BioWare spills first Sonic RPG details

By Robert Purchese Published 14 January, 2008

Stylus controlled, watercolour visuals.

BioWare has released the first details of its Sonic role-playing game for DS.

As part of a seven-page spread in US magazine Nintendo Power, the title has been confirmed as Sonic Chronicles: The Dark Brotherhood.

According to the article (as reported by NeoGaf forum users) you will be able to control a party of four, picked from a squad of 11 in total. Confirmed so far are Sonic, Tails, Amy, Knuckles, Rouge, Shadow and Big The Cat. Certain sections will allow you to split your group up.

Each character has their own particular strengths; Tails can float over obstacles, for example. All are customisable as you level up, too.

Battles will be turn-based and non-random, thankfully, plus you will be able to stack team and special attacks to speed things up a little.

BioWare has gone for a completely stylus-driven control system, a la Phantom Hourglass, and an impressive hand-drawn watercolour-style presentation. There are some scanned shots over on Jeux France if you want to take a peek.

The storyline will revolve around the kidnapping of Knuckles two years after Sonic defeated Eggman. BioWare wants to make him a more credible baddie apparently, but he won't be the main villain.

The action will initially take place on familiar sunny ground, but progress later to a much darker world. Oh, and it has cutscenes.

SEGA and BioWare announced the project last summer, suggesting it'll be out some time this year.

Picture of Robert.

About Robert Purchese

Bertie is Eurogamer's Senior Staff Writer. When he's not hunting down news stories he's often found playing with his kids or gabbling about fantasy games and strange online worlds.

Read more articles from Robert by visiting the Robert Purchese archive page.

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Comments (32) Latest comment 4 years ago

Comments threads automatically close after 30 days, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • riz23 #1 4 years ago

    But I want to be a Dr.Robotnik/Eggman type and smash all the furry scum. Smash them! Bwahahha!

  • dirigiblebill #2 4 years ago

    Continued WTF.

    Plus- Big the Cat? Rouge? Why, Bioware, why? Can't we just pretend everything post Sonic and Knuckles never happened?

  • barnard666 #3 4 years ago

    it looks great.

  • Azazel #4 4 years ago

    Sonic, Tails, Who?, Knuckles, Who?, Who? and Who?

  • rhinoxious #5 4 years ago

    I know the extra characters added little, if anything, to the more recent sonic platform games, but I do think that they are visually strong character designs that fit in well with sonic's graphical style.

    They just need a good developer to give tham some depth and a reason to exist in the gameplay

  • HyperShadow #6 4 years ago

    Could be a good turn for the franchise after the stale reception the games got during their 3-d updates.

    It certainly looks good from those screenies.

  • prolific8 #7 4 years ago

    It's not KotoR 3, so I don't know why anyone would care.

  • marilena #8 4 years ago

    It looks rather good, I have to say.

  • The_Aardvark #9 4 years ago

    Want want want!

  • dirigiblebill #10 4 years ago

    It does look rather lovely, doesn't it? Hopefully this will be Sonic's Thousand Year Door.

  • JonFE #11 4 years ago

    What about Blaze? She was quite a catch in Sonic Rush :)

  • Slamhound #12 4 years ago

    It looks rather good, I have to say.

    It does. It really does. They could've gone the route of making it full-3D and looking like ass, but...

    I've actually got some faith in that this'll turn out good. I really do.

  • viper_h #13 4 years ago

    They spelled Rogue wrong in the article.

    Oh wait, too used to WoW :D

  • NthSimulachum #14 4 years ago

    Maybe there'll be lots of conversations like Mass Effect, though hopefully not.

    Sonic: Tails, tell me about your culture

    Tails: Foxes are generally stable animals, which have played a great role in the Woodland Council, but still have not been afforded recognition as such. We were instrumental in the establishment of a unified Woodland currency, but due to our short statue, ginger-headedness, and scavenger-like ways, we have been ostracized and shot. Fox governments tend to be anarchic, whilst our understanding of survivalist economics tends to dominate all our conversations. Conversations which tend not to be characterised simply by demands for information, then long monologues, as in this game.

    Sonic: Oh, fuck you. We sold 1.5 million in 2 weeks.

  • growleroo #15 4 years ago

    Given Bioware's pedigree I'm expecting to be faced with troubling moral dilemmas, a bildungsroman set against a world scourged by war, and a variety of villains each more nefarious than the last. And the chance to become the most powerful spiky-blue-hedgehog-thing in the galaxy!

    Seriously, the idea of Bioware making a Sonic RPG is nearly as odd to me as the idea of putting Darth Vader in Soul Calibur 4. When franchises collide! Sort of.

