Sonic X Shadow Generations Review – The Ultimate Collection

For a franchise as long-running as Sonic, it’s rare to see its vast cast of characters having solo adventures. Save for odd spin-offs on the Game Gear and SEGA 32X, Sonic’s friends were always along for the ride in his adventures.

Shadow is one of the rare cases where he not only had a major game to himself, but it received a sudo-sequel with Shadow Generations. Shadow’s grand adventure joins the beloved 2011 Sonic Generations in the ultimate collection with Sonic X Shadow Generations. But does his dark journey match the high-energy nostalgia-fueled fun that Sonic and his classic self offered players in the past?

Shadow Generations not only matches the quality of Sonic Generations, but in several ways, it surpasses it.

Developer & Publisher // Sonic Team, SEGA
Platforms // Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Nintendo Switch, PC
MSRP & Release Date //$49.99, October 25, 2024
Reviewed On // PC (Steam)

What is Sonic X Shadow Generations?

Before we break down Shadow’s adventure, we must discuss Sonic X Shadow Generations as an overall package. The first half of this collection is the 2011 Sonic Generations, originally released on PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, and PC.

Sonic Generations speaks for itself, being one of the highest-reviewed 3D Sonic games in many years. However, the major issue with the title was its platforms. Save for the PC community’s amazing work with mods to maintain it and Xbox’s Backward Compatability team making it playable on modern Xbox consoles, Nintendo and PlayStation gamers had no access to Sonic Generations.

That changes with this latest release on PlayStation platforms, offering the near-4K resolution and frame rates PC and Xbox players enjoyed. This version of the game on PC matches the visual quality from the 2011 Steam Release while also providing additional graphics options, letting you change things in-game, rather than doing it before start-up.

The second adventure in this double pack is Shadow Generations, a brand-new adventure exploring Shadow’s character, his relationship with his origins, and facing his past once, and for all. Shadow’s adventure doesn’t have as many zones as Sonic Generations (six versus nine) but the overall content easily matches Sonic’s time-traveling adventure.

Sonic X Shadow Generations – Sonic’s Adventure

Narrative

This 2011 time-traveling adventure has Sonic and his classic self venturing across iconic levels from the franchise. Due to a mysterious monster sucking up time and space, the hedgehogs blast through Green Hills and fight familiar foes.

Due to Sonic Generations originally releasing during a time when the narrative was put on the back-burner, Sonic Team had Ian Flynn revisit the story of the game. Not much has changed overall. Some dialog has changed, the opening and ending cut-scenes have slight animation changes, and Modern Sonic now talks to his friends when saving them. This contrasts with the original game, where freeing them after ‘restoring’ a zone has Sonic posing or performing a small animation when his friends talk with him.

In addition, some of the most recent voice cast and even some typical Atlus VAs lend their talents to voicing Sonic and his friends. Unlike the opening and ending cut-scenes, very little work was done to ‘adjust’ the character models and lip-syncing for the moments you save Sonic’s friends. It can look a tad awkward seeing Modern or Classic Sonic react to what his friends say, not exactly matching the new dialog Sonic himself is saying back to them.

The changes to the script add further connections to the overall world of the Sonic series, being more direct than in the original Sonic Generations. I appreciate this effort, but Sonic Team should’ve offered a mode that used the original script for those who preferred that experience.

Gameplay/Controls

Very little has changed from the original 2011 Sonic Generations, with both Sonic’s controlling how they did in that original release.

Modern Sonic can boost at high speeds, perform a single jump and air dash to get across gaps, slide under tight gaps, and utilize other maneuvers throughout his adventure. As you play through the game, various abilities like Wall Jumping and Light Speed Dashing (getting across trails of rings) become more common level design elements, alongside Quick Stepping left or right and drifting around tight corners.

Classic Sonic is simple to control being able to move left or right and use his iconic spin-dash to get insane speeds. Unlike the original Genesis Classics, he doesn’t feel exactly like those games, unlike more recent Classic Sonic efforts like Sonic Mania or Sonic Superstars. That doesn’t mean his levels aren’t fun though, using creative level gimmicks and having great level design encouraging the bottom/middle/top routes Sonic 3&K is famous for.

A new ability for both Sonic is the Drop Dash, a recent move present in Sonic Mania and Sonic Frontiers. It’s a move, while helpful for Classic Sonic, it’s practically useless for Modern Sonic. Activating the move for him involves doing an Air Dash, using far more button inputs than Classic Sonic’s way of pulling the move off.

