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Sonic Colors Saved Sonic--And Set It Up For A Troubling Decade
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https://www.gamespot.com/articles/sonic-colors-saved-sonic-and-set-it-up-for-a-troubling-decade/1100-6536272/?ftag=CAD-01-10abi2f
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https://www.gamespot.com/a/uploads/screen_medium/1585/15855271/4603729-3853205-sonic-cu.jpg
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Sonic Colors celebrated its 15-year anniversary on November 16, 2025. Below, we look back at how the game shifted the nature of Sonic games with new gimmicks.
Sonic Colors marked a significant turning point in Sonic the Hedgehog's gaming career. Four years prior, the franchise had hit a horrifying low with Sonic the Hedgehog 2006. Two years after that, Sonic began a slow and shaky climb from rock bottom with 2008's Sonic Unleashed. And in 2010, Sonic Colors finally brought the blue hedgehog back into gamers' good graces, becoming the best-received 3D title since the Adventure games of the late '90s and early 2000s. Things were finally starting to look bright again for the franchise--but with the good came the bad as well.
Up to that point, 3D Sonic games had learned more heavily into their narratives, with the Sonic Adventure duology and Sonic the Hedgehog 2006 standing out as significant examples. For Colors, the plot was scaled back considerably, harkening back to the simpler stories of Sonic's classic games. In fact, like most of the classics, Colors foregoes an opening cinematic completely. Once the player moves beyond the title screen, they're immediately dropped into the first level. Only then does the story begin to take shape: Sonic and Tails have made a trip to space to investigate Eggman's Interstellar Amusement Park, a creation of the mad doctor designed as penance for his evil misdeeds in the past.
Naturally, the duo isn't buying Eggman's change of heart for a second. Their suspicions are confirmed as they almost immediately discover that the park is a front for a sinister alien-enslavement operation, in which Eggman plans to use their energy to power a giant mind-control device and--you guessed it--conquer the world. Now, it's up to Sonic to race across the six captive planets that make up Eggman's twisted amusement park and free their inhabitants from his grasp. It's a plot ripped straight out of a goofy Saturday-morning cartoon, and a refreshing change after years of the franchise's hit-and-miss attempts at deeper and more complex stories.
With the more lighthearted story came a greater focus on comedy. To facilitate this, Sega brought on US-based writers Ken Pontac and Warren Graff of Happy Tree Friends fame to write the game's dialogue. The characters' personalities remained intact, albeit with a much snarkier edge than they typically displayed. This is perhaps best exemplified in Eggman's PA announcements. In every level, messages from Eggman play at regular intervals over the park's PA system. These range from warnings not to lick the rides at Sweet Mountain to the importance of holding your breath while in Asteroid Coaster's harsh vacuum of space.
What made these lines work comedically was their brevity. Actual conversations between characters, however, were a different story. Many jokes and gags were laboriously drawn out to the point that they stopped being funny. Sonic is no stranger to cracking off amusing one-liners, but much of the dialogue in Colors is akin to a frat boy at a party telling a joke that doesn't land, then trying to explain to his unamused audience why they should be laughing. If you've ever heard the insipid phrase "Baldy McNosehair" in gaming circles and were unsure where it originated, well … here you go. Pontac and Graff (who, as a side note, had virtually no prior knowledge of the Sonic franchise when writing for Colors) would continue to write for subsequent titles up through 2017's Sonic Forces, contributing to a strong tonal shift for the series that would define that decade of Sonic games.
For the first time in a 3D Sonic game, the focus was put solely on traditional high-speed Sonic gameplay--a move greatly appreciated by fans weary of the series' insistence on alternate gameplay styles. The boost mechanic returned after its successful debut in Sonic Unleashed, allowing Sonic to attain blisteringly high speeds with a simple push of a button. Of course, with the original Sonic Colors being exclusive to Nintendo Wii, a console with far lower processing power than its contemporaries, it wasn't nearly as flashy or exhilarating as its predecessor was on PS3 or Xbox 360, but it was serviceable enough. Colors also brought back Unleashed's occasional switch from 3D to 2D gameplay and allowed platforming to take center stage. Unfortunately, much of said platforming was clunky and methodical, lacking the flow and speed that made older side-scrolling Sonic games unique and fun.
