Im only partway through the video currently, but I think the difficulty drop from Team Sonic to Team Rose is because Team Rose is meant to be played first. While the UI indicates Sonic should be played first, if you go into the tutorial, it has you play as Rose. Kinda like a subtle hint that they are the "beginner" team.
It does apply the other way around too. Heroes being a multi platform release around the time when physical games were atill mainstream. Make it incredibly easy for Heroes to end up in the bargin bit, especially for less popular consoles like the og Xbox. Also being locked to just the GameCube was rough in terms of SA2 battle exposure. Like I fall into that older zoomed camp that played sonic Heroes used for ps2 as my first sonic game, and if SA2 had a multi console release it could of been thst first sonic game for people like me too. I doubt I'm the only person in the community thst played Heroes prior to SA2 battle, mainly due to heroes' much wilder availability.
I started playing Sonic Heroes since December 2023, mastered it, 100% it by myself (never doing that ever again), completed Super hard mode, had a lot and I mean a lot of fun, it's one of my favourite Sonic games, but it's a big flawed game, I don't know what Sonic team was thinking when pacing the game, I think they expected players to use the Omochao guide on the select screen but it failed horribly, man games need to have a better tutorial. Originally the teams where all going to be the exact same, some of team rose's stages you can go behind their goal rings and still find the original goal rings of the other teams. (Also suprise: I play Sonic Heroes emulated on my phone from the beginning)
You definately nailed why I love heroes in the begining. It feels like a classic/rennesance era game compared to SA2. While i prefer SA1 to heroes, heroes is one of the only sonic games from the 2000s that I actually like.
I started with SA2B as a kid and then got Heroes after. The feel of Heroes was all wrong. The textures were more plastic, the polygons were more jagged, the opening menu was garish, the impact on enemies felt weak, the jumps and homings felt slow and floaty, and the special moves felt stilted. The tornado and wall jump in particular cancel all other momentum, and the flight character’s ‘flying’ being more a glorified jump just felt bad. 06 looked awesome, but I (thankfully?) didn’t have a next gen console to enjoy it. I don’t recall Heroes being harder than SA2B. I could 100% Heroes, but I couldn’t 100% all SA2B’s missions. I also disliked the goofier levels (more reminiscent of the OG games). Calling something like Pumpkin Hill 'realistic' feels like a stretch, but it felt more like a place that could exist. I should probably try Frontiers.
Regarding the visuals, I think that was all part of the weird character designs many ppl were experimenting with in the early 2000s. Everything looked weirdly shiny and fake. I think SA2 is easier to get into and harder to master, whereas Heroes is harder to get used to (mostly because of the weaker controls and unforgiving level design) but once you get used to how everything operates you could 100% it easier than SA2.
This was such a great review, it went into a lot of specific depth and gave interesting perspectives i haven't seen on other Heroes videos. I always find hearing other's personal history with the older Sonic games fascinating. I love watching Sonic restrospectives; it's really relaxing for me.
As someone who has beaten this game with 120 emblems, 141 A-ranks and Super Hard Mode: fuck Chaotix extra missions. I dont mind the story missions, but the extra ones haunt my nightmares.
This was a great video that I loved sitting and listening to. It was quite interesting and in depth! I personally would keep all four teams. They are meant to be difficulty specific from Easy(Rose), Medium(Sonic), Hard(Dark), and Chaotix(Mission). If they put a little wording to the side, I think that would have helped people figure it out easier. Sonic Heroes despite it's many flaws, is still a great and fun game. It does get a bit repetitive having to play through it so many times though. Getting all A ranks is also a huge challenge, but feels accomplishing when you get it done. Also, may I recommend the character voice be toned down a bit in future videos? It's just a small critique. I had to turn the video up to hear it, but then Sonic just shouts at double the volume compared to the talking. I got jumped scared a couple times with how abruptly loud it was.
I'm glad you enjoyed it! I don't know if I delivered it well, but my point about the multiple playthroughs being too much was specifically as a requirement to unlock the final story. Otherwise I don't mind that there's more content and different difficulties and whatnot. All-in-all though I did have a LOT of fun on the game. But I also had a lot of fun on every other game in the series so I'm probably a bad judge to go off of 🤣. Also regarding the audio issue, that's good to know. I've been working on soundproofing my set up so that it could speed up my editing and I think it's resulted in my voice audio being lower, so I'll try and be more cognizant about the random bursts of sound so I don't destroy anyone's ear drums. Anyway, thanks for watching and for the comment!
