90%PC

While Sonic Generations holds up about as well as stale socks, Shadow Generations is a breath of fresh air to the entire Sonic franchise. Both are wonderful love letters to the Sonic series as a whole, but only Shadow Generations is made with a level of polish that the hedgehogs deserve. Gorgeous visuals, tight controls, varied mechanics, and impressive level design help to make Shadow Generations the definitive Sonic experience. It's worth playing through Sonic Generations for the story context and to see how much everything has improved in the 13 years since its release. All Hail Shadow!

100%PlayStation 5

All Hail Shadow!

85%PlayStation 5

This review could be even higher if A. The whole game was Shadow Generations or B. They gave Sonic Generations the updates they gave Shadow.

To be clear, Sonic Generations is a very fun sonic game in my opinion. I sort of missed the boat on this one when it originally came out as I was very hit or miss with sonic games at the time. I am very glad I played through it because it is awesome sonic gameplay and the sense of speed and creativity with reworking levels from old games worked super well from a vibes perspective. But I have to say, some of the platforming got pretty loose here. Definitely parts where I felt like the games controls were working against me. Also the challenge levels in Sonic could be more of a nuisance than fun at times. Generally the simpler ones were fun, but using the other characters (mapped to triangle usually) could unfortunately be a chore. Rival battles, on the other hand, I thought were a great inclusion. All in all, it's a very good sonic game, probably even more so at the time it came out.

Shadow Generations, for me, was better in just about every way. It's almost unfair because it is built in a newer engine (probably should've used it for both games) and as a result it looks and plays better in ways that I did not think would be so immediately noticeable. I felt that the controls were much tighter for Shadow to the point that when I died, I almost always could acknowledge I messed up, not the controls. Shadow just felt great to play as. The challenge levels in shadow also felt much tighter. The gimmicks in shadow focused on challenging you in fun ways that still play into the strengths of sonic games whereas the sonic challenge levels felt like they pulled you out of that in less fun ways. Shadows level design in general shows that they have been cooking in the years since generations originally released because I thought these were all hits, no misses really.

I think that Shadows powers probably could've been tightened up a bit as there were times where I questioned their execution. They probably could've been used even more as well, but I think it is better for not doing so in this case. And that is fine because a dose of powers in top of these high octane ass shadow levels is really all that was needed.

In conclusion, Sonic Generations itself is probably more of an 8 to me while Shadow Generations is a 9. Excellent building point for future 3D Sonics, including frontiers control wise (from the bit of that I have played).

90%PC

The Shadow levels are some of the best designed platforming I've played.

70%PlayStation 5

Shadow carry

85%PC

Shadow Generations

Haven't had this much fun with the boost formula ever. Great level design though the lengths do make the replayability repetitive. The hub world is my favorite part. Wish the story was longer but the emotional moments made up for it. Sad no gun.

8.5/10

80%PlayStation 5

Sonic Generations is just Sonic Generations. I've kind of soured on the game over the years a little bit, but it still is good for what it is.

Shadow Generations though, is pretty fucking nice. As with Sonic Generations, I could have done with a little bit more content, but, this felt like a decent expansion on the modern/current Shadow with all his baggage.

I was absolutely floored by the interactions with Maria and Shadow, I still think it's weird that Gerald is depicted as a cute loving Grandpa, and I still fucking hate black Doom and the black arms, but the recharacterizations of all of these things made me feel something that I thought was impossible for me. Fucking nostalgia for Shadow the Hedgehog THE GAME.

Some of the callback moments had me fist pumping and standing up with excitement, while others just didn't hit as hard and I felt like I was just playing to beat the game.

75%PlayStation 5

Although it's nice to see this game with the bonus shadow content, it doesn't seem to really improve or innovate on the base game aside from the shadow story. It's ok at best, at worst it just feels like recycled content. Hopefully this encourages sega to make more character centric games. Tails, Knuckles, Amy, the cast and potential for variety is there. The game is great, even if it's mostly just a re-release. The game looks near identical to the old PC version of sonic generations.

85%PC

Not a fan of the changes to Sonic Generations, they were really unnecessary and tacked on for the sake of selling the game again. Shadow Generations is great but I wish it felt more like a full game rather than an amalgamation of ideas and stages. It's quality sure, but it's more to test the waters with Shadow getting a story again within the games.
Because why is this the only time Shadow's Doom powers show up, why are events from games that haven't happened yet, present in the game? Why no Shadow the Hedgehog 2005 representation?
Overall, a fine enough package but Shadow needs a fully fledged game of his own with this type of gameplay.

100%PlayStation 5

10/10

85%Nintendo Switch

An exceptional port of a fantastic game. Sonic Generations is a wonderful experience filled with detailed levels begging to be mastered, quality missions that are more than just filler, and loving nostalgia represented by quality graphics and an exemplary soundtrack (City Escape, need I say more?). Plus, the writing is at least tolerable with is a step-up from Colors.

