VGC has summarized why Sonic fans are asking the Japanese company to postpone the latest 3D Sonic.

For a brief period, #DelaySonicFrontiers became a trending hashtag on Twitter. The franchise’s fans used it to express their disappointment at seeing the first gameplay videos. At the time of VGC publishing its article, IGN’s gameplay premiere had 72,000 likes and 50,000 dislikes (you’ll need a browser add-on to see it, as Google hides this statistic by default), and the combat presentation was slightly better, with 19,000 dislikes against 35,000 likes.

Most of the criticisms were about the poor animations, the not very lively open world and the lack of Sonic’s momentum (these criticisms can also be applied to Sonic Boom: Rise of Lyric, which was released on Nintendo Wii U and was a colossal failure…). One comment says that the open world of Sonic Frontiers seems to be automated, which is odd because they put a lot of dash panels in front of springs, for example. Another reaction says he’s afraid of the game because he’s been excitedly waiting five years for this game, and he’s not satisfied but instead feels that he’s seen this elsewhere, and if this is the future of Sonic in the next ten years, fans of the franchise are in big trouble.

Some are openly demanding that SEGA give Sonic Frontiers a demo in addition to a delay. There should be a questionnaire alongside the demo, allowing the Japanese publisher to gauge opinions. However, Sven Joscelyne, founder of the Sonic Stadium fan site, who is also the international publishing director at IGN, sees no chance of delaying the game:

“#DelaySonicFrontiers won’t work because the main concern is about its entire concept & gameplay approach; a delay in killing bugs & adding content isn’t going to address that. Sonic Frontiers appears to want to be a hyper-realistic, combat-focused Sonic game that draws from the movies… that leans on Sonic’s athleticism rather than physics/momentum-based play. And that’s fine if that’s the goal. It’s just not the Sonic game I was hoping for in 2022. I’ll still assess it on its merits. If it all gets polished up between now and Winter, it might be a real fun time for fans looking for this thing… But a delay isn’t going to be necessary, I think. Sonic Team has its goals set. It’s moving forward with this. Accept it.”

It will be challenging to recover from this situation even with the game still months away.

Source: VGC