The idea of bringing Sonic into an open world is a double-edged sword: putting his shoes to the test is always exhilarating, but environments must have enough excitement and attractions as to hook the player. Sonic Frontiers has it very much in mind and its most recent trailer shows what we can expect from its environments. The open ones and the linear ones.
A week after SEGA set a release date for sonic frontiers On the occasion of Gamescom we get a new preview in which the history of the game is slightly addressed as well as the structure of the levels that we will have before us. Of departure, Starfall Islands is a wide archipelago full of mysteries, but in it we can find different kinds of islands. Some of them, by the way, designed to go through defined and bounded circuits.
As is made clear in the preview, Sonic will go through scenarios based on natural environments, urban areas or classic leagues that linear sections will alternate with free-running platform spaces. In addition to these, in Sonic Frontiers there is the World Map itself that offers a huge space with different biomes.
But the most interesting thing is that, according to SEGA, we will have a gameplay system is flexible. What does that mean? While the similarities to Zelda: Breath of the Wild have been very visible so far, the general premise is also that we dive into the adventure starting where we want and do what we want from there. It will be time to rescue our friends Amy and Tails, but the rest depends on the player. Namely:
- From the outset, we will be given the freedom to play and progress in the adventure in the order we want.
- In addition, we will be able to face great bosses that are loose in the open areas.
- When it comes to fighting we will show off new powers and abilities and Sonic will have his own upgrade tree in the game with unlockable powers and that we can level up.
- Logically, no matter how fast Sonic goes, it doesn’t hurt to have shortcuts, with which it will also be possible to unlock new portals.
- In fact, an interesting aspect is Stafall Islands puzzle solving– In addition to increasing Sonic’s power level and speed, new parts of the map will open up; solve challenges and collect different collectibles including -of course- the chaos emeralds themselves.
- And yes, we will even have access to side missions.
Regarding Sonic’s mobility, it has been confirmed that he will have his own arsenal of attacks and a very FromSoftware-style mobility including dodges, rolls and even tight blocks. However, if we do not want to complicate ourselves too much, we have the option of resorting to the automatic combos that only require a single button to run.
Last but not least, Sonic will have a new ability created for the occasion called cycloop through which it generates a bluish trail that, when surrounding enemies and objects, is capable of generating different types of effect.
Seen what has been seen, it seems that there will not be much time to get bored in Sonic Frontiers. Now it’s time to cross your fingers so that everything is well assembled and all those ideas don’t fall on deaf ears. The good news is that there is much less left to clear up that unknown: Sonic’s first open world game will open its doors next november 8 on PlayStation, Xbox, Nintendo Switch and PC. Let’s start with stretching!