Sonic's first attempt at 3D falls way short of his rival's. It's a ten car pile up of video games.
Dr. Robotnik, now known as Dr. Eggman, has been tormenting Sonic for a long time and it's about time for him to do it again. This time, he has a new minion; the evil water monster Chaos. Sonic handly defeats Chaos at first, but Eggman has a ace up his sleeve; Chaos can absorb the Chaos Emeralds to gain new powers and transform. Each new form is more deadly than the last and Eggman is on his way to finding all seven. It's up to Sonic and his friend Tails to save the world by stopping Eggman. It's nothing special, but it's more in depth than most Mario games.
The gameplay is Sonic, just in 3D. You run through stages, stopping every now and then for some precise platforming and it usually works. There are some pretty bad glitches and the camera is pretty terrible, due to the Dreamcast not having the buttons to control the camera. Some glitches can get you killed; I fell through the stage on multiple occasions. You can play as five other characters besides Sonic; Tails, Knuckles, Amy, Big the Cat and Omega. The only other character that is fun to play as is Tails since he plays basically the same as Sonic does. Knuckles' stages are all about climbing around looking for pieces of the Master Emerald.
Amy's stages are all about running from a robot and different obstacles try to stop you from doing this. Omega's stages are about getting to the end of each stage, blasting everything in your path. Big's stages are by far the worst of them all and probably the worst thing I have ever played in an otherwise okay game. His goal is to fish for his friend Froggie and you are timed. The fishing is incredibly awkward and getting the stupid frog to bite is aggravating. As for the other characters, they are generally playable but the game shines with a serious lack of polish for the Dreamcast, SEGA's entry into the sixth generation. Super Mario 64 was ten times more polished and playable than this game.
When not in a stage, you explore multiple hub worlds looking for the entrance to the next stage and various secrets. You can enter the Chao gardens from the hub worlds and raise creatures called Chaos. As you defeat enemies, you get these little animals that, if you give them to your Chao it changes their appearance. These little Chao can take up a lot of your time and there is a a lot to unlock with them, but it's hardly necessary. The Chaos do little to mask the lack of polish in the basic gameplay, and considering this is an improved port, the original must be awful.
The music is pretty good. Its usually your usual Sonic fare, but the title track is a rock song. This song plays only a few times but it's pretty cool when it does play. The voice work is pretty bad overall. There are some lines in the game that are LAUGHABLE at best and sickening at worst. Jon St. John, of Duke Nukem fame, lowers himself to voicing Big the Cat and it ruins everything. If this game gives you the option of turning the voices off, it'd probably be wise.
The visuals make you wonder how the Dreamcast could ever compete with the GameCube. The models are all solid, smooth shapes slapped together and the NPCs in the hub worlds look absolutely TERRIBLE. There are also framerate dips on top of all this. Sonic and his friends look good but when they talk it's like something is wrong with them. The facial animation is atrocious and it's an abomination to everything. The levels looks decent though the enemies look generic and simple. Sonic's first 3D outing makes Super Mario 64, a game that was released a full generation ago, look like the Mona Lisa. Sonic's world looks like a slightly advanced PlayStation game.
PROs:
- Sonic and Tails are fun to play
- Dr. Eggman's voice is excellent
- Music is good and opening track is cool
- Controls are good for the first 3D Sonic
- Chao garden is cute
CONs:
- Gameplay is bugged
- The other four characters aren't very fun
- Big the Cat is the worst
- Visuals are worse than Conker's Bad Fur Day (an N64 game)
- Facial animation is terrible
- Sonic's campaign is pretty short
- Final boss controls terrible
- Hub world is atrocious
- Chao Garden is a useless distraction
- Fishing
- Searching around the hub world trying to find some small detail you missed
Overall, Sonic Adventure DX: Director's Cut is a pretty poor first impression for any Nintendo gamer who has never played a Sonic game before. It's buggy, mostly unfun, unattractive, bland game with only a few fun spots. Sonic's stages are mostly fun and Tails is pretty enjoyable as well, but the other four characters take most of the game time for themselves. It's a poor first attempt at a 3D Sonic game, just buy Sonic Adventure 2: Battle instead, unless you really want to see what's up.
Story: 5.0/10
Gameplay: 3.5/10
Audio: 6.0/10
Presentation: 4.0/10