Well as some of you may have noticed, Shadow the Hedgehog is getting his own game. And those damn bastards at Sonic Team have gotten me interested.

In a previous rant I said the Sonic series was dead to me, but this has piqued my interest. Because, while it does look like it’s doing some daft things with the series, it also looks like its doing one thing right. Focusing on a speed orientated character. I’ve said over and over that one of the problems with Sonic in the 3D era is the multiple character approach, too many shite gameplay styles taking up too much gameplay time. Now I wish it was Sonic, but Shadow will do in a pinch. This may surprise you guys but I do like Shadow a little. If only because of his design (I’m a sucker for the colours red and black), it’s his fucking generic angsty personality that pisses me off. Plus the fact SEGA can’t seem to decide whether he’s good or evil. In the trailer for the game they play up the whole “Hero or Villain” thing again. Damnit SEGA, he helped save the world, TWICE! I don’t think he can respectfully call himself a villain, and no, giving him an oversized gun won’t change that. Good guys use guns too.

I gotta say, looking at the graphics in the game makes me cringe a little. It looks to be using the same engine as Sonic Heroes, which was the kiddy-est looking Sonic game I’ve. And despite the games “dark” look, it still looks like a Saturday morning cartoon designed for 8 year olds. Mind you that is the Sonic series main market. The gun/guns in the game are ludicrously oversized for Shadow as well. You can see then glitching through the fucking ground. That’s just shoddy coding on SEGA’s part. In one part of the trailer, Shadow uses what looks like MP5A3 sub-machinegun (or a variant of it). The damn thing is longer than his torso and legs combined. How the fuck does he lift these damn things one handed without break his arm or getting a hernia? Mind you that’d be applying real life physics to the Sonic series. If they did that, half the characters non-existent necks would break because of their huge oversized heads.

I will admit, adding a gun to the gameplay does seem like a cynical attempt to get more sales. I think the reasoning behind it went something like this:

Sega Exec #1: GTA HAS GUNS, LETS GIVE SONIC ONE!
Sega Exec #2: No Sonic is too good to use guns!
Sega Exec #1: Shadow then, he’s exactly the same but really angsty!
Sega Exec #2: YES!

Pity they can’t let the game sell on the speed orientated gameplay by itself, which were the only good parts of the previous 3D sonic games. But at least focusing on one character is a step in the right direction

Do I support the game? I don’t know really, but it’s got me interested in it. Do I think it will be good? To be honest, no. SEGA’s track record with 3D Sonic games hasn’t been great. But I do hope that they will prove me wrong sometime. Maybe not with this game, but sometime.