Sonic the Hedgehog Retrospective: 25th Anniversary Edition (Part 1)

Sonic the Hedgehog is my all time favorite video game series. I've loved it for a long time and I still love it today, even though it's not exactly in the best place right now. Nowadays, people tend to look at the Sonic series in a bit of a negative light. Even though there are good Sonic games in existence, only the bad stuff comes up in conversation.

And even I'll be the first to admit that Sonic has had some major missteps in it's 25 year history. But that's not what this will be about (for the most part). This series means a lot to me and I wanna focus on more of the positive aspects of Sonic and not come off as one of the many infamous "fans" who complain about the stupidest things like green eyes or voice acting.

I will be talking about the main series of games only, so spin-offs like 'Shadow the Hedgehog' and 'Sonic Boom' will not be mentioned. I also wont be talking about any games on Handheld systems, Console games only.
These are my opinions and memories of playing these games. I wont ask others to feel the way I feel, if anything I hope this inspires others to try to find and play these games and form their own opinions.

PART 1: HERE COMES SONIC

SONIC THE HEDGEHOG:
(Sega Genesis - June 23, 1991)

Sonic the Hedgehog was actually one of the first games I ever played. In fact, its the game I have the best memory of playing when I was young. According to my parents, I played 'Super Mario Bros.' (which I referred to as "JUMP") and I dabbled a little into 'The Legend of Zelda', but I unfortunately have no memories of that.

I do however have fond memories of playing Sonic.
It was at my Daycare where I first got my exposure, in one of the play area's there was a table with a Sega Genesis hooked up to a small TV. I got curious, started playing this game I saw about a blue Hedgehog who ran fast and saved little animals from inside robots made by a fat, orange-mustached, man named Robotnik. I probably wasn't very good at it, but I had a ton of fun doing it.
I loved the fact that Sonic moved faster than Mario (and yes I know he can move fast if you hold down B), that made the gameplay a lot of fun. I've always felt that the Mario games were needlessly challenging, if Mario gets hit without a power-up he dies, and power ups aren't exactly plentiful. They're there, but you still have to look for them. This is why I love the Rings, Rings are scattered throughout all the levels and they offer Sonic a level of protection. If Sonic gets hit he'll loose his Rings but they can be picked back up without breaking the fast paced flow, and all you really need is one Ring to avoid dying. And if you collect 100 Rings, you'll be granted an Extra Life.

That isn't to say the game is all easy. After you complete all Acts of Green Hill Zone, you get introduced to Marble Zone, a level that focuses less on speed and more on platforming. And you need to be careful or else you may get crushed or burned in lava. Later you'll run into Labyrinth Zone where there's water all over the place, and unlike Mario, Sonic can't swim, moves slow underwater and will run out of breath and drown. And Scrap Brain Zone...practically everywhere is a death trap!

The music in this game is really good and very catchy. You'd be hard pressed to find anyone who doesn't know the theme to Green Hill Zone, and every other Zone has their own unique theme and you will be tapping your feet to it while playing through them. And if you finish the game, you'll be treated to a nice medley of the Zone themes during the credits.
In addition the game also has Special Stages that can be unlocked by jumping into a large Gold Ring at the end of any of the first 2 Acts of a Zone with at least 50 Rings collected. You'll enter a rotating, maze-like area that you guide Sonic through to collect a gem called a Chaos Emerald. There are 6 Chaos Emeralds you can collect, they don't affect anything gameplay-wise, but they unlock the best ending in the game. The mazes themselves can be tricky to navigate through and there are bumpers that will bounce you back, slow/speed up the maze rotation or reverse the direction the maze is spinning and you need to avoid the goal orbs that will take you out of the zone or else you won't get the Emerald. I had a lot of trouble with these stages at first, but as I've played this game numerous times, trial and error makes all the difference.

And that's what started my love affair with the series. It wasn't until later that I discovered my parents had at one point bought a Sega Genesis and among games like 'Ms. Pac-Man' and 'Frogger', there was 'Sonic the Hedgehog' and I played it as often as I could. In addition to Sonic the Hedgehog there was a certain other game I noticed we had.

SONIC THE HEDGEHOG 2:
(Sega Genesis - November 21, 1992)

As soon as I found out Sonic 2 existed, I jumped at the chance to play it. Once again, it was hard for me, I don't think I ever made it past the second Zone. I even once tried to play through the whole game when I was a kid, but I had to go somewhere with my parents so I just left the TV and Genesis on and continued to play once I got back. I remember getting pretty far too.

