Sonic Boom: Rise of Lyric
| Sonic Boom: Rise of Lyric | |
|---|---|
North American cover art | |
| Developer(s) | Big Red Button |
| Publisher(s) | Sega |
| Director(s) | Bob Rafei |
| Producer(s) | Lisa Kapitsas Stephen Frost |
| Designer(s) | Brian McInerny Christian Senn |
| Programmer(s) | Jeff Lander |
| Artist(s) | Adam Yeager |
| Writer(s) | John Melchior Christian Cantamessa |
| Composer(s) | Richard Jacques |
| Series | Sonic the Hedgehog |
| Engine | CryEngine |
| Platform(s) | Wii U |
| Release | |
| Genre(s) | Action-adventure, platform |
| Mode(s) | Single-player |
Sonic Boom: Rise of Lyric is a 2014 action-adventure game developed by Big Red Button and published by Sega for the Wii U. Along with Sonic Boom: Shattered Crystal and Sonic Boom: Fire & Ice for the Nintendo 3DS, it is a spin-off of Sega's Sonic the Hedgehog series and part of the Sonic Boom franchise, which consists of an animated television series, which the games serve as a prequel to, a comic series by Archie Comics, and a toyline by Tomy. The story follows Sonic, Tails, Knuckles and Amy, who, after Sonic accidentally awakens Lyric, the last Ancient, from his thousand-year imprisonment, must stop him from acquiring the Chaos Crystals, which he plans to use to power a robot army and wipe out all organic life, while battling Doctor Eggman, Metal Sonic, and Shadow.
Sonic Boom: Rise of Lyric began development in 2011 under the title Sonic Origins and later Sonic Synergy. Originally intended to be a Jak and Daxter-style game focused on four-player gameplay for release on PC and other consoles, development was moved to the Wii U as part of a three-game exclusivity deal Sega signed with Nintendo. Since CryEngine was not designed to run on the Wii U, many gameplay concepts were removed or simplified, while the story was rewritten due to Sega gaining full control over the television series. Richard Jacques, lead composer for Sonic 3D Blast and Sonic R, returned to compose the soundtrack.
Sonic Boom: Rise of Lyric was released in North America, Europe and Australia in November 2014, and the following month in Japan as Sonic Toon. Sega did not provide reviewers with advance copies; it received overwhelmingly negative reviews from critics for its controls, camera system, combat, story, gameplay, dialogue, and bugs and technical issues. Some described it as both one of the worst games of 2014 and one of the worst Sonic games ever made. The game was also a commercial failure, with the combined sales of Rise of Lyric and Shattered Crystal totaling 620,000 copies by March 31, 2015, making them among the worst-selling games in the franchise. Following the failure of Rise of Lyric, Big Red Button nearly considered shutting down.