Sonic Frontiers is Open-World, Led by Sonic Forces Director - News
by William D'Angelo , posted on 10 December 2021 / 3,824 Views
Sega during The Game Awards 2021 announced Sonic Frontiers will launch for the PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and PC via Steam in holiday 2022.
Some new details on the upcoming Sonic game have dropped via GameInformer. It is an open-world title that Sega describes as an open-zone. It is developed by Sonic Team Japan and led by Sonic Forces director Morio Kishimoto.
Sonic the Hedgehog in the game goes on an adventure at the Starfall Islands. It has forests, deserts, waterfalls, and other biomes.
The head writer of IDW's Sonic the Hedgehog comic and former lead writer of the Archie Comics Sonic series Ian Flynn will be writing the story.
A life-long and avid gamer, William D'Angelo was first introduced to VGChartz in 2007. After years of supporting the site, he was brought on in 2010 as a junior analyst, working his way up to lead analyst in 2012. He has expanded his involvement in the gaming community by producing content on his own YouTube channel and Twitch channel dedicated to gaming Let's Plays and tutorials. You can contact the author at wdangelo@vgchartz.com or on Twitter @TrunksWD.
More Articles
I'll hope for greatness, and await the highly likely disappointment.
They haven't even figured out how to do a Sonic game right when it's linear and half 2D. Not very confident in their ability to make an open world game.
But this is the thing. Sonics issue in 3d was heavily related to the constraints of fast 3D movement in tight 3D levels.
Openning it up into vast 3D levels/world allows more room for speed to be managed and play into level design. This is something that needed to happen a while ago. Not necessarily open world but huge sandbox levels.
Isn't that the opposite? Generally speaking, the 3D Sonic games people usually like are the Sonic Adventure games, Generations and Colours, and those are really linear, even if they are 3D. The more open a level is, the slower you have to go to explore it all correctly, which is the opposite of the series' "gotta go fast" principle.
Adventure 1 was pretty open with its level design. There were many different path ways you could take and the Spin Dash in that game could break the levels in half and still go pretty fast.
I guess Unleashed, Colors, and Generations aren't a thing.
Looks like Sonic Halo
Or Xenoblade Sonic.
Well there goes my hope...
Sonic Cycle be damned.
Why am I getting Sonic '06 vibes from this?
They should outsource these games, since Sonic Team is incompetent. Sonic Team's games are consistently mediocre or bad. It's just baffling.
Good news, but Ill wait, as there hasn't been a good sonic since Sonic adventure 2 in 2001, that is 20 years ago.
I actually like Sonic Heroes, Secret Rings, and especiallly generations.
I tried to like it, but it feels and sounds (dialogue) targeted to children.
Unlike sonic adventure which even tough I was a teenager back in 98, it still felt cool.
Mostly I didn't like the mix of 3d with 2d, just felt off like the game was badly designed or something.
Maybe because in 98 those graphics were unbelievable, it was pushing a lot, nowadays sonic graphics are nothing to even mention.
Or maybe it was the amazing soundtrack it had.
But its good that someone likes it, we all have different tastes.
Sonic in general is targeted to children. The only time where they tried to cater to adults and older audiences was Shadow the Hedgehog... and that game absolutely sucked. I actually think it's worse than '06.
To every one who is gasping or going "Oh great..."
He was also the director of Sonic Colors, which last I checked, was one of the most critically acclaimed Sonic games in history. He also did Black Knight, which has its fans, myself included.
And just because one game shares directors with another one, doesn't mean THAT particular game will be just like the other one. Skyward Sword and Breath of the Wild have the exact same director (along with the majority of the team) yet those two games are polar opposites in terms of structure, approach, design, direction, and... pretty much everything else. The only thing those two games have in common is that they're both 3D Zelda games. Yet those are two of the most acclaimed and beloved Zelda games of all time even if Skyward Sword has its detractors.
So wait and see.
Interesting. Would be excited except for the fact that Sonic has never worked well in an open environment. It's always only worked in a 2D or rails type of style. The gameplay is all about speed and that just doesn't translate to an open platforming environment. I want this game to be awesome but I have serious doubts.
