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RttP: Sonic Adventure 2

SolVanderlyn

SolVanderlyn

Thanos acquires the fully powered Infinity Gauntlet in The Avengers: Infinity War, but loses when all the superheroes team up together to stop him.
Sonic_Adventure_2_cover.png


Depending on who you ask, this game is known as:

-The last good 3D Sonic
-A terrible Sonic game
-One of the best Dreamcast games
-A terrible game in general
-A game with a unique and gripping lyrical soundtrack
-A game with the worst OST ever
-Last Sonic game with a good story
-A Sonic game with a laughable story
-A classic
-A game that aged terribly

Yeah, so, it's pretty divisive. Personally, I loved it back then and still managed to enjoy it today. I'm playing the HD port on PSN, and while aspects of its game design have aged and the flaws it had back then are even more apparent now, it's still a fun ride the whole way through. Call me out on it all you want, but I love the soundtrack. Top three tracks:

Metal Harbor

Pyramid Cave

Lost Colony

Top three tracks with lyrics:

City Escape

PUNKIN HILL

Meteor Herd

The gameplay is pretty straightforward. The biggest mistake Sonic Team made was grouping all of the Hero and Dark characters together. Sonic Adventure 1 had each character's story as a separate entity, and since each character played much differently, it was like having several games in one. Here, the mishmash of Speed, Shooting, and Searching stages gives the game a sort of identity crisis. The Sonic/Shadow stages are by far the best, but the other two styles of gameplay are not as inherently bad as people make them out to be. Would the game have been better if it cut the new stuff and played as a strictly 3D adaptation of classic Sonic, like Sonic/Shadow's stages do? Probably. But the shoot-em-up and shard searching levels are still pretty fun.

The story is one thing I found much cooler as a child. Maybe it was because Sonic was following a central canon back then and they've since gone the Saturday morning cartoon approach, thus leaving the mythos in the Adventure games essentially defunct, but I couldn't find myself caring about Shadow, Maria, the ark, or any of that. Although, I do still prefer the style of storytelling seen here as opposed to the style that's used in the newer games, but I know a lot of people prefer the less serious take on Sonic's world.

Since I've seen the game being panned in recent years for aging badly, I'm surprised I enjoyed it as much as I did. It's not the best game of all time, but it's still a good one.
 
Z

Zeyphersan

Banned
-A terrible game in general
-A game with a unique and gripping lyrical soundtrack
-A Sonic game with a laughable story
-A game that aged terribly

Shame, I loved it on the GameCube when I was a kid. But replaying it was something else entirely. It's the game that convinced me to never go back and re-experience anything from my childhood because it's probably pure shit

Oh well, LIVE AND LEARN
 
P

PaRappa

Member
This mascot game was released after Sega had abandoned the Dreamcast and hardware in general. It would be like a hypothetical Nintendo releasing a Mario swan song after abandoning the wii u and going third party - roe tinted opinions at their very extreme.
 
C

Cdoogs

Neo Member
LOL are there seriously people who think this game had a good story? Besides the people who write Sonic fanfictions I don't see how anyone could feel this way.

Besides that, I loved the game when I was a good, but I doubt it would hold up well today.
 
S

Seik

Banned
Loved it as my younger self, still love it today.

I need to do a playthrough really soon though, its been a while.
 
D

Doctor_Thomas

Member
Neither of the Sonic Adventure games are very good. They're plagued with poor controls and design. I, literally, cannot tell what makes either of them good.
 
P

photogaz

Member
For me the last excellent Sonic game was Sonic 2. Sonic 3 and Sonic and Knuckles were good but lacked the creativity of 2 and the music. Sonic CD was a masterpiece too.

After those the creative direction went seriously pair shaped.

I never cared for any 3D sonic games, for me the formula just didn't work.
 
B

Betty

Banned
The Sonic and Shadow stages are still mostly fun and the music is good.

Time hasn't been kind to it though, and I adored it when it came out.
 
M

MrBadger

Member
It's my pet peeve when people say this is the last good Sonic. Heroes, the Rush trilogy, Colours, Gens and Lost World are all better.
 
C

Crayolan

Member
SA2 (Battle) was one of my favorite games a child. I replayed it last year and still really enjoyed it, though the Eggman/Tails levels are really meh and drag on far too long. Sonic/Shadow levels are still awesome and I surprised myself with how easily I could beat the Knuckles/Rouge levels, I guess I still had the patterns memorized from all those years ago, enough so to enjoy them.

Despite being able to recognize its flaws now, it's still my favorite Sonic game.

SolVanderlyn said:
-A game with the worst OST ever
Click to expand...

People think this? I mean, people can shit on Sonic games all they want, but the music is always good.
 
N

Noray

Unconfirmed Member
The high points are high, the low points are loooooooow.

