Released over a decade ago, Sonic Boom was supposed to be a fresh take on the iconic character; a cross-media blitz that would include video games, a TV show and related merchandise, giving the Blue Blur a new lease of life with younger audiences.
As it turned out, the resultant video games – Sonic Boom: Rise of Lyric on Wii U and Sonic Boom: Fire & Ice on 3DS were ultimately disappointing, with the former getting a 4/10 rating from our friends over at Nintendo Life.
"Sonic Boom: Rise of Lyric is a worrying misstep for Sega," read the conclusion. "While we applaud the idea of refreshing the characters for newer audiences, Rise of Lyric feels like a mishmash of ideas that never got to fully develop. Big Red Button spoke enthusiastically about the development process throughout the promotion of Sonic Boom: Rise of Lyric, which makes us think that the disappointing final product is a victim of being rushed out the door to accommodate the cartoon's release."
Chris Senn – who worked on the game and was previously employed at Sega Technical Institute, where he worked on the cancelled Sonic X-treme – has recently spoken to Sega Retro about his career and touches upon the development of Sonic Boom.
"The reason I joined that company - Big Red Button Entertainment - was to get a chance to close the chapter of Sonic in my life, because Sonic X-treme had remained open and got cancelled," he explains. "I really wanted to finish a Sonic game, but I was really interested in this one in particular because the vision for the game was 'stronger with your friends.' That simple statement just made my imagination explode. Working with your friends in a cooperative Sonic game, [in] real time - that sounds amazing. I want to explore that."
The aim was to make the game a true cooperative experience, but much of this had to be cut from the final product. "We were running out of time and money, so decisions were made which ultimately chopped all of the awesome cooperative stuff from the game and focused it on a single-player game that you could also play with a friend. That's why you have the [sarcastically] 'Hey, let's work together. I'll stand on this pressure plate.' 'Oh, I'll stand on the other pressure plate. This is so fun.' And I was like, 'Oh my God, this is… Ugh.' It was very disappointing."
Senn explains that one reason development went so poorly was that the target platform hadn't been released when production began. "Some of the reasons it was a struggle were that we were developing for a new hardware device - the Wii U - which wasn't finished yet, so we didn't have all the specs and we didn't necessarily have versions we could run that were bug-free. That was really hard."
Another issue was that, as Nintendo Life's review hinted, the game was timed to launch alongside other related Sonic Boom products:
"Nintendo and Sega were building this huge launch plan where our game would tie into another game being made, that would tie into a TV show, that would tie into a whole new toy line. They didn't have the toys designed, so we were designing the game, and they'd come back with, "Well, could you add these vehicles in the game?" And we're like, "Dude, we're shipping in six months. How could we?" We tried to work with a lot of competing requests and demands while running out of time. Had the decision not been made to make this what it ultimately turned out to be - bugs aside - I don't know if the game would have shipped, honestly."
The biggest issue for Senn on a personal level was that Sonic Boom didn't feel like a Sonic game for one big reason:
"We were about six months from shipping, and before that I had brought up, "Where's the speed in our game?" I saw lots of combat being developed, puzzles, but where's the speed? The reaction I got was unanimously, "Well, we're not making a classic Sonic game." And I'm like, "Yeah, but it's Sonic. How are we going to deliver something without speed?" At one point - I kid you not - one of the pitches for this game was, "This is going to be the slowest Sonic game ever."
I was like, well, it's because it was going to be working with your friends, stronger with your friends. If we nail that, then okay, I could understand there being some allowance for, "It's not the fastest Sonic game," but you can work with your friends. There'd be something to latch onto. Ultimately, what we created didn't do either."
The full interview with Senn also addresses the cancellation of Sonic X-treme and is well worth a read. You might also want to check out Nintendo Life's 'Sonic Boom at Ten' feature.