Sonic Boom: Fire and Ice (3DS, 2016) Is Actually Pretty Good

 NOTE: This review is part of a retrospective of the Sonic franchise. Feel free to read the other Sonic reviews I’ve done here - https://expithecat.blogspot.com/search/label/sonic%20retrospective

What do you get when you mix fire with ice? Water, that’s what.

Background and History

Sonic Boom: Fire and Ice was announced as a follow-up to Shattered Crystal on June 9, 2015. With Shattered Crystal generally faring better than Rise of Lyric, it was decided that Sanzaru Games would take the helm of the next Sonic Boom title and that they would target the 3DS. 

However, with Shattered Crystal still getting a fairly mediocre reception, Sanzaru Games would identify the feedback and improve aspects of it that were criticized - particularly with the level design being so long and exploration-focused which tended to turn off even older Sonic fans and made the game harder to get into. Levels would still carry elements of exploration, but were more designed to be fast-paced and have a greater appeal towards the speed aspect of Sonic games. Y’know, the thing that the series is known for.

Originally the game was meant to launch in the fall of 2015, but ended up being delayed to the following year to give more development time and to coincide with the franchise’s 25th anniversary - likely a partial result with the work being done on two… other Sonic games that would be released in 2017. 

Still, that isn’t something very common with Sonic games, I mean you’ve seen Sega historically rush Sonic games (something they still do apparently with how Colors Ultimate and Origins turned out), so that was something good to see about this game. After all, as the wise ol’ Shigeru Miyamoto said, ‘A delayed game is eventually good, but a rushed game is forever bad.”

Wait… he didn’t say that? Apparently it was just a misattributed quote that’s been circulating the internet for years? Damn, Abraham Lincoln was right to say that I shouldn’t believe everything I see on the internet.

Personal Experiences

When this game was first announced, I can’t deny that I was a little… dumbfounded for lack of a better word. It had been only a little over half a year since Rise of Lyric and Shattered Crystal, with the former especially still getting slammed universally as the worst Sonic game of all time, and Shattered Crystal being seen as mediocre, I found it… odd that they would want to follow that up, especially as soon as they did.

The game did look like an improvement over Shattered Crystal, which was already better than Rise of Lyric, but I had already been soured on the Sonic Boom sub-franchise as a whole, and I had no interest in playing Fire and Ice.

That said, I eventually did reconsider that. Around the time I gave the Sonic Boom series another shot and found myself enjoying it, I had heard Fire and Ice being regarded as an okay to decent game, and at some point I did want to give it a shot. Eventually I came across the game at my local used/retro game store and figured I would pick it up, although at that point I had already started the review series and didn’t get around to playing this game until… well, now. In fact before I even started my play through I actually found an almost complete save file left behind by the previous owner… that now is gone forever, sorry man.

Story

Dr. Eggman discovers a new supercharged element called ‘Ragnium’, which he uses for revenge against Sonic… by creating a robot that can outrun him and embarrass him. Oh yeah, this is a Sonic Boom game.

Anyway, this results in the creation of various environmentally damaging fissures causing dangerous weather patterns, which Sonic and his friends try to close up - in the process, giving them elemental ‘Fire and Ice’ powers. They also come across a robot that Eggman calls D-Fekt, who was built to attract Ragnium but ends up failing and uses his magnetic abilities to create giant robots.

Once again, the story really isn’t anything to write home about, but I will say one thing - it definitely does a better job of tying itself to the TV series. The style of humor actually feels closer to the series, and the events of this game actually do tie into what happens within the series, especially since there is an episode that references this game’s storyline. 

It’s nothing too special, but I will say the tone and humor does feel closer to the Sonic Boom series rather than the whatever-ness of the other Sonic Boom games. Granted, it doesn’t really continue off the plot of either game - as far as I could tell Lyric was never even brought up at any point - but I guess since they didn’t have much of a plot in the first place it’s not a huge dealbreaker. Some of the humor actually even got a chuckle out of me, which alone is a step up over Shattered Crystal.

On top of that, FMV cutscenes are a bit more prevalent here, with animation, again, close to the TV series (with inevitable 3DS compression), but the game also… actually has in-game cutscenes too. Not even just with 3D models behind text - the characters actually speak and move around - which is definitely an aspect I really like. 

The story presentation is definitely a step up, not just from Shattered Crystal, but pretty much all of the handheld Sonic games. Oddly enough the only other handheld Sonic game that comes close was Rush Adventure, in which the in-game cutscenes were still fully animated despite not having voice clips.

