Sonic Unleashed Review
Platform - Wii
Release date - November 18, 2008
Score - 8.5/10

Sonic Unleashed is Sonic Team’s latest full-fledged console Sonic game. This time around Dr. Robotnik (or as everyone except me seems to say now, Eggman…) is harnessing the power of a dark god slumbering beneath the Earth to build his own amusement park of sorts called Eggmanland and it’s up to Sonic to stop him. It’s a bit of a twist on the classic Sonic storyline but it gets the job done. However Sonic get’s caught up in the beam which Robotnik uses to awaken the demon and the resulting effect is that the Chaos Emeralds have lost their power and Sonic has been transformed into a Werehog. The beautifully rendered opening cut scene plays this all out and sets up the premise of the game. Something worth mentioning, the plot doesn’t take itself too seriously either. It feels more like a saturday morning cartoon that a failed attempt at melodrama.

The graphical presentation on the Wii is great. The framerate is very solid. I haven’t experienced any dips in framerate during any of my play sessions so far and I’ve put around 15 hours into the game. The textures are decent. The motion blur is doled out in copious amounts. This game does push the Wii hardware harder than a vast majority of the titles available right now. The camera does indeed seemlessly transition from a closely following 3D view to a 2D sidescrolling view a few times during each of the day stages and follows mostly from above at night. There were times during the night stages where I would have liked to control the camera to line up a jump better and couldn’t, which is a bit of a bummer.

The level design for the daytime stages was developed by Dimps who is also the developer of the Sonic Rush series for Nintendo DS. These guys have proven for the 3rd time now that they know how design a Sonic level. Interestingly enough, these levels are completely different than most of the preview videos released so it’s like playing a totally different game than the PS3/360 version. Everything is so fluid while going through them. There aren’t many showstopping obstacles to break up the nonstop pace of the day stages and if there are, they can be avoided. Multiple plays (you will play the stages multiple times) will result in better completion times. The night stage level design was done by Sonic Team and is fair but not necessarily compelling. The ratio of day levels to night levels on the Wii is quite unbalanced with the day stages totaling 7 and the night stages coming to a staggering 25! For every day stage you unlock, you play 3 or more night stages. This isn’t really an issue if you like beat-em-ups but if you’re only in it for the day stages, be prepared to be underwhelmed for a majority of the game.

Now about the gameplay. There aren’t many out of the ordinary things to do on the platforming side of the werehog stages. Jump over this, grab that, swing here. Nothing spectacular. The combat, which happens quite frequently and in a Devil May Cry “you can’t pass this room until all the enemies are gone” fashion, feels tight. The werehog is pretty underpowered at the beginning of the game but as you defeat enemies you pick up “dark gaia energy” which is used to unlock new moves and ability levels. This is all done in a linear, pre-determined fashion. The player does not have control over which abilites to unlock but the sequence at which these do open up keeps the werehog balanced for the most part.

The day stages are truly amazing. Multiple paths, bumpers, speed pads, chained homing attacks, rails to grind, loop-de-loops and chase sequences are some of what you contend with when the sun is out. The speed is intense and requires lightning fast reflexes to get through them. Some have said that the game looks like it almost plays itself. It only looks that way when you’re watching a skilled player. Believe me, some of my first runs were bad. You learn the courses and you improve. The new drift mechanic works like it should. There are plenty of places in the levels when it can be used to maintain the quick pace although it takes some spot on timing, like pretty much anything when you’re going so fast. The Sonic boost is the equivalent of a nitro button in a racing game and is absolutely essential for getting S rank times. The spin dash of old is back but only before the beginning of the stage. Just before the level starts and you see Sonic’s back you can press the boost button and he will spin dash off the line. Get the timing wrong and he falls on his face however.

The music is nothing short of phenomenal, especially when put up against the soundtracks of pretty much every console Sonic game since the Genesis. Gone is the horrible guitar rock. Gone are the preteen lyrics about following rainbows. What we get in Unleahsed is a whole lot of classy tunes. A good many of them feature some sort of breakbeat drum parts but a good many of them are big band tunes. Horns and funky wah riffs set off the night stages in Spagonia. Ethnic drums and flutes set to techno music drive the pace during the day in Adabat. Twinkly keyboards and catchy melodies accent Holoska. The map screen and hub world have orchstration and/or remixes of the day stages in the respective villages. High marks for class in the soundtrack department.

