The Stunt,[1][2] also known as the Trick,[3] is a move that appears in the Sonic the Hedgehog series and its spin-offs. It refers to different acrobatic maneuvers executed with a racing vehicle while the user is airborne.
Description[]
The Stunt refers to a form of acrobatic maneuvers that the user performs with a race car. When performing a Stunt, the user uses their car to execute a form of aerial movement while their race car is in midair. By executing a Stunt, the user builds up a speed boost. In some cases, it even lets the user steer their race car through midair.
In gameplay, the Stunt is an aerial trick the playable characters can perform whenever their race car is flying through the air. Sending a race car into the air can be achieved by either driving off a ramp, making a jump with the race car, or passing through a Transformation Gate that turns the race car into a flying vehicle. Early on, performing a Stunt had no affect on the flying race car's direction. However, the move has since evolved so that it allows the playable characters to make limited changes to their trajectory, thus enabling them to reach Item Boxes and avoid obstacles in midair. In addition, a successful landing while performing Stunts will reward the playable character with a speed boost that is automatically triggered when the race car lands on the track. For each Stunt, the playable character builds up their boost, with three Stunts in succession delivering the must powerful boost. However, if the playable character lands on the track in the middle of a Stunt, they will lose their boost and be brought to a grinding halt.
Game appearances[]
Sega All-Stars series[]
Sonic & Sega All-Stars Racing[]
Sonic performing a Trick in Sonic & Sega All-Stars Racing.
In Sonic & Sega All-Stars Racing, the Stunt maneuver is referred to as the Trick.[3] In this game, the Stunts are aerial tricks that differ between each character and have no effect on the player's trajectory.
To perform the Stunt in gameplay, the player has to press the Drift/Brake button while their playable character's race car is in the middle of a jump, but of course, various characters each have various trick animations of their own, with some being faster/longer than others, and must be taken into account the trick duration + the jump height to prevent crash-landing without ruining the boost build-up.
Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed[]
Sonic performing a Stunt in Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed.
In Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed, this maneuver is referred to as the Stunt for the first time.[1] In this game, the Stunt maneuver lets the user perform a barrel roll or a somersault in any direction, thereby allowing the playable character to dodge obstacles and reach far-away Item Boxes (somewhat resembling one of Sonic's Tricks from the prior game).
To perform the Stunt in gameplay, the player has to use their Stunt movement controls while their playable character's race car is in the air as a plane or in the middle of a jump as a boat or a car. Depending on which direction the player decides to head in with their Stunt movement controls, the playable character will do either a barrel roll to the left, a barrel roll to the right, a front flip or a back flip. Rolls in particular recover faster than flips, and can be chained during a drift off of a jump depending on the course section to "drift roll" through the air for more distance compared to a beeline-styled multi-flip (by rolling towards the opposite direction of the vehicle's turning direction in order to nudge further-straight along a course jump).
However, doing stunts too quickly will result in the build-up of boost being lost (and the announcer to yell out a "stunt fail"); said fail can also occur if doing stunts too close to the ground causing a crash-landing. Overall in standard car mode and boat mode, stunts normally have a 0.6 second window to be chained into each other without a fail occurring, while plane modes have a 0.85 second window instead. However, some stunt fails can be done intentionally in midair (by doing them too quickly) to drop the stunt-boost-build-up in order to maintain instead a boost from another source (such as from a drift or item) mainly due to how specific the boost stacking mechanics are. This trick mainly works best on small-enough jumps that can allow the user to forgo a level 1 stunt boost if doing something like maintaining a more effective drift boost level but still needing the stunt's momentum on its own.
Another lesser known fact is the fact that unique triple directional stunts can be performed on high-enough jumps. Normally, performing 3 of the same stunt type can net up to a level 3 boost and no more even with more stunts chained in the same jump, but performing at least 2 opposite direction stunts + 1 different direction in any chosen order instead (via 2 different rolls + 1 flip, or 2 different flips + 1 roll at minimum again, in any chosen order) in a single jump can net the driver a level 4 boost as opposed to a level 3 boost upon landing. However, this largely depends on the jump and/or course section as on some sections, it may be more optimal to do standard single-directional multi-stunts instead on specific jumps with a lesser window or doing single multi-stunts for a momentum increase in midair akin to drift rolling. Unique triples can be fulfilled even when a level 3 boost has been build from a continuous triple, so long as 1 opposite direction stunt and any 1 different direction stunt is fitted within the chain during the jump.
During flight mode however, stunts instead subtly slow down the vehicle (on top of needing as aforementioned, a 0.85 second window to chain stunts together without triggering a stunt fail), but the main benefit to stunting in flight mode is near any form of collision (such as a pillar or building drivers can crash into) on the course if done right, triggers a "risk boost" which amounts to a level 1 boost upon properly stunting to avoid the physical obstacle of sorts, which works even on specific walls/boundaries of a course. Chaining risk boosts is an effective way to go faster on a course, even to being able to prolong a single risk boost to reach a transform gate/ring on time during such courses (such as on Carrier Zone) to stack it with a Transform Boost (done by fluidly chaining plane stunts all the way past till the transform gate).
