Sonic Adventure
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| Sonic Adventure | |
|---|---|
 2001 version of the North American Dreamcast cover art |
|
| Developer(s) | Sonic Team Sonic Team USA (international) NOW Production[1] (additional DX staff) |
| Publisher(s) | Sega Activision (Windows) |
| Designer(s) | Takashi Iizuka (Director/Level Designer) |
| Writer(s) | Akinori Nishiyama |
| Artist(s) | Kazuyuki Hoshino (Art Director) Yuji Uekawa (Character Design) |
| Composer(s) | Jun Senoue (Sound Director) Kenichi Tokoi Fumie Kumatani |
| Platform(s) | Dreamcast, Nintendo GameCube, Microsoft Windows, Mac OS X, Zeebo |
| Release date(s) | Dreamcast JP December 23, 1998 NA September 9, 1999 EU October 14, 1999 AUS November 3, 1999 GameCube JP June 19, 2003 NA June 18, 2003 PAL June 27, 2003 Windows JP December 18, 2003 PAL February 6, 2004 NA April 22, 2005 |
| Genre(s) | Platform |
| Mode(s) | Single-player, multiplayer (two-player) |
| Rating(s) | CERO: A ELSPA: 3+ ESRB: E OFLC: G8+ PEGI: 3+ |
| Media | GD-ROM, CD-ROM, Nintendo GameCube Game Disc |
| System requirements | Windows XP or better, 800 MHz Pentium III, 32 MB Geforce 2 or Radeon SDR, 1.2 GB hard drive space |
| Input methods | Game controller, keyboard |
Sonic Adventure (ソニックアドベンチャー Sonikku Adobenchā) is a video game developed by Sonic Team and released on December 23, 1998 in Japan by Sega for the Sega Dreamcast and is the first game in the Sonic Adventure series. One of its development titles was Sonic RPG, (although the final game was an adventure game not a standard RPG). The final updated edition, known as Sonic Adventure International, was released on September 9, 1999 in North America, October 14, 1999 in Japan and Europe, October 18, 1999 in Belgium, the Netherlands, and Luxembourg, and December 3, 1999 in Australia. A director's cut version was released in 2003 as Sonic Adventure DX for the Nintendo GameCube and in 2004 for Microsoft Windows. It has sold over 1 million copies in the United States alone, making it the top selling Dreamcast game.[2] It was the first Sonic game on a sixth generation console. Its sequel is Sonic Adventure 2.
Contents |
[edit] Plot
Centuries ago, the planet was bestowed the seven Chaos Emeralds. These emeralds were a source of absolute power. However, absolute power corrupts absolutely — and it did not take long before wars broke out over who would control the Chaos Emeralds' seemingly unlimited power. A tribe of echidna (the ancestors of Knuckles) responded by creating a singular Master Emerald, which held powers that could control and neutralize the Chaos Emeralds. With the Master Emerald came a guardian spirit. It was said that a rival tribe of echidnas angered the guardian by attempting to steal the Chaos Emeralds and ruining the sanctuary it was protecting. They were all but completely destroyed within a single night and the guardian was never seen again. What was believed to be the guardian was then named Chaos, the God of Destruction, lending its name to the Chaos Emeralds.
In the present day, Dr. Eggman learns of the legend surrounding Chaos. Believing it to be true, he seeks out the Master Emerald and shatters it, freeing Chaos in the process. Eggman's goal is to control Chaos, and use its destructive powers to collect the Chaos Emeralds and conquer the city of Station Square. To help him, he has created the E-Series robots, a group of robots powered by animals placed inside them and programmed to obey him. When Sonic learns of Eggman's plans, he and his friends spring in to action to stop Eggman and they all start their own separate, but intertwined, journeys for the Chaos Emeralds.
[edit] Characters
Unlike the previous game in the series, Sonic 3D Blast, Sonic Adventure has six different characters to choose from, providing two more than the four (Sonic and Tails combo being the fourth) available in Sonic 3 & Knuckles.
[edit] Playable characters
[edit] Sonic the Hedgehog
The main hero of the game. Arriving in the city of Station Square, Sonic's story revolves around Dr. Eggman releasing Chaos from the Master Emerald. Sonic battles Eggman and Chaos in an effort to save the world, as well as finding the Chaos Emeralds before they do. Sonic has the most stages of any character, and his levels involve high speed gameplay. Sonic's theme song is "It Doesn't Matter" performed by Tony Harnell.
