If you're talking about facial expressions, they already did with Sonic Boom. The actual problem is that some characters like Sonic himself weren't designed to be universally expressive. The main Sonic we know for example, was designed to look cool, cocky and have attitude. This is why some of his expressions look awkward. This is still something that bothers me even Sonic Prime.
@@snowyneko6710sonic boom was made by a completely different studio also i think sonic's designed to be very expressive and has a very strong and unique personality, it just needs to be executed correctly
Remember when frontiers came out and people were saying the cutscenes were the best in the series? Even better than unleashed? 😂 The honeymoon period on that game was insane lol
One thing that bugged me about the Sonic Frontiers update 3 cutscenes was that it constantly faded to black only to fade the cutscene back in and continue like nothing happened. Sometimes it even fades to black, fades back in and then fades to black again a few seconds later. Not sure if this happened to anyone else, but it did to me, and it felt super unpolished and odd whenever I'd see it. Why fade to black only to then fade back in for no reason? Idk, it just felt so weird to me lol
This was actually a funny issue of mine with FF16 which is weirdly very formulaic with Frontiers with the bosses and gameplay loop of rinsing and repeating till you get to the epic anime kaiju fight. The side stories were also JUST AS STIFF as Frontiers in animation quality and camera, and the cutscenes literally all just fade to black and back to the cutscene just like some Frontiers scenes you’re talking about.
Oh yeah that definitely bugged me, love seeing Characters stand there in silence only for it to fade to black and into another cutscene where they actually talk. This also happened in the Titan Fights, why not use Tricky Camera Movements to Transition between gameplay and Cutscene.
On an overall look on frontiers I think at least for me The cutscenes are just *aight* But when I take in the other factors as you mentioned I can see what you mean and how you feel about it. Personally I wish every interaction wasn't as dry as they were, hell you may as well do an intercom chat like they did in forces if they can't be arsed with animating. It was really jarring in update 3 but I can easily figure out the issue there. 1 it's a free update so less budget and probably the cast was slimmed later in the project to make head way for the next *big* game if not superstars itself. Because at least for me the game felt like they needed to focus on the main problem and everything else was wayyy behind. Cyberspace is even lazier despite *being new* stuff makes it clear that, the substance. The life as you put it kinda just doesn't exist. Like how does the shield scene feel so off, when it supposed to feel like an empowering and good moment?
11:04 - This dead air between the lines is something I have noticed in anime in general. The characters usually make a long pauses between lines. Even if their line is just "hmpf". The writers and animators have to make sure that there is pause between every word, every interjection, every gesture. And the gestures usually cannot be done simultaneously with the talk either. And then there is this dramatic hand waving with a sound of hand being waved through air as if it's the most dramatic thing ever. I never understood this trope of Japanese writing. I don't find it particularly dramatic.
I think something that could really improve the cutscenes is having more action in them, I mean we’re in the era of the PS5, I don’t think it’s that crazy to want at least an effort to make something like the opening to Unleashed or the cutscene in Black Knight when Sonic and the Knights were escaping the castle. Sonic’s first encounter with Giganto in Frontiers feels like a step in that direction but that’s mainly it. And because I know there’s a chance at least one person will say that “it’s probably too much for a bunch of action regularly in cutscenes”, then I’m gonna call bull crap because once again, we’re in the era of the PS5, you’re really telling me it’d be too hard when games like Batman: Arkham City on the PS3 in 2011 had cutscenes like the Wonder Tower one where Batman is quickly knocking Hugo Strange around the place and tackles Ra’s Al Ghul out of the exploding tower before having to push himself off of Ra’s when he stabs himself also trying to get Batman, or if you want a more current example then look at Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 (yes I will be going over something that might be considered spoilers so if anyone is avoiding them then you might wanna stop reading this), I mean the Coney Island mission has Peter very quickly catching and dodging arrows, throwing fireworks at a couple of Kraven’s men (how are they not dead), all while trying to stop two roller coaster vehicles, or in the final boss where Peter and Miles are fighting Venom in the sky, slingshotting and sky diving throughout with Venom at one point slamming Peter through a truck, at this point more than ever, I don’t think animating action scenes is the problem, we just need to hope Sega doesn’t go back on giving Sonic games a bigger budget because I think either that or the animators not trying hard enough is why it feels rare we have a cutscene where Sonic and co. aren’t just standing around waving their arms like it’s Mario and Sonic at the Olympic Games
Honestly beside the side cutscenes with barely any animation, I like the cutscenes in Sonic Frontiers, the voice acting is top notch and while the animations haven’t improved since forces, the camera has and makes all these scenes feel a lot more dynamic. Hell the animation during the final fight in the final horizon was top notch, ESPECIALLY the final qte.
If I wanted to rank every 3D Sonic game I've played by cutscenes (without counting CGI cutscenes), it would probably be something like: 1. Sonic Unleashed 2. Sonic Adventure 2 3. Sonic Forces 4. Sonic Generations 5. Sonic Adventure The only reason Forces is above Adventure is because I think Adventure's cutscenes look weird sometimes. It's also above Generations because not a lot happens in terms of cutscenes in that game. If I had to rank every 3D Sonic Game I've watched (without counting spin-offs), then Frontiers would probably be under Adventure 2, Lost World would be under Adventure, and Colors would be above Lost World. I don't have a ton of reason for the last two, but I just think Frontiers looks so cool that, even with the slow pacing, I can still appreciate the vision and the action that's happening in between. Is it recency bias? Yeah, I'm not even gonna pretend like it's not, but like... shut up, I like it. Let me like it. (also, I still think it's bogus that SEGA won't give Sonic Team the budget and resources to make Sonic games better. Hopefully that ACTUALLY changes with the next game. Even if it doesn't, I'm not really gonna bat an eye. As long as it looks cool and has expression and identity, I'll still like it...)
Me personally I liked the cutscenes in frontiers (plz no hate) I think they represent how much more mature the characters are and shows growth like Amy isn’t chasing sonic anymore…again? Tails is becoming independent…AGAIN? And knuckles isn’t a total bonehead idiot… *AGAIN?* bro they honestly should have just kept their characterizations from the adventure games if they were just gonna change them back
Splash Dash/Mark left a comment under a Haedox video, claiming to not be someone who plays video games, and yet here he is having a whole channel focusing on Sonic games. The dude lies, it's part of the brand at this point.
The only Cutscene i liked was when Sonic meets Sage and Giganto for the 1st time. The way the camera pans and zooms in on Sage and Sonic's stand-off, The way sonic jumps and lands away from Giganto as the camera keeps the flow going.
I did always think that the cutscenes in Frontiers were a little stiff and lacked some motivation, glad I wasnt the only one who thought this. Hopefully in the future sega can animate the cutscenes and characters a little bit more like the opening for unleashed or the opening for Sonic's story in 06. It doesnt have to be anything too crazy, just something that adds more emotion than just...standing, y'know? And maybe give some of the characters a design check, because most of the models really aren't that appealing lmao
Ok, I do gotta say it is hard to say Frontiers cut scenes sucks after going though any Titan battle, as those seem to have quite a bit put into them to make them feel like an amazing and awesome battle in the game! But... I suppose that is not what the video is about seeing we are mostly talking about interactions between characters and, for the most part, I can see that this can be improved. I do feel when it comes to the small interactions it is difficult to make them the most interesting, like, there are a lot in this game and it makes sense this isn't exactly easy to make visually interesting. But there could be better work on it so it feels like I need to look at the screen when they are talking. When we do conversations in the main story and it isn't too much visually interesting either, then that is a problem. I feel only Eggman is doing the movement based emotions right when something happens. For an issue I got, I do find it weird to compare the less action scenes from Frontiers to the others. I guess most of that goes to the titans for me, but I guess the game could of had more overall anyway. Well unless I want you to judge which Sonic game does Sonic standing around better, I can't ask for much else from ya..... Overall, disagreements on story and voice acting aside, I can see why you feel this way on the game. I kinda do think it's more of a budget reason and I can't exactly tell them to 'do better' after we saw how other Sonic games don't get much bigger then this these days and it's easy to tell that Sonic's main game don't get the highest budget based on how the last few aren't so big (funny we want from a game over like 50 hours long now to a game that was 3 hours long for the average person at least). Lots of hope for the next, but Im more here to enjoy it then just hope now.
Honestly, you know what I think the problem is? I just think it's the storytelling. Sonic doesn't work well with the static dialogue version of storytelling. Think about cutscenes from Adventure 2 or even something like Riders. It felt like the story was progressing and all we saw was what happened for the brief moment when they slowed down. They were actually interacting with the world and all we saw was snippets of what they thought of what was happening. In Frontiers it feels like they have to stop and explain to the player what's going on because the world doesn't feel alive enough to tell it's own story. There's no momentum, ironically enough
Fair conclusion but all I have to say is they had to cut corners somewhere And no one wanting it to be gameplay story or content subpar cutscenes seems like a fair trade off. not being able to be immersed seems like an overstatement the story the voice acting in the body language alone will not the best conveyed the message.
