'Sonic Frontiers' Team Says Negative Feedback Won't Result In A Delay And That Fans Don't Understand It Yet

It's been two weeks since the Sonic Team released a seven-minute gameplay preview of their upcoming game Sonic Frontiers, and the internet appeared to largely agree that it looked bad. The game's open world, an apparent selling point, looked lifeless and boring to many, more akin to a stock Unreal tech demo than a game with any sort of soul.

While many fans and onlookers brace for a Sonic turd to rival some of the franchise's legendary misses, such as the bug-infested mess where Sonic kisses a human woman, the Sonic Team is apparently unbothered, declaring that the negative response will not delay the game's fall 2022 release and further iterated that the concerned fans simply don't understand what the Sonic Team is going for in Frontiers.

In an interview with VGC, Sonic Team head Takashi Iizuka addressed fan concerns by essentially assuring them that the game was not bad, but good, actually, and you're hearing more and more people say this.

"It’s not really that surprising," Iizuka said. "We do realize everyone is just kind of reacting to the videos that they saw, and because they don’t understand what this new gameplay is they’re kind of comparing it to other games that they already know."

Iizuka further elaborated that though the internet says it doesn't look fun and game journalists who have tried a 30-minute demo of the game also say it is very not-fun, the Frontiers playtesters who are "in the demographic" of a Sonic fan want to give the game "a score of 80 or 90 out of 100 points."

…Frontiers is in development now, and actually we’ve been doing a lot of playtesting with our target audience, who would be in that demographic of someone who’d play a Sonic game and enjoy it. From our playtesting results we have been iterating, we have been listening to the comments that come back, but we’ve also been getting a lot of great feedback from people who rate the game and are like, ‘I had a lot of fun playing this game, I’d give it like an 80 or 90 point score out of 100’.

So we do feel that we’re getting to the point where this game is done, and people will like it, and we do want to get that game into our fans’ hands as soon as possible.”

It appears the Frontiers team has no interest in listening to the negative feedback from the internet and pushing back the game to create a more exciting product, though that strategy has paid off before. This was not a comforting message for people fearing the worst for Frontiers, and social media did not interpret Iizuka's message well.

Understand my cock and balls Iizuka https://t.co/MwzTLW7jVG

— YoMama (@Yungsnaku_) June 13, 2022

What company actually goes OUT OF THEIR WAY to say this? https://t.co/Pw5Brhal7n

— Matt McMuscles (@MattMcMuscles) June 14, 2022

Here’s a thought: Maybe we’d “understand” it if we got to SEE some of it beyond what’s already been shown. https://t.co/oAFBT1MnZT

— Jon • Waiting for Stray (@Kudastop01) June 13, 2022

Granted, Iizuka's comments are not as combative as some eye-catching headlines would suggest, but given Sonic Team's track record of releasing bad games, it appears that Frontiers is on course to be yet another contentious release in the Sonic franchise.