Ladies, and gentlemen, start your emulators! It is time for another episode of RetrOS, giving you your recommended dose of nostalgia by reviewing games from your childhood.
This episode is a week one review, as we take a look at the remaster of a timeless classic from the Xbox 360 era. Can Sega redeem themselves after the abysmal failure that was Colours Ultimate? Or is this yet another case of a well-known game developer cashing in on childhood nostalgia?
Let's find out!
Sonic the Hedgehog is one of the most recognisable characters in video games today. Second only to Mario. This speedy, blue hedgehog debuted on the Sega Genesis in 1991.
The franchise itself has been through the rough, such as the absolute abomination that is Sonic 06, a game that was completely rushed to market, both glitches and bugs, which almost single-handedly killed the entire franchise and the smooth, for example, the all-time classic, Sonic Mania.
Sega and Dimps created this title in 2011 to celebrate the franchise's 20th anniversary. This was the first game that featured Classic Sonic. A few days ago, the remaster of this classic title was released, bundled with an additional game, featuring Sonic's lookalike, and all-time rival Shadow.
The games revolve around two evil entities corrupting the time stream, turning his crew and the various environments he visited during his previous adventures into white limbo. It is up to both versions of our speedy, blue protagonist, and his rival to fix the timeline location by location.
The accessibility scores are as follows –
Visibility 10
Let's get the negatives out of the way. There are no colourblind modes, or filters present in this game. However, there is very little need for one. There are no colour-coded elements that can cause an issue for a colourblind player.
Audibility 10
There are subtitles present in this game. These subtitles are present in both cut scenes and during levels. To be fair, the only game that has spoken dialogue present during levels would be Shadow Generations. However, there are no customisation options regarding font size with these subtitles.
This is important because the lack of these options puts a player at risk of eye strain while reading the subtitles.
Mobility 11
In the PC version, which was used to test it, the keyboard controls can be fully customised. However, the game is primarily designed with a controller in mind, so there is full controller support available in this game. Better still, the controls can be fully customised to suit the players' impairments. This allows players with mobility impairments to play this game with no issues.
Gameplay 10.5
In short, Sega seemed to have learned from their mistakes with Colours Ultimate. This game is basically two games in one. You have the remake of Sonic Generations. In this title, they have decided to keep the majority of the assets and engine intact, with numerous graphical upgrades, and quality-of-life improvements thrown in the mix.
With that said, it is time for an open question. What approach would you use to remaster a classic game?
Would you rather strip the game down, use a different engine completely, and use as many assets of the classic games as you can? Like Bloober Team's remake of the classic survival horror game Silent Hill 2, and the crowbar collectives remake of the original half-life, Black Mesa?
Or would you rather play it safe, and take the "if it isn't broke, don't fix it" approach, and use the original game's engine to keep it as nostalgic as possible,, and Halo Wars Definitive Edition?
This game also contains Shadow Generations. In this part of the game, you play as Shadow with a lot of new gameplay mechanics, features, and of course, levels from levels from previous games featuring Shadow, for example, Final Chase from Sonic Adventure 2, and Kingdom Valley from Sonic 06. The Hub world relies heavily on those open zone mechanics which Sonic Frontiers is famous for.
In summary, sonic X Shadow Generations is an excellent way of remastering an all-time classic from the Sonic the Hedgehog franchise, but both the remaster and the expansion, Shadow Generations bundled into one game, this game is excellent value for money. In terms of system requirements, the game is quite low-spec friendly,
if you can run Sonic Generations on high, you should be able to run this remaster with minimal to no frame drops. After all, the GPU listed in the game's recommended requirements came out in 2013.
So, if you are a Sonic fan who is looking for a nostalgia fix, this game is highly recommended.
OVERALL SCORE 103.75%
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