Sonic Shuffle

Better play your cards right.

Sonic Shuffle is a Sonic the Hedgehog-themed Party Game for the Sega Dreamcast that was released in November 2000.

Sonic, Tails, Knuckles, and Amy are asleep one night when they receive a mysterious summons from Lumina, a fairy. Sonic assumes that they are dreaming, and they are; as Lumina explains, she brought them here to save Maginaryworld.

The world of dreams is threatened by the existence of Void, an evil, lonely being who shattered the Precioustone that grants people's dreams. This action also imprisoned Illumina, the Goddess of Dreams, rendering her unable to fix things. So Sonic and friends set off to recover the pieces of the Precioustone and save dreams for everyone.

That, and play mini-games.

The game was done by Hudson Soft, the same company who Nintendo trusted with the Mario Party series as well as the creators of popular multiplayer games like Bomberman. However, despite having the same people who worked on Mario Party work on the game, Sonic Shuffle failed to live up to Mario Party's success and is generally considered a failure for reasons such as Loads and Loads of Loading, a AI of such a cheating degree that Save Scumming is almost required in single-player, a complex ruleset for both the board game and minigame elements, and lackluster minigames.

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Tropes used in Sonic Shuffle include:

• Anvil on Head: Eggman's punishment to the player furthest from the Precioustone.
• Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking: Eggman's plans range from killing everyone with lightning in Thor's Hammer to...shaking a can of soda in Sonicola.
• Artificial Brilliance: The AI can be very smart/lucky at times, even on easy.
• Attack of the 50-Foot Whatever: The mini-game Gargantua has Eggman turning one character giant. Your defense? Pop guns.
• Button Mashing: Some of the mini-games revolved around this.
• Calvin Ball: Gamespot and probably other reviewers complained that the game was hard to understand.
• Card Battle Game
• Cel Shading: One of the few Sonic games to use it.
• The Computer Is a Cheating Bastard: Even on Easy, they seem to hit exactly the right numbers and steal your best cards (even when every player has a full deck!). They're very good in Mini-Games too, even luck-based ones. It is to the point where a player will need to save-scum to complete the one-player mode.
  • While the AI and the frequent loading are generally pointed to as the cause for Shuffle's mediocrity, playing with more players at least alleviates the former problem. Good luck on the loading times, though.
• Contemplate Our Navels: Lumina and Void both do this, angsting about their purpose and loneliness. Justified as they are part of the same being; they fuse to bring Illumina back. In fact, it was Illumina's own contemplating that planted the seed of doubt that started this whole mess.
• Cool Train: The Riot Train starts off as a runaway steam locomotive, but once the Precioustone is restored, it becomes a silver, winged, flying train.
• Damsel in Distress: Illumina, the Goddess of Dreams.
• Did You Just Punch Out Cthulhu?: Defeating Void's monster form by dropping rocks on his head.
• Dismantled MacGuffin: The main Precioustone and its pieces.
• Divide by Zero: If you have no Force Jewels and get a Carbuncle, it eats itself.
• Dream Land/Magicant: Maginaryworld.
• Dungeon Bypass: Amy, Tails, and Knuckles can move across exclusive spaces, creating quite a few shortcuts at times.
  • The Preciousite Force Jewel. If you roll a 1, you jump straight to the stone.
• Evil Is Petty: Eggman has no real reason to be in Maginaryworld, but he messes with Sonic and friends anyway.
  • One of his evil schemes? Shaking up a soda and jamming it into a vending machine. It is possible for this to fail.
• Exposition Fairy: Lumina, quite literally.
• Expy: Lumina, for the Sega character Ni GHTS. And Void for Reala, from the same series.
• Fairy: Lumina. Void may be one.
• Fight Like a Card Player: Cards are used both to move around and attack monsters.
• Fixed Damage Attack: Amy's special in battle always does 5 damage.
• Fusion Dance: Lumina and Void do this to bring back Illumina.
• Green Aesop: The Nature Zone's plants and trees are dying because of odd machinery and structures. Clearing the board destroys the machines and makes a huge, beautiful tree grow.
• High Altitude Battle: Mini-games on the Firebird.
• Holiday Mode: Lumina is turned into Ni GHTS in this mode.
• Jungle Japes: The third board, Nature Zone.
• Keep Circulating the Tapes: This game is one of the only Sonic games to not be rereleased.
• Loads and Loads of Loading: Present throughout the game, thought not to the extent of, say, |Sonic the Hedgehog 2006. The loading screens had pretty pictures, though.
  • The final map, 4th Dimension Space, took longer to load than the others since it was very graphic-intensive.
  • Looking at it glass half-full, at least the load times themselves are not that long, they just happen frequently, since disc access is required anytime gameplay is moved off the board map.
• Luck-Based Mission: Some of the mini games, such as 'Sonicola'. 'Egg In Space' is pretty random, too.
• Mineral MacGuffin: The Precioustones and the Force Jewels.
• Minigame Game
• Names to Run Away From Really Fast: The villain, Void.
• Nintendo Hard: The crocodile escape minigame is almost impossible to do with human hands.
  • Even on Easy, the AI was harder than in most party games.
  • The mini-game 'Psychic Sonic'. You practically do have to be psychic to select the right card before the computer.
• Non-Indicative Name: Despite being classified as a Force Jewel, Carbuncle is a fairy that eats them.
• Not So Different: After awhile, Lumina doubts her purpose in life and asks if she's all alone, even lampshading that she's acting like Void.
• One Hundred Percent Completion: Getting all the pictures, mini games, mini events, and unlockable characters
• One-Winged Angel: Void, in the last fight.
• Ordinary Drowning Skills: Spend 5 turns underwater in Emerald Coast without landing on an air bubble and you drown, losing a turn.
• Out-of-Character Moment: Amy's line after they arrive in Maginary World: "Forget about Sonic! Just look at my clothes!"
• Palmtree Panic: Emerald Coast, though it's partially frozen over.
• Party Game
• Phoenix: The Fire Bird turns out to be one.
• Poison Mushroom: The Carbuncle item eats other Force Jewels.
• Press X to Not Die: The mini-game 'Over the Rainbow' was this.
• Random Event: 'Accident' mini games. Mini Events are randomized, too, as are the Force Jewels you collect.
  • As are the random board events, like saving a trapped dolphin in Emerald Coast.
• Rock Theme Naming: Many of the Force Jewels. Preciousite, Carbuncle, and Barrier Amber.
• Scenery Porn: Maginaryworld's lands are pretty.
• Schrödinger's Gun: Some of the Mini-Events work out like this; a hooded boatman can either be Illumina, Void, or Eggman, each with different responses.
• Secret Character: Four; they are Gamma, Big the Cat, a Chao, and Super Sonic.
• The Smurfette Principle: Amy is the only female playable character.
• Spin-Off
• Spoiler Opening: The opening movie, which is played before the title screen, shows Illumina disappear into a flash of light, which Lumina and Void emerge from. Guess what's revealed at the end?
• Stop Helping Me!: If you're not aware of Sonic's special move at all times, you can overshoot where you're trying to go, since with the double-move you must move the required double amount of spaces.
• Super Drowning Skills: In some minigames.
• Talking to Himself: Sonic and Knuckles were voiced by Ryan Drummond in this game.
• Trainstopping
• Trippy Finale Syndrome: 4th Dimension Space has no real floor, letting you walk upside down, sideways, and diagonally in space.
• Whammy: The Eggman card will cause him to do something bad to the user. This can range from losing a turn to losing all your rings. In a battle, it makes you automatically lose.
• Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds: Void.