Sonic games I will always play.

Sonic The Hedgehog (1991) - I played this recently, and I was still discovering things which I at first didn't think were possible, but are.  It's fascinating.  I almost want to record an LP of it in spite of the fact I don't know the game that well.

Sonic The Hedgehog 2 - My least favorite of the Genesis titles, but without a doubt, I've played through this game more than it's predecessor and have familiar paths I took memorized.  What makes this game the least favored are the special stages.  Only once have I gotten all the Chaos Emeralds through the special stages and I didn't even do it legitimately. (Thanks, YouTube + Pause Button + Save Feature.)  As a kid, I abused the Super Sonic codes the most in this game.

Sonic The Hedgehog 3 - I honestly cannot enjoy Sonic 3 without Sonic & Knuckles.  The game alone probably has my least favorite stages in terms of their themes.  However, it does have my most favored Sonic animations and it gave birth to the best special stages.  I hated Ice Cap 1 because Sonic/Super Sonic could clip through the ground during the first slide.  Was pretty creepy for me as a kid.  Who could forget the horrendous effort it took to get the sound test/level select/debug code to work?  It was a party when I got the debug working...!

Sonic & Knuckles - I absolutely love the stage themes of this game... all of them (now that I think about it).  I loved Hidden Palace Zone with it's Death Egg poking through the ceiling and the Master and Hyper Emerald altars.  The enemy design was smarter than Sonic 3's.  The music was also better than Sonic 3's as well (don't worry, I love Hydrocity Act 2's music).  But again... I just can't bear to play it unless it's...

Sonic 3 & Knuckles - What I feel was the pinnacle of the classic Sonic experience.  Everything all of a sudden was better.  No more clipping through the floor of Ice Cap 1 among other bug fixes.  Tails was in Sonic & Knuckles.  I don't want to list everything that made this game legendary.  The Genesis series was just the best to watch go from Green Hill Zone Act 1, to Doomsday Zone.  At least you could access the sound test/level select with the S&K code.... though I don't remember how debug worked.  I rarely used it for this game.


What?  Only the classics?  I never mentioned Sonic Adventure 2 on any of my lists.  Adventure 2 is probably going to become a game that I won't play again for much longer because I swear, the last time I played it, the only sense of enjoyment I could get out of it was running the forest stage with Shadow, and Sonic's last stage with all the grind rails.  I doubt that I would be interested in speed running those stages as I'm really not a fan of Adventure's controls.  It really is the most mediocre Sonic game that I've played.

Obligatory SA2 post.

http://www.sonicstadium.org/2012/06/sonic-adventure-2-confirmed-for-xbox-live-marketplace/

(And I just got word that SA1 + Director's Cut on XBL is going for 600 MS points this week.)

I'm actually looking forward to this release and I'm glad that they decided to put it in HD.  However, I do have a few concerns.

Seeing this screenshot and all, the first thing I'm wondering is what the framerate is going to be like for the 2-player mode.  When I played this game on the Dreamcast, the 2-player mode was pretty horrible.  More than the drop in frames, it was slow.  I only wonder now that it's running on significantly more powerful hardware, will this still be an issue?  Yeah, this is going to be the "Battle" version and I didn't get to see the 2-player mode in the Gamecube version, so...

If there were to change anything, all I'd ask is for Knuckles to have his radar work like it did in SA1 where it would go off for every shard instead of just one at a time.  THAT'S IT.  Knowing Sega, that's a lot to ask for even if that was centered around one of the game's largest problems: Knuckles' enormous stages.  For me, and I'm sure a lot of other people, that would make the replay value of the game go up.

Then we can hail it as the greatest 3D Sonic game ever made... ha!  I don't think so.  This game was overall a step up from SA1 and IMO, better than Sonic Heroes as far as story, variety of gameplay, voice acting... and MUSIC are concerned.  SA2 really did have one of the best Sonic OSTs in the series.

So did SA1 as well.

And for now, that is all!

Happy June!

And we start on a blue note as always but this time, through an E3 trailer of Sonic & All Stars Racing TRANSFORMED where we're welcomed with more heads of the Sonic cast going through what is... a Skies of Arcadia theme?  Either way, check it out if you haven't already.

I wonder if there will be a playable build at E3 next week?  Guess we'll just have to stay tuned for now.

That's all that Sega seems to have lined up as far as Sonic goes.  Yup.  In spite of all the rumors lately, there is absolutely no chance Sonic Adventure 2 will make an appearance there.  You should know by now how Sega employees, or "Sega employees," and Gamestop employees, church friends, neighbors and even your pet rat love to troll Sonic fans with false information. :P

(Shit better be 16.9 or delay of purchase.)