Sonic Chronicles: The Dark Brotherhood Review
Yes, yes. I know this game has been talked about. But holy God damn hell... This was awful. I played through this game beginning to end. And what is that game? Sonic Chronicles: The Dark Brotherhood. It seems SEGA was thinking at the time: "Hey, if Mario can do RPG's and be successful, why not Sonic?" And that itself is not a bad idea. Sonic could pull it off. ... If they knew what they were doing. They didn't.
So, who made this then? Bioware. The same guys who made the Star Wars games, Spore and even the Mass Effect Trilogy. It seems to be divided into two development teams. The A and B teams. The A team makes classics like I listed above. And then you have the B team of development who shelves clearly unfinished, unpolished games and don't give a solitary fuck. Sonic Chronicles falls into the latter category. It's clearly rushed and unfinished.
This will be divided into certain sections and once I'm done, I'll give my score, if anyone gives a shit. So... let the trainwreck begin shall we? Whee.
STORY
The story begins with Sonic and his friends battle with the notorious mad scientist, Dr. Ivo "Eggman" Robotnik at Robotropolis doing... er... something. Yeah. Anyways, they stop him and I guess that's the end of that as Sonic goes running around in Greenhill doing errands for people and Cream the Rabbit who's just... there. Eh. Then suddenly, a mysterious invader appears called the Mauraders. A super soldier with advanced technology that when in battle, manages to steal your HP so they can heal. Sonic defeats the intruder who disappears and wonders just what the hell just happened. Much like the audience playing this game.
Amy appears and tells Sonic that more Marauders appeared out of nowhere and causing havoc. On top of that, Knuckles is missing and supposedly kidnapped by this group. So they meet Tails who is in Central Station and meet Rouge the Bat along with the G.U.N Commander telling the group about the Marauders.
They then look around and find Eggman seemingly reformed (*Snort*) and informs Sonic that they should go to Robotropolis because the Marauders are searching for something there. Oh, and they recruit Cream and Big because why not? Shadow is there, being Shadow and after a few fights and reminding the dumbass: "Hey, if we work together, maybe we can get this done quicker." "... Seems legit. Kay."
You also find E123 Omega here... for some reason. Kay. Then you manage to rescue Knuckles... oh, wait. He rescues himself. Huh. That was... kinda pointless really. Hm. So, they journey to Angel Island and FINALLY meet the main villain of this game. 
His name is Imperator Ix and he wants the Master Emerald and knows about the ancient echidnas for some reason. You fight him and reveal his face and surprise! He's an echidna as well! And so is his right hand woman, Shade. In fact, the Marauders now revealed to be the Nocturnus Clan, are all echidna warriors, throwing Knuckles for a loop thinking that he was the only survivor.
Shade worked with him believing they can co-exist in Mobius again, however, since Ix is insane and a generic villain, he basically goes: "Nah, fam. I'mma take over EVERYTHING, so fuck off, bye." He steals the Master Emerald, causing Angel Island to fall and land in Robotropolis and somehow... we survived? Okay. From there, Shade switches sides and feels guilty allowing all of this to happen.
She explains they were all trapped in an alternate dimension and inside a fortress called the Twilight Cage. Time flows differently because of course it does. Eggman volunteers to stay behind and assess the damage while the group go and stop Ix from whatever he's planning. Of course, this is all a ruse for the end. Wink, wink, nudge, nudge, stab, stab, explosion, explosion.
So, they travel to the other dimension and encounter four races who are slaves to Ix because... uhm... wait, how did he do this exactly? Oh well, who cares? Let's do dumb fucking errands so they help us. Because, yes. Anyways, after you help the four leaders of the alien races, they use their combined powers to reveal the Twilight Cage and lower its defenses. Why? Because they all share the same goal: Ix is an asshole and idiot poopface.
Sonic and the others journey inside the prison fortress and encounter Gizoids. Yeah, the same ones from Sonic Battle and Sonic Advance 3. Turns out, they were originally created by Ix and the Nocturnus Clan. Which also explains where Gerald found Emerl. I guess. The teams splits up to disable the defense system leading to Ix's room and fights two advanced Gizoids who are master fire and ice.