What was unique and fun was the introduction of the aforementioned wisps: small alien creatures made of pure energy that augmented Sonic's speed-based abilities. After absorbing their powers, Sonic could transform into a cyan laser that zips along pathways, an orange rocket that shoots upward destroying everything in its path, a yellow drill that tears through the ground, or even a blue cube that … well, turns things into cubes to hop onto (not all of them were winners). Most of these powers felt like natural extensions of Sonic's typical gameplay as opposed to the drastically different alternate gameplay styles of past games.
At the time, fans and critics alike lauded Sonic Colors, and in some respects, deservedly so. It was a refreshing, back-to-basics approach that Sonic desperately needed after years of bizarre experimentation with team-based gameplay, guns, out-of-place human romances, werehogs, and the like. On the other hand, it was also a significant dilution of the Sonic formula that would unfortunately become a defining characteristic of the franchise throughout the 2010s. It was both a return to form and a troubling portent of things to come. Thankfully, recent games like Sonic Frontiers have sent the pendulum swinging back in the other direction, bringing onboard longtime Sonic scribe Ian Flynn and once again fleshing out the gameplay and story elements. We're currently in a promising new era for Sonic, but there's no telling if we would have gotten here without the huge shakeup--for better or worse--that Sonic Colors brought to the franchise 15 years ago.
content_html
Sonic Colors celebrated its 15-year anniversary on November 16, 2025. Below, we look back at how the game shifted the nature of Sonic games with new gimmicks.
Sonic Colors marked a significant turning point in Sonic the Hedgehog's gaming career. Four years prior, the franchise had hit a horrifying low with Sonic the Hedgehog 2006. Two years after that, Sonic began a slow and shaky climb from rock bottom with 2008's Sonic Unleashed. And in 2010, Sonic Colors finally brought the blue hedgehog back into gamers' good graces, becoming the best-received 3D title since the Adventure games of the late '90s and early 2000s. Things were finally starting to look bright again for the franchise--but with the good came the bad as well.
Up to that point, 3D Sonic games had learned more heavily into their narratives, with the Sonic Adventure duology and Sonic the Hedgehog 2006 standing out as significant examples. For Colors, the plot was scaled back considerably, harkening back to the simpler stories of Sonic's classic games. In fact, like most of the classics, Colors foregoes an opening cinematic completely. Once the player moves beyond the title screen, they're immediately dropped into the first level. Only then does the story begin to take shape: Sonic and Tails have made a trip to space to investigate Eggman's Interstellar Amusement Park, a creation of the mad doctor designed as penance for his evil misdeeds in the past.
Naturally, the duo isn't buying Eggman's change of heart for a second. Their suspicions are confirmed as they almost immediately discover that the park is a front for a sinister alien-enslavement operation, in which Eggman plans to use their energy to power a giant mind-control device and--you guessed it--conquer the world. Now, it's up to Sonic to race across the six captive planets that make up Eggman's twisted amusement park and free their inhabitants from his grasp. It's a plot ripped straight out of a goofy Saturday-morning cartoon, and a refreshing change after years of the franchise's hit-and-miss attempts at deeper and more complex stories.
With the more lighthearted story came a greater focus on comedy. To facilitate this, Sega brought on US-based writers Ken Pontac and Warren Graff of Happy Tree Friends fame to write the game's dialogue. The characters' personalities remained intact, albeit with a much snarkier edge than they typically displayed. This is perhaps best exemplified in Eggman's PA announcements. In every level, messages from Eggman play at regular intervals over the park's PA system. These range from warnings not to lick the rides at Sweet Mountain to the importance of holding your breath while in Asteroid Coaster's harsh vacuum of space.
