Let's get
straight to the point for once: this game could as well have been subtitled
"Shattered Crystal 2". It's a virtual copy-paste of the first Sonic
Boom entry on the 3DS: it sports the same aesthetics, the same cast of
characters, the same physics, the same gameplay, the same weirdly vague zone
themes, the same lacklustre soundtrack and the same overall atmosphere.
Everything I said about Shattered Crystal applies to
that game to a T, and that's why I'm going to focus on the — very few — new features that Fire and Ice
brings to the table.
Let's start with the game's main selling point, i.e. the fire and ice gimmick.
It's actually quite good for what it's worth, and it completes nicely the
already existing Sonic Boom mechanics; but unfortunately, it's also
completely underexploited. I fully expected the world of Fire and Ice to
be solely composed of fiery and wintery zones that would have pushed that new
gameplay feature to its limits; but instead, we have a potpourri of very
classic and cookie-cutter zones in which the fire and ice gimmick is used only
sporadically. Not only is that poor use a missed opportunity, but it also
dilutes the impact of the character-specific gameplay mechanics introduced in Shattered
Crystal. Fire and Ice could as well have featured Sonic alone for
all the use it makes of the rest of the crew's abilities — and in my opinion, it definitely should
have featured the Blue Blur alone in a land of fire and ice so gorgeous it
would have made Georges R. R. Martin green with envy.
Mind you,
the fact that character-specific abilities take a backseat in F&I is
not entirely negative. It does away with one of SC's most annoying
elements, namely the obligation to clear levels over and over again with
different characters in order to be able to progress at all. This infuriating
display of fake longevity is absent from F&I, replaced by a fluid
progression that lets you rush forward to your heart's content. That makes F&I more
akin to a genuine Platformer, while SC felt and played more like
some sort of weird mix of Platformer and Action-Adventure game.
F&I is also noticeably harder than SC, which really
took me by surprise — before
I started huffing and puffing about it, that is. This added difficulty doesn't
please me in the slightest, all the more so as it destroys what was in my
opinion the strongest point of the Boom series' gameplay: its very
un-Sonic relaxing quality. SC's gameplay was casual and thus
pleasantly soothing, in an oddly unexpected way; F&I's gameplay, on
the other hand, is more demanding and ends up being quite irritating. I am not
ashamed to admit that I ragequit a couple of times and that playing that game
felt more often like a exercise in frustration than like a relaxing outlet. And
mind you, the level of difficulty involved is as bad as it can be: it's high
enough to get on one's nerves, yet not high enough to be challenging and thus
genuinely thrilling. This becomes painfully obvious when considering the
Challenge Rooms, which are small bonus stages featuring some really tricky
platforming; said platforming is so well-crafted and demanding that clearing
these stages is truly exhilarating, and that's all the difficulty that game
needed in my opinion. Just give us those nerve-racking challenges in small
doses and let us luxuriate in that mellow trademark Boom gameplay.
All in all, I really can't fathom why this sequel was released at all. It was delayed by a whole year, and one could have thought that Sanzaru Games put some major work into the project; instead, what we got is a copy-paste of the first game with an underused gimmick added. What's the point of even developing such a game? Mind you, I know what the point is: the target audience for the Boom subseries are kids, and kids have long forgotten everything about the first entry and are no doubt treating F&I as a totally new and fresh game. For those of us who have longer memory spans and still own Shattered Crystal, Fire and Ice is an entirely dispensable purchase. It brings too little to the Boom formula and takes away too much from it to be worth playing, and that's coming from someone who genuinely enjoyed Shattered Crystal. I'll probably sell my copy of F&I at some point and hold onto SC for future replays; because SC is really all I need if I want to get a fix of that soothing Boom signature gameplay. Thanks for reading, and be my guest anytime!
8 comments:
Geddy16 February 2017 at 18:17
I almost bought this game, and was persuaded not to by a Gamestop employee (instead picking up Theaterhythm Final Fantasy: Curtain Call, so no loss of course). You may remember I am not a fan of Sonic games - but do these new games play the same at all? The whole franchise confuses the hell out of me, because half of them are 3D platformers, some are 2D, and some are a mysterious mix. I cannot seem to wrap my head around this franchise no matter how hard I try :(
Isleif17 February 2017 at 11:58
Although the Boom 3DS games are
technically 2D Plaformers, they play nothing like the 16-bit entries or the
more recent Nintendo DS ones. The Boom gameplay is much more deliberate and
unhurried, with speed sections being semi-scripted and few and far between.
