The Spindash got through Act 63! (Recorded Nov. 10, 2014)

Welcome back to the Spindash, still your audio source for everything blue, rapid, and spiky!

With our illustrious return, so comes a version of the Spindash leaner and more manageable than before, but with one core difference:

You can download the episode as normal above, OR you can listen to our full, uncut livecast below!
PLEASE BE AWARE! The uncut livecast is exactly that, uncut, unedited, and absolutely no post-production. It is the raw Google Hangout recording, with about an hour of episode after-party and IRC interaction. If you want a cleaner, better organized product, go with the MP3 version above.

This week, the crew checks out the first episode of the Sonic Boom cartoon series, and the 3DS demo of Sonic Boom: Shattered Crystal.

To put it mildly, it was an interesting build-up to Sonic Boom’s cartoon launch. Though skepticism and cynicism paved every step of its path, we were pretty darn satisfied with what it released as, a madcap action-sitcom that was more often than not pretty dang funny. I mean, it sure beats Adventures of Sonic the Hedgehog, Sonic X, and Sonic Underground. By a long shot. A looooooooooong shot. I’d add further o’s, but that would just belabor my point: if you like cartoons, which is to say if you like cartoons outside of just Adventure Time or Korra or whatever, then you should give it a chance.

Since this recording on Monday, I’ve put much more time into both the Wii U and 3DS version of Sonic Boom. As is par with Sonic games anymore, the console version is the superior version, yet the two are incredibly different. A word of warning, if you do play Sonic Boom for the Wii U, the game is a slow burn. In hindsight, it feels like no surprise that the game never reviewed well; it definitely does not leave a good first impression: the camera is horrible, the early dialog is incessant, and even I of all people have to complain about the framerate in the first hour of the game. But as I continued to play, completing level after level, I felt more comfortable with the battle system, the platforming was way more interesting. While it never hit Sonic Colors-caliber of design, I found I was having more and more fun.

Sonic Boom 3DS is a much harder sell, especially at $40. The best advice I can give you is to play the demo. Literally everything level gimmick you see in the first level makes up every subsequent level throughout the game, just arranged in more challenging ways. Most “worlds” in the game even has a worm battle and a race. I know that will rub a lot of people the wrong way, but for what the game is, I’m enjoying it. Levels are built with exploration in mind, and the game frequently asks you to link tons of tricks together in quick succession, like homing attacks, enerbeam swinging, and Sonic’s incredibly useful air-dash. (Pro-tip, you can use air-dash twice, up and to the side, to gain lots of distance in the air.)