Gaming Target - Dreamcast: Sonic Adventure 2

Written by Ryan Smotherman on June 25, 2001

Review: If you thought age was going to slow this hedgehog down, think again.

To say Sonic Adventure 2 has been highly anticipated is a bit of an understatement. It's along the same lines as saying Star War fans are patiently awaiting the next incarnation of the Star Wars movies, there's a point where it's just off the charts high. For one, we haven't had a new Sonic game in over a year (Sonic Shuffle doesn't count), o and it's Sonic's 10th birthday, plus Sonic Team themselves have been preaching that this is the greatest Sonic game they've ever created. So, you can see where all the hype is coming from. But, does it live up to it is the question? Yes it does, although there are a few bumps along the way.

Sonic Adventure 2 brings back everyone's favorite characters from Sonic Adventure. Note I said favorite, so thankfully you won't be using the less popular characters such as Big the Cat (he's hidden through out the game), Amy, or Eggman's robot, the E-102 GAMMA (yawn). Besides everyone's favorite hero, Sonic, his sidekick Tails, and their buddy Knuckles, there are three previously unplayable characters at your disposal. One being Sonic's archenemy Dr. Eggman and the others being two brand new faces to the Sonic world. The first, and the coolest, is Sonic's alter ego Shadow the Hedgehog, he's just as fast as Sonic but he uses hover skates to blast him along (it's much fun). Then we have Rouge the Bat, she possesses the same moves as Knuckles, but she is somewhat lacking in personality. Overall though, this character line-up beats out the originals with ease.

As I'm sure everyone knows by now, Sonic Adventure 2 is basically split right down the middle, with the hero side consisting of Sonic, Knuckles, and Tails, and the dark side containing Shadow, Rouge, and Dr. Eggman. Unlike the first Sonic Adventure however, the characters are all split up equally and given 5 levels apiece. This comes as a bit of a disappointment though, seeing as you'll spend more time playing the less fun levels with Tail/Eggman and Knuckles/Rouge than you will with the Sonic/Shadow characters, this is УSonicФ Adventure, right? But in the end it still works out pretty well, since after you complete a level you can go back and play it as many times as you wish, who needs to dig for treasure and blasts things down anyway? We all know why we love Sonic games, the speed baby! Which brings us to the gameplay.

Sonic Team did a magnificent job in implementing three very distinct gameplay styles into Sonic Adventure 2. The first, and the most entertaining, is the Sonic/Shadow action stages. Just as in the first Sonic Adventure, you venture around each level at break neck speeds collecting rings, killing enemies, and searching for the goal marker. Adding to the excitement this time around is the inclusion of the new rail grind move, which is used in full effect towards the end of the game. Surprisingly, the Tails/Dr. Eggman sections of the game are some of the most enjoyable (I had my doubts). Essentially, you character is equipped with a robot suit that can lock-on and launch multiple missiles at enemies. And that's what the stages consists of, you running around blasting all the enemies you can till you reach the end of the level, maybe not the most challenging or deep gameplay around, but it's simple and fun. I guess you could call it a guilty pleasure.

This brings us to one of most inadequate aspects of Sonic Adventure 2, the treasure-hunting mode of play. Playing as Knuckles/Rouge your job is to search for the missing pieces of the Master Emerald, and it's done like this. When the level starts out you look for hanging TV's that contain clues to where the emeralds are hidden. At the bottom of the screen you have three ghost emeralds that light up yellow once you near an emerald, and red when you're on it, this is your radar, when you collect three emeralds your finished. I know this doesn't sound too difficult, but for some reason it gets tired and frustrating, especially when you're stuck in a level for 30 minutes searching for a damned emerald. I'm not saying it's terrible, actually it can be quite fun at times, but I believe it has more potential.

Boy, I tell ya, Sonic Team can push the Dreamcast like no other developer out there (PSO can contest to this). Everything in SA2 just jumps out at you in bright, vivid colors. A lot of the texture work is flawless, leaving an almost photo-realistic look. And it also runs at a solid 60 FPS, and even in the most intense of situations (including 2-player mode) it never drags down. Characters are well animated and just look really...well, they all look УcoolФ. Some of the boss characters are even quite impressive; take the EGG GOLEM for example. And the speed, o man the speed, this is most certainly the fastest Sonic ever. The bottom line is that this is about as good as it gets on the Dreamcast graphically, at least till Shenmue 2 arrives anyway.

The first Sonic Adventure sported some really great music, if you don't believe me check out our article entitled УSounding Off With SegaФ for the full scoop, or better yet, play the game for yourself to find out first hand. And with SA2 we all expected the music to be equally as good, if not better, than the original's music. And thankfully it is, usually when I first turn on the game on I'll sit there and jam to the theme song for a while, it's seriously that good. The music never lets up either, from Knuckles rappy tunes to Sonic rockin' soundtracks, it's some of the best gaming music out there. All the sound effects are in typical Sonic fashion as well, the bling noise it makes when you pick up a ring, the bong noise when you hit a spring, it's all there. But, there is one part of SA2's sound department that just isn't music to your ears.

What's that you ask? It's the voice acting. Now while it's not Resident Evil quality bad, the voices have their faults. Actually, just a few of them do, the Sonic, Knuckles, Rouge, and Shadow voices are done very well and they match the characters personalities dead-on. But some things are missing from the others. Dr. Eggman lacks a certain intensity he should possess (I would anyway if I was trying to take over the world), Tails just sounds really lame, and the Omochao's (or as Akash put it, HomoChao) voice is hauntingly bad. Overall though, it's pulled off really well and thankfully the few faults don't take too much away from the atmosphere of the game.

There are other imperfections in this title I have yet to mention. First, the camera can mess with you at times, which leaves you wondering where the heck you're at. It's not too bad in the action and hunting stages, but during the Tails/Eggman's shooting boards it can be frustrating at times. In addition, the cut scenes can also be quite annoying, especially the ones with that include Tails, just because of that horrible voice acting (please get a new person to take over Tails's voice Sega). And every now and then it's sounds as if the character are whispering, for some odd reason there voices get really muffled which sort of ruins the whole cut-scene. Yet again, these are just some minor problems that could have been easily avoided, (you think they would have noticed some of these) and in turn the game could have had a more polished feel to it.

Sonic Adventure 2 is also chocked full of extra goodies that will keep busy long after you've beat the game. First and foremost, cause it's so darn fun, is the 2-player modes. After it's 9 year absence, multiplayer Sonic returns, and with a bang. I was really surprised by just how fun the multiplayer modes actually are, you and your opponent choose whether to be the Hero Side or the Dark Side, then go at it in a two out of three battle either in racing mode, hunting mode, or battle mode. Also making a return appearance is the Chao, Sonic Team made sure to make the Chao raising mode even better than ever with the addition of a whole Chao world that is accessible by collecting the Chao key during action stages. To be perfectly honest with you though, I've never been a huge fan of the whole Chao thing, so I can't really go into many details.