I'm the other half, the only game I actively hate in the series is Sonic Skating Simulato-I mean Sonic Heroes. It isn't a "bad" game, but it's incredibly boring which is much worse imo. (Imagine the whole game is just the first quarter of the game 4 times over, to unlock a seizure simulator at the end.) It was a cool concept with poor execution. I love the rest of them. (I did count the GOAT Sonic's Schoolhouse, thanks for asking)
This is something you need to be convinced of? Considering the wide array of different gameplay styles, it was *certain* that this was going to happen. Inevitable even. This franchise is like 30 years old. That means the Sonic games you played as a Kid are so far removed from the current games that kids are playing now. If you were born on the same day as Sonic The Hedgehog (1991), you could have gone to college and had kids. This game now spans 2 generations.
I remember playing it back in 09-11 and I always thought that for the high definition and amazing graphics that Sonic was real. The locales being based off real life didn't help. This game solidifies itself as the best game I've EVER played. Bar none.
SEGA clearly doesn't care, that's why the rumor of Frontiers being Sonic Team's last chance was and still is so strong and allegedly confirmed by SEGA employees, but Sonic Team genuinely cares, they try to compensate for the lack of budget, time, team, resources and experience they have compared at what they had with Unleashed, Unleashed had brilliant minds at their disposal, people who loved and understood Sonic from years, help from external technology and graphic teams to make the Hedgehog Engine the demon of an engine it is even today and so much much more Is such a shame we can't get this sort of things today and the main team needs to prove the company they can still keep going when most lay offs come from SEGA's questionable management, poor decision making and sometimes anti-consumer strategies Btw the strechy nature of Werehog is due the influence of Dark Gaia, Nightmares do the same but they barely use attacks that stretch their bodies reason why almost no one knows about it
Can I hear reasoning for why SEGA is the one who doesn't care, and it's not just Sonic Team being consistently incompetent? Other SEGA franchises are doing well.
@@magical_pixie_horse7346 Why don't other franchises have this problem then? I'm not sure I'm convinced it's all about deadlines. I mean, Frontiers was in development for 5 years, from what I've heard. Given the trash that came out of that half a decade of work, you can't tell me it was an unreasonable deadline issue.
Honestly. I think it could be true that SEGA doesn't care, but not in the way you think. They don't care to fire everyone in Sonic Team, perhaps because they are friends with many of the top people there and enough money keeps coming.
Sonic Unleashed was so well animated. Not just the cgi but the in game cutscenes and gameplay too. Like you said all is very expressive. Somehow the cutscene quality started to dip for later games, especially in Sonic Forces.
I’ve always said Id rather see an animated movie like the intro cut Scene to Unleashed than a live action movie. That cut scene is so beautiful, I remember getting goosebumps watching it as a kid
One of the things that really grips me about the older 3d Sonic games is how seriously they took themselves. Games like Colors, Generations, the Boom series, etc. do this weird ironic thing where the games almost make fun of how ridiculous they are. Meanwhile the older games like SA2 and Shadow do have absolutely bonkers plots. But because they're so earnest in telling those stories I can't help but appreciate them.
Being “serious” is not automatically a better thing, being silly and noddy isn’t bad, it doesn’t make the games any less “earnest” or “sincere.” Games don’t have to always take themselves super seriously, you do remember Sonic’s origins don’t you? It’s a series about a speedy, blue hedgehog than runs really fasts and stops an overweight evil scientist, from taking over the world and imprisoning animals in robots.
@@lenarmangum8630 Everything I said in that comment was my opinion. You are welcome to like the campy, nothing narratives of the 2010s games if that's what you like. My point however is that a series that is ashamed of what it is will never be as entertaining TO ME as a series that is bold and confident about what it is. After Sonic 06, SEGA lost confidence in Sonic and started pandering to nostalgia. I don't like that. I like when the games took themselves seriously, felt confident in telling their narratives, and didn't have to shoehorn in Green Hill Zone and metatextual jokes into every cutscene of Sonic and Eggman just talking to each other. Just personal preference, like what you want to like, I could not care less.
Even the 2D games did that 3 and Knuckles especially. When I first played it in origins I was surprised by how epic amd action packed the story was in a speedy acion platformer with no dialogue. God that final fight against eggman was so anime I love it.
@@strideytidey8665 "a series that is ashamed of what it is will never be as entertaining TO ME" That wording is so incredibly full of bias. You see self-aware and light-heartedness as something only caused by being ashamed of oneself, and I think that's really telling. Besides that, saying things like "shoehorning" in Green Hill and metatext is not how you express an opinion. That is an objective critique disguised as an opinion and it's frustrating that you can't tell the difference. If you wanted to be subjective like you claim to, you would describe things as they are rather than being loaded with implicit criticism. The sad part is that I actually agree with you, that the games that take themselves more seriously are generally more well-made story-wise. But you lost me with that overly defensive and spineless rebuttal.
Colors does not make fun of itself ,stop making up bullcrap ,just for you can push this dumb idea of this generation is better than this generation bullcrap
SEGA doesn't care about sonic, but i see sonic team genuinely does, and it can be seen trough games like frontiers or superstars, i can write the reasons i think my point stands, but i'm too lazy to do that lol Edit: Wow this really did the numbers lmao, i got a whole comment section of my own
@@thedredayshow9246 me too, like i atleast hope one day these guys separate from sega and begin an indie studio, because they are clearly talented, they just aren't let work in peace
@@squarethinkingdudeif they do tho then what will happen to sonic franchise? The team obviously wants sonic games to be made amazingly but they cant if they leave, also recently i heard that after frontiers succes sega is giving sonic team a bigger budget and resources as well as more people being hired, so their starting to care again
@@SonicTheBlueBlur15 While i still think sega doesnt care for sonic (see sonic superstars wich is missing levels because arzest didn't ave time to finish), i think there are 2 good outcomes, they begin an indie studio and make a sonic-like to compete against sega, or they actually get the resources and launch sonic to succes, but i still think we will have good not amazing products for a while
@@thedredayshow9246I don't. They can have all the good will and love in the world; doesn't change the fact they're painfully _mid_ developers. If anything it makes them look worse than if they just didn't care, cause this means this is really all the best they can do.
Unleashed is the GOAT of Sonic games. It just...man, does so much right. The gameplay, the presentation, the story, the MUSIC. It's so good, dude. SEGA seriously needs look back at Unleashed and replicate it for future games. Just imagine what a modern Unleashed style Sonic game could be.
@@WadeWalker22 I do play unleashed from time to time on my Xbox one . The last time I played was before my graduation day in high school and it was the final battle with dark Gaia.
The last big budget sonic game ever made that introducing the hedgehog engine also using until this day and the first 3d boost game and also the first game that makes IGN embarrassing themselves
Us Sonic fans who started with Unleashed really share the exact same perspective of this amazing franchise, i felt every single word of this video as if it were mine too. This video felt like a nostalgic trip back to my childhood with a friend who was always there, thank you.
This video is my thoughts exactly.. Just last night I was thinking how unfulfilling the franchise has been for the last 12ish years and how I always seem to fall back to peak.. (unleashed is my goat always and forever)
Sonic unleashed was the peak of sonic. The visuals are the best they have ever looked. The Cutscenes were insane even now. The story was great. The levels and gameplay were at their peak. It’s a shame we will never get anything like this again.
I have not yet seen this video as of writing this, but I would say that The main thing with Sonic is managing expectations. Frontiers was solid, nothing ground breaking, but solid. Sonic Unleashed is still the best Modern Sonic one to this day in my opinion.
@@PlayPodOGIf it's because of the werehog then let me tell you that Unleashed and SA1(or even 06)weren't the first to make Sonic slow, the classic games didn't feel that fast either, only when you got the "Speed Shoes" powerup, this is *ESPECIALLY* true when you get to levels like Marble Zone where it's platforming central
Thank you bro for showing Sonic Unleashed the love and praise it deserves, I just wish SEGA could watch this video and see what an impact this game had on me and a lot of other people, really hope it gets a remaster for latest gen consoles and pc.
Lol it was a last ditch effort to save the franchise but there was no concrete intent for it to be the “final game” ever in the game’s development, and no sonic game has been either
@michaelbullen3104 I swear like 3 months ago I heard smth about unleashed being the last sonic game if It failed that's why they went all out on this game
Sonic unleashed is still my fav for everything it stands for it's a shame Sega won't let sonic team have the resources to make another game like it ever again. We need an unleashed 2 I swear
I meant to comment on this a few days ago upon first watching. I just want to say I love your take on this game and I agree with most of what you said. To me I feel this is Sonic's biggest and most grand adventure in the sense that Sega put lots of love into it. The cutscenes, the graphics, the globe throtting, the symphonic score. It's all beautiful. This feels like what Mario Odyssey was. A grand adventure with beautiful music and a huge love for what makes this character amazing. The cast was small but it allowed the game to be more focused after several games of having large casts. The representation of world countries and their cultures which actually inspired me to travel as I do now (I live in Asia now, originally from America) and just the beautiful detail and attention to everything. The hub world's look nice, Sonic is faster than he's ever been, even more so than Frontiers, going so fast he blurs everything. I love this game, despite always having difficulties with it due to long night stages and difficulty. I hope one day Sega makes another game of this quality. Sonic games have felt so cheap, uninspired and generic the last decade or so. The last game I really liked was Generations and nothing has impressed since then (except Mania). I hope with the success of the movies and Frontiers that Sega becomes more confident in Sonic. Despite the mixed reviews of the games from the early 2000s, the games in that period are so memorable and enjoyable because Sega took risks and made fan favorite characters and made amazing music.
This video encapsulated exactly how I think this game is. Out of all the sonic games that I continue to come back to, it’s always this one. Because almost EVERYTHING about it screams: “We do care”. Remember, this was the game after 06, so obviously they had to pull all the stops to ensure to fans that they CAN make something amazing, and this game just absolutely SELLS it. An amazing game (while not perfect) that stands the test of time
YOU MY MAN ARE UNDERRATED AS F*CK. And yes, I also don't think Sega will ever be able to create a Sonic game again that was as good as Unleashed. The models, the gameplay, the graphics, the music, the good (and even at the end, the depressing and sad) story and most important: the cutscenes. It's quite sad to hear and I but I really do think Sonic and Sega were at their prime during Sonic Unleashed. Still looking foreward to an even more improved Unleashed 'ultimate' with PC port!
