What's so bad about this review?

[Yaminomalex]

This review I wrote for GayFags, er Gamefaqs just got rejected. =\

Sonic Adventure 2 : Battle
For Nintendo Gamecube

Intro

In this game, you decide pick to play as either Sonic, Tails and Knuckles or you can decide to be the bad guys Robotnik, Shadow and Rouge. There’s not much a difference between the sides, Sonic and Shadow’s game play are similar, Tails and Robotnik’s are similar and Knuckles and Rougé’s are similar. The game introduces 2 new characters to the franchise : Rouge the Bat a treasure hunter obsessed with gems. And then, there’s Shadow, a Sonic clone. He has the special ability to freeze Time called “Chaos Control”. But you can’t even use that in gameplay mode which sucks and makes it feel morel like a Dues Ex Machina. Aside from my ramblings, I still got more to review to.

Graphics

Compared to old Sonic games, the graphics are very inconsistent. Sometimes they can look quite beautiful, and other times they can be ugly and blocky. During stages and cutscenes you can see solid objects pass through each other. I gaurnetee you'll see a lot of body limbs going through walls, objects. Sonic’s pupils look like they were glued onto his eyes and help together with string and chewing gum. On top of that, most of the human characters look ugly as fuck. Most of the charcter art is solid for the most part. Robotnik looks very strange however.

My Score : 5/10

Story

The story is just a big WTF. It makes sense, but it just seems very messed up for the most, as if a 7 year old was in charge of writing the script.

Sonic the Hedgehog is captured by a secret military force  G.U.N. They say he’s being captured because he’s done some seriously bad things that can’t go unpunished. He says he done nothing and escapes a military helicopter en route to a highly secured prison called Prison Island. He leaps down to the streets of a city in effort to escape. There, he meets black hedgehog which look like Sonic for some reason. Meanwhile, Dr. Ivo  Robotnik penetrates the high-security GUN base on Prison Island looking for a weapon that his grandfather, Dr. Gerald Robotnik. Deep inside of the base, Eggman, er ROBOTNIK discovers that the “weapon” is black hedgehog called Shadow that claims he is the ultimate. Shadow invites Eggman to the Space Colony ARK and shows him a massive weapon known as the Eclipse Cannon, which is capable of destroying the Earth. Just as they start to do their evil plan, a female bat named Rouge offers her help as well.

The story isn’t all that bad, but it dosen’t fit the feel for a Sonic game, and it would be more at home in a James Bond movie. Some of the cutscenes are cheesy as hell, so it loses some points here.

My Score 7/10

Controls

The controls are responsive. That camera, can be a bitch, though.

My Score : 8/10

Gameplay

As Sonic or Shadow your goal is straightforward, get to Goal Ring at the end of the stage as quickly as possible. Use the A button to jump attack and press it again in midair and you’ll perform a homing attack. The homing attack  gives you a bit of an air boost and if there is anything attackable nearby you automatically home onto it and attack it, the when it’s destroyed you can Home Attack once more on something else and do this again and again nothing left todestroy. Also, consider the fact that this is a fucking Sonic game, hold the B button to charge up a Spin Dash, let go and you’ll hurl yourself as a little ball at top speed. However, you go so fast  you can barely control it. It’s really a shame that one of the series trademark attacks is useless for the most part in this game. If you simply press B you will summersault. A summersault will squeeze you into tight spaces and it can be used to destroy enemies. Sonic and Shadow can also grind on rails, which becomes more important in later stages. If you’re playing as Knuckles or Rouge, you got a long, hard and boring job to do. You must go throughout the level to find 3 green shards of the Master Emerald/3 Silver Keys/ 3 Chaos Emeralds. You'll have a radar in the lower center of the screen that beeps as you get closer to the shard. As you get closer, it will change colors. When you are very close to the shard your radar will beep really fast in red and your character will have an exclamation point over his/her face. If your radar is red and there’s no shard in sight, then, you’ll probably need to dig for them. You must find all three shards in order to complete the level. As Knuckles or Rouge you jump with A, hold A in midair and you’ll begin to glide. As you glide, you fall down, you cannot glide up. While you glide you can kill opponents by touching them with your front side, if you touch them from your side or rear end, you will receive damage. Press B while gliding and you will drill dive, and if you have the Pick Nail or Shovel Claw upgrade you will dig when you hit the ground. While on the ground, press B and you will either punch or kick, a very basic but powerful attack. For Tails and Robotnik, things are a little werid. The goal is also to reach the end of the stage as fast as you can in your robot suit. Robotnik has his Eggwalker and Tails has his Cyclone. Instead of physical attacks, they attack with guns, lasers and missles. As Robotnik and Tails, you use A to jump. If you have the Hover Jet upgrade, you’ll be able to hover, in midair to hover when you press A down in a jump. Press B and you shoot a small bullet, If you hold B and you’ll have a laser that you aim at enemies. You’ll be unable to walk around, however, you’ll rotate around in your walker. As you rotate while holding the B button, you will lock on to your enemies. You only have the laser for a limited time. Once the enemy is locked on, release B and you will shoot lasers at the enemy/ies you locked on to. Unlike with the other charcter, as Tails or Robotnik you can survive with no rings, as long as your health bar stays filled. In the bottom center of your screen you have a health bar, every time your hit, life decreases. To get more life, collect rings or Chaos Drives which are dropped by robots after you destroy them. As you go on levels, your charcters will recive upgrades, which allow them to do more things. Sadly, the game play can get very boring, tedious and annoying. Also, for some reason, characters have a bad habit of falling through solid fucking metal floors, going through walls and sometimes they simply dying for no reason. Shadow and Sonic's levels are the only levels in the game that don’t grate your brain and these levels sadly only take up about one third of the game.

