Sonic Rivals (PSP) (gamespy)

-gamespy -

In one of my favorite games, Sonic CD, there is a particularly memorable boss fight where Sonic takes on his robotic rival, Metal Sonic. Metal Sonic is invincible and can't be beaten the standard way of bashing him until he's scrap. Instead, Sonic has to defeat the doppelganger by beating him in a race to the end of the level. If he wins, Metal Sonic collides messily against a wall at full speed, leaving Sonic to proceed victorious into the next level.

Sonic Rivals is essentially this particular boss battle applied to the length of several levels. This time around, though, Sonic's facing off against Knuckles, Shadow and series newcomer Silver in a race to discover what the nefarious Doctor is plotting this time around -- hence the "Rivals" in the title. It's also a 2D-scrolling game rendered in 3D polygon graphics, similar to last year's Sonic Rush on the DS. With the disappointment of the most recent 3D Sonic fresh in our minds, can Sonic Rivals live up to the glory-days, side-scrolling Sonics of the past?

Portable and Picturesque

It's worth noting that Sonic Rivals was outsourced and developed by Backbone Entertainment, whom you may know as the designers of the Death Jr. games. The team's expertise with the PSP hardware is obvious in the visual quality of the game. The character models and enemies boast a high degree of detail, and the stages are brought to life with bright, vivid colors and spectacular lighting effects. The game's frame rate is a mostly consistent 30 frames per second, though it does fall noticeably on occasion.

The sound, however, leaves something to be desired. The music's in line with the sort of tunes we've been hearing in most of the 3D console Sonics, though nowhere near as good. Sound effects are generally recycled from previous titles as well. There are a few voices during the story sequences done by the actors from the recent Sonic X anime series, but they're short, silly-sounding clips that have little or nothing to do with what's actually being said onscreen. Suffice it to say, you're not going to be missing too much if you play this with the volume turned down.

Rat Hedgehog Race

The gameplay in Sonic Rivals is fairly basic. Your mammal of choice faces off against another character in a race to the end of the stage. Along the way, you can collect rings, defeat enemies, and use power-ups to hinder your opponent. If you win, you proceed to the next level; if not, you'll need to start the stage over again.

Of course, it's a little more complicated than that -- though not by much. Stages are full of helpful and harmful elements like springs, loops, speed boosters and spikes. There are multiple routes through the stages, along with special objects scattered throughout that allow you to perform either a super jump or a dash boost. There are rings scattered throughout the stages that act as a shield if you get hurt -- get hit by an opponent or enemy while you have no rings, and you lose valuable time as you respawn. Varied power-ups are also found throughout the levels, and depending on your position, they can have either an offensive or defensive effect. Each character has their own specific special attack they can execute after collecting a star power-up, ranging from Sonic's hyper-speed rush to Silver's ability to screw up his opponent's controls. Of course, it's possible to attack the opponent directly as well, and bashing your opponent to knock him down and steal his rings is quite satisfying. Perform well throughout the stage, and you'll win special cards that unlock bonus options.

The game also has boss fights, which are also competitive in nature. You and your opponent face off to see who can deal the most damage to Dr. Eggman's latest vehicular invention, all while avoiding both the machine's attacks and those of the other player. Most of the bosses are only vulnerable once they move into a certain position, so oftentimes you and your rival will be fighting each other for prime sniping space. It's an interesting twist to an all-too-familiar formula, though none of the bosses prove to be exceptionally difficult.

There are six zones total, each with two acts apiece. They're all strung together by a hilariously awful story that fails to explain why the characters have to race against each other to foil Dr. Eggman. (Admittedly, it's far more entertaining than the melodramatic emo-fest of the recent console Sonic.) The first couple of zones are rather dull both in gameplay and graphical design, but as one gets further and further into the game, the stages become far more interesting and complex. There are even a couple of homages to the Metal Sonic fight I mentioned at the beginning of the review, which made me very happy to see.

Hardly a Marathon

As a whole, though, the game is quite short and not very challenging. While the races between the characters are almost always very close, I never found myself in a position where it would be completely impossible to catch up to the CPU racer ahead of me. In some racing games, the AI opponent cheats so that you can never get too far ahead of them. Sonic Rivals feels like the opposite -- the opponent never seemed to get too far ahead of me. (Though they did pull the old "use your power-up just as you're nearing the finish line" trick from time to time.) Once you've gone through all the stages in story mode, you can play through them in challenge mode, or you can go through story mode again with a different character. Since all the characters play almost exactly the same, though, you probably won't get too much out of subsequent story mode playthroughs. In the end, the replay value you'll get from Sonic Rivals is limited to how much you really want to collect all the cards and bonus goodies.

The competitive multiplayer mode is also a disappointment. It's pretty much the exact same thing as single-player mode, only with a human opponent and the ability to wager cards. Options for multiplayer gameplay are extremely limited, and even with four characters to choose from, races are strictly limited to two players. Sure, four players at once would be extremely chaotic, but in most multiplayer games, the chaos is half the fun!

Sonic Rivals is a fun but shallow game. The graphics and speed-based level design are great, but the game's short length and lack of truly compelling replay value are cause for hesitation. It's a good buy for Sonic and 2D platforming fans; everyone else might want to think it over a bit before they go ahead and plunk down forty bucks. One thing's for sure: It's certainly a lot better than Sonic on the X360. Then again, that's not saying much, is it?