Sonic Generations (3DS)

To celebrate 20 years of Sonic, Sega has launched the latest game in the series, Sonic Generations, on multiple platforms including the Nintendo 3DS. Now, the legendary hedgehog meets his classic counterpart in a new adventure where old and modern merge.

As it turns out, a mysterious new creature comes into play and starts creating “time holes,” which take Sonic and with his friend Tails back in time, just as they were celebrating his birthday. Encountering the younger, classic version of Sonic, they both start on a quest to find the source of these time holes and save their friends.

As if one Dr. Eggman (also known as Dr. Robotnik) wasn’t enough, the future Eggman, using the powers of this creature, summons the classic version of himself to double the trouble, and try to defeat Sonic once and for all.

Gameplay

Sonic is all about speed, collecting rings and occasionally avoid being killed to get that S rating on every stage, just to brag about it to your friends. Sonic Generations continues the legacy of the famous hedgehog bringing the best of both worlds.

For this tile, Sega made almost exact replicas of various classic levels from other Sonic titles, instead of recreating them. The Nintendo 3DS version is slightly modified and plays differently than the PC version. You won’t even find levels like Sky Sanctuary, City Escape or Speed Highway from its PC iteration, these being replaced with classic stages as Mushroom Hill, Emerald Coast and Radical Highway.

Play as Classic Sonic ...	... or as Modern Sonic

As most classic Sonic fans must know, the blue hedgehog can only run or do the Spin Dash trick, but this changes in Sonic Generations.

The modern Sonic, faster and with a bunch of cool moves up his sleeve (Sonic Boost, slide under obstacles, jump off walls) will teach the classic version of himself some of his tricks, including the homing attack that you will be able to use in every stage (even in Green Hill) from the moment you learn it. Hardcore fans looking for that vintage Sonic experience will surely disapprove of this.

It’s been a long time since I last played Sonic, so this game was for me quite a challenge as regards awareness and reaction speed, especially when moving through the levels with supersonic speed.

This is not a game where you can master a stage from the first run. Getting that S grade on every level will prove to be a challenge even for the more experienced players because levels get increasingly more difficult.

Every level features two acts, one for each Sonic, designed to showcase the unique features of both, and a special stage where you’ll have to catch a Chaos Emerald that will be useful to you at a later time. These stages are very fun, but they get harder and harder, as you will need to dodge bombs and maintain your speed boost.

Dodge dangerous creatures ...	... and go supersonic

As you progress, the levels are more challenging. More than once I found myself going crazy over a missed jump, ending between shortcuts or running into the same enemy over and over, every time I played an act. Practice makes perfect and Sonic Generations offers good replay value of any stage if you want to get that S grade or just finish it using an alternate path.

Apart from the story, the 3DS version of the game comes with some enhancements. You can unlock special content and new challenges using the StreetPass feature of the console. Keeping your 3DS in sleep modes earns you Playcoins that can be exchanged for new Sonic challenges, which adds to its replay value.

Time Attack is another mode featured on the 3DS that challenges you to finish every level as fast as you can. Your time can be submitted to leader boards, where you can compare it to results from other players around the world.

Video and Audio

Believe it or not, but activating the 3D feature of the Nintendo console will make Sonic Generations loose that PSP graphic look and give it a boost in terms of gameplay. Turning on the 3D will actually help by bringing depth to the stages, and thus taking Sonic to a whole new level.

In terms of sound, Sonic Generations doesn’t excel. Classic Sonic is silent the entire game and will only perform some basic actions or gestures, while the other characters (modern Sonic, Tails) have only brief exclamations.

The 3DS version also features 50 unlockable songs, which can be played from the collection room even when your console is in sleep mode (if your headphones are connected).

Multiplayer

Playing with a friend in a Wi-Fi 2-player race or challenging the world using a Wi-Fi connection can also be done from your 3DS console. You can upload your scores to online leader boards and compare them to those of your friends. By playing online races, you can unlock new content in the collection room and earn points for your profile card.

Conclusion

If you are truly a Sonic fan, you will probably love this game. Playing many of the classic levels will bring back childhood memories to all you hedgehog lovers. I'm a little disappointed that modern Sonic doesn’t get a full 3D stage to show the real power of the 3DS. At most, you will get a 45 degree shift to show what’s ahead of you.

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Sonic & Sega All-Stars Racing

Sega fans can rejoice because there’s a new and awesome kart racing game that will surely satisfy their need for adrenaline and wacky racing style. Sonic & Sega All-Stars Racing is a blissful merge between the Mario Kart racing style and classic age-old characters from Sega’s hall of fame.

