Sonic the Hedgehog, a name many know and love. And what a history he has. Much like the loops he speeds through on his way to stop Eggman, Sonic has had a lot of ups and downs. His early days on SEGA consoles solidified his popularity. Then in 1998, he made his first jump to 3D with Sonic Adventure. The early 3D era went well enough until it started going downhill with the divisive Shadow the Hedgehog in 2005 and the disastrous release of Sonic ‘06 a year later. To say ‘06 severely damaged Sonic’s reputation is an understatement. It took years before the Hedgehog recovered and was back on his feet. 5 years later in 2011, Sonic Generations released as a celebration of the Hedgehogs 20th anniversary at the time.
Sonic’s story sees his friends throwing a birthday party for him when a mysterious entity called The Time Eater shows up and throws reality out of whack. This results in Sonic meeting up and teaming up with his past self, Classic Sonic. Together the two Sonics must speed their way through a number of stages based on past and iconic zones in Sonics history in order to fix the damage. These stages include the classic and admittedly overused Green Hill from Sonic 1, Power Plant from Sonic 2 and they even included stages from later titles like Seaside Hill from Heroes and Crisis City from Sonic ‘06. There’s definitely a lot of love for Sonics history here and as a celebration it shows in the stage design.
The biggest draw of both Generations games is revisiting fan favorite stages from across Sonic and Shadows history. As mentioned before, the Sonics revisit a number of reimagined zones. Shadow comparatively has fewer main stages but he makes up for that with a more open overworld and those stages he does get are pretty fun to go through. Classic Shadow stages such Space Colony Ark from Adventure 2 and Kingdom Valley from Sonic ‘06 make a return and are better than ever. Shadow even gets a couple stages from games that happened after Sonic Generations initially released so that's pretty cool. One of those however, is a Sonic Frontiers level which feels like a weird choice. Mostly because Shadow had nothing to do with Frontiers. It's especially baffling considering they didn’t bring back any stages from Shadows solo outing. I’d have enjoyed at least seeing Westopolis here but oh well. What we got is still fun to play and I’m still more than willing to replay these stages.
Each stage is divided into 2 main acts. For Sonic, act 1 is a 2D sidescroller where you play as Classic Sonic while act 2 is a 3D level you play as Modern Sonic. Similarly, Shadows stages also alternate 3D and 2D acts, with act 1 for Shadow being the 3D one. It's actually pretty cool and goes a long way toward making sure the stages don’t feel too repetitive. Classic Sonic controls like, well Classic Sonic. He can run, jump and spin dash his way across his stages. Since Classic Sonic is meant to be like the Genesis games, his stages are usually pretty straightforward. Run, hop across obstacles and make it to the goal post at the end. Modern Sonic instead opts for the “boost” style approach first seen in Sonic Unleashed. Like his classic counterpart, Sonic can run and jump but he lacks a spin dash and instead uses a boost ability which can be triggered with the press of a button. He also has a homing attack that can be used to cross gaps and hit enemies and things like springs. As the game progresses, more of his moveset gets used such as a lightspeed dash and a stomp attack. Modern Sonic can do more things than Classic Sonic but this translates into his stages being more complex and sometimes leaning more toward using certain gimmicks to progress. Which is usually fine, but this does occasionally come with frustrating pace breakers that can make certain challenge acts later on more annoying than they need to be.
Shadow controls similarly to Modern Sonic. He’s got the homing attack, the boost button and even a stomp move. What really sets Shadow apart though are his Chaos and unlockable Doom abilities. Out of the gate, Shadow has the ability to use Chaos Control after filling a meter. Using this ability stops time entirely on a stage, letting Shadow deal with enemies more efficiently or bypass certain obstacles. As this also stops the stage timer, it can be very useful for those coveted S ranks. More than just that though, the game also puts it to creative use. There’s a point in one of the stages where Shadow needs to use it in order to platform off of missiles for example. There’s also Chaos Spear which can stun enemies and activate certain switches. The aforementioned Doom abilities are unlocked over the course of the main story but grant Shadow useful traversal options such as Doom Surf, which lets him surf across water and Doom Blast, which lets him cover huge gaps by knocking an enemy into the air and blasting them away.