I think this game will only work if they turn Sonic into a more standard slower platformer with just specific areas or sequences where you run fast. In which case it kinda loses its appeal as a Sonic game.
These game looks like they are trying to "BotW" Sonic. Which makes it seem like Sega doesn't even understand what makes Sonic good.
I'd rather they just went the direction of really high quality and high presentation 2D Sonic games. Nintendo just made a fantastic 2D Metroid that sits along side other great AAA games, there's no reason Sega can't do the same with Sonic. I think Frontiers is going to be a game that 'looks' really cool and then is a big, but expected, disappointment when it comes to actual gameplay.
I am so excited for this! Look, no matter how bad a Sonic game is, they still always somehow end up finding a place in my heart :P Yes, I really liked and enjoyed Shadow the Hedgehog, Sonic and the Secret Rings, Sonic Boom. I'll be there day one for this!
Just wait for it.
And in 2023 will come Sonic Wars and become a first person shooter. Geez, just remaster the 3 first Megadrive games and then stop polluting the franchise and just let Sonic rest in peace.
Universal success? How many millions did it sell? 10 million? 20?
Maybe have 3D and something similar to Mania release around the same time because not everyone cares about the older style of Sonic games.
Sure, that would work too. I just think it's odd they completely abandoned the one Sonic game that was a smashing success and universally praised.
I agree, worked well when they released it around Forces release. If Frontiers sucks too, then maybe releasing a Mania 2 or something would help the negativity. I hope Frontiers is great though
Smashing success? A game that launched on all platforms to be a smashing success would have to sell 20 million at least. Didn't it sell just over 1 million?
I hope not, the megadrive ones are dull especially compared to modern videogames. Have you actually tried to replay them recently? I have and its nowhere near as good as I remember. Even back then Mario was always much nicer to play with much better music.
I own all four Sonics on Genesis plus Sonic CD and every time I play them, I'm swooning. So I'm going to have to disagree here lol. Imo... they are classics.
Maybe that's the problem, you are a fan from back then. The majority of gamers nowadays were born either after or they don't miss it. If you're going to make a game, better try to sell it to the general gaming population, not just for the 5% of gamers who used to love it back 25 years ago. Its difficult to try and sell the same old formula from ages ago, sometimes it works, example Metroid dread, but I am sure if it was metroid prime 4 it would have sold a lot lot more.
Unless its something really amazing such as Ori, then I say let these old 2d side scrollers die. They worked back then when machines were limited, but now we have powerful consoles capable of full huge and dense open worlds. Unless developers are lazy and just go the easy root.
There was a time when the thought process for success was make game>improve game via tech. That if you weren't reworking the IP to utilize the advancements of the day, the IP was as good as dead. But then indie games came out of nowhere, most of them developed by one or two people, and showed that games don't need to be modern, or technologically advanced to be successful. That if the wheel isn't broken, and there's enough people who love said wheel, leaving it alone is just fine... and that's what Sonic Mania was all about. I don't know the demographics behind its sales, but the game did well. So as a developer, it only makes sense to, at the very least, make more Sonic games like that. If you want modern Sonic, that's fine. Keep trying to pull it off. But don't take what actually DID work away just because it's using old tech.
Games like resogun and ori are great examples of what can be done in 2d and its amazing, sonic 2d is nowhere near that, its like copy paste from early 90's games, that's too lazy.
I do not think sonic mania had good sales. Mario odyssey has sold 22 million in 1 single console, sonic cant even sell 1.5 million on all platforms, so yeah that formula is not working. Also sonic is constantly on sale, mario odyssey its still sold at full price.
Sonic Mania was certainly a success, and the profit over budget had to be astronomically huge considering it was a 16-bit game.
But we're just going to have to disagree. A great game is a great game, imo. I can have just as much fun playing Mario 3 on NES, or Cave Story as I can Halo Infinite.
Agreed. I think Forces had some attention to detail that they should have added, and I do think they cut corners in quite a few areas, but it wasn't bad. Still fun and enjoyable.
Sonic Forces was not good. There's just nothing interesting about it. Its 5.7 rating which means mediocre seems entirely appropriate, and users didn't rate it much higher. I didn't hate it, but by the midway point I just had no desire to keep going. The best thing you can say about it really is that it wasn't broken.
