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Sonic Adventure Retrospective: Sonic Month
332 Plays2 years ago
In the final episode of Sonic Month, Satsu and Adam discuss the iconic Sonic Adventure series. Does it still hold up today? Is there as much homage paying to Gerald Robotnik? Join us as we celebrate with the series that got the duo into the Sonic the Hedgehog franchise!
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Transcript
Introduction of Guests and Episode
00:00:05
Speaker
Welcome to Chad Tsunami. Hello everybody and welcome to another episode of Chad Tsunami. I'm Sad Tsunami and living and learning with me today
00:00:26
Speaker
is my very good friend who has, indeed, he has agreed to open his heart for this episode.
Introduction to Sonic Adventure Series
00:00:33
Speaker
It is the one and only Adam. Adam, are you ready to talk about some sonic adventure? Hello hello, good to be back and all I can really say to answer your question Mr Satsu is he's not going to get away with this! So what you're saying is we are going to try our best to not make
00:00:50
Speaker
mincemeat after this episode. I'm going to try my best not to shoot Amy in the face.
00:01:00
Speaker
Oh dear, we're not even a minute in and already the laughs are going up. You know it's the end of Sonic Month so why not go out with a bang? You are indeed correct, let's go out with a bang and not a dud in the same place. Moving on! Yes today we are indeed going to be talking about quite frankly a series that I hold near and dear to my heart although quite frankly if you have been listening to Sonic Month
00:01:25
Speaker
You all know that I absolutely adore the Sonic Adventure series and this indeed was the very first series that I introduced you to Adam. Indeed it was, you introduced me to Adventure 1. Oh my god, pre-lockdown anyway. Three years ago now? Yeah, I was gonna say three, it must be three. Good god. Where has the time gone? Oh yeah, the different age.
00:01:47
Speaker
As people have been calling it, the global panini. And sorry, that's offensive to S banks. Anyway, only true fans will know that reference. I love when you sprinkle in those, just for the true fans.
00:02:00
Speaker
Like, I mean, there's inside jokes and then there's just utter niche. Jokes inside of jokes. Yeah, just to quickly explain, Esbank's one of our friends and co-streamers at times. Yeah, he uses a pinini as an avatar. Not because he chose it, but because he didn't choose anything. So I chose for him. He was born that way. He was born flat and grilled. He was pressed that way. Did you say he was pressed that way?
00:02:25
Speaker
You're a panini press, right? Is that a thing? Yeah. Oh no, it is. Green Shield actually got me one. I don't know if I told you that. You are the kind of person who'd have a panini press. What, me or him? What, me or him? What, me or him? Well, clearly you. Okay, I'm moving this conversation back to Sonic.
Nostalgia and Personal Experiences
00:02:44
Speaker
Seems wise, seems wise. So yeah, I ended up introducing Adam to Sonic Adventure.
00:02:51
Speaker
yeah I think about three years ago and it honestly doesn't feel like three years ago but yep we're here now we are through the pandemic as always and of course because of sonic month you went back and played like a lot of these games to get yourself prepared and one of the games you actually saved which quite frankly the best till last is the sonic adventure games so I gotta ask before we go into this how did you find it
00:03:20
Speaker
It was an interesting experience, so to give some context into my exploration of the Sonic series, one of the first games I sat down to try was Sonic Adventure 1. So I started playing that at the beginning of Sonic Month. I was playing that alongside some of the retro games, finished that up. I'm quite glad that Sonic Adventure was the first Sonic game that I fully got into. I think it's quite a good intro into this series and I'll
00:03:42
Speaker
expand upon that more as we get into this episode. And then I set it aside, I went and played, tried out a lot of the other different Sonic games, and I really wanted to save Adventure 2 for the end because I thought it would make a nice comparison to having played Adventure 1 with kind of very limited experience of having played any Sonic games. It would be interesting to play Adventure 2 after having played quite a few, just to see how my opinions differed from there.
00:04:04
Speaker
And would you say it was worth it? Oh, definitely. It made a really nice book, they made really nice bookends to the explanation of the Sonic series. It was nice to have that kind of like nice narrative arcs around where, but have that nice kind of arc to my sampling of the Sonic series to start in the Golden Age and then kind of end, go back to the Golden Age after having experienced, you know, the Dark Age and the Modern Age and everything like that. So it made a nice, made a nice kind of circle to the whole experience.
00:04:29
Speaker
And I have to say, although it has been a long time coming, we have pretty much worked our way through the different ages. We've of course started with the retro age, with the 16-bit era. We then moved on to the dark age, which of course, the less said about that, the better. But for a little recap, you know, you've got your Shadow of the Hedgehogs, your Sonic 06s, your terrible repeating jazz in Sonic Unleashed. I will still hold that as like a crime against video games that soundtrack.
00:04:58
Speaker
But, you know, we're not here to bash Sonic Unleashed tonight. We had a whole episode to do that. You had your chance to do that earlier. Yeah, I had my chance in the field. And speaking of field, we also talked about the modern age of Sonic the Hedgehog Link. Yeah, a half joke there. Again, Panda Lawyer in the corner saying, for legal reasons, yep, this is indeed a joke. Thank you. And yeah, we wrapped up with
00:05:22
Speaker
the final games of the series, that of course being Sonic Forces and Sonic Mania which
00:05:30
Speaker
Yeah, so far we're kind of waiting for Sonic Frontiers as of this episode to come out, but instead of, you know, ending it with a kind of, eh, don't know about the series, we're gonna end it on a high, okay? We're gonna end it on Sonic Adventure, which quite frankly has been beloved by pretty much the majority of Sonic fans. I mean, there are a few, like, hardcore fans I think don't really like this game. Like, have you come across that in your research?
00:05:58
Speaker
Well, it does seem to me that there is a hardcore group who are very, very dedicated to 2D Sonic. I don't mean the 2D Sonic who appears in things like Generations and Forces. I mean the Genesis games and that kind of style of Sonic games. They never seem to have embraced the 3D Sonic games, even ones like the Adventure series, which are much better regarded than
00:06:20
Speaker
of the later ones.
Sonic Fanbase and Game Eras
00:06:21
Speaker
But yeah, I don't know if that's a big group. You can probably tell me if that's a big group within the Sonic fanbase or that's still a relatively small niche. Honestly, I think it's hard to tell because although Sonic fans are pretty much a large group of very passionate fans that are a lot of very vocal fans,
00:06:39
Speaker
so it's kind of hard to tell if that's like the vocal majority or you know just the vocal minority because being a Sonic fan myself I know how passionate people can get about Sonic you know for example Sonic's arms turning blue and Sonic boom all Sonic shoes are different oh the gameplay is different oh I don't care what anyone thinks Sonic 06 is my favorite game kind of attitude you know it's hard to kind of pin down everybody's got so many different opinions
00:07:08
Speaker
it's almost a bit like any other franchise to be honest because we were talking about for example Batman. I can't believe I'm making this comparison but you and I were talking about like Batman earlier and it's kind of like that depending on like who your first like Batman is or even James Bond or I mean maybe James Bond or Doctor Who that kind of thing you know is more apt because like you know Sonic you're coming into like a whole different kind of set of tones, different set of
00:07:35
Speaker
characters you know the 2D fans will obviously be a lot older and remember the old days of the 16-bit era and they might prefer that compared to the grim dark of the dark ages and some people might prefer the modern age because it might be a younger audience that grew up because I was going to say younger audience they must be because Sonic Colors came out in 2010 which you believe so 12 years ago and you called that game modern
00:08:03
Speaker
Yeah, modern quote-unquote. But say without any further ado, will we jump into quite possibly one of the most well-regarded games of the franchise? Let's go for it. It's been a long month and we're nearing the end, so let's spin Dash into this one more time. Or it's just a double boost. Sorry, it's double boost into it.
00:08:23
Speaker
Well Adam, while we listen to these ads that are just about to play, follow me, set me free, trust me, and me and you will escape from this ad
Podcast Promotion and Sonic Adventure Discussion
00:08:33
Speaker
break. Let's do it. Welcome to Chatsunami, a variety podcast that talks about topics from gaming and films to streaming in general interest. Previously on Chatsunami, we discussed Game of the Decade, Deadly Premonition, the romantic thriller, Birdemic, and listen to us get all sappy as we discuss our top five Christmas films.
00:08:53
Speaker
If that sounds like your cup of tea, then you can find us an anchor, Spotify, YouTube and all good podcast apps. As always, stay safe, stay awesome and most importantly, stay hydrated.
00:09:06
Speaker
We are Beer and Chill Podcast. Podcast where we review TV shows, games, movies, and whatever else takes our fancy. So what are you waiting for? If you're a cool kid like us, you're gonna listen to the Beer and Chill Podcast. You can get it anywhere from Spotify all the way to your grandmother's radio. My name is Jan. And I'm Craig Yisi. And we are Beer and Chill.
00:09:41
Speaker
Good lord, there was a lot more trucks than I remember.
00:09:45
Speaker
and that abric. Yeah, Sonic Adventure. Where do we begin? Well, we might as well begin at the beginning, which I know very cliche. Before we go on, let me just put my cards on the table here. I am a Sonic Adventure fanboy, okay? I'm sorry you had to hear it here first, Adam. I always suspected to keep down. I had a feeling when you said things like, I love the Adventure series and the Adventure series are my favourite Sonic games, I suspected.
00:10:12
Speaker
thought I hid it so well though. I could have sworn I hid it so well. Well as we know from the previous episode, you're a fan of 3D chess so you're good at plotting and scheming. Ah yes, that old 3D chess. I absolutely love this game. As I said in our Retro Age episode, my brother used to have a Sega Mega Drive
00:10:32
Speaker
and he would play the original Sonic A Hedgehog and later on I would get a sample of Sonic CD. And while I loved kind of playing those games, it definitely enamored me. You know, there were so many other games coming out at the time when I was growing up and I was kind of getting
00:10:49
Speaker
you know, like the tail end of the hype. And I've said this story a million times, but it wasn't until I actually started watching my brother play Sonic Adventure on the Dreamcast that I actually, I really fell in love with the game. I thought, wow, this looks so cool, you know, Sonic fighting this big water monster and everything. And eventually I ended up buying the games like years later for the GameCube. And yeah.
00:11:15
Speaker
have fallen in love with it ever since. But before we get into that, I'm giving you a job Adam, you know, in a summerized Sonic Adventure, in this paragraph or list.
Sonic Adventure Plot and Character Dynamics
00:11:26
Speaker
Oh my god. Right, so the story of Sonic Adventure encompasses six different stories.
00:11:35
Speaker
you have Tails, you've got Knuckles, you've got Amy, you've got Big the Cat, and then you've got, I'm gonna mess up his full title here, but you've got E102 gamma? Yep, that's right. Oh my god, I can't believe I got that right. Who's an Eggman robot, basically. So each character has their own separate story that they often do overlap, and basically kind of hanging above all these separate stories is this new
00:12:00
Speaker
character called Chaos who as you described is it looks very much like a water monster and basically it turns out that Eggman has released Chaos
00:12:11
Speaker
Eggman is seeking to find the seven Chaos Emeralds and give them to Chaos. Each time Chaos gets a Chaos Emerald, it gets more powerful and grows in size. Eggman is planning to use Chaos to destroy the city of a Station Square, which is predominantly where the game takes place. Eggman, I believe, is hoping to build his own city on top of Station Square.
00:12:34
Speaker
8-Man Land. We never would define what 8-Man Land is. I'm imagining a theme park from Shadow the Hedgehog. Or Colours as well, doesn't it? Yeah, and Unleashed as well. We finally built 8-Man Land and it is like a carnival. You're right, yeah. You've got one vision. It's a carnival or I'm out. I demanded robot clowns, them!