Compared to most Sonic gimmicks, these are pretty well designed and well integrated into the experience. Using them doesn’t bog down the pace or feel weird and on that note, I feel Shadows stages are, for the most part, better designed than Sonics. They’re paced very well and it's easier to maintain that pace compared to some of Sonics levels. Honestly, the black Hedgehog has never felt better to control and I actually felt like any mistakes I made on Shadows stages to be purely my own and not due to the games occasionally slippy controls as was the case with Sonic. That’s not to say Sonic controls badly or isn’t fun to play, the blue hedgehog is still as fun as ever. Any occasional hiccup or glitch that happened was just that, occasional and not nearly frequent enough to hinder my enjoyment of Sonic's campaign.
Speaking of, one thing Sonic and Shadow have in common is “White Space” a bizarre hub world where the Hedgehogs can access their stages, challenge acts and bosses. Sonics is pretty much a linear affair that acts more as a glorified menu. Going from left to right, you can find a skill shop, the stages in exact order of appearance and that's about it. Some platforming is needed to access the Challenge Acts which have to be completed in order to obtain keys to access a boss that once cleared, opens up the next batch of stages. There’s also a pinball stage you can play for fun and rival battles against characters like Metal Sonic and Silver that can be completed for Chaos Emeralds. Shadows' version of White Space is, on the other hand, quite different. Taking cues from Sonic Frontiers, White Space in Shadow Generations is far more open, with various unlockables to find and collect. It's not as big as an actual open world title but the freeform exploration is still a nice change of pace. There’s no pinball or rival battles but Shadow still gets challenge acts that he needs to complete for boss keys. And of course, both versions have their own collection rooms where you can look at the different artwork and listen to the different music you’ve unlocked in the corresponding game.
Across Sonics main acts are red rings. 5 per act and each one collected unlocks a piece of artwork or a track for Sonics song collection. Getting all 5 in a single act also unlocks a skill for that particular version of Sonic. Artwork and music can also be gotten by ringing bells on completed Challenge Acts. As an added bonus, this remaster also adds chao that can be found on Sonics stages. Collecting them doesn’t seem to do anything but they’re there and they’re cute to look at. As Shadow also gets Challenge Acts, he can also unlock artwork and music by ringing bells and grabbing the music notes. Unlike Sonic however, Shadow doesn’t get red rings. What he does get are keys(which can even be found in the Challenge Acts) that are used to unlock boxes across the hub world. I actually like this as it encourages exploration of White Space since many of the boxes are pretty well hidden. There’s a lot of music and artwork to be unlocked between the two games, including official art and concepts. It’ll take a little time to unlock everything and fully complete the game but it still feels satisfying to do so.
Shadow doesn’t have as much artwork or music to unlock compared to Sonic, but he does get other things like summaries of his story from the various games(which helps new players get to know him) and pages from Gerald Robotniks journal which sheds a little more light on Shadow's origins. Shadow does get some modern remixes of bangers like What I’m Made Of and the classic All Hail Shadow which are as fun to jam to as they’ve ever been. I even like how bits of All Hail Shadow crop up from time to time in certain segments. They really made sure to celebrate Shadow and did him justice. Even though Sonic games aren’t typically very long, there’s enough to see and do to keep you occupied for a little while and maybe revisit.
Sonic Generations was a celebration of Sonic's history up to that point. The highs and the lows. Shadow Generations is a look back and acknowledgement of Shadows history, putting the Black Hedgehog in the spotlight for the first time in years. Shadow the Hedgehog debuted in Sonic Adventure 2 back in 2001 and quickly became a fan favorite for his cool appearance and more serious attitude compared to Sonic. In 2003, He came back and formed Team Dark alongside Rouge the Bat and E-123 Omega in Sonic Heroes, which became a favorite team for many who played that game. Then, in 2005, Shadow got his own spin-off and standalone title which attempted to expand on Shadows origins and answer questions left unanswered in Heroes. It accomplished this but also got a bad reputation for its overly edgy tone, cringey dialogue and unique gameplay choices. And the next game he appeared in as a main character was Sonic ‘06, which as I mentioned already, became infamous in gaming history. His subsequent appearances would be in spin-offs until the Episode Shadow DLC for Forces and a surprisingly major role in Netflix’s Sonic Prime series. And with Shadow set to make a new debut in Sonic the Hedgehog 3 soon, it's safe to say that this Year of Shadow is gonna end on a bang.
Generations is a long awaited conclusion to an arc that arguably began over 20 years ago. At long last, both we and Shadow can finally move on and look forward to what feels like a new chapter. Shadow and Sonic both have gone through loops in regards to the franchises history but at least this latest entry ends on a positive note for both as it remasters a beloved modern Sonic game and also gives his long time rival some much needed closure.
Thanks for reading!
