Sonic Frontiers – Breath of Desire
Will we be able to cross the border with a good 3D Sonic?
Holy Sonic! Spins with the speed of the wind: suddenly disappears, suddenly reappears! One shot is 2D, one shot is a remake, and one shot is 3D. In short, it’s a strong license, but you have to be honest, for a few years we’ve seen more mediocre games or disappointments than anything else. Will the blue hedgehog end the year in style with the release of the all-new Sonic Frontiers?
It’s good to have balls!
The story of Sonic Frontiers introduces us to Starfall Islands. Sonic, Amy, and Tails investigate why the Chaos Emeralds are drawn to these five seemingly deserted islands. Of course, things go awry when Amy and Tails get absorbed into some kind of parallel dimension called Cyberspace. Suddenly, our friend Sonic, who managed to save his small muscular hips, finds himself alone on these islands. We will discover the Sonic game in an open world that combines exploration, combat and quests. Moreover, with a map full of points of interest, as in Ubisoft, we will do this quickly, and we will first have to think about revealing areas of the map, as in Ubisoft. We’ll even climb big towers… just like in Ubisoft. We will regularly pass levels in Cyberspace, which is more like what we know in different 2D or 3D Sonics: we go from point A to point B as fast as possible. Finally, of course, because I forgot to say, Robotnik is here to crack nuts and rule the world!
No, it’s not Sonic’s Creed or Sonic Cry
On paper, Sonic Frontiers makes you want to. A mix of speed, open world and vintage levels, and quite interesting hack and slash style combat, not to mention puzzles to keep our brains busy a bit. The problem is, one wonders if the developers have eyes bigger than their stomachs. Sonic Frontiers is the kind of big capacity where a lot of ideas are thrown in between nods to known licenses (such as Tetris in the puzzle), the famous open world, to look modern with tons of points of interest or quests. A story worthy of a Gulli cartoon. All this with a broken 3D engine: Were you shocked by the release of the trailer for Cyberpunk 2077 or Halo Infinite with Craig’s appearance? Well, wait until you play Sonic Frontiers!
No need to take a taxi
I was not happy with the art direction in Starfall Islands anyway. It’s boring, Sonic is completely denatured… Yeah, ok, explained, it’s not his size… Bullshit to me is a one-size-fits-all screenplay pirouette. Basically, Sonic needs a realistic style except for his face from the morning cartoon in TFOU. But in addition, it is technically very weak with bonus bugs and other inconveniences. Sometimes it looks like an Xbox 360 game… Which offers an open world that would have been great ten years ago. In short, yes, Sonic is fast, we can go anywhere, and I’m sure fans must love the madness. But for me, we don’t care about a kangaroo or a turtle as a main character, and the Lambda Frontiers character wouldn’t be talked about that much. Especially when you see the finish: decor elements often appear in front of us. Not just the scenery in the distance, not the trees, not the… Platforms or rails you have to use to move forward. In the third island, it’s sometimes a big joke, because between the speed of Sonic and the slow appearance of the rails you have to grind, you can’t expect anything. Don’t worry, there are also cuts in the shadows or the appearance of the rings in the background, don’t worry!
Horizon Sonic Dawn?
As far as concerns go, we can also talk about the empty side of this open world: there isn’t much living except a poor seagull here and there and a few characters to rescue. There are weeds that move to brighten our days. Who says 3D platform game, the camera says what’s the problem? Since Sonic goes fast, that’s a double yes. He often makes us drunk. Fortunately, we have less difficulty when playing Cyberspace levels. Plus, Cyberspace’s sets are much nicer than the main map. Why did they destroy the open world? Trying to copy friends is definitely not a good idea. In cyberspace, we find ourselves in more scripted levels, and there, yes, the fun of the game returns.
Who approved these decorations?
Also, it’s stupid because Sonic Frontiers’ gameplay isn’t rough. We enjoy powering up our hedgehog, battles against large enemies are quite well done, giving an epic side to the whole. Well, then there are the cheap effects that remind you that the game is dragging its engine: you only need to see the explosions to tell yourself that Crackdown 3 wasn’t so bad back then, but it was also fun… Sonic Frontiers can be sometimes. On the other hand, once we get to the cutscenes… There’s nothing connected anyway. We’re directing Sonic in a realistic world, but in terms of cinematography, we’re giving the impression of going back to a more classic cartoon on an art direction level. In addition, dialogues are absorbed and dubbed in French boxes. Frankly, a movie with a neighbor, Sonic Malik Bentalha, this is Molière. The award is given to a Sonic voice actor who must win a contest to have his voice in the game. Talking about the soundtrack, the sound effects generally stand out and the music is very nice and quite pleasant to listen to. for, but most of the time I found it outside of what was happening on screen. Let’s end on a positive note, at least for those who enjoyed the Sonic Frontiers experience: a lifetime. You can easily spend twenty hours in Starfall Islands.
I’ll use my erasers
I hesitated for a long time on the final rating of Sonic Frontiers. To be honest, I wanted to give it a forty-one note to sanction the “sloppy” side of the title. But Sonic Frontiers redeems itself with its gameplay which can be quite thrilling and have its fair share of fun at times. In the end, I think it deserves an average price, but we’ll have to overlook its (many) many flaws. With a little cocktail on Paradise Island, I think it could play! In short, Sonic Frontiers gets lost in its ambitions by wanting to do too much.