[edit] Miles "Tails" Prower
After Sonic rescues Tails from Emerald Coast after a "Tornado" prototype experiment runs out of fuel (because the chaos emerald was gone) and crashes, the latter sets out to help Sonic collect the Chaos Emeralds and stop Chaos. Most of his levels are shorter versions of Sonic's, which require him to reach the end of the level before Sonic (or Eggman) can. Tails' theme song is "Believe in Myself" performed by Karen Brake.
[edit] Knuckles the Echidna
Knuckles is the guardian of the Master Emerald and one of the main protagonists after Sonic and Tails. The Master Emerald shatters when Eggman frees Chaos and Tikal's spirit from within it, causing Angel Island to fall out of the sky. Knuckles' goal is to reassemble the shards of the Master Emerald and he has time for little else. His stages are enclosed areas where Knuckles must find shards of the Master Emerald. He can glide through the air and scale most walls. Knuckles' theme song is "Unknown from M.E." performed by Marlon Saunders.
[edit] Amy Rose
Amy Rose is walking through Station Square, reminiscing about her earlier adventures with Sonic, when a tiny blue Flicky falls from the sky and lands on her head. It is discovered that Dr. Eggman needed this Flicky (nicknamed "Birdie" by Amy) because of the Chaos Emerald in its pendant. Amy and Birdie must escape ZERO (otherwise known as ALPHA), one of Eggman's robots by reaching the balloon at the end of each stage. ZERO can be paralyzed temporarily by hitting it with Amy's Piko Piko Hammer. She resolves to help the young Flicky find its family and hopefully meet up with Sonic along the way. Her primary weapon, the Piko Piko Hammer, returns (previously seen in Sonic the Fighters). Amy is considered to have the shortest story since she has fewer levels than the other characters. Amy's theme song is "My Sweet Passion" performed by Nikki Gregoroff.
[edit] Big the Cat
Big the Cat is a newcomer to the Sonic series. Big's best friend is a frog who became possessed by Chaos' tail, and swallows Big's "lucky charm", a Chaos Emerald, which causes him to mutate. The frog then runs off, and Big's story begins. His levels involve using his fishing pole to try and catch Froggy, although he can also choose to try and catch big fish, with score bonuses based on size. Big's theme song is "Lazy Days (Livin' in Paradise)" performed by Ted Poley.
[edit] E-102 Gamma
E-102 Gamma is one among a series of robots designed by Eggman to take orders without question. After an encounter with Amy, he suffers a malfunction and gains a "conscience." He then turns his aim to destroying his robotic brothers and freeing the animals trapped inside them. "Gamma" is one of the letters in the Greek alphabet. Gamma's levels are shooting levels in which the player races against the clock to get to the end and destroy the target (usually one of the other E-Series robots). Players gain time depending on how many enemies they shoot in a row/chain by using the lock on feature that Gamma has. Interestingly, Gamma is the only one of the main characters to not have a vocal theme song; instead he has an instrumental motif.
[edit] Super Sonic
Super Sonic is unlocked after the stories of the other characters have been completed. The story is a continuation of Sonic's story and brings all of the characters together to face Perfect Chaos. When in Super form, Sonic moves faster and attacks by gaining speed and ramming into Perfect Chaos. Super Sonic's theme song is played during the final battle and is also the theme for the game; "Open Your Heart" performed by Crush 40. It was also said he was supposed to be playable in in Sonic's regular levels, due to fans finding an unused Tikal Voice Clip.[citation needed]
[edit] Villains or allies/Non-playable or unlockable characters
[edit] Dr. Ivo "Eggman" Robotnik
Dr. Robotnik, also known as Dr. Eggman because of his round body shape, has formulated a new plan to conquer the planet, this time not relying on his robots alone, but employing a strange liquid creature known only as Chaos.
Although this is not the first game in which the name "Eggman" was used, it is the game that popularized the use of the name in the West. It should also be noted that, in this game, Robotnik is his primary name, while the nickname "Eggman" is only used by four characters.
[edit] Chaos
Chaos is the guardian of the Chao. He is apparently water or a plasma-like material and changes form after consuming a Chaos Emerald. After consuming all seven Chaos Emeralds, it turns into Perfect Chaos and starts destroying the city, until Super Sonic "defeats" it (in actuality, he neutralizes the evil within Chaos's heart, which was causing it to function within a state of blind rage).
[edit] Tikal the Echidna
A mysterious female echidna who appears whenever Sonic, Tails, Knuckles, Amy, E-102 Gamma and Big are sent back in time. She is trying to stop her father, Pachacamac, from stealing the Chaos Emeralds from the Master Emerald shrine. She appears mostly in the form of a red ball of light called a Hint Orb.
