In all the gaming universe there is one question that haunts each of us day in and day out, with no answer in sight. Much like the ancient riddles of "What is the sound of one hand clapping?" or "If a tree falls in the woods and no one is around to hear it, will the man who gets pinned underneath receive medical attention before he dies?" we all sit and wonder, what happened to Sonic the Hedgehog?

   The once proud Sega mascot who helped the company stand toe-to-toe against the mighty Nintendo empire has fallen on hard times recently, with his last decade or so of existence appearing in a string of subpar games that continually tried to reinvent a franchise gamers had no interest in changing. All we wanted was an anthropomorphic hedgehog that could run real fast. Instead we got a character with 'tude, and an ever-expanding cast of useless supporting characters. Now Sonic Team is trying once more to fix something that was never broken, and wouldn't you know it, the parts of Sonic they restored to his roots are brilliant, while the rest of the game stinks like only a Sonic game can.

Note to Self: When Evil Plan Succeeds, Make Sure to Kill Nemesis

   This latest entry into the Sonic series opens in space as the hedgehog does battle with his sworn enemy, Dr. Robotnik (no, his name isn't Eggman and I will never refer to him as such, stop trying to make me). Just when it seems Sonic is all set to win yet again Robotnik manages to capture our hero along with the Chaos Emeralds in a sort of vice ray and use the power of the gems to blast the planet with a giant laser, breaking it apart and releasing Dark Gaia, a particularly nasty ancient evil.

   In his Kefka-esque moment of conquest Robotnik decides to use the power of Dark Gaia to build what can best be described as the world's worst amusement park, and jettisons Sonic and the now spent Chaos Emeralds back to Earth. Of course, the smart thing here would have been to simply kill Sonic while he was weakened and far away from antibiotics, but apparently the good doctor had a sudden twinge of compassion at just the wrong moment.

   As a side effect of Sonic's proximity to the beam when it was fired, he was imbued with a bit of Dark Gaia's power, and now whenever night falls he transforms into Sonic the Werehog. If you're currently rolling your eyes or sighing heavily then you are doing it right; if you're thinking "Gee, that sounds like a nifty idea!" then you're probably that special kind of boy or girl that likes to drool while they talk, and should seek immediate medical attention.

It's As Different As Day and Night... You See What I Did There?

When the Moon Comes Out, So Does the Crap

   Sadly though, high-speed running and bouncing is only half the game, and the other half consists of sloppy combat and precision platforming stages that will have you sighing with regret every time they rear their ugly head. The nighttime stages feature Sonic in his newfound Werehog form, and that means he's now slower, stronger and a lot less fun. The night stages are mainly generic beat-'em-up levels where you wade into a clearing, mindlessly flail the controller until everything is dead and then move on.

   When you aren't fighting you're being asked to use Sonic's super-stretchy arms to tackle a series of platform challenges so old-school in their difficulty that I had to check and make sure I hadn't turned on my Genesis. Some of these stages are downright infuriating, and the fact that Sega stubbornly clings to a life-based system rather than one focused on checkpoints means that if you struggle enough times and lose all your extra lives then it's all the way back to the very start of the level, sorry about your luck.

   The nighttime levels suffer because they are brainless, boring and far too long. Even though the game is evenly split between day and night stages, Werehog levels can easily stretch to three times as long as a daytime event, meaning that you have to spend a whole lot of time playing this awful new gimmick. Also, while there is a power-up system ala God of War or Devil May Cry, it's pretty worthless as almost all the enemies can be defeated by simply swinging the controllers around until you make contact. Sure, you can try to string together combos, but why dance around and pepper an opponent with jabs when he's leaving himself wide open for the haymaker from the get go? I promise that will be the last boxing analogy I make, because no one cares about that sport anymore, sort of the way no one is going to care about Sonic the Werehog.

Nope, Sonic Still Isn't Fixed Yet, but We're Getting There

   In a lot of ways, Sonic Unleashed is a big leap forward for the franchise, and when the game is humming, it's a lot of fun. Each continent Sonic travels to features its own locally themed levels, and the stage design and music really creates a sensation that you are actually racing through the Mediterranean, China, Africa and so forth. Also, the visuals are top notch, particularly for a Wii game, which made me do the old cartoon trick where I take out my eyeballs, rub them off and then replace them while blinking in an exaggerated fashion.

   The big area where the game stumbles is that the Werehog concept is just a total wash. I understand why Sega had to do something to lengthen the game, as the daytime stages by themselves probably constitute less than an hour of actual gameplay, but there has to be a better way to stretch the experience than this. Still, maybe Sega is getting a little closer to understanding what the rest of us have known all along: what we really want in a Sonic game is pure, unbridled speed. Now that we've had a taste of the good life, let's hope that Sega puts a silver bullet right in the Werehog's brain and gives us the true Sonic experience next time around. For now, this game is a solid rental, but you need to be a real superfan before you go ahead and buy.

       ... Brad