Playing Sonic Unleashed is like driving a Ferrari through stop and go traffic, where brief moments of exhilaration are cut short by a series of red lights. Sega peppered the speedy levels with these awful werehog segments that go against everything Sonic stands for, resulting in a sloppy and unbalanced adventure that spits in the face of the company's beloved mascot.
Things get off to an excellent start, thanks to a flashy computer generated intro and levels that tug on our old school heartstrings. Sonic, having lost the precious Chaos Emeralds to the diabolical Eggman, explores a coastal village at lightning speeds, crashing through tables, busting up robots with his homing attack and spiraling through loops while collecting hundreds of gold coins. It's so amazingly fast and joyous that we ignored the loose controls and the terrible quick time events. We were just happy to finally have the 3-D Sonic game we'd clamored for. So long as the entire game was based around this fast-paced experience, we'd forgive Sega for its missteps.
Sonic: Unleashed
Sonic Unleashed will offer a re-defined experience for fans and newcomers of the franchise alike by combing picturesque & detailed scenery, an expansive world with multiple paths to choose from and dynamic viewpoints for an immersive and renewed gaming atmosphere. Along with seamless 3D to classic 2D camera transitions, the game is built on a powerful, new proprietary "Hedgehog Engine," which introduces impressive lighting abilities and new technology tailor made for Sonic's new speed capabilities. Under development for approximately three years, the Hedgehog Engine will help to produce a visually rich next generation look and feel with elements of classic Sonic gameplay components. (Screenshot 1 of 54)
Sonic Unleashed will offer a re-defined experience for fans and newcomers of the franchise alike by combing picturesque & detailed scenery, an expansive world with multiple paths to choose from and dynamic viewpoints for an immersive and renewed gaming atmosphere. Along with seamless 3D to classic 2D camera transitions, the game is built on a powerful, new proprietary "Hedgehog Engine," which introduces impressive lighting abilities and new technology tailor made for Sonic's new speed capabilities. Under development for approximately three years, the Hedgehog Engine will help to produce a visually rich next generation look and feel with elements of classic Sonic gameplay components. (Screenshot 2 of 54)
Sonic Unleashed will offer a re-defined experience for fans and newcomers of the franchise alike by combing picturesque & detailed scenery, an expansive world with multiple paths to choose from and dynamic viewpoints for an immersive and renewed gaming atmosphere. Along with seamless 3D to classic 2D camera transitions, the game is built on a powerful, new proprietary "Hedgehog Engine," which introduces impressive lighting abilities and new technology tailor made for Sonic's new speed capabilities. Under development for approximately three years, the Hedgehog Engine will help to produce a visually rich next generation look and feel with elements of classic Sonic gameplay components. (Screenshot 3 of 54)
Sonic Unleashed will offer a re-defined experience for fans and newcomers of the franchise alike by combing picturesque & detailed scenery, an expansive world with multiple paths to choose from and dynamic viewpoints for an immersive and renewed gaming atmosphere. Along with seamless 3D to classic 2D camera transitions, the game is built on a powerful, new proprietary "Hedgehog Engine," which introduces impressive lighting abilities and new technology tailor made for Sonic's new speed capabilities. Under development for approximately three years, the Hedgehog Engine will help to produce a visually rich next generation look and feel with elements of classic Sonic gameplay components. (Screenshot 4 of 54)
Sonic Unleashed will offer a re-defined experience for fans and newcomers of the franchise alike by combing picturesque & detailed scenery, an expansive world with multiple paths to choose from and dynamic viewpoints for an immersive and renewed gaming atmosphere. Along with seamless 3D to classic 2D camera transitions, the game is built on a powerful, new proprietary "Hedgehog Engine," which introduces impressive lighting abilities and new technology tailor made for Sonic's new speed capabilities. Under development for approximately three years, the Hedgehog Engine will help to produce a visually rich next generation look and feel with elements of classic Sonic gameplay components. (Screenshot 5 of 54)
Sonic Unleashed will offer a re-defined experience for fans and newcomers of the franchise alike by combing picturesque & detailed scenery, an expansive world with multiple paths to choose from and dynamic viewpoints for an immersive and renewed gaming atmosphere. Along with seamless 3D to classic 2D camera transitions, the game is built on a powerful, new proprietary "Hedgehog Engine," which introduces impressive lighting abilities and new technology tailor made for Sonic's new speed capabilities. Under development for approximately three years, the Hedgehog Engine will help to produce a visually rich next generation look and feel with elements of classic Sonic gameplay components. (Screenshot 6 of 54)