What made these lines work comedically was their brevity. Actual conversations between characters, however, were a different story. Many jokes and gags were laboriously drawn out to the point that they stopped being funny. Sonic is no stranger to cracking off amusing one-liners, but much of the dialogue in Colors is akin to a frat boy at a party telling a joke that doesn't land, then trying to explain to his unamused audience why they should be laughing. If you've ever heard the insipid phrase "Baldy McNosehair" in gaming circles and were unsure where it originated, well … here you go. Pontac and Graff (who, as a side note, had virtually no prior knowledge of the Sonic franchise when writing for Colors) would continue to write for subsequent titles up through 2017's Sonic Forces, contributing to a strong tonal shift for the series that would define that decade of Sonic games.
For the first time in a 3D Sonic game, the focus was put solely on traditional high-speed Sonic gameplay--a move greatly appreciated by fans weary of the series' insistence on alternate gameplay styles. The boost mechanic returned after its successful debut in Sonic Unleashed, allowing Sonic to attain blisteringly high speeds with a simple push of a button. Of course, with the original Sonic Colors being exclusive to Nintendo Wii, a console with far lower processing power than its contemporaries, it wasn't nearly as flashy or exhilarating as its predecessor was on PS3 or Xbox 360, but it was serviceable enough. Colors also brought back Unleashed's occasional switch from 3D to 2D gameplay and allowed platforming to take center stage. Unfortunately, much of said platforming was clunky and methodical, lacking the flow and speed that made older side-scrolling Sonic games unique and fun.
What was unique and fun was the introduction of the aforementioned wisps: small alien creatures made of pure energy that augmented Sonic's speed-based abilities. After absorbing their powers, Sonic could transform into a cyan laser that zips along pathways, an orange rocket that shoots upward destroying everything in its path, a yellow drill that tears through the ground, or even a blue cube that … well, turns things into cubes to hop onto (not all of them were winners). Most of these powers felt like natural extensions of Sonic's typical gameplay as opposed to the drastically different alternate gameplay styles of past games.
At the time, fans and critics alike lauded Sonic Colors, and in some respects, deservedly so. It was a refreshing, back-to-basics approach that Sonic desperately needed after years of bizarre experimentation with team-based gameplay, guns, out-of-place human romances, werehogs, and the like. On the other hand, it was also a significant dilution of the Sonic formula that would unfortunately become a defining characteristic of the franchise throughout the 2010s. It was both a return to form and a troubling portent of things to come. Thankfully, recent games like Sonic Frontiers have sent the pendulum swinging back in the other direction, bringing onboard longtime Sonic scribe Ian Flynn and once again fleshing out the gameplay and story elements. We're currently in a promising new era for Sonic, but there's no telling if we would have gotten here without the huge shakeup--for better or worse--that Sonic Colors brought to the franchise 15 years ago.
content_text
Sonic Colors celebrated its 15-year anniversary on November 16, 2025. Below, we look back at how the game shifted the nature of Sonic games with new gimmicks.Sonic Colors marked a significant turning point in Sonic the Hedgehog's gaming career. Four years prior, the franchise had hit a horrifying low with Sonic the Hedgehog 2006. Two years after that, Sonic began a slow and shaky climb from rock bottom with 2008's Sonic Unleashed. And in 2010, Sonic Colors finally brought the blue hedgehog back into gamers' good graces, becoming the best-received 3D title since the Adventure games of the late '90s and early 2000s. Things were finally starting to look bright again for the franchise--but with the good came the bad as well.Up to that point, 3D Sonic games had learned more heavily into their narratives, with the Sonic Adventure duology and Sonic the Hedgehog 2006 standing out as significant examples. For Colors, the plot was scaled back considerably, harkening back to the simpler stories of Sonic's classic games. In fact, like most of the classics, Colors foregoes an opening cinematic completely. Once the player moves beyond the title screen, they're immediately dropped into the first level. Only then does the story begin to take shape: Sonic and Tails have made a trip to space to investigate Eggman's Interstellar Amusement Park, a