@@therealmrarchive Ambition, Passion and Polish. the 3 main points that the entire industry is missing these days. everybody is too scared to actually stick to their guns. and thus their mediocre products get a lot of hate for good reason. Which ends up scaring the companies even MORE and it turns them away from opting for safer routes and getting rid of the very elements their products NEED.
@@KnucklestheEcidna how are they any less scared to stick to their guns now than back then? They revized the whole movement system sonic had had for 15 years in Unleasehed, and people hated it. Now one of their main points of criticism from fans is that they rely too heavily on nostalgia, and you try to say that they are afraid to stick to their guns???? They are sticking too much to them bro. Pick one. You can't use both criticisms, they are literally opposites.
i was born in 2009, so one year after the release of this BEAUTIFUL game. I have an older brother who has a xbox 360 so i used to "play" this game, but, as I was too young, I couldn't understand much. I also have another brother, who has had a PS2, and when he didn't use it anymore, he gave me the console and one of the first things my parents got me was sonic unleshead, for the wii/ps2 version. At first, I was disappointed, because that "wasn't the game I remembered". But after I started to play that I EFFING LOVED THAT THING, but after finishing it and playing some more levels, I stopped playing it. After my brother translocated to Milan, I asked him if I could have the console and he said yes. This was two years ago, so I was 13. I remember enjoying ANYTHING about that game. I played two times the storyline and did all the secondary levels, I managed to maximise the stats of the Werehog and DAMN that was hard, but it didn't feel like it, because I was REALLY happy to play that game. About the medals, I didn't even know what they did, then the game blocked me to enter adabat levels so... I guess I understood what they were used for. I also cried for the final cutscene and the death of chip. Then, A year after that, my brother asked for the xbox back, so I gave it to him, and about the ps2, at the time, I didn't care much about my games so I lost that game and Rachet and Clank 3, another videogame i loved. But, to this day, I still think about sonic unleashed, as my childhood, and I couldn't ask for a better one
I was born in that time frame too and my brother had a Wii u and a ps3 and stuff and I got unleashed for that ps3 a few days ago but I remember on the new PS4 playing sonic unleashed on psn and loving it I literally restarted the game so I could play the day stages cuz i didn’t like the night stages but now I do
Sonic Unleashed wasn't the last time Sonic Team cared for Sonic Sonic Colors and Sonic Generations were going for a desperate new direction because it's what the series needed, Sonic Unleashed, as ambitious and big as it is, was still a negative reviewed game like most of the mid and late 2000 games were The direction change worked, Sonic Colors and Generations were both recieved better than most of the 2000s games released after Sonic Adventure 2, of course, right after we got Lost World and Forces, but that's already a different story I also think Frontiers was still experimenting with stuff, not because it isn't ambitious, but because they're trying to go further and show they care for the series, Frontiers WAS an important game for the series, it was trying to reach "new frontiers", and for the effort and passion Sonic Team tried putting on it, it rightfully got what it deserved, it surpassed Heroes, the best selling 3D Sonic game for almost 20 years, and it was super well recieved in general, even Kishimoto was getting feedback from the public, applying into the game, taking it in consideration, saying he'll try to apply them in the next games It's impossible to know what will the future games be like and the future of the series in general, I'm not a fortune-teller, but no matter if it's good or bad, Frontiers still is an important game, and I really hope Sonic gets a hopeful future thanks to what Frontiers wanted to stablish, Sonic deserves the world
Love how you explained each version of Sonic Unleashed. Watching the entire game gives me the right to call out the GOAT of all Sonic games; with Frontiers, I’ll give it the queen. SEGA should definitely make a remaster of Unleashed soon cause I want to experience the adventure
Okay can we just take a second to appreciate how awesome the editing is in this video? So many REALLY satisfying moments where the gameplay and music syncs up, it shows how long you spent tinkering with it to get it just right. Good stuff, really!
great video, nice writing. I usually don't comment but you really managed to make it interesting and entertaining. And thanks for covering the banger that is the Wii version
Man this might be long. I was a little baby when I was introduced to Sonic, Sonic 2 on Genesis. It’s one of the first games I can remember. Even did the thing where I made my little sister play as Tails and she would get mad lol. But I got N64 and didn’t see Sonic much for yrs til my cousin brought his SA2 to Thanksgiving. I don’t think we left the room, beating the story from front to back and dancing to the final boss theme feeling like a true badass. SA2 was always the one for me. But I didn’t really follow up w the games aside from Sonic being my favorite thing to draw on notebooks and chalkboards in high school, simply bc I love the design. I could probably do it w my eyes closed lol. But when I finally decided as an adult to go through the whole catalog of console Sonic games, I discovered that Unleashed might be my favorite of all time, nostalgia aside. My first playthrough was fun, but last yr I decided to sit down and play the game as intended in my spare time and on weekends, as if I were a kid again. Replaying stages (yes night ones too) for S ranks and talking to every NPC for side quests. Wow. It may feel cliche to say, but it made me feel like Sonic. Helping innocent ppl and experiencing all these cultures just out of the kindness of my heart and bc it seems like fun. And blasting through deserts and jungles at lightning speed while kicking some good old Eggman robot ass. There’s really not another experience like it. The quick decision making and memorization are combined w 2D sections that almost always give you a way to quickly get through them which is something the games that came right after couldn’t rly master, as well as ass-clenching S ranks especially in the back half of the game. Something I like about it is that unlike the Zelda games of the time, the temple is simply the goal and not the level. I like the idea that the thing you need is just right inside and the fun of Sonic is just the hoops (literally) you have to go through simply getting there. Along with the rest of the game being an adventure forming connections between diverse cultures, it really makes those old cliches true: that it’s all about the journey not the destination, and that the real goal is the friends you make along the way. It may have its flaws, but this game will always be the GOAT in my opinion. Thanks for reading.
I loved the night stages too. I had the PS2 version of the game so the game only went as far as the Egg Beetle boss fight, and I was far better during the night stages than day time stages
What I would give for a Sonic & Knuckles game that has the gameplay styles of this game. Imagine a combat system like this game's night stages tailored to Knuckles's character while giving Sonic more day time stages like this game's. I think that would be the honest-to-god logical sequel to this game, gameplay-wise anyway. The games already flirt with playing with different characters and having different gameplay styles since, like the Adventure games, but all we've gotten since this game is just 2D Sonic against 3D Sonic and whatever Frontiers is doing. I find it so strange that the first time Sonic Team designs a fully-fledged action brawler combat system they give it to a Werehog form of Sonic instead of the obvious recipient in Knuckles.
I’m playing through this game on and off and, no matter if I’m loving this game or raging at it, I’ll forever be grateful for this game’s theme song for indirectly introducing me to Bowling For Soup
As 3D platformer fan the werehog was my favorite part of Unleashed. Its because of it I got into Sonics core gameplay too. I probably would like day stages over night if the performance was half decent in the day stages (PS3 version). This game really needs an official or unofficial PC port. Emulating them still just has the same performance issues as the original hardware.
There's a mod for Sonic Generations on PC that replaces the normal stages with the day stages of Unleashed. Honestly it plays better than the original most of the time. Not having homing attack mapped to the boost button is a big improvement.
Ik it's a spin off, but Sonic All-stars racing transformed has some of the aspects of unleashed that makes unleashed good. Sick Opening, gameplay fixated on bold unique idea (ik Mario kart 8 had similar land/water segments, but transformed has it as its main selling point, actually adjusts the physics, and was conceived before MK 8 was released), and has a lot of skill expression while being simple enough for newcomers to pick up.
Sonic unleashed is a great game it was my second sonic game its my second favorite 06 was my first and favorite and its been like that for 10 years and nothing changed so im glad
Unleashed will always be my favourite. The game is as old as i am, so obivously i played it a bit later. I believe i started playing that in like 2019 and it was my first 3d sonic game. Yet, still the opening scene left my jaw open. Overall i had a very fun experience with this game and it has a special place in my heart. Although, eggmanland was one hell.
Sonic Unleashed is the best Sonic game ever made. The sheer detail, ambition, & passion poured into this game has not been topped. The risk/reward gameplay has not been topped. The standard for an opening cutscene has not been topped. Level aesthetics have not been topped. Eggmanland, a true final level that actually tests the skills you built up over a playthrough has not been topped. To me, Unleashed is the only Sonic game that truly feels like a AAA game.
Ambition and Passion were just as high, if not better in the Adventure games. What exactly is the reward for doing well in difficult levels? Not just getting good Ranks, WHAT does getting good Ranks do? In SA2 all A-ranks gave you an extra Emblem to get better Chao Market items, and in Heroes you unlocked multiplayer content. Level aesthetics again are just as if not better in the Adventure games and Heroes. Even Shadow the Hedgehog has you going through a computer system and outer space. Super Hard and Expert Mode in Heroes and Shadow are lengthy challenges in their own right. And that doesn't include things like the story, but especially the characters which most of the past games blow Unleashed out of the water with. Everything else is just graphics, graphics, graphics with your comment. You're dickriding the game so hard I feel like I'm reading a porno.
@@AkameGaKillfan777 If you disagree, you can just say so instead of being a complete ass hat about it. Ranks don’t have to do anything at all. People care about ranks because it marks your skill at the game. That’s common sense in any video game with a ranking system & that shouldn’t have to be explained. But with all crack you’re smoking I’m not surprised it escapes you. It must be something strong for you to think the adventure games, Heroes/Shadow, or any Sonic game is on par with Unleashed level aesthetics whether you consider graphics or not. And I never said Unleashed had the best story. It’s arguably between SA1 & SA2 and I personally give it to SA2. But Unleashed has something in regard to story over both those games, and that is Sonic’s characterization. The only game to top Unleashed portrayal of Sonic is Black Knight. And no other Sonic game has the quality of presentation Unleashed does. I could just as easily say you’re dick riding Heroes because it is definitely a product of its time whereas Shadow actually did have great aesthetics for the time. Yeah Heroes & Shadow had extra challenges but that’s irrelevant to my point which is that the final levels Sonic games haven’t hit the same since Eggmanland and the one’s prior don’t really reach that level either.