Bro I remember buying this game as a kid. It was my first ps2 game ever. Took me so long to get all 7 chaos emeralds. And even longer to beat Metal Sonic. But once I did. Mannn it was a good ass time 🔥.
The only thing I hated about this Game was putting the Chaos Emeralds in Special Zones, I did everything except being able to collect them and after them being apart of the Plot in Sonic Adventures 1 and 2, I was really disappointed they made them separate.
Rail Canyon i like that there a part where you can race the train. on a first play your meant to switch rail and let the train pass but no you are fast enough to race it. keep in mind if it hits you you are Maybe dead? i have saved myself before
I belonged to that 3 group in the target. I loved the Megadrive games but I bought playstation 1 so Sonic Heroes was my 1st 3-d Sonic 🎉 and I found it hard and unbalanced. I liked it quite a lot and finished it with my then boyfriend, whi had never ever played games before. It was so much fun and frustration 🎉😂❤
A higher amount of people became fans during the adventure era, or better said, because of the adventure games. Sonic heroes was a fun game but it wasn’t adventure 3 which is why “these” fans hate it. Sonic heroes is an overall fun game. Yes, it’s slippery, but what do you expect when you go so fast? I’ve seen others play adventure and it looks so boring, the speed for Sonic is so slow it puts me to sleep. I’ve see. Turtles go as fast as Sonic in those games. The level designs are alright ish, but no where near to Sonic lvls. What I can give them though is that they do have the best story of all the games. People also complain about the “time” of each stage but let’s be honest here, for those of us that played Sonic unleashed, eggman land, we have not right to complain lol. The stages last a good time, I disliked Amy’s time frame, it was too short, Sonic’s felt just right. Going back to adventure fans, you can tell who they are based on how they play heroes, they refuse to play with anyone but the speed type, only using flight and power when absolutely demanded. That’s not how Sonic heroes plays, and they’re outright pushing against the core gameplay mechanics. In any game, if u push against the game’s mechanic, u won’t enjoy it. At max lvl, the flight type is absolutely broken, and learning the flow with the mechanics and physics feels aboletly great as you cut complete areas from the game.l, and the less time you actually spend on the ground. Sonic heroes is what the classic Sonic games are if they were placed in the 3D world.
I agree that adventure games made more fans! My argument is Heroes (based on the numbers) was more people's first 3D Sonic game than Adventure 2 battle. Also regarding the stage length, I think in Unleashed it wasn't as easy to lose a life in the Werehog levels, and if you did, you wouldn't be sent too far back. Heroes is very easy to lose a life in and there's just 1 checkpoint. But I agree that it's an overall fun game.
I was just curious have you gotten around to Mario Wonder or Sonic Superstars? Honestly while it would have deviated perhaps even more from Aventure 2, I'd have been all for Heroes committing fully to that 'return to roots' idea by being a 3D game with the same gameplay priorities as the Genesis ganes (physics, momentum, speed, pacing, etc). It's an itch still not scratched to this day
I played them both for about 30 mins on co-op but still haven't given them a true shot yet. They're sitting on switch switch dashboard waiting for me to give them a go. In due time! Also, yes I'm still looking for an official classic Sonic in 3D game haha
I'm of the mind that the only actually bad sonic game is Boom: RoL, even 06 being as glitchy and rushed as it was had some heart in it and it actually FELT like a sonic game. RoL just felt like a bootleg Ratchet and Clank.
In my opinion the reason heroes was weak is because of it does a poor job of following the sonic mentality of “story first, gameplay second”. Even the first sonic game did this right by putting sonic in so many situations out of his comfort zone. I love contextualized inconvenience so I love a lot of sonic games but not this one. This one felt random and I have very little love for it. Even Shadow is more fun.
Team Dark is actually more so the "normal mode" since their the ONLY team to see the full level. Example: Team Sonic ends Hang Castle after running down the tower but Dark keeps going down an extra section. I think there's more examples but that's all I can remember.
