Sonic Frontiers Review (zmanandtails)
A joy from beginning to end.
Sonic Frontiers is the latest entry in the Sonic The Hedgehog series. Rather than go the usual, rushed game every year or two, SEGA and Sonic Team decided to take a different route this time, for Sonic’s 30th anniversary celebration (give or take a year late), and worked on this game for 5 years.
A bit of love and care went into this game. So much so that they actually brought in a veteran writer from the IDW comics to write this game. Meaning if you’ve been disgusted by the overly toony and terrible jokes and humor we’ve seen from the games since Sonic Colors released on the Wii, then you’ll be pleased to know that isn’t the case here. The characters are very well written out too, so they’re not so one sided. As you progress the game, Sonic helps them overcome some of their flaws. There’s also numerous call backs to Sonic Adventure 1 & 2, and various other titles and adventures the speedy blue hedgehog has had over the years. The writing team really excelled in this title.
Gameplay is pretty good in my opinion. There’s a number of islands you can play on, though they’re unlocked as you progress the story. From grassy fields and lush forests to ash blanketed isles. Each island is home to simple challenges that, when completed, unlock a portion of the map, often times unveiling another challenge or two, to give you a new idea of where to go next to help find your way around. These challenges also award seeds which are invaluable for leveling up Sonic.
Also on each island is a number of mini-bosses that award Portal Gears when defeated. Portal Gears are used to access Cyberspace levels, which, depending on how many missions you complete, award Chaos Emerald Vault Keys, which are needed to collect the Chaos Emeralds to progress the story.
Also on each island are side stories, memory tokens, koco purple coins, and a purple portal which takes you to a cyberspace fishing spot. Fishing is ideal for learning lore, and/or leveling up Sonic. Four attributes can be leveled up to level 99, those being Speed, Rings, Defense, and Offense. Speed increases Sonic’s top boosting speed. Rings increases the amount of rings Sonic can hold onto at once (which function as health). Defense lessens the amount of rings dropped when a hit is taken. Offense increases how much damage Sonic does when he attacks.
The soundtrack is pretty great. But what can you expect? It’s a Sonic game. The music is always great.
This game blew most Sonic games we got in the last ten years out of the water. And I’m proud to have been able to experience it first hand. Never played an actual brand new Sonic game on day one before (that wasn’t a remake, collection, or remaster) but I’m glad it was this one. It was a really fun journey. I can’t wait to see where they go from here.