I both agree and disagree at the same time. There are actually times when the character models look okay, and they do convey a bit more emotion than what I've been seeing. However, there are so many times where the models/animations are Reboot-worthy. Though I shouldn't be that surprised because crappy 3D presentation in these games has been a thing since Sonic Adventure to me. 😅
I mean, Sonic Boom: Rise of Lyric gets too much hate in my opinion, but the animation in that game needed a lot of work, and the game is boring after a while, which I don't like about that game.
@@portalgaming8057 what are you talking about? Sonic Boom Rise Of Lyric had some of the best animations this franchise has ever seen in terms of character-acting. Consistent motion and dynamic expressions.
I don't think a lot of people appreciated the cutscenes in games like the first 2 Riders and ROL. Despite how drastic the character models are, they were able to get the most out of them by making the characters actually emotive and move depending on each of their personality. I really love Riders because it has a more anime-esque tone, so it makes the comedic scenes all the more hilarious. Like Sonic's face when he realizes how much he pissed off Amy still gets me to this day and scene involving Knuckles is a riot.
I can't speak as much for Riders (though what few scenes I've seen of the in-engine cutscenes are pretty good), but I feel like ROL has the same issue. There is some quality character animations, but it still has plenty of in-engine cutscenes where the characters just stand around, blank faced, while the camera either goes way too close to their expressionless faces or away and starts swiveling around them. Not even just with scenes where you're talking with NPCs, there's plenty of that when going through the main game as well.
@@ScottPillgram20 Well, maybe the Riders game have decent cutscenes then. Which Sonic game do you think has the worst Sonic cutscenes. I'd say it is Sonic '06.
I hate that Sonic is a franchise I like so much, but constantly find myself asking "what if this looked better and closer to AAA games being made today?" After all the success and internal company restructuring Frontiers has given Sonic Team to make higher quality Sonic products, I'll be incredibly disappointed if the next game ends up having budget issues like this again.
Agree , i understand Frontiers having the issues since they had time constraints + not so big budget+ not too much team working , i mean , for AAA industry standard Sonic Team is really small , last time i checked they have less than 100 members , so i hope that with a bigger budget + proper time and a bigger team they can work things out
Its also super annoying because with each new game... We're getting older and older... Like bro i was 19 when Forces came out... I'm 25 now and we're still being fed half baked bullshit. It's embarassing. Theres absolutely no reason for Sonic Team to be in the state that it's in when it's literally the flagship team for SEGA. They avarage like 3 billion dollars each year and Sonic Team still has 60 employees... I didn't buy Frontiers, (ty steam share) but if SEGA isn't going to invest in sonic, why tf should I anymore?
@@lukenewman7635 I was 17 when Forces came out and now I'm 23 lmfao it's just getting ridiculous at this point. If Frontiers is supposed to be "one of the best selling 3D Sonic games of all time" like they're claiming, AND the Sonic movies brought in crazy revenue, then they officially have no more excuses if the next game ends up with the same problems Frontiers has. Frontiers just barely managed to keep me hanging on as a Sonic fan, but Frontiers 2 or whatever comes next for 3D Sonic is genuinely their last chance for me. Getting too old for this shit lmao
I just wish we could get cutscenes like the prerendered CGI ones from Shadow the Hedgehog back. They were so well animated and even in moments where barely any animation exists(Like the opening shot of Shadow just standing on a hill), it still visually looks bad*ss due to the insane visual quality and level of detail in everything.
I personally like Frontiers cutscenes, I like the animation with the characters most of the time but you can definitely tell the budget ain't fully there. What ever happened to the gorgeous looking CGI cutscenes? We haven't had that since Lost World I believe.
The problem is the lighting and animation as well as the general artstyle being meh. The characters just standing or sitting around and talking instead of actually doing anything doesn't help
I know you're talking about the opening cutscene......the scene where Sonic tried grabbing a totally oval shaped capsule with his bare hands (like what?). However, the cutscenes in Lost World are exactly done the same way they are in Frontiers. I mean the normal ones are them just standing around all stiff like with nothing else going for them
I like sonic boom cutscenes not that one when they taking to people in game witch saying something good about sonic boom seems illegal to me well who cares
These characters are meant to MOVE. Yet somehow in Frontiers, it’s like if the the body language itself was reading from the script. How do you do that?
Well yes frontier is meant to take a slow approach so I do see why their is less movement in frontiers because it has a more somber tone. It would have felt very out place if they kept emoting in a very serious dialogue but I do also agree that their should be slight brief movement instead of them standing their stiffly
I really hope they hire Marza again to do high quality cutscenes again. Also, I'd be down if they like... do the Sonic Unleashed NPC thing where you talk with a character in first person and you read their word bubble.
@@kaxcommentssomethingREAL The teasers, the trailers, the everything in marketing.(The stuff that showed Sonic stomping down on a Spider guardian in Kronos for example) It was everywhere from UA-cam ads to fanmade music videos for a long while, so you should reasonably know what I talk about.
@@lpfan4491 ah man, excuse my horrible observation I thought that the Sonic Unleashed type cutscenes where you talk with townsfolk were originally going to be in the game lol
The cutscenes during chaos island were the best. Super cinematic while also having much better animation. Take the scene where sage talks to sonic about his "end goal". That was some of the best animation i'd seen in a sonic cutscene in YEARS and I really wish we got more like that.
I feel like majority of Kronos and ares had the best animation when Amy or knuckles interacted with sonic their was a lot of movement within most a majority of cutscenes tails on the other hand that's when the stiffness felt very apparent
As an amateur 3D animator myself, you hit the nail on the point that there a limited motion with the models. But the beauty of models is that you can absolutely squash and stretch and make more expressive models. Also the camera work needs much needed fixes.
One thing that's really been annoying me recently with sonic games is that the CGI cutscenes are only used for the trailers and nothing else. Forces I kinda get why the cgi cutscenes weren't there because they included the avatar which wouldn't line up in game but it made no sense for frontiers to have absolutely none.
It honestly felt like the CGI trailers were straight up lying about what kind of game it would be. Like the VERY iconic trailer with Sonic fighting Giganto shows that he was gonna go Super Sonic before the fight and probably in the open zones at some point but that’s never possible. The CGI trailer for Another Story made it look like they had simply redesigned Supreme to look more unique, but it turns out that’s just a transformation and also the final boss.
Some cutscenes do look well produced in the game. I think you should look at it like the Yakuzs games, which have the fully animated cutscenes on one hand and the more static poses on the other to save budget, and since ghe script has alot of just people talking ro each other not all conversations need incredible animation and camera work to convey what they have to
Yeah a lot of games have the stock NPC conversations that aren't as dynamic as actual cutscenes. I think the main cutscenes should be a lot better but I'm not too fussed for the largely optional chats being of lesser quality, though any improvements are welcomed.
I know other games like rpgs do cutscenes like this. But it looks good in those. Thing is frontiers just cycles through the same poses mainly Sonics default stance he always does with his hands clinched. it looks rough. Sonic doesn't blink his eyes at all during most dialogue scenes
Honestly i think it could help that in the fixed camera angles cutscenes, they could attempt to dynamically break the models to make more interesting poses, such as what arcsys did with DBFZ
At 7:16 I like how you said the Shadow was above Sonic looking down on him. It's funny since that's how it kind of was for most of their interactions in SA2. When they run into each other in the forest he's somewhat above Sonic again. However, when they have their final fight there on equal ground/footing, as Shadow acknowledges Sonic. So, maybe they did this on purpose or I'm probably just overthinking this.
I cannot agree with the bold statements, we've had worse and I can name multiple games below frontiers. I can agree that this could be better and does take away from the story sometimes. But I can't agree with that, absolutely an exaggeration lol.
Sonic Boom has the best cutscenes at least in terms of character animation. There's A LOT of stretch and squash the characters are CARTOONISH and they have actual good character animation that isn't mo-cap or characters standing in front of the other.
I'd definitely agree with the statement that Frontiers' cutscenes have some of the largest peaks and valleys. As for voice direction, I'm so curious of who was in charge of it for this game because they were so off the mark at times it was baffling. I'm actually starting to come around to Roger's voice for Sonic but god damn the people in charge above are not doing him any favors with these poor ass line deliveries.
I hate the voice direction for Amy in this game. Cindy Robinson and Roger Craig Smirh just don’t work with this “super serious” line delivery thing cos their voices just didn’t fit the designs. Tails’ VA isn’t doing a more dramatic performance so these two don’t really have a excuse. I’d honestly rather they recasted Roger and Cindy, no offence to their fans. I never liked them as sonic and Amy, not even in Boom
Literally the only time we’ve got voice direction with Roger here was with the final boss fight of base game when he gives his speech and the dlc when he does that scream. It’s crazy we can see potential and what could’ve been, but for the rest of the game, it’s just stale and unexpressive (because oooo so serious, mature, and melancholic!!). Even Eggman, Mike Pollock who is the star of VAing in every game he appears in, just sounds so one toned. I don’t know, I’m not really one into conspiracies, but it legit kinda feels like an assassination attempt to get new VAs and that they’ll point to the Frontiers voice criticism for the reason- like Cindy and Roger were already attempted to be fired until the fan outcry, maybe this would be enough support to push that over the edge??
