What is Sonic Colors Ultimate?
Sonic Colors is one of the blue blur’s more iconic adventures. Revisiting the themes from Sonic 1’s nature vs machine, Sonic explores planet-sized amusement parks, leveraging the strong gameplay foundations that Sonic Unleashed established.
However, the game was limited to the Nintendo Wii and was never ported or remastered to other platforms. That was, until SEGA revealed Sonic Colors Ultimate, a remaster of the original Wii adventure with improved visuals and more.
Do the colors still feel so right? Or have they faded with time? Speeding through this adventure once more, the colors still feel amazing, even if some of the remastering effort is half-baked.
Publisher/Developer: SEGA/Sonic Team, Blind Squirrel Games
Platforms: Xbox One/One X, PlayStation 4/PS4 Pro, Nintendo Switch, PC (Epic Games Store & Steam)
Price: $39.99
Release Date: September 7th, 2021
Reviewed On: Xbox Series X via Xbox One BC
Returning to the Roots – Premise/Story
- Sonic and Tails explore Eggman’s Interstellar Amusement Park, learning that the good doctor is up to no good again.
- The game lightly touches on the Nature vs Machine themes from Sonic 1 and Sonic CD.
- Some of the game’s comedy is funny, but it rarely lands and feels childish.
The game begins with Sonic and Tails exploring Eggman’s Incredible Interstellar Amusement Park, with the good doctor making it in ‘good faith’ to make up for his past actions. Sonic doesn’t buy that one bit, and he’s soon proven right after seeing two of Eggman’s lackies (Orbot and Cubebot) trying to capture a Wisp.
Freeing the little alien, Sonic and Tails learn that Eggman has captured them and wants to harvest their HyperGoOn Power to take over the world. Following the grand world adventures of Sonic Unleashed, Colors returns to the roots of the series.
This is Sonic fighting Eggman to stop him from ruining nature around them. It’s a classic plot, with games like Sonic 1 and Sonic CD making it a focus through visual storytelling. That is still somewhat the case here, but the larger focus on the narrative is Saturday Morning antics.
The writing is comedy-focused, as Happy Tree Friends writers penned the English script. Sonic Colors does have some genuinely laugh-out-loud moments. One in particular happens before you fight the boss in Planet Wisp, where Eggman comments on something. Sonic then chimes in, saying, ‘No Copyright Law in the Universe is going to stop me!’
Sadly, the comedy isn’t consistent, with some jokes not landing. Despite that, though, Sonic Colors is a simple adventure that the whole family can enjoy.
Familiar Winds – Gameplay & Wisp Abilities
- Taking the foundations from Sonic Unleashed, Sonic speeds with familiar moves, all the while using new Wisp powers.
- Wisps grant Sonic one-time abilities, such as launching into the sky or drilling through water and dirt.
- Speed is still present but takes a back seat to more focused 2.5D platforming.
Taking the Boost Formula established from Sonic Unleashed, Colors has Sonic sporting a similar moveset on this galactic adventure. The Blue Blur speeds ahead with the returning boost, slide, stomp, and wall-jump ability. However, some abilities from Unleashed, like the Light Speed Dash (flying across a trail of rings), are now tied to the colorful Wisp aliens.
In every level, Sonic can free these colorful creatures from capsules, and each one grants him a unique ability. From turning into a Cyan Laser to hit long-distance objects, transforming into a Yellow Drill to dig through the earth or water, and blasting into the sky as an Orange Rocket, these abilities add new wrinkles to Sonic’s overall moveset.
There is a trade-off to the inclusion of the Wisps: Sonic himself feels ‘slower’ compared to Sonic Unleashed, due to the game being designed with the Wii in mind. The result is that the gameplay balance leans more toward 2.5D platforming than reaction-based 3D boosting.
But this isn’t much of a sacrifice when some of the most creative platforming in the series is present in Sonic Colors.
Alien Buddies – Progression & Level Design
- Progression is based on a map, with Sonic going to stages selected. This contrasts with hub worlds present in games like Sonic Adventure or Sonic Unleashed.
