Recent reviews by Blackmore

Probably the closest a game has ever gotten to matching those N64 platformer vibes. Platforming's great too, the only downside is that it's not as long as the Rare 3d platformers it's based on (about 5 hours to beat, 10 hours to 100% the game, depending on how good you are at platforming).

Not even really game so much as just a clip show that requires very little thought to get through. And the story's lame too, doesn't really have much of anything to say and the twist is neither compelling nor well written.

All of the secondary story-lines are way more interesting than the actual main story, which is a very generic coming-of-age plot.

This game is probably one of the best 7/10 games ever. While it's overall a great game it has way too many flaws to be considered amongst the best Sonic games. Here's the breakdown:

The Story

The story and writing has been considerably better than most of the other Sonic games, and I was actually invested in a Sonic story for the first time in 10 years. But I wouldn't say it's flawless. There's an annoying habit where characters will reference a previous Sonic game with little context (almost like it's about to start a Family Guy cutaway) purely just for fan service. There's also a bunch of 'sidequests' where characters will have optional dialogue with each other, which feels like 30 seconds of dialogue where absolutely nothing of value is said. And while the overall story is pretty good, a lot of the times it feels too tied down with having to follow the gameplay formula (that is, travelling to islands and going through the same loops until you beat the boss) to be as interesting. I think fans are overexaggerating at the quality of the story. It's like marveling at the writing of Sonic Adventure 2; while yes, it probably does have the best story of all the Sonic games, that's not really saying much and it still pales in comparison to a lot of other games/ forms of media (also SA2's story was more interesting at least, because it felt less tied down by the gameplay and more free to go to unexpected places).

Gameplay

Gameplay is a mixed bag. There are high peaks, but they feel interspersed with a lot of mediocre problems. For one thing, there seems to be a lot of useless gameplay mechanics:
- You'll almost never use the drop dash because of the boost (and sometimes having the dropdash can screw you up in the Cyberspace levels).
- You can upgrade your ring capacity, but since you can only get godspeed at max rings, why would you ever want to when it makes achieving max speed harder?
- Combat moves often feel superfluous, like just being showy but not offering much difference in battle use between the other unlockable moves
- Fishing is basically braindead with no gameplay. I really think it just exists so that players can have an easy way to grind to max level, but they could of at least made it fun.
- Most of the little gameplay sections interspersed through each island are painfully easy, with little thought required. The beacons to reveal the map have little minigames that are basically braindead, and there are hundreds of little platforming sections to unlock memory tokens which pretty much play themselves.
- There's way too little moves unlocked by XP, I had basically maxed out the whole tree just playing the game normally by the time I reached the third island.

That being said, there are a lot of positives too. While the combat is no Devil May Cry, it is still pretty fun and there is a great variety of minibosses throughout each island that keep it interesting. I thought there would be lot's of repeats, but it's basically only the Ninja and Tower enemies, the rest all unique enemies with their own special fights. You can also do some crazy things during the fights in this game, and I feel like this is something that would be great if it was tweaked and expanded upon in a future Sonic game. The locations are great too, and it can be very fun to just blast through every island at max speed. Also there's...

Cyberspace

At first I was disappointed in Cyberspace. It basically resuses assets from Sonic Generations (and only the first 3 levels) while controlling much worse (there's huge hit stops when you hit enemies, the boost was nerfed, you can't shorthop). But after continuing to play them, I actually started to consider them the best part of the game. For one, there's a new music track with every level, which is a plus. But for another, I realized that it doesn't control worse than Generations, only differently. Boosting in the air is much more essential than Generations, and you can get crazy distance and take insane shortcuts if you cancel a homing attack with a boost. Given the strict time limit on some levels, the huge hit-stop with hitting enemies and the fact that parts of the levels line up well with the homing attack cancel, I say that this isn't a glitch but intentional on the part of the developers, in which case props to them. Time attacking the Cyberspace levels soon became the most fun part of the game, and while I'll probably never replay the main game, I'll keep coming back to the Arcade mode. Though at the same time, it also makes me feel like Cyberspace should of just been the main game, and it would've been better if we just got a Sonic Generations 2 (only without Classic Sonic, because he's been used to death and the Classic gameplay in Generations wasn't as good as the originals).

Better than the first game in every way, and the first game was already amazing.

If you like text-heavy RPG's like Planescape Torment, then you'll love this.

Best gameplay of the Hitman series, and it's replaced Blood Money's position as the best Hitman game in my eyes. What it sacrifices in number of locations, it more than makes up for it with the breadth and details of each level. Paris was probably one of the best Hitman locations ever made, and Sapienza was even better than that, which goes to show the level of polish that this game has. Definitely very much recommended in my opinion. Also a tip: don't play each of the missions only once. The levels were designed with multiple playthroughs in mind, and you'll get the most enjoyment out of the game by doing so.

Best gameplay out of the entire Deus Ex series. Combat and stealth mechanics have been polished to a mirror sheen. The main story does suffer some with flimsy racism analogy and glaring cut content (not that it matters much as the main story for human revolution wasn't that good either), but the sidequest stories more than makes up for it. Overall, better than Human Revolution in my opinion and probably the second best deus ex game.