Sonic The Hedgehog 2

[Guest]

"Don't just sit there and waste your precious time. When you want to do something, do it right away. Do it when you can. It's the only way to live a life without regrets."

Background Info

Sonic The Hedgehog 2 is a game in the Sonic series released for the SEGA Mega Drive/Genesis in Japan on November 21, 1992 & November 24, 1992 in the USA & Europe. As the title obviously tells, it is a sequel to the original Sonic The Hedgehog on the Genesis, released in June 1991. Due to the groundbreaking success of the first game, it would be obvious to make a sequel for the newfound fans of the blue hedgehog. Due to quarrels between Yuji Naka & SEGA of Japan, and Naka eventually leaving SEGA to look for another job, the original team that had created the original Sonic would not be developing this game, so SEGA hired Mark Cerny to create a new gaming studio for the company, which would become the Sega Technical Institute, which was founded in the United States in order to develop Sonic 2, along with members of Sonic Team.

Though at the beginning of development, Cerny had gotten Naka, and a few others from the Japanese staff to help with work on the game. Many ideas were bustling around for the game, and the team planned to introduce a new main character to the series to be a friend of Sonic, and accompany him on his adventures.. With a small competition, Yasushi Yamaguchi won with his character, Miles "Tails" Prower, a young fox with two tails. Making his official debut in this game (though technically first appearing in the 8-bit Master System/Game Gear version, which was released shortly before it's much more well-known 16-bit brother), and eventually become one of the most popular characters in the series.

Art of Miles "Tails" Prower made for this game.

When the game was released worldwide in late November, it was advertised as "Sonic 2sday" due to the simultaneous release in Europe & America, on November 24.The game got almost near perfect scores at the time, and became a tremendous commercial success, by being able to sell over 6 million copies, becoming the best selling game of the 16-bit era, and the best selling game on the Mega Drive, becoming one of the most successful video games of all time. (What also helped sales is that it was bundled with the Genesis) Also helping Sonic become a cultural phenomenon in the West, and heighten the competition between SEGA & Nintendo. The game has been so popular that it's been ported to many consoles, such as the Sega Saturn, PC, GameCube, PS2, Xbox, PSP, Wii, PS3, 360, iPhone, & DS.

Story

The story of Sonic 2 takes place after the events of the first game. After Sonic had stopped Dr. Eggman from taking over South Island, and saved his animal friends, Sonic was restless and wanted to look for adventure. He booted up his biplane called the "Tornado", and flew around in the skies until he decided to land on an island called Westside Island. A few days after landing on the island, he notices someone had been following him, a young fox. Sonic had ignored it, and continued running, the fox continued to follow him. The fox's name was Miles Prower, but known as "Tails" by his peers because he donned two tails instead of one. Inspired by Sonic's cool and confident attitude, he saw him as an idol, and wanted to be like him. "Tails" discovered Sonic's plane, the Tornado, and was engrossed in it's design, then seeing Sonic sleeping under a tree nearby. While still looking at the plane, an explosion occurred near Emerald Hill Zone, which surprised Tails, and Sonic was shocked awake from his sleep. It was no other than the diabolical deeds of Dr. Eggman, who wants to imprison the animals on Westside Island, and collect the 7 mystical gems known as the Chaos Emeralds to power his evil flying fortress of destruction, the Death Egg. Sonic ran to the source of the explosion, with "Tails" following.

The first entry of the Death Egg Saga has begun.

Gameplay & Content

Still retaining the original formula of the original Sonic, running, spinning, jumping, avoiding obstacles, & destroying badniks while trying to reach the end of an Act in a Zone all in under 10 minutes. What would later be a staple move in later Sonic titles introduced in this game is the Spin Dash (or Super Dash Attack as it's called here), a move that allows Sonic to rev up in place in form of a ball, and dash away in a burst of speed, destroying any badniks in front of him. This allows you to gain speed more quickly than a usual spin attack on the ground by holding the down button when running fast enough. The speed cap has also been removed in this game, which is pretty nifty, since it somewhat bothered me in Sonic 1.

Two characters are playable in the game, Sonic, and his sidekick, Tails. When playing with the "Sonic & Tails" option, you control Sonic, while Tails, as an A.I. automatically follows wherever you go. Tails has an infinite amount of lives, which will help you a lot whenever a 2nd player is playing as Tails. Whenever dying, Tails flys down back to the ground. Despite the flying animation being shown, he is not able to fly, and plays exactly like Sonic. Tails would not be able to obtain his flying ability until the release of Sonic The Hedgehog 3 in February 1994. You can also have the option to play as Sonic or Tails alone.

Unlike Sonic 1, there is a larger number of zones in this game. Compared to Sonic 1's 7 zones, Sonic 2 has 11 zones. Instead of 3 acts per zone in the previous game (facing the boss at the end of act 3, there are 2 acts per zone in this one. (Facing the boss in the end of act 2). Here they are listed:

(Many other zones were scrapped during development because of time constraints, such as the famous & much discussed Hidden Palace Zone, Dust Hill Zone, Wood Zone, Cyber City Zone, and others.)

