Sonic Lost World

A shocking learning curve for a Sonic game. The extra buttons and combos do allow for lots of new moves, but Sonic feels more like a truck than ever. Lots of struggle points with wallrunning, several bossfights require you to know how to attack without being told, and the 3D areas still feel 2D with the lack of camera controls.

Lost World pulls a lot from Super Mario Galaxy, without understand what made that game good and bad. And it still doesn't understand what makes Sonic good and bad. Sonic Forces did overcorrect on explaining game mechanics and simplifying gameplay, while Lost World pushed me to look up speedrun tricks and gameplay guides to figure out how to progress some places consistently. I'm glad to have conquered it, but I can't recommend it.

Loved this game when I was younger, but I couldn't even convince myself to get past world 2 this time. Despite Sonic being slower overall to make platforming easier, the air control still felt too slippery somehow, with very weak turns and the bounce being the only real way to correct your jumps. The wall run and wall climb both feel clunky and unresponsive, with the wall run being made worse by the way some levels are laid out. For example, trying to get to the 4th red ring on 1-2 was made more difficult by the fact that the world doesn't rotate while sonic is in the air, making jumping to one of the walls to start a wall run literally impossible, making Sonic just slip off like he didn't even make contact with the wall. I was even able to make the wall almost completely horizontal to try to just walk on it and Sonic just floated along until he fell off the ledge.
The wall climb was more or less fine, with my only complaint being how picky Sonic is with when he wants to start running up the wall. The only boss I was able to convince myself to play was the first one in 1-4, and I didn't even realize that the fight at the end of the stage was even supposed to be a boss.

ts buns man they gave sonic, the momentum game meant for hardly and max speed, a fucking RUN BUTTON like gngygng are we deaduzz? And a DOUBLE JUMP? This is sonic, not mario galaxy. Its NOT a coincidince this is segas one and only Nintendo only game (besides steam obv but nintendo messed with that a bunch and shi) so yeah its js a mario rippoff with a generic control scheme losing all sonics originality. Also, the plot sucks. Its ligit js "Dr Eggmans stealing more animals, and got a bunch of koopalings, and sonics in a new world. (also like the world sonics from is getting like eaten idk i couldnt bring myself to care enough). so yeah worse then all the bad of 06 and Forces combined.

Same as the Wii U version with a few visual differences and of course the Nintendo levels removed in favor of a NiGHTS themed one. The Nintendo levels can be modded back in should you so desire, and they are very faithful recreations at that. Overall I still stand by Sonic Lost World being a fun unique take on Sonic reminiscent of what Sonic Xtreme on the Saturn might have been, though I think the 3DS version was better for its fleshed out ranking system and Chaos Emeralds being obtained through special stages rather than getting all Red Star Rings. 7/10

I enjoy it, but if someone were to ask me what sonic games they should be trying out in the franchise, then no. I wouldn't recommend this game. if someone wants to get into the series, chances are, its because the sonic games are heavily about going fast, and this game is incredibly crap at that in comparison to others.

also tails and sonic are just really bloody obnoxious in this game. egg man ended up being the most likeable character.

This game is good in terms of gameplay and music, but it has two problems. In this game, Sonic is much slower than in other games. Another problem is controlling Sonic, which is a bit difficult and takes time to learn. But despite the problems, it is still a good game and I recommend buying this game when it is on sale.

Lots of people throw shame on this game for being a mario galaxy game and not going fast enough.
But thos same people also enjoy playing mario galaxy soooo
That means it is a great game!!!!!!!

The game is fine at best. It plays closer to a Mario game than it does a Sonic game - which is not necessarily a bad thing. Unfortunately, the controls are clunky... Sonic moves slowly (Seriously, you have to hold down a button to make Sonic run fast now?), and the story is just not there. On a positive note, the visuals, voice acting, and soundtrack are nice. The game is just more stylized in a way that isn't definitively "Sonic." You can tell that this was a Wii U exclusive and aimed towards a Wii U audience. I would recommend this game only for those who are just curious about the game, it has its fun moments, but its nothing special. Check it out when it's on sale, but don't bother buying it at full price.

This has to be the most whatever Sonic game. It's not really that bad or interesting and it's certainly not very good. It's biggest claim to fame is underutilized gameplay mechanics in favor of shit gimmicks and wanting to be Mario so bad.

Like all these levels are just generic Mario themes and the bad guys might as well be the koopa kids and bowser since they have about as little personality.

Its just a game it's literally the game of all time. Who care too bad so sad they didn't even put a level from this game in shadow gens even though the following mainline games got stages and that's because this shit is a mildly unpleasant dream that you'll forget in 2 seconds.