The game has solid controls no matter which scheme you choose. The motion controls all work as they should and make sense most of the time. I experienced no problems getting a homing attack to recognize using the motion which I did have problems with in Sonic and the Secret Rings. What I did have problems with however is the mechanic in which you can double tap on the control stick to send the werehog off into a sprint. Some of the more difficult platforming sections, especially in Adabat and the final area resulted in some very cheap deaths as these sections contain plenty of high platforms and lining up a jump often ended up in death as Werehog ran off the edge of whatever he was standing on because the game saw a double tap. This is one of the only real areas of beef I have with the game. I personally prefer the feel of the Gamecube controller to play it as the quick step is more intuitive compared to the Wiimote+nunchuck in my opinion.

One particularly upsetting thing to note about the Wii version is that it’s missing 2 entire areas that were shown before the Game was released. These missing zones are Mazuri (present but contains only a boss fight) and Empire City (completely left out). This is a letdown as the PS3/360 version contains these areas and 2/3rds less werehog levels. Expect another review of the PS3 version in the coming months.

Overall, Sonic Unleashed does a lot of things right. It’s day stages are superb, the night stages are great for beat-em-up fans, the soundtrack is top notch and the production values are through the roof. However it falls short in the level balancing, it’s missing entire stages and has some twiddly controls in spots. If you’re a Sonic fan, it’s worth the money. If you think Sonic “should just die”, then you weren’t going to be objective and try it out anyways.

Dave

I just got this game today, and have put a good five hours into it. I feel I’ve spent enough time with it to give a good review. So here we go.

Mario’s Tennis was the game that came with the Virtual Boy. Like most other pack-in titles, it does a decent job of showing off what the system can do while at the same time being not so great that you don’t want to purchase any other games. That’s pretty much the idea behind a pack-in game.

The visuals in this game are actually very impressive. Even though there are only two colors displayed (red and black), the Virtual Boy manages to pull off some pretty nice effects. If you’ve got it focused right, things pop out at you while you’re playing the game. The ball looks as if it’s really coming towards you, and when thigns are supposed to look far away they actuallly look far away rather than just being smaller. The system’s display is relatively high-resolution, so everything looks clean. There is some minor texture work, and the character models look really good. Better than anything we saw on the Super Nintendo for sure. Menus and the score box also “pop”, and gives the game a really polished look. There are nice backgrounds for the various courts, such as Peach’s Castle and various other locations in the Mushroom Kingdom. The backgrounds remain stationary while the character moves, which gives off a very cool scrolling effect. To be quite honest, there are some effects that the Virtual Boy displays that I’d like to see implemented in modern day systems. Every object in the game has depth and it is a very cool thing to see the game’s logo and the tennis ball actually flying towards you. Sort of like when you’re watching a movie in 3D, and it works better than you’d expect (you know, with the polarized 3D glasses instead of those shitty red and blue ones). No screen shots or videos do these games justice, because each eye sees something different. That’s one of the reasons the system can pull off everything that it manages to.

The sound is exactly what you’d expect from a Mario game. The tunes are lighthearted, catchy, and well-composed. Any Mario fan will feel right at home playing the game. The sound effects themselves are sufficient if unremarkable. They’re nothing to write home about, but they don’t hinder the experience in any way.

The character selection isn’t great. You get Mario, Luigi, Peach, Yoshi, Donkey Kong Jr., Toad, and a Koopa Troopa. Aside from their appearances, there isn’t a whole lot of difference between them. There aren’t really any power ups or signature moves, so it feels like you’re playing a tennis game with Mario characters rather than a Mario Tennis game.

But the gameplay itself is well-done. It’s a solid arcade tennis game. Your characters do move a bit slow and there is a learning curve, but there are no major flaws. The learning curve comes from the adjustment period. It took me a few sets to get a feel for the depth perception, but once I did it was the familiar sensation of a tennis video game. If you like tennis games, you’ll like this game. If you like Mario, that’s a bonus.

The gameplay modes are somewhat limited. Like all Virtual Boy games, this is a single-player experience. You can play against the computer, in a doubles match with a CPU team mate against two CPU opponents, or in a singles or doubles tournament. Every game mode is satisfactory. You can choose to play 1 or 3 sets, but 1 is generally enough as this game has more of a “pick up and play” feel than a marathon one.

Again, it’s pretty easy to see why this was the pack-in game for the system. It does a satisfactory job of hooking the player while leaving him wanting more. Multiplayer, more characters, and power-ups would have been ideal, but it’s still an enjoyable experience without them. The game is one of the cheapest available for the system, and if your Virtual Boy doesn’t come with it (if you ever get one) there’s no reason not to track it down.

Visuals: 7
Sound: 8
Extra features: 4
Replay value: 8
Gameplay: 7
Bang for your buck: 10

Overall: 7.5/10