Sonic has undergone variant change after variant change as long as we can remember. Sometimes, Sonic would be a cute looking mascot and other times he was a knight with a giant sword. He even was a werewolf long ago as well in Sonic: Unleased! In Sonic Colors: Ultimate, Sonic has returned to 2000s form where he looks cool but more adult orientated than his '90s original look.

All jokes aside, Sonic Colors: Ultimate is a nice looking title that maybe isn’t pushing any of the consoles to their hardware limits but still has a modern day sheen that can’t be missed. Stages are colorful and well designed, and watching Sonic plow through levels at lightning speeds has never looked better. Unfortunately, Sonic Colors: Ultimate does falter in one area, and that is the cutscenes.

While the base game of Sonic Colors: Ultimate has gotten a new coat of paint, the cutscenes clearly were just ripped out of the original 2010 game. Most cutscenes look dull and rough, which can ruin the transition from a great run in one of the several main stages. Thankfully, these issues never detract from the main game and only show that SEGA was a bit lazy with this enhanced version.

Sonic Colors: Ultimate brings back the one element that many of the modern Sonic games lacked: speed, and plenty of it. Sonic often flies through stages with an almost abandonment to being weary of free falls and deadly space cruisers looming underneath him. Running through stages has never felt better, and thanks to the new Wisps—which give Sonic various abilities like laser movement and drilling powers—levels have a multitude of routes to take to nail those high scores!

Where Sonic Colors: Ultimate misses the mark is the platforming, which can ruin the speed. Likewise, most of the platforming is a bit slippery—Sonic tends to slide across platforms a bit too easily. With a bit of practice, you can overcome the platforming without too much of a headache. Overall, Sonic Colors: Ultimate is one of the better Sonic experiences in terms of speed and gameplay, and we pray the Wisp system returns in newer titles!

Sonic has come back to great form, but the goofy story—that even will make a child cringe—also returns. In this newest title, Sonic has gone to an amusement park in space run by his arch-enemy Dr. Eggman, but this fun land is actually a front. What a surprise, for a nefarious plot to rule the world. Sonic Colors: Ultimate’s story is really corny. It works, but don’t expect to get hooked to this space-themed tale.

One element that does ruin the experience of Sonic Colors: Ultimate is in the form of the technical concepts within this enhanced port. We noticed several bugs, like losing rings by touching the end goal with no enemies around, or weird glitches in maps. Add to this, loading times can be anywhere from 10 seconds to almost 30, and that shouldn’t be seen in any 2021 game made by a big publisher like SEGA. Sonic Colors: Ultimate clearly needs some updates to smooth out these problems but, out of the box, Sonic Colors: Ultimate is a bit weak on the technical front.