Sonic Boom: Fire & Ice Reviews
The streamlined level design and improved pacing makes for an enjoyable, if shallow, experience
A few flaws keep Sonic Boom: Fire and Ice from perfection, particularly other characters, but it succeeds at being a simple game about going fast. Pick this one up and go for the time trials, it's a lot of fun.
Sonic Boom: Fire & Ice is - rather like its predecessor - a solid effort and worth consideration on 3DS. The core campaign blends a variety of styles, with the main stages employing an enjoyable mix of exploration and puzzle solving with moments of satisfying momentum and speed. There are some slightly disappointing downsides, and it's a game that occasionally feels constrained rather than supported by its source material. Overall, however, it deserves credit for what it does well, and should certainly be tempting to fans of the show and also broader Sonic enthusiasts willing to accept its limitations.
Fire and Ice just isn't a good game. While its platforming may be mechanically sound, the game just tries to do too much - and fails at most of it. If you're looking for a return to form for Sonic the Hedgehog, Fire and Ice unfortunately isn't it.
The younger players amongst us should have no trouble picking up and enjoying some Sonic Boom: Fire & Ice. It’s geared toward younger kids, and maybe as a 32-year-old man with nostalgia brain, I want to try something a bit more. It feels short with only a handful of hours to work through each stage, many of the stages feel the same, and while the platforming isn’t bad, it’s like a small piece of candy: It’s gone quickly, no matter how nice it might taste. The game is somewhere between the classic franchise titles and the modern ones, but it holds truer to the originals, and y’know, that’s a good enough start.
While it’s not going to revolutionize the Sonic the Hedgehog series, Sonic Boom: Fire and Ice is a solid entry in the franchise. Its slick controls, fun boss battles, and entertaining speed sections are bound to put a smile on fans’ faces.
Sonic Boom: Fire & Ice isn't the worst Sonic game I've ever played. It isn't terrible. The platforming and sense of speed are here, though just not as fun as you might remember them. The whole affair is rather ugly -- which can't only be blamed on the 3DS, though it doesn't help -- and the game isn't exactly long at a few hours to complete, if that. Hardcore fans of the series will probably get some enjoyment out of this, but for the full price of $40, it is hard to recommend to anyone else. If you're desperate for another Sonic game, you could do worse.
Sonic Boom: Fire & Ice successfully builds on the lessons that were learned from identifying Shattered Crystal's faltered mistakes. With flashes of near brilliance, the sense of speed becomes an unrivalled thrill, even if that is best seen in the few Bot Racing stages. Brevity is the game's pitfall, but we expect some would argue that they would rather have a shorter, more polished adventure than a lacklustre, lengthier experience.
It's good to see that Sonic Boom: Fire & Ice, while far from the higher thresholds of the classic Sonic games that built the character, improves on its predecessor and presents a very decent gameplay and good ol' high speed action on its levels. It doesn't go all the way with it, though, as its lacklustre visual presentation demonstrates, not to mention the lack of alternative paths but this new chapter is closer to what is expected from a game bearing the name of Sonic.
Review in Portuguese | Read full review
If the story, characters and voice acting doesn’t get to you, the frustrating controls and level design might put you over the edge.