Sonic and the Secret Rings (Wii) Pre-Review

Jeff’s Take

This won’t be our “best” prediction, as this game comes out this week. Nevertheless, since no reviews have come up yet on GameRankings, I thought I’d take the opportunity to make a prediction on the game.

This one has, however, been our radar for awhile. There’s been a lot of early buzz that this will be the first “good” Sonic game in awhile. We have a bit more information about the game than we likely will for most other games that we’ll be doing this with, since some people have already played it. However, based on earlier info as well as some early play testing here and here, I think the biggest complaints will likely be (after the jump):

1) Control

2) Depth

3) Replay value

Control is something that I think most games will struggle with on the Wii for awhile. There have already been some slight complaints that I’ve seen about it for this one. As for the Depth, I’m worried that the game will be a little too simple, short and repetitive. I hope I’m proven wrong here, but my guess is that this will be one of those games that you can “blow through” in just a few hours. Adding to my worry is the addition of several minigames. My experience with these in other games is that a few of them are fun, but most of them are garbage. Plus, I get suspicious when any game adds “tons” of minigames… it automatically makes me think there’s just not that much to the core game. There are exceptions, of course, but if the core game here takes more than 5-6 hours to complete, I’ll actually be pleasantly surprised.

Finally, for replay value, there are apparently lots of things to collect, but unless these unlock things that people actually care about or the game is insanely fun to play through, they probably won’t add too much replay value for anyone except for completionists.

The verdict? A 7.8 - Fun but short and flawed.

Geoff’s Take

Naturally, for our first pre-review I find myself totally agreeing with Jeff.  From what I can tell, the best part of the game - the on-rails levels - is also the shortest part of the game.  The minigames feel like padding to me, and since the game wasn’t designed around them I’m guessing that much like Wii Play there are a few good ones and lots of Mario Party-esque junk.  If the game manages to defy expectations, it will probably be because the “achievements” are a good mix of challenge, fun, and reward.  That seems like a tough tightrope to walk and so I’m going to concur with the 7.8.  Good, but not quite good enough to break the Sonic curse.