Classic Game Review: Sonic Adventure

Hey guys! Welcome to another game review! This is a game about a hedgehog. A little blue hedgehog with super speed. Who am I talking about? Why, SONIC! He can really move! SONIC! He's got an attitude! SONIC! He's the fastest thing alive! He's the fastest thing alive! He's the fastest thing ALIVE!!!!!!!!!

Sonic the Hedgehog is one of the most iconic game series of all time. Starting out on the Sega Genesis in the 90s, Sonic starred in many great games back in the day, a worthy rival to Mario. Sonic has had his fair share of ups and downs over the years, (good, great, good, bad, good, good, bad, terrible, bad, bad, good, great, good, terrible!), but the blue blur is still definitely one of gaming's most famous and rockin' characters, with his super speed, devil-may-care attitude, and awesome soundtracks! As well as video games, Sonic has starred in a long-running comic book series, 5 cartoon shows, and an animated movie. Sonic Adventure was the first well-received 3D Sonic game. We had Sonic R and Sonic 3D Blast before Adventure, but those games were awful! We also had Sonic the Fighters and the hub world of Sonic Jam, but those don't count! This was Sonic's late answer to Super Mario 64. A mysterious creature has appeared in Station Square. A shape shifting being made out of water. It's dangerous. The evil Dr Robotnik has control over this creature, Chaos. He wants to collect the 7 Chaos Emeralds to turn his creature into an unstoppable force of destruction! Sonic, Tails, Knuckles, Amy, and the rest of the gang must collect the Chaos Emeralds before Robotnik does, before it's too late! But, can they?

While this game is, of course, a classic, it is a very flawed game. I'll start with all the positives. This game has a great soundtrack, as always from Sonic. The gameplay is varied, there are 6 playable characters each with their own campaigns! Some of them work great and are fun to play, others, not so much. The story is simple and charming. Most of the time. It can sometimes get a little bit too complicated or convoluted, which can be annoying. It's a game about a talking blue hedgehog. Why does the story need to be so complicated? Oh, well, that's just modern Sonic for you. Deal with it. Chaos is a very cool villain! He's one of my favourite characters in the whole series! This game also has the Chao Garden, which is a virtual pet minigame built right into the game! It's very cute and fun! The main gameplay is fun, sometimes. It can become a real pain sometimes because the camera in this game is awful! It's a joke! It's tolerable, but the weird angles really do make the game hard to play. That and the controls can be pretty bad. The graphics are only okay. It does have a higher polygon count than other 5th generation console games on the Playstation and Nintendo 64, but the Dreamcast's pixels and textures were awful! This can be a very ugly game at times. It's very dated. There were definitely better looking games on the Dreamcast. Jet Set Radio, for example. The voice acting, lip syncing, and character animations in the cutscenes are terrible! They can make the game very funny, the lips don't even remotely sync up with what the terrible voice actors are saying! The animations are very awkward, it feels like I'm watching Foodfight sometimes they're so bad!  I know this is Sonic, cheesiness is a given, but I still don't consider this an excuse to have terrible acting. Would you excuse this kind of acting in a movie? No! So why is it okay in a game? The game is long with all the character's campaigns put together, plus there's a secret Super Sonic campaign as the game's finale, plus there is DLC that upgrades the game to Sonic Adventure DX: Director's Cut, which adds more challenges, a Metal Sonic campaign, and the character models get all shiny! There is lots to do in this game with lots of replayability. There's the Chao Garden, time trials, and extra challenges to play with after the game's over, so the game won't get boring for a while. I did come across a lot of glitches and bugs. They are mostly hilarious, but the camera angle glitches are the most annoying. I actually really like a lot of the glitches in this game, so the glitches aren't a huge problem. Overall, this is a classic that people should check out. It can be fun, but it's still quite flawed and dated. This game, overall, is okay. It's 5 bucks on PSN and XBLA, so give it a try! It's definitely worth 5 bucks! I give this game a 2.9 stars out of 5. He's the fastest thing ALIIIIIIIIIVE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Have you played Sonic Adventure? What did you think of it? Tell me in the comments!

And just in case if anyone's wondering what I think about Sonic Adventure 2, I'm not gonna play it! It looks terrible! Even worse than this game! Still better than Sonic 06 and Sonic Boom: Rise of Lyric, though. Not as good as Sonic Generations, though. Play it, it's amazing.

Yeah. Shadow is me. Ugh, why does everyone like this game???

Okay, I'm out!

Game Review: Silent Hill: The Escape

Welcome to another game review! This one is yet ANOTHER horror game! This is Silent Hill: The Escape!

Silent Hill is considered to be one of the best survival-horror game series ever made. The Silent Hill games, made by Konami, have been praised for their great story, characters, music, gameplay, and, of course, scares. The games were so great that they inspired a Silent Hill comic book series and 2 Silent Hill movies! Silent Hill: The Escape is the only iOS Silent Hill game to be released in North America. Japan and Europe got a lot more. The game is very simple. You are a man who doesn't remember who he is or where he came from, just like in Amnesia: The Dark Descent, alone in an abandoned mental institution. The game is a first person shooter where you tilt your device to aim, tap to fire, and swipe to move. The mental institution is a maze and you need to find the exit. However, there are monsters hunting you in the dark, the creatures and environments getting scarier and more twisted as the game progresses and your sanity slips away. You must shoot the monsters, but you have limited ammo and must reload frequently, so if you run out of bullets, you're screwed! If you get caught by the monsters, the game is over.

This game is really freaking scary! It isn't as terrifying as it's console counterparts, but you should still be in for a scare with this game! The graphics are not very good, more of a callback to the earlier Silent Hill games on the original Playstation. The game uses the darkness to hide the unknown. You truly don't know what you will meet in the hallways of the mental institution. The creatures are terrifying in this game, and the music is the stuff of nightmares. The sound design in this game is excellent. The sound comes on even if your device's ringer is off, giving you an unexpected scare! The controls in this game are brilliant, and again are a bit of a callback to the controls of original Silent Hill games. The tilt to aim and reload feature is cool because sometimes you are shaking with fear and can't aim properly, giving the game a realistic feel. I like that you need to reload frequently, just like in real life, and I like that you have limited bullets, just like real life. This puts the fear level up a huge notch! Also, your flashlight battery eventually runs out, just like in Slender! This game does a good job at making you feel alone and claustrophobic, almost to the point that you are scared to look around. This game is a scary experience all the way! Now, the game is pretty difficult and frustrating, almost to the point where it isn't even fun anymore. The scares get less scary as the game goes on, as is with all horror games. Scary the first time, but you get used to it. You do accidentally shoot at nothing often because you are trying to move, but fire your gun instead. This wastes a lot of ammo. But those are the only major complaints I have about this game. This is probably one of the scariest games on iOS. It isn't perfect, and it isn't nearly as good as the console Silent Hill games, but as a simple cell phone game, it definitely delivers! I would recommend this game for ages 12 and up because this game is SCARY!!! If you want to try it, it is a buck on the App Store. I give this game 4 stars out of 5! A simple, SCARY, experience!

Have you played Silent Hill: The Escape? What did you think of it? Tell me in the comments!