In concept, this game does not seem like a bad idea.

However, the controls are so confusing and janky it ruins the game. the boss fights (or at least the ones i got through) were so boring id rather watch paint dry.
the story is cheesy which is expected.
some pros would be the look of the game. i think it doesnt look half bad and i like the aesthetic.
if the gameplay wasnt so slow and janky, this would be worth it. its not god awful, its just not great

The largest issue with this game is that it is trying to be a mid tier Mario game.

Holding down R2/RT to actually move is infuriating in a Sonic game. Half the point is moving fast and trying to survive a level. Instead you get a Sonic ripoff of Mario Galaxy that cannot surpass its inspiration. I wish I liked this game. There are some fun parts with how the spin dash works for getting S rank on levels, but it is infuriating to try for some of those S ranks on various levels.

I like the base idea of a Mario Galaxy Sonic game, but they failed to deliver. Too much Mario not enough Sonic.

Honestly, this may be the most overhated and disregarded Sonic game. It is simply, mid, not terrible. It has enough problems for it to be bad to recommend to most people, but it definitely has some value and I quite enjoy it.

This game was doomed to not impress from the start. It was made to be a Wii-U exclusive so it both had to be targeted for a non-Sonic audience and also a generally younger more casual one. This doesn't feel like, play like or is designed like a standard Sonic game. The levels are quite simple and straightforward, they have more automation than usual and they try to bring a lot of different gimmicks into the levels that completely change the gameplay, often in bad ways. It's mostly a fine yet weird game, but during the last say 5 levels, the challenge and need to use certain mechanics abruptly increases to the point where you'll definitely be suffering.

Besides not being like a normal Sonic game, the biggest issue are the controls. What really turns Sonic fans off with this game is the fact that it has a run button. This means that instead of a variable speed that depends on how long you move, you can only be walking, running or spindashing. What REALLY sucks is that your air control is limited here. You can NOT accelerate when jumping, meaning that if you jump at a low speed, you'll cover very little distance. This has gotten me killed a countless amount of times across the entire game due to missed jumps. Also, when you double jump, you exit out of your ball form which means you can get hit again. You also can't continue a spindash immediately upon hitting the ground after double jumping and it will abruptly change which direction you're going midair which can be pretty useful but takes a while to get a hang of. Lastly, the ice controls kinda stink because if you make Sonic jump, he'll do a twirl where he can't change direction midair or double jump, meaning you are likely to fall off the stage.

One of the focuses of this game is the extensive moveset you have. You can spindash, super-peelout, multi-homing attack several enemies, charge your homing attack, do a homing kick, continuously bounce higher three times, run up walls, run aside walls and- do a weird uncurled roll for some reason. The problem with these moves is that the game seemingly doesn't inform you on how you're supposed to use them or that you even have them. What you may miss is that a question mark appears when the developers wanna teach you a move. It is simply displayed on your hud however and you must click it to see what it says. If you don't see it appear or don't wanna read the tutorial, you'll mostly be fine, but you'll eventually hit a roadblock in the last 5 levels because you don't know what to do.
The parkour mechanics that allow you to run on walls aren't the best despite them being the most advertised feature of the game. You have to hold the run button to do parkour and it activates as soon as you touch a wall. This means that you'll CONSTANTLY be accidentally climbing up walls or even small blocks and stairs because you're going to always be holding the run button down for speed. You'll also probably accidentally jump off a wall sometimes or won't position yourself on the wall correctly to collect something or reach a ledge. This combined with the controls makes this game janky, but just like the adventure titles, it can be overcame.

This game I can certifiably say has the worst story and character writing in the entire franchise. The premise is that Sonic and Tails chase Eggman to the Lost Hex, a mysterious flying series of hexagons. Besides from Tails saying in the first cutscene that the Lost Hex is- the Lost Hex, you learn absolutely nothing about it. Also, the fact that it's made of hexagons has no application in the game besides the level select making you traverse on them. They decided to throw the wisps into this game too despite them leaving the planet after Sonic Colors, so it makes no sense what they're doing here. Sonic is mostly his normal self and besides from the occasional unfunny joke, he is likable. He does admittedly disregard Tails a bit, treating him like a defenseless kid which is frustrating. Tails himself for some reason acts WILDLY out of character in this game. He gets extremely jealous and angry, upset that Sonic made a mistake and works with Eggman to save the day.
Now, the Zeti... Least likable characters in the franchise honestly. They have very unappealing designs, a lack of lore or power establishment and wayyy past too-far generically exaggerated character tropes. Heck, their names aren't memorable and are rarely ever spoken ( According to another review, one of their names isn't even said once!!! ). It especially irks me that they talk an EXTREME amount of smack to you throughout the entire game despite you being able to TWO-SHOT them in almost EVERY bossfight. They're pathetic!

