E3: Sonic Rush – Hands On

Last year, Sega unveiled a Sonic the Hedgehog tech demo at E3 during the debut of the Nintendo DS. It was pretty simplistic. The goal was simply to rub the touch screen as fast as possible to get Sonic to run towards the goal. After E3, Sega announced that they were producing a full title off of the franchise for the DS. People naturally assumed that it was based off of this demo, but it turns out that was far from the truth.

Here we have Sonic Rush, a title from Sonic Team in the vein of classic Sonic titles. Graphically, the game’s levels themselves are a hybrid of sprite graphics and polygons placed together. When you’re running in a flat plane area the game will used sprite based graphics, and it will naturally kick into polygon graphics when you’re in an area where 3D can be used to enhance the game. Sonic himself is modeled out of polygons for an extreme quality in the animation department. The enemies are a mix of both styles.

The thing that separates this game from last year’s tech demo is that it is actually a 2D side scroller. It’s common knowledge that some of the best Sonic titles were 2D, including the excellent Sonic Advance series, and this is no exception. It does not use the touch screen and instead uses the second screen to show double the playfield to give you more time to react to situations. All of the control from Sonic Advance 3 is intact here and tightened up thanks to the extra power of the Nintendo DS.

In the demo, the first boss gives a good example of how the 3D is used. Sonic is running around a 2D plane in front of the screen, and in the background is a giant snake-like boss swinging back and forth. To defeat him, you have to wait for him to fly into the foreground and slam his head on the ground which is where you jump on him. The thing is, though, sometimes he will jump on the side and start rolling towards you which is where the camera swings behind Sonic, 3D platformer style to let you jump over it with more precision. After that, the camera swings back out to the side and the game continues as normal.

The music thus far is rather unimpressive, which is rather disappointing. It resembles Game Boy Advance music at higher quality, but it’s nothing special. Sound effect wise, Sonic Team has wisely chosen to continue using the classic Genesis sounds to keep hardcore fans happy.

The game is shaping up to be extremely tight, and is a much better title than the tech demo ever was. It may not be the most innovative thing ever made, but it’s fun, and isn’t that all that really matters?

• Your text to link…