Following yesterday’s brief gameplay tease, Sega has released a considerably more substantial seven minutes of Sonic Frontiers gameplay, offering a much clearer look at how the hedgehog’s first foray into open-world platforming will likely play out.
Yesterday’s footage was perhaps most notable for the rather muted art style Sega has opted for this time around, with the game – at least from what we’ve seen so far – placing Sonic in a realistically hewn world that almost feels closer to the sodden, boulder-pocked hillsides of Death Stranding than it does the colour-blasted Sonic backdrops of old.
We get to see a lot more of that expansive landscape in Sega’s newly shared seven minutes of Sonic Frontiers gameplay (thanks IGN), with the bulk of the footage focused on leisurely exploration as Sonic roams around, solving puzzles to unlock new elements in the world.
Some sequences – including various flits across rails suspended in the air and a lengthy clamber up a tower – do showcase a spot of Sonic’s trademark high-speed platforming, but, generally speaking, it’s perhaps rather more sedate than series fans might be expecting. That said, today’s footage arrives as part of a month-long look at Sonic Frontiers on IGN, so there’s plenty more opportunity to see if the hedgehog returns to more familiar gameplay territory.
There’s no release date for Sonic Frontiers just yet, but it’s currently expected to arrive on Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S, PS4, PS5, Switch, and PC later this year.