creation of the mad doctor designed as penance for his evil misdeeds in the past.Naturally, the duo isn't buying Eggman's change of heart for a second. Their suspicions are confirmed as they almost immediately discover that the park is a front for a sinister alien-enslavement operation, in which Eggman plans to use their energy to power a giant mind-control device and--you guessed it--conquer the world. Now, it's up to Sonic to race across the six captive planets that make up Eggman's twisted amusement park and free their inhabitants from his grasp. It's a plot ripped straight out of a goofy Saturday-morning cartoon, and a refreshing change after years of the franchise's hit-and-miss attempts at deeper and more complex stories.With the more lighthearted story came a greater focus on comedy. To facilitate this, Sega brought on US-based writers Ken Pontac and Warren Graff of Happy Tree Friends fame to write the game's dialogue. The characters' personalities remained intact, albeit with a much snarkier edge than they typically displayed. This is perhaps best exemplified in Eggman's PA announcements. In every level, messages from Eggman play at regular intervals over the park's PA system. These range from warnings not to lick the rides at Sweet Mountain to the importance of holding your breath while in Asteroid Coaster's harsh vacuum of space.What made these lines work comedically was their brevity. Actual conversations between characters, however, were a different story. Many jokes and gags were laboriously drawn out to the point that they stopped being funny. Sonic is no stranger to cracking off amusing one-liners, but much of the dialogue in Colors is akin to a frat boy at a party telling a joke that doesn't land, then trying to explain to his unamused audience why they should be laughing. If you've ever heard the insipid phrase "Baldy McNosehair" in gaming circles and were unsure where it originated, well … here you go. Pontac and Graff (who, as a side note, had virtually no prior knowledge of the Sonic franchise when writing for Colors) would continue to write for subsequent titles up through 2017's Sonic Forces, contributing to a strong tonal shift for the series that would define that decade of Sonic games.For the first time in a 3D Sonic game, the focus was put solely on traditional high-speed Sonic gameplay--a move greatly appreciated by fans weary of the series' insistence on alternate gameplay styles. The boost mechanic returned after its successful debut in Sonic Unleashed, allowing Sonic to attain blisteringly high speeds with a simple push of a button. Of course, with the original Sonic Colors being exclusive to Nintendo Wii, a console with far lower processing power than its contemporaries, it wasn't nearly as flashy or exhilarating as its predecessor was on PS3 or Xbox 360, but it was serviceable enough. Colors also brought back Unleashed's occasional switch from 3D to 2D gameplay and allowed platforming to take center stage. Unfortunately, much of said platforming was clunky and methodical, lacking the flow and speed that made older side-scrolling Sonic games unique and fun.What was unique and fun was the introduction of the aforementioned wisps: small alien creatures made of pure energy that augmented Sonic's speed-based abilities. After absorbing their powers, Sonic could transform into a cyan laser that zips along pathways, an orange rocket that shoots upward destroying everything in its path, a yellow drill that tears through the ground, or even a blue cube that … well, turns things into cubes to hop onto (not all of them were winners). Most of these powers felt like natural extensions of Sonic's typical gameplay as opposed to the drastically different alternate gameplay styles of past games.At the time, fans and critics alike lauded Sonic Colors, and in some respects, deservedly so. It was a refreshing, back-to-basics approach that Sonic desperately needed after years of bizarre experimentation with team-based gameplay, guns, out-of-place human romances, werehogs, and the like. On the other hand, it was also a significant dilution of the Sonic formula that would unfortunately become a defining characteristic of the franchise throughout the 2010s. It was both a return to form and a troubling portent of things to come. Thankfully, recent games like Sonic Frontiers have sent the pendulum swinging back in the other direction, bringing onboard longtime Sonic scribe Ian Flynn and once again fleshing out the gameplay and story elements. We're currently in a promising new era for Sonic, but there's no telling if we would have gotten here without the huge shakeup--for better or worse--that Sonic Colors brought to the franchise 15 years ago.
