Sonic's decline into a miserable territory since after Sonic Adventure 2 is, simply put, pathetic. Those who were fans were ready to convert into the 3D gameplay since then but along came Sonic Heroes.

And Shadow the Hedgehog. And Sonic 2006. And Sonic Unleashed. And the Wii games. Failure all around. It's become so bad that an amusing image was made to reveal the truth about the time a new Sonic game is announced all the way until release, known as the Sonic Cycle (conveniently attached to this article).

And at the beginning of this year came word as to the reason why: Sonic Team is now a sweatshop for Sonic games. Don't believe it? Read this.

So what's a fan to do? Give in to the ridiculous fanbase that adores every new useless "friend" that's added into every game and commit to atrocities such as fanart consisting of recoloring current characters while swapping body parts of other existing "friends" with great exaggerations (and calling it "original content")?

No. You do it yourself. And someone has.

A mod author by the name of Dekrayzis is currently in the LONG process of creating his own 3D Sonic game using the Unreal Tournament 2004 engine. Dated? Quite so, but it looks nice, and it'll actually run at full settings if you're got a recent computer that's worth anything. Having watched HD footage, the man has got classic Sonic platforming spot-on and none of the stupid "reusing entire stages from Sonic Adventure and reskinning everything" business. He's put effort here and it shows. But why read about it when you can watch it? Watch the YouTube link for HD footage.

Of course, it's a large project. The man needs help. If you're good with modding UT2K4 and want nothing to do with current abominations, check his blog. Get far enough and maybe this will be ported to the UT3 engine.

During a routine exercise, Sonic and Co. are alerted to a disturbance on the Floating Island. There, Eggman and his badnik army are excavating for a lost Chaos Emerald of immense power. Sonic & Shadow combine forces once again to thwart Eggman's attempt to imprison the planet, but Eggman escapes with the emerald in tow. Unbeknown to them all, the future is about to change for the worse, once the power of the emerald re-awakens one of Mobius' oldest threats.

A:DR is an action adventure modification for Unreal Tournament 2004 based on the adventures of Sonic the Hedgehog. The player will assume the role of Sonic the Hedgehog (and friends) to save planet Mobius from his nemesis Dr. Ivo 'Eggman' Robotnik and the nefarious Ashura.

Reenee via youtube.com »