Everyone loves Sonic!... Ten years ago. Lately it’s been pretty rough if you’re a Sonic fan (if there’s any of you left out there). Back in the day, plenty of ten year olds fought over the superiority of Mario and Sonic the same way 50’s kids used to argue if Superman or The Flash was faster. Mario has ruled the past ten years with no contest considering the huge slump Sonic’s been in. Sonic Generations is attempting to win back old fans with an emphasis on 2D gameplay and classic stages with a graphical upgrade.

Early in the game, Capt. Smoke Monster (or whatever he’s called) flies into our world via a space vacuum and trolls Sonic’s life. He grabs the slightly pudgier Sonic from the 90’s and throws him into present day with 3D Sonic and his entourage of backward characters. I understand the narrative in a Platformer isn’t exactly key to its quality, but Sonic always had a few cool characters you wish someone would take advantage of. Unfortunately, it’s not happening in this outing.

Every level has two acts. The first act is played exclusively in 2D with Classic Sonic on stages remade from past titles. The graphics are prettier and add some depth to the former 16-bit environments, but sometimes the new visuals can be distracting. Visual pizazz confused me for a workable platform a few times, causing me to fall to my death. Still, it’s a great way to revisit some of your favorite stages from 15 years ago.

The second act claims it’s in 3 dimensions, but it’s really kind of a hybrid. The playing field switches back and forth between dimensions to give you a bit of the old and a bit of the new. They are meant to be a reimagining of the old 2D levels if they were done today. Unfortunately, today’s Sonic developers don’t quite have the skills they used to. This causes every second act to be a little bit of a disappointment.

The mechanics are everything in this genre. If it doesn’t feel good to hop around on a ton of enemies while feeling like a total badass, you might as well hang it up. Not everything feels as good as it did in the past. There seems to be a slight lag in every jump and controlling Sonic with the joystick isn’t as tight as it could be. When playing a game about speed and timing, these are a few small inconveniences that turn into huge problems during gameplay. It just aint what it used to be.

All the original content in the game is very underwhelming. Every recycled boss requires the completion of a few drab challenges, and every spruced up classic stage is followed by a modern uninteresting one.

The game only has nine levels and makes for quite a missed opportunity. A couple of the levels are even pulled from some of this generation’s Sonic library, and trust me, no one wants to revisit those. All development could have been geared towards more classic levels and it would have made for a better game. Too much time was wasted on the uninteresting story, boring challenges, and 3D stages. With downloadable stages, this might turn out to be a pretty way to enjoy sonic in 2D again, but as is, it’s not a whole lot of content and it’s not all peaches.

I hate the concept of drowning. It's terrible. It's awful. It's a morbid demise. My teeth clench, skin slithers, and every moment spent around water as it fills an entire room to the brim are agonizing. My hand shakes. My breath shortens. I can feel my lungs collapse. Oh how I hate drowning…. Is what the main character must be thinking! (Did you like that?)

Hydrophobia is a game centered on a sinking ship named Titanic, and the protagonists Jack and Rose.... No wait. Oh my goodness, no! The ship's name is Queen of the World, and the protagonists are Kate and Scoot. How silly of me, but oddly enough they hail from the same United Kingdom as the Titanic (coincidence?). The first game for Dark Energy Digital, and available for XBLA, PSN, and PC.

The premise is that the world has gone to Hell, and the ocean has engulfed all known land mass, forcing people to live on boats. The Queen of the World is a city-sized ship refuging thousands of citizens from Mother Nature (score one more for humanity!) so people can continue to toil in their daily lives. At least until terrorist who call themselves the Malthusians attempt to hijack said boat and begin to slaughter everyone. They proclaim: in order to save the world some people must die so others may live, hence their motto, "Save the World, Kill Yourself".

Kate works as an engineer, and Scoot is her boss. One day she receives a call from Scoot saying there is a malfunction on the lower decks. Innocently skipping all the way there, she checks on the situation… and that’s when shit escalates! Malthusians! Lots of them! EXPLOSION! “Scoot! What’s happening?” “I don’t know! I just work here!” EXPLOSION! “Water everywhere? How could this happen?” “Do I look like Miss Cleo?!” “Let it go Scoot! Miss Cleo wasn’t psychic!” Well, something like that. Kate is thrust into a situation where in order to survive she must halt the hijacking. Scoot plays the part of control center and assists Kate via radio. Together they reluctantly uncover the Malthusians’ plot, and attempt to thwart them.

Game play is cover based third person shooter type of deal with a heap of platforming. One weapon is used throughout the campaign with a variety of ammo pick-ups, five in all: sonic, gel, semi auto, energy, and rapid fire rounds- look for them in specially marked cereals!- and a cool compact hacking mechanism called a MAVI that can decrypt encoded systems, or hack far away consoles. The game starts you bare (No, not like that you sickos! Bare as in no weapons, and no MAVI!), and pick-ups are introduced as Kate progresses. The hacking mechanism becomes more elaborate with distorted frequencies, or encryption keys hidden in wall panels only the MAVI can detect, and near the end of the game Kate is trying to hack doors underwater!

Combat is diversified by having Kate fighting underwater, or shooting panels off the walls to surge baddies with water, or shooting combustibles to burn baddies, or shooting electrical systems to fry baddies (would you like your baddie braised, barbequed, or smoked?). The five ammo pick-ups work well, and can even be chained to cause major damage. I ran through the game using only the initial Sonic Rounds, totally missing the point of the four other ammo types, but that’s why developers must hate me so much! I got lost many a time trying to run through a corridor to avoid being drowned, but it would always happen. Then I’d have to sit through Scoot yelling, “NOOOOOOOOOO!” in his terrible voice, and repeat the process.

The acting isn’t all too great (especially Scoot, sorry!), and was pretty short (only three acts with three chapters), and I didn’t experience the “mastery of water” (some magic mumbo jumbo where Kate can manipulate water), and the ending was sad (not as in teary-eyed, but pitiful), the overall game was surprisingly an okay experience. Although the game boasted its Hydroengine superiority of water mechanics, I failed to see what was so awesome about the flowing water, or the ripples it made. It did, however, piss me the hell off every time I broke a panel to flood an area so I could get the achievement to knock three baddies with water, and the water would only lightly dampen the baddies, but would knock my character off her ass instead! (Deep breaths… remember your Karma.) B. Not a C. No, that would dissatisfy all those who worked hard on this title, and are still working to perfect it! So if ya’ll would excuse me… I need to see a therapist, because I have a phobia… of spiders.