I am legitimately sad about what happened with Sonic Boom.

[Roxas1359]

Really, there were two big reasons why Sonic Boom failed so badly.

1. This game was originally supposed to be multi-platform, possibly not even on the Wii U but Sega roped this game into Nintendo's 3-Sonic Exclusive contract. As such, the game was made using the Cry Engine. Anyone can tell you that this engine isn't the best one to use on the Wii U. It can be done, but it's...buggy. Add to the fact that this game was originally a Xbox 360/PS3 focused originally than ported to the Wii U and you have the basics for a bad game code foundation.

2. This is actually more important than the first one but the main reason why this game looks like half of the people didn't do there job was because around half of the people in Big Red Button left the company in the middle of production. These people included the game's producer. This is perhaps the biggest reason why this game failed. Especially from a gaming standpoint as most of the people who left were programmers, leaving the game a buggy, unfinished mess.

It's a shame really, I was sort of looking forward to this game. I just really wished the characters would shut up though...

Pretty much everything here is the entire reason why the Sonic Boom game was really bad. Mainly more with the second reason, which came to light a few days ago. Hell if you go on Sonic Stadium right now you can see the concept art of things that were scrapped.

Lyric for example wasn't supposed to be a snake version of Dr. Nefarious from Ratchet and Clank. He was supposed to be an owl that was like an old sage who turned evil. There were also supposed to be Chao Gardens that would return. But let's just say, they aren't the Chao we know and love.

The worst part of the game for me was just how much Eggman got shat on. It got to the point in which I legitimately felt sorry for him. Not to mention I summarized it best when it came to how Sonic Boom connects to the show when my friends and I were streaming it.

[HEADING=1]Here is the story on how Dr. Eggman got the braclet he uses in the show![/HEADING]

At least the show is good, so I still have that. :3

 

[sextus the crazy]

Since they made precisely one good 3D sonic game ever, Generations, and then completely ignored everything that worked about that game for subsequent releases who is surprised that there is a shitty Sonic game coming out?

Sad, but not surprised.

Same here. I'm not super surprised, but given the number of decent games they've released recently, I was hoping Sonic team at least would be competent.

 

[Roxas1359]

Same here. I'm not super surprised, but given the number of decent games they've released recently, I was hoping Sonic team at least would be competent.

Just so you know, Sonic Team had nothing to do with Sonic Boom at all. In fact, Sonic Team themselves hate Sonic Boom in it's entirety, but SEGA let Big Red Button Entertainment go ahead with it. Heck, when Takashi Iizuka, current head of Sonic Team, played the game he actually was caught on camera facepalming at what the game was.

 

[sextus the crazy]

Same here. I'm not super surprised, but given the number of decent games they've released recently, I was hoping Sonic team at least would be competent.

Just so you know, Sonic Team had nothing to do with Sonic Boom at all. In fact, Sonic Team themselves hate Sonic Boom in it's entirety, but SEGA let Big Red Button Entertainment go ahead with it. Heck, when Takashi Iizuka, current head of Sonic Team, played the game he actually was caught on camera facepalming at what the game was.

That would explain it. Big Red doesn't even have a wiki page. That is a bad sign.

 

[Roxas1359]

That would explain it. Big Red doesn't even have a wiki page. That is a bad sign.

Big Red Button are a new development studio, and why SEGA allowed an Indie studio to do this is beyond me. Mayhaps they saw all the amazing Sonic Generation mods and figured that if modders could do that, then perhaps an Indie studio could do more. Either way, Sonic Boom as a game is a mess and is terrible, but the show is actually pretty funny. Mike Pollock's performance as Eggman is hilarious and the banter with Sonic is spot on. So at least that's a positive.

Plus, as @xaszatm said above, there were huge changes in development. The title's producer for one was one of the people who left the studio along with a bunch of other people during the game's development. They basically started entirely over, and it didn't help. Not to mention the problems with the CryEngine and how it doesn't get along too well with the Wii U and you've just got tons of problems.

As for Sonic Team, they've been working on a new Sonic title for the main series itself, but have been very hush-hush about it. It's rumored that it's gonna be for the newer consoles, PS4/Xbox One. If they were smart they could also release it for PC seeing as Valkyria Chronicles is a huge success right now.

