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Sonic Adventure
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| Developer(s) |
Sonic Team
Sonic Team USA (International) |
| Publisher(s) |
Sega |
| Designer(s) |
Yuji Naka
Takashi Iizuka
Kazuyuki Hoshino |
| Platform(s) |
Dreamcast, GameCube, Windows |
| Release date(s) |
Dreamcast
JPN December 23, 1998
NA September 9, 1999
EUR October 14, 1999
AUS December 3, 1999
GameCube
NA June 18, 2003
JPN June 19, 2003
PAL June 27, 2003
PC
JPN December 18, 2003
PAL February 6, 2004
NA September 14, 2004 |
| Genre(s) |
Platformer |
| Mode(s) |
Single player, limited multiplayer (Tails can be controlled in Sonic's stages with controller 2) |
| Rating(s) |
ESRB: Everyone
OFLC: G8+
ELSPA: 3+ (Dreamcast version)
PEGI: 3+ (GameCube and PC versions) |
| Media |
GD-ROM, CD-ROM, Nintendo GameCube Game Disc |
| System requirements |
Windows XP, 800 MHz Pentium III, 32 MB Geforce 2 or Radeon SDR, 1.2 GB hard drive space |
| Input methods |
Game controller, keyboard |
Sonic Adventure (ソニックアドベンチャー, Sonikku Adobenchā?) is a video game created by Sonic Team and released on December 23, 1998 in Japan by Sega for the Sega Dreamcast and is the first game in the Sonic Adventure series. One of its development titles was Sonic RPG, (although the final game was an adventure game not a standard RPG)citation needed. The final updated edition, known as Sonic Adventure International, was released on September 9, 1999 in North America, October 14, 1999 in Japan and Europe, October 18, 1999 in Belgium, the Netherlands, and Luxembourg, and December 3, 1999 in Australia. A director's cut version was released in 2003 as Sonic Adventure DX for the Nintendo GameCube and in 2004 for the PC CD-ROM. It has sold over 1 million copies in the United States alone, making it the top selling Dreamcast game.[1]. It is the first ever Sonic game on a sixth generation console. Its sequel is Sonic Adventure 2.
Plot
Centuries ago, a water-like guardian bestowed upon the planet seven Chaos Emeralds. These emeralds were a source of absolute power. However, absolute power corrupts absolutely — and it did not take long before wars broke out over who would control the Chaos Emeralds' seemingly unlimited power. A tribe of echidna ancestors of Knuckles responded by creating a singular Master Emerald, which held powers that could control and neutralize the Chaos Emeralds. With the Master Emerald came a guardian spirit. It was said that a rival tribe of echidnas angered the guardian by attempting to steal the Chaos Emeralds and ruining the sanctuary it was protecting. They were all but completely destroyed within a single night and the guardian was never seen again. What was believed to be the guardian was then named Chaos, the God of Destruction, lending its name to the Chaos Emeralds.
In the present day, Dr. Eggman learns of the legend surrounding Chaos. Believing it to be true, he seeks out the Master Emerald and shatters it, freeing Chaos in the process. Eggman's goal is to control Chaos, and use its destructive powers to collect the Chaos Emeralds and conquer the city. To help him, he has created the E-series robots. When Sonic learns of Eggman's plans, he and his friends spring in to action to stop Eggman and they start another journey for the Chaos Emeralds.
Introduction
The intro to the game shows Perfect Chaos attacking the city, and Sonic then comes running in to save the day. Tails then breaks through a window in Station Square, flying. All the other characters come in too, and then it ends with Sonic standing, ready for action, and Perfect Chaos' eye opening.
Characters
Unlike the previous game in the series, Sonic 3D Blast, Sonic Adventure has six different characters to choose from, providing two more than the four (Sonic and Tails combo being the fourth) available in Sonic 3 & Knuckles.
Playable characters
Sonic the Hedgehog
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Sonic being chased by a giant Orca in Emerald Coast, as seen in Sonic Adventure.
The main hero of the game. Arriving in the city of Station Square, Sonic's story revolves around Dr. Eggman releasing Chaos from the Master Emerald. Sonic battles Eggman and Chaos in an effort to save the world, as well as finding the Chaos Emeralds before they do. Sonic has the most stages of any character, and his levels involve high speed gameplay. Sonic's theme song is "It Doesn't Matter" performed by Tony Harnell.