  • Lexx87 #16 4 years ago

    prolifc 8...shutup

  • Andytails #17 4 years ago

    Do want. They should do themselves a favour and bring back a classic character like Fang instead of this Shadow/Big/Cream stuff though. Heres hoping its good.

  • Muddtallica #18 4 years ago

    This looks rather good, actually, but the presence of Big the Cat means no sale for me. I still have flashbacks to the sheer horror of the "fishing" "gameplay" in Sonic Adventure...the big purple tard.

  • The_Inquisitor #19 4 years ago

    The only way this could get any worse is if they had voice acting in the game (please don't let the characters have voices). If this game doesn't end up being another down point in the Sonic series, I will be surprised. I say this despite having respect for Bioware, they have a challenge in front of them, I hope they pull it off.

  • mikew1985 #20 4 years ago

    @ NthSimulachum

    hahaha!

  • prolific8 #21 4 years ago

    @Lexx87

    I presume you're talking to me, though it's common courtesy to at least correctly spell the name of the person you're talking to.

    Secondly, no. BioWare did well with Mass Effect, now they need to make KotoR 3 before bad things happen to them.

  • Tomo #22 4 years ago

    Wow. Now that does look good. Nice.

  • darc #23 4 years ago

    "Sounds difficult to have a storyline set in the Sonic world that can span for a whole RPG"

    Well, it doesn't have to be a story that makes tons of sense, nor one that's especially compelling by traditional RPG measures. Considering Paper Mario: Thousand Year Door worked so well, no reason this can't. I haven't seen the screen shots yet, but the overall description of the game sounds very interesting.

  • Muddtallica #24 4 years ago

    Crofto - I never have understood the bizarre stigma some people have about playing a handheld at home. Who ever said they're only supposed to be "travel consoles", anyway? I do appreciate that I CAN play my DS on a plane or train, but 90% my playtime on it has been sat at home, and I've never felt the slightest bit weird about it. How is it any different from playing a game on a home console? I don't get it... :S

  • Guv #25 4 years ago

    huh... it sounds really strange when you just read about it but looking back so did paper mario, and I love that game (not so much the Wii one though)

  • Nikanoru #26 4 years ago

    It sounds like an interesting game, but once again it's on a damn DS! The amount of games I want to play on that little device is unreal, but I can't justify buying a handheld for home-use only (as I'll never use it "on-the-move";).


    I don't like handhelds much, never have, but the DS is different. It does things that just aren't possible on a regular home console, and that's what made the purchase justifiable for me, even for home use. Play Phantom Hourglass, or Canvas Curse, or any number of other games that utilize its features to their maximum potential, and you'll understand. ;)

  • darc #27 4 years ago

    "so did paper mario, and I love that game (not so much the Wii one though)"

    We're on the same page (LOL) there. Super Paper Mario was a yawner.

  • Muddtallica #28 4 years ago

    It was a shame about Super Paper Mario. It had a lovely concept, and typically imaginative writing and plotting (who'll ever forget the giant geek chameleon and his bizarre dating-sim version of reality?), but it was hamstrung by the decision to make it a platformer-RPG rather than the standard RPG-platformer. The gameplay and physics engine, a means to an end in the other Paper Marios that merely paid aesthetic lipservice to the platform genre, buckled under the pressure of having a whole game designed around them, ditto the level design. As such, playing the platform levels of Super Paper Mario was akin to eating a pot of jam on its own; it seems a nice idea, but you soon realise that you need the bread and butter, which has always been and should always be the turn-based battle system. Hopefully we'll get a more traditional Paper Mario sequel soon.

  • NewbieZilla #29 4 years ago

    @ NthSimulachum

    Priceless :D

  • Pulsar_t #30 4 years ago

    It sounds like an interesting game, but once again it's on a damn DS! The amount of games I want to play on that little device is unreal, but I can't justify buying a handheld for home-use only (as I'll never use it "on-the-move";).

    There are always emulators you know :p

  • AHiFi #31 4 years ago

    Nth - Just imagining the voiceover to that convo! =D

  • Laurenza #32 4 years ago

    I've been wanting a Sonic RPG for years because it's a merger of two of my favourite things. I've never played any BioWare games so I don't have any particular bias for or against them, but I've heard good things about them as a developer. Looking at these screens, I must say the scenery art is absolutely gorgeous. The character models look a bit rough, though, so let's hope they improve. Whilst I agree with people to some degree that they should bring back older characters and stop making new ones, in the interview in the mag did say that BW were going to flesh out the characters, Big especially.