[edit] Zero
Zero is one of Dr. Eggman's Robots sent to find Amy's friend Birdie. He follows Amy wherever she goes hoping to capture her and the bird. At one point he succeeds but Amy is rescued by E-102 Gamma. Eventually Zero is defeated by Amy on the Egg Carrier. Zero is the antagonist of Amy's story due to him trying to catch the bird.
[edit] Chao
Chao exist primarily in the Chao Gardens as a sort of intelligent virtual pet for the player to raise, an "evolution" of the A-life system from NiGHTS into Dreams... Chao can be taken with the player by downloading the minigame Chao Adventure to his or her VMU, or in the GameCube version, by downloading the Chao to a Game Boy Advance. You can also raise their stats, by giving them small animals. You can find these animals in action stages, by defeating the robots.
[edit] E-Series
Dr. Eggman's E-Series of robots play a large role in Gamma's story, as he is one of them, and is out to destroy or "save" the others. All of them have letters of the Greek alphabet as part of their name.
- E-101 Beta is a black robot with two gun arms. He is the first boss in E-102 Gamma's side of the story, and is later upgraded into E-101 Beta Mk II, who is Gamma's fifth and final boss.
- E-103 Delta is a blue robot who is Gamma's second boss, waiting at the end of Windy Valley.
- E-104 Epsilon is an orange robot who is the third boss of Gamma's side of the story and is fought at the end of Red Mountain.
- E-105 Zeta is a purple robot who is Gamma's fourth boss and is located at the end of Hot Shelter. While at first humanoid, Zeta is altered into a cylinder-like form with several turrets made up of a few Dreamcast machines.
[edit] Story structure
The story is told through the perspective of the character you choose to play as and as a result the stories tend to diverge at certain points based on the character arc. It is interesting to note that the story takes on a certain Rashomon type structure in terms of dialogue and certain events when more than one of the playable characters is present in a scene. For example, each character has their viewpoint of a certain scene, so the dialogue between versions tends to be different. This perspective also justifies the different outcomes of certain encounters, for example, when Sonic faces E-102 Gamma on the Egg Carrier, through Sonic's perspective Sonic is about to destroy Gamma, through Tails' perspective Tails is about to destroy Gamma and through Gamma's perspective, Gamma is about to kill Sonic.
[edit] Gameplay
The game is divided up into two stages: Action Stages, and Adventure Fields. The division of Action Stages and Adventure Fields was a serious departure from previous Sonic games.
[edit] Action stages
Action stages are basically playable levels. This is the only type of area where Sonic or any of his companions will encounter enemies (most boss battles appear to take place in the adventure fields, but they are actually in action stages designed to look like the Fields). There are eleven action stages, accessible by different characters. However, unlike previous Sonic games, action stages are not made up of Zones and Acts. Instead, the game plays more like each adventure field is a Zone and the action stages are the Acts in the Zone. The action stages have separate areas that could be considered "Acts", but they are not separate levels, as in previous games.
[edit] Adventure fields
Adventure fields are non-linear game stages, generally designed for (light) puzzle solving, exploration, and plot advancement. They contain very few items (enemies, rings, etc.) and each of them have action stages which are accessible through certain areas in the adventure field. There are three adventure fields, Station Square, a big metropolitan city that contains a train station which leads to the Mystic Ruins, a casino, a hotel/restaurant, Twinkle Park, a City Hall area, and the beach, Emerald Coast. The city resembles locations from New York City, Los Angeles, Tokyo, and Miami. Second is the Mystic Ruins, a large mountainous region that contains Tails' Workshop, a jungle, a lake, a few caves, and Angel Island. Third is the Egg Carrier, Dr. Eggman's flying fortress that later ends up crashed in the ocean. Every adventure field links to the other two Fields and a Chao Garden. They also have four Emblems each. They are each packed with various powerups for different characters.
[edit] Cast
| Character | Japanese Voice Actor | English Voice Actor |
|---|---|---|
| Sonic the Hedgehog | Junichi Kanemaru | Ryan Drummond |
| Miles "Tails" Prower | Kazuki Hayashi | Corey Bringas |
| Knuckles the Echidna | Nobutoshi Hayashi | Michael McGaharn |
| Amy Rose | Taeko Kawada | Jennifer Douillard |
| E-102 Gamma | Jyoji Nakata | Steve Broadie |
| Big the Cat | Syun Nashiro | Jon St. John |
| Tikal | Kaori Aso | Elara Distler |
| Dr. Ivo "Eggman" Robotnik | Chikao Otsuka | Deem Bristow |
[edit] Music
Head composer Jun Senoue brought a new sound to the Sonic the Hedgehog series with this game, and as such it features many different styles of music such as jazz, rock, techno, pop and country. Each heroic player character (aside from Gamma) also has an instrumental motif that later translates into a vocal theme song that plays during the end credits of their story. The game contains vocal performances from Tony Harnell, Karen Brake, Marlon Saunders, Dread Fox, Ted Poley, Nikki Gregoroff and Johnny Gioeli, who would later join Senoue to form the band Crush 40.