00:12:56
Speaker
I really want the Sonic game where Eggman has to go to the city square planning committee and be like, I want to build Eggman Land and they're like, no, there's just so many violations here. You need so much permission. And then this is how he turns into a supervillain. But anyway, so I'm getting very off track now. This has nothing to do with Adventure 1. This is just my Sonic fan game that I'm now describing. So yeah, so basically Sonic is out to stop Eggman. Sorry, Sonic and Tails are out to recover the Chaos Emeralds before Eggman can get them. Knuckles gets dragged into the store.
00:13:26
Speaker
because as Chaos is released it shatters the Master Emerald which is this thing that Knuckles is sworn to protect so he sets out to recover the pieces of the Master Emerald and return them to Angel Island. Amy gets swept up in the story because she's basically very obsessed with Sonic and is trying to find a way to get Sonic's attention and as she's doing that she then basically runs into this small Flicky which is a small bird and it's being chased down by some Eggman robots and so she decides to help the Flicky and protect it.
00:13:54
Speaker
Big the cat is out to do some fishing with his best friend Froggy but his best friend Froggy swallows the Chaos Emerald and escapes so Big has to track him down and then Gamma starts off as an Eggman robot but begins to see the kind of evils and horrors behind Eggman and sets out basically to free his robot brethren from Eggman's clutches.
00:14:14
Speaker
So they've got these separate stories all happening, but they intersect and characters run into each other. Someone's experienced the same events as others. And so they do all kind of tie in and then they all kind of tie in around this theme of chaos and as we learn more about his backstory. But that's basically, if I've hopefully summarized it correctly, that's basically the general story of Adventure 1. Yeah. I couldn't have summed it up better myself. That's why I got you to do it. I'm sure you could have. I'm sure you could have, but I appreciate the compliment.
00:14:41
Speaker
Sonic punches water, saves the day. Oh, that's what I should have said. I was going to say either that or what I ended up saying with... Yeah, it's quite an interesting one because before this, the games mainly focused, other than the spin-offs. Like, lights pertained, knuckles, chaotics didn't exist for a second. But for the most part, Sonic was very, you know, it was all about Sonic,
00:15:05
Speaker
if that makes sense. I know that sounds like a weird thing to say considering this game is called Sonic Adventure. It's about Sonic's adventure and you play as Sonic and he's got the longest campaign in this and everything but it's quite interesting that they take away the focus from Sonic because kind of the closest you got to that was like with Sonic 2, Sonic 3 where you got to play his tails and knuckles.
00:15:26
Speaker
But you're still kind of playing through the same levels. It wasn't really as story driven, if that makes sense. Like there was a story and it had to be told through, you know, the pixel art. But for Sonic Adventure, they definitely took a different approach. And I think the reason for this is because it was originally supposed to be an RPG. I think for the Saturn could be wrong in this. I think because the Saturn bombed so much.
00:15:50
Speaker
then they decided yeah let's flip this to the Dreamcast and of course that's what ended up happening they ended up developing Sonic Adventure which is just this massive grand scale adventure well I say grand scale because I'm gonna be honest the hub world when I was younger was a lot bigger compared to going back nowadays and looking at it because it's tiny it's just because you were so small back then oh exactly like I remember getting lost so much seeing that forest oh yeah
00:16:20
Speaker
I hated that forest, but kind of now that I know where to go and everything, I'm like, okay, this is the way you go here, there. I still get kind of lost, but I know the main bits. I'm like, okay, that's fine. I hated that forest. Anyway, but yeah, it's definitely a different take on Sonic, because I'm quite curious to hear what you have to say about this.
Development and Origins of Sonic Adventure
00:16:39
Speaker
How did you find it having the different perspectives for the story?
00:16:42
Speaker
It's an interesting concept, and the idea of having interlocking stories is not a new thing. That's been done before in other mediums. But it was certainly interesting for a Sonic game, as you say, when previous mainline games had been so focused solely on Sonic.
00:17:01
Speaker
what he was doing so it was interesting to get a kind of broader broader view and it was nice to kind of get a bit more to flesh out some more of the characters and stuff you know to see a bit more of Knuckles and you know why the master emerald is so important to him and you know to build up to develop characters a bit more like Amy and even to kind of go into like go into kind of Eggman's army and stuff and get Gama's perspective so it really it was really interesting it's a really interesting concept it felt like Adventure 1 was really designed to kind of show off
00:17:29
Speaker
you know, the power of the Dreamcast in that way, as you say, by having this kind of open world and by having much more of a focus on story, you know, including obviously voice acting and things that they couldn't do before. Because we are now into, you know, we are now into the cinematic age of gaming by 1999. You know, we've had titles like Ocarina of Time's been out, you know, we've had Half-Life kind of games like that that were much more focused on providing this kind of cinematic experience, Metal Gear Solid as well, things like that. So it really felt like Sonic Adventure was a part
00:17:57
Speaker
of this kind of new trend. And I think it succeeds in a lot of ways in doing that, in giving a much more kind of grander scale to a Sonic game than the Genesis ones had managed to do. I'm actually laughing because I'm thinking back to, you know the trivia episode where I asked you why Shadow the Hedgehog has a gun? Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. And I think the reason Gamma had a gun was for very similar reasons. People were trying to get Sonic a gun since 1999.
00:18:25
Speaker
I don't get what this obsession was with Sonic fans trying to get Sonic a gun. It's like, oh god. It would solve the Eggman problem. I mean, I'm just saying, not to support vigilante justice, but... Well, you can't make a normal one without capping a few Eggmans apparently. Nice, I like that. Get on a t-shirt. Yep. Trademarked. Satsanami. Yep.
00:18:49
Speaker
It seems like an eclectic mix of characters A. Are you ready for this Adam? A smorgasbord of characters. It just seems like an odd bunch, but I will say this, it does definitely add into the adventure aspect of it. You know, because you go from an urban environment like Station Square and then you end up running all the way to the Mystic Ruins, which
00:19:15
Speaker
have to admit one of the things I love about the Mystic Ruins is the fact that the development team actually went to South America to research this because obviously that was a time where the internet wasn't as, really wasn't as it is today you know so they didn't have really any reliable sources so they decided hey let's fly to South America and you know they went to the ruins there and they took photos apparently some of the photos made it into the game like as textures just the attention to detail for a lot of things because I
00:19:45
Speaker
I have to admit that is what I love about this game, the fact that it does feel like a grand scale adventure. You know, you start off in, as I said, in the mean streets of Station Square. And thinking back to it, I think this is the first time, obviously other than the robots, that we've seen a gun in a Sonic game. Because at the very beginning, the police tried to robocop chaos and they start shooting them and then they realise, oh yeah, he's made of water.
00:20:10
Speaker
maybe we shouldn't start shooting. Where'd you go from there? So of course, they think I know, just leave it to the Blue Angel. It's kinda messed up actually. I just like how the police never bothered to shot for the rest of the game. Pretty much, yeah. Like, well, we tried. It's not even like gun was a thing at this point. Fucking point. It is, it's just the police who are like, oh no, our weapons are useless. Retreat. All personnel fall back. And that's it. It's like, okay, now what?
00:20:37
Speaker
It's like, aww, police, police guys! Yeah, of course that kickstarts the whole adventure where Sonic is trying to get the Chaos Emeralds before Eggman. I'm gonna be honest, I really like the idea of Chaos. I love the fact that there is that kind of sense of urgency that is your kind of developing, you know, with your skills in the game. So too is Dr. Eggman with his arsenal, whether it be, of course, you know, his weaponry, the bloody Egg Viper, we don't talk about the Egg Viper, still get PTSD after that.
00:21:07
Speaker
boss. You know you've got Chaos who keeps continually evolving with them. All I'm seeing is Chaos 0 up to 4 are cool designs and Perfect Chaos is good. But man what was up with Chaos 6? It does go a bit wild.
00:21:22
Speaker
It's almost like a big beetle in a way. Yeah, it's like a big beetle cat thing. Yeah, that was a bit strange. But it's something out of Adventure Time, yeah. He does look, he has quite a cool design. You know, even if it is quite blocky, but that's graphics at the time, you can't really hold that against the game for using the technology that was
Gameplay Mechanics and Character Arcs
00:21:41
Speaker
available. Damn sake, I'm not going into the future and bringing back current 4K graphics now. But he looks
00:21:48
Speaker
And I agree with you, I like the idea that I think it's cool that he does morph and change. And you kind of get a reason for that. He's absorbing the power of the Chaos Emerald, so that's quite cool. And it does provide, as you say, it does provide some good motivation for you trying to progress and prevent Chaos from getting any more powerful. And I've got to ask, say by the end of this game, what were your thoughts? So by the end of the game, I had my frustrations.
00:22:12
Speaker
I'm not gonna lie, I'd had my trials and tribulations with the different characters and with some of the levels and some of the events. Trial and tribulations is the perfect description for my experiences fighting perfect chaos. But, by the end, I was genuinely surprised how much I enjoyed this game. I was a bit nervous going in, I wasn't sure, I was like,
00:22:31
Speaker
it is like a 1999 game is it have I just missed the boat on this is it is it too late for me to get into it you know how am I gonna find it but I'm actually surprised how much I enjoyed it and I think it was a really good introduction to the Sonic series because you know obviously by I mean I'm not an expert now playing something games now but right at the start you know I was basically a baby trying to figure out you know how to spin dash and what the hell I was doing with controlling these characters but it felt the game felt mostly quite forgiving and it's got it's got a good checkpoint system which
00:23:14
Speaker
I was going to ask, would you say it holds up as a game?
00:23:22
Speaker
I think yes, because I think generally playing it, I think is still pretty good and it's still playable. You know, it's not it's not like some other games where it's really, it's really frustrating and really fiddly. And you kind of feel like that you kind of feel like the knowledge of how to play this has kind of been lost. Like I feel bad always bringing up GoldenEye, but I kind of feel GoldenEye is one of these games that, you know, is so much of its time. And now going back to it, having played modern FPS games, it's quite difficult and quite
00:23:52
Speaker
challenge I think it's I think it's easier if you play modern platformers to go back to Sonic Adventure 1 like it's not perfect you know and you probably will find frustrations with it but I think it's still it's still perfectly playable and I certainly somebody who's not with you know a fan of platformers ice I was able to you know play around with it and have a good time with it I
00:24:11
Speaker
think where it falls down I think is in a lot of the ways of it trying to be a cinematic you know trying to fit into that cinematic experience and I think a lot of those faults are you can see Sega and Sonic Team trying to figure out how they're going to you know transition Sonic into this kind of 3D cinematic era. There's good bits to the story and I really like things like I think Gamma has a great story. I enjoyed Knuckle's story and I enjoyed parts of Sonic's story and everything
00:24:38
Speaker
I just think the story is told really badly. It's interesting having the interlocking characters but it models the story up so much and to be honest it wasn't until the end and maybe this is the intended thing like I understand that you know sometimes you don't understand the story fully until you've played all the characters until you know you've seen all the characters viewpoints and you reach the end but I didn't really get that satisfying experience with Sonic Adventure amongst all the kind of different character stories you have the kind of backstory to Chaos and this kind of ancient
00:25:07
Speaker
this cataclysmic event that happened in the past. You get a lot of flashbacks of the different characters, but it just feels so bizarre the way the flashbacks happen and the fact that the characters don't seem to have that much reaction to getting transported back to the past. They seem so inconsequential at points and it's such a model.