Presentation

My opinion on this game’s presentation, outside of the story aspect anyway, is about the same as Shattered Crystal. Once again, the character models do seem a little rough, and overall it’s about what I expect from a handheld side game. I will say the environments are definitely even nicer here than in Shattered Crystal since the game offers a greater variety of stage themes and color palettes. A lot of the same art style is kept from Shattered Crystal, and the game, again, looks fine. Nothing to write home about, but it does feel more colorful than it’s predecessor.

On top of that, there’s the soundtrack which is, again, forgettable. Nothing terrible, but quite frankly I basically remember none of the tracks from this game and it all just kind of… blended together to me. More of the same as Shattered Crystal, really - if you made me listen to any of the themes on their own without knowing their corresponding level names or whatever, I’m not even sure if I’d do a good job differentiating them between the three Boom games.

Gameplay

If you didn’t read my Shattered Crystal review, my opinion was basically that the game had an okay foundation and understood the Sonic formula much better than it’s Wii U counterpart, but it definitely had a few major problems that hampered the overall experience - particularly the forced exploration to progress on top of the stages being very maze-like. 

Sonic Boom: Fire and Ice uses a similar formula. The game once again takes the form of a 2.5D platformer with an emphasis on speed and exploration, with a few different playable characters. As I said though, Sanzaru Games did take into account the criticism that Shattered Crystal received, and you can definitely tell that early on.

Whereas Shattered Crystal focused too much on exploration rather than fast-paced platforming, Fire and Ice manages to find a better balance of those two elements. The level design in general is more streamlined, feeling overall faster-paced and not as overly maze-like as in the previous game. Exploration is still present here, but it doesn’t come at the cost of overbearing long, overbearing levels that send the player in a bunch of different directions.

Levels are also shorter this time around, but on the same token, there’s more of them in each world - an approach that I definitely like better. It’s easier to stomach each individual level and doesn’t make the game feel so bogged down. I can take breaks between levels if I want rather than having to spend 10 minutes going through each level especially if I want to backtrack and explore.

Which leads me to another massive improvement about this game, in that exploration isn’t forced on you this time around. My biggest criticism with Shattered Crystal was that the game basically forced you to almost complete it by searching for various items to unlock new levels, and thank god, this game doesn’t do that. There are still collectibles to get for the sake of completion - Amy’s hammers which unlock different cosmetics, coils for Sticks to unlock a special bot for the game’s ‘Bot Racing’ mode, and Ragnium to collect to unlock other robots and upgrades for said mode. There’s also ‘Challenge Rooms’ you can find within the levels which, as the name suggests, offers a few quick platforming challenges that you can do to gain Trading Cards.

I’ll get to the Bot Racing mode later, but the point is that none of this is required for you to progress through the game’s main campaign and story. If you want to play this like a traditional Sonic game - going through the levels from start to finish - the game allows you to simply do that without the need to scour each level for collectibles.

It definitely helps too that the level design in general here feels more fluid, dynamic and fast-paced. It doesn’t feel as blocky or rigid as Shattered Crystal and also allows for better use of Sonic’s movement and moveset. The staples of Sonic’s gameplay that were present in Shattered Crystal are present here too - boosters, grind rails, alternate paths for exploration in addition to objects to swing off of with the enerbeam - and it does feel better intertwined with the faster paced level design.

I wouldn’t call the level design anything too spectacular admittedly - in the end it still feels more or less like basic Sonic level design - which while is definitely well-made and fun enough on it’s own, is nothing necessarily to write home about. It’s an improvement over Shattered Crystal’s level design and does genuinely make solid use of Sonic’s movement and mechanics, and that’s about it. It is good for what it is, just nothing amazing, but still does offer a fun enough time. A better focus on fast-paced platforming with a decent amount of exploration that isn’t forced on you.

Oh yeah, and you can also bounce between the foreground and background which is a pretty neat mechanic.

As far as controls go, I couldn’t really tell whether this was because of the faster level design, but I do feel like Sonic and his friends feel a tad more fluid here in comparison to Shattered Crystal. Regardless though, there is at least one major change to the controls with the addition of the ‘Fire and Ice’ mechanic. With the push of the shoulder buttons, you can swap between two auras that simulate ‘Fire’ and ‘Ice’, and are taken advantage of within the level design in order to progress through certain areas. Sometimes you’ll see a block of ice in your way and need to have the ‘Fire’ aura enabled, or there’ll be a platform of water which you need to freeze using the ‘Ice’ aura.

It’s a neat little addition to the controls, although nothing too terribly deep or special. As you make your way through the game, the levels do take more advantage of it both by using it to solve puzzles, find ways for exploration or using it for reaction-based areas, particularly in the Bot Racing modes. It’s nothing too fleshed out here, but it offers an interesting new mechanic when it is used well in addition to the moveset that Sonic and his friends already have.

