Difficulty:

Hard

Time Spent:

10 to 20 Hours

The Bottom Line:

"Underappreciated"

Sonic the Hedgehog for the 360 and PS3 was not only Sonic's 15th anniversary game, but also Sonic's first outing on a next-gen console. And let me tell you, this definitely looks and plays like a Sonic game for this generation. The theme is darker, it has great visuals, and, heck, it just looks like a next-gen game! But is it really?

This game really should have been named Sonic Adventure 3, because it is almost exactly a copy of Sonic Adventure. The game has three different stories, one for each of the three different hedgehogs, who each have two other minor characters that you will play as once in a while. Sonic of course has Tails and Knuckles, Shadow has Rouge and Omega, and Silver has Blaze and Amy. After you beat the main story modes, you can always go back and play any of the action stages and the...oh yeah! The game also takes place in the area of Soleanna, and lots of the time you will be running around Soleanna looking for the next stage to play in the story, or doing missions for the citizens. All in all, there's lots to do, and it has lots of variety and it's pretty fun!

However, the game does have issues. One, the other characters you get to play as are really boring. Tails is decent, but he cannot fly straight upwards, so you'll be waggling the joystick all over the place just to get him to fly straight up. Knuckles is kind of slow, and his punches are useless....Rouge is slow and always gets stuck on walls, and it takes forever to get her off of them, making flying extremely tedious. Omega is decent, but his voice drives me NUTS. Blaze is the smoothest of them all, and Amy is just ridiculous. She can turn invisible....what? And her hammer is tiny, making enemies difficult to smash. Over all, the hedgehogs are all pretty smooth, but the friends are quite tedious at times. Also, the loading screens are quite unbearable. When you install the game to your hard drive, they get a little bit quicker, but the town missions still take FOREVER. Other than that, the frame rate does freeze up quite a bit, especially in the Town areas, in the stages, not so much at all. there are also a few glitches to beware of, because just like Sonic Adventure 12, if you're trying to get an S-Rank, glitches will kill you every once in a while. Which is extremely nerve racking.

But is the game still worth playing? Yes it is! Sure, the amigo characters aren't the best, but I found that they just took a bit of getting used to. Overall, the story is quite cool, especially the new character Mephiles, he's a tank! I also love the epic music and the amazing graphics. Sonic's levels are very fun to play, and even though the others are a bit slower, Shadow is still fun and Silver is really cool. The new telekinesis powers are very fun. However, one more thing to note, Shadow's vehicles are crap. There is only about 3 or 4, so stay away if possible. Getting S-Ranks are possible and fun because because the levels are a blast to play over again. There are also tons of silver medals to hunt down, and it is quite fun to explore levels and find them. The point of the game is to finish the story mode, but to really beat the game, you gotta get all of the gold medals. (Emblems)

Frustrations: Many, but they are mostly loading times and glitches. Most are avoidable, and you can help fix loading screens by installing the game to your Xbox 360's hard drive. PS3 users, I'm clueless. :P

Comparisons: This game is similar to the Sonic Adventure games. If you're looking for classic Sonic gameplay, I recommend Sonic Adventure. However, if you want a game to explore and a game with lots of replayablility, go with this.

Value: It's 10 bucks now. If you like Sonic, buy it. It's a bargain!

Overall rating: 7/10. True, this game has it's issues, but overall, it's quite a fun game! Check it out if you like Sonic.