pub_date
17 November 2025, 3:30 pm
guid
1100-6536272
creator
Paul Cecchini
processed
TRUE
id: 86785
uid: e6WYs
insdate: 2025-11-17 16:20:09
title: Sonic Colors Saved Sonic--And Set It Up For A Troubling Decade
additional:
category: Game Spot
md5: 346f4bbd16a4ba8cc7a030f2a376fa90
link: https://www.gamespot.com/articles/sonic-colors-saved-sonic-and-set-it-up-for-a-troubling-decade/1100-6536272/?ftag=CAD-01-10abi2f
image: https://www.gamespot.com/a/uploads/screen_medium/1585/15855271/4603729-3853205-sonic-cu.jpg
image_imgur:
description:
Sonic Colors celebrated its 15-year anniversary on November 16, 2025. Below, we look back at how the game shifted the nature of Sonic games with new gimmicks.
Sonic Colors marked a significant turning point in Sonic the Hedgehog's gaming career. Four years prior, the franchise had hit a horrifying low with Sonic the Hedgehog 2006. Two years after that, Sonic began a slow and shaky climb from rock bottom with 2008's Sonic Unleashed. And in 2010, Sonic Colors finally brought the blue hedgehog back into gamers' good graces, becoming the best-received 3D title since the Adventure games of the late '90s and early 2000s. Things were finally starting to look bright again for the franchise--but with the good came the bad as well.
Up to that point, 3D Sonic games had learned more heavily into their narratives, with the Sonic Adventure duology and Sonic the Hedgehog 2006 standing out as significant examples. For Colors, the plot was scaled back considerably, harkening back to the simpler stories of Sonic's classic games. In fact, like most of the classics, Colors foregoes an opening cinematic completely. Once the player moves beyond the title screen, they're immediately dropped into the first level. Only then does the story begin to take shape: Sonic and Tails have made a trip to space to investigate Eggman's Interstellar Amusement Park, a creation of the mad doctor designed as penance for his evil misdeeds in the past.
Naturally, the duo isn't buying Eggman's change of heart for a second. Their suspicions are confirmed as they almost immediately discover that the park is a front for a sinister alien-enslavement operation, in which Eggman plans to use their energy to power a giant mind-control device and--you guessed it--conquer the world. Now, it's up to Sonic to race across the six captive planets that make up Eggman's twisted amusement park and free their inhabitants from his grasp. It's a plot ripped straight out of a goofy Saturday-morning cartoon, and a refreshing change after years of the franchise's hit-and-miss attempts at deeper and more complex stories.
With the more lighthearted story came a greater focus on comedy. To facilitate this, Sega brought on US-based writers Ken Pontac and Warren Graff of Happy Tree Friends fame to write the game's dialogue. The characters' personalities remained intact, albeit with a much snarkier edge than they typically displayed. This is perhaps best exemplified in Eggman's PA announcements. In every level, messages from Eggman play at regular intervals over the park's PA system. These range from warnings not to lick the rides at Sweet Mountain to the importance of holding your breath while in Asteroid Coaster's harsh vacuum of space.
What made these lines work comedically was their brevity. Actual conversations between characters, however, were a different story. Many jokes and gags were laboriously drawn out to the point that they stopped being funny. Sonic is no stranger to cracking off amusing one-liners, but much of the dialogue in Colors is akin to a frat boy at a party telling a joke that doesn't land, then trying to explain to his unamused audience why they should be laughing. If you've ever heard the insipid phrase "Baldy McNosehair" in gaming circles and were unsure where it originated, well … here you go. Pontac and Graff (who, as a side note, had virtually no prior knowledge of the Sonic franchise when writing for Colors) would continue to write for subsequent titles up through 2017's Sonic Forces, contributing to a strong tonal shift for the series that would define that decade of Sonic games.
For the first time in a 3D Sonic game, the focus was put solely on traditional high-speed Sonic gameplay--a move greatly appreciated by fans weary of the series' insistence on alternate gameplay styles. The boost mechanic returned after its successful debut in Sonic Unleashed, allowing Sonic to attain blisteringly high speeds with a simple push of a button. Of course, with the original Sonic Colors being exclusive to Nintendo Wii, a console with far lower processing power than its contemporaries, it wasn't nearly as flashy or exhilarating as its predecessor was on PS3 or Xbox 360, but it was serviceable enough. Colors also brought back Unleashed's occasional switch from 3D to 2D gameplay and allowed platforming to take center stage. Unfortunately, much of said platforming was clunky and methodical, lacking the flow and speed that made older side-scrolling Sonic games unique and fun.
