izigame.me

I, like many people, was dubious at the thought of a remaster of Sonic Generations. My trust in Sega regarding this was also particularly low due to the disappointment that was Sonic Origins a few years back - shoddy remakes with technical issues not present in the original games, all the while delisting said original games from digital storefronts forever, alongside developer mistreatment.
With Sonic X Shadow Generations, Sega seems to have learned their lesson, at least somewhat. First of all, the original Sonic Generations from 2011 is still available for purchase, provided you buy it in a bundle with other older Sonic games. While not the best solution to this, this is still a better compromise than what they did with Sonic 1, 2, CD, as well as 3 & Knuckles.
Second - there is actually something new here for everyone. Sonic Generations, surprisingly enough, received new content in the form of re-animated cutscenes or brand new dubs to fit the series' continuity better. This is the first time I've seen them actually rewrite the story of an older game to make it make more sense within the confines of the series' universe canon. The one thing I do not like about the remaster of Sonic Generations here is the nerf to Classic Sonic's movement. The overpowered spindash from the old version of the game is completely gone, making Classic Sonic feel insanely sluggish to control due to years of muscle memory of the older version. Aside from that, if you wanna know what I think of Sonic Generations itself, read my old review on the original version of the game.
Now, for Shadow Generations...okay, first of all - I find it very weird that they named it "Shadow Generations" to begin with. Shadow has had playable main story appearances in 4 games total - Sonic Adventure 2, Sonic Heroes, Shadow the Hedgehog and Sonic 06. What I really wish they did with the Shadow Generations portion is decouple it entirely from Sonic Generations & release it as its own separate game, with a longer, more detailed and fleshed out story, a few more levels - preferably with more original theming rather than revisiting ones from older games again - and name it "Shadow the Hedgehog 2".
That's just the thing...playing this honest to god felt like a direct sequel to the infamous 2005 game - Shadow the Hedgehog. And you know what? I am so on-board with this idea. I am one of the rare few who actually loves that game, despite its glaring issues with structure, pacing & everything else. And I absolutely adore the ideas they toy around with in the game, be it the new powers for Shadow or fleshing out characters which we vaguely knew about regarding Shadow's past. That whole thing was AWESOME and I genuinely wish they just made it a full blown "Shadow the Hedgehog 2" with it instead.
Granted, I understand why they didn't and felt the need to basically shoehorn it into a remaster of Sonic Generations - marketing. Because Shadow the Hedgehog was critically panned & overall receives mixed-to-negative feedback from the community even in 2024, close to 20 years after its original release, I understand that they don't want to make a sequel to Shadow the Hedgehog, at least not yet.
What I'm hoping for is that Sonic X Shadow Generations is just the testing ground to see how receptive people are to the idea of Shadow starring in his own games again, and my honest opinion? Hell yeah! I've already mentioned that I love the original Shadow the Hedgehog. I love the Shadow Generations portion of this game so much, just wish there was more of it. And I want to see more dedicated Shadow the Hedgehog games in the future.
The game itself is rather short. I completed Shadow Generations in around 3.5 hours - not much longer than Sonic Generations itself. Controls' wise I found it to be pretty much perfect. Aside from the final stage where it's centered around a new ability Shadow gets, everywhere else I found him controlling pretty much perfect. Did not encounter any bugs or anything of the sort in my time playing either. The length of the game though...again - really wish they made it its own separate game & had time to flesh it out, it's so good otherwise!
From a technical standpoint, I ran this game start to finish on my Linux machine and it ran beautifully. Steam Deck & Linux people, you're in for a great OOTB experience with this one!
Overall, yeah I do recommend Sonic X Shadow Generations. For both people who have never played Sonic Generations, and those who know it front to back. There are enough neat additions in Sonic Generations that will make you go "I wonder what else they changed", as well as a very enjoyable Shadow adventure to go through, albeit both games are rather short.
I can't wait to see what the modding scene for this will look like.