I feel mixed on Roger in Frontiers. It's the best he's been outside of the Boom cartoon and I feel like his usual tone for Sonic in mainline stuff would've clashed hard with this game's tone, but it varies depending on the cutscene. I also feel like the voice he gives Sonic sounds a little too old for him. Like sure, SEGA erased the ages from their bios, but even if we considered Sonic to be older then 15 in this, it still sounds too old for a young adult. Cindy Robinson I think had it the worst, at least in Update 3. It was a little warbly and awkward in the main game, but I was fine with it until I started playing as her in Final Horizon. I do not understand the direction she was being given, she sounds all over the place. Not to mention the weird little noises she constantly makes when you're playing as her lol.
I hard disagree with you all high pitched goofy voices would not fit the story and the "he sounds to old" critique holds no water when there is no definitive age or rather voice he should have that's just your head canon and basing a critique on that is not very constructive and I hate to break it to you but Roger and Amy's direction got alot more support than the other camp especially Roger this is peak roger and sonic
Sonic Unleashed in game cutscenes honestly are the best looking ones in the series. Colors and Generations are a close second. I love how they all used the same in game model of Sonic too basing it off the renders and cgi. Ever since Forces the budget has been so bad and i hate the short quills and shorter limbs they gave Sonic now
You argue that the cutscenes have gradually gotten worse since Unleashed and it got me thinking, is that purely because of the budget constraints? I mean, after Unleashed, or maybe Black Knight? Since Colours, haven’t all the main series sonic games had a lower budget than previous games? That could be a big reason why. Dev time and budget.
It really didn't most of the cutscenes in sonic frontiers are very expressive... specially those super sonic bossfights.. like how thevtitans animated or how super sonic destroying them tbose are done super well man.
Sonic games just kinda frustrate me a lot nowadays. See, I’m one of those dumbasses who in regards to sonic, when forced to choose between the two, would rather have a good story and good characterization over good gameplay. This kind of poor presentation, on top of Flynn’s just generally mid-bad writing really just sour my opinion on what I’d probably have a very good opinion of otherwise. (I know people are gonna get mad at me for saying Flynn’s a bad writer but it’s true. The only reason people enjoy his stuff is because the people who came before him[Penders, Pontac & Graff], were even worse than he was. Bring Maekawa back, please).
I'm not seeing much of an improvement in the writing, even with Ian Flynn, given that things are still very much like the Meta Era, where nothing really matters. Colors: oh no! Tails is being mind controlled and- oh, its resolved already? K I guess... Lost World: oh no! Tails is being mind controlled, again, and- oh, its resolved already? K I guess... Forces: oh no! Sonic has been sucked into Nullspace and- oh, its resolved already? K I guess... Frontiers: oh no! Sonic has succumbed to the cyber corruption and- oh, its resolved already? K I guess... Then comes the Final Horizon DLC, where after Sonic's friends sacrifice themselves to bring him back, its undone immediately after that. Which not only completely undermines their sacrifice in the main story, but also the cyber corruption itself further. It just seems a lot like more of the same, to be honest. Though I do agree with you about the English voice acting direction for Frontiers, because lowering ones voice and sounding older than what you are does make your story come across as mature, despite what the English cast would have you believe. Instead it screams trying way too hard to be taken seriously. Especially when the Japanese cast continue to talk normally, as they have done for the near 25 years they've been doing it.
I think the reason why the cutscenes are mostly stiff is because of the budget they had in this game. And the limited amount of people working on this.
From what i heard, the reason why most of the cutscenes are stiff is because they were added on late into production due to playtesters saying the Open-Zone was "Too Empty".
@@ataladin87 Bro, 6 years with less than 100 devs, new engine, and a paper-thin budget. Let me see you try to make a AAA game with that shit. This is why Sega needs to learn to stop rushing games, and stop making their budgets so low, I mean if you want high Metacritic scores (like they said) put more effort into properly managing your next awaited game.
@@somestrangerando this is a terrible excuse and a other mediocre attempt to justify this lazy ass game. So what if just 100 people??? 06 people had less and what's worse.... they split I half to make secret rings. You saying *"You make the game then"* is pathetic.
I hate how in the later half of Frontiers, most of the cutscenes aren't even animated anymore. They'll just have characters standing motionless in default stance talking to each other, lips barely moving half the time. It makes the earlier cutscenes in the game look amazing by comparison, and they aren't even that good.
The hedgehog Engine it's only a game engine, and while a game engine can affect how the cutscenes are made, It's not the reason as to why Sonic Cutscenes are bad nowadays. They're just not animated very well, but the HE2 can do good animation and more expressive, Sakura Wars isn't all sun and Rainbows, but there's a bunch of cutscenes (specially the Mecha ones) that look really nice, and that game also runs on the Hedgehog Engine 2. As for Sonic Model, they didn't got lower poly after Generations (in the mainline), on the contrary they got higher poly, Frontiers models is 32K triangular polygons, versus Unleashed which was 18k tris, but even that, I have to say that bigger/lower poly doesn't automatically equals to better/worse animation, keeping with Sonic, Sonic Boom Ryse of Lyric have some of the best Animations in all of Sonic games, and that Sonic model was less than 10K tris. What can really be the reasons as to why the Animations are so bad now are. First, the current models and thei rig is very limited and can't stretch or deform too much or else they would be off model or weird, but I can't confirm that, someone would have to look at the ingame models and animate to see how far can you go with them. The second, the animators are just not doing a very good job when animating these characters. It could also be affected by the tools they're using. I don't know about frontiers, but in Forces most animations were done either in Maya or a proprietary animation app from HE that looked really barebones, but again, HE2 can play animations in Maya, so if they needed the animations to be better, they could use that program. I honestly think that at this point Sonic and all his friends need either a redesign, or new models built from the ground up with new and better rigs, I would be surprised if they are still using the same rig and amount of characters bones like the Xbox 360 games, after all, as some modders have showed, all the Generation Classic Sonic and Modern Sonic Idle animations work without problem in the In game model of those games, they're not gonna be able to reuse older character animations into this new model, but I think the only way Sonic can have better animation is by having better models with a better and more advance rig than what we have as of now.
As your resident 3D game engine "expert" - I don't think the engine has anything to do with it, it's just bad art direction and a lack of attention to detail for lighting and animation. For a good example - the Resident Evil remakes and DMC5 are all in the RE Engine and look incredible, but Monster Hunter Rise is also on the same engine and looks completely different. This is partially for downscaling on Switch and also for the needs of Monster Hunter's more stylised world (and probably lower budget). Frontiers could absolutely have good looking cutscenes, they just chose not to make them. Again, mostly for budget.
Even aside from the lighting and animation, it's very clear that there's some sort context breakdown in the pipeline from writing to the script the actors got. There's a lot of line readings that came out really awkward for the context, and then a few scenes where lines are just straight up delivered wrong for what they're saying it about. If they bring Ian Flynn back for the next one (which I'm expecting) I really hope they let him stay in the room for more of the process.
As someone that disagrees with your take on the cutscenes in Frontiers being bad you make a lot of really great points. I do wish that you would've talked about how the significantly higher number of cutscenes in Frontiers compared to the past games in the franchise may have been a factor for the lower quality. The integral story cutscenes I think are solid but completely agree that the extra cutscenes are very stiff and may have bogged down the quality of the integral cutscenes
Terrible excuse, they had 6 years to make this game. The main story cutscenes do have movements, but the camera shots are so painfully mid you don't feel. anything when watching them.
I think Sonic's animation should lean more towards a stylized look in general, but I think I agree that Crash 4's approach might not translate perfectly. It would definitely be an improvement, but the Sonic series was never overtly slapstick-y in tone like Crash is (aside from occasional visual gags). Sonic has influence both from American and Japanese animation, so I think it would make sense to incorporate sensibilities from both styles that compliment his character design. Or something like that idk I'm not an animator
One hung I can give frontiers credit for is how well they handled the character relationships and personalities. None of them feel like 1 dimensional characters and they actually feel fleshed out. Now if they can improve upon their expressions then I think that would make for excellent cutscenes
I can understand having a lot of cutscenes with standing around in a Sonic game isn't as entertaining as what we got. But the content (and I would argue the voice direction) helped a lot. Definitely would like more dynamic cutscenes in the future. More movement, expressions, and staging. However I will say the big ones still hit very well. Sorry they didn't work for you
Not joking but when I first saw the game’s ending cutscene after it was leaked a day before release I honestly thought it was some fake fan thing. Like a Sonic Omens cutscene or something. Was shocked to find out that it really looked like that
Yeah, Fronteirs' cutscenes quality is what threw me off from the game. I tried the free demo. Gave up when something wanted me to collect more pointless stuff.
The lazy animations is the equivalent of how lazy some developers are still sucking on Generations d1ks (cheap nostalgic pandering); wanna see more green hill and chemical plant, kids? Oh and rushed too, because of course it is, and it emphasized even more in update 3. Anyway, 7.5/10 game. Better game than forces and lost world, but still reliant on "safe" d1k sucking, and dumb technicalities. Also, new models are desperately needed. I'd rather play Unleashed and deal with its sloppiness.😂
9:57 Bro what is this terrible voice direction coming from Sonic 😂 he sounds like a 40 year old man. I'm all for him sounding more serious, but I think they went a bit overboard here
I don't think the models or game engine have much to do with the cutscene quality, unless the game engine somehow doesn't have the ability to import animations created from an external tool, which would be ludicrous. It would also surprise me greatly if they weren't using different models for cutscenes and gameplay. No reason to have a ton of detail no one would notice during gameplay eating up performance. The only explanation that I think makes sense is that they just had way too many animations and not enough animators, so they had to rush them and use extremely basic movements.
