[Editors Note: James had the wonderful opportunity of seeing Sonic Unleashed, first-hand at E3. Be sure to thank him for this detailed writeup of Sonic's new adventure! He's pretty beat from all the events this week!]
Sonic Unleashed is a unique experience because Sega has decided to return to Sonic’s original winning formula: fast paced gaming with occasional platforming qualities, bosses, lots of jumping and Chaos Emeralds.
As you well know, the story goes like this. Dr. Eggman (still Dr. Robotnik in my heart) managed to collect all the Chaos Emeralds and used their power on Sonic, causing him to turn into Weresonic at night. Sonic must cure himself and get back at Eggman for his devious ways.
There are several important changes that have been made to Sonic Unleashed. For starters, rings don’t simply act as 1-Up counters and health-bars anymore. Now collecting enough will enable Sonic to have speed bursts. And unlike some previous games, being hit by an enemy won’t make Sonic lose all of his rings.
As Sonic, Sega is utilizing a proprietary engine that they’ve worked on since 2005 called the Hedgehog Engine, made specifically to stream architecture quickly for high-speed movement in-game. While the current build is still a little sluggish, it proved to be very good at what it’s made to do while keeping the framerate steady most of the time.
With Sonic running so fast much of the time, the problem previous titles had was that people couldn’t keep up because the game wasn’t accommodating to them. It simply let sonic run along and players were left wondering what was going on. Not anymore. Now when Sonic runs at the speed of sound, the camera goes into 2-D mode, either from a side angle (as we’ve seen in the trailers) or from behind Sonic. When looking at Sonic from behind, the controls switch from using the left analog stick for movement to using the right and left bumpers (on the 360 version) to perform “quick steps”. Hitting the right bumper will move Sonic one space to the right, and the left bumper to the left.
At the same time, when not running, Sonic Unleashed acts as a platformer. The demo I saw first-hand had Sonic jumping up a set of ledges on moving platforms with rotating spikes looking for blood, just like the good ol’ days. Sonic has his typical running gameplay, and pushing the X button is a homing attack that becomes very useful and necessary when getting through levels. B is for crouch and A is for jump (Xbox 360 version was shown).
As Weresonic, the rules change drastically. Controls change to the Y button being attack, X being an attack throw and B being a grab. Weresonic doesn’t run nearly as fast as Sonic does, even if he’s on all fours. However, Weresonic has many other qualities that Sonic doesn’t have that change the pace of gameplay significantly.
Weresonic has long arms that stretch, making him an excellent climber. Much of the game as Weresonic will have him climbing different areas, making his sections of the game more vertical as opposed to Sonic’s horizontal gameplay. Weresonic is also a fighter; as explained by the controls, he’s got three different attack buttons that can be performed on enemies at any given time, and he fights lots of enemies. All in all, Weresonic has over 30 different fighting combos’, many of which are unlocked after gaining experience points. He also won’t lose rings because Weresonic uses a health bar, though to compliment that he also has a shield bar. This bar is for blocking attacks. The more attacks Weresonic blocks, the lower his shield gets, but he won’t lose health while blocking.
There is no online multiplayer, so don’t expect to be running next to friends playing as Tails or Knuckles. Also, don’t expect to be playing as other characters; this one is purely Sonic or Weresonic, though mini-games will have players as other characters in the Sonic universe.
Sonic Unleashed is set for release on the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, Wii and PS2 November of this year in the US and Europe. No release date has been set for Japan or other regions. The Wii version will of course have motion controls, but will also allow players to use their Gamecube or Classic controllers. The PS2 version will be completely different from the others, though no details were given on what those differences are.
we all also consider you as a...
@dragonite: Thats prettty cool dragonite. I think like most people I’m tails and sonic. As i’ve said before hence the name. Propbably a little more tails.
@Sonicman: That japanese site was kinda weird. I tried it but prefered here. The trailers take ages to load at that site and there are no interesting facts or headlines. But I’m sure it will get better.
Thanks james for the write-up. Only thing I’m slightly weirded out about is that you dont lose all your rings when you hit an enemy. Though this is a good thing just very different. and instead of homing with A,A u home with A,X. But hey wont be hard once I get out of the habit
@Sonic The Hedgehog:
How did you get your comment to show?
I try to show the same thing about the japanese website but it won’t show.
how come my comment won’t show?
oops
sorry for my repeating comment.
He admin have you notice that the Japan has its own sonic unleashed page. I found out on The Sonic Stadium.
Well I think we should try to use google translate to find out if there is any info on Sonic Unleashed.
http://sonic.sega.jp/SonicWorldAdventure/#/index
Also I think I noticed that there is some different pictures on japanese website.
Here is the link
http://sonic.sega.jp/SonicWorldAdventure/#/index/screen/020
Another thing I wanted to say is that I think the a new rumour now is that the release date is November 18 and there is a tutorial magzine for 20 dollars.
Note: When will the fact sheet be updated?
Ok, I am much more relieved. It looks like even though this game is very fast, it is still a platformer, giving you time to think, and not just hold the boost button down. This game looks more and more massive and just plain awsome as things go on.
i think the ps2 version will be crappier….
http://sonic.sega.jp/SonicWorldAdventure/
NEW WEBSITE on Sonic World Adventure
@Quik: whoa that’s really cool how do you do that?
What does it mean when it says
“Your comment is awaiting moderation”
[...] impressions are here. You’ll note at the end that James says no online multiplayer is planned. We had [...]
Wow.
Online functions - online multiplayer = High scores and Chao!
lol that picture’s pretty awesome! nice work quik!
@David Leggett: Yeah, I’m in the same boat. Not much of an artist, but I like my design skills.
If you don’t mind a bit of spam (totally not what I came here for, btw), you and the Campers might appreciate this: http://quiksilverzero.deviantart.com/art/Sonic-the-Cereal-finished-41712987
@BanoX93: Not sure. Xbox 360 for sure, and most likely the Wii as well. Really depends on the differences between versions though (not from an enjoyment level so much - although I will enjoy it :P, but so I can talk about them all here).
cool thanks james
@David Leggett: Are you going to pick up all the versions of SU?
@Link451: I’m not sure why people thought we were interviewing SEGA. I said that we would be shown Sonic Unleashed, and I remember mentioning in a discussion previously that there was a chance we’d be able to ask them questions ourselves (which didn’t pull through as expected).
@NintendoBrad: You and lots of other Sonic Fans.
As Lamb84 asked, was this your interview? Since it doesn’t really seem like one.
I’m catching up with all the info, and everything looks very good so far, although I’m not quite sold on the Werehog gameplay just yet.