{"id":15698,"date":"2016-11-18T00:01:06","date_gmt":"2016-11-18T00:01:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/?p=15698"},"modified":"2016-10-30T01:30:01","modified_gmt":"2016-10-30T01:30:01","slug":"sonic-boom-fire-ice-3ds","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/2016\/11\/18\/sonic-boom-fire-ice-3ds\/","title":{"rendered":"Sonic Boom: Fire & Ice (3DS)"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"SONIC_BOX\"<\/a>Strange fissures have appeared in the Sonic Boom world, and while trying to seal them up, Sonic and Amy discover that the radiation from the fissures has affected their armband communicators, and now allows the team to have fire and ice attacks.\u00a0 Using their new abilities, Sonic and Co. must track down the source of the fissures (most likely Dr. Eggman), and save their world from strange weather anomalies in this 2-D platforming adventure based on the computer animated TV show.<\/p>\n

The 2-D stages are similar to other Sonic games, except here you can switch between Sonic and his friends on the fly by tapping on them from the bottom touch screen.\u00a0 Each character has his or her own special abilities.\u00a0 Sonic can spin dash and do a dash jump that can break certain blocks.\u00a0 Tails can hover and fly if there are air pockets around, and he can also use a laser blaster and can even aim and reflect it on mirrors.\u00a0 Knuckles can punch and burrow into the ground to dig for goodies.\u00a0 Amy uses her hammer to flatten enemies and pound down certain pillars.\u00a0 And Sticks can use her boomerang to hit long distance switches and enemies.\u00a0 All characters have an \u2018enerbeam\u2019 that they can use to swing on certain floating hooks, too.<\/p>\n

By pressing the L or R shoulder buttons, you can switch between fire and ice elements.\u00a0 When you see blocks of water, change to ice to freeze them so you can walk on them.\u00a0 And if you see ice blocks, change to fire to melt them so you can go past.\u00a0 This simple little gimmick keeps the game from becoming nothing but a \u2018hold right and run\u2019 fest.\u00a0 Every so often you\u2019ll battle a boss.\u00a0 You\u2019ll automatically switch to the character needed for these fights, but you must change between fire and ice to attack properly.\u00a0 These bosses take up both screens on the 3DS, and are quite a lot of fun.<\/p>\n

Aside from the main areas, there are mini-games and challenge rooms for you to find.\u00a0 You\u2019ll race as Sonic in a third person view as you nab rings in a half-pipe corridor.\u00a0 Pilot a submarine built by Tails, or play as Tails as he rides a hovercraft in a vertically scrolling shooting stage.\u00a0 You can also find hidden goodies in the main stages, too.\u00a0 You can even view a map on the bottom screen if you feel you must complete the stages 100 percent.<\/p>\n

By collecting these extra doo-dads, you\u2019ll unlock new racers and tracks to use in a racing mini-game that you can play with friends.\u00a0 But the mini-games are super tough and even more annoying, and the rewards aren\u2019t much of a payoff, especially considering I can\u2019t imagine too many people really playing the racing mini-game with others.\u00a0 Luckily most of the mini-game challenges are optional.\u00a0 The only time it isn\u2019t is every so often, Eggman will force Sonic to race his robots, and you can\u2019t progress until you beat them.\u00a0 These stages are passable, but still annoying.<\/p>\n

The only other main problem I had with the game was with the controls.\u00a0 You can only move around with the analog stick, and I wish you could use the D-pad as well.\u00a0 And if Sonic isn\u2019t spin dashing or being sent off from a booster pad, he runs awfully slow here.\u00a0 Plus the ending area is a bit anti-climatic.\u00a0 While I don\u2019t think this is the Sonic game fans wanted (don\u2019t worry folks, Sonic Mania comes out next year and I think it\u2019ll be awesome), it\u2019s certainly a heck of a lot better than previous Sonic Boom titles<\/strong><\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"SONIC_SCREEN\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Kid Factor:<\/strong><\/p>\n

Sonic Boom: Fire & Ice is rated E for Everyone with an ESRB descriptor of Mild Cartoon Violence.\u00a0 All you do is jump on robotic enemies, and if you get hit, you just fall down.\u00a0 You get unlimited lives, too, so it\u2019s not too frustrating.\u00a0 Reading skill is helpful for some of the text, and younger gamers might need help with some of the tougher areas.\u00a0 But kids love Sonic so they\u2019ll probably like this game anyway.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Strange fissures have appeared in the Sonic Boom world, and while trying to seal them up, Sonic and Amy discover that the radiation from the fissures has affected their armband communicators, and now allows the team to have fire and ice attacks.\u00a0 Using their new abilities, Sonic and Co. must track down the source of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":15685,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15698","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-game-reviews","category-television"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15698","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15698"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15698\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15729,"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15698\/revisions\/15729"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15685"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15698"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15698"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15698"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}