There’s a reason for this, they don’t have time to render every single cutscene like extra stories and they have to make skins appear in cutscenes so it all so prevents it from being pre-rendered
So... can I come out and say that Sonic Boom had the best animated cutscenes of any 3D sonic game because of how cartoony and expressive the models were? Or will that still get people jumping on my throat because they think I'm saying the game is good?
This is a problem with a lot of open world games, this game as a lot of "cutscenes", is not the same as the other sonic games, if you think about it update 3 has more cutscenes than forces/unleashed for example, since there is so much dialogue in the game the quality suffer when you have a small staff, they have proven that they are capable of doing cool cutscenes mostly in chaos island cutscenes, but it is a lot of work.
Ironically I have the opposite problem with Sonic Frontiers’ cutscenes… specifically talking about the CGI cutscenes used as promotional material of the game (In Teaser Trailers and Advertisement). They seemed extremely OFF, miles away from the Marza ones, expressionless in comparison; while I personally see the In-game ones as surely a step up from Forces or Colors, thanks to all the Interesting camera angles and poses. I think that if this team was given more man power, time and even budget;this game could have been an even bigger leap into a new era of this franchise (at least I hope so)
The Cutscenes in Sonic Unleashed and 06 were my Favorite, not because of their Content but because of how Oddly satisfying they are to watch. The Motion Capture makes the Characters’ movement very Light and Fluid which I like for some reason. The Way Supreme Moves in that very Specific QTE Cutscene where Sonic Breaks free from its Grasp really reminded me of Unleashed. The Camera Angle was really Nice and the Realistic, somewhat jittery movements of Supreme were so good.
I think the main issue with the cutscenes is the background, it always feels so empty and void of anything, I think if they were more filled up, and the characters were more expressive, I think the problem would be fixed.
i never thought of this… i don’t mind it really. i noticed some cutscenes were stiff while others were really cool, but i never thought any were bad, so to speak. i thought the story-important cutscenes were really nice, although i will admit sometimes some expressions/animations do look a little bit silly/awkward. but that never impeded with my enjoyment of the scenes…
As much as it hurts me, i have to agree There are a handfull of cutscenes that are very good imo (some are even the best in the series imo), but most of the time, theyre just standing somewhere being stiff Tbh, i think its more of a "Sega Problem" (like most of the time) then a "Sonic Team Problem" Just like you, i hope the Sequel will do it better
I completely agree frontiers was one of the best sonic games but i cant overlook how bad the cutscenes are i have been saying that since my first playthrough they need to make high quality cutscenes in the next game this is unacceptable for a ps5 game this game has cutscenes look like they were made for ps3 and the first cutscenes u can see the pixels 😂
Frontiers hard lacks cinematography, actual set pieces, an appealing art direction to look at when you’re watching these scenes, and mostly importantly, NEW CURRENT GEN MODELS PLEASE HOW LONG HAS IT BEEN? We’ve had literally the same model since Unleahsed except it somehow gets downgraded every time these models are so restrictive and bland
I agree about art direction, but saying it lacks cinematography is FLAT OUT WRONG. The cinematography and choreography in frontiers is the best yet in terms of in-game cutscenes.
@@Terminal_Apotos Ah yes, the frontiers hater. I see you and another guy called marc on almost every vid. Just hate on every aspect on the game for the sake of it.
Sure the quality is low you can even see the pixels in cutscenes but the story is much better than allot of previous Sonic games and dialogue is more enjoyable I actually care what is happening next in the story and what Sonic is going to do next unlike the generations where they just have no story and forces well I don’t have to talk about that game and we all know how terrible the story is in Sonic colors that’s why I enjoy the cutscenes because they actually have story but I can agree that their quality is so bad
12:20 You do realize that SEGA & Sonic Team also used motion capture for the in-game cutscenes in Unleashed, right. Showing that it can be done. While of course the more faster & cartoony-er animations were hand animated.
Dude, I came across this channel completely organically through recommended, but I recognized LS Mark's voice immediately. I've watched too many hours of you complaining about Butch Hartman to not recognize it lmao.
If I can say one thing, using Yakuza 0 as the example of other SEGA games is not applicable, as it is not made by Sonic Team However, PSO2 is made by Sonic Team, so that example is more sound IMO
SEGA needs to reboot 3d Sonic's models and stuff, they're using the "same base" since unleashed. Honestly i would love to see how a Cel shaded mainline sonic game would look, i think it fits sonic's expressions and moves pretty well in gameplay (wich i think is even more problematic than cutscenes, Sonic is stiff as hell when transitioning trough his moveset) and obviously in cutscenes
get ready for the 100 commentaries from Sonic fans explaining why the funny blue hedgehog inspired by Mickey Mouse and Felix the Cat who runs fast, is actually a shonen protagonist and not a cartoon character.
I think the Yakuza series is actually a good comparison. Every story cutscene in that series is so over-the-top and cinematic, I wish Sonic games had that level of ridiculous bombasity
It’s really just cuz sega doesn’t wanna give a budget or team to sonic games since unleashed after that got poor critical reception, I’ve HEARD that they will be getting a bigger budget and team next time but I’m not holding my breath. An insomniac Spider-Man level sonic game would go CRAZY!!!
It's uncanny hearing the characters emote while they still haven't figured out facial animation at this point.
they did in Unleashed and Colors, Generations. they just aren't trying anymore nowadays
If you're talking about facial expressions, they already did with Sonic Boom.
The actual problem is that some characters like Sonic himself weren't designed to be universally expressive.
The main Sonic we know for example, was designed to look cool, cocky and have attitude.
This is why some of his expressions look awkward. This is still something that bothers me even Sonic Prime.
@@snowyneko6710sonic boom was made by a completely different studio
also i think sonic's designed to be very expressive and has a very strong and unique personality, it just needs to be executed correctly
@@mart5610they’re just not using their resources effectively
@@snowyneko6710so many artists online have shown Sonic's design can do whatever he needs to do for emotion
Remember when frontiers came out and people were saying the cutscenes were the best in the series? Even better than unleashed? 😂
The honeymoon period on that game was insane lol
it still is insane on twitter, I can’t wait till people calm tf down
unleashed still holds the crown on best looking game in both in game cutscenes and cutscenes
They only looked at the titan ones of course and forgot the rest
@@nyhtfall1969 such a good looking game, I can’t believe it’s 15 years old
@@darudesandstrom1067 crazy right?
One thing that bugged me about the Sonic Frontiers update 3 cutscenes was that it constantly faded to black only to fade the cutscene back in and continue like nothing happened. Sometimes it even fades to black, fades back in and then fades to black again a few seconds later.
Not sure if this happened to anyone else, but it did to me, and it felt super unpolished and odd whenever I'd see it. Why fade to black only to then fade back in for no reason?
Idk, it just felt so weird to me lol
I remember it at least happening with the cutscenes whenever the playable character would switch and for some of the emerald collecting scenes, IIRC.
This was actually a funny issue of mine with FF16 which is weirdly very formulaic with Frontiers with the bosses and gameplay loop of rinsing and repeating till you get to the epic anime kaiju fight. The side stories were also JUST AS STIFF as Frontiers in animation quality and camera, and the cutscenes literally all just fade to black and back to the cutscene just like some Frontiers scenes you’re talking about.
Oh yeah that definitely bugged me, love seeing Characters stand there in silence only for it to fade to black and into another cutscene where they actually talk. This also happened in the Titan Fights, why not use Tricky Camera Movements to Transition between gameplay and Cutscene.
On an overall look on frontiers I think at least for me The cutscenes are just *aight* But when I take in the other factors as you mentioned I can see what you mean and how you feel about it. Personally I wish every interaction wasn't as dry as they were, hell you may as well do an intercom chat like they did in forces if they can't be arsed with animating. It was really jarring in update 3 but I can easily figure out the issue there. 1 it's a free update so less budget and probably the cast was slimmed later in the project to make head way for the next *big* game if not superstars itself. Because at least for me the game felt like they needed to focus on the main problem and everything else was wayyy behind. Cyberspace is even lazier despite *being new* stuff makes it clear that, the substance. The life as you put it kinda just doesn't exist. Like how does the shield scene feel so off, when it supposed to feel like an empowering and good moment?
11:04 - This dead air between the lines is something I have noticed in anime in general. The characters usually make a long pauses between lines. Even if their line is just "hmpf". The writers and animators have to make sure that there is pause between every word, every interjection, every gesture. And the gestures usually cannot be done simultaneously with the talk either. And then there is this dramatic hand waving with a sound of hand being waved through air as if it's the most dramatic thing ever. I never understood this trope of Japanese writing. I don't find it particularly dramatic.