Two Control Schemes

Also worth noting is that the game has two control scheme options. One is based on Sonic Frontiers and another is based on the original 2011 Sonic Generations. I recommend switching to the ‘Legacy’ controls right away. More so from how often you are Quick Stepping, an ability mapped to the bumpers. When having to do that, while boosting with the RT/R2 button it can feel awkward.

Design – Challenge Acts

Upon playing through each ‘era’ of Sonic (Classic, Dreamcast, Modern), being a cluster of three full zones, players complete a challenge act for each zone. Doing so gets you a key, which can unlock a boss gate. The challenge acts can be simple (racing against a ghost double of yourself) and offer fun challenges (teaming up with one of Sonic’s friends to get through a modified level).

Highlights include the Elemental Shield challenges, which upon completion lets Classic Sonic equip them before starting a level and exploring levels at different times of day. Seaside Hill from Sonic Heroes and Planet Wisp from Sonic Colors have challenge acts that let players do this with Modern Sonic and I loved seeing iconic locations in a new way.

Boss Encounters

There are two styles of bosses in Sonic Generations. You have three main bosses, that require three Challenge Keys to unlock. While they lack a real challenge, being able to fight Perfect Chaos as Modern Sonic or fighting the Sonic 2 Death Egg Robot can be quite enjoyable.

The other style of boss encounter is rival battles. Facing off against Metal Sonic on Sonic CD’s Stardust Speedway or recreating the iconic Sonic VS Shadow race in Sonic Adventure 2 is great fun. Despite lacking challenge, similar to the main bosses, they are fun celebrations for the eras they represent.

New Collectables and Quality of Life Additions

While much wasn’t added content-wise to the base Sonic Generations experience, a new collectible was introduced. These are the cute Chao characters, with every act having three to collect. Upon finding them, you will see them at the main zone gates, flying alongside the saved Sonic friend for the area. Despite not adding much to the overall experience, seeing cute Chao whom longtime fans likely raised in Sonic Adventure 2 return is a nice way to celebrate that game.

A minor quality-of-life change I appreciated was how the Red Ring Collection works. In the original release, you weren’t sure of the order in which the objects were located. Though using Sonic Frontiers and Sonic Forces’ tracking of Red Rings, it’s easy to tell if you collected an end-level one or one in the middle of your run.

Missed Potential

While Sonic Generations was untouched, they could have done more to enhance this great experience into something even better.

Since 2011, many amazing level mods have been added to Sonic Generations. From the entire roster of Day Levels from Sonic Unleashed being playable and even full-character skins for Modern and Classic Sonic, the community did a lot to extend the base experience.

SEGA is known for reaching out to the community, resulting in amazing work. So the fact they didn’t feel the need to add some of the top community efforts into Sonic Generations disappoints. They did, however, add skins for both Modern and Classic Sonic. So if you pre-ordered the game or signed up for SEGA’s newsletter, playing as Sonic Jam‘s version of Sonic or Sonic Adventure’s version of Sonic is a nice bonus.

Sonic X Shadow Generations – Shadow’s Adventure

Narrative

Arriving on Sonic Adventure 2’s Space Colony Ark, believing that the alien threat of Black Doom and the Black Arms are back, Shadow is soon wrapped up in a time-traveling adventure started by the Time Eater, the main villain in Sonic Generations.

Waking up in his version of White Space, a void in the time-stream, Shadow must take down Black Doom while encountering friends from the present, and the past he left behind. Unlike Sonic’s joyful romp down memory lane, Shadow’s adventure is all about him both facing and accepting his past.

The character went through a similar arc in Shadow the Hedgehog. But while in that game, both Gerald and Maria Robotnik are mere memories, the two have an active role in Shadow’s character development in Shadow Generations. Not only can you talk with them, alongside some other members of the Sonic cast, but they frequently show up in the game’s well-animated scenes.

Several moments in the game, such as Shadow seeing them in the distance upon clearing one of the zones and brushing it off as ‘no, that can’t be real’ or giving into his raw fury seeing one of the friends in danger and utterly crushing the Black Arms monsters that dared attack them, were powerful. By far, the most hard-hitting emotional moments, come from the game’s final half-hour.

Shadow’s Character Development & Voice Acting Highlights

When Shadow’s adventure concludes, you feel his struggles. As a character, Shadow is more nuanced than Sonic. In the recent Sonic Frontiers, a lot of his character development was through how he helped his friends grow into stronger people, but he is so steadfast in his beliefs, that he just powered through any struggles his way.