What was unique and fun was the introduction of the aforementioned wisps: small alien creatures made of pure energy that augmented Sonic's speed-based abilities. After absorbing their powers, Sonic could transform into a cyan laser that zips along pathways, an orange rocket that shoots upward destroying everything in its path, a yellow drill that tears through the ground, or even a blue cube that … well, turns things into cubes to hop onto (not all of them were winners). Most of these powers felt like natural extensions of Sonic's typical gameplay as opposed to the drastically different alternate gameplay styles of past games.
At the time, fans and critics alike lauded Sonic Colors, and in some respects, deservedly so. It was a refreshing, back-to-basics approach that Sonic desperately needed after years of bizarre experimentation with team-based gameplay, guns, out-of-place human romances, werehogs, and the like. On the other hand, it was also a significant dilution of the Sonic formula that would unfortunately become a defining characteristic of the franchise throughout the 2010s. It was both a return to form and a troubling portent of things to come. Thankfully, recent games like Sonic Frontiers have sent the pendulum swinging back in the other direction, bringing onboard longtime Sonic scribe Ian Flynn and once again fleshing out the gameplay and story elements. We're currently in a promising new era for Sonic, but there's no telling if we would have gotten here without the huge shakeup--for better or worse--that Sonic Colors brought to the franchise 15 years ago.
content_html:
Sonic Colors celebrated its 15-year anniversary on November 16, 2025. Below, we look back at how the game shifted the nature of Sonic games with new gimmicks.
Sonic Colors marked a significant turning point in Sonic the Hedgehog's gaming career. Four years prior, the franchise had hit a horrifying low with Sonic the Hedgehog 2006. Two years after that, Sonic began a slow and shaky climb from rock bottom with 2008's Sonic Unleashed. And in 2010, Sonic Colors finally brought the blue hedgehog back into gamers' good graces, becoming the best-received 3D title since the Adventure games of the late '90s and early 2000s. Things were finally starting to look bright again for the franchise--but with the good came the bad as well.
Up to that point, 3D Sonic games had learned more heavily into their narratives, with the Sonic Adventure duology and Sonic the Hedgehog 2006 standing out as significant examples. For Colors, the plot was scaled back considerably, harkening back to the simpler stories of Sonic's classic games. In fact, like most of the classics, Colors foregoes an opening cinematic completely. Once the player moves beyond the title screen, they're immediately dropped into the first level. Only then does the story begin to take shape: Sonic and Tails have made a trip to space to investigate Eggman's Interstellar Amusement Park, a creation of the mad doctor designed as penance for his evil misdeeds in the past.
Naturally, the duo isn't buying Eggman's change of heart for a second. Their suspicions are confirmed as they almost immediately discover that the park is a front for a sinister alien-enslavement operation, in which Eggman plans to use their energy to power a giant mind-control device and--you guessed it--conquer the world. Now, it's up to Sonic to race across the six captive planets that make up Eggman's twisted amusement park and free their inhabitants from his grasp. It's a plot ripped straight out of a goofy Saturday-morning cartoon, and a refreshing change after years of the franchise's hit-and-miss attempts at deeper and more complex stories.
With the more lighthearted story came a greater focus on comedy. To facilitate this, Sega brought on US-based writers Ken Pontac and Warren Graff of Happy Tree Friends fame to write the game's dialogue. The characters' personalities remained intact, albeit with a much snarkier edge than they typically displayed. This is perhaps best exemplified in Eggman's PA announcements. In every level, messages from Eggman play at regular intervals over the park's PA system. These range from warnings not to lick the rides at Sweet Mountain to the importance of holding your breath while in Asteroid Coaster's harsh vacuum of space.
