Having had the time to play through Sonic Adventure more thoroughly, I'm now able to present a more in-depth impression of the game than I could on the 24th. That said, please keep in mind that this is in no way a final review - I've just cleared the most of the levels with Sonic, the Wind-level with Tails, and have spent a good two hours with the VMS game.
First things first, Sonic Team was obviously rushing to get the game out the door in '98. There are numerous camera glitches wherein the camera is entirely obstructed from the view of the game play by a ceiling or something, leaving you completely blind. Worse yet, there are certain parts in the game where you can become stuck, unable to escape and forced to reset. That's right, game over stuck (owners of the game should try spin dashing in the Mystic Ruin cave where the hologram of Dr. Eggman is going up and down).
Speaking of getting stuck, non-Japanese speakers will have to deal with being stuck with a game that requires a lot of guesswork due to the inability to read the in game clues. This isn't really a problem during the action sequences of Sonic Adventure, but rather in the adventure scenes. The adventure scenes consist of you, as any of the game's characters, going around in the gameworld's non-action environments (Mystic Ruin and the City) talking with people in order to gain clues to find the next action level. Since you can't read what the people are telling you, you're stuck guessing as to where you need to go to start the next action game. This is especially frustrating when you first start playing Sonic Adventure, not really knowing what to expect and still not on the same wavelength as the level.
When all is said and done, Sonic Adventure is fun game, definitely worth putting up through the Japanese and camera glitches. The game is a testament to the Dreamcast's incredible graphical powers and to Sonic Team's unique and incredibly interesting game play. On the graphics side of things, Sonic Adventure is exactly how everyone has described it: silky smooth, lush and colorful. Pop up? Bah, if you're playing the game you won't notice it - only when you go horizon watching does it become apparent. The great thing about Sonic Adventure's move to 3D is that it has retained the original flavor; the game constantly reminds you of the 16-bit Sonic games, the second level's (windy level) first section reminds you of Sonic 2, the enemies are straight out of the entire series.
The thing is, it's not just the look that has been retained but the game play has been as well, with a few added touches of course. Sonic has, and always will be about speed, and that's what the action-sequences are all about, rushing through levels collecting coins and kicking ass. The spin-dash is here, along with two new moves: the homing attack jump and the light-speed dash. The homing attack jump is Sonic Team's way of dealing with depth perception in a 3D environment; instead of having to aim your jumps to perfection to perform Sonic's head-stomp, you simply press the jump button twice to do away your enemies. The light-speed dash is a move you discover a few levels into the game; after building up your spin-dash to a proper level, Sonic says "Ready" and off you go at a speed that's so fast you often end up half way across a room with no idea how you got there!
Replayability seems to be huge; the action levels are littered with opportunities for exploration and the game has enough mini-games to make a PC Shareware CD-ROM blush. To start off with, each level in the game has three objectives (a, b, and c). The first run through the level is usually just to complete it (though it varies); this is the only run required to continue the story line and beat the game. You can re-enter the same level two more times with two different objectives (say, finish the level with 50 coins); if you meet the objectives you earn a Sonic medallion. I'm not sure how many Sonic medallions there are total (probably 100+), but if you collect them all something neat is sure to occur! Mini-games such as Sonic Pinball and NiGHTS Pinball (see other stories) could be games by themselves (I can see it know - Sonic Team Spinball: NiGHTS, Sonic, and Burning Rangers tables), and the VMS Chaos building is a top-notch tamagotchi adventure.
There's still a lot more left to cover (Twinkle Park and Speed Highway are drool inducing), so go checkout the other Sonic Adventure stories posted today and get ready for a review in the New Year.
Send in your Sonic Adventure movie requests to webmaster@seganet.com
Movies
Wind Level/Tails (1:42 Min) - 10.5 Meg MPEG Format
Wind Level/Sonic (3:58 Min) - 24.6 Meg MPEG Format
Eggman Hornet/Tails (2:10 Min) - 13.5 Meg MPEG Format
Snowboarding/Sonic (1:38 Min) - 10.2 Meg MPEG Format
