One Word Review: Auspice
Let's all be honest with each other, the Sonic franchise has been stagnant over the last twenty years or so. Even those of us who grew up Nintendo kids had some respect for Sonic during his Genesis onto the scene, but once Sonic was brought into the 3D world he was never rebounded. The sense of speed has never been the same and, for those of us who are casual fans, the tireless campaigning on Sega's part to convince us that the Sonic universe is interesting has always fallen flat.
Of course there have been some bright spots along the way for the Sonic franchise; this game, Sonic Chronicles for the DS, and Sonic Colors for the Wii are the only bright spots for the series in this reviewers opinion. Each game is good for very different reasons; Colors because it is a return to the old fast paced gameplay and the toning back of the story elements that Sega revels at shoving down our throats. Chronicles, on the other hand, pushes the series towards expanding the Sonic universe through story telling. Sonic Adventure was the point where many of Sonic's casual fans balked Sega desire for an overarching story, but this is also where many of the die hard fans started pumping out their Deviant Art creations.
It was under the leadership of Bioware that Sega decided to go ahead with this Sonic RPG. Sega finally caught up to Mario; 12 years later with their first foray into RPGs. Like Sega, Nintendo went to one of the preeminent RPG makers of it's time, Square, and asked for their help to broaden Mario's appeal. Nintendo succeeded in making a great game that has a cult following to this day and the House of Mario continues to put it's publishing power behind this branch of the franchise; Paper Mario and Mario & Luigi.
Also, like Nintendo, Sega made the decision to publish this game at the end of the hardware's life, which did not help either title to become a smash success. I am confident that Sega will not continue pushing forward with the Sonic Chronicles series – with or without Bioware.
I liked Sonic Chronicles. The game added some interesting mechanics to the RPG genre. The acclaimed branching style story telling that Bioware is known for is present in the game, but it is completely dumbed down and pointless. The only kind of player that would be encouraged by this system are those Deviant Art artists that want to nibble every spare morsel of Sonic's story.
I am glad that Sega pushed forward with this project. It was an auspicious collaboration between two AAA developers to bring a floundering character back into the forefront of videogames. There are some great ideas in this game and I am optimistic to see Sega collaborate with other developers to bring Sonic back to his place at the table with the other godfathers of gaming.