I consider Sonic the Hedgehog 2 to be the 'Link To The Past' of the Sonic series. Meaning it is the game that introduced many of the mainstay elements that would be repeated throughout the series. It introduced Sonic's best friend and loyal sidekick, Miles Prower, or "Tails" as hes more commonly known, a Fox with 2 tails which he uses to fly by spinning them around like a helicopter. Tails follows you throughout your journey to once again rescue animals from robots and thwart the plans of Dr. Robotnik. He can help take out enemies, collect Rings and make it easier to beat bosses, but at times he can also screw you over (more on that later).

The default gameplay has you playing as Sonic and Tails together, but you can choose to play as Sonic or Tails alone. But if you select Tails, for some reason you can't make him fly. I've never understood this.
One of Sonic's signature moves was introduced in Sonic 2, the Spin Dash. In Sonic 1, in order to get up slopes or around loops you had to build up speed by running and hope you were fast enough to go up them. But in Sonic 2, you can use the Spin Dash, by having Sonic crouch, rev up to build up speed quicker and blast off through the different Zones.
There are also more Zones in the game with only 2 Acts this time. While the Zones are still fun and challenging, some of them can be a bit annoying. Metropolis Zone in particular isn't necessarily hard, but it can be long and the enemies and obstacles scattered throughout will make sure your ring count never goes above 1. Wing Fortress Zone isn't hard either, but you will constantly fall to your death.
Then there's the final Zone in the game: Death Egg Zone! Robotnik's base of operations which looks like a Death Star, with his face on it. It isn't so much a level as much as it is a hallway with 2 Boss fights. The first is 'Mecha Sonic' or 'Silver Sonic', the first in a line of robotic duplicates of Sonic. He can be a pain, but once you get his pattern down, he shouldn't be too difficult to beat.
Once you defeat him, you chase down Robotnik, who jumps into a large Robot. This is by far the hardest part of the game, the previous Bosses of the game were pretty easy, but with this one you can't just jump on top of him, you have to wait until he either gets low enough to hit or jump up and hit him when his spike arms aren't in the way. While not one of the most impossible boss fights ever it can be tricky, especially since that, throughout these 2 fights you have ZERO RINGS! There is no way to get any more, you will always have no Rings to fight these Bosses, meaning that if you get hit once you have to start over from the fight with Mecha Sonic. 

I had the hardest time ever trying to beat these bosses, but I could never do it. As I got older and better at the game I eventually did it, but the memories are still there and the Death Egg Robot Boss theme will forever haunt me.

Another part of the game that I struggled with was the Special Stages. There are now 7 Chaos Emeralds to collect and it would remain 7 throughout the main series. Collecting them all grants you the ability to become Super Sonic, in which Sonic turns gold and becomes faster and invincible as long as you keep your Ring count high enough.
The Special Stages in this game consist of Sonic and Tails running through a half-pipe track collecting Rings and avoiding bombs which make you lose Rings. You have to collect a certain number of Rings 3 times. If you do, you are awarded an Emerald, if you don't collect the number of Rings you need, you fail.
One problem I have with this is that the control for this feels slippery, even if I move slightly in one direction, Sonic will move like he's on ice and 9 times out of 10, I will run into bombs or not get the amount of Rings I need to complete the stage.
Tails is another problem, remember how I said he can screw you over? Well, he can also grab Rings and run into bombs. While playing these stages, Tails is always following behind you and when you move Sonic, Tails moves a second after and that can cause problems. It's bad enough when I run into bombs and lose Rings, but when Tails had the one Ring I needed to complete the stage but ran into a bomb before I could finish? That is seriously irritating.

I could probably do it if I had someone else controlling Tails, but to this day, I have never been able to beat Sonic 2 on the Genesis with all 7 Chaos Emeralds collected, because I found the Special Stages just too annoying to even bother.

Sonic the Hedgehog 2 is often considered to be the best game in the original series. While I can see why people think that, I don't agree. I consider a certain other game to be the best of the original series, but we'll get to that in a bit. That being said, I still think Sonic 2 is a fantastic game that took what made the first game good and made it better. I still find myself replaying it many times and I will continue to do so.

SONIC CD:
(Sega CD - September 23, 1993)

Believe it or not, I had no idea Sonic CD or even the Sega CD console in general was a thing as a kid. It wasn't until I got the Sonic Mega Collection for the Nintendo GameCube that it come to my attention.

