From: jared@hpalace.com   
      
   Scott H wrote:   
   > Relic wrote:   
   >> Had my nephews here a little earlier; they sat down   
   >> to play this demo. The control problem I mentioned earlier?   
   >> The younger boy had a little problem with the control   
   >> (due to the fact he was trying to blow through   
   >> everything), but the older boy? Finished it   
   >> with a B grade.   
   >>   
   >>   
   >   
   >      It's a child's mindset.  I'm convinced that people today are so set   
   > in the dumbed down gameplay of the mass-market releases, that they're   
   > actually expecting the game to conform to them.  As long as you pick up   
   > the controller with the intent of figuring out the game in order to   
   > master it, changes aren't a problem.  It's when you play too many of   
   > these new dumbed down releases that innovation and 'hard-coreness'   
   > starts to get in the way of your enjoyment.  I finished the level my   
   > second try (after running out of continues) with something like 29,800   
   > points and a B grade, I just had to remember how to play Sonic in 3D.   
   > Your nephews were probably just open enough to get the controls down   
   > based on the on screen reaction.  It's just one of the hazards of   
   > experience, getting set in our ways.   
      
   No, it's more than that.  Recent Sonic games' level design sucks.   
   Starting with Sonic Heroes, Sonic Team has become fucking infatuated   
   with placing bottomless pits everywhere.  It's weird, because one of the   
   key features of the original 2D games was the nearly complete lack of   
   bottomless pits.  If you fell down, you'd fall to an easier, though less   
   rewarding, route.  Sure, they would appear now and again, but it was an   
   extremely rare occurrence, one usually reserved for the later levels.   
      
   Recent Sonic games have ditched this multiple path mindset and place   
   bottomless pits EVERYWHERE.  One misjump means death.  The odd controls   
   wouldn't be a problem if you didn't have to be perfectly precise in   
   timing your jumps.  Remember how you died most of the time in Billy   
   Hatcher?  Or Sonic Heroes?  Or Shadow the (Motherfucking, Badmouthed,   
   Hard Assed) Hedgehog?  Yeah, it was those bottomless pits all over the   
   place.   
      
   The basic mechanics have always been good in Sonic, all Sonic Team needs   
   to do is improve their level design and they'd be golden.  And it   
   saddens me to see them not improve.   
      
      -- MJF   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)