OLD REVIEW: Sonic and the Black Knight

READ THIS BEFORE THE REVIEW: since in the past I posted other reviews
with the wiikly news reports I'm gonna post them here too, so that you
won't miss them. I'll post an old one each day until we are caught up
with the current ones ^^

Keep in mind that those reviews are
old...I did this one almost one year ago, so my writing and my way to
explain things may have been quite a bit worse back then (and were also
shorter than now), but I figured it would be interesting ^^

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WII GAME OF THE WEEK: Sonic and the Black Knight
Genre: action game
I had to think for a while before using this as wii game of the week. not because it's a
bad game but because it isn't a game for everyone X3 but I'll explain the details now ^^
Sonic and the black knight is a spin-off of the sonic series, a kind of spiritual sequel
of Sonic and the secret rings, giving sonic a sword and putting him into a medieval
setting.

The story is quite simple, but this doesn't mean it's a bad one: during the intro movie
you can see a girl, supposedly a wizard, running away from this dark knight who soon
catches up on her and summons an army of monsters and corrupted knights. As a last,
desperated move she summons a hero from another dimension, who appens to be Sonic, who
was still eating his chili dogs when he finds himself falling trough the air and ending
upside down into the ground. After looking around for a bit he just realizes that he's
in trouble so he gets rid of the enemies quickly, but before the black knight can attack
him the wizard girl teleports herself and Sonic out of the knight's range. Said wizard
is Merlina and her grandfather is the famous Merlin. She tells Sonic she needs his help.
The black knight is the famous King Arthur, corrupted by a dark power and Sonic needs to
stop him.

This is the premise of the game, not a mean one in my opinion, since this is a spin off,
so it won't affect the main storyline of the game and it's more something to have fun
with. The plot haves its twists too, so it may keep you entertained until the end if it
gets to catch you.

the gameplay, despite the sword-fighting is fast-paced. You can move sonic more freely,
so it isn't on-rails like the previous game. You'll be able to attack enemies by
slashing the wiimote at the right time...fights are more complex than you'd think, you
can't just waggle aimlessly...Not only you need the right timing, but you also have to
shield yourself from enemies attacks. It will probably take some practice until you take
the grasp of the commands though, so don't worry if it feels confusing at first ^^
The boss fights are also very fun, not too easy and not too difficult in my opinion. The
most important ones will probably hype you up if you can get easily excited like me X3

The level design is various enough and while it doesn't reach the sonic adventure level
it does its work at not being repetitive. The graphic look of the game is very good, the
models are very well.made and have very nice animations and most of the levels will give
you very nice sights to look at. The framerate also never slowed down during my play.

The soundtrack is probably one of the best aspects of this game. Not only they did call
back crush40, the guys who made the soundtracks of sonic adventure 1 and 2, but they
also managed to pull out celtic/rocky music in this game X3 the instrumental songs are
awesome and entertaining, while the sang ones, heard mostly during the boss battles will
probably hype you up during the battle, wich is good XD

in my opinion this soundtrack is more fitting than the sonic unleashed one, I have to
say, that it isn't a bad soundtrack, it just felt a bit like a mario-rip off, trying to
take off the usual fast-paced sonic musics and replace them with calm, happy music, wich
would work better on a mario game...just a personal opinion though ^^;

now, the flaws of the game: taking a grasp on the commands is difficult and it will
probably get more than a few tries to get to learn how the fighting works. This and the
fact that this game is not what sonic should be...this is not a flaw to me to tell the
truth, but some people might be annoyed by the unusual setting X3

in the end I suggest to either buy this game if you're a hardcore sonic fan who liked
sonic and secret rings. or simply rent it if you feel like you could have fun with it ^^

here are a few screens:



I like the design of the armours, I must say :3



I wonder what kind of bee or butterfly would suck pollen out of that flower o.o;



engarde!

and here are a couple of videos:

http://www.gametrailers.com/player/46266.html
http://www.gametrailers.com/player/46369.html

This game has always been one of my "guilty pleasures". I enjoyed it more than most other recent games, and I found the gameplay to be rather intuitive. I feel like this game would have gotten a much better reception if they hadn't made it a Sonic game.

Also, with regard to the huge flower, am I the only one who thinks of Andrew Hussie's "Homestuck" when I see it? It kind of looks like it's surrounded by little Kernelsprites, and it looks like something Jade would encounter in the lake on her island.

cool! is that Blaze the cat I see fighting Sonic?, in the top picture?

Technically, it's "Sir Percival", but for all intents and purposes, yes, that is Blaze the Cat. You might also encounter a particularly angsty and grim Sir Lancelot (Shadow) and a rough but good-hearted Sir Gawain (Knuckles). One character is oddly absent from the game, though: Robotnik.

thanks kismet, heh it might be a good thing Robotnik is gone, he's probably on vacation during this.

Hey, I like Robotnik! He's one of my favorite characters in the series! X3

There is an explanation for his absence, though. It takes place in a storybook/in the past, so he really would have no way of getting there, not to mention he would be out of place by his very nature (robots in a medieval setting). There's no explanation as to why the others are there (aside from Sonic), of course.

I thought the game was so-so. the difficulty was just right, but post game with some super tough challenges (like beat sir Lancelot again in an insane difficulty) It didnt hold me for long sadly.

Kismet wrote:Hey, I like Robotnik! He's one of my favorite characters in the series! X3

There is an explanation for his absence, though. It takes place in a storybook/in the past, so he really would have no way of getting there, not to mention he would be out of place by his very nature (robots in a medieval setting). There's no explanation as to why the others are there (aside from Sonic), of course.

ah ok, and I didn't mean my earlier post to be mean, I just figured Robotnik was simply doing a little RnR was all thanks for the clarifying

I know, I was just kidding. I suppose sarcastic indignation is rather difficult to convey in this manner. I attempted to do so with the emote "X3", but it seems I was unclear. In any case, Robotnik is one of my favorite game villains. He's just malicious enough to seem threatening, but ridiculous enough to keep the games from getting too heavy and oppressive.

yeah he tends to fudge up his own schemes at times eh?, except in Sonic Underground he was dangerous, but his HENCHMEN were MAJOR bunglers!

Sonic and the black night was fun but the final boss was to easy
ya im a sonic nerd XD
ive got the first comic and the movie plus the entire satam series XD

T.T I have no life