Sonic Colors was one of the best received 3D Sonic games because it's a 2D sonic game. I don't mean something like "it's not a true 3D Sonic game" I mean it's literally a 2D Sonic game. About half the levels are strictly 2D and even in the ones that are 3D, at least half the level is in 2D. So, it's probably more justified to call it 2D, since that's where you spend most of your time. Hybrid at best. Boss music for Negawisp armor is amazing though. So much so that I almost bought the Switch version just for that.
So... considering they can't figure out a way to make 3D work for more than a 30 seconds or so at a time in Colors (and a lot of what was 3D Was either just running straight ahead or rails sequences with nothing to do but strafe), I'm not sure they're up to the task of a 3D open world or "open zone" game.
You say that. But the best parts of Sonic Unleashed were the Daytime stages, which, with a few exceptions here and there, were almost entirely 3D. Almost everyone agrees that if the entire game was nothing but the Daytime stages and no Werehog, it would be the best 3D Sonic game by far. Or at least the best of the Boost games.
There's also the Adventure games and Heroes which, despite their age and flaws, are still beloved. There's a reason why in this age of remakes, fans have been begging for the Adventure games to be remade.
Is that a reply to me? Because I didn't say anything negative about the 3D sections in Unleashed or any other Sonic game. I actually quite like them generally. My point was that Sonic Team has not been able to put together a game of nothing but 3D Sonic stages yet, and Colors does not prove their ability to do so, because Colors is more than half 2d.
Both those games were horrible. Nowhere near Sonic adventure games. We need a fully 3d open world sonic, not half baked 3d with 2d elements.
People want that, look at Mario odyssey and Mario 64, successful marios because its open 3d worlds, the issue with the adventure games was that it launched on the Dreamcast which almost no one had. But now, a full 3d open world Sonic would sell well. There's going to be minimum 60 million ps5+xbox series by the time this game drops.
And that brings me back to the good 1998 and sonic adventure, I hope they can match it.
Mario doesn't run as fast as Sonic. At the rate Sonic goes through scenery, it's much more difficult to make a fully 3D game and make it fast as Sonic games should be. The adventure games were fully 3D, but they reused levels multiple times so it would work. Or had slower moving segments (Big, Knuckles, Eggman, Gamma, etc.) to pad it out.
I don't think it's feasible to have a pure 3D games at Sonic's speed without a lot of backtracking or other padding. 2D-3D hybrid is the best formula they've found so far, so I'd rather them just do that.
True but it worked for sonic adventure, no one's asking to take hours to traverse the map like assassins creed odyssey.
Lets look at it this way, gta5 has aeroplanes and the map is smaller than Odyssey.
Also him being very fast is a nice reason to not include fast travelling points.
What's really the point of him being very fast anyway? If it hurts gameplay. If they managed to do it on Sonic Adventure in 1998. that's 23 years ago with a console a thousand times weaker, then my guess is they can do it now.
Adventure 1 and 2 are still the ONLY sonic games I actually enjoyed, didn't like any of the 2d megadrive ones or the newer ones.
To be on the safe side I'll try the game and read plenty reviews before investing the money.
Going fast is fun. And it seperates it from something like Mario. It's why Sonic succeeded in the first place while so many other Mario competitors are long forgotten. Plus, at this point, the brand is synonymous with that, so if someone bought a Sonic game and it wasn't fast, they would be pissed.
Well let’s just say i hope it’s just another sonic. So it would be less money i have to spend there’s already far too many good Games coming in 2022.
If it isn’t like sonic adventure then I’ll just skip it. No big deal because i never expected to like sonic ever again. Movie was great though.
Oh there are FAR more issues with the Adventure games than what console it launched on.
The camera in those games are terrible. And in the case of Adventure 1 and its very narrow pathways, don't be surprised to find yourself ramming into a wall or falling of the edge of a cliff into a bottomless pit because the camera and narrow hallways screwed you over. There's also the narrative messes of their stories and the unnecessary play styles that pad the games out. Adventure 1 had Big, Gamma, and Amy. Adventure 2 had the treasure hunting and half the mech shooting.
I love the Adventure games as much as the next Adventure fan, but they have problems.
Essay Pro