 

[ScrabbitRabbit]

Heck, when Takashi Iizuka, current head of Sonic Team, played the game he actually was caught on camera facepalming at what the game was.

That... that is truly beautiful.

I've actually enjoyed the last few Sonic Team games. Unleashed and Lost World are okay and I really enjoyed Colours and Generations. I don't think the franchise will ever reach the heights of 3D Mario but after Sonic '06 most of the games have been at least okay.

That being said, I was expecting nothing less from this. I've had a bad feeling about it from the start. I wanted it to be good, sure, I just couldn't shake this cynical feeling. Guess I was right :/ Some people are even saying it's as bad as '06.

 

[Roxas1359]

Some people are even saying it's as bad as '06.

It's bad, definitely. There is no defending it any other way. However, it is not as bad as Sonic 06. On the launch stream my friends and I had for the game, we talked about it and got lots of people asking if we think it's worse than 06. See, 06 was worse because it marked the absolute lowest point the series could ever hit. Not only was it supposed to be the next biggest Sonic game, hyped up as all can be, but it was also for Sonic's 15th anniversary. That's what makes 06 worse, that Sonic Team release not only that game to reboot the franchise for their mascots 15th birthday, but they also released this abomination the same day:

Spoiler

The fact that both those games were released the same day, and the PS3 port shared the same bugs as the 360 port despite being released later (it had even more bugs as well, which is why I LPed that version) showed that Sonic Team had no care at all. That was a wake up call for them, and they've at least been attempting. Yeah Lost World wasn't the best, but seeing as I've seen and played the lowest point of the franchise I definitely know it could of been worse.

 

[SmallHatLogan]

I don't know if I'm just getting cynical in my old age (27 is pretty old, right?) but I thought this was going to be a catastrophe as soon as I saw the trailer. The 3DS version seemed somewhat salvageable but I won't be buying it. I'll admit I have a bit of a bias since I think pretty much all 3D Sonic games are garbage (3D Blast being the one exception), but the fact that people were hopeful for a good game when they saw the trailer did surprise me.

I actually thought Sonic Lost World was a step in the right direction. I won't say it was a good game but it felt like a better 3D representation of the 2D Sonic games. I can imagine a parallel universe where Sonic Lost World was the first proper 3D Soinc game instead of Adventure.

 

[Emcee_N]

Same here. I'm not super surprised, but given the number of decent games they've released recently, I was hoping Sonic team at least would be competent.

Just so you know, Sonic Team had nothing to do with Sonic Boom at all. In fact, Sonic Team themselves hate Sonic Boom in it's entirety, but SEGA let Big Red Button Entertainment go ahead with it. Heck, when Takashi Iizuka, current head of Sonic Team, played the game he actually was caught on camera facepalming at what the game was.

Apparently the idea was that Sonic Team were going to continue on and make their own actual Sonic game while the licensed game was pushed out by Big Red.

A real shame as this licensed trash will colour the views of any potential game they now release. I was holding out hope that they would take the time to refine the potential of Lost World into a genuinely good game on this new Classic/X-Treme inspired engine, the way that the potential of Unleashed was refined into the genuinely good games that were Colours and Generations. However now that this game has undone all of the goodwill, it's going to be harder to avoid the whole "Sonic games are automatically bad" thing.

This rushjob is a massive own-goal for SEGA.

 

[Smooth Operator]

The art and writing are stellar? I must have been playing an entirely separate Sonic Boom then.
What time I had with the game things appeared very confusing, borrowing from any game they saw along the way and sticking it onto a very old concept in a very cheap way, if I didn't know the release date of this game when playing I would have said it's from 10 years ago.

 

[Shadow-Phoenix]

You know it's going to suck hard now we know Boom is a failure while BRB botched it up, have little to no credibility along with half the team leaving the game in a mess, meanwhile Sonic Team will probably be working on a proper title and will probably only go on PS4/XB1, maybe even PC and I''m going to guess Wii U gets left out in the cold meaning Nintendo once again doesn't get a decent Sonic game.

 

[Vault101]

It's time for everyone to just give up on Sonic.

Its fanbase is comprised primarily by the cringiest people on the internet these days.
10,000 furry characters that look exactly the same apart from their colour.

