Before we get going with this review, let's address the elephant in the corner of the room: SEGA Forever. SEGA's latest attempt to bring its classics to iOS has had a bit of a rocky start thanks to a frankly lackluster Genesis emulator. SEGA got a lot of feedback from those initial releases and, to their credit, have been working hard trying to address the problems. Their latest release is Ristar [Free], and it comes with a new emulator build that shows significant improvement over previous ones. It's not perfect, mind you. While it greatly improves on the framerate and sound issues many have had with earlier releases, this version sometimes has some screen tearing. Nevertheless, it's a solid enough release that we feel it's worth reviewing this game largely on its own merits.
It's a funny thing, but in spite of the name of the developer and the popularity of their namesake, my favorite games from Sonic Team tend to be the ones without Sonic in them. Ristar isn't officially a Sonic Team production, but it might as well be. Most of its key staff members were coming off of working on Sonic CD and, after finishing Ristar, comprised a big part of the team behind the SEGA Saturn game NiGHTS Into Dreams. The main character himself, the titular Ristar, evolved from a prototype Sonic Team cooked up when they were brainstorming the original Sonic the Hedgehog. Yet for all Ristar shares with his famous older brother, his game is very different. It's more methodical in its pacing, an...