Sonic Colors Road Journal 2 - Forget About Any Sonic Colors Trailer You May Have Watched and Just Play This Game Already

Sonic Colors Road Journal 2 - Forget About Any Sonic Colors Trailer You May Have Watched and Just Play This Game Already
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Continuing Sonic’s Spectacular 3D Adventure

If you haven’t yet played Sonic Colors on the Nintendo Wii, stop what you’re doing, and go out and get it now. (Of course, you can finish reading this travelogue if you’d like. I would greatly appreciate that, actually.) Forget what you saw in the Sonic Colors trailer. Forget the screenshots of in-game footage. If you played the demo at this year’s E3 like I did, forget about that too. Like the old-school Sonic titles, Sonic Colors is a game about losing yourself in the moment. This became clear to me as I played through Sweet Mountain, the game’s second zone.

Speeding Through the Tasty Land of Sweet Mountain

Sweet Mountain

If you read my travelogue of Kirby’s Epic Yarn, then you probably already know that I absolutely loved that game’s sugar-themed world, Treat Land. Sweet Mountain in Sonic Colors is just as bright, cheery, and tasty-looking as Treat Land, and it was a lot of fun to play through. The six acts in this zone were filled to the brim with popcorn, gingerbread men, and lollipops, all of which I deliberately ran right through. Backgrounds featured candy-making machines with sweets literally pouring out of them, massive cakes, and even hamburgers. (Maybe this area should be called Heart Attack Zone. Then again, that would probably be a tad controversial.) The feature I found most visually pleasing was the donut loop-de-loops sprawled across all of Sweet Mountain.

To compliment the great scenery was solid fast-paced gameplay that expanded upon what the first zone had to offer. While everything was still familiar, there were more loops, more ramps, and more enemies. Each of the six levels in Sweet Mountain were also a lot faster than those in Tropical Resort. One of the acts did feature a bit of timed jumping and switch stomping, but because past Sonic games have provided more than just blinding speed, I welcomed these changes and enjoyed the pace alteration.

So Far, So Good

Do not play this zone on an empty stomach.

As I got more engulfed in the level design of Sweet Mountain, I came to the same conclusion I’ve come to in the past. This conclusion dawns on me whenever I play Sonic’s 2D escapades on the Sega Genesis; it dawned on me when I played the daytime stages in Sonic Unleashed; and it dawned on me when I played Sonic the Hedgehog 4: Sonic is about getting lost in loops and an unparalleled sense of speed. There’s no need for Werehogs (although I admit I somewhat enjoyed the nighttime stages in Sonic Unleashed), cheesy voice acting, or unfittingly deep storylines. So far, Sonic Colors has all the boxes ticked for what is supposed to be a proper experience with the blue hedgehog. I can’t wait to play the next zone.