Shadow does things mainly for himself first, with his actions helping others being a mere bonus. This leads to his inner struggle with rage toward the Black Arms, going out of his way to crush them no matter what. But as the narrative develops, seeing Shadow’s decision on how to utilize his rage and newfound Black Arms abilities, makes him an even more engaging anti-hero.

Supporting Shadow Generation’s strong narrative is its stellar voice cast. Kirk Thornton kills it as Shadow, conveying the character I and many other fans have wanted to see since Sonic Adventure 2 and Sonic 06. In addition, Stephanie Sheh voices Maria Robotnik, adding emotional warmth and care to her performance, making it clear why Shadow loves her so much.

And while I won’t spoil who Robbie Daymond voices in the game, his performance adds many new layers to the role and personality of a long-forgotten Sonic character in Shadow Generations.

Open Zone White Space

Taking a page from Sonic Frontiers, Shadow’s White Space is a vast location to explore. Unlike Sonic’s, a simple 2D hub world with minimal platforming, Shadow’s is a fully 3D area. In many ways, it is comparable to a single island in Sonic Frontiers.

Shadow’s core movement controls match the main stages, so he can jump, boost, grind on rails, and use all his abilities without issue. Supporting tight open-zone controls, is a responsive camera, ensuring players don’t get lost or confused about where to go next.

Trading in the parkour movement options Sonic had in Frontiers, Shadow uses special Doom Powers to explore his Open Zone. Starting with an upgraded Chaos Spear that can target multiple objects, he can eventually get Doom Surf, letting him easily get across bodies of water for example. Completing the game, and having his full power-set unlocked, exploring his White Space is a treat.

Shadow Generations Collectables & Challenges

The overall game design is made with this open White Space in mind, with collectibles in the main stages and challenge acts giving you keys. You use these keys to open chests spread across the open zone, unlocking concept art and even music tracks that can be played on any level.

My favorite collectible has to be the Garalad Robotnik dairy pages, with a physical version being a pre-order bonus for physical copies of the game. By using your Doom Spear (the upgraded Chaos Spear) on floating balloons in the open zone, players collect the fallen pages and can read new lore. It’s not unlike the Eggman Audio-Dairy that gave additional backstory to the Starfall Islands in Sonic Frontiers, and I hope this continues to appear in future games.

The collectibles on offer, alongside optional challenges to complete for concept art, extend the overall run time of Shadow Generations far longer than even the base Sonic Generations. However, the only major issue is how the game’s map works. Unlike in Sonic Frontiers where you could make waypoints to your destination, you cannot do that here.

Gameplay/Level Design

The meat of the overall experience is a series of high-quality 3D and 2D levels for Shadow to run through. Spread across his many adventures and even places he’s never visited, the roster of levels offers a nice variety.

Kicking things off with Sonic Adventure 2’s Final Rush, Shadow’s movement feels like a perfected evolution of Sonic’s moveset in Sonic Generations and Sonic Frontiers. Shadow does feel unique from Sonic, with his iconic Chaos Spear and Chaos Control abilities being game-changers.

One example is Sonic Heroes Rail Canyon/Bullet Station level, Shadow using the Chaos Spear ability to stun robots that are shocking incoming rails. Or, you can instead use Chaos Control to freeze time and prevent incoming exploding carts from crashing into a path up ahead, allowing you to get a hidden collectible.

Shadow Generations Doom Abilities

These abilities are given to Shadow from the jump, with level completion unlocking his various Doom Powers. In many ways, they are better versions of the vehicles he used in Sonic 06. For example, his Doom Surf ability is heavily utilized in Sonic 06’s Kingdom Valley, letting him access lower routes and effortlessly transition to upper and middle routes due to how organic going in and out of his abilities is.

Doom Blast is another ability he gets early in the adventure, allowing him to launch Black Arms creatures in the air and freely aim where they land, being able to teleport where they went. This, paired with sections of levels involving smart use of Chaos Control, helps players get to the goal ring their way.

What surprised me the most was how each act was structured. Every Act 1 is fully 3D, while most Act 2’s are fully 2D. This contrasts how Sonic Generations approaches level design, with Modern Sonic having 2D sections on his levels. I appreciated this, as it creates some of the best 2D boost levels in the franchise.

The dynamic camera angles are on full display, giving them the ‘illusion’ of 3D. How they utilized Shadow’s Doom Powers is fantastic, making them feel different from Sonic Generations‘ 2D levels as they didn’t use dynamic cameras in nearly the same fashion.

Boss Fights

Spread throughout the White Space Open Zone, are a few boss fights with familiar faces from Shadow’s past. They aren’t on the same ‘epic scale’ as the Titan fights in Sonic Frontiers, but they match those games’ battles with impressive presentation.

