Sonic Adventure

is a 1998 platform game developed by Sonic Team and published by Sega for the Dreamcast. It was the first main Sonic the Hedgehog game to feature 3D gameplay. It follows Sonic the Hedgehog, Miles "Tails" Prower, Knuckles the Echidna, Amy Rose, Big the Cat, and E-102 Gamma in their quests to collect the Chaos Emeralds and stop Doctor Ivo Robotnik from unleashing Chaos, an ancient evil. Controlling one of the six characters—each with their own abilities—players complete levels to progress the story. Sonic Adventure retains many elements from prior Sonic games, such as power-ups and the ring-based health system. Players can play minigames such as racing and interact with Chao, a virtual pet.

Sonic Team began developing Sonic Adventure in 1997, after the cancellation of the Sega Saturn game Sonic X-treme. Led by director Takashi Iizuka and producer Yuji Naka, the team strove to reinvent Sonic for the 3D era of video games. Adventure features a stronger emphasis on storytelling and role-playing elements in contrast to previous Sonic games, while Yuji Uekawa redesigned the series's characters for their transition to 3D. Sonic Team attempted to demonstrate the technical prowess of the Dreamcast with realistic graphics and drew inspiration from locations in Peru and Guatemala. The soundtrack was primarily composed by Jun Senoue, who preferred rock music over the electropop of previous Sonic games.

Following its reveal at the Tokyo International Forum in August 1998, Sonic Adventure was highly anticipated and was released in Japan in December 1998, North America in September 1999, and Europe in October 1999. It received acclaim and became the Dreamcast's bestseller, with 2.5 million copies sold by August 2006. Reviewers considered Adventure a major technical advancement and praised the visuals and gameplay. Though critics noted glitches and camera problems, and reactions to the audio were mixed, they considered Sonic Adventure exceptional; some speculated that it could help re-establish Sega as the dominant console manufacturer after the unsuccessful Saturn.

Journalists have retrospectively ranked Sonic Adventure among the best Sonic games, and it is recognized as an important release in both the series and the platform genre. Many characters and concepts introduced in Adventure recur in later Sonic games. Sonic Adventure 2 was released in 2001. Adventure was ported to the GameCube and Windows in 2003 with modernized graphical choices, more challenges and additional content, while a high-definition version was released for the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 in 2010 and for Windows in 2011. Reviews for these releases were less positive; critics felt the game had not aged well and ran at an inconsistent frame rate.

Gameplay

left|thumb|alt=Gameplay screenshot of Speed Highway, one of the levels in Sonic Adventure. In this image, Sonic runs on a road, to a line of rings. The HUD shows a timer, the amount of rings, and the player's lives.|Gameplay screenshot showing [[Sonic the Hedgehog (character)|Sonic in one of the game's levels, Speed Highway]]

Sonic Adventure is a 3D platform game with action and role-playing elements. The cancellation is an important factor in the Saturn's commercial failure, leaving it with no original Sonic platform game. Meanwhile, Naka and Sonic Team developed original Saturn games, such as Nights into Dreams (1996).

Naka wanted a 3D Sonic game, but felt that only Sonic Team should undertake the endeavor; his refusal to let STI use the Nights game engine was instrumental in X-treme cancellation. according to Retro Gamer, Sonic became part of the "background" by mid-1997, so "it was astonishing to see that, just six years after his debut, Sonic was already retro." Nights into Dreams designer Takashi Iizuka felt that Sonic fans had been let down because Sonic Team was not focusing on the series. Additionally, Kazuyuki Hoshino, who would serve as art director on Sonic Adventure, said he thought during the Saturn era Sonic had become outdated. Sonic Team started to work on it in April 1997 on the Saturn with a 20-strong team. but the Saturn's limited capabilities made development difficult. Sonic Team undertook development in conjunction with the Dreamcast, aiming to release the game in December 1998, even if it meant making improvements after release. gave Iizuka influence over the console's development;

Characters and art

thumb|alt=Yuji Uekawa's concept art, showcasing his redesign of Sonic. The handwritten notes showcase some of the redesign's elements.|Sonic was redesigned to appear slimmer and more "mature" by Yuji Uekawa.