There are only two gripes I have with the game. First, the controls can be hard to get used to. Classic Sonic feels strange (especially coming from Superstars and the Genesis games) with a lack of momentum although it was a change I got used to. More problematic (at least for me) was the stiffness of modern Sonic in 3D. It feels like a mode built for high-speed boost gameplay which, given how often boosting messed me up, meant I was experiencing a subpar control scheme. A shame since I do like the 3D platforming this game offers. Finally, I feel that, as someone who enjoys going through a game once and putting it down, that I did not appreciate all this title has to offer. I respect the design choice but acknowledge that it does hurt the enjoyment I could have. Still, this is one of best 3D Sonic games out there and one that I can strongly recommend. I'm not sure when I'll get to Shadow Generations but I'm certainly looking forward to it.

85%Xbox Series X/S

A giant step in the right direction for the series.

90%PC

After playing Frontiers, I had good faith in the future of titles in the series but this solidified that even more. For the Shadow Gens portion that's not that long, they put a lot of effort into this and I love it. The music is great as always, the controls feel smoother than Frontiers, the level design is fast and fun like base gens was, and the writing was fantastic. Performance was good and the visuals looked clean aside from the pre-rendered cutscenes. I have played a little of the gens portion and in my opinion, the rewrites weren't necessary and it's a shame that they didn't surpass the 60FPS limit. Having played the base gens from start to finish over 5 times now, I still appreciate that it was included with this along with some new things.

Alongside Unleashed and Frontiers, this is now one of my favorite titles in the series. I highly recommend if you like Sonic and or have played gens/frontiers before and enjoyed it to get this. I have confidence in Sonic Team again.

90%Xbox Series X/S

The best Sonic after the 2005 era. It’s almost a perfect sonic(shadow) game!

80%Xbox Series X/S

Surprisingly my first time playing through Generations. Definitely felt like a slog to 100%, but it was fun nonetheless.

The Shadow content felt refreshing and consistently fun, even when cleaning up the last few achievements. It felt great mechanically, and never left me feeling frustrated that things weren't working quite right (the same can't be said for Sonic).

The Doom Morph ability took some getting used to, but eventually felt consistent enough.

95%PlayStation 5

This is one of the best remasters of all time and the new Shadow campaign has pushed this over Sonic Mania to become my favorite Sonic ever made! They’ve polished up the base game but the biggest problem with Generations was always the lack of content. It’s a short 5-hour game with only 9 zones to represent all of Sonic’s history, so fans always dreamed of it having more levels. Thankfully, the Shadow campaign adds an additional 6 zones and roughly doubles the playtime. This finally feels like a complete package worth full price. Even better, Sega is only charging $50 - this is a steal!

Sonic Generations
If you’re unfamiliar, Generations is basically a greatest-hits collection of the Sonic franchise. Each Zone is from an old Sonic game where you play one level as 2D Sonic with the Genesis/Megadrive physics and one level as modern 3D Sonic with the boost gameplay. You start at Green Hill Zone from Sonic 1 and work your way up through Sonic Colors. The really neat thing is you get to play classic levels like Chemical plant as 3D sonic and you get to play modern levels like City Escape and Rooftop Run as 2D Sonic. These modern 2D levels in particular are a real treat, contrasting old school gameplay with insane modern visuals. The dissonance of seeing 2D Sonic and rings everywhere set against a dark post-apocalyptic city feels like fan-art brought to life and is pure delight. This game is an exceptional love-letter to Sonic!

It’s polished, fun as hell, and packed with fan-service. Every Sonic fan needs to play this game. However, it’s simply too short at 9 zones and 18 levels. There’s a lot of side missions but most are disposable and you only have to do 10% of them to advance. That said, this was and remains a fantastic game to 100%. The achievement list is the same here, still not requiring S-ranks on bosses and challenges, so this is my 3rd time doing 100%.

I didn’t notice too many changes with the remaster, aside from 3 collectible Chaos in each level. I’ve never been a fan of collectibles in Sonic games, as you can’t backtrack and there are forking paths. That said, this looks much sharper and the framerate is perfect now. I’m no framerate snob but it’s a big deal for a game about going fast.

Shadow Generations
The large addition here is Shadow’s campaign. This has 6 new Zones, tons of new challenge levels, and a giant hub to explore. Instead of retro Sonic and modern Sonic, you play a level as 3D Shadow and one as 2D Shadow. The 2D levels still have boost gameplay, similar to Sonic Rush and the 3DS games. The levels are all excellent and even the challenge missions are much more polished than the base game. There’s 3 challenges per level instead of 5 and you have to do more of them to advance, but they’re quality over quantity and don’t feel like busywork. Shadow’s campaign just feels much more even than Sonic’s, where the side content felt like an afterthought. Shadow also has some unique abilities that make his campaign feel fresh and not just like a level-pack.