What made these lines work comedically was their brevity. Actual conversations between characters, however, were a different story. Many jokes and gags were laboriously drawn out to the point that they stopped being funny. Sonic is no stranger to cracking off amusing one-liners, but much of the dialogue in Colors is akin to a frat boy at a party telling a joke that doesn't land, then trying to explain to his unamused audience why they should be laughing. If you've ever heard the insipid phrase "Baldy McNosehair" in gaming circles and were unsure where it originated, well … here you go. Pontac and Graff (who, as a side note, had virtually no prior knowledge of the Sonic franchise when writing for Colors) would continue to write for subsequent titles up through 2017's Sonic Forces, contributing to a strong tonal shift for the series that would define that decade of Sonic games.
For the first time in a 3D Sonic game, the focus was put solely on traditional high-speed Sonic gameplay--a move greatly appreciated by fans weary of the series' insistence on alternate gameplay styles. The boost mechanic returned after its successful debut in Sonic Unleashed, allowing Sonic to attain blisteringly high speeds with a simple push of a button. Of course, with the original Sonic Colors being exclusive to Nintendo Wii, a console with far lower processing power than its contemporaries, it wasn't nearly as flashy or exhilarating as its predecessor was on PS3 or Xbox 360, but it was serviceable enough. Colors also brought back Unleashed's occasional switch from 3D to 2D gameplay and allowed platforming to take center stage. Unfortunately, much of said platforming was clunky and methodical, lacking the flow and speed that made older side-scrolling Sonic games unique and fun.
What was unique and fun was the introduction of the aforementioned wisps: small alien creatures made of pure energy that augmented Sonic's speed-based abilities. After absorbing their powers, Sonic could transform into a cyan laser that zips along pathways, an orange rocket that shoots upward destroying everything in its path, a yellow drill that tears through the ground, or even a blue cube that … well, turns things into cubes to hop onto (not all of them were winners). Most of these powers felt like natural extensions of Sonic's typical gameplay as opposed to the drastically different alternate gameplay styles of past games.
At the time, fans and critics alike lauded Sonic Colors, and in some respects, deservedly so. It was a refreshing, back-to-basics approach that Sonic desperately needed after years of bizarre experimentation with team-based gameplay, guns, out-of-place human romances, werehogs, and the like. On the other hand, it was also a significant dilution of the Sonic formula that would unfortunately become a defining characteristic of the franchise throughout the 2010s. It was both a return to form and a troubling portent of things to come. Thankfully, recent games like Sonic Frontiers have sent the pendulum swinging back in the other direction, bringing onboard longtime Sonic scribe Ian Flynn and once again fleshing out the gameplay and story elements. We're currently in a promising new era for Sonic, but there's no telling if we would have gotten here without the huge shakeup--for better or worse--that Sonic Colors brought to the franchise 15 years ago.
content_text: Sonic Colors celebrated its 15-year anniversary on November 16, 2025. Below, we look back at how the game shifted the nature of Sonic games with new gimmicks.Sonic Colors marked a significant turning point in Sonic the Hedgehog's gaming career. Four years prior, the franchise had hit a horrifying low with Sonic the Hedgehog 2006. Two years after that, Sonic began a slow and shaky climb from rock bottom with 2008's Sonic Unleashed. And in 2010, Sonic Colors finally brought the blue hedgehog back into gamers' good graces, becoming the best-received 3D title since the Adventure games of the late '90s and early 2000s. Things were finally starting to look bright again for the franchise--but with the good came the bad as well.Up to that point, 3D Sonic games had learned more heavily into their narratives, with the Sonic Adventure duology and Sonic the Hedgehog 2006 standing out as significant examples. For Colors, the plot was scaled back considerably, harkening back to the simpler stories of Sonic's classic games. In fact, like most of the classics, Colors foregoes an opening cinematic completely. Once the player moves beyond the title screen, they're immediately dropped into the first level. Only then does the story begin to take shape: Sonic and Tails have made a trip to space to investigate Eggman's Interstellar Amusement Park, a creation of the mad doctor designed as penance for his evil