After yesterday's post on Channel 3 where I made a very accurate statement calling the Sonic the Hedgehog series overrated, I didn't expect the reaction it received. While most smart people agreed with me, there's still some that said I was crazy. That I must just not be good at the game. Well, let's see if that was true. I fired up Sonic on my Anbernic 351V last night because I'm a man of integrity and wanted to play thru it one more time. I've obviously played this game DOZENS of times over my life, but did I ever truly enjoy it? Spoiler: it stinks.
The opening level of Sonic the Hedgehog, Green Hill Zone, is iconic. Sure. Lush vibrant colors. A great soundtrack. Fun graphics. Cool enemies. But it all stops there. The game was touted as being so fast that even fat Mario would be jealous. They said the processing power of the Sega Genesis would blow the SNES out of the water. The only thing it did was turn Genesis kids into bullies. The amount of wedgies I got from someone wearing a Streets of Rage t-shirt back in elementary school...well let's just say I went thru quite a number of Mario Underoos.
Within a few minutes of playing this game, heck even a few seconds, you start to hit walls. Or enemies. Tons of them. Your rings go flying. Sonic gets thrown backwards. Then it's a mad dash to collect even 1 more ring so you don't die (which you will).
Let me ask you this, good people who defend Sonic: is there ANYTHING more annoying in the entire history of video games than not hitting a Sonic loop-de-loop at anything less than full speed and having your "fast" blue hero have to start all over again because he can't make it all the way around? How far do I have to go back to get a head start? 10 feet? 20? Oh I have to backtrack like 50 feet to get this guy a running start? OK cool. Mario could fly at this point. But yeah, cool shoes Sonic.
Then if you're unlucky enough to actually get to the Chaos Emerald bonus stage (more on this later), you have to play thru one of the most annoying and most difficult to control bonus stages ever. But these Emeralds aren't that important are they? They don't really mention them in the game at all. Oh...just wait.
So then you move on to World 2 if you haven't already ripped your Sonic cartridge out of the console and put in a better game like Toejam & Earl. Marble Zone might be the worst designed level I've ever played. The amount of times you have to stop and wait for the slowest moving platforms to come close to you is insane. Wasn't this supposed to be a fast game? Why am I waiting forever for this little block to come close to me? And why is this music terrible?
This game continues on and on like this. Most of the levels aren't fun. "Oh but what about the level where you can drown constantly and it plays the most anxiety inducing music ever? Isn't that fun?!" I can't believe this got 75 sequels. I can't believe Sonic is STILL a thing. And I don't hate Sonic! I don't. The movies are great. I've played most of the games but after a while I started thinking why are these so popular? They aren't that good. They're incredibly frustrating, especially the first one. It should have been killed right then and there. The geniuses behind SEGA did such a fantastic job marketing him that Sonic could do no wrong. A friend said “He's the Snoop Dogg of video games.” Snoop's first album, Doggystyle, is SO good that we ignore his last 20 albums which were all kinda bombs.
I eventually made it all the way to the end (with a few cheats because I just HAD to see how this game ends again). Besides a very uninspiring final boss fight with Robotnik where you have to do the ONLY attack move Sonic has by jumping into something, the game also has a terribly boring ending. Sonic frees a bunch of bunny rabbits and other woodland critters. Why? There's no story in this game. Why am I saving these things?
But the real pièce de résistance, the best thing about this game, truly, is if you didn't actually get all those Chaos Emeralds that they never explained you should get...you get the world's worst ending ever...
That's it. Not a "Good job!" or "Wow you sat thru this garbage game and beat it? Here's your $50 back." Nope. Just a mean old "Try Again". I assume it's in the manual what you're supposed to do for a 'real' ending but this is 2023 and I didn't have it on me.
But seriously, the amount of waiting for a slow platform to come close to you, or the amount of cheap times you bump into an enemy or a wall going full speed, or the overall pretty boring level design and drab music as the game goes on, makes me really think this is the most overrated video game franchise ever. I challenge each person who loves Sonic to go back and play the original. Write down your favorite parts. I dare you. I'll read them. I have 30 seconds to spare. I don't WANT to hate this game. I understand what it's done for gaming and how it fueled the console wars back in the early 90's. It was fun. But Sonic clearly couldn't cut it as the main guy. Nintendo literally bought his company and told him to go wait in the corner until they throw him into Smash Bros (don't get me started on that...what a bad Smash character).