Sonic Colors

Sonic Colors
🎵I'm gonna reach for the staaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaars🎵 🎵Although they look pretty faaaaaaaaaaaaaaar🎵 🎵I'm gonna find my own waaaaaaaaaaaaaaay🎵 🎵And take a chance on todaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay🎵
Protagonist(s): Sonic the Hedgehog Genre(s): Platform Platform(s): Nintendo DS Wii Microsoft Windows Nintendo Switch PlayStation 4 Xbox One Release Date: Nintendo DS, Wii PAL: November 11, 2010 NA: November 16, 2010 JP: November 18, 2010 Microsoft Windows, Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, Xbox One WW: September 7, 2021 AS: September 9, 2021 Developer(s): Sonic Team Dimps (DS) Blind Squirrel Games (Ultimate) Publisher(s): Sega Country: Japan United States Series: Sonic the Hedgehog Predecessor: Sonic Unleashed Successor: Sonic Generations

Sonic Colors (known as Sonic Colours in Europe and Australia) is a 2010 platform video game developed by Sonic Team and published by Sega for the Nintendo DS and Wii. The game was released worldwide in November 2010 and is the first Sonic game to feature power-ups known as Wisps. On May 27th, 2021, in celebration of Sonic's 30th anniversary, Sega announced a Wii remaster titled Sonic Colors: Ultimate (known as Sonic Colours: Ultimate in PAL regions), released on September 7, 2021 for Microsoft Windows, Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One.

Why It'll Reach For The Stars

Overall

1. Unlike many other Sonic games, the Wisps mechanic acts more like the power-ups system in Mario games rather than an intrusive gimmick. The color powers enhance the gameplay rather than detract from it since they allow access to multiple pathways, help find collectibles, have unique properties, and the stages are designed to specifically accommodate them.
2. Fun boss battles.
3. Fantastic voice acting.
   • This is also the first main game in the series to use the current voice cast for the characters.
4. Decent level design with frantic and fun 3D and 2D sections.
5. Beautiful graphics, especially for Wii standards. You can also use the Nvidia PhysX engine to improve the graphical qualities.
6. Amazingly catchy soundtrack, especially for Aquarium Park and Asteroid Coaster.
7. While collecting 180 Red Star Rings can be a pain, it will be worth all your troubles since you’ll be able to transform into Super Sonic.
8. The final battle against Dr. Eggman is so good that it was remade (although poorly) twice in Sonic Lost World and Sonic Forces.
9. The game is also compatible with the GameCube Controller and the Classic controller, if you don't feel like using the Wii remote to play the game.
10. Despite its very loose definition of "comedy", some lines manage to actually be funny (mostly from Sonic and Eggman), like “No copyright law in the universe is going to stop me!”, “Try the newest dining experience at Eggman's Incredible Interstellar Amusement Park, the Bucket O’ Sushi. Now with FISH!” and “How 'bout you and me make like Eggman's hairline and recede?”.
11. The first 7 stages in Eggman's Sonic Simulator are very creative callbacks to Sonic 1's levels. And unlike some of its successors, they are actually quite subtle.

Nintendo DS version

1. Great graphics for a DS game.
2. Fun and improved special stages from the other Rush games.
3. Great music renditions from the Wii version, even with a couple of new songs.
4. The gameplay is faster paced than the Wii version and the levels are free of cheap hazards and bad enemy placements.
5. The version features the Red Burst and Violet Void wisps which are unique to this version and they feel great to control.
6. The story is a little different, with the childish humor being toned down (like in the Japanese Wii version) and Sonic's friends make appearances in the different zones. Some of the dialogue between characters can also be pretty entertaining.
7. Unique bosses in Tropical Resort and Planet Wisp and this version also presents an extra final boss.
8. The Nega Wisp Armor boss fight is more of a challenge.
9. Improved homing attack over Sonic Rush and Sonic Rush Adventure.
10. Nice pre-rendered cutscenes.

Bad Qualities

Overall

1. From this game until Sonic Forces, Ken Pontac and Warren Graff were the writers of the games. Unfortunately, they made this game's humor very childish, most notably when Sonic talks to the robots who don't talk back and stretches at their sight, when Tails translates the Wisps' words into random nonsense, or how Eggman is constantly treated like a joke since he serves as the comic-relief punching bag in the cutscenes (to the point of not taking himself seriously!) instead of being the threatening villain he was always remembered for.
2. Collecting all the Red Rings is a chore because the fast-paced levels with multiple branching paths makes them very easy to miss. Most levels have Red Rings that are outright impossible to grab without unlocking a Wisp later in the game, forcing you to backtrack if you want all of them.
3. Most of the game is in 2D and it barely improves the Boost formula.
4. While the bosses are creative, half of them are reskins from the first three bosses.
5. The controls are much different than the controls in Sonic Unleashed and are a hard to get used to when playing this game with a Classic controller, due to the Quick Step and Drift being available only on certain sections.
6. The level design, while decent, has some flaws, which makes some areas long and boring, and these design errors are worse in 2D zones.
7. The Cube wisp is certainly the worst one of the bunch. Although an interesting mechanic, it's boring due to his slow animation that makes the game come to a halt, and its enemy-destroying earthquake isn't really that impactful.

Nintendo DS version

1. The game is very short, making the console versions feel long by comparison. Even Sonic Rush, an earlier game that was similar to this, was much longer.
2. The Special Stages, while fun, are some of the easiest in a Sonic game, especially when compared to the touch-screen exclusive Special Stages from other Sonic games from Dimps.
3. Asteroid Coaster Act 2 can be frustrating to deal with.
4. The unique true final boss, Nega Mother Wisp, is pretty underwhelming.
5. The Cube and Spikes wisps from the console versions didn't make the cut.

Ultimate

Unfortunately, the game was clearly rushed, leading to many issues. Therefore, it got a negative page. See this page for more details.

Reception

Sonic Colors received positive reviews. On Metacritic, the Wii version has a 79/100 rating, while the DS version has a 78/100 rating from critics. Nintendo Life gave it a 9/10 rating, while Nintendo Power gave the Wii version a 9/10 rating and a 7.5/10 rating for the DS version.

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