However in plane mode, it is also possible to "Danger/Reckless Boost" by instead chaining stunts on specific obstacles, by doing so per each stunt before a risk boost could trigger at any point akin to charging up a stunt or drift boost just before unleashing it. This is normally done so by dodging multiple obstacles in succession or flying the vehicle at specific angles towards a course boundary to stunt alongside it continuously, which the latter method can be a notoriously advanced technique for most inexperienced players to master.
Also new to Transformed is the addition of the "Transform Boost" bonus, done by performing a stunt upon passing into a transform ring/gate as long as the driver is sent airborne like with any normal jump upon entering/reaching the gate/ring. The same rules of multi-stunts and/or unique triple stunts also apply. However, transform boosts are impossible when transitioning from any mode into flight mode (yet flight-into-car or boat works), though in some niche cases, boat-to-car may allow for a transform boost depending on the situation and/or course section. When going from flight-to-car/boat mode, it's possible to perform an early flight stunt into a transform ring/gate to buffer a stunt to go for either a multi or unique triple on some sections. Performing a flight roll upon passing through a transform gate/ring during a certain point also halts the horizontal momentum normally generated by the roll (turning it into a roll that only flies straight forward). It should be mentioned that going through a transform gate normally cancels the driver's current state for the most part, preventing drift rolls-into-transform boosts from being possible as the drift gets instantly cancelled upon transforming.
Due to the quickness of the stunts unlike the prior Tricks, specific courses, despite how small the jumps can be, can allow for room for at least a single roll (or even a flip), so long as the course's aspects and sections are all studied thoroughly. It should be HEAVILY noted that there are certain jumps that allow the vehicle/driver to be considered airborne earlier than expected, thus if stunts are performed too soon during that period, the vehicle may come into contact too close to the surface before fully leaving it; one major example applies to the very first wood ramp jump during Samba Studios' water section, where inputting a stunt too soon (especially a flip of any sort) before the vehicle is far enough away from it, causes it to contact the ramp itself with the stunt and fail to build any boost.
Transformed is also infamous in the console, PC and Vita ports for a "stunt locking bug" that causes stunts if performed too early on specific course jumps, to have the game consume/lock the stunt input and store it for a later jump right after (which causes the locked-stunt to be automatically chained from any later stunt input, intentional or not). This often causes issues with certain stunts being performed and/or buffered too soon on a majority of courses, especially on jumps with a smaller window of altitude. It should be noted that the bug occurs only on very specific jumps on very specific courses as some are normally exempt from triggering the bug, others are not.
Team Sonic Racing[]
In Team Sonic Racing, this maneuver is called the Stunt again.[2] Like in Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed, the Stunt maneuver lets the user perform a barrel roll in any direction, enabling the playable character to dodge obstacles and reach far-away Item Boxes.
To perform the Stunt in gameplay, the player has to use their Stunt movement controls when their playable character's race car is airborne. Depending on which direction the player decides to head in with their Stunt movement controls, the playable character will do either a barrel roll to the left, a barrel roll to the right, a front flip or a back flip. Also, in case the playable character lands on the track in the middle of a Stunt, they will lose their Rings alongside their speed boost when coming to a grinding halt with a crashing-sound effect.
Unlike in Transformed, stunts can now be chained continuously with the window for quick-stunt-fails no longer existing, allowing them to be liberally chained to the driver's leisure. However, early stunts done too soon on specific course jumps (such as the first wooden bridge on Lost Palace) can cause the vehicle to crash into contact of the jumping surface, failing the stunt. The sound effects are now different as well, from both performing a stunt (from a "whooshing" sound to a cartoonish bounce sound) and landing from a stunt successfully (a "confirmation click" of sorts).
On the flipside, unique triple stunts no longer exist due to boost levels only being at level 3 maximum, though multiple stunt chains can still offer increased momentum like with the aforementioned drift rolling in Transformed which still works (and also the increased effectiveness of straight/beeline-styled multi-flips having slightly more momentum). However, the aforementioned stunt fail from a crash-landing leaves almost lesser window for some jumps, especially since the removal of the strict stunt window from before no longer allows for intentional midair stunt fails to be performed. Early surface contact stunts from certain jumps as aforementioned also increase the penalty due to far more momentum being cut as it counts specifically as a vehicular crash.
Stunt boosts are also held when performing them during a drift, which cause them to be stacked with drift's boost (unlike before where they unleash a boost of their own separate of the drift boost). As a result, drifting before landing from a stunt if possible allows the vehicle to store the boost and/or power it up at specific moments if needed even if stacking it is now impossible. However, it is still possible to boost off of a jump, then chain stunts to boost right after again upon landing if one is not drifting to halt it. On certain jumps with high enough altitudes and when drifting, it's also possible to accidentally or intentionally release a drift when a stunt or more is done to release the boost early in midair, causing the rest of the possible stunts before landing to stack another boost right after.
Another major difference is that certain course sections via their terrain can cause stunt boosts to occur late due to the landing causing a slight bounce, making it so that the vehicle in question must fully be grounded before a stunt-landing boost can occur on some more bumpy landings.
See also[]
References[]
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed (PC) United Kingdom Steam manual, pg. 4.
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 Team Sonic Racing English instruction manual.
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 Sonic & Sega All-Stars Racing (PlayStation 3) United Kingdom instruction booklet, pg. 11.