Sonic, Tails, Ulala, Dr. Eggman, Shadow, Amigo, Knuckles, Billy Hatcher and many others have been brought together for the sole purpose of racing it out on various tracks for your amusement.
If it sounds like a deja-vu (granted, it borrows some of Mario Kart’s features) the game is quite unique in terms of landscapes and track diversity.

Story
I’ve abandoned a long time ago the notion that a game is only as good as its story is and with this statement I strongly emphasize that Sonic & Sega All-Stars Racing has no plot whatsoever. Honestly, I couldn’t figure out for what all these characters are racing for or what their purpose really is for attending each race.

Nevertheless, this is actually a good thing because it’s hard to imagine a story coherent enough (or that didn’t sound like a massive cliché) to support the sheer amount of characters. So, don’t beat yourself up trying to figure out what B.D. Joe (from Crazy Taxi) or Ulala (from Space Channel 5) are looking in a race against Sonic the Hedgehog related characters.

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Need for Speed: The Run Is Official, Powered by Battlefield 3 Engine

Need for Speed: The Run has been officially announced and detailed by Electronic Arts, the publisher of the iconic racing series, and will be launched at the end of the year on a variety of platforms.

We heard of the existence of Need for Speed: The Run at the end of last week, when a retailer leak busted through EA's strict embargo on information.

The publisher immediately released a teaser trailer, and it has now revealed the first pieces of information about its brand new racing game.

Need For Speed: The Run will see the return of the franchise to story-based games, with its developer, Black Box, taking things one step higher than previous titles, like Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit or Shift 2: Unleashed, which shined through their extremely polished gameplay.

“This is the year that Need for Speed goes to the next level,” said Jason DeLong, executive producer at EA. “We think that Need for Speed The Run is going to surprise people with its intense, thrilling story and big action feel. But the game would be nothing without hot cars and crazy-fast chases. So that is what we’re delivering -- explosive racing that will have players flirting with disaster at 200-miles an hour.”

NFS: The Run will have a huge ace up its sleeve, as the game will be using the new Frostbite 2 engine, created by EA's own DICE studio for the upcoming Battlefield 3 first-person shooter.

We already saw what stunning graphics the engine produced in several videos for Battlefield 3, so it's going to be very interesting to see just what it can do for a racing game.

As was revealed in the retailer leak, The Run will see players engage in a bitter race across the USA, from San Francisco to New York, with not only the police but with other racers hot on your tail.

"Entering the race is just the beginning as you blow across borders, weave through dense urban traffic, rocket down icy mountain passes and navigate narrow canyons at breakneck speeds. Powered by DICE’s state-of-the-art Frostbite 2 engine, Need for Speed The Run takes the action racing genre to new heights with stunning visuals and car physics that hug the road even at top speeds all built around a gripping storyline.

"The cars are hot, the racing is intense and the story will have you at the edge of your seat… all the way from the Golden Gate Bridge to the Empire State building."

Besides the new story, highlighted above, and the great graphics, provided by the Frostbite 2 engine, Need for Speed: The Run will see the return of the Autolog online multiplayer component, which has been refined after appearing in Hot Pursuit and Shift 2 Unleashed.

NFS: The Run will be released on November 15, in North America, and November 18, in Europe and the UK, for the PC, PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, Nintendo Wii and Nintendo 3DS platforms.

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Need for Speed: Shift 2 Unleashed

Oh, what a difference the racing line makes. For me having it around means that I have a reliable way of judging my own driving decisions. Its absence makes me feel lost in an ocean of driving possibilities out of which I am only extracted by the sickening sound of crumpling against another concrete barrier.

It does not take more than 2 or 3 races, all of them probably accompanied by quite a few restarts, to see that Need for Speed: Shift 2 Unleashed is a serious racing sum, the kind of game that can lead to controllers being thrown in frustration and to loud curse words being uttered in the general direction of the other racers.

Shift 2 Unleashed is well put together, with a nice catalog of cars on offer, some very well built tracks, good intelligence for the other drivers, full implementation of the Autolog feature that debuted in the rebooted Hot Pursuit, a lot of options when it comes to modding cars and tweaking settings and enough events to keep a gamer occupied for more than one month as long as daily racing time is at about 2 hours. The big issue that the new Need for Speed has is that it's difficult right from the start and that it might discourage more casual virtual drivers from spending too much time earning levels and discovering new events.

