Sonic Shuffle was one of the 3 Sonic The Hedgehog games released on the now defunct Dreamcast. Released in 2000, this party mascot type game, was put up against Mario Party series and Crash Bash. But Really, the only reason why this game was made and released was to keep Sonic fans happy until Sonic Adventure 2 came out in 2001. From what that sentence says right there, you can get a pretty good idea of how good quality the game is...

The story... is... well... different. There is Robotnik in it, yes, but he plays a minor role in the enemy plot, with your real enemy being a creature/being/thing called Void. This game takes place in "Maginary World" where dreams are made from or whatever. (sounds like Mario RPG...) Void tried to steal the precious stones of maginary world, reacking it into havoc. Sonic ends up coming here through a scream/yell/plea of help from your guide, Illumina Flolight, which looks alot like NiGHTS. So.. you have to go through all these board games, trying to recover the precious stones before your friend or opponent does.

Graphics

Really, this is the only good part of the whole game. Sonic Shuffle sports some real good cel-shaded graphics like the graphics in Jet Grind Radio. Sonic and gang makes a real good transition into the cel-shaded world, and the graphics around them, like the backgrounds, are very lush and colorful. There is still problems with mouth movements in cutscenes, and they're so much worse then Sonic Adventure's mouth movements. I have never seen anything that bad when it comes to some characters mouth moving! But really, that is the only bad thing.

9/10

Sound

Ack!! The music... piercing... ears... This is absolutely the WORST music I've EVER heard from the Sonic series. This is worse then Mario Party's music in every aspect. At least Mario can get catchy, and not heart your ears! Who made these songs?!

And the sound effects are exactly the same as Sonic Adventure with HORRIBLE voice-overs. And the voice acting is the most horrible I've ever heard. Much worse then Sonic Adventure and Sonic Adventure 2. Yes. Its that bad.

2/10 I would give it 1... but the Sonic Adventure sounds aren't the worst thing in the world, and the intro song is actually catchy.

Gameplay

... This is a Sonic game? Oh wait... it isn't. Its just a sophisticated bundle of tag mini-games and horrible game board design. This is much worse then Mario Party 1,2, or 3. There is times when it can get passed mediocre, but really, I don't like party games. They just don't play right. There is nothing here. It can be fun with 4 players though.

4/10

Replay Value

Well... there is some mini-games that are somewhat amusing, and there are secret characters, but they're too taxing to get for your own worth. The only thing that might have you come back to the game is if there are friends at your house, but I doubt they'll ever want to play this game. (unless they like Mario Party)

5/10

Bottom Line

Sigh... this is a pathetic excuse for a Sonic game. Never waste your money on this game unless you're trying to collect all the Sonic games. (or you get it free with the system like me) Just... no.

4/10