The visuals and environments of this game are hated for being so generic, Mario-esque. You got Green Hill number 497, desert ruins, fruity beach, ice casino/factory, jungle ruins, sky level and volcano base. There is only a small amount of creativity presented here. In each zone ( Or actually world I guess ), there are 4 acts ( Or actually zones I guess ). Some acts in this game have no connection to what zone they're in and some of them CLEARLY should be part of another zone ( For example, there's an ice cave level in the jungle zone instead of the ice zone ). Also, the sky zone just reuses assets from the Green Hill, desert and jungle zones which is lame.

People say that this soundtrack is generic, and while that is mostly true, it's only true because the composers had a lack of unique zones to base the music on and so had to make it work with the basic themes. The music overall is really good and there are still a few unique tracks here that sound amazing. It's honestly one of my top Sonic soundtracks, though I'd say it does decrease in quality for the last few zones.

There were a few bugs and oddities I experienced: Biggest issue is with the rhythm wisp because, on the Wii-U gamepad, you tap to move after hitting all the notes, but you can't do that on this PC port and so have to wait until the wisp runs out or else risk falling to your death. There are some cases where you get stuck after being sent to a location or when a boss falls down onto where you stand. The credits seem likely to crash the game and it's annoying because you have to re-fight the final boss ( It's extremely easy and short so whatever actually ). Sometimes scripted sequences fail to work which can lead to your death. Lastly, Eggman's mic sounds lower quality compared to the other characters which is odd.

Now, to say why I still like this game... I don't know, I just enjoy a lot of the early levels and a few of the later game ones enough to enjoy replaying them and getting better at them. Once you get used to the mechanics and controls of the game, it is actually pretty fun to play. If you do get it, I encourage that you try to collect all the red rings, though only after beating it because you'll then be experienced with the game. I also quite liked time attacking the levels, though only up until the gimmicks and several enemy battling sections started to get annoying later on. A lot of my enjoyment also probably came from singing along to the music to be honest. If you get good enough to overcome the jank and just want to spend time mastering some levels, you can certainly have some fun with this very, very weird platformer.

Most Sonic fans will not have fun with this game, and because the unique Sonic-style isn't here and the story is terrible, I see no reason for one to check this game out unless they're extremely curious. Only get this game yourself if you're willing to get through a lot of jank, a very unappealing story and some suffering at the end. Also, get it on sale for under 8 dollars too as it gets discounted fairly often.

Oh dear lord, avoid this game. How this got a PC port before Colors amazes me. How this got a PC port while Unleashed is locked to seventh generation machines is just... downright sickening.

Most underrated sonic game of all time. Doesn't deserves the hate it gets.

i hope sonic the hedgehog 4 has my favorite sonic characters, the deadly 6

While not having a good story and movesets being clunky Sonic Lost Worlds is fun time but going to 100% on this game is painful and grindy don't do like me.

I can not give this game a positive rating.
Sonic lost world is just that, lost.

I do like a few things about it, but most of the game will probably annoy every new player more than it is fun.
Here's why:

First of all, there is basically no tutorial on how to control Sonic in this game and it changes a lot in how he controls compared to other games.
If you're already lost on how to control Sonic correctly as a veteran, a new player will be much more lost trying to get him to do what they want.
I had to read like 2 pages of tutorial online to understand how to actually use Sonics movement in this game. It's needlessly complicated. I very much prefer the boost gameplay or simple classic 2d Sonic controls.

If you want to keep your speed in this game, you can not doublejump. Use the spindash and keep it pressed and only ever jump once. Thats the most fun way to move around, but the game doesn't tell you that.

The stages themselves are fine, just some places are impossible to reach, without reading up on the controls first.
The bosses are sometimes confusing, but once you know what the game wants from you, they're pretty easy.
Generally, most of this games difficulty simply comes from not knowing what to do or how to do it.

Also, some things are broken in this version. There is a Wisp with musicnotes for example that worked by tapping the screen in the original version to jump where you want to go. In this version you just gotta tap jump at the right time and always wait for it to expire, because if you don't you'll just randomly fall into the abyss. Makes S ranking a specific mission almost impossible. You need to practically speedrun the entire rest of the stage, to have enough time for that buggy mess of a wisp to barely be able to get an S rank.