The hub is pretty cool, letting you bounce around and find secrets. They clearly copied Bowser’s Fury here and you can’t unsee it once you notice. It’s generally fun from a casual-run perspective but is a total miss regarding completion. There are ~100 of both machine parts and treasure chests to collect but the map does almost nothing to help you find these. The map should mark ALL of this upon beating the game.

Nitpicking Levels:
The level inclusions are all solid here. IMO Rail Canyon should have been the Heroes level in the base game and even the new ’06 level is a banger. They hilariously did not include a Shadow the Hedgehog level in spite of this being a sequel to it. They also shockingly included levels from Forces and Frontiers, which came out after Generations. This is like putting a Mario Galaxy level into Mario 64, very cool!

Unfortunately, I can’t help but wish they added more to Sonic’s campaign. 9 zones just isn’t enough, the Forces/Frontiers levels would make more sense in Sonic’s campaign, Shadow’s campaign is beefier than it needed to be (even if I love it), and I happily would have traded the expansive hub or Radical Highway for a couple more Sonic Zones. It is especially painful that Adventure 2 now has 3 levels and Heroes/’06 get a double-dip even if the levels are great. ’06 is straight garbage and I’ve never liked Heroes, while Sonic 3, CD, and the portable games still have zero representation. IceCap Zone is right there, Sonic Team!!!

Conclusion
Sonic Generations was already the best 3D Sonic game by a mile to me, being a beautiful celebration of Sonic’s legacy. With Shadow’s campaign, they’ve addressed its core problem of a lack of content, adding 6 Zones that are all excellent. A casual run now takes 10 hours instead of 5, and 100% will run you ~30 instead of ~15. Buy this game people, I want Generations 2!!!

90%PC

Sonic x Shadow Generations lets you not only experience the old Sonic Generations from 2011 in a remastered form, but also the brand-new Shadow campaign that follows the new Sonic formula that’s been introduced in 2022.
___
Sonic Generations Remastered

This is one of the better remasters.

Sonic Generations is a compilation of old Sonic levels that were completely reimagined to fit the 2D Classic Sonic style and the modern boost-formula 3D Sonic style.
Classic Sonic is more akin to his old Genesis appearance, with the spin dash and his momentum based 2D platforming, that focuses not only on speed, but on multiple paths that let you go faster, with the risk of easier falling off due to harder platforming. It’s quite replayable thanks to each new path uncovering a new way to play the level.
Modern Sonic is all about blitzing through levels that transition between 2D and 3D by using the boost gauge and various other moves. You have to manage the boost gauge efficiently to ensure you can boost throughout the entire level. It’s just so addicting, the thrilling speed and multiple routes make it infinitely replayable.

The game’s structure is simple & fun. You finish three zones, pick for each zone one challenge act that has more of a gimmick focus and then move on to a boss fight, which for the most part are enjoyable.

Now, the Remastered part changes a few things.

Some minor additions are collectible Chao and 3 save files.

Also, Classic Sonic and Modern Sonic have the dropdash, which is basically a spindash in the air, you land, you get launched forward. Classic Sonic gets some use out of it since his games invented it, but Modern Sonic has better options, so it isn’t used at all.

Last, they rewrote some of the dialogue & animations to better represent the characters. In the 2010s, they were written flat with barely any personality, and this rewrite addresses that, but in the end, you either like one or the other. They’re both pretty negligible since there's barely any story or dialogue to begin with, it’s only really there for consistency’s sake.
Though, I gotta admit, some of the animation changes were bad. They sometimes don’t reflect what is being said and seem a little awkward. They also removed some of the slapstick, which is questionable; having some humor doesn't cause mischaracterization.

What’s also disappointing is that there are no higher-resolution textures, so some spots show their age.

Overall, this is an alright Remaster of an amazing game with very minor changes. 9/10.
___
Shadow Generations is built off of Sonic Frontiers’ framework, however with an insane amount of polish, making all the good parts even better, and it still adds new ideas on top of it.

The animations and graphics are top-notch. This game looks great and is exactly what I want from a next-gen Sonic game.

The gameplay is Sonic Frontiers’ 3D level formula perfected, with the structure of Sonic Generations. It lets you boost and has much more open level design, creating a plethora of new routes. Levels can transition through multiple areas several times, giving you an ever-changing experience that never really drags on.
They also added multiple new abilities that change the way you play. Chaos Control is the most notable one; it requires you to fill a meter and lets you stop time, meaning you can create a lot of new paths with it, like using rockets as a bridge. It’s a great ability that opens up the level design much more and rewards players who find creative ways to use it.
In contrast, though, it ain’t as much fun in 2D. The biggest issue is just how easy it is to charge Chaos Control in them, making it so much easier to get the optimal route without really trying.