00:25:28
Speaker
I think it really harms the story overall. I think that's where it hasn't held up because now we've had so much more experience of how to tell cinematic stories through gaming. I think a lot of these faults are much more prominent now and you're like, it's just not aged well.
00:25:48
Speaker
gameplay wise I think the game is still playable I mean you can argue about the open world I don't quite know where I fall in the open world because I like some parts of it but I don't like other parts of it but yeah I think gameplay wise I think it still holds up pretty well. This iteration of Sonic is, and this is nostalgia talking but I really do like this version of Sonic that of course being Ryan Drummond who voiced Sonic from a
00:26:11
Speaker
I wanna say Sonic Adventure to Sonic Heroes. I think that was like the range before they got in Jason Griffith. But I really liked him and I liked a lot of the voice cast in this game. Especially Eggman. Oh, sorry. See, before we go on, can we talk about Eggman?
00:26:27
Speaker
that of course being Dean Bristow who pretty sure he did the voice for Sonic Adventure and Sonic Adventure 2. I'm 99% sure on that but my god what a voice actor. It's a shame that he's unfortunately passed away so the mantle of the voice actor for Eggman was passed on. I think it was to Mike Pollock next who no offense to Mike Pollock does a fantastic job of being Dr. Eggman and that kind of big booming voice but
00:26:55
Speaker
See, when it comes to being intimidating, my god, Dean was by far head above shoulders. I don't know if I can think of any other iteration of Eggman where I've genuinely thought, oh no, this guy is serious. For example, at the end of Tails' story, he literally just fires a missile into the middle of Station Square. You think, oh my god. And he's like, oh no, it was a dud. So you have to run after and get to the missile before him.
00:27:24
Speaker
and then he jumps at these giant mech and then you know the very iconic line of away before I make mincemeat out of you and you know I am not selling that very well but trust me just the sinisterness just dripping from his performance I will say this I feel as if he is the only one out of the voice cast that kind of has like a consistency to him because I've heard rumors and everything so I can't 100% say oh the reason they weren't good was because of this or that because I've
00:27:53
Speaker
Apparently Knuckles actually had a different voice actor for E3 and then for some reason they changed him for the main game. Now there's loads of reasons like some people say oh it's because they didn't tell them you know how they should be acting or there was other moments where it was like oh they were being directed by people who didn't speak
00:28:13
Speaker
very well so I don't know the specific reason for why the deliveries come out the way they do but some of them come out quite awkward like for example Adam do you remember the very beginning where Tails is about to crash his plane and Sonic literally goes look out you're gonna crash ah there are a couple of those kind of ones aren't there I mean it's a bad day when the robot's even more consistent than Sonic
00:28:36
Speaker
I have to say though, it's the story-wise, I would definitely say Sonic's is definitely the strongest one and this is something I brought up to you before we started recording this but I'm wondering how well this game would have held up if it was just a Sonic-centric story. That's an interesting question, that's a good question.
00:28:56
Speaker
Sonic's gameplay certainly I think is some of the best. I think Knuckles was my favourite gameplay wise. I think it's just because I found Knuckles so easy to control but much more easy to control than I'd found Sonic and Tails.
00:29:15
Speaker
In fact, I really enjoyed the first half of Sonic's story, but I found myself getting frustrated later on than the kind of latter half. Part of that is maybe the game design, but I think a lot of that is the fact that this was my first Sonic game and I was still kind of, you know, learning the ropes of how Sonic controlled and everything and how these games work. So I don't think I can fully put that on the game's design. It's an interesting question, because as you say, it's an interesting point you say with it being titled adventure, because that does imply, you know, a much grander scale of events.
00:29:42
Speaker
with a larger cast of characters, so maybe to just have had Sonic might have felt a bit underwhelming. You know, it might not have felt like a proper adventure in many ways. That's a good question. I don't know. I don't know quite know what to say to that one, but it's a really good question. Because I have to say, the Sonic's not.
00:29:57
Speaker
perfect in this game but I would say it controls probably the way I think a lot of people thought it would control from 2D to 3D because let's face it there's a lot of games that really really struggle to adapt 2D characters into the 3D sphere because I mean you and I have had conversations about the transition for Mario going into you know from 2D to Super Mario 64 which is your favorite game of course. I'm sure we'll bring this up again but
00:30:27
Speaker
I have some things to say. Yeah, in the future. Actually, no, sorry, before we go on, would you say, and this is where we're going to get controversial, this is Chat Tsunami Hot Takes here, would you say the transition from Sonic's 2D to 3D was done better than Mario's transition from 2D
Sonic's 3D Transition vs Mario's
00:30:46
Speaker
to 3D? Right, here we go. Since you're leading me down this garden path, I'll skip down it here. Right.
00:30:52
Speaker
I think comparing Super Mario 64 to Sonic Adventure. I think Super Mario 64 is a more important game. And you know, I think it deserves its place in gaming history. You know, because this was the first attempt to make a 3D platformer and Nintendo deserved all the props for what they did and it laid the groundwork and everything like that. That being said, I had far more fun with Sonic Adventure than I did with Super Mario 64.
00:31:16
Speaker
Again, this is a personal opinion, this doesn't represent Chatsunami as a whole, and other opinions are available, I accept that. I personally think Sonic did the 3D transition better in his first game than Mario did. I found Mario 64 quite a frustrating game to play. I respect it, I didn't like it. Sonic Adventure has its faults, it has its flaws, but I had much more fun playing it.
00:31:38
Speaker
So that's what I'll say about it. And yeah, is this your last episode? Please direct all hate to Satsunami, he's my agent. I don't agree to that. Can I borrow your red pandal or please? I feel like I'm gonna need some. Yeah, yeah, just over here. Yeah, yeah, I'll give you the details later. Okay, he's on his way.
00:31:59
Speaker
Sonic Adventure, I have to say, is definite with one of those games like that. It's hard to say if it was as impactful. I would say Super Mario 64 is probably your right. It's more impactful on the 3D platformers and you have no idea how much that hurt to say. But I
00:32:17
Speaker
do think that Sonic Adventure can't be understated, and I know it has its flaws, it has big the cat, but for the time, considering it has all these different gameplay styles, and I mean don't get me wrong, not all of them have, like as I was saying to you, I have played through this game so, so many times, and you know, I always play through Sonic's, I play through Tails, I play through Knuckles, I play through Gamma Stages,
00:32:44
Speaker
And then after that, you've got Amy and you've got Bic the Cat and you're like, do you want to play? Because I genuinely, I have less memories about going through those. I mean, I remember I used to be afraid of Zero, who's the robot that chases Amy. I remember that. I remember being terrified of that when I was younger. I can get that out of it. I can see as a kid that would mean it.
00:33:04
Speaker
kind of scary thing. Yeah like when they got old out of your eyes you can just hit them and run away and there's like no tension whatsoever you're like oh okay but back then yeah it was like absolutely terrifying this huge hulking monster and I didn't want to believe it that way but I was like oh it's too scary. I was like what, sue me. No actually for legal reasons that's a joke don't sue me.
00:33:22
Speaker
But I have to admit, some of my favourite moments of this game come from the side characters. I absolutely love the characterisation of these people. I love Tails' growth as an individual. You know, he goes from a sidekick to Sonic to saving Station Square.
00:33:40
Speaker
We've got Knuckles learning to kind of stand on his own two feet. Even with Amy, I have to admit, even with Amy, although I'm not a big fan of her character, I did like the fact that she became a little bit more independent throughout the story. She realised she didn't need to depend on Sonic either, which is kind of ironic because it's all these stories about people not depending on Sonic, and then in the last story they all depended on Sonic to save them.
00:34:04
Speaker
kind of shot themselves in the foot with that one after they beg. He's begging. He fishes. There's really not much to say other than he's become like a running joke on this channel. And then there's Gamma. And before we move on to Adventure 2, and of course the last story, can we just talk about Gamma for a second?
00:34:23
Speaker
Yeah, I think from story perspective, Gamma was my favourite, definitely. Oh, by far, head and shoulders above. Because Wild Tales is, and tries it in that three times, Wild Tales is quite, you know, emotional. It's quite always, you know, standing up. He's becoming his own hero. Sonic is the cool dude with the attitude. You know, you've got all these kind of self-growth stories. Gamma's is a tragic one. And I remember watching like a couple of people lay through
00:34:52
Speaker
Sonic Adventure and it actually got me quite annoyed because again I'm not going to name any names but there were particular let's plays where they played through Gamma's story and they were like laughing at the very end and obviously you know you can interpret it the way you want I'm not going to gather the torches and pitchforks and things and be like that with the heads but I honestly thought was quite poignant I mean again Sonic game but
00:35:14
Speaker
thought it was quite sad because it's the only story in the game where Jack had to practically dies and doesn't come back. Gammon's whole purpose in the game is, well in fact, rewinding. At the beginning you see him, you know, with his brothers quote-unquote, his fellow robots and then he sees his fellow robots like snatched away right before his eyes and then he ends up going into the wrong room and you see this absolutely horrific image. Well it would be for a robot of his brother getting
00:35:42
Speaker
ripped apart and rebuilt into this Frankenstein monster thing. And after that, I do love his reaction. He's dead panicked when he comes out and he goes, this was the wrong door. It's like, oh no. I think it's so sad because his whole purpose after realizing there's more than being an Eggman robot is he decides to save his friends by blowing them up. I know there's an irony there. But you realize that he's blowing them up so that
00:36:12
Speaker
flickies inside can get out and then at the very end he just decides to you know get shot fatally they fall and there's this just like slow zoom out as this flickie flies away and I remember the first time as a kid getting quite emotional over this being like wow I didn't expect this from a Sonic game you know what were your thoughts on it Adam?
00:36:31
Speaker
I think, I think it's really good. I think for a start it was a really interesting idea to have this perspective from within side, you know, the Eggman Empire, so to speak, and to get this and to actually see, you know, because it's one thing to view Eggman through the eyes of characters like Sonic and Tails and everything, but to actually see it from, you know, a character who's working for Eggman and then their kind of, you know, their journey, their kind of redemptive arc. I think it was really great. I think it was done really well. And I think it is. I think it's a really kind of effecting ending.
00:36:58
Speaker
I know I kind of criticized the overall story earlier on, but I think the individual stories really helped to kind of elevate this game, because I think gameplay-wise, I found Gamma quite clunky to play. I kind of enjoyed it to begin with, but I found him quite clunky to play as later on and a bit awkward, and I kind of found the same thing with Tails. I wasn't really a fan of Tails' gameplay, because I felt like I was just having to repeat the exact same stages as I'd just done with Sonic and everything, but
00:37:25
Speaker
I kind of feel that their character arcs are really good, and that kind of makes up for the, you know, the kind of, I'd say, well, to me, an immortal kind of lackluster gameplay. But having these kind of really strong arcs and seeing these growth in these characters, even Amy, like, Amy was probably my least favorite story. I just really didn't like her gameplay. But, you know, she has some nice growth towards the end. So it kind of makes it, it makes it seem worth it. And you kind of can forgive, well, I can certainly forgive the kind of gameplay faults I was finding, because I think these character arcs are quite strong.
00:37:52
Speaker
of course flash forwarding to the end because let's face it there's so many good things about this game. Also but I will admit you know like the sky chase, the sky deck, anything with the word sky in it pretty much is a death sentence for my enjoyability for these levels but I think
00:38:10
Speaker
I don't know. I really liked a lot of this game. I love the way Sonic controlled. Sometimes he's a little bit janky. I love the fact in, you know, levels like, is it casino opolis? Yeah, it's a casino opolis, isn't it? Yeah, the casino level where, you know, you can decide to either play the pinball or if you don't get enough rings you can go down and do like a more kind of traditional route underneath in the sewers and you can do more platforming there.
