Sonic Unleashed – Part 19: NiGHTS Into Dark Gaia’s Face

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A commentary that’s been a long time coming, Fastest Thing Alive joins the BrainScratch crew as we finally take a leisurely lightspeed jog alongside Sonic as he embarks on a World Adventure, occasionally stopping to wait when Sonic inexplicably turns into a werewolf and compulsively beats things up for fifteen minutes at a time.

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Comments

Chris - X says:

Featuring Dante from Devil may cry

TheaTheAmiga says:

I don't mind the werehog really. Granted, I only played the Wii version, so levels were shorter. But I don't like how the Wii version has them all back to back. I also wish Sonic had more than 1 act per zone. But all in all, not a bad game, I plan on playing the HD day stages through the Sonic Generations mod Unleashed Project so I think I finally figured out how to enjoy Sonic Unleashed.

LittleFieryOne says:

God Dammit, I like Nights. The thing is, though, Nights would have you focus on either what's ahead of you or what's in the background that could potentially damage you. Never both at the same time, like this boss does.

NaiblistheCurious1 says:

I'd also like to point out the North Pole is still Eggman Land, because we didn't destroy anything building-wise while we were there.

NaiblistheCurious1 says:

I'd like to believe that the Gaia Temples sort of resurface on the planet's surface like ingrown hairs. They just randomly pop back up in inconvenient locations. Like suddenly Empire City has a random hand-shaped temple sticking out of its tallest skyscraper.

StarfleetOfficer Danielle says:

I like Unleashed, no, it's defiantly not perfect but has some great things to it. I wouldn't mind a "port / remastered" on PS4/Xbox One. 60fps, with Generations' controls, and Chao gardens in each continent. The Chao gardens could even be as in depth as in how day and night affects them, imagine the Werehog petting and feeding Chaos!

Robonikes says:

I want another game like Unleashed or Adventure, with a story like Unleashed.

JustAdam says:

Colours did have an actual orchestra. It was the Amsterdam Orchestra that did the title screen, final boss and level select music.

High Rollin' Armadillo says:

This game is just…okay, in my opinion. The day stages (While better than the stages in Sonic Colors) are still way too linear and rely a bit too much on split-second reaction times for my tastes (Not to mention the quick-time events just break the flow in many instances). Generations (While being a bit too easy and never scales in difficulty) at least understood the core elements of Sonic more than this game did. This game tries to give the illusion of space instead of actually giving Sonic some breathing room. And I feel only the atmosphere saves it in that regard.

The Werehog levels, while not the worst thing in the world, are really, really boring with tedious and boring puzzles and an unsatisfying beat-em'-up gameplay style. It makes sense for the story, but in practice it definitely feels tacked on — so as to not make the game several hours long. A console Sonic game with one gameplay style can work, so why did they add this unnecessary fluff? All it does is make the game tiring, not satisfying. I can erase my save file for Generations and even Sonic 3 & Knuckles and replay through it just fine, but this game shits on that aspect.

The story is good and the art direction is definitely amazing but for me characters like Amy and Chip (I'll get to him later), are just plain annoying. Amy's still Sonic's fangirl who has nothing else to do except trail him around wherever he goes and talking about how great he is which, in my opinion, doesn't make for a good character. The story would have been all the same without her as all she does is add flavor text. Amy's a capable character so why does she just stand around and do nothing?

And something about Chip just irks me. He seems a bit too 'goody-goody' and innocent for me to care about. It's almost like the writers just kind of forced Chip upon you as someone you're supposed to love and appreciate. For me, the only instances where I actually cared a little bit more about him is the Dark Gaia boss fight and the ending. It's incredibly sentimental and I appreciate when a game takes so much time building up a character to 'kill' them off in a meaningful way. But all in all Chip is just an awkward character to get used to. I don't utterly hate him, but he tends to get on my bad side more than a few times.

To this day I don't understand why people hold such a defensive stance when comparing this game to the ones that came afterwards. Yeah, sure in some aspects I feel they did a couple things right here than in Colors or Generations, but as a whole this game just drags to be honest. This game just does some key things wrong that ultimately stop me from ranking this higher than the other Boost games in the series (Rush 1 and 2 as well). It's okay, but not my favorite.

fecman94Playthroughs says:

And before Worth a Chance, My Destiny in Sonic 06 (which is the best out of those three)

Delta Phoxtrot says:

About that whole thing with memories connected with music:
My ex sang Angel With a Shotgun to me, and it was from the heart, one could clearly tell. He wasn't the most talented musician, I'll say that right now; however, he had the spirit and that's why I loved it. We broke up a few years ago, but to this day whenever I hear that song I get really sad because I was such a prick to him before we separated. If for some odd reason I ever see him again, I just want to tell him how sorry I am for all I've done, and that I hope he found someone who he'd be happy to spend the rest of his life with.

coopercastille says:

I got around to finally playing through Sonic Unleashed, and I gotta say, I think it's my favorite Modern Sonic game (yes, better than Colors & Generations), I even didn't mind playing as the werehog! SA1 is still my favorite 3D Sonic game, but Unleashed is the better game overall. The story, the music, the gameplay (despite being uneven) and the graphics are SO… SO good. It seriously wouldn't take much for Sonic Unleashed to be a great game for me. If an HD Remaster ever happened then it should:

-Improve the framerate (most obvious issue)
-Disable the quick time events
-Import Sonic's controls from Generations
-Make Sun & Moon metal collecting not too picky
-And <controversial opinion> better English voice cast (specifically bring back Ryan Drummond as Sonic + Kate Higgins as Tails, re-cast everyone else)

I can still play the game with the Japanese voices and I can handle the QTEs, but it really wouldn't take much to make this a great 8/10, for me at least…

Joseph says:

I love the Perfect Dark Gaia theme. Amazingly well done!

XenoSonic1 says:

Saying this now… this is my favourite Sonic game. I get that it has a lot of problems, but to be honest, while I can see why people like Colours and Generations more than this, Unleashed wins me over because I feel like it has more to it. I don't have any major issues with the Werehog (I actually LIKE the Werehog quite a bit, maybe because I'm into that kind of game), and I feel like running around the hub worlds talking to the NPC's gave the game a lot of depth that the two games following it didn't have. Granted, in Generations, you cold go and talk to Sonic's friends, but those are characters that I'm familiar with, whereas the NPC's in Unleashed were entirely original, giving me more incentive to talk to them and get to know them better. I will agree that the controls and the medal system are legitimate problems, and the start of the game is rather slow, but when I got past that and when I levelled up Sonic enough (especially in the Werehog's case), it really became something that I got down with.

Keith Hougasian says:

The only thing that's completely orchestrated in this game is the main-theme ("The World Adventure" by the Tokyo Philharmonic Orchestra), the music in the opening cut-scene, the fighting-theme, some level-themes, and I think the menus as well. But that's it. Everything-else is fake.

Lone Star says:

is it wrong to say that this game is by far the closest we'll get to an sa3?

superspider64 says:

Not trying to be rude here but personally i have to kinda disagree with Ted's speech on balance being that light always wins, i think the main idea of it is that there's both good and evil in the world, but neither side can really overtake the other

Ahsokaisawesome says:

I think you see Chip's bracelet in colours

GrimmyReaper says:

Game with many problems … but it holds a special place in my heart.

K. Alice says:

I like how USA and EU are the only civilizated areas

blackwind677 says:

Question: If we're underground, why are there floating rocks like they're asteroids in space?

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