I was looking at the extra material when I noticed the movies section had a video called 'Sonic CD Intro Movie'. It was a short animated video showing Sonic running through fields and forests, over water and up cliffs like a badass. But I thought it was a cartoon and not a game. It wasn't till later that I found out it was an actual game, and I knew I had to try it out. I couldn't get a Sega CD or a copy of the game, but I did have a GameCube and there was another Sonic game compilation made for it called 'Sonic Gems Collection' which included such "classic" games as 'Sonic the Fighters' and 'Sonic R', but the stand out inclusion was most definitely Sonic CD.

As I started to play it, I was greeted by the intro movie I saw on the Mega Collection and then the game began. Right from the start, my reactions were all over the place. I liked how colorful it looked compared to Sonic 1 and Sonic 2. The music was catchy and it played pretty much like the originals (though I don't get why we needed 2 different Spin-Dash attacks).

But there were so many things that confused me. Why were there these posts that said 'Past' and 'Future'? Why did the enemies turn into flowers when I destroyed them? And why were the levels designed in such a ridiculous way that had me bouncing backwards, up, down and all around the place. It was kinda making me sick. It was hard to have fun with it cuz it was annoying me so much. I got to a point where I just stopped playing and didn't pick it back up until much later.

Much later I learned more about the game from watching YouTube videos, particularly by one user named: SomecallmeJohnny. His review of the game and a Let's Play he did inspired me to go back and replay it and play it the way it was meant to be played.

The main focus of Sonic CD is time travel, Sonic has to use these posts with the word 'Past' on them to travel back to a point in time before Robotnik took control of the Zone and filled it with his robots by destroying his Robot Generators, therefore making a good future with no enemies and very few hazards. When you do this for the first 2 acts all you need to do to make a good future for the entire Zone is to beat the bosses which range from pathetically easy to annoying and monotonous. You'll have to do this for 7 Zones. All the while you put up with the aforementioned, annoying level gimmicks.
In addition to 'Past' sign posts, there are also posts that can send you into the future. You'll want to avoid these if you don't want to complete the game with a bad future.

There is another way to ensure a good future for the Zones by collecting the Time Stones, this games version of Chaos Emeralds, but only if you can manage to get through the Special Stages. Like in Sonic 1, you need to collect at least 50 rings and jump into a large ring at the end of the first 2 acts. You then get transported into a 3D area where you have to run around and destroy a certain number of UFO's to obtain the Time Stone before the time runs out.
I'm gonna be honest, I hate these stages. The control is way too sluggish when it comes to turning, the UFO's move to erratically for me to even try and hit them and if you land in the water areas (which get more plentiful as you progress), your time will drop by 10 seconds and will run out before you even have time to notice it!
Instead, I always use the time travel method.

This game also introduced 2 characters who would become staples in the series. The first is Amy Rose, A pink Hedgehog who is in love with Sonic. During the second level, Sonic will run into Amy, who is swooning over the Blue Blur, when suddenly she gets kidnapped by the second new character: Metal Sonic, who also serves as the second to last boss of the game. Well, maybe boss isn't the right word, all you have to do is beat Metal Sonic in a race and he'll slam into a wall. With that done, you rescue Amy and proceed to the final Zone of the game.

I gained a new found appreciation for Sonic CD, and while I don't quite rank it as one of my top favorites, I still have a good time playing it, especially with a remade port released for PSN and Android devices in 2011.

Now if only a certain other game would be released on Android devices.
Speaking of which...

SONIC 3 & KNUCKLES

SONIC THE HEDGEHOG 3: (Sega Genesis - May 27, 1994)

SONIC & KNUCKLES: (Sega Genesis - October 18, 1994)

While I played a great deal of Sonic 1 and 2 at home, I still played it a lot when I was at my Daycare. And then, something crazy happened, I learned that there was a Sonic 3! I was eager to play the next installment in the series that I had grown to love so much. 

Unfortunately, I rarely got the chance. I was picked on a lot and the kid who brought his copy of Sonic 3 never let me play it, for no other reason other than, he didn't like me. It was a crushing experience. I would continue to be picked on until I eventually started Intermediate School. It didn't get much better though, I was verbally abused on an almost daily basis and it pretty much crushed my spirit to the point where I would count down the days till summer vacation, where I could hopefully find solace. And to add insult to injury, my Genesis stopped working and sadly it got thrown out. I had no way to play Sonic anymore are any other Genesis games I had like 'Aladdin' or 'Jurassic Park'.