There are also new challenges and bosses. The bosses are all fun, they test your knowledge of your newly acquired abilities in multiple phases. The challenge levels are a different story. They just ain’t as interesting as the ones from Sonic’s side. They’re much shorter, have less variation and blend in. It feels like it was just a mandatory thing to keep the structure.

Outside the levels and bosses, you find a small-scale hub world that takes a lot of inspiration from Sonic Frontiers, minus the combat & heavy focus on it.
This hub world has lots of small missions and collectibles to keep you on your toes, while you go from level to level. The missions are also a step-up compared to Frontiers. Gone are the fake mobile ad puzzles, now it actually gives you something to do in a small timeframe.

The last thing that’s worth mentioning is the story. Whereas Sonic Generations is a bare-bones and has dialogue to keep the plot going, Shadow Generations strives for a darker and more emotional story. It takes itself a bit more seriously and reintroduces Shadow as a proper character.

Shadow’s campaign deserves to stand toe to toe with Sonic Generations, it perfects so much, but the forced Generations structure hurts some aspects. 8/10.

90%Xbox Series X/S

Im so so so happy for Sonic Team, you can just feel the new found confidence they had when making this

Please Sonic Team, just keep making great games... please

90%PlayStation 5

holy shit

sonic generations: 02:56:56
shadow generations: 03:50:09

90%PC

Peak

80%PlayStation 5

I was blown away with the quality of Shadow Generations. Tight controls, fast pace levels and most importantly the game was fun. While I wasn't completely disappointed with Sonic Frontiers, I still thought it was good compared to what Sonic Team had been putting out prior. Shadow Generations managed to 1-up Sonic Frontiers, they nailed it. I'd probably give Shadow Generations a 9/10.

Sonic Generations is pretty much the same as before and considering I just replayed it on PS3 last year I was able to breeze through it. It was cool they added 3 chaos to each level, gave us something new. After just coming off Shadow Generations though Sonic Generation felt worse than before, I won't take that into consideration too much as I recall enjoying the title when it first released and when I replayed in last year. The game is good for the most part, some of the challenges are tedious... but most of the game is genuinely fun. The Planet Wisp level is still awful and always leaves a bad taste in my mouth when I wrap up this game. Regardless Sonic Generations sits around a 7/10 for me.

90%PlayStation 5

Sonic x Shadow Generations is pretty much the ultimate Sonic package. Sonic Generations is still one of the best 3D Sonic games and is as fun as ever, but the real draw is Shadow Generations, which is everything i could possibly want out of a Sonic game. The levels are so unbelievably fantastic and fun to master. The Adventure formula speed stages are my favorite Sonic stages, so its no surprise that i love an entire game of them! These versions of Space Colony Ark, Kingdom Valley, Radical Highway, and Rail Canyon are some of the best Sonic stages of all time. The 2D levels are good too! I didnt enjoy them as much as the 3D levels, but they were fun ways to change up the pace. I loved the bosses, the Doom Powers, the fun open zone, everything. Shadow Generations honestly made Sonic Generations a little bit more underwhelming this time around, its that good! I’m so hoping that the next Sonic game builds off of this, because its absolutely incredible.

90%PlayStation 5

Probably in an "objective" sense, the best 3D Sonic game. Really excited to see where they take both the series and Shadow from here.

80%Nintendo Switch

It was good overall, though I was not wowed by the gameplay. The story is also on the shallow end, but good for what it is. The game has been receiving monumental praise, but I don't seem to be seeing what everyone else is seeing. I felt that the level design and gameplay controls didn't feel super smooth and "fun" as much as I wanted it to be. It wasn't bad though, and there seemed to be not much in the way of glitches either. Overall it was a slightly positive experience. It was a nice throwback for the fandom.

95%PC

9.5/10

95%PlayStation 5

Maria :’( Doomed by the narrative but as sweet as always. Amazing game, please give us more games like this!

80%PC

shadow's campaign alone was goated, overall with sonic's...YES.

90%PlayStation 5

(Shadow Generations only)

95%PC

Literally My only complaint is it's too short - sure generations TECHNICALLY makes up for it, but come on. No one is buying this for generations. I'd say get it on sale, or if you somehow don't own Gens - as much as I love this game I really don't think it's worth the $50 price tag.

100%PC

I’ve only played the shadow portion so far but this is phenomenal. Shadow generations feels like a mini sonic frontiers with so much polish. The music is awesome the levels are awesome and the actually polished. I was no expecting a mini hub world for shadow. His powers are cool and unique as well. I hope we see more stuff like this from sega. There’s is also a very good remaster of sonic generations bundled in