Sonic Team felt challenged by the new hardware to recreate Sonic and his world in a new way. Hoshino noted that the characters' longer limbs made it easier to recreate their 2D poses in 3D. Big was designed to be giant and relaxed so the player would not expect something more intense.

While some Sonic games, such as Sonic CD (1993), contained limited voice work, Sonic Adventure was the first Sonic game to feature extensive voice acting. The decision was made early in development as the game was more story-focused than previous Sonic games. Sonic Team's staff had differing opinions about how Sonic should sound. Iizuka recalled that the only element they agreed on was to avoid using an anime voice actor, favoring a film actor with an "over-the-top" voice. Sonic Team cast Jun'ichi Kanemaru as Sonic. In an interview celebrating his 30th anniversary as a voice actor, Kanemaru said one reason he was cast was because of his ability to speak English. After Sonic Team USA was formed, they hired American actors to translate the Japanese script. The English-language voice cast consists of Ryan Drummond as Sonic, Corey Bringas as Tails, Michael McGaharn as Knuckles, Jennifer Douillard as Amy, Jon St. John as Big and E-102 Gamma, and Deem Bristow as Robotnik. Iizuka used Sonic Adventure to introduce Robotnik's Japanese name, "Dr. Eggman", to western audiences; he accomplished this by having Sonic insult Robotnik when they meet for the first time in-game. Similarly, he avoided referring to Tails as "Miles", which he was commonly called in Japan. One of the biggest challenges the Adventure designers faced was transitioning Sonic 2D style to 3D. Sonic Team split levels into parts to save memory. The team also wanted to add elements unexpected in a platform game; for example, the level in which Tails sandboards was inspired by a group of sandboarders in Ica, Peru. The design took considerable time to finalize and had to be made as simple as possible because the virtual pet's look changes form as it evolves. Adventure was Senoue's first project as sound director and its scope meant he had many more responsibilities, including schedule management, compared to his previous games. Despite this, Senoue said he did not feel much pressure, as he was a Sonic fan and had contributed to previous games' soundtracks.

In contrast to previous Sonic games, which featured electropop soundtracks, the Adventure sound team preferred "hot, funky, and rock 'n' roll" music.

Senoue composed several songs with English lyrics to highlight the various characters' personalities, and collaborated with Tokoi and Kumatani to polish them. It was unveiled by Naka and the rest of Sonic Team on August 22, 1998, Naka described the debut as intense, having "[given his] all" to make it fit for release. The Japanese version shipped with many glitches; according to Iizuka, Sonic Team did not have time to fix them due to the tight schedule. The promotion began on July 15, 1999, and took place at 1,055 Hollywood Video stores across the country.

The localized version was released in North America on September 9, 1999, as a launch game, and in Europe on October 14, 1999. It includes Japanese and English-language audio and Japanese, English, Spanish, French and German subtitles. Online features—including Chao daycare and downloadable content (DLC) such as minigames and new level assets—were also added. The American release of Studio Pierrot's Sonic the Hedgehog (1996) original video animation coincided with the Western release of Sonic Adventure, while DIC Entertainment's Sonic Underground (1999) was commissioned to help promote the game. The localized version was released in Japan as Sonic Adventure International.

Before release, Sega projected to sell a million copies of Sonic Adventure. In Europe, it sold 86,000 copies during its first five days on sale. In the UK, it was the top-selling Dreamcast launch game, and topped the all-formats chart. After the North American release, there were complaints of a number of Sonic Adventure discs failing to load. Sega of America determined that this was a software problem due to errors at one manufacturing facility and tracked the faulty software. Most copies were unaffected, and customers with defective copies could trade for working ones at retailers.

Reception