2024 has been the year of shadows and I have loved every minute of it. Everything is gearing up for the brooding hedgehog's film debut this December, but one of the biggest stops along the way has been Sonic x Shadow Generations. Shadow playing half a game by himself is the closest thing to an anti-hero having his own outing in nearly 20 years, and it's everything I could have hoped for. But pairing it with the lackluster remaster left a sour taste in my mouth.
I was always going to play the remastered Sonic Generations before moving on to Sega's effective take on Bowser's Fury. Not only does Sonic's name come first, but it's also the older game of the two. The reviews further convinced me that it was the right decision, as there was a near-unanimous consensus that Shadow's Generations trumped Sonic's, and I'd rather have the bad ones first. It's the video game equivalent of eating all your broccoli for dessert.
Shadow Generations might be the best 3D Sonic game I've ever played.
Despite my love of all things Sonic, few of the Blue Blur's 3D outings have left a lasting impression on me. It's certainly not as good as the original 2D tetralogy, but it lays the foundation upon which almost everything I love about games is built. I know that being fast is what Sonic is all about, but I've never liked the speed and movement in most 3D games.
That continued in the Sonic Generations remaster. It was okay, but it felt almost exactly like the original. When I finally got into Shadow's campaign, I feared the worst. If it had been nothing more than an expansion of Sonic Generations starring Shadow, the 20-year wait for significant Shadow content would have ended with a whimper.
Thankfully, Shadow Generations isn't just an expansion of the Sonic remaster. It shares some elements, such as returning your life to various areas and finding keys to unlock boss levels. Otherwise it wouldn't make sense to call them Shadow Generations. However, the gameplay is so much better than Sonic Generations that it feels like the best 3D Sonic game I've ever played. Movement feels smoother, I've yet to find myself falling into random, supposedly solid parts of the various levels, and boss designs feel much more complex and thoughtful.
That's good news, of course, but it took a few levels of smooth Shadow gameplay before I started overthinking the situation and getting a little annoyed. If Sega knows how to make 3D Sonic games feel this good, why wasn't the same formula applied to Sonic Generations?
Sonic Generations should have been better, and certainly could have been better.
The main reason why the Sonic Generations remaster, like the original, will be a game I barely even think about is because it just doesn't feel good to play. If Sega hadn't improved the feel of the Sonic games since the original release, they would have focused solely on improved visuals. Even though these improvements feel minimal in the remaster, they were probably everything I had hoped for. It clearly has better handling in gameplay, so why wasn't it changed to bring it up to the standards of the Shadow campaign in the remaster?
The only logical explanation I can think of is that it took too much effort. Shadow Generations is completely new content that must be created from scratch. Sonic Generations already exists, so painting it fresh, albeit very thinly, was much easier than rebuilding the game, so it feels better to play it in 2024 than it did in 2011.
It's also clear that the Sonic Generations remaster wouldn't have happened if Sega didn't need a vehicle to include Shadow in the game. With a whole new generation of Sonic fans introducing Shadow to the big screen, there was a need for a game with Shadow as the star. Giving Shadow his own game would have made no sense, and it almost certainly wouldn't have sold well. However, adding a standalone campaign to a game that is old enough to be safe from remastering is the best option.
It's a shame it had to do that, and that's probably why Sega didn't feel the need to invest more effort than they did into the Sonic Generations remaster. It's also a shame that Shadow won't be popular enough to appear in his own game again like he was in 2005, even after Sonic 3 hits theaters next month. If the best we can hope for is something like Sonic x Shadow. But I'll take the Frontier. I'd rather wait another 20 years for Shadow to become the focus again.

Sonic
- released
- October 25, 2024
- Open Criticism Evaluation
- strong