@@Cerberus589 Name one video where I only respond to comments of people praising the game. And I don't just mean dumb comments like this one trying to make an objective statement like it's true, I mean people who are just praising the game and nothing more.
@@AkameGaKillfan777Well, for one, SA1 gives you the Meral Sonic skin to use in trial mode after you get all emblems, secondly, SA2 gives you Green Hill Zone for all A ranks and finally, Shadow gives you expert mode for all A ranks, which is also a continuation of the ending because of the fact that each character you've met(excluding the unnamed G.U.N soldiers)talk to you during it
Unleashed saved the Sonic franchise cuz nobody liked Sonic 06 or Shadow the Hedgehog, intro was peak combat system was peak voice acting was peak, music was peak I can't really find anything bad to say about the game other than some of the Werehog stages it was overall a fun game it's personally the best Sonic game I've played so far and it was unappreciated at it's time
You can't imagine how happy it made me seeing someone finaly giving Unleashed the praise it deserves without any bias or using misinformation made by people blindly following the popular opinion like many journalists and reviewers tend to do. From every standpoint, you are absolutly 100% right! Unleashed is the only "true AAA" and Sonic game and the amount of blind hate it still gets it's utterly infuriating. From the excellent challenging gameplay, the story, the Warehog to how well made it was not to mention, how polished one fact is clear: Unleashed is a underappreciated masterpiece of a game, and while it got it's fair share of flaws they don't get in the way of the positives like many want you to believe. We seriously need more AAA like quality bangers like Unleashed as even Frontiers (And even the classics and Mania) couldn't come close to it's greatness and probably never will, especially considering what came after the meta era was either mediocre or downright terrible until Frontiers but i'll stay optimistic until then. In conclusion, you have my full respect and thank you for being one of the few people in the fanbase with some actual critical thinking instead of blindly following the popular opinion like many do.
@@ssg-eggunnerSo It's not really your thing? That's fine, more power to you. My main problem really is that people have this habit of dismissing the entire game just for the Warehog but it's expected when they are the same people that blindly follow popular opinions like sheep do.
@@Bombastic_daioh i mean unleashed was definitely the best sonic game ever released when compared to other sonic games heck I think it's way better than generations but the werehog and medals made it not reach quite there if it wasn't for those factors the "sonic was never good" phrase wouldn't have existed nowadays
@@Bombastic_daiohIt's exactly like that, people just follow the majority's opinion because it's the majority's opinion, they don't have their own opinion and already follow a pre-established bias, they don't have an open mind, which is why we see people reproducing the same opinion without depth. Of course, people still have opinions and can genuinely hate something, but there is still a bias
the " hate" isn't blind. level progression is annoying with the medals. it introduced boost sonic into 3d sonic which turned into a cancer for the series. adding 2d sections as a crutch for level design. and the absolute worst thing, the werehog. which is like 75% of the game.
Siiiiiick editing maaaan! This was like a movie. I love this game so much. Always been my favorite Sonic game. I actually just picked it up two days ago! The ps3 version, which I still have NEVER played before. I grew up on the wii version. But man…gotta try the HD! Great vid bro! Keep up the excellent work and editing skills!
In 2008, People came way too hard down on Sonic Unleashed. To this day, I prefer it over much of the boost games that came out since 2008. I mean, yea… I played the Wii version of Sonic Unleashed in 2009. I did not like that version. I ended up dropping the game. Later I remember playing the PS3 version of Unleashed for the first time in 2012. I loved the game. The music, the story, the levels… all fantastic.
While Unleashed wasn’t my first Sonic game, that being Adventure DX, Unleashed instantly became my favorite game in the franchise after my first playthrough. There just hasn’t been another Sonic game thats given me the same feel or thrill I still feel whenever I go back to it; especially if we’re talking about the day stages. Frontiers was a good attempt at course correction, but I feel SEGA needs to put more passion into their next title if we’re ever gonna get anything close to if not better than what they managed to cook up with Unleashed.
Finally, someone giving some respect to the werehog. I've always liked this dynamic of unleashed as a kid it adds variety and its a cool idea in my opinion sure the stages are long but I don't mind that I loved exploring the night stages at night as a kid and the night stages are still able to add a sense of scope and scale that day stages have. I've always like the werehog as an idea sure I'm baisis since this game means alot to me since I grew up playing it, and having fond memories of it but I don't care 😅
Another nitpick I would give to the night stages is the combat ost, it gets repetitive FAST, it would’ve been better if each zone had 1 or 2 unique combat ost that fits its culture, probably even have them been dynamic and increase in intensity has you defeat enemies
imo sonic unleashed was the peak of the sonic series for me after this game the sonic has never been the same ever again. i loved unleashed. it was Colors that made fall out of the series
No,unleashed was the one who started the fall out,it started the less characters things ,the tails being useless thing,and the more goofy mood being shown with some of chips moments and cubots moments
I'm saving this video for later, but I know this is going to be gooood. Also, Sonic Unleashed still has one of the best combat systems to this day. All it needed was another moment to shine, and updated for different characters.
You hit the nail on the head. What Sonic has been missing basically since the 90s is confidence. Back then, your game devs weren't expecting an enormous paycheck or trying to play you, but they also weren't trying to make something you'd like. They made something they'd like and they told you it was cool. After Sonic Heroes, they asked us what we wanted. They set up a poll. WE asked for that Shadow game and any unnecessary melodrama that followed it. Frontiers sorely lacks confidence and oomph. It's basically the least-objectionable parts of some middle schooler's doodle book. Since that's kind of the central appeal with Sonic, people have been raving about it, but I find it grossly unflattering and stale.
Before i watched this, i found myself frustrated at even seeing the title, because it feels like I've seen an increasingly prevalent trend where it feels like people who were disappointed by Superstars, or who think that Frontiers is being too heavily praised for being a game that isn't _completely_ exceptional, seem to talk about the series like it's still 2020, we have no known direction and the last game to release was Team Sonic Racing, which would never see any content updates. It feels like I've seen people talk about how 'Sega isn't doing good enough' or 'Sega doesn't care' even after we've gotten more releases in two years than we did in almost a decade _already,_ and after a mainline game that promised for the first time in 16 years promised multiple playable characters, albeit in a content update. Bottom line is that Sega absolutely cares, or at least Sonic Team does [it's debatable if Sega the conglomerate even cared about _Unleashed_ even] and i was frustrated because it feels like all this time after the final patch for Frontiers, people forgot, or even ignored that Sega _has_ started caring again. I think i understand a lot more, now, though. I myself could easily realise that the newer games feel different, sure, but i figured that was just a matter of times changing- after all, it'd been more than a decade since we'd had a proper game with the confidence of Unleashed. Maybe it was just confident in something else, something that's a little bit less familiar to what i had in my childhood. But, i think that's wrong, and for everything Sonic Frontiers does right, i think it's trying... too hard to be an apology for games like Boom and Forces. Even down to its best aspects, like its lore and plot and character development, it all felt so sudden that we were just now getting the lore equivalent of Sonic Adventure 3 and everyone in the game was undergoing some... radical character development from the moment they entered the screen after the intro. It's part of why i love the game so much, don't get me wrong- I love how aware it is and how aware the whole series has become of who we are and the history we have with the rest of the series, and i wouldn't have it any other way now that we have the game we have- but i think we'll probably look back on Frontiers _even more_ fondly further down the track. The series is growing up, and... growing up is always a little ugly, and you always have to go through some terrible mistakes to become the person you deserve to be. And the first steps out of that pit are awkward, and you spend so much of that time thinking about your mistakes, and just trying to do... _not_ that. And for all the good it does for the game, for a while Frontiers is just going to be not much more than... _not that._ We don't _know_ the path forward yet. We don't _know_ the end point yet, what it'll be like when the series can really be confident in itself yet. And i think Frontiers is going to be an even better game when we _do_ have that, when we can see what it was really growing into and trying to represent. People talk about 'dark era this', '2010s' that, 'adventure era' this, but i feel like at this point the series is best defined by two different eras, which i won't name myself but span from Sonic 1 to 2005, and from Unleashed to now- with 06 not belonging in either, and just as a singular point in between the two, a defining event, a cataclysmic reset of the maturity the series had reached. It's practically two different whole _franchises,_ at any rate. The series has had to reach maturity twice passing through phases of innocence and pure belief in its ability to rise above the challenges set for it- compare Sonic 1-2 to Unleashed and Colours in that regard- and a phase of pure downfall and hubris getting the better of it- compare the WHOLE CONSOLE GENERATION Classic Sonic missed and its inability to save the dreamcast [which i know, was Adventure's time but was the mistake of the previous generation largely] vs the 10 years of barely any releases, one of which being Sonic Boom which was so horribly confident in all the wrong things- and now we're here, in this spot best compared to Sonic Adventure, which itself was bound by its limited environment and limited knowledge, desperately trying to claw its way into maturity and out of its mistakes with what it had- and Sonic Frontiers, which is bound entirely by its past, trying so hard to just be _not that,_ taking the path of imitating those who _had_ succeeded before it in so doing- whether that be the analogical 'classics' in the boost games formula and style, or the story of the Adventure games which are already so beloved. ...Which is why, imagining that separation and the very similar uphill battle, i'm _very_ hopeful for the future. Sonic Adventure and Frontiers alike received a lot of praise for their innovation within their contexts, and that positive feedback was what led to them leaning so heavily into the character and charm they did in Adventure 2, which _oozed_ confidence from every pore. I don't mean to say what comes next will match Adventure 2, but i _am_ saying that if the analogy stands, Frontiers has done a lot for the confidence and morale of the developers... something i'm sure they're itching to test on their new frontier. 👀
Don’t forget it has leveling up system that levels up all of the were hogs and regular sonic aspects of combat. It shows up each time you finish a stage to upgrade songs c abilities and werehogs abilities 16:47
Talking about boldness, this holds true for SEGA as a whole. They never fully recovered from the death of the Dreamcast. SEGA used to be cutting edge in every conceivable way. They used to make Arcade cabinets completely committing to a games idea and pushed it to perfection. They made Shenmue and Phantasy Star Online, pushing console gaming into new stratospheres. Now, the games they publish could be made by any other company. Sonic used to be their last crown jewel, hence they put all the effort into new Sonic games. But lately they seem to have run out of steam, and started to chase trends rather than setting the pace - which is what happens once innovation and portfolio-variety is no longer a top priority.