That all changed one day during summer vacation when I was with my Mom at a Staples store, I was looking through the computer games and I saw the 'Sonic & Knuckles Collection'. Of course, I begged my Mom to buy it for me, she did and I love her for it. I installed it on our computer and I played it pretty much everyday till the cows came home. I would later get a brand new Genesis as well as the 'games' I'm talking about. 

You should know that the game I'm talking about is that it is technically made up of 2 games: 'Sonic the Hedgehog 3' and 'Sonic & Knuckles'. It was made to be one game, but was forced to be split apart because of time/budget reasons at SEGA. To make up for this, the cartridge for Sonic and Knuckles has a cartridge slot built into the top of it, by inserting Sonic 3 on top of it, you unlock 'Sonic 3 & Knuckles' the entire game as it was meant to be played. 

Remember how I said a lot of people thought Sonic 2 was the best game in the original series and how I don't think that's the case?

If you had to ask me to pick the best Sonic game in the series, I would Say Sonic 3 & Knuckles. There is so much I love about this game. Whenever I played through and died while playing Sonic 2, I had to start over from the beginning. Sonic 3, has a save feature that allows you to pick up from the zone you last played and when you play through the entire game, you unlock a level select. Once again you can choose to play as either Sonic and Tails together, Sonic alone or Tails alone (and you can make him fly this time!). And when you locked on with Sonic and Knuckles, you also got to play as Knuckles, a new character who can climb up walls, break through certain areas and glide through the air for a short amount of time. All of these make playing as Knuckles one of the highlights of this game.

Both games had 6 Zones with 2 Acts each and both Acts have their own unique musical tracks and boss fights. The Zones in this game can be huge, allowing for a lot of exploration and multiple pathways to get through the individual Acts. The game also plays out differently, depending on who you play as. Knuckles can go to areas and fight bosses exclusive to him and after completing all 18 Zones when playing as Sonic, a final level is unlocked called Doomsday Zone.

There have been power-ups in the past games, but none of them compare to the Elemental Shields in Sonic 3 & Knuckles. The Water Shield allows Sonic to breath underwater and gives him a bounce attack. The Flame Shield protects Sonic from Fire damage and allows Sonic to dash forward like a meteor. But my personal favorite is the Lightning Shield, it protects you from electrical attacks, allows you to do an extra jump in mid-air and attracts rings to you like a magnet. These shields were all awesome and I wish they were in more Sonic games.

Sonic 3 and Knuckles also has the best Special Stages of any Sonic game. By jumping into large Gold Ring's hidden throughout the 16 Acts, you are taken to an area with a large checkerboard floor and the goal is to run into a certain number of Blue Spheres and avoid Red Spheres (touching these will end the stage). These can be a bit hard at first, and if you spend a long enough time in these stages, Sonic will start to run faster, making getting the Blue Spheres a lot more difficult. But I with enough practice, these Special Stages can be easy to do and really fun.
In fact, the Sonic and Knuckles Collection I owned also had the Blue Sphere stages as a separate selectable game. The number of levels you can play are in the millions and I spent a lot of time playing them. Believe me they can get crazy!
Anyway, completing the Special Stages will award you a Chaos Emerald and when you collect all 7, you can turn into Super Sonic. Unlike Sonic 2, I can actually accomplish this goal and blaze through the game as Super Sonic. 

In addition to Chaos Emeralds, Sonic 3 & Knuckles introduces the Super Emeralds, which you can collect after you start the second half of the game. If you thought Super Sonic was cool, if you collect the 7 Super Emeralds, Sonic can turn into HYPER SONIC. And Hyper Sonic is ridiculously awesome! He can move faster, jump higher and can do a dash attack that can kill every enemy in your vicinity.

The Super Emeralds also gives you access to Super Tails, which allows Tails to run and fly faster. But the best thing about Super Tails is how he is surrounded by 4 invincible birds that take out any nearby enemies and make boss fights a joke. Knuckles also gets a Super and Hyper form.

The gameplay, music, levels and content easily make this my favorite Sonic game and, in my opinion, the greatest Sonic game EVER. I've played it more times than I can care to count and have basically become a master at it.

As new game hardware came out, so did more Sonic games. Unfortunately, I was unable to play them for a while because I didn't have the systems to play them on. I would play them eventually and I'll be taking about those next. In part 2, I will look at Sonic's jump into 3D and all the highs and lows that came with it.

TO BE CONTINUED...

Click here for Part 2

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