Glad im not the only one who finds the cutscenes in this game insanely boring
damn, yall can't have shit without complaining.
I think something that could really improve the cutscenes is having more action in them, I mean we’re in the era of the PS5, I don’t think it’s that crazy to want at least an effort to make something like the opening to Unleashed or the cutscene in Black Knight when Sonic and the Knights were escaping the castle. Sonic’s first encounter with Giganto in Frontiers feels like a step in that direction but that’s mainly it. And because I know there’s a chance at least one person will say that “it’s probably too much for a bunch of action regularly in cutscenes”, then I’m gonna call bull crap because once again, we’re in the era of the PS5, you’re really telling me it’d be too hard when games like Batman: Arkham City on the PS3 in 2011 had cutscenes like the Wonder Tower one where Batman is quickly knocking Hugo Strange around the place and tackles Ra’s Al Ghul out of the exploding tower before having to push himself off of Ra’s when he stabs himself also trying to get Batman, or if you want a more current example then look at Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 (yes I will be going over something that might be considered spoilers so if anyone is avoiding them then you might wanna stop reading this), I mean the Coney Island mission has Peter very quickly catching and dodging arrows, throwing fireworks at a couple of Kraven’s men (how are they not dead), all while trying to stop two roller coaster vehicles, or in the final boss where Peter and Miles are fighting Venom in the sky, slingshotting and sky diving throughout with Venom at one point slamming Peter through a truck, at this point more than ever, I don’t think animating action scenes is the problem, we just need to hope Sega doesn’t go back on giving Sonic games a bigger budget because I think either that or the animators not trying hard enough is why it feels rare we have a cutscene where Sonic and co. aren’t just standing around waving their arms like it’s Mario and Sonic at the Olympic Games
Honestly beside the side cutscenes with barely any animation, I like the cutscenes in Sonic Frontiers, the voice acting is top notch and while the animations haven’t improved since forces, the camera has and makes all these scenes feel a lot more dynamic. Hell the animation during the final fight in the final horizon was top notch, ESPECIALLY the final qte.
If I wanted to rank every 3D Sonic game I've played by cutscenes (without counting CGI cutscenes), it would probably be something like:
1. Sonic Unleashed
2. Sonic Adventure 2
3. Sonic Forces
4. Sonic Generations
5. Sonic Adventure
The only reason Forces is above Adventure is because I think Adventure's cutscenes look weird sometimes. It's also above Generations because not a lot happens in terms of cutscenes in that game. If I had to rank every 3D Sonic Game I've watched (without counting spin-offs), then Frontiers would probably be under Adventure 2, Lost World would be under Adventure, and Colors would be above Lost World. I don't have a ton of reason for the last two, but I just think Frontiers looks so cool that, even with the slow pacing, I can still appreciate the vision and the action that's happening in between.
Is it recency bias? Yeah, I'm not even gonna pretend like it's not, but like... shut up, I like it. Let me like it.
(also, I still think it's bogus that SEGA won't give Sonic Team the budget and resources to make Sonic games better. Hopefully that ACTUALLY changes with the next game. Even if it doesn't, I'm not really gonna bat an eye. As long as it looks cool and has expression and identity, I'll still like it...)
Me personally I liked the cutscenes in frontiers (plz no hate) I think they represent how much more mature the characters are and shows growth like Amy isn’t chasing sonic anymore…again? Tails is becoming independent…AGAIN? And knuckles isn’t a total bonehead idiot… *AGAIN?* bro they honestly should have just kept their characterizations from the adventure games if they were just gonna change them back
“The towers aren’t even that hard to climb”
I like you man, you lie a lot.
They really aren't
List some other times he's lied
Splash Dash/Mark left a comment under a Haedox video, claiming to not be someone who plays video games, and yet here he is having a whole channel focusing on Sonic games. The dude lies, it's part of the brand at this point.
They aren't.
@@HOTD108_Has it ever actually been confirmed that they're the same dude
The only Cutscene i liked was when Sonic meets Sage and Giganto for the 1st time.
The way the camera pans and zooms in on Sage and Sonic's stand-off, The way sonic jumps and lands away from Giganto as the camera keeps the flow going.
I did always think that the cutscenes in Frontiers were a little stiff and lacked some motivation, glad I wasnt the only one who thought this. Hopefully in the future sega can animate the cutscenes and characters a little bit more like the opening for unleashed or the opening for Sonic's story in 06. It doesnt have to be anything too crazy, just something that adds more emotion than just...standing, y'know? And maybe give some of the characters a design check, because most of the models really aren't that appealing lmao
people praise this game too much. It's a medicore 6.5/10
Ichiban hangs dong in Yakuza 7: Like A Dragon and Yakuza 8: Infinite Wealth so please don’t call the cutscenes bad Mr. Mark.
Ok, I do gotta say it is hard to say Frontiers cut scenes sucks after going though any Titan battle, as those seem to have quite a bit put into them to make them feel like an amazing and awesome battle in the game!
But... I suppose that is not what the video is about seeing we are mostly talking about interactions between characters and, for the most part, I can see that this can be improved. I do feel when it comes to the small interactions it is difficult to make them the most interesting, like, there are a lot in this game and it makes sense this isn't exactly easy to make visually interesting. But there could be better work on it so it feels like I need to look at the screen when they are talking. When we do conversations in the main story and it isn't too much visually interesting either, then that is a problem. I feel only Eggman is doing the movement based emotions right when something happens.
For an issue I got, I do find it weird to compare the less action scenes from Frontiers to the others. I guess most of that goes to the titans for me, but I guess the game could of had more overall anyway. Well unless I want you to judge which Sonic game does Sonic standing around better, I can't ask for much else from ya.....
Overall, disagreements on story and voice acting aside, I can see why you feel this way on the game. I kinda do think it's more of a budget reason and I can't exactly tell them to 'do better' after we saw how other Sonic games don't get much bigger then this these days and it's easy to tell that Sonic's main game don't get the highest budget based on how the last few aren't so big (funny we want from a game over like 50 hours long now to a game that was 3 hours long for the average person at least). Lots of hope for the next, but Im more here to enjoy it then just hope now.
Mate sonic team we’re probably only given £0.01 from Sega to make these, your lucky it wasn’t just text
Honestly, you know what I think the problem is? I just think it's the storytelling. Sonic doesn't work well with the static dialogue version of storytelling. Think about cutscenes from Adventure 2 or even something like Riders. It felt like the story was progressing and all we saw was what happened for the brief moment when they slowed down. They were actually interacting with the world and all we saw was snippets of what they thought of what was happening. In Frontiers it feels like they have to stop and explain to the player what's going on because the world doesn't feel alive enough to tell it's own story. There's no momentum, ironically enough
You should’ve said something on twitters and the story boarder/animator/someone would’ve gave us an answer
Fair conclusion but all I have to say is they had to cut corners somewhere And no one wanting it to be gameplay story or content subpar cutscenes seems like a fair trade off. not being able to be immersed seems like an overstatement the story the voice acting in the body language alone will not the best conveyed the message.
I both agree and disagree at the same time. There are actually times when the character models look okay, and they do convey a bit more emotion than what I've been seeing. However, there are so many times where the models/animations are Reboot-worthy.
Though I shouldn't be that surprised because crappy 3D presentation in these games has been a thing since Sonic Adventure to me. 😅
I think one of my personal issues with The Frontiers cutscenes is that most of them are just the characters standing around
YES A VIDEO ABOUT SONIC CUTSCENES I just hate how stiff they are,it’s so crazy how rise of lyric has the best animations out of any sonic game
Yeah, I’ll admit I haven’t played a modern Sonic game since Colors and I knew something felt off about the cutscenes in Frontiers.
Sonic Boom had specifically made models for this kind of animations.
Do they ruin the game?
I mean, Sonic Boom: Rise of Lyric gets too much hate in my opinion, but the animation in that game needed a lot of work, and the game is boring after a while, which I don't like about that game.
@@portalgaming8057 what are you talking about? Sonic Boom Rise Of Lyric had some of the best animations this franchise has ever seen in terms of character-acting. Consistent motion and dynamic expressions.
I don't think a lot of people appreciated the cutscenes in games like the first 2 Riders and ROL. Despite how drastic the character models are, they were able to get the most out of them by making the characters actually emotive and move depending on each of their personality. I really love Riders because it has a more anime-esque tone, so it makes the comedic scenes all the more hilarious. Like Sonic's face when he realizes how much he pissed off Amy still gets me to this day and scene involving Knuckles is a riot.
I don't know. Rise of Lyric had some flawed cutscenes and weird animation, but the game isn't as bad as people say.
I can't speak as much for Riders (though what few scenes I've seen of the in-engine cutscenes are pretty good), but I feel like ROL has the same issue. There is some quality character animations, but it still has plenty of in-engine cutscenes where the characters just stand around, blank faced, while the camera either goes way too close to their expressionless faces or away and starts swiveling around them. Not even just with scenes where you're talking with NPCs, there's plenty of that when going through the main game as well.
@@ScottPillgram20 Well, maybe the Riders game have decent cutscenes then. Which Sonic game do you think has the worst Sonic cutscenes. I'd say it is Sonic '06.
