Hey! Did you gain weight?

As a kid growing up you were either a Mario guy or a Sonic guy. Sure I loved both game franchises and played each religiously, but when it came to comparing the two Sonic was always my winner. Mario was fat, slow and very Italian. Sonic on the other hand was ultra fast, super cool and definitely not Italian. I had both a Master System and a Mega Drive, all the games, and would get up on Saturday mornings just to watch the cartoons.

Obviously I'm referring to the awesome cartoons...

…and not this.

Thus the general decline of awesome in the Sonic franchise after my childhood was rather upsetting. Every year folk get their hopes up that this would be the good one, only to discover it has a warehog in it, or Sonic kissing children. We fall for this every time. Most recently Sonic 4 promised a return to the series' 2D roots in episodic format, only to provide a single, short episode that had wonky physics and terrible level design.

Which is why the news that Sonic Generations was actually decent blew my mind. On the recommendation of a friend I picked up the game for 360 and was amazed by how good it is. The simple premise of the game is that "unknown dark evil" has gone through time and merged the worlds of classic 2D fat Sonic and svelte, obnoxious 3D Sonic. The nine levels in the game are each inspired by a different Sonic game and each one has two acts, one played in 2D reminiscent of the Mega Drive era and one in 3D like the Dreamcast era.

Remarkably they got both of these right in a single package. The physics for 2D Sonic are spot on, you always have a feeling of speed and it doesn't suffer from bad level design such as bottomless pits just off-screen that kill you because you were going so fast and didn't "know" to jump. The 3D levels are also shockingly good, thanks to the boost button and the homing attack that keep sonic moving. Sonic has always, and should always be about speed. The moment you stop and have to navigate difficult platforming, it all goes to shit, because Sonic is a terrible platformer. 

The story around the time zones of two Sonics being merged isn't half bad either, with the short cut scenes between levels including some comedic interactions between the two. Sega even make reference to the stupid change from Robotnik to Eggman, which makes me happy. 

Unfortunately its not a perfect package. The boss battles are lousy, and getting to them requires you to do three challenges (of which there are many more optional ones) in the levels you previously completed. None of these challenges are of particular high quality and feel entirely like padding. Similarly, you collect points that can be spent on upgrades for Sonic, which are supposed to add some depth to the game, but they never felt like they were needed. With nine actual levels, each with a 2D and a 3D act, the game felt incredibly short.

The real surprise for me was a mode Sega probably threw in at the last minute with very little thought. The game has a 30 second time trial mode where you try to get the furthest distant you can in each level, which is then recorded on a leader board. Myself and the friend who recommended the game have been viciously competing on this, going back on forth trying to get ever so slightly further in the level. As I said, Sonic is about speed, so constantly trying to better your time, particularly on the 2D levels, is an absolute blast.

So in summary; its very short, but what there is is the best Sonic we've had in years. Also, if someone tries to touch you in a place you don't like, thats no good. Especially if they're Italian.