Miles "Tails" Prower
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After Sonic rescues Tails from Emerald Coast after a "Tornado" prototype experiment goes wrong (and crashes), the latter sets out to help Sonic collect the Chaos Emeralds and stop Chaos. Most of his levels are abridged versions of Sonic's, which require him to reach the end of the level before Sonic (or Eggman) can. Tails' theme song is "Believe in Myself" performed by Karen Brake.
Knuckles the Echidna
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Knuckles is the guardian of the Master Emerald and one of the main protagonists after Sonic and Tails. The Master Emerald shatters when Eggman frees Chaos and Tikal's spirit from within it, causing Angel Island to fall out of the sky. Knuckles' goal is to reassemble the shards of the Master Emerald and he has time for little else. His stages are enclosed areas where Knuckles must find shards of the Master Emerald. He can glide through the air and scale most walls. Knuckles' theme song is "Unknown from M.E." performed by Marlon Saunders.
Amy Rose
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Amy Rose is walking through Station Square, reminiscing about her earlier adventures with Sonic, when a tiny blue Flicky falls from the sky and lands on her head. It is discovered that Dr. Eggman needed this Flicky (nicknamed "Birdie" by Amy) because of the Chaos Emerald in its pendant. Amy and Birdie must escape ZERO (otherwise known as ALPHA), one of Eggman's robots. She resolves to help the young Flicky find its family and hopefully meet up with Sonic along the way. Her primary weapon, the Piko Piko Hammer, returns (previously seen in Sonic the Fighters). Amy is considered to have the shortest story since she has fewer levels than the other characters. Amy's theme song is "My Sweet Passion" performed by Nikki Gregoroff.
Big the Cat
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Main article: Big the Cat
Big the Cat is a newcomer to the Sonic series. Big's best friend is a frog who became possessed by Chaos' tail, and swallows Big's "lucky charm", a Chaos Emerald, which causes him to mutate. The frog then runs off, and Big's story begins. His levels involve using his fishing pole to try and catch Froggy, although he can also choose to try and catch big fish, with score bonuses based on size. Big's theme song is "Lazy Days (Livin' in Paradise)" performed by Ted Poley.
E-102 Gamma
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Main article: E-102 Gamma
E-102 Gamma is one among a series of robots designed by Eggman to take orders without question. After an encounter with Amy, he suffers a malfunction and gains a "conscience." He then turns his aim to destroying his robotic brothers and freeing the animals trapped inside them. "Gamma" is one of the letters in the Greek alphabet. Gamma's levels are shooting levels in which the player races against the clock to get to the end and destroy the target (usually one of the other E-series robots). Players gain time depending on how many enemies they shoot in a row/chain by using the lock on feature that Gamma has. Interestingly, Gamma is the only one of the main characters to not have a vocal theme song; instead he has an instrumental motif.
Super Sonic
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Main article: Super Sonic
Super Sonic is unlocked after the stories of the other characters have been completed. The story is a continuation of Sonic's story and brings all of the characters together to face Perfect Chaos. When in Super form, Sonic moves faster and attacks by gaining speed and ramming into Perfect Chaos. Super Sonic's theme song is played during the final battle and is also the theme for the game; "Open Your Heart" performed by Crush 40.
Villains/ Non-playable characters
Dr. Eggman
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Main article: Doctor Eggman
Dr. Ivo Robotnik, also known as Dr. Eggman because of his round body shape, has formulated a new plan to conquer the planet, this time not relying on his robots alone, but employing a strange liquid creature known only as Chaos (who ends up betraying him).
Note: This is the first game in which the name "Eggman" was used in the West.
Chaos
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Chaos is the guardian of the Chao, and is actually a mutated chao himself. He is apparently water or a plasma-like material and changes form after consuming a Chaos Emerald. After consuming all seven Chaos Emeralds, it turns into Perfect Chaos and starts destroying the city, until Super Sonic "defeats" it (in actuality, he neutralizes the evil within Chaos's heart, which was causing it to function within a state of blind rage).
Tikal the Echidna
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A mysterious female echidna who appears whenever Sonic, Tails, Knuckles, Amy, E-102 Gamma and Big are sent back in time. She is trying to stop her father, Pachacamac, from stealing the Chaos Emeralds from the Master Emerald shrine. She appears mostly in the form of a pink ball of light called a Hint Orb.
Zero/Alpha
Zero is one of Eggman's Robots sent to find Amy's friend Birdie. He follows Amy wherever she goes hoping to capture her and the bird. At one point he succeeds but Amy is rescued by E-102 Gamma. Eventually Zero is defeated by Amy on the Egg Carrier. Zero is the antagonist of Amy's story due to him trying to catch the bird.