I would give anything for riders (specifically riders 1) cutscenes i can't take this dry drab husk of a direction we've been stuck in
@@nyhtfall1969 Okay, have you played Sonic '06, the worst Sonic game of them all?
I hate that Sonic is a franchise I like so much, but constantly find myself asking "what if this looked better and closer to AAA games being made today?" After all the success and internal company restructuring Frontiers has given Sonic Team to make higher quality Sonic products, I'll be incredibly disappointed if the next game ends up having budget issues like this again.
Agree , i understand Frontiers having the issues since they had time constraints + not so big budget+ not too much team working , i mean , for AAA industry standard Sonic Team is really small , last time i checked they have less than 100 members , so i hope that with a bigger budget + proper time and a bigger team they can work things out
Its also super annoying because with each new game... We're getting older and older... Like bro i was 19 when Forces came out... I'm 25 now and we're still being fed half baked bullshit. It's embarassing. Theres absolutely no reason for Sonic Team to be in the state that it's in when it's literally the flagship team for SEGA. They avarage like 3 billion dollars each year and Sonic Team still has 60 employees... I didn't buy Frontiers, (ty steam share) but if SEGA isn't going to invest in sonic, why tf should I anymore?
@@lukenewman7635 I was 17 when Forces came out and now I'm 23 lmfao it's just getting ridiculous at this point. If Frontiers is supposed to be "one of the best selling 3D Sonic games of all time" like they're claiming, AND the Sonic movies brought in crazy revenue, then they officially have no more excuses if the next game ends up with the same problems Frontiers has. Frontiers just barely managed to keep me hanging on as a Sonic fan, but Frontiers 2 or whatever comes next for 3D Sonic is genuinely their last chance for me. Getting too old for this shit lmao
Don’t worry, the next game will be the same. If they can sell low quality and make enough profit, they won’t do a high quality game.
I just wish we could get cutscenes like the prerendered CGI ones from Shadow the Hedgehog back. They were so well animated and even in moments where barely any animation exists(Like the opening shot of Shadow just standing on a hill), it still visually looks bad*ss due to the insane visual quality and level of detail in everything.
The best cutscene in frontiers was when sonic stared directly at the camera and said "Huh- Bababooey, amirite?"
You mean "Hooba Dooba"?
@@LukeStationno, I mean his titular catchphrase? "Bababooey" ?
I personally like Frontiers cutscenes, I like the animation with the characters most of the time but you can definitely tell the budget ain't fully there. What ever happened to the gorgeous looking CGI cutscenes? We haven't had that since Lost World I believe.
The problem is the lighting and animation as well as the general artstyle being meh. The characters just standing or sitting around and talking instead of actually doing anything doesn't help
I love em too most of the time. :3
Splash Dash is about to get some comments prob. talking about how his opinion is wrong.
There were a few in Frontiers. I think the attack where the final boss rips the Chaos Emeralds from you and then dunks you is a good looking cutscene
I know you're talking about the opening cutscene......the scene where Sonic tried grabbing a totally oval shaped capsule with his bare hands (like what?). However, the cutscenes in Lost World are exactly done the same way they are in Frontiers. I mean the normal ones are them just standing around all stiff like with nothing else going for them
Riders had the best expressions and Unleashed had the best overall appearance but the CG 06 cutscenes look so good
I like sonic boom cutscenes not that one when they taking to people in game witch saying something good about sonic boom seems illegal to me well who cares
sonic unleashed opening cutscene is peak imo
These characters are meant to MOVE. Yet somehow in Frontiers, it’s like if the the body language itself was reading from the script. How do you do that?
Exactly can't these characters at least Breath at least some air during idle animations
Well yes frontier is meant to take a slow approach so I do see why their is less movement in frontiers because it has a more somber tone. It would have felt very out place if they kept emoting in a very serious dialogue but I do also agree that their should be slight brief movement instead of them standing their stiffly
This guy hates everything
Yeah, I can’t stand that guy.
Total knobhead.
Go back to watching FNAF R34 or something you FREAK. I'm trying to watch SPLASH DASH
Bruh
fr
I really hope they hire Marza again to do high quality cutscenes again. Also, I'd be down if they like... do the Sonic Unleashed NPC thing where you talk with a character in first person and you read their word bubble.
They literally did, just that those scenes are not in the game and it is really jarring.
@@lpfan4491wait what? where can i find more about this?
@@kaxcommentssomethingREAL The teasers, the trailers, the everything in marketing.(The stuff that showed Sonic stomping down on a Spider guardian in Kronos for example)
It was everywhere from UA-cam ads to fanmade music videos for a long while, so you should reasonably know what I talk about.
@@lpfan4491 ah man, excuse my horrible observation I thought that the Sonic Unleashed type cutscenes where you talk with townsfolk were originally going to be in the game lol
Yeah like the halo 2 anniversary cutscenes
The cutscenes during chaos island were the best. Super cinematic while also having much better animation. Take the scene where sage talks to sonic about his "end goal". That was some of the best animation i'd seen in a sonic cutscene in YEARS and I really wish we got more like that.
I feel like majority of Kronos and ares had the best animation when Amy or knuckles interacted with sonic their was a lot of movement within most a majority of cutscenes tails on the other hand that's when the stiffness felt very apparent
As an amateur 3D animator myself, you hit the nail on the point that there a limited motion with the models. But the beauty of models is that you can absolutely squash and stretch and make more expressive models. Also the camera work needs much needed fixes.
One thing that's really been annoying me recently with sonic games is that the CGI cutscenes are only used for the trailers and nothing else. Forces I kinda get why the cgi cutscenes weren't there because they included the avatar which wouldn't line up in game but it made no sense for frontiers to have absolutely none.
It honestly felt like the CGI trailers were straight up lying about what kind of game it would be. Like the VERY iconic trailer with Sonic fighting Giganto shows that he was gonna go Super Sonic before the fight and probably in the open zones at some point but that’s never possible. The CGI trailer for Another Story made it look like they had simply redesigned Supreme to look more unique, but it turns out that’s just a transformation and also the final boss.
Some cutscenes do look well produced in the game. I think you should look at it like the Yakuzs games, which have the fully animated cutscenes on one hand and the more static poses on the other to save budget, and since ghe script has alot of just people talking ro each other not all conversations need incredible animation and camera work to convey what they have to
Yeah a lot of games have the stock NPC conversations that aren't as dynamic as actual cutscenes. I think the main cutscenes should be a lot better but I'm not too fussed for the largely optional chats being of lesser quality, though any improvements are welcomed.
I know other games like rpgs do cutscenes like this. But it looks good in those. Thing is frontiers just cycles through the same poses mainly Sonics default stance he always does with his hands clinched. it looks rough. Sonic doesn't blink his eyes at all during most dialogue scenes
Honestly i think it could help that in the fixed camera angles cutscenes, they could attempt to dynamically break the models to make more interesting poses, such as what arcsys did with DBFZ
At 7:16 I like how you said the Shadow was above Sonic looking down on him. It's funny since that's how it kind of was for most of their interactions in SA2. When they run into each other in the forest he's somewhat above Sonic again. However, when they have their final fight there on equal ground/footing, as Shadow acknowledges Sonic.
So, maybe they did this on purpose or I'm probably just overthinking this.
This is the same with Jet.
"he likes to feel tall"
I cannot agree with the bold statements, we've had worse and I can name multiple games below frontiers.
I can agree that this could be better and does take away from the story sometimes.
But I can't agree with that, absolutely an exaggeration lol.
He unironically said forces cutscenes looked better
@@liambiniares3182 They did, though. Seperate the game itself from the cutscenes 🤦♂
Sonic Boom has the best cutscenes at least in terms of character animation. There's A LOT of stretch and squash the characters are CARTOONISH and they have actual good character animation that isn't mo-cap or characters standing in front of the other.
Which Sonic Boom?
Rise of Lyric?, Shattered Crystal?, Fire & Ice? or the animated series?
@@azimuddin1890 find any other sonic boom game that has great cutscene animations, and you'll find out what they're talking about.
@@azimuddin1890 I think they're talking about Rise of lyric
I'd definitely agree with the statement that Frontiers' cutscenes have some of the largest peaks and valleys. As for voice direction, I'm so curious of who was in charge of it for this game because they were so off the mark at times it was baffling. I'm actually starting to come around to Roger's voice for Sonic but god damn the people in charge above are not doing him any favors with these poor ass line deliveries.
I hate the voice direction for Amy in this game. Cindy Robinson and Roger Craig Smirh just don’t work with this “super serious” line delivery thing cos their voices just didn’t fit the designs.
Tails’ VA isn’t doing a more dramatic performance so these two don’t really have a excuse. I’d honestly rather they recasted Roger and Cindy, no offence to their fans. I never liked them as sonic and Amy, not even in Boom
Literally the only time we’ve got voice direction with Roger here was with the final boss fight of base game when he gives his speech and the dlc when he does that scream. It’s crazy we can see potential and what could’ve been, but for the rest of the game, it’s just stale and unexpressive (because oooo so serious, mature, and melancholic!!). Even Eggman, Mike Pollock who is the star of VAing in every game he appears in, just sounds so one toned.