That ending edit of Sonic Unleashed was perfect dude. Sonic Unleashed is my favourite sonic game and that edit gave me goose bumps haha. Awesome video :)
Frontiers was a step in the right direction for 3d sonic, hopefully sega dose something with it. ALSO unleashed was suposed to have a PC port but they thought it wpuldnt do well or somthn
That’s how you get more combos for the werehig you upgrade his aspects and how you make regular sonic faster and make it easier him to gain rings and have stronger ring gauge 17:52
I honestly hope they don’t. The remaster of colours was….not great. Still a great game Ofc since it’s still colours. All I want is for unleashed to just be available on pc, and PlayStation in 60fps
This video is so well edited and structured! I was surprised when I looked at your channel. Your subscriber count does not reflect the amount of effort you put into your videos at all. I’m looking forward to your future videos!
honestly i find it criminal how lambasted this game was upon its release. i get that it was coming off from 06 and released between the storybook games which put more focus into story than gameplay so i understand people were overall more critical of the next big release and having half the levels be longer combat stages is definitely a put off since people were also criticising the concept of sonics friends having different slower playstyles, ignoring that every platformer had its gimmick stages to help pace the game because doing the same thing over and over does get stale even if it is solid. at least for the traditional 8 hour + experience. but man it was judged so damn unfairly, the game looks gorgeous, was a great translation of the rush playstyle into 3D and was the first to meld 2D and 3D platforming into one game and the werehog while being an entirely different genre was massively fun. while i have my own personal gripes with the game like it beginning eggmans flanderisation, where despite literally splitting the earth in the opening cutscene man is treated as a joke and mr pickle starting the weird obcession with food gags colours and lost world had for some reason, overall even when i was a petty child annoyed at my gameplay style getting abandoned because one game was rushed, never hated the game itself. and honestly those few annoyances have mostly faded, chip is amazing comedy relief because sonic has always had its more campy moments of character banter, chip was more akin to a character like marine or charmy than the bad writing of the 2010's and the ring boost being used instead of trick gauge is a carpel tunnel reduction. like you could do tricks in generations and it has zero gameplay impact much like you could spindash in rush but at its best it was only comparable to the boost when going downhill. like this game really did feel like a transision for the series and it's just ashame the devs got cold feet about their own ideas, even in the high points of the later series it's hinging on referencing the old like its modern simpsons, generations and mania being great games on their own but combined invalidate eachothers existance and make eachother less impactful as anniversary celebrations because there was nothing after worth celebrating, and then fronteirs with its non stop referential dialogue. i innitially liked fronteirs story but as it sat the issues i had with ian flynns writing style just kept creeping back in. by the time new horizons came out i just felt nothing because that story was carried by the theatrics and the dlc just lacked it. like minor rant i legitimately tried getting into the comics both archie and idw multiple times but they have the most yappy self referential dialogue i've seen in a tie in comic, like a comic where silver fights enerjak? 95% dialogue panels a good number of which take up half. or the trope in early idw where a character has amnesia, an old villain gets introduced then powered up then everybody fights on angel island. i honestly have more confidence in prime and the movies than i do the actual main series and its comic tie in especially if they wanna pull a kingdom hearts and make literally everything canon while leaving many canon games with key plotpoints like the shadow bots unavailable to modern audiences.
I feel this game is far more appreciated by Gen Zs who played it as little kids. 90s kids did not receive this game as well at the time. The Sonic level designs required clairvoyance at times, the werehog stages were a slog, and collecting shit to reach the next stage was tedious. Generations perfected this formula, and then Forces took a dog shit on it.
I still love this game, and even though the graphics are so much worse, PS2 has to be the go to for me since you actually get to fight dark gaia, it isnt a QTE session, you get to fight the boss yourself and it makes it so much better than just clicking a button every so often.
Imagine making games, from decent to great like Lost World, Unleashed, etc. only for the media to say "blue hedgehog bad" and have a bunch of mindless drones echo that rhetoric every time you do. It's what I call the "GTA Clone Effect" like when someone makes a sandbox game with RPG and gunplay elements and everyone dooms its success by labelling it a "GTA clone", every time they try something, it gets compared to GTA and every time people make sure you don't forget how you're destined for 2nd best. I'd find it hard to care too. Though if you ask me, SEGA gave Sonic a backseat the second they lost the need to push new hardware. Every game on SEGA hardware, save for CD and & Knuckles sold over 6 million in total over their lifetimes, then Heroes the first multiplat game was half-assed, sold 3.4M, divided fans and birthed the beginning of the "blue hedgehog bad" mindset. (For anyone wondering, 2.5M Sonic Adventure sales were solely the Dreamcast version, it, and Adventure 2, sold over 8M in their lifetimes putting them above even Sonic 2, 3 and & Knuckles.)
SEGA of America played a big role in Sonic's status. Their "dude with the 'tude" and "gotta go fast" rhetorics are what everyone holds Sonic up to, so if he's even slightly slower, then even if the game is solid (like Sonic Lost World) it is automatically seen as bad. Not all of them are perfect, Sonic BOOM, 4 Episode 1 are good examples, but even the ones with little to no problems, like Lost World are lumped in as bad ones too. Also the fact that Sonic is held to a higher degree on writing than others both in SEGAs on repertoire and others; if the writing isn't a solid 10/10, then people call it "mid" "mediocre" and slap a 0/10 on it. This mindset is the only thing that keeps IGN afloat, just tick off the angriest fanbase you know and profit.
The thing about "the series losing its way" after this game... is at the time, people said that _about this game_ . _Unleashed_ was and arguably still is considered a joke - as in, "WTF is this??" Just shows it's all about what you personally grew up with.
my issue of werehog stages aren't that "it isn't real Sonic stages" of being fast and anything, but is the quality of the action gameplay on its own, Werehog stages I did feel that it is just a "oh hey, god of war and devil may cry were pretty succesful games....let's copy that" stages, it even had the QTE finishing move just like GoW, they tried to copy those games but they still felt like a downgrade, the only thing that's kinda ok is the platforming, but still there are other games which is way better than Werehog stage for that. Werehog stages are not unique compared to other games, and didn't manage to be as good as them, unlike booster sonic stages, in which there wasn't any other game like that, so it's a unique gameplay and a pretty good one(even to this day).
I kinda disagree with the statement that the franchise hasn’t lived up to the same precedent as Unleashed since then. When Unleashed came out people were very divisive / negative towards it. I’d argue Colors and Gens changed everything and had Sonic in a better light than Unleashed despite the change in writers and tone.
Yes! Justice for the nighttime stages! Although I enjoy going fast and speeding through enemies I also enjoyed just spacking the shit out of em and trying all the combos to see which one deals more damage and looks the coolest. Xbox 360 game will forever be the best version dont @ me lmao
Check out my Patreon!-www.patreon.com/JP2427
2 whole console generations later and machines still can't process the complexity of Eggman's sandwich
Gonna need an 8K machine for that one.
Still find it hard to believe how he destroyed that foot long sandwich in like 3 bites
The subway sponsorship we didn't know but needed in our Sonic game. Next to Pizza hut
Good thing emulation exist and it's getting better and better by the day.
agreed
They set the bar so high after Unleashed it's been almost impossible to replicate with teams changing so much, visions, and budgets.
Midleashed
@@thefastcommenter7774 themidcommented774
@@thefastcommenter7774 Peakleashed
@@thefastcommenter7774 you had to like your own comment just to justify how sad your opinion is about unleashed 🤡
@@gabelster3729 I didn’t like it though. Watch the like counter turn into 2 as I like it now.
I’m a keep it real. I’m just convinced that half of the sonic fans are just fans of certain eras rather than a fan of the franchise as a whole
I'm the other half, the only game I actively hate in the series is Sonic Skating Simulato-I mean Sonic Heroes. It isn't a "bad" game, but it's incredibly boring which is much worse imo.
(Imagine the whole game is just the first quarter of the game 4 times over, to unlock a seizure simulator at the end.) It was a cool concept with poor execution.
I love the rest of them. (I did count the GOAT Sonic's Schoolhouse, thanks for asking)
Yep
I like all of it
I'm in love with the franchise which is the story behind it don't even play the games like that i just need the story for it
This is something you need to be convinced of?
Considering the wide array of different gameplay styles, it was *certain* that this was going to happen. Inevitable even.
This franchise is like 30 years old. That means the Sonic games you played as a Kid are so far removed from the current games that kids are playing now.
If you were born on the same day as Sonic The Hedgehog (1991), you could have gone to college and had kids.
This game now spans 2 generations.
16 YEARS?!? godddd i feel old LMAO. Sonic unleashed will always be a fave to me
I remember playing it back in 09-11 and I always thought that for the high definition and amazing graphics that Sonic was real. The locales being based off real life didn't help. This game solidifies itself as the best game I've EVER played. Bar none.
Being born the same year this game came out just hits man 😌
I’m just a couple months older than this game🤣
@@logan4579For me 2 years old-
SEGA clearly doesn't care, that's why the rumor of Frontiers being Sonic Team's last chance was and still is so strong and allegedly confirmed by SEGA employees, but Sonic Team genuinely cares, they try to compensate for the lack of budget, time, team, resources and experience they have compared at what they had with Unleashed, Unleashed had brilliant minds at their disposal, people who loved and understood Sonic from years, help from external technology and graphic teams to make the Hedgehog Engine the demon of an engine it is even today and so much much more
Is such a shame we can't get this sort of things today and the main team needs to prove the company they can still keep going when most lay offs come from SEGA's questionable management, poor decision making and sometimes anti-consumer strategies
Btw the strechy nature of Werehog is due the influence of Dark Gaia, Nightmares do the same but they barely use attacks that stretch their bodies reason why almost no one knows about it
For some reason, I always figured the strecthy nature of Werehog Sonic's body came from his speed that went all in his arms lol
Can I hear reasoning for why SEGA is the one who doesn't care, and it's not just Sonic Team being consistently incompetent? Other SEGA franchises are doing well.
@@danielgrizzlus3950
Sega's unreasonable deadlines. Izuka had to fight for 1 more year of development for Frontiers. They do care.
@@magical_pixie_horse7346 Why don't other franchises have this problem then? I'm not sure I'm convinced it's all about deadlines.