00:38:37
Speaker
the game does reward you for exploring because after i was watching a video on the sonic adventure series and i didn't realize like there's some moments where if you get up to like certain buildings and certain rooftops you can actually get like extra lives and things like that there were all these like kind of tiny details that the programmers really didn't have to add
00:38:57
Speaker
They didn't have to say, oh, we're going to add this bit, we're going to add that bit just for poops and giggles. But at the end of the day, they did. And it just shows the love and attention to this game. And as I said, you've got Station Square, which is, I was going to say bustling Metropolis, but it's like three zones in a sewer. OK, maybe a couple more. There's a pool. I like the fact that the NPCs have their own stories. I don't know if you kind of picked up on this or talked to many of the NPCs, did you?
00:39:27
Speaker
I didn't when I was playing through the game, but looking at things afterwards, it was cool to see that they did have these separate stories and you could actually track different characters as the game progressed. Because I mean, you've got the mother who has a gambling problem, which I thought, Jesus, that's dark. You've got the guy who's having an affair, apparently. You've got all these kind of stories going on in the background and I have to say, that's kind of
00:39:53
Speaker
a nice touch I want to say. You know it was something that's completely not necessary and like and I know technically it's for gameplay reasons like for example the train strikes and everything where you go up and it's like oh sorry you can't go to the mystic ruins which means your level is in that particular area which again I do like that
00:40:13
Speaker
There's some janky bits in the story, again having to repeat certain levels, like having to fight Chaos 4 three times, having to fight Chaos 6 three times, one of which is with a fishing rod. I do not like that Sega, I really do not like that, how dare you. But at the end of the day, it's this kind of package that comes together, and don't get me wrong, before any Sonic fan points it out, I know that I've primarily played the DX version, which is like
00:40:40
Speaker
the considered to be the Jankier version. But even with the Jankier version, I still loved this game. I absolutely adored it, even though there was a couple of moments where I thought, oh great, we have to do this again, we have to do that. I loved it. Before we move on to Sonic Adventure 2, because I know that's what the fans want, I've got to ask, what did you
Emotional Depth and Impact of Sonic Adventure
00:40:58
Speaker
think of the finale?
00:40:58
Speaker
So I experienced, I think it's fair to say, a range of emotions in the finale. I think the form of Perfect Chaos is really cool and it's imposing, it's intimidating. And the fact that Station Square just gets wiped out is pretty dramatic. I was like, oh damn, I didn't quite expect that. So that was quite a cool shock.
00:41:16
Speaker
and when I said Perfect Chaos looks pretty cool. I suppose it's nice that all the characters kind of gather together to give their emeralds to Sonic. It didn't quite, I don't think it quite all made sense why it happened, but you know, a power friendship and everything. And it was cool to play. This was my first experience of playing as Super Sonic, so that was quite cool.
00:41:34
Speaker
I thought the fact that the boss fight was kind of based around sonic speed and getting to get into perfect chaos was really cool and I was like oh that's a really cool concept I really liked it however at first I didn't quite understand the mechanics of what was going on so when you're in supersonic form you have a ring count but it's
00:41:50
Speaker
constantly ticking down and if you reach zero rings and Sonic reverts back to his normal form and you'll basically die and you'll lose a life so you need to kind of keep collecting rings and also move fast enough to prevent that from happening. I didn't realize that was happening at first so I had a couple times I was like
00:42:05
Speaker
What happened? What's going on here all of a sudden? That was frustrating. I also found it frustrating because I felt I was getting caught on bits of the scenery which would just instantly kill my momentum and basically then meant I was likely to get smashed by one of Chaos' projectiles and then lose my rings and everything. So I was like...
00:42:22
Speaker
I found it very frustrating. I'm going to be honest in the middle section because I just felt I was running into these kind of mechanical issues. I didn't understand the gameplay and everything. But once I figured out that the rings were counting down and I had to get them before it reached zero, I focused, got myself in the zone and I got a really good sense of satisfaction from taking down Perfect Chaos. So yeah, a range of emotions. I think because I left with it, I left with a good emotion. I'll say it's overall good. I just wish I'd kind of understood quickly.
00:42:52
Speaker
what was happening and what I needed to do. So what you're saying is, oh well that ends well, right? Yeah, let's go with that. I feel as if that line, and I'll get to the one that's on the adventure too, but that line from Tales where the city's been submerged in water, countless people probably dead by this huge chaos god, and he goes, oh well that ends well, right? And it's like,
00:43:17
Speaker
It's a city half full of water, not half empty water. Well he is an optimist, what can I say? He saved it from getting blown up only for it to be drowned so, you know, you know, small wins. You can only control what you can control. So two things before we move on, but two things I really appreciated in this particular moment was, you know, you've got like the huge build up to supersonic
00:43:40
Speaker
you know he's holding the aim roads and everything you know it's happening it's happening he turns into supersonic but one of the narrative decisions i really liked in this level was the fact that i mean obviously the gameplay was just like bashing into a big monster but narratively that's not
00:43:58
Speaker
what was going on. Like Sonic himself says he doesn't say like oh let's trap this beast, let's throw rocks at his brain until it collapses. He was saying like even if we beat this thing and put it back into the emerald it's still gonna be angry. And I guess it's cheesy and everything but I think that's quite a nice lesson for kids as well. You know it's not all about saying oh I'm the good guy and you know this is the bad guy. It's like him trying to justify and say this is like a creature that's been taken advantage of.
00:44:28
Speaker
views abused and just absolutely wrecks havoc because of all these injustices and you see that in the flashback scenes and admittedly the flashbacks might not hold up as well but i mean you get to see at the end you know chaos like descends down and then he does a poochy and says he must go because his chow needs him and yeah that's then the end of the game and i have to admit what i love as well is the fact that eggman is not a pushover in this game it's the fact that he pulls
00:44:57
Speaker
He pulls an egg carrier 2 out his backside where he's just like, the egg carrier 2 was designed for this kind of thing. You have to find your master stupid beast. And it starts like going pew pew. Did this game also set the trend for Eggman unleashing a powerful evil only for the powerful evil to turn on Eggman and ultimately at the end? I think you're right, yes. I didn't notice that a couple times in the games. I was like, aye. He's not quite learnt, has he?
00:45:22
Speaker
Well, I mean, it happens in Sonic Lost World of course. I can't believe I'm bringing that game up again. Sonic Unleashed. 06. 06, yeah. Technically heroes. Technically, but not technically. Yeah, no you're right. Adventure 2 of course. But speaking of that, before we move on to Adventure 2, are there any kind of closing points you want to bring up about this game?
00:45:44
Speaker
I just think I would say in summation that I really admire what Sonic Team and Sega were trying to do with this game and I think it was a really admirable attempt to bring Sonic into 3D and I think they succeeded in a lot of ways. I don't think they quite got there. I think there are faults with this game but I really admire the intentions and the fact that they were trying to just expand this and they thought let's include multiple characters and let's have a much more kind of epic story
00:46:08
Speaker
let's have a kind of open world players can explore around and let's try for some different gameplay styles. So there's so much to admire in this game but I think that can kind of that kind of overrides a lot of the faults of the game because you're like well they were really worth trying here you know they really were they obviously this was something to really show this was a game to show off like the power of the Dreamcast.
00:46:26
Speaker
And I think it really succeeded in a lot of ways. So, you know, you can criticise this game. I don't think it's perfect by any stretch, but I think there's just so much to admire in it that, yeah, I just, I think that's probably why I enjoyed it as well, because I could see the kind of, you know, I could see the effort that went into this and the kind of hopes they had for it. And I have to say this, of course, was one of the most prolific games for the Dreamcast. And unfortunately, Sonic Adventure 2 would be its last entry.
00:46:54
Speaker
into the, well, the last Sonic entry into the Dreamcast library. And my god, what a swan song to actually go off on, because where Sonic Adventure kind of set the stage for a 3D Sonic, and quite admirably, might I say, we ended up getting Sonic Adventure 2, which, do you want me to summarise this? Because I feel bad getting you to summarise Adventure 2. I mean, I'm going happy to try and do it again, but if you really want to go for it and you want to do an actual proper job,
00:47:23
Speaker
I'm completely staked off, but I can always try. No, no, no, I'll take this one then, because I feel bad. I made you do this. My summation of Adventure 1 was so bad, I don't blame you. No, no, you had six characters to cover. To be fair, so yeah, long story short, you might be wondering, is Sonic Adventure 2 a continuation? Yes and no, because there's a lot of references to Adventure 1, but really it's not a direct
00:47:50
Speaker
I wouldn't say it's like directly falling on from adventure. It is an essence. Essentially the story follows the miscommunication of the century where they think that this evil hedgehog is Sonic the Hedgehog. And apparently there's only three hedgehogs in the world, Sonic, Shadow and Amy at this point. And they go, okay, it can't be Amy, it must be Sonic. And of course the president who is anti-hedgehog up until Shadow the Hedgehog with his pro-hedgehog,
00:48:19
Speaker
That's another story from another
Sonic Adventure 2 Plot and Gameplay Refinement
00:48:21
Speaker
day. Essentially they try to
00:48:23
Speaker
frame Sonic for these horrible horrible crimes, and throughout this he unveils a conspiracy where he finds out that this new mysterious figure, Shadow the Hedgehog, is trying to activate this space station which conveniently has the face of Dr Robotnik. But spoilers, it turns out it isn't Dr Robotnik's, it's his grandpa which makes me think, what happened to Eggman's dad?
00:48:57
Speaker
He was a simple man. I just want her big toys for the children. Oh yeah, I don't know how that works and I don't know who Eggman's grandmother or mother is, you know. Some things in The Sonic Lower are best left alone. That's all I'm saying, best left alone. But of course that leads to a rather interesting confrontation between Eggman trying to, you know, establish Eggmanland and fighting against our heroes who are racing against the clock before Eggman fires his
00:49:12
Speaker
Is he the failure of the families? We don't talk about him.
00:49:25
Speaker
I wouldn't say death beam. It feels as if that's all you can call this. I know it's the Ark canon, but yeah, it just seems like a death beam. Which is not good for anything until we learn in Shadow the Hedgehog that, yes, to blow up aliens. I was disappointed too.
00:49:41
Speaker
Yeah, it's a race against time to stop Eggman essentially. It is high-octane action, there's a lot of explosions. It's pretty much what would happen if Michael Bay directed a Sonic game. Not wrote it, but just directed it. There's a lot of action in this game, but as muddled as that was, do you think that seems like an appropriate for now, an appropriate summarisation? I honestly think that it makes me sad that you were able to deliver such a concise summary.
00:50:09
Speaker
After about a year and a half of me trying, I still can't summarise anything properly. Well, I've missed a ton out, like, Sonic ambitioning the president once again. God, we'll get to that. But of course, as we established, you went into Sonic Adventure first of all, and that was kind of your first exposure to 3D Sonic. How did this game hold up in comparison?
00:50:32
Speaker
So this really felt like a refinement of Adventure 1's gameplay. It felt a lot tighter and a lot more responsive in many ways. And I say better design, but that's probably unfair to say because I think Sonic Adventure 1 is well-designed. I think it just feels much more refined, basically. I think it was interesting coming back to this kind of style of gameplay after having played some of the more modern Sonic entries, because I think there's a lot to really like about this game.
