PixlBit

Games of the Decade #16/Blog a Day #15

Hello everyone, how are you?

A while back I talked about how some well-known game franchises get spin-off games. Sometimes there are cases when the main series of said franchise has lost its way but somehow a spin-off is doing so much better. A series that had no idea what it was doing once the 90's were over was Sonic the Hedgehog. But while his core titles didn't do well, some of his spin-off games were actually really good, which was quite the opposite of the main series. One of the games in question was Sonic and All-Stars Racing Transformed.

 

                                       The music in this game is really incredible ♥

That name is still quite the mouthful years. Backstory time: Following the success of Sonic and Sega All-Stars Racing, Sumo Digital decided to make a sequel that improved upon the first game. Sumo Digital is no stranger to working with Sega as they have made various games for them in the past, games that they have made with Sega includes various Out Run games and Sega Super Star Tennis. But one thing that can be said about Sumo Digital is that racing games are their bread-and-butter.

The game plays like Sonic and Sega All-Stars Racing, but the twist here is that you not only race in land, but also in the water and air. This is achieved by transforming vehicles that have 3 modes, car, boat, and plane. Pass through a blue gate in a course and your vehicle automatically transforms to a different form that corresponds to the type of terrain up ahead. Not only that, but a number of courses also transform as well which is also pretty amazing.

Since transforming vehicles are a new gameplay element in the game, each type of vehicle handles differently too. Each vehicle has a different technique based on the terrain, like on land you can drift your car. On the water, the boat vehicle has realistic boat physics and you can also use waves from the water as jumps or ramps to catch air and do stunts. Lastly on air, you can roll out of the way to dodge obstacles and you can even get a boost when you dodge an obstacle in the course. 

 

 Carrier Zone is among one of my favorite levels due to all the action going on while you race

The courses definitely deserve a special mention too. Each course if full of detail and most of the courses are based on a different Sega IP based on the characters that are in the game. All the courses are from Sega games, but a number of the courses don't have a character that represents that franchise. What I love about the courses is that some of them transform and if you look closely, something is going on. Think of it like a story is unfolding in a course.

Let's talk about the characters. You have various characters from different Sega games like Sonic the Hedgehog, Jet Set Radio, and more. The game even has guest characters too like Ralph from Wreck-It Ralph and famous racecar driver Danica Patrick? Okay. Sumo Digital curated the character roster based on fan feedback from the first game. And while I say that they picked some great characters, I feel like the character selection was much better in the first game. However the pc version of the game has a number of characters not available in the console and handheld versions of the game.

"But Captain N, where can I play this game?" Well hypothetical reader, you have many options to play it. It is available on the PS3, 360, Wii U, 3DS, PS Vita, and PC. I would say go for either PC or console and ignore the handheld versions. The Wii U has some extra mini-games and you can do 5 player split-screen locally. But if you don't care for that, the other console versions work fine. The Wii U and 360 versions have an extra character not present in the PS3 version, like Wii U has Miis and 360 has Avatars. PC has some exclusive characters not present in any of the other versions. It really depends. Also the game is backwards compatible with Xbox One and they even rereleased it too but I've only seen a picture of it on the internet. You have plenty of options to choose from.

          Racing on the lava is really cool. Thought you could only race on water huh?

Final Thoughts: This has never been done in a game before. Games like Diddy Kong Racing do have vehicles for those terrains in this game but in Sonic they transform as part of the gameplay. There is something so satisfying about seeing your vehicle transform which reminds me of Transformers in a way. Each character vehicle has different vehicle transformations too which is such a great attention to detail.

The amount of Sega fanservice in this game is amazing, from the characters, to the music, and the levels. Like a lot of it is obvious in the courses but there's also these subtle ones that you can only notice if you look closely. You can tell all the hard work that went into making this game. This is definitely the closest thing Sega fans have to a Smash Bros. game of their own.

The real tragedy here is that Mario Kart 7 had the same idea with being able to race in land, air, and water, but just a different execution. Thing is Sumo Digital was working on this game way before MK7 but Nintendo announced their game first and many thought Sonic was ripping off MK which simply wasn't the case. And unfortunately Sonic and All-Stars Racing has been living in MK's shadow since which is a shame because this game is far better tha MK7 and dare I say MK8.

Another thing is that we almost got Kirby in the 3DS version of the game and Sumo Digital has said that they had a model but weren't allowed to show it and that plan was cancelled. Nintendo told them that they wanted to add Kirby in their own game first but so far we haven't seen Kirby in MK8. Fox from Star Fox was even planned for the Wii U version but that was scrapped but a sound effect from SF is actually present in the game.

                                 Ralph wants a trophy instead of a medal this time

I asked one of the directors of the game ages ago and was told that they even had plans to add more characters for the other versions like Master Chief or Banjo for the 360 version among other characters like Sackboy for the PS3 version. They had big pans with this game but unfortunately they couldn't get licensing deals for those characters. But in the end we got a really great game that is still very impressive. Definitely try it out if you haven't.

But that's all for now. Thanks for reading and I'll see you at the end of the race....