
Once the sun sets and day turns to night, Sonic transforms into The Werehog, a shaggy beast who uses his claws to attack enemies and long stretchy arms for platforming. While the sun is out, players are given control of Sonic the Hedgehog, who is equipped with the ability to boost, drift, homing attack, leg stomp, wall kick, and quick-step (a strafing maneuver). The Action/Town stage motif is further broken down by what time of day they're accessed.

However, the Gaia Gates in the PS3/360 Sonic Unleashed, while compact in size, can be immensely confusing to navigate while also being unclear in presenting the player with their next objective to progress through the game.

In comparison to past Sonic games, the towns in Sonic Unleashed for PS3/360 are considerably more compact in size and generally can be navigated from end to end in a matter of seconds. In the PS3/360 Sonic Unleashed, new stages are accessed by collecting Sun and Moon Medals hidden within stages and towns, whereas in Sonic Unleashed for PS2/Wii, Sun and Moon medals are awarded strictly by completing stages. Towns advance the game's storyline and house NPC characters (which offer side missions or items to Sonic) and generally lead the player to access the next level (an Action Stage) via that town's "Gaia Gate". Like Sonic Adventure and Sonic the Hedgehog, Unleashed is broken up between two specific modes: Towns and Action Stages. In general, Sonic Unleashed features a tighter, much more narrowly focused design when it comes to Sonic's standard ''high speed'' gameplay. Borrowing well-received elements from Sonic and the Secret Rings and Sonic Rush, Sonic Unleashed frequently shifts between a classic side-scrolling perspective and a behind-the-back 3D perspective in an attempt to provide the best of both worlds.

Overview Speeding through the "Dragon Road" Action StageĪfter Sonic the Hedgehog (2006) tried to revive the Sonic Adventure formula and was met with negative critical reaction, Sega decided to take a step back and think more carefully about the next game in the franchise.