misdeeds in the past.Naturally, the duo isn't buying Eggman's change of heart for a second. Their suspicions are confirmed as they almost immediately discover that the park is a front for a sinister alien-enslavement operation, in which Eggman plans to use their energy to power a giant mind-control device and--you guessed it--conquer the world. Now, it's up to Sonic to race across the six captive planets that make up Eggman's twisted amusement park and free their inhabitants from his grasp. It's a plot ripped straight out of a goofy Saturday-morning cartoon, and a refreshing change after years of the franchise's hit-and-miss attempts at deeper and more complex stories.With the more lighthearted story came a greater focus on comedy. To facilitate this, Sega brought on US-based writers Ken Pontac and Warren Graff of Happy Tree Friends fame to write the game's dialogue. The characters' personalities remained intact, albeit with a much snarkier edge than they typically displayed. This is perhaps best exemplified in Eggman's PA announcements. In every level, messages from Eggman play at regular intervals over the park's PA system. These range from warnings not to lick the rides at Sweet Mountain to the importance of holding your breath while in Asteroid Coaster's harsh vacuum of space.What made these lines work comedically was their brevity. Actual conversations between characters, however, were a different story. Many jokes and gags were laboriously drawn out to the point that they stopped being funny. Sonic is no stranger to cracking off amusing one-liners, but much of the dialogue in Colors is akin to a frat boy at a party telling a joke that doesn't land, then trying to explain to his unamused audience why they should be laughing. If you've ever heard the insipid phrase "Baldy McNosehair" in gaming circles and were unsure where it originated, well … here you go. Pontac and Graff (who, as a side note, had virtually no prior knowledge of the Sonic franchise when writing for Colors) would continue to write for subsequent titles up through 2017's Sonic Forces, contributing to a strong tonal shift for the series that would define that decade of Sonic games.For the first time in a 3D Sonic game, the focus was put solely on traditional high-speed Sonic gameplay--a move greatly appreciated by fans weary of the series' insistence on alternate gameplay styles. The boost mechanic returned after its successful debut in Sonic Unleashed, allowing Sonic to attain blisteringly high speeds with a simple push of a button. Of course, with the original Sonic Colors being exclusive to Nintendo Wii, a console with far lower processing power than its contemporaries, it wasn't nearly as flashy or exhilarating as its predecessor was on PS3 or Xbox 360, but it was serviceable enough. Colors also brought back Unleashed's occasional switch from 3D to 2D gameplay and allowed platforming to take center stage. Unfortunately, much of said platforming was clunky and methodical, lacking the flow and speed that made older side-scrolling Sonic games unique and fun.What was unique and fun was the introduction of the aforementioned wisps: small alien creatures made of pure energy that augmented Sonic's speed-based abilities. After absorbing their powers, Sonic could transform into a cyan laser that zips along pathways, an orange rocket that shoots upward destroying everything in its path, a yellow drill that tears through the ground, or even a blue cube that … well, turns things into cubes to hop onto (not all of them were winners). Most of these powers felt like natural extensions of Sonic's typical gameplay as opposed to the drastically different alternate gameplay styles of past games.At the time, fans and critics alike lauded Sonic Colors, and in some respects, deservedly so. It was a refreshing, back-to-basics approach that Sonic desperately needed after years of bizarre experimentation with team-based gameplay, guns, out-of-place human romances, werehogs, and the like. On the other hand, it was also a significant dilution of the Sonic formula that would unfortunately become a defining characteristic of the franchise throughout the 2010s. It was both a return to form and a troubling portent of things to come. Thankfully, recent games like Sonic Frontiers have sent the pendulum swinging back in the other direction, bringing onboard longtime Sonic scribe Ian Flynn and once again fleshing out the gameplay and story elements. We're currently in a promising new era for Sonic, but there's no telling if we would have gotten here without the huge shakeup--for better or worse--that Sonic Colors brought to the franchise 15 years ago.
pub_date: 17 November 2025, 3:30 pm
guid: 1100-6536272
creator: Paul Cecchini
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