It’s amazing to think how much has changed since 2011, when the Sonic Generations was originally released. Back then, the blue hedgehog’s public perception was way worse than it is today, with a couple of games of questionable quality preceding it to blame for. It was without surprise that when Generations came out, being incredible as it is, it felt like the second coming of Christ, becoming without much doubt an instant classic.
The situation is quite different now in 2024. SEGA did a brilliant job these last few years with the franchise, not only with the most recent games and compilations (for the most part), but mainly with everything else, such as merchandise, TV shows and movies, making Sonic more relevant than ever for the mainstream culture. It’s precisely in that context that Sonic X Shadow Generations appears - a remaster that initially didn’t look more than an easy way to promote the upcoming Sonic 3 movie, where Shadow will be prominently featured. For the surprise of everyone, it turned out to be much, much more than that. This is truly the “Year of Shadow”.
Not much to remaster
For those who never played Sonic Generations before and have no idea what I’m talking about, let me explain it. This game was essentially a huge celebration of the series’ history - being released to celebrate its 20th anniversary - recreating some of its best stages, from the Green Hill Zone (Sonic The Hedgehog, 1991) to Planet Wisp (Sonic Colors, 2010). A well crafted game combined with the nostalgia factor was a recipe for success.
The concept of remastering Sonic Generations might be a bit silly, considering how good the original game still looks like nowadays, but there was always a chance for things to go wrong, like it happened in the past with Sonic Colors Ultimate, ported by a third party and launched in a terrible state. This time around SEGA didn’t risk and put the original developers, as in, Sonic Team, in charge.
The result was magnificent. Sonic Generations is here in all its glory, but now with improved resolution, textures and framerate! Besides that, all the cutscenes’ dialogs were apparently re-recorded to include more references to the previous games’ events. This was totally unnecessary but it perfectly reflects the effort put on this.
The new Shadow campaign
Now let’s talk about the real star of this release. When you boot the game, you are presented with two separate options: Sonic Generations or Shadow Generations. The first is what I described in the chapter above, a remaster of the original release. The second is an entire new campaign with a distinct gameplay and stages. Obviously I jumped immediately to this option once I got the game.
Shadow’s story, while it overlaps with Sonic’s one, is quite unique. Much more dark and sad, fitting for the character. Here Shadow, much like Sonic on its side of the story, gets stuck in a weird time loop and is able to revisit past events, which means more reimagined stages! Since Shadow was introduced in 2001’s Sonic Adventure 2, the first stage featured is precisely from that game, with other notable inclusions being Kingdom Valley from the infamous Sonic’06 and Chaos Island from Sonic Frontiers. Actually this last one doesn’t make much sense canonically, since Shadow doesn’t appear in Frontiers, but honestly I don’t care, because the stage and its remixed soundtrack are awesome.
Speaking on Frontiers, a game that I absolutely adore despite its shortcomings, it’s very clear that it served as a backbone for this Shadow Generations. Here we also have an “open zone”, where we can not only navigate between stages, but also run freely while collecting the many random tokens spread around by completing small environmental challenges. Obviously Shadow’s open zone is more condensed than the vast islands of Frontiers. Probably because of that, exploring it becomes a bit tiresome after some time. Frontiers’ influence is also felt in the gameplay, with Shadow being very responsive to the player inputs, just like in that particular game. This was something that I only realised when I jumped back to Sonic Frontiers and had an hard time readjusting to the more floaty controls of that game. With that said, both gameplay styles are fine, but if I had to choose one, it would be Shadow every day.
Pros
- Sonic Generations is great as it was 13 years ago
- Shadow Generations isn’t just a bonus, but an entire new game
- Shadow’s gameplay precision is arguably the best in the entire series
- Amazing new reimagined stages
Cons
- Shadow Generation’s open zone can become a tad repetitive
- Sonic’s controls feel a bit floaty in comparison with Shadow’s
Great✦✦✦✦✧
Sonic X Shadow Generations is a masterclass in how to remaster and re-release a beloved game, by updating it to today’s standards and bundling it with an even better new one!
<< More posts