10 Divisive Video Game Levels Fans Can't Agree On
5. Any Knuckles Stage - Sonic Adventure
Sonic Adventure, for all of its faults, was bold. It featured six playable characters, all of which had tweaks to the gameplay to make them stand out.
Sonic was the baseline around which other styles were crafted such as Amy Rose being constantly chased through stages by an unstoppable robot and Big the Cat chilling out with a little fishing.
Knuckles the Echidna, Sonic’s on and off friend and rival, spends the game searching for shards of the shattered Master Emerald in what is often described as one of the worst gameplay sections of the game (which is saying a lot considering the aforementioned fishing stages). Exploring small self-contained environments essentially becomes a “hot and cold” minigame of searching for three randomly placed macguffins.
Arguably, it takes away the speed from a game traditionally all about it… but is that a bad thing?
For some Sonic fans, this new gameplay slant is an interesting aside to other characters' more traditional modes that allows them to take a breather. Each stage does at least make use of Knuckles’ abilities to glide, climb and dig. Six characters in your first 3D outing is a big ask and, whilst Sonic Adventure doesn’t excel 100% of the time, Knuckles’ gem hunting is refreshing enough that it returned for the sequel.
Unlike the fishing game, obviously.