I am back yet again to review another random game I found under the couch cushions. This time it’s Sonic Rush Adventure for the DS. This game includes 4 boat-riding games, an upgradeable island, and very occasionally platformer gameplay. Sonic Rush Adventure is a good game with lots of charm and variety.
Remember, this review reflects my experience and therefore everyone else’s as well. If you disagree with any point I bring in this post, then you should reflect on your opinion until you agree with me as I am correct and you are wrong. Thank you for reading!
Boats!!!
Sonic Rush Adventure takes place in a wide-open ocean. It is up to the player to chart a path and find islands which have stages on them. There are 4 boats each with their own minigame. Overall, exploring the ocean and playing these minigames takes up about half of the game, which is fine by me since I think the exploration and these minigames are the best parts of the game.
The first boat you get is the Wave Cyclone. This is basically a Jet Ski that you can move left and right with the stylus to avoid obstacles. By collecting coins and powerups, you can slowly fill the boost gauge. If you hold L or R, then you go faster and murder all enemies for a short period while the boost gauge depletes.
Now, the creators set up this control scheme so that both left-handed and right-handed players could use the stylus with one hand while pressing the shoulder button with the other. Unfortunately, I am right-handed, and my 3DS’s L button recently stopped working. No matter! I just used my right pinky to hold R while still using my right-hand for the stylus. It was not ideal, but a true gamer can make do with whatever controls are available to them, broken buttons be damned.
The Wave Cyclone is also used to race a robot named Johnny. Johnny can be found in a few places on the ocean wanting to race you on your Wave Cyclone. After defeating him, he gives you a chaos emerald. As far as I can tell, there is no given reason for why or how he has the chaos emeralds, but it’s nice of him to play fair I guess. These races are pretty tough. The race for the 5th emerald is so hard that I thought it may be literally impossible to do before upgrading the Wave Cyclone, but I was proven wrong by this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7lYX9RFxM08 by eMPlay’s Modetro who manages to win by a fraction of a second.
The final boat you get is a submarine called the Deep Typhoon. This boat’s minigame is literally just the rhythm game OSU, and I’m not complaining. This minigame works perfect on a DS.
Southern Island
At the beginning of the game, Sonic and Tails wind up in a plane wreck and are beached on an island where they are found and poked with a stick by Marine the raccoon. I like Marine as a character; she’s like Sticks the Badger but younger and Australian. This island is called Southern Island and acts as this game’s hub.
By completing missions, you can get decorations for the island like a balloon and a statue of sonic. These make the island feel more alive and are a good reward. My only problem with this is that one of the first decorations you can get is a literal brontosaurus! It takes up a third of the island and puts every other decoration to shame. It really takes away from the singular palm trees you get later on.
The Southern Island also has a few koala characters called the Coconut Crew. These guys mostly do stuff that would usually be in a boring menu. One of them let’s you rewatch cutscenes from the game, and another let’s you listen to all the music. Good luck unlocking all of the music though; you’ll have to complete 58 optional missions to unlock all of them. Why so many? I have no idea.
The Actual Levels
And now to talk about the actual platformer gameplay of this game. Big reveal……. It’s okay. The levels are a mixed bag. The controls are fine and it feels really good the charge up the boost gauge, then hold Y to go fast. Sonic and Blaze play similarly but are unique enough to change how you play the game just a little bit.
However, I found that a lot of levels didn’t provide enough warning for obstacles. And I know! This is a Sonic game! Fast reactions are a part of the game, but I never had quite this much trouble with sonic 2 or 3. Many times, I would fill up the boost gauge and want to use it or have the urge to jump to see if I could find a secret, then I would instantly fall into a giant pit and die. It put a damper on my urge to explore the levels.
I was a fan of the bosses; they are plain fun. For some reason though, you do not have a boost gauge in the bosses which I found myself trying to use from time to time. I guess it was removed since there is no real way to charge the gauge during bosses. My favorite part of each boss is the ending animation. After getting the final hit on a boss, every single time, they play the crunchiest 3D explosion you’ve ever seen. It looks so cheap, but to me it’s charming.
Score
I liked the game. Ironically, my least favorite part was the traditional sonic gameplay. The ocean exploration, the upgradeable island hub, and the boat minigames gives this game a lot of variety and a number of extra goals past the end credits. However, the problems I had with the core gameplay held it back from being a great time through and through.
I agree with person 1
Speed