When I still wore shorts, Sonic was definitely one of my favourite games and I used to spend hours on the Micro Genius playing it.
I can’t say the same unfortunately for any of the newer versions of this game as none of them managed to keep me interested enough.
Sonic Generations is an upcoming video game in the Sonic the Hedgehog series, currently in production by Sonic Team for Play Station 3, Xbox 360, PC and Nintendo 3DS. It celebrates the 20th anniversary of the original Sonic the Hedgehog game and will be released by Sega in Europe on November 4.
The plot of this game revolves around Sonic’s 20th anniversary celebrations, where a strange time hole appears, sucking everyone in and scattering them across time.
As Sonic searches for his friends, he ends up meeting his old self, Classic Sonic. Both Modern and Classic Sonic decide to collaborate and race through their history in order to save their friends and fix the time stream.
The game features levels derived from 20 years of Sonic history, spreading across three eras – classic, dreamcast and modern. These can be played as either Classic Sonic or Modern Sonic.
Classic Sonic’s levels are strictly two dimensional side scrolling stages, using classic moves like the spin attack and spin dash.
Modern Sonic’s levels follow a gameplay style similar to more recent entries in the series, with the console versions using the 2D/3D style gameplay of Sonic Unleashed and Sonic Colours. It also features homing attacks, boosting, speed drift and the quick step.
The 3DS version will use the 2D gameplay of the Sonic Rush series. As well as classic power-ups such as invincibility and speed shoes, certain levels have unique power-ups, such as skateboards in city escape and wisp powers in planet wisp.
Each zone consists of a main act for each Sonic, as well as several side-missions with various challenges such as beating an opponent to the goal.
Similar to Sonic Colours, each main level contains various red star rings which unlock different content. Unlike the console versions, the 3DS version will feature special stages and a multiplayer versus mode, and the majority of stages included will be different from those of the console versions.
The development team is also currently considering the inclusion of stages from previous handheld Sonic titles in the 3DS version.
Without any doubt, this is one of the games I’m going to be keeping an eye on. I’m very curious to see how the developers will mash up classic with 3D – it can either be a success or a failure.
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