I don’t know, I’m not really one into conspiracies, but it legit kinda feels like an assassination attempt to get new VAs and that they’ll point to the Frontiers voice criticism for the reason- like Cindy and Roger were already attempted to be fired until the fan outcry, maybe this would be enough support to push that over the edge??
I feel mixed on Roger in Frontiers. It's the best he's been outside of the Boom cartoon and I feel like his usual tone for Sonic in mainline stuff would've clashed hard with this game's tone, but it varies depending on the cutscene. I also feel like the voice he gives Sonic sounds a little too old for him. Like sure, SEGA erased the ages from their bios, but even if we considered Sonic to be older then 15 in this, it still sounds too old for a young adult.
Cindy Robinson I think had it the worst, at least in Update 3. It was a little warbly and awkward in the main game, but I was fine with it until I started playing as her in Final Horizon. I do not understand the direction she was being given, she sounds all over the place. Not to mention the weird little noises she constantly makes when you're playing as her lol.
Amy was Especially terrible
I hard disagree with you all high pitched goofy voices would not fit the story and the "he sounds to old" critique holds no water when there is no definitive age or rather voice he should have that's just your head canon and basing a critique on that is not very constructive and I hate to break it to you but Roger and Amy's direction got alot more support than the other camp especially Roger this is peak roger and sonic
Sonic's voice in this game makes me laugh.
"what's the plan?" In the most deadpan voice possible.
Sonic Unleashed in game cutscenes honestly are the best looking ones in the series. Colors and Generations are a close second. I love how they all used the same in game model of Sonic too basing it off the renders and cgi. Ever since Forces the budget has been so bad and i hate the short quills and shorter limbs they gave Sonic now
I miss the funny goofy faces of sonic adventure ):
Watch out, you're gonna crash, ahhh
😧
You argue that the cutscenes have gradually gotten worse since Unleashed and it got me thinking, is that purely because of the budget constraints? I mean, after Unleashed, or maybe Black Knight? Since Colours, haven’t all the main series sonic games had a lower budget than previous games? That could be a big reason why. Dev time and budget.
Sega wanted this to be more of a AAA game, literally said so. That's also why this shit is $60
It really didn't most of the cutscenes in sonic frontiers are very expressive... specially those super sonic bossfights.. like how thevtitans animated or how super sonic destroying them tbose are done super well man.
For some reason I just can't get over why Sonic's eyes look plastic in these cutscenes.
Sonic games just kinda frustrate me a lot nowadays. See, I’m one of those dumbasses who in regards to sonic, when forced to choose between the two, would rather have a good story and good characterization over good gameplay.
This kind of poor presentation, on top of Flynn’s just generally mid-bad writing really just sour my opinion on what I’d probably have a very good opinion of otherwise.
(I know people are gonna get mad at me for saying Flynn’s a bad writer but it’s true. The only reason people enjoy his stuff is because the people who came before him[Penders, Pontac & Graff], were even worse than he was. Bring Maekawa back, please).
Yall its an opinion, don't take It too serious
I'm not seeing much of an improvement in the writing, even with Ian Flynn, given that things are still very much like the Meta Era, where nothing really matters.
Colors: oh no! Tails is being mind controlled and- oh, its resolved already? K I guess...
Lost World: oh no! Tails is being mind controlled, again, and- oh, its resolved already? K I guess...
Forces: oh no! Sonic has been sucked into Nullspace and- oh, its resolved already? K I guess...
Frontiers: oh no! Sonic has succumbed to the cyber corruption and- oh, its resolved already? K I guess...
Then comes the Final Horizon DLC, where after Sonic's friends sacrifice themselves to bring him back, its undone immediately after that. Which not only completely undermines their sacrifice in the main story, but also the cyber corruption itself further. It just seems a lot like more of the same, to be honest.
Though I do agree with you about the English voice acting direction for Frontiers, because lowering ones voice and sounding older than what you are does make your story come across as mature, despite what the English cast would have you believe. Instead it screams trying way too hard to be taken seriously. Especially when the Japanese cast continue to talk normally, as they have done for the near 25 years they've been doing it.
I think the reason why the cutscenes are mostly stiff is because of the budget they had in this game. And the limited amount of people working on this.
They had 6 years........not even Maekawa's team had that long back in the day.
@@ataladin876 years of trial and error while also having a mcdonalds budget
From what i heard, the reason why most of the cutscenes are stiff is because they were added on late into production due to playtesters saying the Open-Zone was "Too Empty".
@@ataladin87 Bro, 6 years with less than 100 devs, new engine, and a paper-thin budget. Let me see you try to make a AAA game with that shit. This is why Sega needs to learn to stop rushing games, and stop making their budgets so low, I mean if you want high Metacritic scores (like they said) put more effort into properly managing your next awaited game.
@@somestrangerando this is a terrible excuse and a other mediocre attempt to justify this lazy ass game.
So what if just 100 people???
06 people had less and what's worse.... they split I half to make secret rings.
You saying *"You make the game then"* is pathetic.
It's so fucked up to think that Frontiers cutscenes have about as much movement as the SA1 cutscenes did back in 1998...
SA1 even had more facial expression... for better or for worse.
I hate how in the later half of Frontiers, most of the cutscenes aren't even animated anymore. They'll just have characters standing motionless in default stance talking to each other, lips barely moving half the time. It makes the earlier cutscenes in the game look amazing by comparison, and they aren't even that good.
Ah, so i wasnt wrong and an idiot when i wanted to skip through the cutscenes?
just make a sonic game with the style of yakuza with how the qte and cutscenes work in that game then you'll have peak
How did we go from final fantasy 15 level cutscenes in 2006 to stiff blender animations on youtube in the span of like 18 years. HOW!?
Because Sonic Team fucking sucks
@@MasterAlpha1000 They contracted a third party studio for the CGI.
Blur Studio.
The hedgehog Engine it's only a game engine, and while a game engine can affect how the cutscenes are made, It's not the reason as to why Sonic Cutscenes are bad nowadays. They're just not animated very well, but the HE2 can do good animation and more expressive, Sakura Wars isn't all sun and Rainbows, but there's a bunch of cutscenes (specially the Mecha ones) that look really nice, and that game also runs on the Hedgehog Engine 2.
As for Sonic Model, they didn't got lower poly after Generations (in the mainline), on the contrary they got higher poly, Frontiers models is 32K triangular polygons, versus Unleashed which was 18k tris, but even that, I have to say that bigger/lower poly doesn't automatically equals to better/worse animation, keeping with Sonic, Sonic Boom Ryse of Lyric have some of the best Animations in all of Sonic games, and that Sonic model was less than 10K tris.
What can really be the reasons as to why the Animations are so bad now are.
First, the current models and thei rig is very limited and can't stretch or deform too much or else they would be off model or weird, but I can't confirm that, someone would have to look at the ingame models and animate to see how far can you go with them.
The second, the animators are just not doing a very good job when animating these characters. It could also be affected by the tools they're using. I don't know about frontiers, but in Forces most animations were done either in Maya or a proprietary animation app from HE that looked really barebones, but again, HE2 can play animations in Maya, so if they needed the animations to be better, they could use that program.
I honestly think that at this point Sonic and all his friends need either a redesign, or new models built from the ground up with new and better rigs, I would be surprised if they are still using the same rig and amount of characters bones like the Xbox 360 games, after all, as some modders have showed, all the Generation Classic Sonic and Modern Sonic Idle animations work without problem in the In game model of those games, they're not gonna be able to reuse older character animations into this new model, but I think the only way Sonic can have better animation is by having better models with a better and more advance rig than what we have as of now.
This has nothing to do with the video but doesn’t this guy sound like LS mark?
That's crazy, there's no way it's him. They sound VERY different.
As your resident 3D game engine "expert" - I don't think the engine has anything to do with it, it's just bad art direction and a lack of attention to detail for lighting and animation.
For a good example - the Resident Evil remakes and DMC5 are all in the RE Engine and look incredible, but Monster Hunter Rise is also on the same engine and looks completely different. This is partially for downscaling on Switch and also for the needs of Monster Hunter's more stylised world (and probably lower budget). Frontiers could absolutely have good looking cutscenes, they just chose not to make them. Again, mostly for budget.
2:34
what the fuck just came out of your mouth
he2 is better than he1 in everything and every way
it's just that sonic teams animators all died
Clearly it shows
Even aside from the lighting and animation, it's very clear that there's some sort context breakdown in the pipeline from writing to the script the actors got. There's a lot of line readings that came out really awkward for the context, and then a few scenes where lines are just straight up delivered wrong for what they're saying it about. If they bring Ian Flynn back for the next one (which I'm expecting) I really hope they let him stay in the room for more of the process.
It's stiff as hell and kinda 'cringe' to watch imo. Rough game, overall.
As someone that disagrees with your take on the cutscenes in Frontiers being bad you make a lot of really great points. I do wish that you would've talked about how the significantly higher number of cutscenes in Frontiers compared to the past games in the franchise may have been a factor for the lower quality. The integral story cutscenes I think are solid but completely agree that the extra cutscenes are very stiff and may have bogged down the quality of the integral cutscenes
Terrible excuse, they had 6 years to make this game.
