No plans for Sonic Adventure 3, says Sonic Team boss, but "we'd love to make it"
Chao for now.
There are currently no plans to make Sonic Adventure 3 and continue the Sonic series from the Dreamcast days.
Sonic Team boss Takashi Iizuka was interviewed by VGC and discussed the possibility of continuing the series, as well as a return of its much loved Chao Garden.
Iizuka acknowledged the requests for the Chao Garden to make a return, but noted "it's part of the whole Sonic Adventure series game".
"It's not a standalone game, it's integrated into the whole Adventure series gameplay, so we can't just break it off and make it a thing," said Iizuka.
"And so it's like, alright, well if you're asking for Chao Garden and Adventure 3 then that's pretty much asking for Adventure 3.
"I think at some time I'd like to say 'hey, yeah, we're making Adventure 3', but we don't have plans for that yet. It's just one of those things that if, if the stars align and it can all happen, then yeah, we'd love to make it."
For anyone who hasn't played the Sonic Adventure games, the Chao Garden is an integrated minigame in which animals rescued in main missions are used to level up cute critters (known as Chao), who then race and battle against one another.
While more recent games have referenced the Chao Garden, it hasn't been included in full since Sonic Adventure 2. Fans are desperate to see it return, but it that won't be possible without a potential Sonic Adventure 3.
So why haven't more recent 3D Sonic games been called Sonic Adventure 3 to continue the series? As Iizuka described the likes of Sonic Colours or Sonic Frontiers, "these games had something new to them that made them what they were and gave them the titles that they were titled.
"And so, in order to really make like the next Adventure game, I think there’s a whole checklist of things that would need to be in there - ways of presenting things, gameplay - they would need to be in there to really define it as something that should be called Sonic Adventure."
Until then, Sega will release Sonic x Shadow Generations in October. I got to play it at Gamescom last month and could finally admit that Shadow is better than Sonic.