Well, it worked for the first Sonic the Hedgehog movie. Will it help Sonic Frontiers?
The weekend after Sonic Frontiers revealed its first gameplay, the hashtag #DelaySonicFrontiers was trending on social media. Like the social media reaction that followed the revelation of Sonic’s original design for the 2020 live-action film, fans are massively calling for Sega and Sonic Team to return to the drawing board.
After a seven-minute video game for Sonic Frontiers (via IGN), fans recorded their meh-at-best reactions, shouting at an open, empty world that doesn’t communicate Sonic’s speed. nor the linear levels of its era of 3D platforms. . The puzzles were memorable and tasteless, and an additional seven-minute combat trailer did little to excite viewers either.
Polygon commentator AirPower summed up the overwhelming consensus of most Sonic fans over the weekend: “I love seeing the guy who made Mario’s demos on Unreal Engine work.”
Soon came the pleas to pump the brakes. Some were conciliatory:
Sega, from your fans who love this series, please, #DelaySonicFrontiers.
We don’t have to play this year. Please focus on making this game as good as possible.
Instead of doing this practice it almost killed the franchise.
Twice. pic.twitter.com/CYe91jWAex
– Collin LW (@CLWenter) June 2, 2022
Others were more direct and open about their intentions:
Sonic Frontiers looks like a shitty man If we can intimidate a company to fix a shitty movie, we can harass Sega to fix its shit game #DelaySonicFrontiers
– Dual-Space (@Upop_the_gamer) June 1, 2022
And others argued that pressure from fans to reconsider the “Ugly Sonic” revealed in early 2019 not only saved this film, but turned it into a rare critical and commercial success for a video game adaptation. Sonic the Hedgehog had the best release weekend of any video game movie, had a sequel that premiered in April and is slated for a third movie plus a Knuckles spin-off and Paramount Plus.
Sonic Frontiers, the first open world title in the 30-year-old franchise, was first unveiled with a prerendered movie trailer during The Game Awards 2021 in December. The game is slated for the holiday quarter of 2022 and will be released on Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Windows PC, Xbox One and Xbox Series X.