I mean, Frontiers was in development for 5 years, from what I've heard. Given the trash that came out of that half a decade of work, you can't tell me it was an unreasonable deadline issue.
Honestly. I think it could be true that SEGA doesn't care, but not in the way you think. They don't care to fire everyone in Sonic Team, perhaps because they are friends with many of the top people there and enough money keeps coming.
Sonic Unleashed was so well animated. Not just the cgi but the in game cutscenes and gameplay too. Like you said all is very expressive. Somehow the cutscene quality started to dip for later games, especially in Sonic Forces.
this video is a love letter to Sonic Unleashed and I'm all for it
I’ve always said Id rather see an animated movie like the intro cut Scene to Unleashed than a live action movie. That cut scene is so beautiful, I remember getting goosebumps watching it as a kid
One of the things that really grips me about the older 3d Sonic games is how seriously they took themselves. Games like Colors, Generations, the Boom series, etc. do this weird ironic thing where the games almost make fun of how ridiculous they are. Meanwhile the older games like SA2 and Shadow do have absolutely bonkers plots. But because they're so earnest in telling those stories I can't help but appreciate them.
Being “serious” is not automatically a better thing, being silly and noddy isn’t bad, it doesn’t make the games any less “earnest” or “sincere.” Games don’t have to always take themselves super seriously, you do remember Sonic’s origins don’t you? It’s a series about a speedy, blue hedgehog than runs really fasts and stops an overweight evil scientist, from taking over the world and imprisoning animals in robots.
@@lenarmangum8630 Everything I said in that comment was my opinion. You are welcome to like the campy, nothing narratives of the 2010s games if that's what you like.
My point however is that a series that is ashamed of what it is will never be as entertaining TO ME as a series that is bold and confident about what it is. After Sonic 06, SEGA lost confidence in Sonic and started pandering to nostalgia. I don't like that. I like when the games took themselves seriously, felt confident in telling their narratives, and didn't have to shoehorn in Green Hill Zone and metatextual jokes into every cutscene of Sonic and Eggman just talking to each other.
Just personal preference, like what you want to like, I could not care less.
Even the 2D games did that 3 and Knuckles especially. When I first played it in origins I was surprised by how epic amd action packed the story was in a speedy acion platformer with no dialogue. God that final fight against eggman was so anime I love it.
@@strideytidey8665 "a series that is ashamed of what it is will never be as entertaining TO ME"
That wording is so incredibly full of bias.
You see self-aware and light-heartedness as something only caused by being ashamed of oneself, and I think that's really telling.
Besides that, saying things like "shoehorning" in Green Hill and metatext is not how you express an opinion. That is an objective critique disguised as an opinion and it's frustrating that you can't tell the difference.
If you wanted to be subjective like you claim to, you would describe things as they are rather than being loaded with implicit criticism.
The sad part is that I actually agree with you, that the games that take themselves more seriously are generally more well-made story-wise. But you lost me with that overly defensive and spineless rebuttal.
Colors does not make fun of itself ,stop making up bullcrap ,just for you can push this dumb idea of this generation is better than this generation bullcrap
SEGA doesn't care about sonic, but i see sonic team genuinely does, and it can be seen trough games like frontiers or superstars, i can write the reasons i think my point stands, but i'm too lazy to do that lol
Edit: Wow this really did the numbers lmao, i got a whole comment section of my own
S.T. always tried their best with the scraps Sega gave them regarding Sonic. That's why I admire Sonic Team so much.
@@thedredayshow9246 me too, like i atleast hope one day these guys separate from sega and begin an indie studio, because they are clearly talented, they just aren't let work in peace
@@squarethinkingdudeif they do tho then what will happen to sonic franchise? The team obviously wants sonic games to be made amazingly but they cant if they leave, also recently i heard that after frontiers succes sega is giving sonic team a bigger budget and resources as well as more people being hired, so their starting to care again
@@SonicTheBlueBlur15 While i still think sega doesnt care for sonic (see sonic superstars wich is missing levels because arzest didn't ave time to finish), i think there are 2 good outcomes, they begin an indie studio and make a sonic-like to compete against sega, or they actually get the resources and launch sonic to succes, but i still think we will have good not amazing products for a while
@@thedredayshow9246I don't. They can have all the good will and love in the world; doesn't change the fact they're painfully _mid_ developers. If anything it makes them look worse than if they just didn't care, cause this means this is really all the best they can do.
Unleashed is the GOAT of Sonic games. It just...man, does so much right. The gameplay, the presentation, the story, the MUSIC. It's so good, dude. SEGA seriously needs look back at Unleashed and replicate it for future games. Just imagine what a modern Unleashed style Sonic game could be.
Generations better
@@WadeWalker22 Okay, bud.
@@WadeWalker22I played generation but unleashed when you boost you feel faster. And generation the boost it feels like they tone down the speed a bit.
@@samuraix2328 gotta replay it then wished emulation for it was better on smaller pcs
@@WadeWalker22 I do play unleashed from time to time on my Xbox one . The last time I played was before my graduation day in high school and it was the final battle with dark Gaia.
Sonic unleahed was the last game with every ounce of soul and love put into it
Possibly the best opening cut scene to a sonic game that’s for sure
The last big budget sonic game ever made that introducing the hedgehog engine also using until this day and the first 3d boost game and also the first game that makes IGN embarrassing themselves
I always thought the play style of the night stages would fit Knuckles really well.
I honestly think it would be better suited for chaos 0 honestly.
Wade Whipple you mean
@@pikminarmy7538what
I think it would be cool so that the knuckles night stages are basically just night version of sky chase
Us Sonic fans who started with Unleashed really share the exact same perspective of this amazing franchise, i felt every single word of this video as if it were mine too. This video felt like a nostalgic trip back to my childhood with a friend who was always there, thank you.
This video is my thoughts exactly.. Just last night I was thinking how unfulfilling the franchise has been for the last 12ish years and how I always seem to fall back to peak.. (unleashed is my goat always and forever)
Sonic unleashed was the peak of sonic. The visuals are the best they have ever looked. The Cutscenes were insane even now. The story was great. The levels and gameplay were at their peak. It’s a shame we will never get anything like this again.
I have not yet seen this video as of writing this, but I would say that The main thing with Sonic is managing expectations. Frontiers was solid, nothing ground breaking, but solid. Sonic Unleashed is still the best Modern Sonic one to this day in my opinion.
I'd say it's the best sonic in general
@@ssg-eggunner fucking ew
@@PlayPodOG what's better than unleashed then?
@@ssg-eggunnerNOTHING MY BROTHER UNLEASHED ON TOP 👆💯💯💯🗣🗣🗣
@@PlayPodOGIf it's because of the werehog then let me tell you that Unleashed and SA1(or even 06)weren't the first to make Sonic slow, the classic games didn't feel that fast either, only when you got the "Speed Shoes" powerup, this is *ESPECIALLY* true when you get to levels like Marble Zone where it's platforming central
Thank you bro for showing Sonic Unleashed the love and praise it deserves, I just wish SEGA could watch this video and see what an impact this game had on me and a lot of other people, really hope it gets a remaster for latest gen consoles and pc.
This game was meant to be the last sonic game from what ive been told
Lol it was a last ditch effort to save the franchise but there was no concrete intent for it to be the “final game” ever in the game’s development, and no sonic game has been either
It was not meant to be the last sonic game
Sonic adventure 2 was supposed to be the last sonic game
@michaelbullen3104 I swear like 3 months ago I heard smth about unleashed being the last sonic game if It failed that's why they went all out on this game
Sonic unleashed is still my fav for everything it stands for it's a shame Sega won't let sonic team have the resources to make another game like it ever again. We need an unleashed 2 I swear
I meant to comment on this a few days ago upon first watching. I just want to say I love your take on this game and I agree with most of what you said. To me I feel this is Sonic's biggest and most grand adventure in the sense that Sega put lots of love into it. The cutscenes, the graphics, the globe throtting, the symphonic score. It's all beautiful. This feels like what Mario Odyssey was. A grand adventure with beautiful music and a huge love for what makes this character amazing. The cast was small but it allowed the game to be more focused after several games of having large casts. The representation of world countries and their cultures which actually inspired me to travel as I do now (I live in Asia now, originally from America) and just the beautiful detail and attention to everything. The hub world's look nice, Sonic is faster than he's ever been, even more so than Frontiers, going so fast he blurs everything. I love this game, despite always having difficulties with it due to long night stages and difficulty. I hope one day Sega makes another game of this quality. Sonic games have felt so cheap, uninspired and generic the last decade or so. The last game I really liked was Generations and nothing has impressed since then (except Mania). I hope with the success of the movies and Frontiers that Sega becomes more confident in Sonic. Despite the mixed reviews of the games from the early 2000s, the games in that period are so memorable and enjoyable because Sega took risks and made fan favorite characters and made amazing music.
Funny cuz odyssey devs were unleashed devs too
@@ssg-eggunner wdym by odyssey? For some reason, Mario odyssey comes to my mind lmao
@@Supersonic6427 yeah mario odyssey is what i mean
This video encapsulated exactly how I think this game is. Out of all the sonic games that I continue to come back to, it’s always this one. Because almost EVERYTHING about it screams: “We do care”. Remember, this was the game after 06, so obviously they had to pull all the stops to ensure to fans that they CAN make something amazing, and this game just absolutely SELLS it. An amazing game (while not perfect) that stands the test of time
YOU MY MAN ARE UNDERRATED AS F*CK. And yes, I also don't think Sega will ever be able to create a Sonic game again that was as good as Unleashed. The models, the gameplay, the graphics, the music, the good (and even at the end, the depressing and sad) story and most important: the cutscenes. It's quite sad to hear and I but I really do think Sonic and Sega were at their prime during Sonic Unleashed. Still looking foreward to an even more improved Unleashed 'ultimate' with PC port!
Sonic Unleashed will always be the best game for me.
I don't understand why the reviews are so mixed. I was blown away when I played it, but I was expecting it to be kinda bad.
something something ambition and passion
And polish
30 min summed up by this yea
@@therealmrarchive Ambition, Passion and Polish. the 3 main points that the entire industry is missing these days. everybody is too scared to actually stick to their guns. and thus their mediocre products get a lot of hate for good reason. Which ends up scaring the companies even MORE and it turns them away from opting for safer routes and getting rid of the very elements their products NEED.
