Sonic Forces Review - The blue blur on autopilot.

By Sam Coles:

Sega have provided us with some excellent titles throughout this year such as Yakuza 0 and Kiwami, as well as the excellent throwback game Sonic Mania which gave us some old school Sonic gameplay. You would hope that their new Sonic game Forces would be the next step to increase the popularity of the blue blur once more, but unfortunately this is not the case. The game is not bad by all means its functional but it is let down by a short campaign that you can finish in one sitting coupled with gameplay that feels as if it is on auto pilot where you have little input where you just hold right or up on the analogue stick throughout the duration. Let’s get into more detail.

Sonic Forces starts off rather dark as instead of a happy introduction, we are presented with a dark dystopian future where Doctor Eggman has defeated Sonic and has taken over the world. Presumed dead the rest of the team must carry on the rebellion knowing that Sonic’s spirit is watching over them, however it turns out that Sonic is still alive because otherwise it wouldn’t much of a Sonic game without the titular character

Gameplay is split up into three sections you have the boost formula with 3D Sonic that started in Colours, classic 2D Sonic and the gimmick for this game an avatar that you can create. The selling point of the game is that you can make your own original character, I say selling point because no matter what you do the created character looks like something from the depths of hell.

The controls for each gameplay style is competent for the most part, 3D Sonic and your custom avatar feel great especially when you use the boost mode for Sonic as you barrel through enemies at high speed. However some levels are not built for Sonic’s super speed as you’ll find yourself speeding off a cliff without warning, plus these stages just feel like they are on auto pilot as you have very little input, plus it does help that you can finish most of these stages within 60 seconds, I’m not joking. 

2D stages are not good to control, after coming from Sonic Mania with its tight and fluid controls, this game has odd momentum as you can accelerate at full speed down a slope to then come to a complete stand still as you hit the bottom of a hill. The gameplay in general just feels lazy and little effort is needed to finish the game, plus the game is short and I mean really short. Do you know how quickly I finished the game? Well I finished it the same day I received the review code for this review within 3 hours, which could explain the lower price point.

The game is inconsistent when it comes to its presentation there are parts like Green Hill Zone and the city with the 3D Sonic levels look great, on the other hand there are levels that look very flat with the textures and in general are forgettable and uninteresting. At least the frame rate is high running at a blistering 60 frames per second for the most part although it does chug a bit during some of the boost segments where there are a lot of enemies.

Sonic Forces is a huge disappointment with an insanely short length where I finished it in 3 hours to the gameplay which I felt I had little input as the game pretty much played itself. After the excellent Sonic Mania this feels like a complete let down, it has its moments but overall it just falls flat on its face.