00:50:57
Speaker
excellent levels in this one. City Escape is obviously great, but I really enjoyed levels like Metal Harbor, yeah, after the kind of, when you're escaping the prison, I thought that was excellent. The Jungle, I can't remember what it's called now, but the one in the Jungle, what do you play as Sonic? Uh, White Jungle? I think it is, yeah, I think that's the one. I thought that, those two were excellent. They're back to back and I thought they were both, they were so much fun to play and I had such a blast. Maybe I'm wrong in saying this, it felt like Sonic's levels were a lot more linear in this one than they'd kind of previously been in my writing saying.
00:51:27
Speaker
it does feel like that. It feels as if for Sonic Adventure it did, as I said, it rewarded you for exploding so you could take like numerous paths. So I'm kind of so used to going my own set way of taking shortcuts but I can see like other people who play it for the first time and they just take like the predetermined paths and everything. There's so many choices and
00:51:51
Speaker
technically you can do that for some of the sonic levels here but you're right it does seem a lot more linear even with one thing i forgot to mention is both of these games have stellar introductory levels you know the sonic calving emerald coast and sonic adventure and of course city escape which was one of your favorite levels
00:52:11
Speaker
Oh yeah, City Escape is great. I'm kind of annoyed at myself that I played Generations before having played this because it obviously kind of spoiled a bit of City Escape. I think I would have liked City Escape much more if I'd gone straight to Sonic Adventure 2 rather than kind of having it spoiled for me. I think one thing I noticed was that I do feel that the modern Sonic game, and this is just a consequence of these games having been developed later with the experience, I think they are kind of
00:52:36
Speaker
better to play some of the more modern Sonic games as opposed to the adventure series. But I think if you stick with the adventure series, you get into it pretty quickly and you understand how it controls. And I didn't really find that many frustrations. I found the last two stages of Sonic's campaign to be a bit frustrating, but that was really a kind of outlier. I didn't really have many other frustrations leading up to that point. I just thought it played really well.
00:53:01
Speaker
I thought it was you could really tell this was the kind of focus on on that kind of cinematic game plan. It really worked. There's some excellent kind of set pieces, obviously from like Scaping from the Truck and City Escape. Some of the bits of Metal Harbor were like planes are like flying and you have to run up the rocket and everything was really excellent. I think gameplay wise Adventure 2 really felt like a step up from Adventure 1 and
00:53:22
Speaker
I felt that way as well with the story. You did a great summation of the story. But I felt like the story was a lot better in Adventure 2 because I felt it was told much better. And I really liked a lot of the plot points and everything. And it was good to follow. And I felt it worked well with the interlocking characters this time in that you got a little bit of suspense. There's one bit where you meet Shadow about, I think in the jungle level, Sonic meets Shadow.
00:53:48
Speaker
When Shadow talks about how the island's going to blow up in 15 minutes, which leads to an exciting escape, but you're like, why does that happen? I can't wait to find out how that's going to happen. And then you get to the dark storyline, you get to play that level, and you understand why the island's going to blow up everything. So I thought that worked really well. There was a much better way to have these kind of separate characters.
00:54:07
Speaker
and overlap so I just felt it was a it felt like in many ways it felt like they kind of narrowed the scope and kind of reigned in the kind of ideas and concepts while with adventure when I felt like they would put into trying to do a lot of different things you know it felt like this one was a much more narrowing down so maybe in a way it wasn't as it's not as maybe as imaginative and perhaps not as ambitious but I think for what it was it was such an excellent refinement of everything that I really enjoyed adventure to
00:54:33
Speaker
I would totally agree with you there and definitely feels more like a linear game, which I am with you. I don't know how to feel about the fact that in Sonic Adventure 1 you have this very vast, adventurous pub world and everything you've got. As I said, the cities, you've got the jungles, the metallic egg carrier, Angel Island of course, which is a lot tinier than you'd be led to believe. You know, you've got all these kind of aspects of the world and then in this one it's kind of like
00:55:02
Speaker
Oh, you're going from Level A to Level B to Level B to Level C. From what I remember, I think the original game was only supposed to have Sonic, Knuckles and Eggman as playable characters, and then people kicked up a big stink about not having tails in, so eventually they had to rework.
00:55:20
Speaker
the gameplay. So in Sonic Adventure you had 6 gameplay modes, you had your speed for Sonic, you had your racing for Tails, your treasure hunting for Knuckles, game ahead, Big was just there fishing, and you had your shooting for E1 or 2 gamma.
00:55:35
Speaker
For this, it splits it up into three core game styles. You've got your speed for Sonic and Shadow. You've got your shooting for Tails and Eggman, which I know you loved, Adam. And for your treasure hunting, you had Knuckles and
Challenges in Sonic Adventure 2
00:55:50
Speaker
Rouge. And I'm gonna ask you because I know
00:55:53
Speaker
you said you loved Knuckles in Adventure, but did you think he compared any better in Adventure 2? I didn't like Knuckles's gameplay as much in Adventure 2, I'll admit. I wasn't as big a fan of the treasure hunting in this one. It was nice though, what I did like is that they actually designed stages for these different gameplay styles while with Adventure 1
00:56:17
Speaker
they kind of try to force these other characters into Sonic stages. Some of them I think work but others just really don't work that well for the other characters, but at least with Ear, you know, all these levels have been specifically designed for each of the characters in each of their different gameplay. You know what, in many ways I think the treasure hunting gameplay is probably better in Adventure 2. They've kind of nerfed the radar a bit, so in them
00:56:40
Speaker
basically in Adventure 1 you need to find, in Knuckles level, you're basically tasked with finding three shards of the Master Emerald. You have this radar along the bottom, and basically it tracks all the shards at the same time, while with Adventure 2 it only tracks one shard at a time. You can still find the other two, but the radar's not going to go off until you've found that. The preceding shard, which does kind of add to the gameplay, makes it more challenging
00:57:05
Speaker
that means that you kind of have to learn the level a bit and you're gonna have to probably backtrack and you know and crisscross the level several times to find all the shards but i don't know i think there was just something about i think it was just because i kind of struggled a bit with tales and sonic in adventure one and i just found knuckles so smooth just like glide around and climb everything i just really enjoyed that so perhaps because i found especially because i found sonic a lot more easier to play eventually perhaps i didn't quite have that you know i didn't have the kind of knuckles bump i've been like oh i can control this now this is excellent but i
00:57:34
Speaker
I don't know because again on the surface I'm like it's definitely better because they've designed it better in Adventure 2 but I don't know I can't really put my finger on it I just didn't have as much fun with it so I don't quite know why that is but it was just kind of my experience I definitely think Knuckles controlled a bit better like I like the fact you can dive now you know when you're gliding you can just press B and you go down and that really helps speed things up but yeah
00:58:01
Speaker
I really don't like the radar nerf in this game. I do agree. I don't understand how you're standing right beside an emerald and your radar's not going off. No wonder it keeps losing the master emerald. It just seems as if, you know, he's not suited for the job. Hashtag cancelled knuckles. Anyway, I might beliefs aside.
00:58:22
Speaker
Would you say, narratively, this game does a better job as well? Because you say it's gameplay wise, it kind of refines like Sonic's gameplay. I'm assuming when you say it refines, it refines Gamma's gameplay as well for Tails and Eggman. Do you know, weirdly for Eggman, definitely. Like I had, I didn't really have many problems with Eggman.
00:58:41
Speaker
But, weirdly, I don't know, I had a lot of issues with Tails, and especially Tails' hover mechanic. And I don't know why, there was one particular level, oh my god, I forgot the name of it now, but it's at the Pyramid, where you need to basically bust into the Pyramid with Tails. And I had so much, that was the hardest level that came from me. I had so much trouble with Tails, I think that's where you get Tails' hover mechanic.
00:59:00
Speaker
And I just found the thing was so unpredictable. It would work at points, but then it wouldn't work. Sometimes you would clip into something and it would cancel the hover and then you'd like absolutely scream. You'd fall into the quicksand and die. But I didn't have that issue with Eggman, so I don't know whether I was just really severely incompetent in that Tales level. And I just psyched myself out and I just couldn't do it. I was just fumbling all over the place. I think overall it was a refinement of Gamma's gameplay, but I don't know why it has such issues with Tales. And I really can't explain why. It must just be my incompetence.
00:59:28
Speaker
I have to admit I streamed this game like a couple weeks. In fact it probably was last month and I gotta say I feel as if I had similar problems with Tales and I don't know what it was, if it was my controller, if it was just the way the game's optimized and the PC. I totally agree because I was having trouble with the hover mechanic where sometimes it would cut out. Again, not all experiences are going to be the same there but
00:59:53
Speaker
Yeah it just seemed weird. The one I have to admit I hated the most was the treasure hunting stages because as I said not only did they nerf the treasure hunting mechanic as of there where you know you had the radar which only pinged for one object, you also had Rouge's levels and I know that the dark story is supposed to be a lot harder. I did not like Rouge's stages at all in this game. I hated the fact that Eggman said she had 15 minutes and she said
01:00:23
Speaker
five minutes should be plenty and it's like well why are we here Rouge just to suffer what why are we here if you're just not gonna listen to Eggman Mad Space as well and meet your hair both of them hate them really hate those levels I do not appreciate them whatsoever that is my rant
01:00:40
Speaker
for those two. Those were the main kind of ones. A Quotic Mine heated a Quotic Mine up until I got the breathing apparatus because remember I went through the whole game when I first played it and I forgot to get it. Or sorry, I didn't even realise that was like a power-up you could get. So I had to go all the way back to a Quotic Mine and get the power-up for breathing underwater and then it helped me in the last level. Do you know how hard that last level is by the way? I cannot imagine doing that last level without that at all. I don't know how you do it.
01:01:10
Speaker
Oh, I didn't. Like, I kept trying and trying and I thought, okay, this is ridiculous. There must be something that can help. So, you know, I went up on the old dial-up internet and I was like, huh, what do you know? I love that. I love that.
01:01:25
Speaker
I was an absolute nightmare. I'm going to be honest, I don't know if I prefer the story in this one to the first game. Where do you stand on this? I definitely prefer Adventure 2's story. I just think it's more competently told and there are really great elements to Adventure 1's story. I just think it suffers from the structure and how
01:01:47
Speaker
unfolds I think really kind of dampened my enthusiasm for the story. While with Adventure 2 it's much more logically told and I just found it quite compelling and I like the different characters and I like that you've kind of got this redemptive arc of shadow and it felt more natural in the end as well why all the characters were teaming up.
01:02:04
Speaker
While I don't know, it felt a little forced in the end for Sonic Adventure, while everybody decided to show up right at the end there. I kind of felt like it made much more sense why everybody was going to come together in Adventure 2 to stop the space colony arc from crashing into Earth. I kind of liked it more. I think just because it was more logically told to me, I was able to follow it a lot easier.
01:02:24
Speaker
What I will say in defence of Sonic Adventure 1 is it does feel more like a translation of the old games, if that makes sense. The whole concept of Sonic Adventure, and I'm not saying Sonic Adventure is better in that regard, I would definitely agree with you and say Sonic Adventure 2 has the better story, and I think the reason behind that is the fact that it stands on its own
01:02:48
Speaker
is a story, whereas Adventure 1, although the adventure as they are, and you know the environments are there and everything, is very much a Dr. Eggman has an evil plot. Let's stop him. And that's the whole game. It's Sonic stopping Eggman, and although we could say that for 90% it's Sonic games, but
01:03:04
Speaker
With Sonic Adventure 2, there's definitely a lot more going on. You know, you've got the mystery of this new character, Shadow the Hedgehog. Who is he? And why does his audio keep clipping above the other characters? We might never know. Hashtag, I will make you eat those words. Okay, one thing I will say, let's get the elephant out of the room. I hate the audio mixing for this. I feel as if we are the under edited for Sonic Adventure, the nearly over edited.