There are no boobie traps and the gameplay is mostly aerial-based, with a lot
of swinging around and Homing on enemies, springs and items.
Overall, these games offer some really tight yet not overly difficult
platforming, and they are perfect to chill out. Shattered Crystal is more
relaxing and polished than Fire&Ice, so I would definitely recommend that
game if you want to give the Boom series a try.
Kumiko17 February 2017 at 13:09
Maybe they made this game to finally
be done with their exclusive contract with Nintendo? In case you didn't know,
Sega made a contract with Nintendo a few years back to release 3 Sonic games
exclusive to the Nintendo platforms, starting with Sonic and the Lost World. If
the last Sonic Boom game on the Wii U and 3DS only counted as one game, it
explains the existence of this one and why it was pushed out the door this way.
It may also explain why Sega lost interest and farmed out these games to
another company after Sonic and the Lost World didn't do so good because, you
know, Wii U exclusive. Can't say I blame them after excellent games like Tokyo
Mirage sold so poorly, it's not like they had any reason to try when stuck to
the Wii U.
Anyways, I'm still putting off playing this spin off. I keep putting off the
original Sonic Boom because the idea of being forced to play the same stages
with different characters over and over, not to complete the game and collect
stuff like in most platformers, but just to make progress in the story is
completely abhorrent to me. But my OCD makes loathe to play a sequel first. Not
that this one sounds that much more appealing, I'm not particularly patient
with difficulty when it comes to platformers. I'm fine with it in RPGs and some
oher genres, but it's a no-no for platformers. You seem more tolerant of that,
so if even you had to to ragequit...
I think I'm gonna wait for Sonic 2017 and Sonic Mania. It'll be nice to see
what Sega has been planing to do with Sonic themselves after these last couple
of years. I'm hopeful for both of them.
Isleif18 February 2017 at 15:34
"Sega made a contract with
Nintendo a few years back to release 3 Sonic games exclusive to the Nintendo
platforms": let's look no further, THAT must be the reason for
Fire&Ice's very existence. Still, Sanzaru Games could have being more diligent
and made the game more original and polished; but I guess they really didn't
want to bother after the tepid reception of Shattered Crystal and just did the
bare minimum.
I'm also really not fond of backtracking, but I can't remember being annoyed by
the necessity to replay levels in Shattered Crystal; and that's mostly because
the platforming in that game is genuinely enjoyable, and deeply relaxing to
boot. To put it otherwise, I would probably have replayed the game several
times in a row anyway, so I really didn't mind replaying levels over the course
of a single playthrough--all the more so as playing with different characters
did open new exclusive paths. But hey, I'm not trying to convince you to play
Shattered Crystal. That being said, if you ever find it in a bargain bin for 5
euros... ^___^
Kumiko18 February 2017 at 23:04
Oh, I already have both games
actually. Because of their tepid reception, it was fairly easy to find used
copies of them for awesome prices. I'm a sucker for Sonic even when the games
are received badly. I just haven't gotten around to playing them yet and I've
been meaning to play Shattered Crystal for a year now.
But with such a huge backlog, one full of RPGs no less, I haven't found an
excuse to put a game I'm unsure of in the front. Right now I still have to
finish Story of Seasons, Ape Escape, Soul Sacrifice, Hyperdimension Neptunia
and Digimon Next Order. Even at the speed I can go through games (10 this year
so far, another reason I keep putting off making my own blog, the number of
games I'd have to take screens of is astounding), I haven't managed to slot in
even Sonic Generations. I have been trying to get into the habit of slotting in
a shorter game between the RPGs and farming games I play, but with all the RPGs
I was in the middle of already that plan hasn't bore much fruit already.
Replaying Dynasty 8 Empires/Samurai Warriors 4 Empires all the time hasn't
helped either and I'm also feeling the urge to play Cyber Sleuth on my PS4,
even though I completed it on the Vita last year.
I'll consider it putting it into the front though, once I'm done with my
current short game Ape Escape. But I'm also putting that game off until I
finish Digimon Next Order, which is turning out to be really long so...