My score : 6/10

Audio

This game has pretty decent audio. Most of the sound effects sound good and match the game. Most of the music is decent but after a while, it will grate on your ears. A lot of it is J-rock, Ska and bullshit rap (You’ll be hearing that a lot in Knuckles stages). Also the music in Rougé’s stages is for the most part LALALALALLALALALALA I AM A WOMAN LALALALALALALALALALALALALaaaaALAALALALA, and that’s very painful to hear for the most part. You can go to the sound test and listen to all the songs. Every single character in the game has a horrible theme song that starts playing when that character appears in the scene. A horrible flaw in the audio that is most noticeable is when during a cinema scene the music is playing too loud and when the character talks their voice is too soft so you can’t tell what they hell they’re saying unless you read the subtitles. Also, sometimes while one character is talking another may start talking while the first still isn’t finished so the two voices blend. The voices for the most part match the charcters, but they can get annoying after a while.

My Score : 6/10

Replay Value

Despite being a short game, this game has a shit load of replay value. You can unlock different costumes for your characters in 2 player mode. There is a total of 180 emblems for you to get in the game. You get an emblem after you beat a stage or a mission. Once you get them all you get a 3D remake of the very first Sonic level ever, Green Hill Zone. Sadly, this game gets boring really fast. It takes patience to raise your Chao all on its own, and the Chaos are gimmicky and they won’t appeal to everyone. To get 180 emblems is just the biggest pain in the ass. There’s a lot of stuff in this game to keep you playing it, but there simply isn’t enough action to keep you in.

My Score : 5/10

Overall

This is one of the better 3D Sonic games. If you’re a hardcore Sonic fan, get this game. If you like to raise retarded, annoying virtual pets, get this game. If you’re a wap, get this game. Avoid this game if you are a fan of the old Sonic games, this game is nothing like them. At best, this game is worth a rental, because it’s not exactly a must have and it’s not for everyone. Some of the stages will have you ripping you hair out and grinding your teeth. This isn’t exactly my favorite Sonic game, but it’s not really that bad. It can, however get really boring after a while.

Overall score : 6.16/10

[Superyoshi]

I'm gonna be serious for a moment and say it's because of the swearing.  GameFAQs only allows minor swears such as "damn" and "hell"

[Herb]

I'm gonna be serious for a moment and say it's because of the swearing.  GameFAQs only allows minor swears such as "damn" and "hell"

That, and there is a lot of unprofessional-like grammar and spelling errors. Too much opinion also in places where it doesn't even matter (i.e. the music being hip-hop)

[CJMErl / Yami CJMErl]

Yeah, if a review as good as Fate's review for FFVII was rejected, you'd have a tough time getting yours on there.

[Peaches]

Gamefaqs is utterly bizarre.  They won't pass reasonably well written reviews, yet they pass some absolutely horrid reviews where it's obvious they didn't even get halfway through the game.

I've been rejected twice only to have morons send theirs in with 1 or 2 out of 10 scores or the typical 10 out of 10 BEST GAEM EVAR reviews.

Yeah, get rid of the minor swearing.

[Draconis]

Gamefaqs is only good for info. The reviews are crap(I have yet to find a decent, unbiased review), and the forums are filled with idiots, although, there seem to be some decent members amidst the idiocy.

Personally, I see nothing wrong with the review, except a few grammar mistakes. I'd rather see an unbiased review with grammar errors, than a total fanboy/fangirl review with no mistakes.

[Superyoshi]

Gamefaqs is only good for info. The reviews are crap(I have yet to find a decent, unbiased review),

Lurk moar.  There are tons of unbiased people at GameFAQs if you take the time to look.  Usually if you take the time to find the review with the lowest score for a game popular (Such as Kingdom Hearts 2 or whatever), there's actually critisism, which is good.

For example, here is a well written review for Sonic Advance 2, and states almost every reason why I hate the game.