01:03:30
Speaker
for Sonic Adventure 2 where you've got characters that you basically can't hear them because the backing music is too loud, the audio just clips over other characters and they're interrupting other people. It's bad, isn't it? Yeah, there's definitely, you can definitely, I do agree, it does feel like, it depends on the swung too much the other way with Adventure 2. They definitely were still trying to find their feet in that regard.
01:03:53
Speaker
That's the major criticism I would levy against this game other than Security Hall and Mad Space. Yeah, I would say that narratively this holds up better because it is its own story and it has a lot more going on than because the central core of it is Eggman trying to take over the world but
01:04:12
Speaker
It's not just all about Eggman, if that makes sense, you know, you've got Shadow being a very key player and all with us telling Eggman about the space cult and the arc and having his own motivations and we get the horrific flashbacks to him witnessing his friend Maria getting shot and I've gotta ask you Adam, because obviously you played Shadow the Hedgehog first, you've heard me go all in about, oh look at how silly it is that Maria gets like shot and everything and
01:04:40
Speaker
How do you feel about Shadow's characterisation in this game, in comparison to Shadow the Hedgehog and beyond? I think his characterisation here was a lot better adventure too than it was in the Shadow the Hedgehog game.
01:04:55
Speaker
Just because the Shadow of the Hedgehog game is so muddled and there's so much, like, is he an android? Is he really, there's all that kind of, that faff to it. While at least with Adventure 2, it was quite interesting when this character just shows up and then you're like, who is this? You know, it's an interesting character. And then you learn more, you learn more about the backstory and you kind of understand what his motivations are. But then you get a nice bit at the end where, you know, he kind of remembers and he realizes, you know, what the promise that he made. And then, again,
01:05:22
Speaker
major spoilers again here, but he sacrifices himself in the end and it's a nice, he has a nice arc in this in a way that I did not, first I didn't finish out of the hedgehog, but I don't know, I didn't feel like I was gonna get that kind of satisfying arc, and maybe the game does, but I didn't find that anyway.
01:05:38
Speaker
I know people like him in 06. I didn't play enough of 06 to see his whole arc, so I can't really comment on that. I liked the character in Adventure 2, and it's not perfect by any stretch, but I just felt he had a really nice narrative arc. I thought there were really interesting elements to his character, and I just thought he developed really well over the course of the game.
01:05:57
Speaker
I feel as if, nowadays, because of games like Shadow the Hedgehog, that, and ironically enough, even Sonic 06, I think, characterised them better than Shadow the Hedgehog in any iteration since. Because, for some reason, ever since Shadow the Hedgehog, everybody associates Shadow with being this gun-toting, oh look at me, I'm riding the motorcycle, born to be bad kind of character. That's just not who Shadow is.
01:06:26
Speaker
and again you know it's not like a hedgehog game, don't take it seriously but it's kind of criminal almost in gaming terms but it's kind of criminal how they portray him in the later games because in this game he has he's got like quite a tragic backstory and i feel as if in this game in particular they really they walk the line you know between what is acceptable and what's straight up fan fiction at age of course with Maria getting shot and
01:06:53
Speaker
and Gerald Robotnik literally trying to cause a genocide of humanity by crashing the space station.
Shadow the Hedgehog's Storyline
01:07:00
Speaker
There's a lot of really dark elements in this game, even for a Sonic game. This is long before we have Sonic getting killed, before we have Shadow shooting guns. This is a story about a twisted hedgehog that has been locked up for about
01:07:15
Speaker
50 years in isolation. The last memory he had was him getting shot into space while his best friend died in front of him and there was nothing they could do. You know, there's some really hard-hitting things compared to... I mean, obviously there are moments like that in adventure, but nothing is hard-hitting. And would you agree with that?
01:07:35
Speaker
or am I just being too overdramatic in this one? No, there's some really kind of dark elements to Adventure 2, but in a way to me they felt more appropriate than in some of the other games which have tried kind of darker storytelling elements. The stuff that's in here, especially with Gerald Robotnik's plan to take it around on humanity, it felt more fitting in this game than for instance something like Silver ruminating on whether it was
01:07:57
Speaker
you know, whether it was morally right to take a life. Just something like that in Adventure 2 just felt more fitting. So it felt like storytelling on a kind of more epic scale than, you know, certainly than the kind of old Genesis Sonic games. And it felt like that kind of, they carried that on from Adventure 1's attempt to have a kind of epic story. But I just thought it worked really well. There wasn't really a narrative misstep in this game that I can remember.
01:08:19
Speaker
You know, while I feel like in some of the other ones, I think in most of the Sonic games, there's something where I'm like, oh, that didn't work. Or I'm like, well, that feels very out of place. I don't know. Everything just seemed to kind of work in Adventure 2. There's nothing I can really put my finger at and be like, oh, that sticks out. Other than the fact they blew up a whole island filled with people. Well, you know. Well, Station Square got obliterated and nobody seemed to care about it. So what's one island in the grand scheme of things? It's OK, though. Everyone was evacuated. Wait, no, sorry.
01:08:49
Speaker
I got my notes mixed up with Shadow the Hedgehog. Oh boy, oh boy. They didn't evacuate, did they? See, this is the thing, and I'm gonna get this out of the way before we continue with, like, more of this, because it's something that I moan to you a lot about Adam. That, of course, being our running joke of talking about how the president and Shadow the Hedgehog tried to absolve Professor Gerald Robotnik as being this somehow Nobel Prize-winning
01:09:16
Speaker
peace-giver and everything, and at the end he has the infamous line of saying, let us honour Professor Gerald Robotnik. Let us ensure peace and prosperity, rules and all of this utter rubbish. Because, and I tell you why, because in this game we get to see first hand this poor, poor man who loses his whole life's work, who is trying to rescue his
01:09:39
Speaker
granddaughter from well it's establishing the comics in the kind of expanded lore they don't really say what's wrong with Maria but I think it's he's trying to cure a disease that she's got not going to go into that too in depth but long story short the gun soldiers storm the base
01:09:55
Speaker
and they think the first thing they should do is shoot a child in the face, lock him up and execute him live on camera. And of course he has this very very grim speech where he's saying how you know humanity took everything away from him. It's quite sinister for a Sonic game. You know this is this isn't your granddad's Sonic. This is really hard-hitting stuff. You know then in Shadow the Hedgehog they retcon it where Gerald Robotnik's like
01:10:22
Speaker
Oh by the way, the canon wasn't to blow up humanity, it was to blow up aliens. I'm done. I'm done. This is a crock of rubbish. This is utter ridiculous. It just shows that anybody can get a presidential pardon, no matter what you do. I honestly, this is my conspiracy theory of the night. I am convinced he's just doing this to one more vote.
01:10:43
Speaker
What from the mad scientist community? I have no idea, because first I've always like, oh my god Sonic the Hedgehog is in my van, or limo, what's he doing? And then it's like he's got a photo of Shadow and Sonic on the table, which makes me think he's got a pro hedgehog policy, but why for Shadow and Sonic the Hedgehog?
01:11:04
Speaker
And then in Shadow the Hatred, he's like, letters on our doctor Charles Robotnik. Because that was probably beamed, that video was beamed to the entire world. So he's thinking, okay, my presidential polls have been going down since the alien attack. Let's give him a presidential pardon. That'll get my votes up. So you're welcome, SEGA. You're wondering, how can we write this into the lore? I've just given you a reason, okay? Right, back to the episode.
01:11:29
Speaker
Does that now mean that if we were to go to the President's desk now, there's a picture of Gerald Robotnik outside the White House? Yeah, and there's just like a sticker over Maria's face. Would the President just put his face on top of that? I can't believe I got to meet my hero, Gerald Robotnik. Let us pay homage to this tall, incredible man. I love Gerald Robotnik.
01:11:51
Speaker
Oh, Gerald Robotnik is such an underrated character. Obviously he's dead, which is something you don't say a lot about sonic characters, but yeah, he's just such an underrated villain. Because, you know, yeah, it'd be a very short game. That's true.
01:12:07
Speaker
like Gerald Robotnik is referred to throughout the entire game. They always say, oh Gerald Robotnik, he built this massive space station, he created Shadow the Hedgehog and everything, but we don't quite know anything about Gerald Robotnik until the very end, where he's like, I had a bit of a whoopsie with the government anyway, here's a space lizard.
01:12:27
Speaker
Right, and that's at 8 decides the crash course and the entire space station towards the earth where we get a weird weird montage of these like, I have to admit it's quite a weird but interesting choice where it's like all these humans all over the world so you've got ones in Egypt, you've got ones in France.
01:12:44
Speaker
Yeah just all over the world being like oh no how terrible. It's interesting but it's just such like an old shit moment at the very end because I remember the first time I played it I think I played through the hero story and you're like yay I played a Sonic I win.
01:12:59
Speaker
But what you don't realise is if you play the dark story, Doctor Eggman actually gets the last Chaos Emerald, throws it into the machine, he's going, haha, yosh, and all of that. And then all of a sudden they turn round and there's a big danger sign flashing on the screen or warning. It depends on whether you're watching the credits. That's a fun fact, by the way. It's different in the credits compared to the cutscene. I think it says warning in the cutscene and danger in the credits. Fun fact of the night, totally useless information, but...
01:13:28
Speaker
And then of course that leads us into quite possibly one of the most stressful moments where you have to play as all characters, you have to gather up all the knowledge that you've accumulated throughout the game. Once you get by that, you have to fight quite possibly one of the E. And I'm not saying that's badly designed, but one of the worst enemies I've ever faced in my life, one of the worst bosses ever. That of course being the Bio-Lizard. And before I go on my rant,
01:13:51
Speaker
Is there anything you want to say about the bio-wizard? Yeah, so I was just, I speak about that, that final stage beforehand. I love the, I love the idea of the final, I love the fact that it is all these characters working together, you know, to kind of open the path for Sonic. I really liked that idea. I found, I found something frustrating, like, I found some of those ages quite difficult, and the fact that when you die, you're like, oh, you're out of lives.
01:14:11
Speaker
I'm going to have to play this all again, you know, I'm going to see all these characters again. So it added a good amount of tension. I managed to, I remember I was playing this, so it's basically divided into six parts, the kind of final level. And the last bit of Sonic, I remember being down there, I had like no lives on my last life. So I was like, right, I've got to get through Sonic stages because I can't go and play, I can't play the other five again, I can't do it. But it added a really good level of tension to it. So I think, I think that was a lot of fun.
01:14:33
Speaker
Yeah, the Bio-Lizard is very similar to another boss fight earlier. It's a lot harder, but it's similar. There's one where you fight a ghost, which, can I just say, has the worst voice I've ever heard in a video game. King, is it Boomboo or something? Yeah, you're right. Yeah, so you fight it with Knuckles, and he just has a voice that's like, and it's terrible.
01:14:53
Speaker
I'm sorry. The fight's okay, but the voice just grated on me so quickly. Yeah, but what's worse though? Is the ghost worse or not close to whether anybody goes, whoa, what? A ghost? That makes me laugh at least. The king boomba, I was like, no. I was really laughing. This isn't even funny in that juvenile kind of way, you know. King Boomba? You were a ghost the entire time? Okay, carry on, sorry. I'll disconnect you from this if I had the power to.
01:15:20
Speaker
for that cheek. But yeah, so the Bialys is kind of a bit like that. It's a lot harder, as you say, and it is awkward. There are some awkward stages to it. Like there's one bit towards the end where basically the Bialys kind of like creates all these kind of, are they like balls of energy? I don't really know what they are, but basically like you need to kind of direct, you're playing the shadow in this.