Some of the late-game Sonic and Shadow stages are frustrating and shit, too. The Knuckles/Rouge levels are fine, whatever. The shooting stages were just dull.

But man, Metal Harbor. City Escape. Green Forest. That shit was dope, and Crush40 was ON POINT for this game. Live and Learn is an amazing song to this day, and so is It Doesn't Matter (way better than the SA1 song of the same name)
 
Welfare

Welfare

Member
I played the game when I was young, thought it was good.

Played the HD release on the 360 2 years ago, my god it does not hold up. Besides the Sonic/Shadow sections, how do people enjoy this game?
 
F

Ferr986

Member
I loved SA1 & 2 as a kid.
I still love the Sonic portion of Adventure 1 but I didnt enjoy Adventure 2 HD.

Adventure 2 got better controls and 60 fps over 1. But thats pretty much all of it.

Sonic levels are more speed focused than Adventure 1, with less platforming, and less interesting visually and gameplay-wise.
The other gameplay styles not only are now part of the main story (meaning that you cant avoid them), they are actually worse than SA1, and drags for too long.

Also, it was the first game to distant itself from the mainline Sonic story. Even SA1 felt like a follow up on S3&, focusing on the Emeralds and Angel Island.

Chao garden was awesome though, same as the soundtrack, but you arent going to find a Sonic Team game with a bad soundtrack anyways.
 
D

Deleted member 57681

Unconfirmed Member
I 100%ed it back in the day, so it's my guilty pleasure I guess?

ROLLING AROUND AT THE SPEED OF SOUND
 
M

MissileTrick

Member
It was fun , but aged poorly, I mostly can't go back to it because of the Chaos. I wasted so much of my time caring for those things, It became the focus of the game for me. I maxed several out and had champs, but my memory card got corrupted so I lost them all. ;-;
 
V

V_Arnold

Member
The best Sonic game for me.

I loved it back then, still have nostalgia whenever I think about the effort I put into doing all sonic/shadow stages for A (or was that S? Nah...I think it was A.)

That ONE Shadow stage though with the red highwaypath and nighttime...I remember needing 18000 score, and getting 17800 for the vast majority of the time, like 10 times in a row. I was about to give up. Damn.
 
M

Mozz-eyes

Banned
I remember playing a demo of Sonic Adventure in Woolworths back in the day. Coming from an n64, that game seemed like a mind blowing leap.

However, I think kids are more immune to the terrible controls that the Sonic Adventure games have.
 
N

NotLiquid

Member
I'm of the belief that the original Sonic Adventure aged better than Adventure 2. Smoother game play across all characters and more interesting level designs.

It's still alright though. As Dreamcast's swansong, Sonic Team really went all out.
 
F

ffdgh

Member
I still enjoy the game on gcn.
Glitchesarecool said:
Still the best Chao sim ever. The rest of the game was fine, sadly giving us Shadow the Edgehog and defining a generation of terrible fangirling.
Click to expand...
Also definetly this lol. Wasted so many hours screwing around with chao on 3 different memory cards and sonic advance 1 and 2 tiny chao garden.
 
J

Jamix012

Member
Still think it's a fantastic game. A classic. The best sonic game period IMO.

Yes the story is goofy as shit, but it has charm.
 
K

Kid Ska

I Was There! Official L Receiver 2/12/2016
I can actually get down with this game. It's got some undeniable flaws, but it's fun. And oh the hours spent raising Chao.
 
S

Shadow Hog

Member
It's a terrible game that hasn't aged well at all and I love every last minute of it.

No, really. I can list a whole slew of things that it does wrong, and yet I still have a fair bit of fun when I play it. Wish I could say the same for SA1, since I like its setting and plot a fair bit more, but it does just enough wrong that it's a bit harder for me to overlook. I didn't much care for Heroes when it came out, and the less said about Shadow and 2K6, the better, but SA2, at least, I still enjoy. Guilty pleasure, I guess.

Plot's way too dark for a Sonic game, though. Oh, sure, Sonic 2/3&K had the Death Egg and all, but you never saw Eggman blowing up half the moon or deliberately attempt to try to raze the Earth's surface by slamming it into the planet.
 
U

UnlovedJew

Member
I loved the story when I was a kid. Even now, I really enjoy the sonic/shadow stages and like the treasure hunting. The shooting stuff is pretty lame though, excluding one level.

Great soundtrack and pretty graphics at the time make a sexy ass Sonic game for a kid.
 
T

TheMightyJerkules

Member
I loved this game on the Dreamcast back when it was released. Played it again when my son dug it out of my collection a few years ago. While I can see that it hasn't aged as well as it could have, I still found it to be a very enjoyable game. I love the music. "Supporting Me" from the Biolizard battle is one of my favorite video game songs.
 
J

JoBo4

Neo Member
I'd still have shitloads of fun with this game. I love it. Will love it. Sure there are flaws, but whatever. Such a great game.
 
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