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The Spokesman-Review Newspaper
Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

Game On: The game that destroyed my childlike wonder with video games

Sonic the Hedgehog, better known as Sonic ‘06 to avoid confusion with the 1991 original, received scathing criticism at launch and fares no better in retrospective reviews. It is one of only a few games in the series that hasn’t seen a re-release or support for backwards compatibility.  (Sega Corp.)
By Riordan Zentler For The Spokesman-Review

Growing up with an Atari 2600 and Sega Genesis was a funny thing. Looking back now, it’s obvious how these machines were painfully limited by the technology of their time – but as a little kid, nothing was more wondrous to me than slaying the duck-looking, pixelated dragons in Adventure or zipping across the screen in Sonic the Hedgehog.

For budgeting reasons, my family skipped the fifth generation of video game consoles – namely the Nintendo 64, Sega Saturn and original PlayStation. As a result, when my brother picked up a Sega Dreamcast on its launch day – Sept. 9, 1999 – I was absolutely floored by the gameplay and graphical fidelity of Sonic Adventure and Crazy Taxi. The physics had a long way to go, but I didn’t notice at the time. Such was my amazement that I remember it like it was yesterday, despite being only 5 years old.

That childlike wonder continued to fuel my passion and excitement for video games for many years. My parents rarely gifted me games, so I would save up birthday and Christmas cash and do extra chores around the house to buy what I wanted. I had to be selective, which was good – no one likes the spoiled brat who has hundreds of toys but complains about being bored.

As such, the seventh generation of consoles was a significant hurdle for a preteen to cross. The Xbox 360’s $500 price point was intimidating, and $600 for a PlayStation 3 was even worse. Nintendo made a good call selling the Wii for $250, but the difference was obvious – the Wii was barely more powerful than its predecessor, whereas Microsoft and Sony’s offerings were powerhouse machines at the time.

Growing up as a Sega kid, it was practically a requirement to follow Sonic the Hedgehog wherever he went. Although the blue hedgehog went on to have some interesting Wii exclusives, Sega kicked things off with the now-notorious “next-generation” Sonic the Hedgehog. Released just in time for Christmas 2006, the soft reboot is better known by fans and haters alike as “Sonic ’06” to avoid confusion.

Imagine being a bright-eyed, naïve preteen who relentlessly pursued house chores just to drop nearly $600 on a brand-new game console and a fresh game in their favorite series – then the curtain falls and it turns out the game is abhorrent by almost all metrics.

The physics and controls are far and away worse than its predecessors, there are countless bugs and oversights that hamper your progress, the story is nonsensical, loading screens are long and constant – you get the picture. It holds a score of 46/100 on Metacritic aggregated from nearly 50 reviews. Sonic ’06 is laughably bad, but I sure wasn’t laughing at the time.

I felt betrayed. Every fan experiences this at some point – your favorite TV show gets a subpar season, your favorite film franchise releases an uninspired box office flop or your favorite book series overstays its welcome. That day I learned that pre-release hype is meaningless, and I stopped buying Sonic games for about a decade.

Looking back, my newfound skepticism was long overdue – video games are numerous and there have never been a shortage of stinkers. I was lucky enough to follow game series that were consistently good or better, until my favorite franchise of all took a nosedive in quality that it still hasn’t fully recovered from.

While Sonic ‘06 regularly finds itself on “worst game” and especially “most disappointing game” lists, there are still those who defend it. I’ve noticed that most fans of the title were even younger than myself when they got their hands on it, which is telling. Perhaps there simply comes a time when one’s childlike wonder begins to erode regardless of the quality of the media consumed.

But I would argue the skepticism of a mature media consumer isn’t all bad. There’s satisfaction to be found in developing a taste profile for oneself and finding that movie, game or book that ticks all the right boxes. Sonic ‘06 forced me to branch out and try new games and new genres. Even as a cynical adult, I am astounded by the variety of quality games we enjoy today.

Riordan Zentler can be reached at riordanzentler@gmail.com.