Sonic and the Black Knight

Sonic and the Black Knight is criminally underrated in my eyes. I actually don't dislike this game and while it isn't perfect by any means, It's definitely better than Secret Rings.

Sonic and the Secret Rings was a disaster on almost every front. The gameplay was a broken, unfair mess. The music was irritating, and the progression and pacing were horrendous. However, I commended the game's unique setting with the Arabian Nights and the idea of putting Sonic in popular stories. Sonic and the Black Knight is basically what I wanted Secret Rings to be.

The second and last game in the short-lived Sonic spin-off series known as the Storybook Series, Sonic and the Black Knight tells a very fun story in my eyes. Sonic is teleported to the story of King Arthur and the Knights of the Roundtable and has to stop King Arthur, who in this game, was consumed by the power of his Sword and turned evil. Sonic, with the help of a wizard named Merlina and his talking sword, Caliburn explores the land of Camelot. The writing in this game isn't as good as it was in Secret Rings. However, the story and setting are so much more interesting to me and I love the banter between Sonic and his sword.

As for gameplay... It's a lot better than Secret Rings but it is still clunky and unfair in many aspects. Sonic will still move only forward but you are able to stop him now. The motion controls are gone and it makes it a bit easier to control him. He does have a sword now which is the main mode of attack which can be done by swinging the Wii Remote. However, it's hard to do the moves you want which end up in a lot of unfair deaths. Sonic will still run around and kill himself like an idiot because the controls (Although better) are still clunky. The level design is the worst part. Again, it's better than Secret Rings, but not fine-tuned enough. This game does have other playable characters which we haven't really seen since Sonic '06. You have Knuckles who in this world is Sir Gawain, Shadow who is Sir Lancelot, and Blaze who is Madam Percival. (All Knights of the Roundtable). They aren't as fun as Sonic (Especially Percival) but I appreciate them being playable.

What I do like, however, is that the game does tell you what levels aren't or are required and it makes the pacing so much better. I also love the music this time. Where I found the music irritating in Secret Rings, I didn't in this one. The soundtrack is great. Knight of the Wind by Crush 40 is one of my favorite main themes in any Sonic game and With Me by All Ends is also one of my favorite final boss songs ever. They don't spam the main theme at you like the first game so all the songs feel great.

This is also the last game in the franchise to have Jason Griffith play Sonic which is a huge shame considering how much he killed the role.

This game also is the last Sonic game with a real emphasis on the story. It's a cool character study of Sonic. The game shows that Sonic doesn't care if what he's doing is morally good or morally evil. All he wants is for people to live their lives freely and if anyone or anything tries to impede that, he will stop them. I love how they portray him in these games and Black Knight is what shows that.

Sonic and the Black Knight isn't by any means perfect. It has pretty lame level design and the controls still aren't perfect. But the story, the moments, the music, and many more make this game good in my eyes. It took the potential of Sonic and the Secret Rings and made it better. It is criminally underrated. Shame it's so short. Literally, beat it in a day. Still had a lot of fun with this game

Sonic is teleported to the lands of King Arthur by the wizard Merlina. Armed with the talking sword Caliburn, he then begins his quest to become a knight and defeat the corrupted King.

The levels are pretty much on rails; you run forward and have minor control over side-to-side movement. If the level has a harsh turn, Sonic will automatically move as long as you keep holding forward. You can attack enemies by pressing A to jump then A in mid-air to charge at them, or swing your remote to slash but the actual movement doesn't matter. You can move backwards but Sonic never turns round which hinders the combat and so overall; you don't have much control.

In each level you are given a different objective and are graded but it's not clear how this grade is assigned. With the points you earn, you can acquire items which can be equipped to get some minor bonuses. Some levels you just need to reach the end, but others will give you a target like “defeat 50 enemies” or “Give 100 coins to the towns people”. Each area has multiple levels but you will see familiar sights because each level is just a longer version of a previous level in that area.

Boss battles occur occasionally against the Knights of the Round table which are played by the usual Sonic crew like Knuckles, Blaze, and Shadow. There are a few frustrating and awkward moments to the game. If you press jump during the mid-air dash, the animation glitches and Sonic suddenly appears on the ground and this can also happen when you attempt to dash slightly too early to when the game expects. This can be frustrating on the occasions where you need to jump a large gap and you suddenly plummet to your death.

There is a level where you are given the objective of avoiding the towns-people, however the game's poor draw distance for characters means they pop up a meter in front of you when the path looked clear.

The boss battles can be frustrating because it seems unclear what your technique should be to defeat them. The second battle with King Arthur is very frustrating. Your sword chips in with advice and when King Arthur charges at you; he tells you that you can repel his attack with your sword. It turns out this is badly timed advice and he should have said it when he attacks you with the red orbs. He also tells you that you must get close to attack him, but no matter how fast you run, he always stays ahead of you. What you really need to do is use your Soul Surge attack which is powered by the red orbs. Once you use this, Sonic will then jump up to attack and you must thrust the remote when the Remote icon appears. Trouble is, the second time you attack him, its impossible to react to these prompts and so is trial and error to learn the pace which you must attack. This boss should have took 2 minutes but took me over 30 mins to defeat him. After this fight, you think the game is over at around 4 hours long, but it turns out there is a twist to the story and the game continues for several more levels.

The cartoon-like cut scenes and the few movie sequences are very impressive but that's about all that is good in this game. Although I didn't enjoy the actual game-play at any point, the fact that it became increasingly frustrating near the end left a very bitter taste and sadly places it with the worst Wii games I've experienced.