Sonic & All-Stars Racing Golden

Sonic & All-Stars Racing Golden (Japanese: ソニック&オールスターレーシング ＧＯＬＤＥＮ ), stylized in some countries as Sonic & All-Stars Racing: GOLDEN, is the sequel to 2012's Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed and serves as the fifth instalment of the Sega All-Stars series of crossover titles. Much like its two predecessors, Sonic & All-Stars Racing Golden sees a number of characters from properties owned by Sega (as well as some guest characters) coming together to compete in kart races. Being a sequel to Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed, Golden includes the various gameplay mechanics introduced in that game (such as being able to drive on land, on sea, and in the air), with adjustments made to improve the overall game feel. Much like both of the previous Sonic & All-Stars Racing titles, Golden includes several third party characters, and each version of the game includes at least one character exclusive to that version.
Sonic & All-Stars Racing Golden was developed by Existence Software and Sumo Digital, the latter having also developed Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed, , and . also aided development by working on a majority of the Sonic the Hedgehog content included in the game. The game was designed to highlight Sega's history, with the game releasing to celebrate the company's 60th anniversary in 2020.
== Gameplay ==
The gameplay of Sonic & All-Stars Racing Golden is very comparable to that of Nintendo's Mario Kart series. The goal of the game is to place higher in the rankings of a race in order to earn the most points overall at the end of the selection of courses. Depending on the player's placement in races, the player will earn different amounts of , which can be used to purchase new courses and music tracks in the game's store. The shop also includes two different versions of every course as well: one version omits all transformations for a strictly land-based race, and the other reverses the track while adding additional hazards; these alternate versions are appended with the suffixes "Simple" and "Extra", respectively.
Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed introduced the ability to transform one's vehicle from car form into either boat or plane form and back again by driving through Transformation Gates. This returns in Golden, with several gameplay changes allowing for tighter controls in all three vehicular modes. No matter the vehicle's current state, racers can perform drifts in order to gain boosts, the strength of said boost increasing the longer the drift is held. Boosts can also be gained by performing tricks while in midair; though only the first three will grant boosts, and the player will fail if the trick is not completed before they hit the ground. There are three levels of boost, and a Level 3 boost is capable of knocking racers out of the way regardless of the weight difference between the two.
In Sonic & All-Stars Racing Golden, ten racers are put on a racetrack based off locales from various Sega titles and are capable of using a variety of different items in order to get ahead. Items can be acquired by driving through Item Capsule that are designed after those found in the Sonic the Hedgehog series, and can carry up to two at one time. As with its predecessors, the items in Sonic & All-Stars Racing Golden are primarily of original creation, though some items from Sega franchises have been introduced while other items have been redesigned to appear to be from certain franchises. Successfully hitting another racer with an item will earn the user an All-Star Token, which can be spent in-between races in a slot machine to unlock various bonuses, such as beginning the race with a certain item.
The main gimmick of the Sonic & All-Stars Racing titles are the All-Star Moves that each character has. Should the player be doing poorly in a race, they may obtain their unique All-Star Move from an Item Capsule. All-Star Moves, when used, allow the racer to attack other foes with either a radial attack or a projectile attack at the push of a button as their vehicle is controlled automatically. To signify the appearance of an All-Star Move during a race, the music is changed to a certain song unique to that racer, which also signifies the remaining duration of the All-Star Move.
Unlike most kart racing titles, Sonic & All-Stars Racing Golden features a level up system akin to certain role-playing games, a feature which returns from Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed. The player can gain XP to level up the character they are playing as, unlocking extra mods as they level up to alter the stats of said character's vehicle, with most mods supporting one stat category above the others. Unlike Transformed, which featured several different mods that could be unlocked, Golden instead features four mods for each character: three custom mods designated as Rank ★, Rank ★★, and Rank ★★★ mods; and "Gold Mod", which balances a character's stats evenly. XP is earned as the player races, with small amounts being handed out to the player as they perform drifts and tricks, when they successfully impair a foe with an item, and a base amount that depends on the player's placement at the end of a race.
== World Tour ==
World Tour can be seen as the main offline campaign for Sonic & All-Stars Racing Golden. In this mode, the player takes on a number of different challenges, earning a different number of Stars depending on the rank they earn after completing a challenge. Stars can be used to unlock gates that lock out more missions. Stars can also be used to challenge the Golden Aces - 5 racers that can only be unlocked by defeating their challenges in this mode.
