Happy New Year, Happy New Crossfire. I finally have something to talk about that is not a repeat of 100 threads on the first page of the Sonic the Hedgehog forum on the SSMB. Let’s get on with it.

GiantBomb.com, a site founded by former GameSpot employees, were handing out “Game of the Year” awards this past week, as so many gaming websites do. To differentiate themselves from the thousands of wanks telling people what their favorite games were, Giant Bomb added some entertaining joke awards and dubious honors. One such dubious honor was the “Take A Break” award, where a particular franchise should lay low for a while for it being over-saturated, of poor quality, or all of the above. Well, Sonic is once again the butt of everybody’s joke:

2008 continued the trend of Sega producing bad Sonic the Hedgehog games. It’s a trend that’s been ongoing since, well, depending on your perspective, you could claim it went all the way back to the Genesis. Personally, we pin Sonic’s continuing failure to please on polygons, and the gameplay’s failure to stay true to the series’ high-speed roots. There’s only one problem: Sonic Unleashed has moments that attempt to stick to what Sonic does best–running too fast for you to do anything other than watch–and it’s totally boring.

Aside from a few handheld outings, the franchise has been a mess since Sonic & Knuckles. Perhaps instead of continuing to bash their head against the hedgehog year in and year out, the folks at Sega should take a few huge steps back, take a break, and figure out a new direction. Because it’s become pretty obvious that what they’re doing now isn’t working.

With that said, would a break actually help the franchise or does it really matter how much time there is between games? Can a break put an end to THE ALL-KNOWING CYCLE?! Bring on my personal viewpoints already… Continue reading The Crossfire: Take A Break, Sonic