@@KnucklestheEcidna how are they any less scared to stick to their guns now than back then? They revized the whole movement system sonic had had for 15 years in Unleasehed, and people hated it. Now one of their main points of criticism from fans is that they rely too heavily on nostalgia, and you try to say that they are afraid to stick to their guns???? They are sticking too much to them bro. Pick one. You can't use both criticisms, they are literally opposites.
YOU WANNA KNOW WHO ELSE HAD AMBITION??? stalin
i was born in 2009, so one year after the release of this BEAUTIFUL game. I have an older brother who has a xbox 360 so i used to "play" this game, but, as I was too young, I couldn't understand much. I also have another brother, who has had a PS2, and when he didn't use it anymore, he gave me the console and one of the first things my parents got me was sonic unleshead, for the wii/ps2 version. At first, I was disappointed, because that "wasn't the game I remembered". But after I started to play that I EFFING LOVED THAT THING, but after finishing it and playing some more levels, I stopped playing it. After my brother translocated to Milan, I asked him if I could have the console and he said yes. This was two years ago, so I was 13. I remember enjoying ANYTHING about that game. I played two times the storyline and did all the secondary levels, I managed to maximise the stats of the Werehog and DAMN that was hard, but it didn't feel like it, because I was REALLY happy to play that game. About the medals, I didn't even know what they did, then the game blocked me to enter adabat levels so... I guess I understood what they were used for. I also cried for the final cutscene and the death of chip. Then, A year after that, my brother asked for the xbox back, so I gave it to him, and about the ps2, at the time, I didn't care much about my games so I lost that game and Rachet and Clank 3, another videogame i loved. But, to this day, I still think about sonic unleashed, as my childhood, and I couldn't ask for a better one
I was born in that time frame too and my brother had a Wii u and a ps3 and stuff and I got unleashed for that ps3 a few days ago but I remember on the new PS4 playing sonic unleashed on psn and loving it I literally restarted the game so I could play the day stages cuz i didn’t like the night stages but now I do
Sonic Unleashed wasn't the last time Sonic Team cared for Sonic
Sonic Colors and Sonic Generations were going for a desperate new direction because it's what the series needed, Sonic Unleashed, as ambitious and big as it is, was still a negative reviewed game like most of the mid and late 2000 games were
The direction change worked, Sonic Colors and Generations were both recieved better than most of the 2000s games released after Sonic Adventure 2, of course, right after we got Lost World and Forces, but that's already a different story
I also think Frontiers was still experimenting with stuff, not because it isn't ambitious, but because they're trying to go further and show they care for the series, Frontiers WAS an important game for the series, it was trying to reach "new frontiers", and for the effort and passion Sonic Team tried putting on it, it rightfully got what it deserved, it surpassed Heroes, the best selling 3D Sonic game for almost 20 years, and it was super well recieved in general, even Kishimoto was getting feedback from the public, applying into the game, taking it in consideration, saying he'll try to apply them in the next games
It's impossible to know what will the future games be like and the future of the series in general, I'm not a fortune-teller, but no matter if it's good or bad, Frontiers still is an important game, and I really hope Sonic gets a hopeful future thanks to what Frontiers wanted to stablish, Sonic deserves the world
Yeah because people hated that gem and it was but I think gens was the last time they cared
Love how you explained each version of Sonic Unleashed. Watching the entire game gives me the right to call out the GOAT of all Sonic games; with Frontiers, I’ll give it the queen. SEGA should definitely make a remaster of Unleashed soon cause I want to experience the adventure
To this day Sonic unleashed will always be my favorite video game of all time
Okay can we just take a second to appreciate how awesome the editing is in this video? So many REALLY satisfying moments where the gameplay and music syncs up, it shows how long you spent tinkering with it to get it just right. Good stuff, really!
great video, nice writing. I usually don't comment but you really managed to make it interesting and entertaining. And thanks for covering the banger that is the Wii version
Man this might be long. I was a little baby when I was introduced to Sonic, Sonic 2 on Genesis. It’s one of the first games I can remember. Even did the thing where I made my little sister play as Tails and she would get mad lol. But I got N64 and didn’t see Sonic much for yrs til my cousin brought his SA2 to Thanksgiving. I don’t think we left the room, beating the story from front to back and dancing to the final boss theme feeling like a true badass. SA2 was always the one for me. But I didn’t really follow up w the games aside from Sonic being my favorite thing to draw on notebooks and chalkboards in high school, simply bc I love the design. I could probably do it w my eyes closed lol. But when I finally decided as an adult to go through the whole catalog of console Sonic games, I discovered that Unleashed might be my favorite of all time, nostalgia aside.
My first playthrough was fun, but last yr I decided to sit down and play the game as intended in my spare time and on weekends, as if I were a kid again. Replaying stages (yes night ones too) for S ranks and talking to every NPC for side quests. Wow. It may feel cliche to say, but it made me feel like Sonic. Helping innocent ppl and experiencing all these cultures just out of the kindness of my heart and bc it seems like fun. And blasting through deserts and jungles at lightning speed while kicking some good old Eggman robot ass. There’s really not another experience like it. The quick decision making and memorization are combined w 2D sections that almost always give you a way to quickly get through them which is something the games that came right after couldn’t rly master, as well as ass-clenching S ranks especially in the back half of the game.
Something I like about it is that unlike the Zelda games of the time, the temple is simply the goal and not the level. I like the idea that the thing you need is just right inside and the fun of Sonic is just the hoops (literally) you have to go through simply getting there. Along with the rest of the game being an adventure forming connections between diverse cultures, it really makes those old cliches true: that it’s all about the journey not the destination, and that the real goal is the friends you make along the way.
It may have its flaws, but this game will always be the GOAT in my opinion. Thanks for reading.
FINALLY someone who likes the night stages as much as I do :D
I loved the night stages too. I had the PS2 version of the game so the game only went as far as the Egg Beetle boss fight, and I was far better during the night stages than day time stages
Glad to see some respect finally being put on the *GOAT's* name after years of unnecessary hate
What I would give for a Sonic & Knuckles game that has the gameplay styles of this game. Imagine a combat system like this game's night stages tailored to Knuckles's character while giving Sonic more day time stages like this game's. I think that would be the honest-to-god logical sequel to this game, gameplay-wise anyway. The games already flirt with playing with different characters and having different gameplay styles since, like the Adventure games, but all we've gotten since this game is just 2D Sonic against 3D Sonic and whatever Frontiers is doing. I find it so strange that the first time Sonic Team designs a fully-fledged action brawler combat system they give it to a Werehog form of Sonic instead of the obvious recipient in Knuckles.
sonic unleashed and sonic colors are the GOAT. ill have to mention sonic generations too, it was a pretty fun game.
I’m playing through this game on and off and, no matter if I’m loving this game or raging at it, I’ll forever be grateful for this game’s theme song for indirectly introducing me to Bowling For Soup
As 3D platformer fan the werehog was my favorite part of Unleashed. Its because of it I got into Sonics core gameplay too. I probably would like day stages over night if the performance was half decent in the day stages (PS3 version). This game really needs an official or unofficial PC port. Emulating them still just has the same performance issues as the original hardware.
I’m pretty sure there is fan remakes but my ps3 runs day stages pretty well
There's a mod for Sonic Generations on PC that replaces the normal stages with the day stages of Unleashed. Honestly it plays better than the original most of the time. Not having homing attack mapped to the boost button is a big improvement.
Wow, this is like the first video in a while that I ever gave a like to.
You only have 957 subs? You deserve like 1 mill from how HQ your vids are.
Bro you deserve much more subscribers. Your content and editing is amazing.
my favourite game of all time ❤️
Ik it's a spin off, but Sonic All-stars racing transformed has some of the aspects of unleashed that makes unleashed good. Sick Opening, gameplay fixated on bold unique idea (ik Mario kart 8 had similar land/water segments, but transformed has it as its main selling point, actually adjusts the physics, and was conceived before MK 8 was released), and has a lot of skill expression while being simple enough for newcomers to pick up.
Also, one of the best sonic games visually (minus the character models)
Mario Kart 7?
@@paulgilbert5278 did mk7 have meaningful physics changes/flying sections? Or the track being entirely different on lap 2 and 3 vs the first one?
@@MysticMicrowave Yeah, 8 expanded a bit on the water physics and gliding sections but those were all introduced in 7.
Sonic unleashed is a great game it was my second sonic game its my second favorite 06 was my first and favorite and its been like that for 10 years and nothing changed so im glad
ong bro first its 06, then unleashed, adventure 2, frontiers, generations
06 caught my heart as a kid nd same with unleashed, they were my first introduction to the sonic franchise especially since im born in 04
06 being a favorite? what?
@@PlayPodOG oh my favorite sonic game
As a Sonic Unleashed fan and this being my favourite sonic game this YT video was well crafted and I rate this video a 10/10
Unleashed will always be my favourite. The game is as old as i am, so obivously i played it a bit later. I believe i started playing that in like 2019 and it was my first 3d sonic game. Yet, still the opening scene left my jaw open. Overall i had a very fun experience with this game and it has a special place in my heart. Although, eggmanland was one hell.
the werehog has so much aura bro
Sonic Unleashed is the best Sonic game ever made. The sheer detail, ambition, & passion poured into this game has not been topped. The risk/reward gameplay has not been topped. The standard for an opening cutscene has not been topped. Level aesthetics have not been topped. Eggmanland, a true final level that actually tests the skills you built up over a playthrough has not been topped. To me, Unleashed is the only Sonic game that truly feels like a AAA game.
Ambition and Passion were just as high, if not better in the Adventure games.
What exactly is the reward for doing well in difficult levels? Not just getting good Ranks, WHAT does getting good Ranks do? In SA2 all A-ranks gave you an extra Emblem to get better Chao Market items, and in Heroes you unlocked multiplayer content.
Level aesthetics again are just as if not better in the Adventure games and Heroes. Even Shadow the Hedgehog has you going through a computer system and outer space.
Super Hard and Expert Mode in Heroes and Shadow are lengthy challenges in their own right.
And that doesn't include things like the story, but especially the characters which most of the past games blow Unleashed out of the water with.
Everything else is just graphics, graphics, graphics with your comment. You're dickriding the game so hard I feel like I'm reading a porno.