- Stages are more focused on exploration, with collectables and earning the most points being rewarded.
Starting the adventure, running through the opening area, Tropical Resort, you quickly realize progression is similar to games like Sonic Adventure 2. Instead of hub worlds, Sonic explores a simple world map and runs through six acts in the game’s six major zones.
Entering a level, Sonic is tasked with finding the goal ring of every level. The beautiful part of Sonic Colors is that the game gives you the choice in how you approach stages. Do you want to speed through the adventure? Or smell the roses along a brisk jog?
It combines the design approach from Sonic Unleashed‘s Day stages and rewarding exploration similar to how games like the Classic games did. And fully getting everything out of the game’s colorful zones heavily utilizes the Wisps to find Rings and Red Star Rings to increase your overall score. Getting that elusive S-Rank is a genuine challenge, as earning that requires going fast and using the Wisps in the right places.
Ranking System & Stage Set-Pieces
- The game features a ranking system, with the highest being S-Rank. Earning that is challenging, requiring mastery of the game’s various mechanics.
- But you aren’t punished for not targeting S-Ranks, and stage set-pieces are a joy to see on Sonic’s path to the goal ring.
In many regards, the shorter Acts are the hardest to S-Rank, due to stage length demanding you complete them quickly in under a minute or so. Getting S-Ranks rewards you with Lives in the original game, but in Colors Ultimate, you earn upwards of three Tokens when you get an S-Rank.
But if you don’t care about getting everything, enjoying the game’s enjoyable set-pieces for each of the larger acts and speeding through is still just as fun. Highlights of this include riding dangerous roller coasters in Astroid Coaster, drilling miles upon miles through massive cakes in Sweet Mountain, and avoiding laser fire while running down a pathway made of light in Starlight Carnival.
Going for the Coins – Red Rings and Game Land Stages
However, what if you do smell the roses and collect every Red Ring you come across? You unlock the Game Land stages. These unlock as you gradually collect every Red Ring during the adventure, and they are fun mini-stages to run through.
Visually, they aren’t anything to write home about, but the ability to play them with a buddy in local offline co-op and beating each cluster of stages unlocks a Chaos Emerald. And if you know the series, surely you know what collecting all seven unlocks.
Mechanical Rumbles – Boss Fights
- Boss fights are very easy, with some more involved than others.
- The game’s final boss, while not challenging, is enjoyable due to using several of the game’s core mechanics against Sonic.
One of the weaker aspects of Sonic Colors, sadly, is the game’s boss encounters. Like past Sonic games, they involve attacking the robot a few times with careful homing attacks or your boost. Some of them are more involved than others, like the Sweet Mountain and Aquiarum Park bosses, as they make great use of the Yellow Drill.
But the ones for Tropical Resort and Planet Wisp are pitifully easy to take down thanks to the Laser Wisp heaving half their health, and the ones for Starlight Carnival and Asteroid Coaster aren’t too much better, thanks to them having Sonic run in a straight line for most of the fight.
The game’s final boss is enjoyable, thankfully, with Eggman using Wisp abilities you’ve used across the adventure against you. But overall, this is one of the low points of Sonic Colors.
From One Planet to Another – Differences from Nintendo Wii Version
Bringing the game to modern platforms, one would think Sonic Colors would be largely untouched from the Wii original. And in most ways, that is the case. Core level design and overall narrative are the same. The same goes for the game’s general controls, though there are options to remap all of Sonic’s actions in the settings.
The major new additions are new rival races with Metal Sonic, and upon beating him in these handful of races, unlocking Park Tokens. These can be spent on customizing Sonic with new Boost Trails, adding new VFX for the ability. In addition, customizable Glove and Shoe options are available, allowing Sonic to switch them out for different color options and styles.
Sonic the Fashion Hog – Customization & More
These are a nice bonus, taking inspiration from the Avatar character from Sonic Forces, and the idea of Sonic having costume options carries over into future games like Sonic Frontiers. Alongside those new additions is a reworked lives system. Instead of 1-Ups, you can now collect Tail Icons. So instead of dying, Tails picks you back up, and you can get right back into the action.
