Team to finally integrate a higher level of storytelling into Sonic game. Trying isolate specific qualities like voice acting alone is far too reductionist, it's everything from the animation to the 3D landscapes that provide context to that voice acting for multiple characters. That in truth huge and epic stories, where Sonic spoke, have always been a part of the Sonic series. Sonic Adventure simply marks the point when modern technology caught up with what the cartoons and comics had been doing from the beginning.


Games like Metal Gear Solid literally had a 2D picture move it’s mouth slightly for 90% of the game and told a more complex story and built a world better then a Sonic game could ever dream of. You don’t need a fancy machine to make something immersive, radio can be immersive just using sound if done right. The reason there wasn’t voice acting before was because the games didn’t need it, Sonic was about the gameplay and still should be.

I doubt that the Sonic Team was sitting around saying they wanted the technology to get better like James Cameron did for Avatar so they could do Sonic justice and then produce gems like this:


phpBB [video]


Kintor wrote:As for Sonic Forces, you shouldn't pay much attention to such poorly made videos. There are plenty of branching paths and exploration in Sonic Forces, especially when it comes to the later levels. Just take a look at the late game Null Space to consider when Sonic Forces can achieve with its more complex examples of level design:


Grind on a rail for 20 seconds
Land on a platform, get surrounded by enemies and spin in a circle to kill them
Jump on a rail and grind again for 20 seconds
Land on another platform, more enemies, spin in a circle and jump on another rail.

Having 3 different routes that result in you just doing the same thing no matter what route you go down is not complex level design.

Riku Rose has received 3 thanks from: MiTT3NZ, OL, shredingskin
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Re: Sonic Forces & Sonic Mania

Postby MiTT3NZ » Thu Nov 23, 2017 8:34 pm

Jesus christ, that clip is fucking gold! Surely it's not real?
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Re: Sonic Forces & Sonic Mania

Postby OL » Thu Nov 23, 2017 8:36 pm

Good god, I just about died laughing at that.

Kintor wrote:You're still missing the point, Sonic Adventure and the power of the Dreamcast hardware is what allowed Sonic Team to finally integrate a higher level of storytelling into Sonic game. Trying isolate specific qualities like voice acting alone is far too reductionist, it's everything from the animation to the 3D landscapes that provide context to that voice acting for multiple characters.


I'm not missing the point of anything. You didn't say anything about graphics before. You literally just said:

Kintor wrote:People forget now but Sonic Adventure was a real technical showcase of what the Dreamcast could do, a complex multi-character voice acted story is an important technical achievement for Sonic Adventure and the Dreamcast.


...and nothing about any of that was an important technical achievement. You specifically pointed out a "multi-character voice acted story," and there's tons of that all over the Dreamcast and every console from the previous generation. Might have been new for the Sonic series itself, but saying they were important achievements for the Dreamcast is just false.

EDIT: Etc etc, the stuff Riku said.
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Re: Sonic Forces & Sonic Mania

Postby south carmain » Thu Nov 23, 2017 9:00 pm

Just to put it in to context, this is what Kintor refers to as "a real technical showcase of what the Dreamcast could do, a complex multi-character voice acted story is an important technical achievement for Sonic Adventure and the Dreamcast."

phpBB [video]
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Re: Sonic Forces & Sonic Mania

Postby Kintor » Fri Nov 24, 2017 2:02 am

OL wrote: I'm not missing the point of anything. You didn't say anything about graphics before. You literally just said:

...and nothing about any of that was an important technical achievement. You specifically pointed out a "multi-character voice acted story," and there's tons of that all over the Dreamcast and every console from the previous generation. Might have been new for the Sonic series itself, but saying they were important achievements for the Dreamcast is just false.

EDIT: Etc etc, the stuff Riku said.

Of course you're missing the point; you keep trying to reduce this argument to semantics and looking to score points that way, while avoiding the truth of what I'm saying. If graphics didn't matter when it comes to storytelling you'd read a book, using your imagination to fill-in the gaps. Video games however use the power of available hardware to fill-in those gaps, to create virtual environments and detail character interaction that you won't even find from Hollywood, limited as movies are by the constraints of the physical world.

Sonic Adventure is no exception; the extra power of the Dreamcast's hardware improved the capacity for storytelling across the board. There could be voice files before and even some limited animation but what Sonic Adventure achieved was the first time that Storytelling in a Sonic game could match the earlier cartoons and comics. It's not so much doing something different with the Sonic series that has gone before but rather bringing the video games in line with the rest of the Sonic media to offer a unified idea of Sonic as a character, snappy dialogue included.

