T-Man here! OK, let’s get one thing straight: I’m a diehard Sonic fan. Sonic Adventure was my very first game. LOVED IT!!! Everybody else loved it and Sonic Adventure 2 all the same, until the release of Sonic Adventure 2 Battle. That’s when people started to notice the glitchy camera, short length, and clunky controls. Indeed, sometimes when I’ve gone back and played those games, the camera and controls have gotten on my nerves, but only in certain places. People are overreacting about these things in my opinion. Neither is as big an issue as people make it out to be.
What?!! There's no sniper rifle in this game!
After the believe-it-or-not well-received Sonic Heroes, Shadow the Hedgehog came out…and so did the bad scores. The complaints? Below average visuals, terrible controls, camera problems, bad level design, and the fact that the guns wouldn’t automatically lock onto an enemy, rendering them useless. Well, here’s my take:
I was unlucky enough to get the PS2 version. The visuals are even worse on it. Though it came out after Sonic Heroes, graphic-wise it’s either one or two levels below. Nothing that couldn’t have been done on Dreamcast. Like all PS2 games, this has a jagged framerate of 30 FPS. The textures are also lower resolution than that of the Gamecube and probably Xbox versions.
The story isn’t as bad as people make it out to be, and the branching paths are fun to take. I myself set a goal that I would complete all of the stages, though you don’t have to with some good thinking. Sadly, that is a relatively low 22. There are ten endings, however, so you’ll often have to play through the same stage more than once. Because you can only play through six stages at a time, there is a total of 60 stages, counting the times that you’ll have to play some of the stages more than once, 61 counting the stage in the Last Story, which you unlock after getting all ten endings. Too bad there’s more stages replayed than there are in the game, and not only that, but regardless of this “hefty” amount of stages, I beat the game in only three days. Not only that, but some stages have really annoying missions that are only annoying because they are not your traditional straightforward Sonic stages. They are the Super Mario 64-like stages that shouldn’t be in ANY Sonic game, aside from Knuckles’ levels in Sonic Adventure 1 and 2, because they were very fun. These stages are The Doom, Lost Impact, and Central City.
"In the end, we have a VERY underrated game"
The Doom’s Dark Mission is to defeat all the GUN Soldiers. Some of them are pretty hard to find because of that stage’s layout. Then there’s Lost Impact. It has the most annoying mission in the game. You’re supposed to kill 35 liquid creatures, but it takes a SUPER long time to do. Then there’s Central City. For the Dark Mission, you’ve got to detonate five giant bombs, but they’re hard to find.
Despite the fact that the guns don’t have auto-aim, they’re not useless. They’re stronger than the average homing attack and are good for long ranged attacks. You can also use swords, but they’re VERY stupid. Why? Because they have ammo! And a very small amount at that! They probably have ammo to influence you to change your weapon.
It’s not all guns and swords, though. There are also two weapons that suck things up. One of them is a secret weapon called the Vacuum Egg. It sucks up about twenty enemies. Then there’s some alien gun that sucks up things, boxes and capsules included, and allows you to throw them into things.
When I was first getting back into the game after a long period of not playing it, there was about a thirty-second period of me not being able to control it right, but after that it seemed to control okay. Maybe I got used to it?
And like all of the 3-D Sonic games, and most 3-D games in general, this game has an unruly camera, but it’s not really that big of a deal if you ask me. Sure, there will be some parts where you can’t see where you’re going, but it really isn’t that big a deal.
And in the end, we have a VERY underrated game, despite all of its problems. Despite no auto-lock, the guns are fun to use, and most of the time, it’s the same really fun high-speed gameplay Sonic games are famous for.
Rating: Awesome
This game has received the T-MAN’S GAMES T-MAN’S CHOICE AWARD.
What?!! There's no sniper rifle in this game!
After the believe-it-or-not well-received Sonic Heroes, Shadow the Hedgehog came out…and so did the bad scores. The complaints? Below average visuals, terrible controls, camera problems, bad level design, and the fact that the guns wouldn’t automatically lock onto an enemy, rendering them useless. Well, here’s my take:
I was unlucky enough to get the PS2 version. The visuals are even worse on it. Though it came out after Sonic Heroes, graphic-wise it’s either one or two levels below. Nothing that couldn’t have been done on Dreamcast. Like all PS2 games, this has a jagged framerate of 30 FPS. The textures are also lower resolution than that of the Gamecube and probably Xbox versions.
The story isn’t as bad as people make it out to be, and the branching paths are fun to take. I myself set a goal that I would complete all of the stages, though you don’t have to with some good thinking. Sadly, that is a relatively low 22. There are ten endings, however, so you’ll often have to play through the same stage more than once. Because you can only play through six stages at a time, there is a total of 60 stages, counting the times that you’ll have to play some of the stages more than once, 61 counting the stage in the Last Story, which you unlock after getting all ten endings. Too bad there’s more stages replayed than there are in the game, and not only that, but regardless of this “hefty” amount of stages, I beat the game in only three days. Not only that, but some stages have really annoying missions that are only annoying because they are not your traditional straightforward Sonic stages. They are the Super Mario 64-like stages that shouldn’t be in ANY Sonic game, aside from Knuckles’ levels in Sonic Adventure 1 and 2, because they were very fun. These stages are The Doom, Lost Impact, and Central City.
"In the end, we have a VERY underrated game"
The Doom’s Dark Mission is to defeat all the GUN Soldiers. Some of them are pretty hard to find because of that stage’s layout. Then there’s Lost Impact. It has the most annoying mission in the game. You’re supposed to kill 35 liquid creatures, but it takes a SUPER long time to do. Then there’s Central City. For the Dark Mission, you’ve got to detonate five giant bombs, but they’re hard to find.
Despite the fact that the guns don’t have auto-aim, they’re not useless. They’re stronger than the average homing attack and are good for long ranged attacks. You can also use swords, but they’re VERY stupid. Why? Because they have ammo! And a very small amount at that! They probably have ammo to influence you to change your weapon.
It’s not all guns and swords, though. There are also two weapons that suck things up. One of them is a secret weapon called the Vacuum Egg. It sucks up about twenty enemies. Then there’s some alien gun that sucks up things, boxes and capsules included, and allows you to throw them into things.
When I was first getting back into the game after a long period of not playing it, there was about a thirty-second period of me not being able to control it right, but after that it seemed to control okay. Maybe I got used to it?
And like all of the 3-D Sonic games, and most 3-D games in general, this game has an unruly camera, but it’s not really that big of a deal if you ask me. Sure, there will be some parts where you can’t see where you’re going, but it really isn’t that big a deal.
And in the end, we have a VERY underrated game, despite all of its problems. Despite no auto-lock, the guns are fun to use, and most of the time, it’s the same really fun high-speed gameplay Sonic games are famous for.
Rating: Awesome
This game has received the T-MAN’S GAMES T-MAN’S CHOICE AWARD.
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