01:15:39
Speaker
You need to direct Shadow from each ball of energy to the next to try and get him towards the basic the Bio-Lizards weak spot. That's a bit awkward and can be quite fiddly. I don't think it's one of the best boss fights ever. Honestly, I probably preferred it to the Perfect Chaos fight, to be honest. I found the Perfect Chaos fight to be more aggravating mechanically, but I can see why you have frustrations of the Bio-Lizards.
01:16:04
Speaker
especially when you're younger and stuff like that would be a really difficult fight. After a minute, it wasn't until I was a lot older that I actually completed the BioWizard. So this is my confession of the night but genuinely when I was younger I completed it all the way up to the BioWizard, kept playing the BioWizard, I could not do it whatsoever. So I kept going back to years and years past and
01:16:27
Speaker
you know I grew older and the game was still there I left it for a while and I remember coming back to it because I think during that time I was kind of going through a difference of gaming taste at that time I was like oh I want to try more shooters I want to try this and that and then of course I came back to the Biowizard I thought
01:16:42
Speaker
haven't completed it, let's go for it." So I decided to try it and luck away. You honestly have no idea how sweaty my hands were after completing that. It was just this kind of relief where I slumped over and was like, I can't believe I've done that. I just can't believe I've won, finally. It wasn't a great feeling. Oh, it was. It's one of the best gaming feelings I think I've ever had in my life. I was just like, thank God. And then of course you had to fight the final hazard, which is when the
01:17:07
Speaker
The bio-lizard sticks itself up the nose of the space colony and drags it to Earth. Cooling concept, but very weird to explain to people over the dinner party. It's like me with all these napkins surrounding it. You see the nose is very pointy, much like Ivo Robotnik. You see the lizard goes in here. I've got a potato, the other a fork.
01:17:37
Speaker
and then I end the night by proposing a toast for a go. Let us honour Gerald Robotnik. I was never gonna get old, I love it. Aww, I love that running joke, honestly. I will never get old. Much like Maria and Gerald Robotnik. Oh wow, wow. Maybe Gunshot first, okay. I'm mopping up. I am their PR guy at this point. Gunshot first. Put that on a t-shirt.
01:18:05
Speaker
Hashtag the president did nothing wrong. Gun is not an affiliated government organisation. Actually, I don't know how true that is because someone will dig up the sonic lower and be like, actually, the winner might want to shut up. See if that is the case. I can't remember this shit. What are we going to do now? We'll be in the White House and I'll be like, stop the count. This is what we're going to do. Mr. President, get down. Instead of grabbing the photo of his wife, he just carries the photo on Chad's one side.
01:18:38
Speaker
I have to order Professor Robotik. Let us order him in the bunker. Oh my god, I love the Sonic universe. The fact that we can make a joke about this, the gun storm in the White House is why I love the Sonic universe. The fight is probably fitting with the universe.
01:18:57
Speaker
up the White House, or sorry, the Not White House, in Central City, which, I'm going to be honest, that's like a dick move, calling yourself Central City. Yeah, that's true. I mean, station's square. I mean, it's literally, well, probably square. You know, you don't see much of it, but- That's a station in Vegas. Yeah, exactly. Whereas, calling yourself Central City, you know, all I'm saying is, maybe the Black Arms didn't do anything wrong, now I'm working.
01:19:25
Speaker
Anyway, I better move on before the getter gets into trouble. For a gun, come to your house. Let us pay homage to guns.
01:19:33
Speaker
Jokes aside, and I mean when I say jokes, I mean like Shadow the Hedgehog, the game aside, I honestly love Shadow's character. This is a game that by far caused me to fall in love with Shadow's character. I honestly thought they did such a fantastic job, even though you'll play it for the first time and I feel as if people's like idea of Shadow is so sullied by the games afterwards that they'll go, always being edgy, your friend Maria got shot at. But it's
01:20:00
Speaker
and again, going back to the thing of narrative, it's just so narratively well done. Because for a game called Sonic Adventure 2, Sonic isn't as, I mean, he is prevalent, but he's not as much a focus of the story. It seems as if Shadow takes pretty much, you know, he steals the show. Yeah, Sonic is definitely not the central character of this game, which I do
01:20:22
Speaker
think is a bad thing yeah to be honest and you're right you're you're totally right in saying that I think discourse or shadow has been so colored especially by his own game unfortunately is really has really kind of damaged his reputation but he was actually looking for taking adventure to in isolation he was such a good addition I think to this universe especially if they were especially with Sega going down a more kind of you know a darker route a more epic kind of
01:20:58
Speaker
going back to the work of the episode narrative.
Character Development and Music Debate
01:21:02
Speaker
Honestly, I feel as if he has the best character development in this game.
01:21:07
Speaker
Because let's face it, Rouge, not much character development. She re-evises, oh, maybe there's more to life and stealing gems. Proceed to the next games where she does nothing but steal gems and you're like, oh, okay. Knuckles stays the same, Tails stays the same. Eggman nearly shoots Amy in the head, but again,
01:21:27
Speaker
stays the same. I mean, he threatened to make an 80 year old fox boy mincemeat. Like, this guy is unhinged and insane. I love it. He's just so crazy. And of course he tries to blow up Sonic and fails because of a two-sex marketing, which have got the... I mean, it's the cure!
01:21:45
Speaker
It's the Chaos Emerald, you know, where we get introduced to the concept of Chaos Control, which I don't know how Chaos Control works if I'm honest, because sometimes they portray it as being like, slowing down time, and others it's just straight up teleportation, so it's like, what is that? I think, I think Chaos Ex Machina is the perfect way to describe Control, whatever you need me to be, I can be it. I don't ask for this.
01:22:11
Speaker
But there are moments like that where you're kind of like, come on, you know, again, it's on the game, you can suspend your disbelief. Of course, after you beat the Bio-Lizard, you end up coming to the finale where it just accumulates into or accumulates to the final showdown between you and the Bio-Lizard who's hurtling towards there.
01:22:31
Speaker
as quite possibly one of the best songs in Sonic history plays, that of course being Crush 40's Live and Learn. Now, before I go on and you and I were having a conversation about what song was better, Live and Learn versus Sonic Adventures, Open Your Heart. And I actually put a poll up on Twitter today. Did I tell you? I didn't know. Oh my goodness. I'm excited now. What one? Open Your Heart by Lance? No, I'm only kidding. It was Live and Learn. No, of course it was Live and Learn.
01:23:00
Speaker
Yeah, Live and Learn was the one that won. And for good reason, because you were saying yourself there that you're not as big a fan of Open Your Heart. Yeah, I'm not going to say it's a bad song because I don't have the right to say what's good and what's bad in musical terms, but I don't really vibe with Open Your Heart, but Live and Learn I think is excellent and I've basically become a bit obsessed with it.
01:23:27
Speaker
listen to at least once every day since I've finished the game. It's just such a jam. I love it. Yeah, I will agree. I feel as if Open Your Heart from, and maybe this is me kind of reading too deep into it, but Open Your Heart seems a lot more kind of slow and it builds up to the chorus. Because I do love the chorus of Open Your Heart like the, can't hold on much longer.
01:23:50
Speaker
you know and it goes on and on and on and I won't sing the rest of that don't you worry Adam. You know it kind of builds up a bit like chaos throughout the game it's like this slow trickle turning into a puddle turning into a lake turning into a flood and it just like builds up it builds up into that but I do agree it's kind of hard to get into and I feel as if Sonic Adventure does a disservice at the the final act where you're fighting perfect chaos
01:24:16
Speaker
and oh god you're fighting them and the first half of it it does play but then for some reason for the second half of the fight they have this kind of generic battle music yeah it's weird it's like this monster music i don't get it i genuinely don't get it but that's what they decided to do so it's like i live and learn
01:24:35
Speaker
Whereas Love and Learn, right out of the bat, it's thematically amazing. It is just such a bop, as you said. And it is this idea of living and learning. And I'm gonna be cheesy here, Adam, so I apologise in advance. But not only is it an amazing bop, but I feel as if Love and Learn is kind of the quintessential theme for Shadow. Because throughout the game, he is under the impression that
01:24:59
Speaker
Gerald wants him to kill all of humanity, you know, take out his revenge on people. By the end of it, he's reminded by, you know, Amy of all people that Maria would have wanted him to, you know, save people. And I have to admit, it's kind of like a last minute, oh shit, what have I done? And he has to run off and be like, oh no. But that's the thing though, he goes from
01:25:17
Speaker
you know like this kind of solitary character who uses other people for his own gain and then all of a sudden he builds up this kind of trust so by the end of it as you said he risks his own life and he ends up dying quote-unquote because of it and i don't know how much more impactful this ending would have been if they just killed off shadow because the reason they brought him back was simply because he was popular i don't know how well this ending would have been received though if they hadn't been brought back
01:25:49
Speaker
Again, I don't know, I can only speak for myself. It certainly would have been a very impactful ending, but that had been it. This was Shadow's only appearance. But then again, I guess because you're such an interesting character, you kind of do want to see more of him. So that's a difficult one, isn't it? I don't know what to say.
01:26:06
Speaker
Because he's such a popular character, it's oversaturated with, oh look, Shadow the Hedgehog, he's got a Glock, da da da. And you're like, great. But Shadow never used to be like that, there was so much more to his character. And again, I use this phrase a lot, it's not exactly the Citizen Kane of gaming, but at the end of the day, it's
01:26:26
Speaker
not as bad as people say. That's what I'll say, because I know a lot of people go back to play Sonic Adventure, they'll go back to play Sonic Adventure 2, they'll take all these kind of preconceptions in saying, oh, it's a glitchy game, oh, it's this and that. But at the end of the day, that's not what it was. And I know that sounds weird to say, to be like, oh well, if it has bugs at the beginning and it carries to the future, then surely that means it's a broken game.
01:26:51
Speaker
But at the time this was obviously revolutionary compared to, you know, like if it came out nowadays people would say oh it's buggy, no excuse. I don't know, maybe it's just because I'm someone who grew up with these games and went through this adventure with Sonic, with Big the Cat, with
01:27:09
Speaker
E102 gamma and then going on to adventure going through a shadow with Eggman, with Rouge and everything and just like being swept off my feet. Having like a moment of entering this world and being able to explore these new locations with these characters, being able to find out more about shadow, more about these like McGuffins that they pulled out their backsides literally and at the end of the day I think it's just so well done.
Legacy and Nostalgia of the Series
01:27:36
Speaker
And even though some bits might not hold up
01:27:39
Speaker
I would still recommend this game to people but before we end the episode I know you had a couple of questions for me. Yeah I just wanted to because obviously as you said this is a series that is near and dear to you so I thought I'd ask that I thought I'd get the hard-hitting journalistic questions in here and give you a little grilling before the end so I know you love both these
01:28:00
Speaker
or are they both equal in your eyes? That's a hard one. I would probably say they're equal. Interesting. No, no, sorry, that wasn't the end of the video. No, I would probably say they were equal, probably because I have a lot of memories playing through Sonic and Sonic Adventure. To me, Sonic's levels in Sonic Adventure feel a lot more like a translation. As I said, it feels more like a translation from the retro age.
01:28:26
Speaker
into the 3D age, whereas Sonic Adventure 2 is its own story. You know, it's got his big boy soap shoes on, it's got his tie, you know, pulled up and it's like, I'm ready to take on the world for my own, you know, story. As I said, it's not just about stopping Eggman, it's about finding out who Shadow is, what his deal is, who's Rouge, why does she work for the government, why did the president hire a dual-thief bat? Was that part of the election campaign?