The main story cutscenes do have movements, but the camera shots are so painfully mid you don't feel. anything when watching them.
I think Sonic's animation should lean more towards a stylized look in general, but I think I agree that Crash 4's approach might not translate perfectly. It would definitely be an improvement, but the Sonic series was never overtly slapstick-y in tone like Crash is (aside from occasional visual gags). Sonic has influence both from American and Japanese animation, so I think it would make sense to incorporate sensibilities from both styles that compliment his character design.
Or something like that idk I'm not an animator
One hung I can give frontiers credit for is how well they handled the character relationships and personalities. None of them feel like 1 dimensional characters and they actually feel fleshed out. Now if they can improve upon their expressions then I think that would make for excellent cutscenes
Lol no💀
@@MasterAlpha1000no what?
@@MasterAlpha1000 Did you even watch the cutscenes, or did you just skip them before they could even start playing?
I can understand having a lot of cutscenes with standing around in a Sonic game isn't as entertaining as what we got. But the content (and I would argue the voice direction) helped a lot. Definitely would like more dynamic cutscenes in the future. More movement, expressions, and staging. However I will say the big ones still hit very well. Sorry they didn't work for you
You forgot camerawork.
@@ataladin87 yeah that too
@@partyjams it's so bad bro
Litteraly The only scene to do it well was the Giganto introduction.
I skip most of them. So slow, bad animation, terrible camera work, story is weak and poorly explained…
I don't think the camera are bad.
Not joking but when I first saw the game’s ending cutscene after it was leaked a day before release I honestly thought it was some fake fan thing. Like a Sonic Omens cutscene or something. Was shocked to find out that it really looked like that
Yeah, Fronteirs' cutscenes quality is what threw me off from the game.
I tried the free demo.
Gave up when something wanted me to collect more pointless stuff.
The lazy animations is the equivalent of how lazy some developers are still sucking on Generations d1ks (cheap nostalgic pandering); wanna see more green hill and chemical plant, kids?
Oh and rushed too, because of course it is, and it emphasized even more in update 3.
Anyway, 7.5/10 game. Better game than forces and lost world, but still reliant on "safe" d1k sucking, and dumb technicalities. Also, new models are desperately needed.
I'd rather play Unleashed and deal with its sloppiness.😂
Pokemon fans would kill for cutscenes like Frontiers...
9:57 Bro what is this terrible voice direction coming from Sonic 😂 he sounds like a 40 year old man. I'm all for him sounding more serious, but I think they went a bit overboard here
I don’t want Roger back as sonic, period. This game just really shows to me regardless of voice direction, he doesn’t fit for sonic.
I don't think the models or game engine have much to do with the cutscene quality, unless the game engine somehow doesn't have the ability to import animations created from an external tool, which would be ludicrous. It would also surprise me greatly if they weren't using different models for cutscenes and gameplay. No reason to have a ton of detail no one would notice during gameplay eating up performance. The only explanation that I think makes sense is that they just had way too many animations and not enough animators, so they had to rush them and use extremely basic movements.
There’s a reason for this, they don’t have time to render every single cutscene like extra stories and they have to make skins appear in cutscenes so it all so prevents it from being pre-rendered
I can't take Sonic seriously with this awful voice direction
So... can I come out and say that Sonic Boom had the best animated cutscenes of any 3D sonic game because of how cartoony and expressive the models were? Or will that still get people jumping on my throat because they think I'm saying the game is good?
honestly i don't think the game is that bad, got more enjoyment out of it than forces
This is a problem with a lot of open world games, this game as a lot of "cutscenes", is not the same as the other sonic games, if you think about it update 3 has more cutscenes than forces/unleashed for example, since there is so much dialogue in the game the quality suffer when you have a small staff, they have proven that they are capable of doing cool cutscenes mostly in chaos island cutscenes, but it is a lot of work.
Ironically I have the opposite problem with Sonic Frontiers’ cutscenes… specifically talking about the CGI cutscenes used as promotional material of the game (In Teaser Trailers and Advertisement). They seemed extremely OFF, miles away from the Marza ones, expressionless in comparison; while I personally see the In-game ones as surely a step up from Forces or Colors, thanks to all the Interesting camera angles and poses. I think that if this team was given more man power, time and even budget;this game could have been an even bigger leap into a new era of this franchise (at least I hope so)
The Cutscenes in Sonic Unleashed and 06 were my Favorite, not because of their Content but because of how Oddly satisfying they are to watch. The Motion Capture makes the Characters’ movement very Light and Fluid which I like for some reason. The Way Supreme Moves in that very Specific QTE Cutscene where Sonic Breaks free from its Grasp really reminded me of Unleashed. The Camera Angle was really Nice and the Realistic, somewhat jittery movements of Supreme were so good.
I think the main issue with the cutscenes is the background, it always feels so empty and void of anything, I think if they were more filled up, and the characters were more expressive, I think the problem would be fixed.
i never thought of this… i don’t mind it really. i noticed some cutscenes were stiff while others were really cool, but i never thought any were bad, so to speak. i thought the story-important cutscenes were really nice, although i will admit sometimes some expressions/animations do look a little bit silly/awkward. but that never impeded with my enjoyment of the scenes…
Its funny watching this video after sonic x shadow generations gameplay (shadow cutscene are 🔥🔥🔥🔥)
As much as it hurts me, i have to agree
There are a handfull of cutscenes that are very good imo (some are even the best in the series imo), but most of the time, theyre just standing somewhere being stiff
Tbh, i think its more of a "Sega Problem" (like most of the time) then a "Sonic Team Problem"
Just like you, i hope the Sequel will do it better
holy shit guys mark finally played an open world game and didnt skip all the cutscenes he finally got an attention span
I completely agree frontiers was one of the best sonic games but i cant overlook how bad the cutscenes are i have been saying that since my first playthrough they need to make high quality cutscenes in the next game this is unacceptable for a ps5 game this game has cutscenes look like they were made for ps3 and the first cutscenes u can see the pixels 😂
Please make a part 2 when shadow gens comes out
Weather it’s good or bad.
The sa2 cutscenes are primitively animated.
The sonic frontiers cutscenes aren't even animated.
Frontiers hard lacks cinematography, actual set pieces, an appealing art direction to look at when you’re watching these scenes, and mostly importantly, NEW CURRENT GEN MODELS PLEASE HOW LONG HAS IT BEEN? We’ve had literally the same model since Unleahsed except it somehow gets downgraded every time these models are so restrictive and bland
The models are capable of being super expressive, sure you can find them bland thats ok, but they are not at all restrictive
VERY True.
I agree about art direction, but saying it lacks cinematography is FLAT OUT WRONG. The cinematography and choreography in frontiers is the best yet in terms of in-game cutscenes.
@@Prime_Legend Definitely not.
@@Terminal_Apotos Ah yes, the frontiers hater. I see you and another guy called marc on almost every vid. Just hate on every aspect on the game for the sake of it.
Sure the quality is low you can even see the pixels in cutscenes but the story is much better than allot of previous Sonic games and dialogue is more enjoyable I actually care what is happening next in the story and what Sonic is going to do next unlike the generations where they just have no story and forces well I don’t have to talk about that game and we all know how terrible the story is in Sonic colors that’s why I enjoy the cutscenes because they actually have story but I can agree that their quality is so bad
12:20 You do realize that SEGA & Sonic Team also used motion capture for the in-game cutscenes in Unleashed, right. Showing that it can be done. While of course the more faster & cartoony-er animations were hand animated.
Based opinion mar- i mean splashdash. Very cool
Dude, I came across this channel completely organically through recommended, but I recognized LS Mark's voice immediately. I've watched too many hours of you complaining about Butch Hartman to not recognize it lmao.
i like how i can hear is irish accent slipping when talking
Anime uses squash and stretch too so I don't get why Sonic is still so stiff
EVEN SONIC 2006 has better cutscenes quen it comes to CHARACTERS MOVING AROUND
If I can say one thing, using Yakuza 0 as the example of other SEGA games is not applicable, as it is not made by Sonic Team
However, PSO2 is made by Sonic Team, so that example is more sound IMO
SEGA needs to reboot 3d Sonic's models and stuff, they're using the "same base" since unleashed. Honestly i would love to see how a Cel shaded mainline sonic game would look, i think it fits sonic's expressions and moves pretty well in gameplay (wich i think is even more problematic than cutscenes, Sonic is stiff as hell when transitioning trough his moveset) and obviously in cutscenes
get ready for the 100 commentaries from Sonic fans explaining why the funny blue hedgehog inspired by Mickey Mouse and Felix the Cat who runs fast, is actually a shonen protagonist and not a cartoon character.
he's kinda a mixture of both,
Even if this update was unpolished and such, it was really good frr, it's the actually good kind of unpolishment lol
I think the Yakuza series is actually a good comparison. Every story cutscene in that series is so over-the-top and cinematic, I wish Sonic games had that level of ridiculous bombasity
Yakuza is such a great series
It’s really just cuz sega doesn’t wanna give a budget or team to sonic games since unleashed after that got poor critical reception, I’ve HEARD that they will be getting a bigger budget and team next time but I’m not holding my breath. An insomniac Spider-Man level sonic game would go CRAZY!!!