Isleif19 February 2017 at 17:38
Oh, so you're covered! These games
won't go anywhere, so you can just wait for the right moment to play them.
Another great advantage of owning physical copies; you don't have to rush
playing stuff for fear of digital subscription services bailing out and leaving
you with unplayable games.
10 games in one month and a half is pretty impressive, I must say. Fast gamer
is fast! ^___^ You've been lavishing so much praise on Dynasty Warriors 8
Empires and Samurai Warriors 4 Empires that I'm really tempted to play them.
The latter is currently on sale on the PSN for 12,99 euros and the former has a
free version available, so maybe now's the right time to give these games a
try! I guess I'll never manage to get Samurai Warriors 4 Empires for a cheaper
price, so...
Kumiko19 February 2017 at 19:18
Given that you like Senran Kagura,
I'm sure you'll like the playstyle they offer so I recommend that you go for
it.
But the reason I praise the Empire versions of those games so much in
particular is because they fill a gaming niche I never even knew I wanted, and
I can't describe it in just one word. But I'll try to do it with a lot of them:
do you have some days where you're just sick of the current game you're
playing? Since we love RPGs so much, I imagine you do. I love genre, but
because the games are so grindy and long by design, they can cause fatigue
rather often. I used to start playing other RPGs, but then I also got fatigued
of them go figure.
Usually this is the perfect time to try a new game in another genre. But...you
don't feel like doing that either. Learning a new game can be daunting, and who
knows how enjoyable and how long that game can be? Before you know it, you have
a pile of half started games. What you really want is something familiar you
can turn your brain off to, but not so stale as grinding in RPGs can be.
What about a sandbox or a simulator then? I used to play the Sims during those
times, but after 12 years of the Sims 2, I'm really tired of that at the moment
too. Plus, I also want something that has a clear "end", so I can
play it and feel I accomplished something at the end and move back to my
previous games. The Sims is a sandbox with no end, so they weren't fulfilling
that need either. Neither does animal crossing.
This is where the Empire games come in. These games are customizable to the
core, so a run through of them can be as long or as short as you want, but
never quite feel the same. Not only can you create your own character and
choose from many different fighting styles, but what you do in each playthrough
is almost always different. In Samurai Warriors there's different clans you can
control, all with their different goals. Some want to reach a certain spot on
the map, others want to destroy another clan and others want to unite a certain
part of Japan. But you're not forced to only do that goal, so you can
deliberately avoid doing that to prolong the game and conquer the rest of the
map, develop your land, build castles, build relationships between your
clansmen (you can get married, have retainers, friends, rivals and nemesis),
develop your fame, etc. On the other hand, if you want a shorter playthrough,
you can pick a clan with an easy goal and go straight for that. The game also
has so many historical and random events to unlock that even I haven't managed
to get them all, so there's always something to do. So while the game becomes
familiar after your first playthrough, it's not like replaying an old favourite
over and over, each run can be a little different. On top of that, the strategy
periods between fights keeps the gameplay itself from getting stale.
Couple that with a lot of difficulty settings and it's the perfect game to
unwind when your brain is mushy. And at the end of it you still get the nice
feeling of "finishing" a game. It's something I never knew I wanted,
but I can't live without it now. On top of that, Dynasty Warriors is totally
different from Samurai Warriors, and not just fighting wise (and yes, they do
differ a lot on that aspect despite what critics say). In that game you control
one soldier, not a clan, so the whole game changes. You're not stuck with one
faction, you can betray yours to join another one, take over your leader and
lead the clan yourself, be stuck as low ranking officer, rise the ranks so much
that the leader gives the clan to you, make your own clan by recruiting others
to your vagabond army or stick to being a vagabond doing odd jobs for 50 years.
The choices are awesome, so even if I don't feel like playing one Empire game,
I'll certainly feel like playing the other. I personally prefer Dynasty
Warriors, so I urge you to try the free version too.
Isleif20 February 2017 at 13:13
Well, I'm sold there! The idea of a game with customizable characters and malleable playing times and gameplay objectives genuinely appeals to me, so I'm definitely going to give these games a try. Hopefully I will come to love and enjoy them as much as you do. ^____^
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