Editorial: Is Sega Worried About Sonic Colors Stealing Sonic 4's Thunder

The saga of the latest two Sonic games has to be some of the oddest handling of PR I've seen in the industry in a long time. First, Sega made a huge deal of teasing Sonic 4 through its Project Needlemouse hype campaign, with the reveal of a new 2D Sonic game met with renewed hope by longtime series fans. A few months later, without any fanfare or hype build up, Sonic Colors was announced. It was almost as if Sega was embarrassed to mention Sonic Colors. And with the announcement that it would be a 3D platformer with new gimmick characters in the colored alien wisps, many fans were perfectly content to ignore the game and put their full attention on the hedgehog's return to 2D.

Then E3 came around where we actually got to play both games, and Sonic Colors was freakin' amazing. At least for me personally, easily a contender for Game of the Show.

But I wasn't the only one who took notice. Across all manner of gaming blogs and news sites, Sonic Colors was gaining a lot of attention. After all, by all accounts it was the 3D Sonic game fans had been waiting for: fast, fun, only Sonic as a playable character, and without any of the camera issues or sticky geometry of past 3D Sonic games. Sega replied to the excitement by saying that Sonic Colors was actually a kids game, and that Sonic 4 was the game that core gamers will enjoy. Now, in a recent interview with Game, Sonic Colors lead designer Takashi Iizuka has reiterated that distinction between Sonic for kids and Sonic for the core gamer. When asked about how speed and control would be managed in Sonic Colors, to prevent the game from feeling like rollercoaster playing itself, Iizuka replied:

We know there are sometimes opinions about control from core gamers, but we're intending Sonic Colours to be played by children of probably between six and twelve years-old.

So, with Sonic Colours we have aimed more to make a game that everyone can control and have fun in. So, it's not really a game for the core gamers. If you take the rail grind, it's something that's fast, not difficult but is fun to do and looks great. It's about making a game that's right for the core audience of the game.

As I've said before, the distinction between Sonic games for kids and "core" gamers is an utterly ridiculous one to make. Sonic games on the Genesis were all kids games when they were released, and Sonic 4 models itself after Sonic 1 and 2, so logic would dictate that Sonic 4 would be classified as a kids game as well. The only difference is the nostalgia factor, but from a pure gameplay standpoint Sonic 4 would attract the same age group audience that the original Sonic games did: kids.

But I think the bigger problem is how Sega seems to view Sonic fans, as revealed in later comments from Iizuka in that same interview.

I think that there are two types of Sonic players.

One is the people who have played since the MegaDrive, who are mainly fans of 2D Sonic games and didn't really play the 3D Sonic games so much. For those gamers Sonic Team will be giving them Sonic 4 [for Xbox Live and PlayStation Network] so they can pick the Sonic game they want to play.

The other is the ones who have played 3D Sonic games and felt that the game was too difficult. Sonic Colours is the game for those types of players. It's still a 3D Sonic game but the controls are more user-friendly; it's an easy to pick up and play type of game.

He seems to be completely ignoring the third type of Sonic player, the long-time Sonic fan who loved the 2D games and deeply wants Sonic to finally make a smooth transition into 3D. Long-time Sonic fans are almost universally critical of the 3D Sonic games, but we also know that the Sonic cycle is a real phenomenon and those same fans bubble with excitement with the announcement of each new 3D Sonic game, just hoping that this will finally be the one. The "core" Sonic fans have resorted to demanding 2D Sonic games because the 3D ones have been bogged down by technical glitches, terrible cameras, and incoherent miss-matches in gameplay (like fishing, shooting, driving vehicles, and God of War style brawling). They demanded 2D because Sega hadn't shown a good example of Sonic in 3D yet.

But now with Sonic Colors, fans may finally get the 3D Sonic game they had secretly wanted, and Sega seems worried. It's almost as if Sega is scrambling to purposefully sabotage excitement for Sonic Colors, which as far as PR moves go seems completely counterproductive. The only explanation I can think of is that Sega truly wants Sonic 4 to be the game that long-time fans clamor over because that would neatly fit the two demographics of Sonic fans it believes to exist. Sonic 4 prevailing with the "core" audience prevents Sega from having to admit that there was more wrong with the past 10 years of Sonic games than just the difficulty level. And after all of the market research and PR efforts, Sonic Colors is striking a chord with the "core" audience just as much as Sonic 4. Why Sega doesn't seem to think gamers are capable of being interested in both games is completely beyond me.

The fact that Sega is worried makes me worried too. Sega keeps saying that Sonic 4 is made for the "core" audience, but thus far all we have seen of Sonic 4 were the first few levels, which didn't stand out as any more directed at a "core" gamer audience than Sonic Colors did with its branching paths and deeper power-ups. All we have is Sega's word, the same word that said both 2006's Sonic the Hedgehog and Sonic Unleashed would be Sonic's return to glory.

NaviFairy
Posted to Video Games on 13 August 2010 · Comments (7)
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