The game gives you a lot of "missions" basically challenges, that only require you to do specific things more and more, like collecting rings and stuff. I did them all, but it was nothing hard, only work. You simply play the same levels many many times and grind the missions to get... nothing really. But they're achievements. All the missions are achievements, so if you want every achievement, you gotta go grind. Very lame.

The story of the game is laughable really, they also tried to only make it funny and nothing else. Well I guess it was designed to appeal to kids, but then they make the controls so hard, that no kid would ever be able to complete everything.

Weird game for sure. I had enough fun to finish everything, but I believe most people would want to stay away from this!

super derivative of Mario, but still fun enough to justify buying it on sale

im gonna be honest i got this game not expecting much but this game is unbelievably mid bro

If you're a traditional fan of 3D Sonic, then no, I don't recommend this game, but if you are new to this franchise or want to try something new, then yes, I absolutely recommend it.

just really bad controls

It's a pretty good game near the start, just make sure you collect a bunch of animals as you go along!

The stages do get a little annoying during the end but with enough practise you'll get through them.

half my sanity and childhood has been taken from this game i don't recommend you play it if you do so good luck.

this is the first game i've played where i came out of it feeling nothing. I'm not happy, I didn't have fun, I'm not even mad or disappointed. This is a game alright, a video game.

The most goofiest Sonic game I've ever played imo. Pretty good however!

its a good game but not a good sonic game

Its good Decent game. but it's just more playable and more fun with mods enabled

I feel like this game is very close to being good. There's a lot of times when I play it when I think this is actually a pretty good game. Then, about 10 minutes later I'll encounter something that'll make me think "what the hell were the devs thinking?"

I feel like this is the only sonic game that I know of, where you objectively don't want to go too fast because it'll hamper your game progress. As Sonic famously said "gotta go slow and careful!"

If you do play this game, I would recommend you to focus completely on the story / normal levels. Don't bother picking up red coins or more than 1 ring, it'll just cause you frustration.

I had heard really bad things about sonic lost world but its not even that bad. The only really bad thing is that sonic is so much slower then in other games.

This game caused world hunger, and I can't feed my family because of it. Thank you Sega.

Gameplay is fun most of the time, everything else is pretty awful. Still liked it more than Sonic Colors.

just awful nothing else if i had spent more than 10$ id be fuming

One of the more controversial sonic games, but i had fun! :)

If you’re interested in 3D Sonic games (and titles that are stuck on obscure platforms like Wii U), it might be worth grabbing this during a sale soon because Sega has been delisting a lot of older titles (they killed off numerous Genesis and Dreamcast ports just today on Dec 6th. As a huge fan of Sega’s past, this is sad to see.

This Sonic game seems fine overall, it appears as if they were wanting to make something akin to Mario Galaxy. Some of the levels are like spheres and cylinders and you can run around all sides of the small structures. Kind of unique and different for a 3D Sonic game.

i liked how it ran well considering its a wii u exclusive game

Sonic Lost World is truly one of the Sonic games of all time. The best part of the game is when Sonic said "It's sonic time," and then sonic'd all over the generic villain group.

Bad like really bad, I could tell this game was gonna be horrible in the first ten minutes it's so bad.

It's good game, but it's not a good sonic game.

The game's graphics are really blurry.

Eh, I hate the story but the gameplay is underrated!

This game revived my nicotine addiction.

It sucks, the levels are frustrating or otherwise bland and uninspiring.

The art design? Somehow safer than Forces. The writing? It got a few chuckles out of me at times but none of the characters feel like themselves, even Generations, which didn't really have a story, wrote the characters better than this garbage.

If you know of this game, I assume you've heard it takes many cues from Mario Galaxy, this is true. However, the cues it DOES take are here in name only, sure you have tubular level design, riffing off of Mario Galaxy's spherical level design, but it does NOTHING with this gimmick. It feels like an excuse to consolidate otherwise boring flat level design into multiple levels of a singular plane.

The music is pretty good, not AS good as Gens, Unleashed or the Adventure games, but there's some memorable tunes in there. If you're really curious about this game, look at a playthrough on YouTube or listen to the soundtrack on Spotify (I can only recommend the latter.)

The PC version is alright for mod support and on sale, since you can play through the Zelda and Yoshi levels. Whilst I'd say these are the best levels in the game solely on the basis of originality in regard to level design and mechanics, they still don't hold a candle to anything in Generations. It's more of a "WOAHHH they did THIS mechanic from game I know!!" rather than anything interesting or additive.

My recommendation: unless you're playing every 3D Sonic game because you're a masochist or morbid curiosity got the better of you (like my poor soul) stay far, FAR away.