Chao
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Chao are featured in the flashbacks, said to be Chaos' children. They exist primarily in the Chao Gardens as a sort of intelligent virtual pet for the player to raise, an "evolution" of the A-life system from NiGHTS into Dreams... Chao can be taken with the player by downloading the minigame Chao Adventure to his VMU, or in the GameCube version, by downloading the Chao to a Game Boy Advance.
E-100 series
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Dr. Eggman's E-100 Series series of robots play a large role in Gamma's story, as he is one of them, and is out to destroy or "save" the others. All of them have letters of the Greek alphabet as part of their name.
- E-100 "Zero" (Description above). Note that E-101 Beta is the first in the E-100 series in this game. The anime, Sonic X, later established Zero's model number as "E-100" (thus moving E-101 to second in the series, mildly contradicting Sonic Adventure). Note, all the E-100 Series are named after letters in the Greek Alphabet. Therefore due to being described E-100, he is given the name Alpha as well as Zero, due to Beta being the second letter in Greek Alphabet, making Zero/Alpha a letter before him due to being E-100.
- E-101 Beta is a black robot with two gun arms. He is the first boss in E-102 Gamma's side of the story, and is later upgraded into E-101 Beta mkII, who is Gamma's fifth and final boss. Beta is the antagonist of Gamma's story.
- E-103 Delta is a blue robot who is Gamma's second boss, waiting at the end of Windy Valley.
- E-104 Epsilon is an orange robot who is the third boss of Gamma's side of the story and is fought at the end of Red Mountain.
- E-105 Zeta is a purple robot who is Gamma's fourth boss and is located at the end of Hot Shelter. While at first humanoid, Zeta is altered into a cylinder-like form with several turrets.
NiGHTS makes a cameo in the Casinopolis stage where there is a pinball stage based on the NiGHTS series.
Story structure
The story is told through the perspective of the character you choose to play as and as a result the stories tend to diverge at certain points based on the character arc. It is interesting to note that the story takes on a certain Rashomon type structure in terms of dialogue and certain events when more than one of the playable characters is present in a scene. For example, each character has their viewpoint of a certain scene, so the dialogue between versions tends to be different. This perspective also justifies the different outcomes of certain encounters, for example, when Sonic faces E-102 Gamma on the Egg Carrier, through Sonic's perspective Sonic is about to destroy Gamma, through Tails' perspective Tails is about to destroy Gamma and through Gamma's perspective, Gamma is about to kill Sonic.
Gameplay
The game is divided up into two stages: Action Stages, and Adventure Fields. The division of Action Stages and Adventure Fields was a serious departure from previous Sonic games.
Action Stages
Action Stages are basically playable levels. This is the only type of area where Sonic or any of his companions will encounter enemies (most boss battles appear to take place in the Adventure Fields, but they are actually in Action Stages designed to look like the Fields). There are eleven Action Stages, accessible by different characters. However, unlike previous Sonic games, Action Stages are not made up of Zones and Acts. Instead, the game plays more like each Adventure Field is a Zone and the Action Stages are the Acts in the Zone. The Action Stages have separate areas that could be considered "Acts", but they are not separate levels, as in previous games.
Adventure Fields
Adventure Fields are non-linear game stages, generally designed for (light) puzzle solving, exploration, and plot advancement. They contain very few items (enemies, rings, etc.). Every Adventure Field links to the other two Fields and a Chao Garden. They also have four Emblems each. They are each packed with various powerups for different characters.
There are three Adventure Fields:
- Station Square: a large, metropolitan city, and is the location of Sonic's first fight with Chaos. Eggman plans to destroy it and construct "Robotnikland" on its ruins.
- Mystic Ruins: a large mountainous area and the largest Adventure Field in the game, containing the (crashed) Angel Island. Deep in the jungle, a Ziggurat can be found. It also has a base home to Eggman.
- Egg Carrier: Eggman's massive flying airship. This is the Adventure Field where most characters fight their final bosses (except Sonic and Tails[Sonic fights Eggman for the last time deep in Eggman's base after Sonic's final stage in his story: Final Egg. Tails fights Eggman for the last time in Station Square after Eggman gets mad at Tails for getting the missile dud first]). The Egg Carrier has 2 layouts and multiple transport devices unique to this field.
Chao World
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- Chao World is a world full of Chao, children of Chaos. There is 3 Chao Gardens, and 2 eggs are in each one:
- Station Square's, which is an inside garden. This Garden is the smallest. This is where the Black Market(where you can buy food and eggs)is.
