Sonic Frontiers' combat was a breath of fresh air after years of mindless honing attacks. Finally, Sonic learned some new moves and could learn even more over the course of the game. But after a couple of months of perfecting the same attacks, it's fair to say we're looking for something new – which is just what the Frontiers modding community is giving us.
Using two popular Sonic Frontiers mods, you can transform Sonic's latest adventure into a bizarre Devil May Cry spinoff. This comes after it was revealed that the devs originally considered basing Frontiers' combat on the popular hack-and-slash, with the mods giving us a taste of what could have been.
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Two mods are needed to get the full experience, both of which are available to download now on Game Banana.
First up, there's Hedgehog May Cry – Combat/Physics Revamp from Game Banana user KirbyKrew66. This overhauls the gameplay entirely and makes fighting a lot more difficult.
"This game looks really good, but doesn't play as good as it looks," says KirbyKrew66. "That's what this mod tries to remedy by doing several changes to combat and physics."
Everything across the board now requires more skill, with parries needing to be timed correctly, and Phantom Rush ending sooner if you don't build up combos. Some attacks have also seen damage nerfs, but for the most part, the gameplay changes will just incentivise you to think about your combos, rather than mindlessly mash buttons and hope for the best.
To make up for the nerfs, Sonic now moves a lot faster and doesn't lose that momentum when jumping. This should make chaining attacks together much more satisfying, albeit a bit more stressful to pull off at high speed.
To further the Devil May Cry inspirations, you can pair this mod with another from Game Banana user GordinRamsay. Combat DX mainly uses visual cues to encourage fancier combos, giving you a mid-combat ranking. It also complements the gameplay changes introduced by Hedgehog May Cry, as Phantom Rush damage has been "significantly" increased. If you couple this with how the previous mod makes it harder to keep the Phantom Rush gauge going, you have yourself some very high-risk, high-reward gameplay. There's also a bonus for chaining attacks together, so pairing all of these new features up can make for some powerful buffs if you play your cards right.
Better yet, Combat DX actually punishes you for spamming. If you keep mashing the same attacks, they'll eventually do less damage, incentivising you to actually experiment with Sonic's different moves across the skill tree, rather than stick with the ones you learn early on.
With any luck, future Sonic games will expand upon what we got in the vanilla version of Frontiers, and give us the more challenging gameplay that fans are after. And with the head of Sonic Team promising "a lot more" Sonic content in 2023, it's possible we'll hear some news about another instalment at some point this year.