[edit] Reception
The reception at the time of release was overwhelmingly positive, including reviews from GameSpot and GameSpy being above 90%. The current Game Rankings average ranking is 88%.[3] It became one of the few Sega All Stars games. In Japan, it received an excellent 38 out of 40 from Famitsu.[4] Although criticized for its camera system, framerate issues and fishing stages with Big (one critic said, "Putting fishing stages in a Sonic game is like buying a Ferrari so you can sleep in the back seat.") , the game was still highly praised for retaining the fast and enjoyable gameplay that Sonic was known for in 2D as well as the game's visuals, multiple character storylines and soundtrack. Similar to its sequel, however, the later-released GameCube port was criticized by many of the same sources who praised the Dreamcast version, although in this case, Sonic Adventure DX reportedly didn't play as well as the original version did.[5] Sonic Adventure DX: Director's Cut averaged a 63% at Game Rankings.[6]
[edit] Sonic Adventure DX: Director's Cut
Sonic Adventure DX: Director's Cut (ソニックアドベンチャー デラシクス Sonikku Adobenchā Derakusu, Sonic Adventure Deluxe), is a platform game for the GameCube and Microsoft Windows.
The game was released as an enhanced port of the original Sonic Adventure for the Dreamcast, with several additional features added. The Windows version was at first released only in Japan and Europe, but later saw a limited North American release. Sonic Adventure DX includes a mission mode, which included 60 missions to complete throughout the adventure fields and action stages. It also contains a minigame collection, which is comprised of twelve Game Gear games featuring Sonic and friends. Also in the Directors cut if all emblems are collected then the player can play as Metal Sonic. Also in Tails' story after the cutscene where Eggman steals your silver Chaos Emerald Cream The Rabbit is seen flying from a street and over the casino.
Reviews were generally less positive than those of its Sega Dreamcast predecessor, scoring more than 20% lower than the original release.[7]
[edit] Unlockable games
The game features all twelve of the Game Gear Sonic games as unlockable bonuses. If the start button of the second controller is pressed, the game screen will split, and two games will play at the same time. Additionally, Gear-to-Gear cable emulation is present, enabling the games that have two-player modes to be played if both players access the proper options within the game. These games were to be included in the Dreamcast version, but were scrapped due to time constraints. The same goes for the reintroduced feature of being able to play as Metal Sonic when collecting 130 emblems. A new Game Gear game is unlocked after the player receives 20, 40, 60, 80, 100, 110, 120, and 130 emblems, as well as after completing 20, 40, and 60 missions. The last game is unlocked upon receiving all emblems and completing all missions.
Games unlockable (in order):
- Sonic the Hedgehog
- Sonic Drift
- Sonic Chaos
- Sonic Labyrinth
- Sonic Spinball
- Sonic the Hedgehog 2
- Dr. Robotnik's Mean Bean Machine
- Sonic Triple Trouble
- Sonic Drift 2
- Tails' Skypatrol
- Sonic Blast
- Tails Adventure
[edit] References
- ^ "Game Developer Research Institute". http://gdri.smspower.org/wiki/index.php/Now_Production.
- ^ "U.S. Platinum Chart". http://www.the-magicbox.com/Chart-USPlatinum.shtml.
- ^ "Sonic Adventure Reviews". http://www.gamerankings.com/htmlpages2/198694.asp.
- ^ "GEIMIN.NET／週刊ファミ通クロスレビュープラチナ殿堂入りソフト一覧". http://geimin.net/da/cross_review.php.
- ^ "Sonic Adventure DX Director's Cut (cube: 2003): Reviews". http://www.metacritic.com/games/platforms/cube/sonicadventuredx.
- ^ "Sonic Adventure DX Director's Cut Reviews". http://www.gamerankings.com/htmlpages2/589413.asp.
- ^ "Game Rankings's average review score for Sonic Adventure". http://www.gamerankings.com/itemrankings/searchresult.asp?term=Sonic+Adventure&itemid=198694.
"Game Rankings's average review score for Sonic Adventure DX: Director's Cut". http://www.gamerankings.com/itemrankings/searchresult.asp?term=Sonic+Adventure&itemid=589413.