The last of these new additions is reworked placements for Red Star Rings (to accommodate the new Jade Ghost Wisp). This mix-up makes collecting everything feel new, for returning players.
All of these sound like nice bonuses. But how does Colors Ultimate remaster the original’s presentation and audio?
A New Hue of Colors – Presentation
- Lush backdrops await Sonic on his intergalactic adventure through Eggman’s park. Every zone is a visual marvel, showing off the power of the Nintendo Wii in the original 2010 release.
- The remastering effort is hit-and-miss, with the biggest positive being a higher resolution and frame rate target.
With the imaginative setting, SEGA and Sonic Team take full advantage of the amusement park setting. Speeding through the tropical resort, filled with colorful balloons or neon signs, Sonic quickly comes across other stunning locations. Enjoy the savory sweets from donut and cake-filled Sweet Mountain. Or take a tour through the lush grasslands of Planet Wisps, but avoid Eggman’s construction efforts along the way.
Every location is visually distinct and original to the Sonic series, with Colors leaning toward more imaginative locations that evoke the Classic era of Sonic in several respects. Of the game’s seven unique zones, Terminal Velocity was a highlight. Being a one-act downhill run, the powerful visual of the Earth in the background as Sonic narrowly avoids lasers and enemy fire is great.
Moving the game to modern platforms, though, Colors Ultimate isn’t the complete upgrade I hoped, though running at native 4K at 60 FPS on Series X/S is awesome.
Issues include overexposed bloom effects, Sonic’s character model receiving no updates from the Wii release, and some new visual bugs. Examples like an odd opening stage transition for one of Starlight Carnival’s levels come to mind.
One of the bigger visual issues is AI-upscaled cutscenes. They take the 480p scenes from the Wii original and present them at a higher resolution. The visual artifcating is distracting, when they could’ve instead remade the cutscenes in-engine. This, sadly, somewhat sours the game’s otherwise strong visuals.
Music of the Wisps – Soundtrack
Sonic games are infamous for their fantastic soundtracks, and Sonic Colors Ultimate is no exception. The game’s heartwarming vocal theme ‘Reach for the Stars’ perfectly captures the Blue Blur’s spirit, fitting nicely alongside the franchise’s other fantastic vocal tracks.
The various zone themes are fantastic too, fitting each location like a glove. My favorite set of themes is from ‘Planet Wisp’. It’s the homeworld of the alien creatures helping Sonic across his adventure, with Act 1 specifically combining an emotional piano melody and catchy guitar strums. Later acts play around with these two instruments, with Act 3’s track being my favorite of the three themes.
It adds a funky beat to the core melody, cementing Sonic’s progress in liberating the planet from Eggman’s control.
Magenta Rhythm – The Colors Ultimate Remixes
Alongside featuring the original Wii game’s soundtrack, Colors Ultimate includes several remixes of every major act and boss theme. The boss themes get the biggest upgrade, with every major boss encounter sounding something ripped right out of Sonic Adventure.
That energy is also given to the zone themes, with the standouts being the remixes for ‘Astroid Coaster’ and ‘Terminal Velocity’. Both stages are action, set-piece-focused, making the remixes fit the stages better than the original themes.
Closing Thoughts on Sonic Colors Ultimate
Revisiting this colorful blast from the 2010’s, I loved my time with Sonic Colors Ultimate. It may be a brisk jog instead of the high-speed blitz of Sonic Unleashed. But Sonic Colors is still a fantastic, speedy venture all the same, even though the remastering effort is somewhat lackluster.
Sonic Colors Ultimate Review
Pros
Fantastic soundtrack with some standout remixes
Solid level design that encourages exploration.
Sonic is a joy to control, and Wisps feel like natural inclusions to the Boost Formula.
Collectables are fun to unlock, and full 100% completion has a Super reward.
New QoL additions and cosmetics for Sonic are welcome inclusions in Colors Ultimate.
Cons
Remastered visuals can be a downgrade in some places.
Not every new remix is an improvement over the original track
The light-hearted narrative has some hit-and-miss comedy.
This game was reviewed using a copy purchased by the reviewer.