- Mystic Ruins', which is a bigger area with a pond(Although every garden has water). It does look much like Mystic Ruins itself.
- Egg Carrier's, which is the biggest area, and is on an island, obviously having water surrounding the area. There are many giant rocks, and there is a huge rock in the middle, with an Eggman looking door(You cannot enter through this door, though), and a satellite.
Every Chao Garden has a Chao Transporter that looks like a Gameboy Advance, because the Gameboy Advance has to be hooked up to use the Chao Transporter(other than throwing your chao into the wilderness). This starts up the Little Chao Garden on your Gameboy Advance. This can also be used on Sonic Adventure 2: Battle.
At Station Square's Chao Garden, there is a special thing that is no where else. This is Chao Racing. This is where you get to use one of your Chao and race other Chao. You have to be all the Chao though, although this is not so in Sonic Adventure 2. For more information, go to The Chao Website
Reception
The reception at the time of release was overwhelmingly positive, including reviews from GameSpot and GameSpy being above 90%. The current Game Rankings average ranking is 88%.[2] It became one of the few Sega All Stars games. In Japan, it received an excellent 38/40 from Famitsu.[3] Similar to its sequel, however, the later-released GameCube port was criticized by many of the same sources who praised the Dreamcast version, although in this case, the Directors Cut reportedly didn't play as well as the original version did. [4] Sonic Adventure DX: Director's Cut averaged a 63% at Game Rankings. [5]
Voice actors
Dreamcast versions
Sonic Adventure
The original game released in 1998.
Sonic Adventure: Limited Edition
Exactly the same as the above version, except without the Internet.citation needed
Sonic Adventure International
Shortly after the U.S. launch of the Dreamcast, Sonic Team released Sonic Adventure International. This was the same game, but with additional features that provided a more complete experience:
- The complete English voice track and the complete Japanese voice track were included.
- A new option was added to the Options screen, giving the user the choice of text in five different languages: English, Japanese, French, Spanish, and German.
- A few glitches were fixed.
Sonic Adventure DX: Director's Cut
European version of the PC box art
Sonic Adventure DX: Director's Cut (ソニックアドベンチャー デラシクス, Sonikku Adobenchā Derakusu?), is a platform game for the GameCube and PC.
The game was released as an enhanced port of the original Sonic Adventure for the Dreamcast, with several additional features added. The PC version was at first released only in Japan and Europe, but later saw a limited North American release. Sonic Adventure DX includes a mission mode, which included 60 missions to complete throughout the adventure fields and action stages. It also contains a minigame collection, which is comprised of twelve Game Gear games featuring Sonic and friends.
Reviews were generally less positive than those of its Sega Dreamcast predecessor, scoring more than 20% lower than the original release.[6]
Unlockable games
The game features many unlockable games previously available on the Game Gear. If the start button of the second controller is pressed, the game screen will split, and two games will play at the same time. Additionally, Gear-to-Gear cable emulation is present, enabling the games that have two-player modes to be played if both players access the proper options within the game. These games were to be included in the Dreamcast version, but were scrapped due to time constraints. The same goes for the reintroduced feature of being able to play as Metal Sonic when collecting 130 emblems. A new Game Gear game is unlocked for every 20 Emblems the player gets, up until 100, then every 10 after that, or by completing 20 more of the 60 missions.
Games unlockable (in order):
- Sonic the Hedgehog
- Sonic Drift
- Sonic Chaos
- Sonic Labyrinth
- Sonic the Hedgehog 2
- Sonic Spinball
- Dr. Robotnik's Mean Bean Machine
- Sonic Triple Trouble
- Sonic Drift 2
- Tails' Skypatrol
- Sonic Blast
- Tails Adventure
image = Image:Sonic plush.jpg
Soundtrack
The soundtrack was by Jun Senoue, and his band(Crush 40) did "Open Your Heart," the Sonic Adventure theme song. The Disc had a side A and a side B. An FAQ later popped up on Sonic Central asking what the difference was between the music for Sonic Adventure and Sonic Heroes. Jun Senoue explains that the music for Sonic Heroes is a lot better than the music for Sonic Adventure, and that a lot of the Sonic Adventure music didn't fit all the stages.
References
External links
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Sonic the Hedgehog video games |
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| Main console series |
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| Main handheld series |
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| Console spin-offs |
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| Compilations and Remakes |
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| Arcade games |
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| Canceled games |
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