Also, I've noticed that you no longer want to talk about Sonic Forces itself, ever since I offered a great counter-example to that awful video you cited. By now you must concede how Null Space refutes the baseless rhetoric you've been using to attacking Sonic Forces with. Just look at what a skilled player can accomplished, over some small-minded troll with a video editing tool. Across Null Space you can see numerous branching paths and the dynamic landscapes that define the best Sonic levels. This level offers great replay value, that with a little bit of skill and understanding of the gameplay mechanics, each playthrough of Null Space can be different as try to speed run for the highest score and best time, thanks to all the alternate routes.
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Re: Sonic Forces & Sonic Mania

Postby OL » Fri Nov 24, 2017 3:05 am

:lol:
Jesus.
You keep going into this stuff like you're having some grand debate, and no one else is debating properly to meet your standards. You're arguing points that no one was contesting to begin with, then putting words in others' mouths.
Case in point:

Kintor wrote:Of course you're missing the point; you keep trying to reduce this argument to semantics and looking to score points that way, while avoiding the truth of what I'm saying. If graphics didn't matter when it comes to storytelling you'd read a book, using your imagination to fill-in the gaps.

When did I say a single thing about graphics not being important to storytelling?
You said that having voice-acted characters was a major achievement for the Dreamcast itself, and I disagreed on account of a multitude of games having done that previously. You made no mention of graphics in your statement, so obviously I wasn't talking about that.
I'm barely even arguing to begin with; I've just pointed out the holes in your posts, and you seem to take umbrage with that.


Kintor wrote:Also, I've noticed that you no longer want to talk about Sonic Forces itself, ever since I offered a great counter-example to that awful video you cited. By now you must concede how Null Space refutes the baseless rhetoric you've been using to attacking Sonic Forces with.

Another --> :lol:
Whatever I've said about Sonic Forces isn't baseless at all; it's based on the two gameplay videos I've seen of it.
You mention this "baseless rhetoric [I've] been using to attack Sonic Forces with" as if I'm on some kind of smear campaign, when almost literally all I've said is "now that I've seen videos, I'm not impressed."

You're trying way too hard to get some kind of victory out of this, when there's nothing to win. One more for the road: :lol:
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Re: Sonic Forces & Sonic Mania

Postby Kintor » Fri Nov 24, 2017 3:29 am

OL wrote: When did I say a single thing about graphics not being important to storytelling?
You said that having voice-acted characters was a major achievement for the Dreamcast itself, and I disagreed on account of a multitude of games having done that previously. You made no mention of graphics in your statement, so obviously I wasn't talking about that.
I'm barely even arguing to begin with; I've just pointed out the holes in your posts, and you seem to take umbrage with that.

Another --> :lol:
Whatever I've said about Sonic Forces isn't baseless at all; it's based on the two gameplay videos I've seen of it.
You mention this "baseless rhetoric [I've] been using to attack Sonic Forces with" as if I'm on some kind of smear campaign, when almost literally all I've said is "now that I've seen videos, I'm not impressed."

You keep trying to reduce things to semantics and you aren't even reading my later post on video game storytelling. Voice acting is only ever one part of Sonic Adventure more complex storytelling. The views you support try to attack Sonic Adventure and all modern Sonic games because of its voice acting. In response I've pointed out how the earliest cartoons and comics already gave Sonic a voice, if you'd been paying attention to any of the Sonic media in the 90s. To that end, Sonic Adventure simply marks the point when console hardware could finally match the storytelling qualities of a cartoon. Shows like Beast Wars were already experimenting with CGI animation; games like Sonic Adventure just took things to the next logical step and offered cartoon quality stories in a video game.

Now, in regards to Sonic Forces, I must again ask that you take this conversation seriously and actually take a look at Null Space. This level already refutes every baseless attack you've made against Sonic Forces, in terms of level design and the dynamic capabilities of the gameplay. It's a disappointing that you refuse to actually talk about Null Space and instead continue to fall back on a poorly edited video. Sonic Forces is a game that represents what modern Sonic gameplay can do, offering all those branching paths and tiered level design you always claim to like about the classic games. It’s just a shame when Sonic Forces offers you exactly that you suddenly pretend that these qualities don’t exist.
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