Load up your Genesis/Genesis emulators and forget any of this ever happened.

deviant art dwelling emo kids from 2007? judging by the fan art....

 

[Riot3000]

It is pretty much of a shame the blue bomber was got me into this glorious insanity that is gaming. After generations I looking forward to a some quality sonics but Boom well went Boom. The bright side is the show is not that bad that not greatest thing ever is is enjoyable.

Also let the sonic fanbase live on say what you will about them they provide some good internet and made deviant art what it is.

Live on beautiful bastards live on.

 

[Danny Dowling]

same same. i could have taken the design changes in the characters and tbh the animation in the cutscenes are fairly decent for the characters facial expressions etc.

however, the game is a mess. it's as if everything there could have been good, but it all just went to shit.

I remember when Sonic Boom was first announced as a thing saying on the Facebook page "let's hope it's good or we'll be waiting another 5-10 years for Sonic to have a chance to be good again."

Or Sega could pull their finger out and give us Sonic 4 Episode 3... that could always happen...

Edit: Also in reply to the thing about frame rate drops; I think every console Sonic game I've played since Sonic '06 has frame rate drops. It's pretty much expected. It's particularly noticeable in Sonic and Sega All Stars and in Sonic and All Stars Transformed.

 

[MysticSlayer]

Since they made precisely one good 3D sonic game ever, Generations, and then completely ignored everything that worked about that game for subsequent releases who is surprised that there is a shitty Sonic game coming out?

Sad, but not surprised.

I thought that the Sonic/Shadow levels of the Adventure games were good, and I did enjoy Heroes a lot. Then again, it's been at least seven years since I last played them, so it might have just been my ignorant, younger self that enjoyed them with my current self being led by nostalgia. Still prefer the 2D games regardless.

 

[Dragonbums]

It's a shame really. Sonic looked like he was going the right way, with well-received games like Colors and Generations, Lost World was said to be okay. But now he's soared to high and falls right to the ground You'd think SEGA would have learned ot to rush a project from Sonic 06, but apparently not. Just give them enough time, and they forget what they did wrong and just fuck up AGAIN.

From what I've read from the posters below, if SEGA at least tried to give a shit more about the game than they did it would of been a Sonic Worlds 2.0 at worst. Surprisingly good at least. I thought the premise of Sonic Boom was sound. But just like any other game they actually have to work with it. But SEGA was like "nah" and now they have another disaster of a game to add to their list of pieces of shit. I feel this one was easily avoidable with actual oversight on SEGA's part.

 

[Dragonbums]

2. This is actually more important than the first one but the main reason why this game looks like half of the people didn't do there job was because around half of the people in Big Red Button left the company in the middle of production. These people included the game's producer. This is perhaps the biggest reason why this game failed. Especially from a gaming standpoint as most of the people who left were programmers, leaving the game a buggy, unfinished mess.

It's a shame really, I was sort of looking forward to this game. I just really wished the characters would shut up though...

Are you serious with this right now?!

This makes me even more disheartened. Like, why did they leave? What happened? This is truly upsetting because them leaving basically sunk that company. It's their first major game.

I'm going to read up more on this.

 

[xaszatm]

2. This is actually more important than the first one but the main reason why this game looks like half of the people didn't do there job was because around half of the people in Big Red Button left the company in the middle of production. These people included the game's producer. This is perhaps the biggest reason why this game failed. Especially from a gaming standpoint as most of the people who left were programmers, leaving the game a buggy, unfinished mess.

It's a shame really, I was sort of looking forward to this game. I just really wished the characters would shut up though...

Are you serious with this right now?!

This makes me even more disheartened. Like, why did they leave? What happened? This is truly upsetting because them leaving basically sunk that company. It's their first major game.

I'm going to read up more on this.

Here's the source if you want to know more. There really isn't a known reason why but it seems that there was some bad blood among the employees.

http://www.tssznews.com/2014/11/15/reports-suggest-brb-exodus-ahead-of-sonic-boom-launch/

 

[VoidWanderer]

And this is why Yahtzee says to be skeptical... But then again, once i saw the trailer for it I gave up hope for it like the 'new' version of Scooby Doo...

*Shudder!*