The Makers of Sonic Unleashed Hate Me

[SinbadEV]

Examples:

In one area the Over-world stage has "stream" running through it, that it is safe to walk in. In the first stage of this area, there is a bridge with rendered scenery out-side of it, when the games linear design prevents you from jumping over the edge of the bridge... at the end of this bridge there is an open area where you beat some monsters surrounded by a moat of water that looks a lot like the stream in the over-world... unfortunately THIS water is instant death water.

After a good minute or two of very easy level, there is a save point... AFTER the save point there are 4 (or more) very difficult combats in close quarters to the aforementioned death-water where it it quite easy to fall in... and as a bonus there is a secret area where there is a big 50 or so monsters spawning in quick succession arena battle that I get to beat every time I die because it's right AFTER the save point... and as an additional bonus there is a cleverly hidden ledge that I can shimmy along to get a collectible item... after which it appear the ledge continues... but unfortunately THIS part of the ledge is actually just decorative and trying to step on it dumps you into the insta-death water.

When you walk into the clearly marked stage entrance and wait for a few seconds a prompt comes up and asks you if you want to play the stage or not. BUT if you accidentally walk through one of the in-game "disguised as scenery" navigation doors (like walking past the pillars of the university or down the wrong alley)... which is really easy as sonic because his walking is nigh incontrollable in the over-world areas (he's fine inside the levels that specifically target him)... it automatically loads up the new area.

Similarly there are certain puzzles where you have to switch the stage from Day to Night... which is awesome... unfortunately... despite the day and night versions of stages sharing the exact same terrain mesh the game has to completely reload the entire stage, reset the number of rings you've collected, power-up meter and score. Better yet you can just bump into these hour glasses while exploring the levels and breaking things.

Load times are PAINFULLY long...

The worst thing I think is that despite their best efforts I still enjoy the game a lot between bouts of frustration... my only conclusion is that they hate gamers and have purposefully combined psychological torture with enough entertainment to cause people to willingly abuse themselves... because Sega is bitter because they don't have a console any more and want to punish us all for pirating Dreamcast games, waiting till the system was under a hundred dollars to buy it and mocking their VMUs.

[Regret]

Off topic should be subtitled as "Sinbad's blag".

[SinbadEV]

Off topic should be subtitled as "Sinbad's blag".

I post here more then I do on my actual blog, facebook and twitter combined... I have a much higher % chance of people reading it here.

[Regret]

I post here more then I do on my actual blog, facebook and twitter combined... I have a much higher % chance of people reading it here.

Maybe you're approaching the issue wrong. Maybe it's not in the place where you present your thoughts that causes a loss of readership, maybe it's the (lack of) value of said thoughts.

[SinbadEV]

[Caydr]

Ah, no, the makers of Sonic Unleashed hate happiness itself. Don't be such an egomaniac as to think they'd make such a shitty game just for you.

[SinbadEV]

Ah, no, the makers of Sonic Unleashed hate happiness itself. Don't be such an egomaniac as to think they'd make such a shitty game just for you.

Granted... Though my point was that I was personally feeling the hate they extend to all gamers... your point that they hate happiness itself could be a contributing factor here.

[KDR_11k]

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/ ... -Unleashed

[Pxtl]

Why are you even playing Unleashed? I mean, the only games in the whole 3D Sonic genre that have gotten at least moderately lukewarm reviews is Sonic Adventure 2 and Sonic and the Secret Rings... and SA2 turns out to be pretty bad when you play it now (the Knuckles and Tails missions are awful).

[1v0ry_k1ng]

Ah, no, the makers of Sonic Unleashed hate happiness itself.

lmao

[lurker]

I'm still working through the 2006 LP, glad to hear I should enjoy the unleashed LP as much too.

[SinbadEV]

Why are you even playing Unleashed? I mean, the only games in the whole 3D Sonic genre that have gotten at least moderately lukewarm reviews is Sonic Adventure 2 and Sonic and the Secret Rings... and SA2 turns out to be pretty bad when you play it now (the Knuckles and Tails missions are awful).

I really liked the sonic parts of SA2 and SatSR and the demo of one of sonics levels was as fun as the sonic levels in the aforementioned games and, because the demo was installed on the system memory the load-times were significantly shorter.

[Neddie]

I heard that the Black Knight Sonic got a six or seven in most reviews. Does that qualify as lukewarm?

[Pxtl]

I heard that the Black Knight Sonic got a six or seven in most reviews. Does that qualify as lukewarm?

I'd heard some good things about it when it first dropped... but metacritic disagrees. Sounds like Sega carefully managed the rollout to avoid early negative reviews until the game had settled in. The reviews read like most Wii action games - poor camera, and whatever nuance there is in the fighting system can be managed by swinging your sword-wiimote around like a feather-duster.

[SinbadEV]

I have a new theory, gamers* are all masochists addicted to the "it feels good when I stop" rush of endorphins triggered by the stress of gaming... as such Sega is just using sound business savvy when they torture me and frustrate me and then insult me for my efforts... then award me with a bright, fun, easy, unstressful, running level while my body is flushed with more endorphins than I need to deal with the present situation... only to throw in a big ugly spike or pitfall right when I'm getting into my groove.

I have a weak scientific backing for this theory based on some not terribly empirical studies... relatively easy to find with search queries like "girl gamers tetris" "gamers addition endorphins" "gamers are masochists" in Google.

* with the exception of some "social" gamers and sports gamers who don't count... and accepting the fact that many gamers are also sadists.