![]() ![]() There are no longer any 1-ups in the game, and Sonic just respawns at the last checkpoint. Going slow is often treated as a punishment for making a mistake, which makes sense given the game's time attack-centric nature.Ĭolors Ultimate also makes some changes to further push the "time attack" aspect. It's clear that the intent of the game is to chain together moves and keep moving as best as you can. It's pretty much on par with Sonic Generations if you played that, so it doesn't break the game. Sonic can feel both weighty and floaty at different times, and trying to do low-speed precision platforming can sometimes feel awkward. The downside is that anything that doesn't involve going at top speed can feel a little awkward. If you use the Drill Wisp to cut through this area, it can save 20 seconds, but if you launch a daring homing attack on a distant enemy, you can avoid an entire dangerous area. It also makes it fun to play through stages over and over to try to optimize your run just a touch more. ![]() It feels incredibly cool and captures the feel of a supersonic speedster really well. When you're using everything Sonic can do, you're basically a nonstop pinball of boosts, dashes, jumps, slides, and transformations. Part of why Wisps work so well is because the core design of Sonic Colors is about chaining various moves to remain as mobile as possible. The only one that doesn't work so well is the Cube Wisp, which slows the pace of the game more than I'd like where it's basically required. Sonic's primary motivation is to go fast, and the bulk of them offer different ways to do so, usually unlocking alternate paths in the process. Part of what makes Sonic Colors work is that the Wisps don't feel intrusive or out of place. The Wisps unlock alternate paths through the stage, some of which help you trim time from your final score and find hidden red rings. Wisps are gradually unlocked as you play the game and populate older levels, so you have more reasons to revisit earlier stages. Each Wisp only lasts a short time but can be stored until you want to use it or get a replacement. New to the HD version of the game is the Jade Ghost Wisp, which is slow and provides a Homing Attack mechanic that lets Sonic hit a nearby enemy or special object. The Blue Cube Wisp transforms certain special rings into blocks and vice versa. Drill lets Sonic tear through dirt with ease, Frenzy turns Sonic into a terrifying beast that gets larger as he eats more, and Hover lets Sonic float and perform the Lightspeed Dash from earlier Sonic titles. Rocket makes him zoom high into the air, Spikes lets him spin-dash along walls, and Laser has him rush forward at tremendous speed and bounce off objects. The one unique gimmick of Sonic Colors is Wisps, which are power-ups hidden throughout stages, and each one grants Sonic a new, temporarily power. It is Sonic gameplay at its most basic, but the core gameplay is a lot of fun, and Colors doesn't get bogged down. Certain actions, like collecting wisps or destroying enemies, will give him Boost Energy that he can use to zoom forward at Mach speed to destroy a weak enemy in his path. Sonic can run, slide, and perform a timed homing attack to damage enemies. It's a mix of 2D and 3D platforming with a heavy emphasis on speed. Sonic Colors follows on the same basic gameplay formula introduced in Sonic Unleashed and continued in the 3D segments of Sonic Generations. Eggman has an evil plan that involves kidnapping cute (alien) animals called Wisps, but in the end, good triumphs over evil in an all-ages adventure. Sonic is at his best when he's facing simple but amusing threats, and Colors leans hard into that. It's just a cartoon hedgehog being snarky at his egg-shaped mad doctor nemesis, and it works. There's no world-eating monster, no scenes where Sonic is tortured for a year, and certainly no uncomfortable human-hedgehog kissing. Eggman created an evil amusement park, and Sonic and Tails have to destroy it. Sonic Colors: Ultimate stands out from most of the other recent Sonic titles by being a simple adventure story. Sonic Colors, originally released for the Nintendo Wii, had an idea very much like the popular Sonic Mania game: What if Sonic the Hedgehog just ran through hoops and jumped on robots? It turns out you get a darn fun game. Sometimes these weird gimmicks can be fun (like Chao raising), but other times, they become the low point of otherwise fun games. A lot of that boils down to the need to tack on weird, extraneous mechanics in an attempt to pad out the gameplay, whether that's fishing, robot fights, or the one time he inexplicably became a werewolf. His series features some of the greatest platformers ever made - and some of the worst. Mario's longtime rival never reinvented himself as much as the plumber/doctor/go-kart racer/sports star. ![]() Sonic the Hedgehog is a bit of an odd duck. ![]()
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