@@AkameGaKillfan777 If you disagree, you can just say so instead of being a complete ass hat about it. Ranks don’t have to do anything at all. People care about ranks because it marks your skill at the game. That’s common sense in any video game with a ranking system & that shouldn’t have to be explained.
But with all crack you’re smoking I’m not surprised it escapes you. It must be something strong for you to think the adventure games, Heroes/Shadow, or any Sonic game is on par with Unleashed level aesthetics whether you consider graphics or not.
And I never said Unleashed had the best story. It’s arguably between SA1 & SA2 and I personally give it to SA2. But Unleashed has something in regard to story over both those games, and that is Sonic’s characterization. The only game to top Unleashed portrayal of Sonic is Black Knight. And no other Sonic game has the quality of presentation Unleashed does.
I could just as easily say you’re dick riding Heroes because it is definitely a product of its time whereas Shadow actually did have great aesthetics for the time.
Yeah Heroes & Shadow had extra challenges but that’s irrelevant to my point which is that the final levels Sonic games haven’t hit the same since Eggmanland and the one’s prior don’t really reach that level either.
@@TheAlphazoneYTIgnore him, I’ve seen that guy on multiple Sonic videos and he gets angry whenever he sees a comment of someone praising Unleashed.
@@Cerberus589 Name one video where I only respond to comments of people praising the game.
And I don't just mean dumb comments like this one trying to make an objective statement like it's true, I mean people who are just praising the game and nothing more.
@@AkameGaKillfan777Well, for one, SA1 gives you the Meral Sonic skin to use in trial mode after you get all emblems, secondly, SA2 gives you Green Hill Zone for all A ranks and finally, Shadow gives you expert mode for all A ranks, which is also a continuation of the ending because of the fact that each character you've met(excluding the unnamed G.U.N soldiers)talk to you during it
Sonic Frontiers: Allow me to introduce myself
Unleashed saved the Sonic franchise cuz nobody liked Sonic 06 or Shadow the Hedgehog, intro was peak combat system was peak voice acting was peak, music was peak I can't really find anything bad to say about the game other than some of the Werehog stages it was overall a fun game it's personally the best Sonic game I've played so far and it was unappreciated at it's time
You can't imagine how happy it made me seeing someone finaly giving Unleashed the praise it deserves without any bias or using misinformation made by people blindly following the popular opinion like many journalists and reviewers tend to do. From every standpoint, you are absolutly 100% right! Unleashed is the only "true AAA" and Sonic game and the amount of blind hate it still gets it's utterly infuriating. From the excellent challenging gameplay, the story, the Warehog to how well made it was not to mention, how polished one fact is clear: Unleashed is a underappreciated masterpiece of a game, and while it got it's fair share of flaws they don't get in the way of the positives like many want you to believe. We seriously need more AAA like quality bangers like Unleashed as even Frontiers (And even the classics and Mania) couldn't come close to it's greatness and probably never will, especially considering what came after the meta era was either mediocre or downright terrible until Frontiers but i'll stay optimistic until then.
In conclusion, you have my full respect and thank you for being one of the few people in the fanbase with some actual critical thinking instead of blindly following the popular opinion like many do.
Agreed but werehog was ehhhh
@@ssg-eggunnerSo It's not really your thing? That's fine, more power to you. My main problem really is that people have this habit of dismissing the entire game just for the Warehog but it's expected when they are the same people that blindly follow popular opinions like sheep do.
@@Bombastic_daioh i mean unleashed was definitely the best sonic game ever released when compared to other sonic games
heck I think it's way better than generations
but the werehog and medals made it not reach quite there
if it wasn't for those factors the "sonic was never good" phrase wouldn't have existed nowadays
@@Bombastic_daiohIt's exactly like that, people just follow the majority's opinion because it's the majority's opinion, they don't have their own opinion and already follow a pre-established bias, they don't have an open mind, which is why we see people reproducing the same opinion without depth. Of course, people still have opinions and can genuinely hate something, but there is still a bias
the " hate" isn't blind. level progression is annoying with the medals. it introduced boost sonic into 3d sonic which turned into a cancer for the series. adding 2d sections as a crutch for level design. and the absolute worst thing, the werehog. which is like 75% of the game.
Siiiiiick editing maaaan! This was like a movie. I love this game so much. Always been my favorite Sonic game.
I actually just picked it up two days ago! The ps3 version, which I still have NEVER played before.
I grew up on the wii version. But man…gotta try the HD!
Great vid bro! Keep up the excellent work and editing skills!
Man what a video. The way you put it all together gave me goosebumps at the end. You're good, you're really good damn it
well thank god its been confirmed that they are finally going to be making high budget sonic games again
In 2008, People came way too hard down on Sonic Unleashed.
To this day, I prefer it over much of the boost games that came out since 2008.
I mean, yea… I played the Wii version of Sonic Unleashed in 2009. I did not like that version. I ended up dropping the game.
Later I remember playing the PS3 version of Unleashed for the first time in 2012. I loved the game. The music, the story, the levels… all fantastic.
While Unleashed wasn’t my first Sonic game, that being Adventure DX, Unleashed instantly became my favorite game in the franchise after my first playthrough. There just hasn’t been another Sonic game thats given me the same feel or thrill I still feel whenever I go back to it; especially if we’re talking about the day stages. Frontiers was a good attempt at course correction, but I feel SEGA needs to put more passion into their next title if we’re ever gonna get anything close to if not better than what they managed to cook up with Unleashed.
Same
Finally, someone giving some respect to the werehog. I've always liked this dynamic of unleashed as a kid it adds variety and its a cool idea in my opinion sure the stages are long but I don't mind that I loved exploring the night stages at night as a kid and the night stages are still able to add a sense of scope and scale that day stages have. I've always like the werehog as an idea sure I'm baisis since this game means alot to me since I grew up playing it, and having fond memories of it but I don't care 😅
Another nitpick I would give to the night stages is the combat ost, it gets repetitive FAST, it would’ve been better if each zone had 1 or 2 unique combat ost that fits its culture, probably even have them been dynamic and increase in intensity has you defeat enemies
ya I always hated the combat music for werehog. I just want to listen to the regular exploration music in those stages.
imo sonic unleashed was the peak of the sonic series for me after this game the sonic has never been the same ever again. i loved unleashed. it was Colors that made fall out of the series
Colors was so empty. Just a bunch of repeated levels. 0 effort was put into the story.
Why? What about Generations? That was a love letter to Sonic.
@@user-vi4xy1jw7e don't mess with sonic fans, they never think before saying anything.
No,unleashed was the one who started the fall out,it started the less characters things ,the tails being useless thing,and the more goofy mood being shown with some of chips moments and cubots moments
I'm saving this video for later, but I know this is going to be gooood.
Also, Sonic Unleashed still has one of the best combat systems to this day. All it needed was another moment to shine, and updated for different characters.
That intro was FIRE 14:42
You hit the nail on the head. What Sonic has been missing basically since the 90s is confidence. Back then, your game devs weren't expecting an enormous paycheck or trying to play you, but they also weren't trying to make something you'd like. They made something they'd like and they told you it was cool.
After Sonic Heroes, they asked us what we wanted. They set up a poll. WE asked for that Shadow game and any unnecessary melodrama that followed it.
Frontiers sorely lacks confidence and oomph. It's basically the least-objectionable parts of some middle schooler's doodle book. Since that's kind of the central appeal with Sonic, people have been raving about it, but I find it grossly unflattering and stale.
its crazy how well the graphics hold up, i used to own this game on ps3 but i got rid of my ps3 before i was old enough to appreciate the game ):
Before i watched this, i found myself frustrated at even seeing the title, because it feels like I've seen an increasingly prevalent trend where it feels like people who were disappointed by Superstars, or who think that Frontiers is being too heavily praised for being a game that isn't _completely_ exceptional, seem to talk about the series like it's still 2020, we have no known direction and the last game to release was Team Sonic Racing, which would never see any content updates. It feels like I've seen people talk about how 'Sega isn't doing good enough' or 'Sega doesn't care' even after we've gotten more releases in two years than we did in almost a decade _already,_ and after a mainline game that promised for the first time in 16 years promised multiple playable characters, albeit in a content update.
Bottom line is that Sega absolutely cares, or at least Sonic Team does [it's debatable if Sega the conglomerate even cared about _Unleashed_ even] and i was frustrated because it feels like all this time after the final patch for Frontiers, people forgot, or even ignored that Sega _has_ started caring again.
I think i understand a lot more, now, though.
I myself could easily realise that the newer games feel different, sure, but i figured that was just a matter of times changing- after all, it'd been more than a decade since we'd had a proper game with the confidence of Unleashed. Maybe it was just confident in something else, something that's a little bit less familiar to what i had in my childhood. But, i think that's wrong, and for everything Sonic Frontiers does right, i think it's trying... too hard to be an apology for games like Boom and Forces. Even down to its best aspects, like its lore and plot and character development, it all felt so sudden that we were just now getting the lore equivalent of Sonic Adventure 3 and everyone in the game was undergoing some... radical character development from the moment they entered the screen after the intro.
It's part of why i love the game so much, don't get me wrong- I love how aware it is and how aware the whole series has become of who we are and the history we have with the rest of the series, and i wouldn't have it any other way now that we have the game we have- but i think we'll probably look back on Frontiers _even more_ fondly further down the track. The series is growing up, and... growing up is always a little ugly, and you always have to go through some terrible mistakes to become the person you deserve to be. And the first steps out of that pit are awkward, and you spend so much of that time thinking about your mistakes, and just trying to do... _not_ that. And for all the good it does for the game, for a while Frontiers is just going to be not much more than... _not that._ We don't _know_ the path forward yet. We don't _know_ the end point yet, what it'll be like when the series can really be confident in itself yet. And i think Frontiers is going to be an even better game when we _do_ have that, when we can see what it was really growing into and trying to represent.
People talk about 'dark era this', '2010s' that, 'adventure era' this, but i feel like at this point the series is best defined by two different eras, which i won't name myself but span from Sonic 1 to 2005, and from Unleashed to now- with 06 not belonging in either, and just as a singular point in between the two, a defining event, a cataclysmic reset of the maturity the series had reached. It's practically two different whole _franchises,_ at any rate.
