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Just when we get a fantastic portable Sonic release from a different studio than Sonic Team, Sonic Team give us a portable release that isn't even in the same league! That's twice in the same month that Sonic Team have managed to ruin their own franchise!
So why is Genesis so bad? Why should it be bad? I mean, a portable version of the original Sonic game plus the ability to spindash sounds excellent to me. But somewhere down the line, Sonic Team have managed to destroy this title. Technically, this should have been an easy job. Emulate the original game, shrink the aspect ratio and add a spindash. But what seems to have happened is the original source code hasn't played very well with the Game Boy Advance causing Sonic Team to re-write Sonic's gameplay engine. This means Sonic mechanics are slightly wrong making the experience less authentic. Another annoyance about this title is the fact that items such as badniks and moving platforms don't always appear as you get to them meaning badniks and platforms will just appear when they want to, making the game very unpredictable. Places where experienced gamers will know what is supposed to appear won't happen in the same way giving the player a nasty shock when a badnik drops on their head and they lose their rings for the umpteenth time making it near impossible to access the special stage (which has been ruined in its' own special way). The big problem with Genesis is the framerate. Now let me get this straight, the Game Boy Advance is a 32 bit console. To put that simpler, it's a Playstation in your hand. So why on earth does a 16 bit game run slow on it? Every level will have a case of framerate lag making the whole idea of the title somewhat pointless. Isn't Sonic about speed? But there are plenty of things for a Sonic fan to enjoy about this title. It is the closest thing to the original Sonic title in your hand. It does have every stage accurately portrayed with all the graphics intact. It does have a save feature and it does have the spindash. But a lot of minor glitches ruin what could have been the stand out title of 2006. Thank God this game only got a North American release. 5/10 Written by Sonic Yoda on 09/01/07 |