Games for Lunch: Sonic Chronicles: The Dark Brotherhood
In a nutshell: Sonic gets an RPG, over a decade after Mario did. Eat it, Sonic!
10/31/2008 5:52 PM | 0 Comments | Page 1 of 4
Developer: BioWare
Publisher: Sega
Release Date: Sept. 30, 2008
System: Nintendo DS
ESRB Rating: E
Official Web site
0:00 I went from being a rampant Sonic fan to a smoldering Sonic fan around the time of
Sonic Adventure. Still, the RPG elements and participation of BioWare in
Sonic Chronicles: The Dark Brotherhood were enough to at least get me curious.
0:01 In the intro cut scene, lots of quick cuts. Sonic runs. Tails flies his biplane. There's a spaceship. Amy, Knuckles and Tails stand with Sonic. Cut to some in-game footage of some unimpressive 3-D boss battles. The overworld map is much nicer looking, with a cel-shaded Sonic running over a hand-drawn landscape. All four of the main characters stand looking out to the middle distance. I love the high-energy guitar music. Bwreeoow!
0:02 Seems the last guy who rented this game only got to Chapter 1. Not a good sign... New game for me, though. "Some Time Ago..." in Eggman's Floating Castle over Metropolis. The huge ship fires on the city. Sonic and team board from their own mini-ship and attack. "You'll never defeat me," "We'll see about that," etc. Big explosion and the ship starts to go down, causing a huge explosion to engulf the city. Sonic and team fly off on the biplane, apparently unconcerned about the carnage they've left in their wake.
0:03 Present day, on the other side of the world, Sonic gets a phone call as he runs through a field. "CHAPTER 1: HOSTILE RECEPTION." Like, phone reception? "Sonic, you made it, I'm so glad to hear from you." "I'm here, Tails, what's going on." Knuckles has disappeared with the Chaos Emeralds, that's what's going on! Amy's gonna come help Sonic find 'em.
0:06 The touch-screen controls kind of remind me of the DS Zelda game. Touch a place on the screen and Sonic runs over there. Little icons pop up occasionally to let me jump to ledges, speed around loops ... that kind of thing. There are a bunch of rings lying around for me to collect. Pretty mellow so far.
0:08 An old guy is tired and needs help with his chores. I can respond with "I have important things to do," but knowing RPGs, he'll just keep asking until I agree to help him out. So I skip it.
0:09 So the old guy has me walk over to a wood pile to tap the L button when an icon appears overhead. There's not even any timing element to it ... I can just tap whenever I want. That's it? Chopping three logs earns me a POW Candy, which provides "PP + 5" ... whatever that means.
0:10 I access my inventory by clicking the shoe icon on the pause screen. Because I keep my inventory in my shoes? I guess I must ... I'm not wearing any other clothes, after all.
0:11 "Ah, Green Hill Zone. We've had some good times here, haven't we Tails?" "Good times? Like Eggman turning our animal friends into robots and pitting them against us." "Yep, good times." Witty!
0:12 Quote of the moment: "Sonic, look out. That armadillo looks angry." How can you tell when an armadillo is angry?