Sonic Unleashed will offer a re-defined experience for fans and newcomers of the franchise alike by combing picturesque & detailed scenery, an expansive world with multiple paths to choose from and dynamic viewpoints for an immersive and renewed gaming atmosphere. Along with seamless 3D to classic 2D camera transitions, the game is built on a powerful, new proprietary "Hedgehog Engine," which introduces impressive lighting abilities and new technology tailor made for Sonic's new speed capabilities. Under development for approximately three years, the Hedgehog Engine will help to produce a visually rich next generation look and feel with elements of classic Sonic gameplay components. (Screenshot 7 of 54)
Sonic Unleashed will offer a re-defined experience for fans and newcomers of the franchise alike by combing picturesque & detailed scenery, an expansive world with multiple paths to choose from and dynamic viewpoints for an immersive and renewed gaming atmosphere. Along with seamless 3D to classic 2D camera transitions, the game is built on a powerful, new proprietary "Hedgehog Engine," which introduces impressive lighting abilities and new technology tailor made for Sonic's new speed capabilities. Under development for approximately three years, the Hedgehog Engine will help to produce a visually rich next generation look and feel with elements of classic Sonic gameplay components. (Screenshot 8 of 54)
Sonic Unleashed will offer a re-defined experience for fans and newcomers of the franchise alike by combing picturesque & detailed scenery, an expansive world with multiple paths to choose from and dynamic viewpoints for an immersive and renewed gaming atmosphere. Along with seamless 3D to classic 2D camera transitions, the game is built on a powerful, new proprietary "Hedgehog Engine," which introduces impressive lighting abilities and new technology tailor made for Sonic's new speed capabilities. Under development for approximately three years, the Hedgehog Engine will help to produce a visually rich next generation look and feel with elements of classic Sonic gameplay components. (Screenshot 9 of 54)
Sonic Unleashed will offer a re-defined experience for fans and newcomers of the franchise alike by combing picturesque & detailed scenery, an expansive world with multiple paths to choose from and dynamic viewpoints for an immersive and renewed gaming atmosphere. Along with seamless 3D to classic 2D camera transitions, the game is built on a powerful, new proprietary "Hedgehog Engine," which introduces impressive lighting abilities and new technology tailor made for Sonic's new speed capabilities. Under development for approximately three years, the Hedgehog Engine will help to produce a visually rich next generation look and feel with elements of classic Sonic gameplay components. (Screenshot 10 of 54)
Then we reached the first werehog level and this game collapsed faster than the U.S. dollar. Instead of capitalizing on Sonic's trademark quickness, Sega cooked up this ridiculous story about him transforming into a werehog when the sun goes down. When that happens, Sonic goes from his usual self to a hairy beast with claws, spiked shoes and dangerous looking fangs. It also means he exchanges his running ability for a power walk that sucks the air right out of the entire experience. Sonic slowly plods along, beats up gangs of unidentifiable enemies, completes lame puzzles, pushes boxes, balances on narrow ledges and jumps between poles. Meanwhile, the proprietary Hedgehog Engine that powers the game cannot keep up with all of the bad guys on screen, resulting in a sloppy mess that makes it seem like our Xbox 360s will break any second. Even cut scenes featuring the werehog run worse than the ones with regular looking Sonic, most likely because of Sega's horrible attempt at fur.
In addition, the designers play this atrocious music whenever werehog Sonic attacks an enemy; that alone makes us want to break the disc. Then they created these cheap boss characters that take multiple tries to kill, as well as a bunch of pathetic quick time sequences that give us less than a second to hit the buttons. At least they conveniently scatter 1-ups and checkpoints around these appalling stages to prevent us from having to continue from the beginning.
They're also obsessed with telling a story, as if we care about Sonic, his friends and their lame adventures. Figuring out what happens next involves aimlessly wandering through towns and speaking to citizens, only to discover that most of them don't know what we're looking for. Anger is then made worse by the impending depression we feel knowing that all of this monotonous walking around leads to a werehog level.
It's a shame, because Sonic Unleashed shines whenever the hedgehog dons his red running shoes and takes off through the game's imaginative fantasy worlds. The coins, the jump pads, the vomit-inducing loops; this is what we love about the franchise, but the company's decision to transform Sonic into something he's not kills the game. Sorry, but we refuse to pay $49.99 for something that's partially enjoyable.
Reader Comments (2)
What is with these horrible reviews? I mean honestly, where's the professionalism? Sonic Unleashed is the best 3D Sonic game to be released and I thoroughly believe that it is what Sega needed to get Sonic back on track.
screw u gamedaily i know that the werehog levels were not that great but the rest of the game was awesome so screw u.