*Sudden Sonic Boom flashbacks* ... Ech. Anyways, they die and encounter Ix who spouts off mumbo-jumbo about taking over the Universe and some shit and that Knuckles should join after he explains how they were exiled, showing more of how much Pachacamac is a dick. Knuckles is all like: "... Nah, you're still an asshole. Also, Shade's cool so..." And they fight.
Ix uses the Master Emerald to become super... not realizing that Sonic can do the same. OOPS. After a lengthy final battle of... 15 seconds. I'm not shitting you, it's over. Ix just... disappears, dies? Vaporizes due to Sonic's awesomeness? I dunno. The Twilight Cage self destructs and they warp back home to Mobius only to find Eggman rebuild his empire and surrounds the heroes in a cliffhanger. DUN, DUN, DUUUN!
... And that's it. No, really. It just ends there. Roll credits. What a bunch of shit.
GAMEPLAY
Controls don't do anything save for pause and select that brings up the menus. Everything else is by touch screen. I have to ask you... why would they do this? This seems like something you would put on a computer? Not a hand-held system like the Nintendo DS. But I digress, how is the gameplay? Horrible. The battle system also sucks. Think Elite Beat Agents or any rhythm game and that's the battle system. Fuck one thing up in the timing, and the attacks and spells fail. It's downright nonsensical. Why would they do this?
Plus, enemies sometimes have way too much health or absurd defense which takes you FOREVER to kill them. It's downright maddening! Getting experience and levelling up is so slow, the only times I get some best items and experience is doing errands for people. And the currency is get this, rings. The very same rings that protect you when you get hit. That's basically the equivalent of using coins from Mario to build a shield. What.
The puzzles range from simplistic to frustrating. There is so much switching to the characters. Knuckles and Rouge fly over large gaps, Amy smashes things with her hammer, Big can... somehow go through toxic areas and be fine? Eh? And Sonic going through loops and tubes to get to areas. The others? Jack shit. So, yeah, gameplay sucks and it's boring.
SOUNDS
The sounds... are... WHY??? So many stock sound effects such as a person vomiting? A cartoon boing? A stock punch sound? What the fuck happened here? Why is the sound quality and sound effects so bad?! Why does a person vomiting play when an enemy dies?! TELL ME!!!
MUSIC
The music is fucking garbage. I know, a Sonic game with bad music? Unheard of! But unfortunately it's true. Okay, there are good parts. The opening theme is good, and the battle and boss themes are pretty cool. Except the field themes are absolute garbage. They don't even sound close to what Bioware was remixing. It all sounds like generic MIDI I can find online. Hell, I can remaster better if I had the files! This is a fucking disgrace. But there is a reason why. Copyright. Bioware essentially fucked themselves and didn't think to ask for the OK for some music from SEGA. Truly, the incompetence is stunning.
FUN FACTOR
Is the game fun? Is there any reason to replay it and go back? No, not really. After you beat the game, you start a New Game + in a way. You get to keep your stuff and levels, but all other things are reset. So... I guess you can destroy the game. But... I don't care.
FINAL THOUGHTS AND SCORE
It's rather interesting they tried to tie all the other games in and have it make sense. Like the G.U.N Commander from Shadow the Hedgehog, and the relationships to the characters. The writing is very good for these characters and you have a choice system like Mass Effect. You can make Sonic a cool dude or basically an asshole. But I'm sorry, that's not enough to save this mediocre and unfinished game. Because that's what it is. Unfinished. It looks so ugly, lazy and uninspired. Which is a damn shame. Will there be a sequel? Since this game came out in 2008 and 11 years have passed? Eh, no. Not really.
My final score is...
1/10
Why a one? Because some of the music is decent and they tried to make a story, but it suffers under bad decision making and horrible pacing. Anyway, that's my review of Sonic Chronicles: The Dark Brotherhood. Will I do more of these? Who knows.
Sayonara.