01:28:53
Speaker
You know what, I would be surprised if the deviantart community played the deviantart. Well, this was the last episode, it's been fun. But honestly, I think both games have their merits. If I had to choose between one of them, I mean, maybe Sony could range.
01:29:13
Speaker
Sonic Adventure is that game I've played so many times that I could play it sleeping, whereas Sonic Adventure 2, there are some bits that still annoy me, like as I said, Mad Space, Security Hall, those kind of ones, but yeah, I would say they're both equal.
01:29:26
Speaker
that's fair like they both as you say they both definitely have their strong points and because I guess as well they they kind of I know they're just every games but they kind of do feel like a hole as well so yeah you can definitely you know that's a perfectly acceptable answer do you think because obviously you you like you like these games more than you and you are found the sonic series but you like these two games more than
01:29:45
Speaker
the others I think I'm right in saying that others in the series is it a nostalgia thing do you think or what is it about these two adventure games that makes you rate them higher than can any other games in the Sonic series
01:29:57
Speaker
have to say I feel as if a lot of it is nostalgia first and foremost because there's a lot of people who come in and they'll say oh Sonic Unleashed is my favourite game and personally I don't understand that but that doesn't kind of invalidate their opinion you know because that might have been the first Sonic game they grew up with you know same with Pokemon like I hear people saying oh Diamond and Pero
01:30:19
Speaker
Oh, I love the remakes because that kind of, you know, loose paraphrasing there. But like, oh, I can't wait for the remakes because Diamond and Pero was my very first Pokemon game. And I really, this is another controversial point here while we're at it. I do not like Diamond and Pero. I feel as if it's one of the worst of the series. But again,
01:30:39
Speaker
is like, that's not the game I grew up with. I grew up with the janky Pokémon Yoho, which going back to it now, it's filled with bugs. It's filled with, you know, mistakes. But at the end of the day, I still love it for all its flaws. And the same for the Sonic Adventure series. That was kind of the turning point that really hooked me onto the series. And I feel as if going back as an adult all these years later and kind of analyzing them. I don't think they're perfect.
01:31:06
Speaker
I will agree. I don't think these are like you know the best Sonic games ever because I have to say I had a lot of fun with Generations and I had a lot of fun with Mania and those kind of games but at the same time these kind of represent a time where Sonic was trying something new. They were trying something different. They were saying okay what kind of crazy story are we going to get Sonic into now? They were kind of testing the waters with more and more
01:31:34
Speaker
sure storyline without going full blow and shadow the hedgehog. Hashtag pay homage to Gerald Robotnik. Never gets old I told you but I feel as if that's kind of the core thing. It hit that perfect balance of adventure and story.
01:31:49
Speaker
for a Sonic game and I feel as if people who go into it now and they don't give it a fair chance because and again I'm not gonna name names but this particular people who have either played this or they've made certain jokes about like the series and you know what like I'm not gonna sit here and be like oh you can't make a joke about this it's like sacred ground you know
01:32:11
Speaker
make jokes about the janky physics, make jokes about the weird animations, but if that's your mindset going into these games to be like, this is gonna be a terrible game, I can't wait to exploit it and show people how terrible this game is, you're not going in to give it a fair chance, I feel. You're going in just to rip it apart for the sake of entertainment, and I feel as if that's very disingenuous.
01:32:34
Speaker
even if it's a Sonic game, because let's face it, pick any Nintendo game like Legend is Elder. I've said this before, but I never grew up with Ocarina of Time. I never grew up with Majora's Mask. But if someone turned round to you and said, oh, Ocarina are times bad at an age well, and I went into Ocarina of Time and I played it on the channel and said, oh, this is terrible. Look at the terrible graphics. Look at this and that. You know, that's at the end of the day, that's still so much childhood game.
01:33:03
Speaker
And I don't think it deserves the criticism that it gets. Again, it's not perfect. It's not the gold standard of Sonic games. I feel as if the gameplay is improving from those days. I wish they would take some elements from the adventure games to the modern ones, like the spin dash and things. I thought they were perfect in those games. But yeah, that's my kind of two cents on the issue. But does that answer your question?
01:33:27
Speaker
Yeah, that's totally fair. You raise a lot of valid points there and I do, I agree with you. I think the gameplay has got better, mostly. Generally, I think the gameplay has got better. Yeah. Although to us, I found Sonic Adventure 2 easier to play than I found something like 06 in Shadow. So I will say that. I think the gameplay was better there in Adventure 2. Yeah, that's fair.
01:33:49
Speaker
There was a lot it would be nice to say go back and take some of the elements from these two games That was gonna the actual last question. I was gonna ask you. Do you want to see a third adventure game? Do you want to see the sonic go back to this this game?
01:34:03
Speaker
they just kind of left it in the past and just sort of left it with these two games. It's a controversial one because on the one hand they've informally tried to usher in a Sonic Adventure 3, whether that be Sonic Heroes, which some people have informally been like, oh yeah, that's the closest we ever got to Sonic Adventure 3. Personally, I strongly disagree. I don't think Sonic Heroes holds that
01:34:28
Speaker
Randall compared to Sonic Adventure 1 and 2 for many reasons and I could like go on and on about that but you know you had Sonic 06 which was kind of teased as being like the new Sonic Adventure 3. I feel as if if they did do a Sonic Adventure 3 they would need to watch themselves.
01:34:47
Speaker
they would really need to watch what they were doing with the franchise if that makes sense. Again it's no secret that the Sonic fanbase is volatile at times, but I feel as if especially for the Sonic Adventure series they are kind of treasured games. You know it's almost as if they brought out, in fact no they actually did, I was going to make a joke and say it's almost as if they brought out like a sequel to the original games and they did. It was called Sonic 4 and it sucked. It
01:35:15
Speaker
Wasn't good. Nah, I'm not kidding. I played a bit of it. It wasn't my thing, you know, if you're a fan of it, because I have seen people who they said, oh, I like Sonic 4. I wish there was another part, so all power to you. Yeah, it's kind of the careful nature
Future of Sonic Adventure Series
01:35:30
Speaker
of it. You know, you have to make sure that if you're doing a Sonic Adventure game, commit to it. Make it a Sonic Adventure game. Don't just make it Sonic's Grand Slam jam feet knuckles. I would like to see it, but just as long as I'm careful with it.
01:35:44
Speaker
You have trepidation about if they were to try it. Pretty much. That's fair. You know, I think that's fair. For a lot of people I know, do really treasure. I've seen Adventure 2 listed as a lot of people's favourite Sonic game, so I understand there probably would be a lot of people very, very worried if Sega was to, you know, Sonic 2 were to go and make an Adventure 3. Yeah, no, well, thank you, thank you for answering the questions. And it was just lovely. It was just lovely to hear you just, you know, speak about these games and how much they mean to you. It was really nice to hear that. So thank you for sharing.
01:36:13
Speaker
and thank you for playing these games and giving them a fair shot because I know they do have the problems and a lot of it doesn't age as well as I remember it rightfully so but no thank you for giving it a fair shot. Well no it's my pleasure and to us like as I said yes I had some frustrations playing you know both these games but you know what I look back at the whole experience like I had a lot of fun with these games like I really I left Sonic Adventure 1 and was like I really I enjoyed that and I was actually surprised how much I actually enjoyed it.
01:36:41
Speaker
and then the same with adventure 2 you know sure i had my issues with playing as tails and everything like that but you know just thinking about adventure 2 now i'm just like man that was it i really liked that game that was a great game that's i still think looking back at this whole my whole journey through sonic i i still think i would probably put generations as my favorite of the sonic games
01:37:00
Speaker
And I think that it's probably Adventure 2. I really liked Sonic the Hedgehog 2 as well. But I think, I don't know, I think I'd be more inclined to go back and play Adventure 2. Just because I think it's just such a well put together game. And I think I really like the gameplay on the whole and I like the story. And yeah, I was just really impressed. You know, I really liked Adventure 1 as well. I really do. I really admire Adventure 1.
01:37:21
Speaker
For all its faults and everything, I think it was a really ambitious game, and I admire the fact that Sega and Sonic Team just went for it and said, you know what, let's try all these different things. And they didn't all work, but they tried. And I think there's a lot more that works in that game than doesn't. So I really admire that game as well. So this really, I think, was a height of the Sonic series, these two games. Because I think they're both really good in their own separate ways, and I think well worth playing still to this day. I mean, from the gameplay to the music,
01:37:49
Speaker
everything kind of just falls into place as we said you know it's not a perfect game but all I can say is I am really glad that you enjoyed your experience with Sonic 1 because I'm not gonna lie I was a bit worried when you came to me and said I want to do Sonic 1 and I was like oh sweet Jesus that means you're gonna have to listen to Liros Piyomich
01:38:11
Speaker
which I was worried, look at the eye. There was some trepidation there, but honestly, I'm just so happy that you enjoyed this. For anybody out there who you might be thinking, should I get into the Sonic games? Honestly, just go back and listen to our modern age, our retro age, and our Dark Age episodes to see what we think of it. As for the Adventure series, I would wholeheartedly recommend it. Would I say it's the perfect Sonic game?
01:38:38
Speaker
probably not. I do agree with you Adam. I do think that Generations, like in terms of gameplay, is probably one of the best if not the best Sonic game in terms of gameplay. Maybe not in story, but you know, that's a story for another day. Whether you love the Retro Age, whether you love the Dark Age, whether you love the Modern Age, we all just got to live and learn. So without any further ado, Adam, thank you so much for doing this episode with me.
01:39:05
Speaker
It's been so much fun that this episode, all the previous ones, this whole month, and you know, all I'd say is pay homage to Joe Robotnik to try out a Sonic King. And with that, last homage being paid.
01:39:19
Speaker
As we said, this is the very last episode of Sonic 1. Thank you all so, so much for joining us on this journey. I feel as if by the time this is out, the second Sonic the Hedgehog movie will be out. Oh my God, what good timing. I know, exactly, isn't it? I can't wait for it, personally. Are you gonna go see it, Adam? I think I definitely will now. I'm far more inclined now, having become much more well-versed with the series, and also it's got my boy Knuckles in it. I've got to see how, I've got to see, make sure he's been done right.
01:39:47
Speaker
That's true. We're going to see our main boy Knuckles in that. And of course, Sonic and Tails and God knows who else is going to be in there. Because I don't know. There have been rumours, but you never know. You never know with Sega. Come on, bang. Come on, bang. Come on, man. Or John Robotnik, come on. Let us pay homage to Fang the Sniper. His shots continue to keep our country safe. Do you think Fang shot Maria? Oh my God. I feel terrible saying I hope so.
01:40:18
Speaker
I'm just imagining them having to go find Fang now. You know when people start in war films where they have to go travel to find the grizzled old veteran who's living out in a cabin somewhere in the woods? I'm imagining Sonic and Knuckles, Sonic and Tails having to go find Fang who's just chopping down trees and stuff, retired. I haven't heard that name in a good while.
01:40:37
Speaker
I don't know why his voice by, what's his name, you know the guy, the one with the mustache, the cowboy, Elliot something. Oh Elliot, oh I know who you mean, Sam Elliot. Sam Elliot, that's the one, thank you. Let's say Sam Elliot is. I'm going to google that and if not this will be cut from the episode.
01:40:55
Speaker
leaving you on that very controversial point to ponder as we roll into the next couple of episodes. Thank you all so so much for listening to this episode. If you want to hear more sonic content or really just any more of our general content, you can listen to the Chat Tsunami podcast on Anchor, Spotify, iTunes and YouTube under the name Chat Tsunami. So just look for the red panda under the name Chat Tsunami and
01:41:21
Speaker
will catch you there. Until then, stay safe, stay awesome, stay hydrated and most importantly, open your heart.