Yeah, it’s complicated. This game does a lot of things right, yet felt like a step back from the Adventure games. The chaotix missions can be quite gimmicky. Which game did you find buggier, heroes or 06?
I disagree on some story stuff mainly wut u say for team rose & specifically Amy. U're part of the crowd that misunderstands her character here. The point of her playthrough story wise is to showcase the growth she's had since sa1 where she decided she would go out & adventure more for herself & to prove herself to sonic which obv led to her taggin along in sa2 & partly led to her helpin her friends here. In the 1st cutscene u C her holdin a newspaper that very clearly depicts sonic draggin chocola & froggy around & both Cream & Big have no clue where their friends R & R very apprehensive bout goin on a whole quest for them that seems pretty dangerous(this is more accentuated in the character dialogue durin gameplay like most of the story bits R). This showcases her newfound confidence she's gained up to now from bein saved in CD to now leadin a team to boost her friends' confidence & get them to be more darin & try for the sake of their missin friends. This leads to the fight they have. The REAL reason is that Iizuka for some reason randomly decided he wanted to structure the game so Team Rose & Sonic have a Boss fight wit each other & Maekawa had to write around that after the fact so he made shit up & played the bulk of it off as a joke in game. In the story he wrote, it's cus sonic is literally the only lead they have so they got no choice. The "marry me" line was 2 things. 1. a joke obv. 2. a declaration that this adv she'll prove herself to him so he'll pay attention & acknowledge her more, not that she's literally forcin him to marry her(remember when she said somethin similar in SA2 but ended it after sonic said "no" & that was that). Honestly this comes off WAY "worse" in localization than was intended in the og script. After the fight maekawa writes a bunch of lines that basically indicate "this is stupid I know but go wit it & enjoy" & the team eventually surmises that Eggman was the real suspect to go after (they were partially correct as we know). From there they completely forget bout sonic & it's only when CREAM points it out while Amy enjoys seein her friends together & happy that she chases sonic but it's literally jus for fun & nothin crazy. Thematically it's jus a reward for Amy for helpin her friends not only reunite but also gain confidence so they help themselves more when an adv pops up they gotta be a part of. The only part I think doesn't work as well is the way it mixes wit the actual gameplay for the most part. Amy is a character partly defined by the fact that as a city girl who didn't go out much before & doesn't have any special traits like most of the other characters she's usually gotta find a more unique way around her obstacles which is showcased in games like adve1/adva1/R & 06. Or she jus isn't playable but still plays an important character role like Adve2 or World Adve(unleashed). So it doesn't mix well story wise that she's literally doin the EXACT same thing as the other teams gameplay wise even if that's partially(& only partially) addressed by the fact the her Team is the intended easy mode wit the shortest levels & the least obtrusive obstacles. I'll also say that Team Rose was the least fun to play for me personally but maybe part of that is cus as it's the easy mode, I played it 1st to get used to the controls for the other teams later. The story is simple in comparison but a lot of the dialogue builds the characters & their relationships & there's a LOT of complexity comin from Metal at the end after followin CD. This game is really structured mostly like a classic game but under the adve template wit its own unique gameplay mechanics no other platformer has tried to replicate(& only 1 other game in general took inspiration from) & it works "really well". There's a number of factors u could list but I think the main thing for a lot of ppl is it's mainly jus broken asf & mostly jus sonic fans can deal wit the jank wit little issue come team dark(also doesn't help they don't more strongly incentivize goin for Team Rose 1st since they're guna force u to do them all & get the emeralds anyway(I didn't even bother wit how broken those R & got a save file lol). It's a really nice "Another day in the life of Sonic & friends*tm & it's very enjoyable for that. Sry for the mini essay
I don't really agree with majority of this video. But Sonic Heroes was a great game that deserves a remaster or sequel. It'll never happen but I'll always have love for this game
It has been mentioned that Sega is considering the idea of remastering Heroes, so never say never because it might eventually happen. There hasn't been an official confirmation that it will happen but it is possible.
Difficult game? at 10 years old i beat Last Chapter without a memory card. I could get an A ranker within 1 or 2 days. i consider this the easiest game. Sonic adventure 1 i think that would be 2 or 3 days to complete and Sonic Adventure 2 maybe a full week