Not to spoil any of the fights themselves, the game utilizes Shadow’s abilities making them fun challenges to get S-Ranks on. In fact, upon completing the game, you can even fight harder variants of the battles. Something appreciated is that they speak to Shadow during the encounters, something of a rarity in the series. In particular, a later-game boss does this with Shadow, and I loved the back-and-forth they had with one another.

Presentation

Shadow’s dark adventure is one of the best-looking games in the entire franchise. Running on the tech powering Sonic Frontiers, many issues from that release are completely fixed here. The White Space Open Zone has no pop-in issues, making it easy to see where the floating rails and other objects are on the map.

But most impressively, the animation work on display is stunning. Shadow’s animations are very clean, with his spins, kicks, and jumps having a higher level of polish than the series usually has. In addition, he is quite expressive, with his eyes and mouth reacting organically to the world around him.

This is best seen during the game’s frequent mid-level transitions, with Black Doom interrupting a level Shadow is running through and sending him to a warped city hellscape. In many ways, it rivals the work seen in something like Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart. Impressive when you consider this was also developed for platforms like Nintendo Switch and PlayStation 4.

Menus also reflect the high level of polish, having a darker-themed look melding the pop art seen in Sonic Generations but with elements from Shadow the Hedgehog 2005 taking over.

Performance

I played Sonic X Shadow Generations on my Lenovo Legion Gaming Laptop, which has an AMD Radeon RX 6850M XT, AMD Ryzen 9 6900HX, and 32 GB of DDR5 RAM.

Shadow Generations ran at 120FPS with native resolution (1600p) on my display. PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series consoles offer two performance profiles, Quality (4K/30FPS) and Performance Mode (High Resolution/60FPS), with reports saying the game runs well on them.

Music

Sonic games are famous for amazing soundtracks and Shadow Generations delivers. Going for a heavy rock theme, not unlike Shadow’s self-titled 2005 release, many of the music remixes match his character.

Examples include an amazing Final Rush remix for Act 1 of Space Colony Ark and a new remix for Kingdom Valley. Two particular standouts for me have to be Kingdom Valley Act 2 and Sunset Heights Act 1.

The former has a level of emotion that made me genuinely feel something, while the latter offers a heroic version of the Sonic Forces level theme, making the player feel like ‘Yeah, we won this war’.

Other music, such as the Collection Room and overall White Space theme are chill remixes of familiar Shadow themes and have similar energy to the ‘mellow’ tracks from Sonic Frontiers.

Accessibility Support for Sonic X Shadow Generations

Options regarding accessibility aren’t that in-depth in Sonic X Shadow Generations. Save for Omochao, a robotic companion that you can toggle on and off in Sonic Generations, and question marks scattered around Shadow Generations, not much is used to assist the player.

However, some smart decisions have been made for those that struggle. Lives are completely gone in both games, so you restart at the frequent checkpoint markers Sonic and Shadow come across. In addition, the game automatically tells the player the correct button for specific actions, such as performing a slide near a crack in Sonic Generations or during a quick time even in Shadow Generations.

Regarding additional accessibility settings, such as caption size options for subtitles and color blind support, the former is limited and the latter is non-existent.

Closing Thoughts on Sonic X Shadow Generations

It’s no secret I was excited about this release as a die-hard Sonic fan, reporting on it whenever given the chance at Lords of Gaming. But even I was taken aback by Shadow Generations’ raw polish and quality. Sonic Generations alone is an amazing game but I didn’t expect Shadow’s adventure to surpass Sonic’s blast from the past.

With an emotional narrative that makes you feel things for Sonic’s cast, a level of visual presentation completely foreign to the franchise, and some of the best level design from any 3D Boost title, Shadow Generations alone is worth the price of admission.

Pairing that with Sonic Generations merely cements Sonic X Shadow Generations as the Sonic game for anyone who loves the franchise or people new to the series.

Score – 9.5 out of 10

Pros

• Two adventures that offer 10-plus hours of content between both campaigns
• Presentation high quality
• Amazing music for both experiences
• Shadow Generations’ story is an emotional highlight
• Quality of Life additions to Sonic Generations
• Amazing level design and gameplay across both experiences

Cons

• Sonic Generations Remastering effort could’ve added additional content
• Sonic Generations new script doesn’t always match the in-game animation work
• Shadow Generations Open Zone White Space lacks a great map
• Limited Accessibility Settings for both Sonic X Shadow Generations