Players can earn up to five stars on a challenge. Earning an S Rank grants five stars, A Rank four stars, B Rank three stars, C Rank two stars, and D Rank one star. The ranking earned by the player is determined by a number of factors, such as the amount of time it took for the player to complete the challenge, the amount of times the player was hit by obstacles or items, etc.
At the beginning of a World Tour playthrough, a player will only be able to play as Sonic, and all other characters are unlocked by completing certain challenges.
== Characters ==
=== Playable Characters ===
While all characters are available by default outside of the World Tour mode, their Mods still need to be unlocked before they can be used. A Mod will be shared between all modes once it is unlocked however.
Some characters may have appeared in other Sega All-Stars titles, but will still be denoted as "new" characters should they have been absent from either predecessor of Sonic & All-Stars Racing Golden. Additionally, some characters hail from series not owned by Sega; these characters are denoted with "-GUEST-" and one of them previously appeared in the Sonic & All-Stars Racing series.
==== Returning Characters ====
Sonic the Hedgehog · Knuckles the Echidna · Miles "Tails" Prower · Amy Rose · Big the Cat · Shadow the Hedgehog · Dr. Eggman · Metal Sonic · Opa-Opa · Alex Kidd · AiAi · MeeMee · Billy Hatcher · NiGHTS · Reala · Beat · Gum · Ulala · Pudding · Amigo · Jacky Bryant & Akira Yuki · Ryo Hazuki · Joe Musashi · B.D. Joe · Zobio & Zobiko · Vyse · General Winter · Bonanza Bros. · Gilius Thunderhead · Football Manager · ChuChus · Shōgun · Wreck-It Ralph · Banjo-Kazooie
==== New Characters ====
Classic Sonic · Rouge the Bat · Zavok · Sticks the Badger · Stella · GonGon · Axel · Rolly Roll · Bantam Scrambled · Chick Poacher · Shadow · Amiga · Sarah Bryant · Shenhua Ling · Hibana · Kazuma Kiryu · Goro Majima · Phantom R · Aika · Arle Nadja · Jonathan Blade · Sakura Amamiya · Ristar · Nei · Darksol · Bayonetta · Vectorman · Hornet · Segata Sanshiro · LOPIT · Igor · The Phantom Thieves of Hearts · ToeJam & Earl · Hatsune Miku · Hello Kitty
=== Non-Playable Characters ===
In addition to a large selection of playable characters, a number of other characters make more minor appearances in the game. Many characters make cameos on the sidelines of certain courses, while others have more relatively-major roles, acting as the flagman for the races or distributing trophies following a Grand Prix.
== Courses ==
Courses are separated into cups, with each cup having five courses. The cups are named after different elements of Sega franchises, though this has no bearing on what games are represented by the cups present. There are a total of seven cups in the game, with three of the cups being comprised of courses from the previous titles. The order of the courses and which cup they are present in only matter for Grand Prix mode, as in other modes any course can be selected in any order. Some courses may change as the race progresses, forcing the racers to transform their vehicle into different states as the situation around the circuit evolves.
=== New Courses ===
=== Returning Courses ===
== Items ==
=== All-Star Moves ===
== Gallery ==
ACL Sonic and All-Stars Golden.png|Original logo
== Trivia ==
* Of the casts of both Sonic & Sega All-Stars Racing and Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed, the characters that do not return are: Willemus from Total War: Rome; AGES; Simon from Yogscast; Danica Patrick; the Nintendo Wii's Mii; Xbox Live Avatar; and the Pyro, Heavy, and Spy from Team Fortress 2.
** From the rest of the Sega Superstars series, the only characters that do not appear in the game (in addition to the aforementioned) are: Jeffry McWild, Kage-Maru, and Dural from Virtua Fighter; and Angel and Slash from Crazy Taxi.
Category:Xbox Series X Games
Category:Steam Games
Category:Games
Category:Fan Games
Category:Crossovers
Category:Crossover Racing Games
Category:Nintendo Switch Games
Category:PlayStation 4 Games
Category:Xbox One Games
Category:PC Games
Category:Racing Games
Category:Sonic (series)
Category:Sonic Games