The closest we have to Super Mario Galaxy 3

W game, VERY underrated

I'm going to say this is a Yes with an Asterisk.

It has makings to be a really fun, really imaginative sonic game! The art style is so colorful, magical and feels so fitting to sonic. Each world has unique looks and a feeling to them. And the music is so much fun! There's plenty of fun music that fits each level well.

Sonic Lost World has makings to be a really awesome sonic game! But I think it falls flat in it's presentation and gameplay.

The evil rainbow of monster dudes just really exist. They exist, do nothing but exist.
Eggman exists too. Doing eggman things so no complaints there.

The story it tries to tell honestly feels just disjointed and doesn't work well for what the game wants to be. Especially with the game looking like Mario Galaxy in terms of level design. That's where I think the game truly shines, but also falls apart.

It looks cool, feels imaginative and is fun to navigate. But in many occasions honestly it feels like it's just "Mario but faster". It's not inherently bad mind you, but it felt like i'm playing a mario game with a sonic skin on top of it. Espeiclaly in the 2D sections.

The controls though need some work, like it doesn't feel as good as it should. And the game doesn't explain some of the imputs properly for gameplay. There's a dedicated run button, and a homing kick the game just never tells you! It's hard to put into words for me, but the game doesn't feel as good as it could.

Honetly I truly think the game shines when it's going fast. Like a sonic game does! There's a few fast stages where you have to think fast and move quickly to keep momentum up with quick turns, long straightaways, jumping and running. During those? It feels just pure awesome!
But those are few and far in between.


I don't know, I want to like this game. It has it's moment espeically when it's fast and focused. But those are few and far inbetween so honestly I don't know. Get it cheap and enjoy what you can!

This game is alright.
Sonic's control is pretty good aside from his weird momentum jump where his second jump doesn't carry it. And the parkour and the return of the Spindash is also pretty fun mainly when going through the fully 3D levels. This game is also very polish & I didn't really go through many glitches/bugs when playing.

The negative comes from the fact that the level design & of course the story are pretty bad.
The level design is very tube like similar to Galaxy & doesn't take full advantage of Sonic's parkour/spindash
Too many 2D sections.
The artistic direction is WAY too cartoonish even when compared to Classic Era Sonic games.
Only a handful of levels are fun to speed through & they are mainly the 3D ones.
This is arguably Roger's worst performance as Sonic as not only is most of the dialogue pretty bad but it sounds like he is straining his voice with how high he is making his voice. Though playing in Japanese definitely helps here.


I would ONLY recommend purchasing it if it is on sale & just to own this game since the Wii U version is pretty much dead. And who knows when SEGA will plan to delist this game.

Better spending your money on Mania, Generations/Sonic x Shadow Gens, either Adventure games, & maybe even Frontiers too.

even though this game is definitely lacking in some areas, what i think SLW got right that forces didn't was the mobility
sonic felt slippery and smooth, and at times, i was having fun
is it bad in some places? yeah
but this game was one of my favorite wii u games, so yeah

how is this game even in the franchise i know its the first Prequel To Sonic Forces with Zavok & the story line in this is great but the mechanics are Annoying like every single time you tried to dodge or jump the game will say that you didn't dodge or jump or use the power ups as will & please do not remake this before you fix the mechanics in this one sega i know this game is old but if a remake happens on this game just please fix the mechanics after you remake sonic 2006 & i don't understand the lore on this because i thought this game will tell how sonic Turned into Metal but it was tails that was metal tails but he didn't destroy sonic like he did in secret histories & other story lines but not in prime because sonic's ah friendship love for him is wild

See, I always want to start with positives with any game I play, but for Sonic Lost World, there's genuinely only one good thing that isn't *immediately* undercut by something bad, and it's the music. But Sonic Lost World is almost painfully mediocre. The story is standard Sonic stuff, and none of the twists pan out to anything interesting. The Deadly Six are frankly all forgettable (I genuinely forgot about one of them entirely) except for Zavok, and that's only because he's shown up in other Sonic games for some fucking reason.
I would say that a Sonic game with Super Mario Galaxy like gravity would be interesting... if the level design wasn't actually terrible. Every level is a long twisting cylinder, and it's just boring. The one level that does something remotely interesting with this is Honeycomb Highway, and that's an auto-runner. Ironic that that would be my favorite.
The aesthetic would be cool, but honestly it's hard to really notice.
I'd still give it a 5/10 for trying, but I don't personally like it.

It's definitely a unique Sonic game.

oh boy this game is an absolute classic yes indeed! it reminds me of my wife because she brings me beer while i play!