Gameplay
For anyone that knows the series, even if only by name, the concept behind Need for Speed: Shift 2 Unleashed is pretty straightforward: player creates account, engages in racing, picks favorite car, tweaks performance, beats opponents, crashes hard, watches replay, gets creamed by superior opponents, learns new tricks, beats all computer opponents, shifts difficulty up.

The experience in Shift 2 Unleashed is similar to other games in the simulation genre, but there are quite a few differences that stand out: the level of detail included in the simulation, the tough opponent Artificial Intelligence, the amount of tweaks that can be made to a car and the way each track is broken down into sections that can be mastered independently.

One of the best things that happens in the game is the first pre-race drive around, which allows the game to test the performance of the player, starting with whatever settings he wants, in order to then propose a better selection of options, better suited to the skills one has.

Then Shift 2 Unleashed throws the player in one of the most powerful and hard-to-guide cars in the game, on a pretty tough course, again testing the player on his skills while offering an attractive incentive for the future in the form of money to buy the first car in the proper game.

Despite being at the very beginning of the game, it's one of the toughest races of the whole Need for Speed and can be really frustrating for newcomers, especially if one is trying to win it outright. After doing quite badly a couple of times, I just let go of trying to win and just got through the race to get to the career progression. Going with the flow and learning to only get the minimum result for progression is a must for anyone who plans to spend a lot of time with the new Need for Speed.

The Artificial Intelligence in Shift 2 Unleashed is pretty capable, able to keep the line as long as the road is clear but also capable of fighting with the player for the best line and taking him out on gravel or on grass in order to slow him down. There are some issues when it comes to the city-based races, mainly because some of the stars involved a slow corner after a long straight and this can lead to multi car pileups that ruin the rest of the race.

Of course, the game suffers from the long-running illness of all racing simulation: the race to first place. I found I was often restarting in the first half of the race to make sure I got as good a position as possible going into the most important corner sequence. Keeping the first position for the remainder of the event then became rather simple.

Shift 2 Unleashed emphasizes the need to mod the cars in order to win the toughest races. This can be a problem for those players who are not car enthusiasts, but the game has a solid system in place which shows what various modifications mean for the car, though taking the car out on a track is the only way to get a real feel for how things change after a few new, better parts are put in.

The best way to enjoy the game is by using a wheel and setting the realism settings high, only scaling them down if one event proves completely impossible. A controller appears to be the second best option and a keyboard is, unfortunately for pure PC gamers, the worst control method for Shift 2 Unleashed.

The game feels harsher than that of Gran Turismo 5 and all of the cars seem incredibly nervous, ready to spin out at the slightest provocation, but the constant danger is a good way of injecting some more adrenaline into each twist and turn.

A final warning: Need for Speed: Shift 2 Unleashed is a tough game when striving for full realism. Make sure you are prepared for quite a few setbacks, otherwise first drop the difficulty and then the realism until you find a set of settings that feel comfortable and where three run-troughs for one race achieve the desired result.

Graphics and audio
Need for Speed: Shift 2 Unleashed is quite the good-looking game, no matter the perspective the player chooses to drive from. The tracks are detailed, the information from the heads-up display blends well into the actual racing action, and the cars are all detailed, even though at times a little too many shining surfaces for my liking.




The out-of-the-race presentation is also slick and engaging with the only real problem being that pre-race intro sequences cannot be skipped, which is a problem when retrying for that elusive number one position for the ninth time or more.

But, the bigger highlight of the presentation for Shift 2 Unleashed is the sound. The team has clearly taken a lot of care with making sure that all vehicles, from the entry level to the fastest, sound powerful, like racing machines ready to destroy the opposition. There are many cars in the game which players will probably never hear going 200 kph in real life, yet every sound in the game feels incredibly realistic and expands the immersion.

Conclusion
Need for Speed: Shift 2 Unleashed makes it pretty clear that Electronic Arts is looking to split its premiere racing franchise into two very distinct lines, one dealing with the road-racing experience, complete with the concept of an open world and police chases, and another one that is more simulation focused and is more interested in the pilot's experience.

Shift 2 Unleashed very successfully fills the requirements of the second title and, following the success of the last Criterion made Hot Pursuit game, it's safe to say that Electronic Arts has a series which manages to cover all the bases of the driving game genre well.

The challenge will now be to think of the future of the Need for Speed series and see how both games can evolve and keep players interested in the long term, when the surprise of Autolog and good simulation mechanics begins to fade.

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