Which is another thing - once again the system of character swapping returns in this game. Sonic, Tails, Knuckles and Sticks all have their same abilities - Sonic has an air dash, Tails has a hover, Knuckles can burrow in areas, and Sticks can use her boomerang to deactivate obstacles in the way. Amy has also been added as a playable character, and she can use her hammer to create shockwaves or lower pillars in the way. Tails also has the ability to use his blaster to bounce off laser reflects and take out metal blocks in the way.

I do like the option of having multiple playable characters here again, but unfortunately this game doesn’t fix my criticism with Shattered Crystal in having the characters just feel too situational. Once again Sonic still feels the best to play as, and in all honesty I just didn’t feel like the game made interesting use of the other playable characters outside of sections where you needed to switch to a specific one to progress. Sticks does at least have an interesting use of the ‘Fire and Ice’ mechanic with her boomerang, since her boomerang can also be used to burn through ice blocks and whatnot, but again that was about it.

Knuckles in particular I recall maybe using once or twice in the main levels. You can use him to punch enemies, in addition to Amy being able to take out enemies with her hammer, but I didn’t really feel like there was much of a benefit to this over just using the Homing Attack which was faster and more reliable. In fact I actually just now found out while writing this review that I could use Knuckles to punch enemies, not just in Fire and Ice but in Shattered Crystal so… I guess that might say something. 

This game does have one interesting use of the other playable characters though, in the form of the game’s bosses. Yes, unlike Shattered Crystal, the game actually does offer bosses other than the final one, and they’re… alright on their own I guess, but the interesting part is that in each of them, you play as a tag team between Sonic and one of his friends. The character you’re playing as will swap throughout the fight, and you use each of their abilities in order to either avoid obstacles or attack the boss. 

The first boss, for example, has you tag teaming Sonic and Amy. Starting off as Sonic, you have to wait for the boss to try and attack you so that you can get a homing attack, but then at some point you have to use Amy to make a pillar rise, and once you do so you switch to Sonic and climb the pillar using the ‘Ice’ ability and reaching attack point of the boss. There are 4 bosses in total, and admittedly some uses of the other characters are more interesting than others, but I would’ve liked to see the game do more stuff like this in its main levels.

In addition to those though, there’s also Bot Races you face against Eggman, which are fairly self explanatory - basically you have to beat Eggman in a 3-lap race through a 2D level full of obstacles and hazards. Sort of like a bite-sized version of Sonic Rivals which… I haven’t really played, but that’s sort of the vibe I get. They’re nothing really to write home about on their own, but the game also offers a whole mode centered around this where exploring for collectibles has the biggest impact as I implied earlier. 

Like I said, you can collect Ragnium throughout the game to unlock new bots and upgrades for this mode in addition to potentially unlocking a whole new bot by collecting all the coils for Sticks. After the first world, you unlock ‘Thunder Island’, which just serves to offer this mode. In addition, this also serves as the centerpiece of the game’s multiplayer mode. It’s just too bad that, y’know, I don’t have any friends to play this with. But hey, at least this game offers a better completion bonus than a fucking dance party.

The ‘submarine’ areas from Shattered Crystal appear here as well, but they’re now used as their own levels rather than just small parts of the main levels. They feel… about the same here. They’re definitely bigger and sometimes offer multiple of the trading cards, but the obstacles and controls are also more or less the same as in Shattered Crystal.

Speaking of things that return, the Worm Tunnels also come back from Shattered Crystal, only they’re now called Fissure Tunnels. Again, the gameplay is mostly the same, but I think there’s at least a tad more variety here with the ‘Fire and Ice’ mechanic also being involved. Still, nothing too exciting. Neither are these Tailsmobile levels which basically feel like a space shooter that you can beat by holding R and X.

Conclusion

Sonic Boom: Fire and Ice is definitely the best out of the Sonic Boom. Which… isn’t really saying much, and this game does still have a few issues of its own, but I can at least say that this game does deserve a spot in the decent to pretty good camp. Levels offer a better balance of speed and exploration than Shattered Crystal, with a good amount of fast-paced platforming and straightforward level design that still offers a good amount of potential for exploration.

I wouldn’t consider Fire and Ice to be a must-buy or anything - especially back when it was released for $40 - but you do get a decent handheld Sonic game out of it. It’s not the best handheld Sonic game - I would still recommend playing Advance 1, 3, Rush, Rush Adventure and Triple Trouble over it, but if you do have the money and come across this title, I’d say it might be worth at least a try. The game’s also still available on the 3DS eShop for $20 if you’re interested but you may want to get on that fast since it’s also closing in less than a year.

But with that, we’re done with the Sonic Boom games, and now… I’m on the home stretch with this Sonic retrospective.