The series has had to reach maturity twice passing through phases of innocence and pure belief in its ability to rise above the challenges set for it- compare Sonic 1-2 to Unleashed and Colours in that regard- and a phase of pure downfall and hubris getting the better of it- compare the WHOLE CONSOLE GENERATION Classic Sonic missed and its inability to save the dreamcast [which i know, was Adventure's time but was the mistake of the previous generation largely] vs the 10 years of barely any releases, one of which being Sonic Boom which was so horribly confident in all the wrong things- and now we're here, in this spot best compared to Sonic Adventure, which itself was bound by its limited environment and limited knowledge, desperately trying to claw its way into maturity and out of its mistakes with what it had- and Sonic Frontiers, which is bound entirely by its past, trying so hard to just be _not that,_ taking the path of imitating those who _had_ succeeded before it in so doing- whether that be the analogical 'classics' in the boost games formula and style, or the story of the Adventure games which are already so beloved.
...Which is why, imagining that separation and the very similar uphill battle, i'm _very_ hopeful for the future. Sonic Adventure and Frontiers alike received a lot of praise for their innovation within their contexts, and that positive feedback was what led to them leaning so heavily into the character and charm they did in Adventure 2, which _oozed_ confidence from every pore. I don't mean to say what comes next will match Adventure 2, but i _am_ saying that if the analogy stands, Frontiers has done a lot for the confidence and morale of the developers... something i'm sure they're itching to test on their new frontier. 👀
The best sonic game in every category in my opinion
Shadow Generations might break the mold, SEGA seems to be very confident in it. I think they’ve cooked
Don’t forget it has leveling up system that levels up all of the were hogs and regular sonic aspects of combat. It shows up each time you finish a stage to upgrade songs c abilities and werehogs abilities 16:47
I was 8yrs old when I first played sonic now I'm 34 unleashed is a very decent sonic game too bad I never was able to beat it
Sonic unleashed is the best sonic game. No game will ever top it
Talking about boldness, this holds true for SEGA as a whole. They never fully recovered from the death of the Dreamcast. SEGA used to be cutting edge in every conceivable way. They used to make Arcade cabinets completely committing to a games idea and pushed it to perfection. They made Shenmue and Phantasy Star Online, pushing console gaming into new stratospheres. Now, the games they publish could be made by any other company. Sonic used to be their last crown jewel, hence they put all the effort into new Sonic games. But lately they seem to have run out of steam, and started to chase trends rather than setting the pace - which is what happens once innovation and portfolio-variety is no longer a top priority.
That ending edit of Sonic Unleashed was perfect dude. Sonic Unleashed is my favourite sonic game and that edit gave me goose bumps haha. Awesome video :)
You forgot the best part being the absolute orchestra of the music
Frontiers was a step in the right direction for 3d sonic, hopefully sega dose something with it.
ALSO unleashed was suposed to have a PC port but they thought it wpuldnt do well or somthn
I simply LOVE Sonics characterization in Unleashed as well. Wish freaking Prime took notes.
That’s how you get more combos for the werehig you upgrade his aspects and how you make regular sonic faster and make it easier him to gain rings and have stronger ring gauge 17:52
If they ever remastered unleashed, i would pre-order that so fast
I honestly hope they don’t. The remaster of colours was….not great. Still a great game Ofc since it’s still colours. All I want is for unleashed to just be available on pc, and PlayStation in 60fps
@@Natsuki_Kat we can all dream
This video is so well edited and structured! I was surprised when I looked at your channel. Your subscriber count does not reflect the amount of effort you put into your videos at all. I’m looking forward to your future videos!
The thing about unleashed is it actually had unique ideas. And it wasn’t inspired by anything that came before it.
honestly i find it criminal how lambasted this game was upon its release.
i get that it was coming off from 06 and released between the storybook games which put more focus into story than gameplay so i understand people were overall more critical of the next big release and having half the levels be longer combat stages is definitely a put off since people were also criticising the concept of sonics friends having different slower playstyles, ignoring that every platformer had its gimmick stages to help pace the game because doing the same thing over and over does get stale even if it is solid. at least for the traditional 8 hour + experience.
but man it was judged so damn unfairly, the game looks gorgeous, was a great translation of the rush playstyle into 3D and was the first to meld 2D and 3D platforming into one game and the werehog while being an entirely different genre was massively fun.
while i have my own personal gripes with the game like it beginning eggmans flanderisation, where despite literally splitting the earth in the opening cutscene man is treated as a joke and mr pickle starting the weird obcession with food gags colours and lost world had for some reason, overall even when i was a petty child annoyed at my gameplay style getting abandoned because one game was rushed, never hated the game itself.
and honestly those few annoyances have mostly faded, chip is amazing comedy relief because sonic has always had its more campy moments of character banter, chip was more akin to a character like marine or charmy than the bad writing of the 2010's and the ring boost being used instead of trick gauge is a carpel tunnel reduction. like you could do tricks in generations and it has zero gameplay impact much like you could spindash in rush but at its best it was only comparable to the boost when going downhill.
like this game really did feel like a transision for the series and it's just ashame the devs got cold feet about their own ideas, even in the high points of the later series it's hinging on referencing the old like its modern simpsons, generations and mania being great games on their own but combined invalidate eachothers existance and make eachother less impactful as anniversary celebrations because there was nothing after worth celebrating, and then fronteirs with its non stop referential dialogue. i innitially liked fronteirs story but as it sat the issues i had with ian flynns writing style just kept creeping back in. by the time new horizons came out i just felt nothing because that story was carried by the theatrics and the dlc just lacked it.
like minor rant i legitimately tried getting into the comics both archie and idw multiple times but they have the most yappy self referential dialogue i've seen in a tie in comic, like a comic where silver fights enerjak? 95% dialogue panels a good number of which take up half. or the trope in early idw where a character has amnesia, an old villain gets introduced then powered up then everybody fights on angel island. i honestly have more confidence in prime and the movies than i do the actual main series and its comic tie in especially if they wanna pull a kingdom hearts and make literally everything canon while leaving many canon games with key plotpoints like the shadow bots unavailable to modern audiences.
I feel this game is far more appreciated by Gen Zs who played it as little kids. 90s kids did not receive this game as well at the time. The Sonic level designs required clairvoyance at times, the werehog stages were a slog, and collecting shit to reach the next stage was tedious. Generations perfected this formula, and then Forces took a dog shit on it.
Generations made the levels too short.
I still love this game, and even though the graphics are so much worse, PS2 has to be the go to for me since you actually get to fight dark gaia, it isnt a QTE session, you get to fight the boss yourself and it makes it so much better than just clicking a button every so often.
Man, I really loved the daytime stages in Unleashed..
The ending was absolutely beautiful and so many chills
Imagine making games, from decent to great like Lost World, Unleashed, etc. only for the media to say "blue hedgehog bad" and have a bunch of mindless drones echo that rhetoric every time you do.
It's what I call the "GTA Clone Effect" like when someone makes a sandbox game with RPG and gunplay elements and everyone dooms its success by labelling it a "GTA clone", every time they try something, it gets compared to GTA and every time people make sure you don't forget how you're destined for 2nd best.
I'd find it hard to care too.
Though if you ask me, SEGA gave Sonic a backseat the second they lost the need to push new hardware.
Every game on SEGA hardware, save for CD and & Knuckles sold over 6 million in total over their lifetimes, then Heroes the first multiplat game was half-assed, sold 3.4M, divided fans and birthed the beginning of the "blue hedgehog bad" mindset.
(For anyone wondering, 2.5M Sonic Adventure sales were solely the Dreamcast version, it, and Adventure 2, sold over 8M in their lifetimes putting them above even Sonic 2, 3 and & Knuckles.)
SEGA of America played a big role in Sonic's status. Their "dude with the 'tude" and "gotta go fast" rhetorics are what everyone holds Sonic up to, so if he's even slightly slower, then even if the game is solid (like Sonic Lost World) it is automatically seen as bad.
Not all of them are perfect, Sonic BOOM, 4 Episode 1 are good examples, but even the ones with little to no problems, like Lost World are lumped in as bad ones too.
Also the fact that Sonic is held to a higher degree on writing than others both in SEGAs on repertoire and others; if the writing isn't a solid 10/10, then people call it "mid" "mediocre" and slap a 0/10 on it.
This mindset is the only thing that keeps IGN afloat, just tick off the angriest fanbase you know and profit.
The thing about "the series losing its way" after this game... is at the time, people said that _about this game_ . _Unleashed_ was and arguably still is considered a joke - as in, "WTF is this??"
Just shows it's all about what you personally grew up with.
my issue of werehog stages aren't that "it isn't real Sonic stages" of being fast and anything, but is the quality of the action gameplay on its own, Werehog stages I did feel that it is just a "oh hey, god of war and devil may cry were pretty succesful games....let's copy that" stages, it even had the QTE finishing move just like GoW, they tried to copy those games but they still felt like a downgrade, the only thing that's kinda ok is the platforming, but still there are other games which is way better than Werehog stage for that.
Werehog stages are not unique compared to other games, and didn't manage to be as good as them,
unlike booster sonic stages, in which there wasn't any other game like that, so it's a unique gameplay and a pretty good one(even to this day).
If you don't invest danm near all into strength....Have fun in Eggmanland.
Superb video 👏long live the original Hedgehog engine and Unleashed. A remake one day would be a dream come true
watching this felt like a movie, paramount should hire you for Sonic 4's story
I rarely comment but I agree in every aspect with you, I consider your vid a masterpiece, you should have significantly more subs damn
Still some of the best cinematics in gaming history😭
Y’all, Unleashed is about to turn 20 soon…
also, one day, the official sonic unleashed ice cream will become a reality
Sonic games need to have that Sonic unleashed presentation of in their ingame cutscens
I kinda disagree with the statement that the franchise hasn’t lived up to the same precedent as Unleashed since then. When Unleashed came out people were very divisive / negative towards it. I’d argue Colors and Gens changed everything and had Sonic in a better light than Unleashed despite the change in writers and tone.
Yes! Justice for the nighttime stages! Although I enjoy going fast and speeding through enemies I also enjoyed just spacking the shit out of em and trying all the combos to see which one deals more damage and looks the coolest. Xbox 360 game will forever be the best version dont @ me lmao
Bro casually dropped the hardest Endless Possibility edit in the end and thought we wouldn't notice