Special stages also return to this game, but are vastly different from those in the previous game. Instead of going in a giant ring by having 50 rings by the end of the stage, you must find a Starpost around the Zone, and have 50 rings with you. Once touching it, stars start going around the pole, and you must jump into them to enter the special stage. Instead of being on an acid trip in a maze, you are running in a psuedo-3D area, specifically a half-pipe and collecting a set amount of rings by the time you reach a checkpoint. There are bombs set through the stage that make you lose 10 rings each time you touch them, and it can cost you in later stages if Tails (the A.I. version) idiotically decides to not move out of the way of bombs. Once passing through 3 checkpoints with the amount of rings needed, you earn the Chaos Emerald. If you don't have enough rings at a checkpoint, you don't get the Chaos Emerald, and you are teleported back to the zone you were in.

A still of the special stage in this game.

The 7 Chaos Emeralds.

When you collect you all 7 Chaos Emeralds, when collecting 50 rings, and jumping in the air, you transform into a much faster, invincible, golden-colored version of Sonic called Super Sonic. Not only is it a worthy award for getting all the emeralds, (especially since the later special stages are hell) it basically allows you to beat any zone in the game with ease. The Super Sonic form would be available by collecting the emeralds in the special stages in the following games, Sonic 3 and Sonic & Knuckles. Getting all the emeralds also gets you a good ending, if you didn't collect all of them, you get a bad ending.

Super Sonic art.

This is also the first Sonic game to have a multiplayer mode. The first plays as Sonic, while the other plays as Tails. The screen is horizontally split, and you must race each other to the goal. There are only 3 zones playable. Emerald Hill, Casino Night, & Mystic Cave. 2 acts are in each zone, and each zone has it's own unique music remix from it's 1-player counterpart.

Thoughts

My thoughts on Sonic 2? Simple. I LOVE THIS GAME TO BITS. It improves everything from Sonic 1. Visuals, music, bosses, gameplay. Everything. I just have an absolute joy playing this game. It's my favorite 2D Sonic game before CD, and easily one of my favorites in the series. Sonic The Hedgehog 2 is an unaging classic that has stood the test of time like the 2 other games in the classic Genesis trilogy, and may as well be one of the best platformers ever made. I literally don't have any beef with this game, other than the 2-player mode.

Other than that, what are your overall thoughts & opinions on Sonic 2? Your favorite pieces of music, and zones from the game? What do you like & dislike about the game? What scrapped zones and concepts would you have liked to see in the game? Nearly 20 years later, has it held up?

Discuss anything generally about Sonic 2!

MOD Edit: I've removed links in this posts that were hot-linked images from Retro, as retro is experiencing Malware attacks at the moment, which is the reason people are getting warnings upon entering this topic.

Please refrain from hotlinking from their site, and instead rehost your images elsewhere. I know it's a bummer losing some of the flavour from the post, but we can't risk the spread of malicious software.

- remy/remz

Edited August 4, 2012 by Felix
cleaning

[The drunkard from space!]

Best Sonic game next to 3&Knuckles. The End./Thread

[Dr. Dipshit]

I personally think it's boring.

Definitely my least favorite of the Classics. I stop caring about the game from the time you finish Casino Night up until the time you start Metropolis.

The other half of the game is really something awesome, though.

[Soniman]

Best Sonic game ever.

I'm not kidding.

[Wittymations]

It's a'ight. I love Chemical Plant Zone.

And the starting creen makes me happy every time. Probably colorfulness and music.

[MegaMan_EXE]

I have a history with Sonic 2. After beating and experiencing the greatness known as Sonic 1, I knew there was a sequel. So, I spent 800 Wii Points at the Virtual Console for this game. The SECOND I pressed Start, I was blown away by it. The speed was much faster than the first, and Chemical Plant made me excited! The welcome addition of the Spin Dash was a truly amazing one. No longer do we have to walk all the back to a decent distance to run a loop. We can now press Down on the D-Pad and press any jump button to rev Sonic up and make your life easier. The Zones were much more detailed and looked more colorful than the first. Casino Night's busy city and neon lights, Chemical Plant's city, tubes and Mega-Muck, and Metropolis's machinery, are just a few examples.

The music is fantastic! Sonic 1 had a solid soundtrack, and Sonic 2 improves on every level. None of the songs feel like filler, with my personal favorites being Chemical Plant and Oil Ocean. I had Oil Ocean in my head since I played Sonic 2 for the first time. That has to tell you something right there!

Now we get to the welcome addition known as Tails. Tails is by far my favorite Sonic character. EVER! He followed you everywhere you went, and while he was useless in Single Player, it was funny to see him die over and over, and come back like Kenny from South Park XD. When playing the Single Player with two players was the shit! Tails was invincible and could take on anything. Sadly, you couldn't fly as Tails, but that was probably made for the 2-Player Mode.

The 2-Player mode is one of my two issues with the game. While it is fun to play with someone else through Emerald Hill, Casino Night, Mystic Cave, and the Special Stage with their own music pieces, it's shallow at best. I wish there could've been more Zones like Chemical Plant, or Metropolis, or even Wing Fortress. After maybe a half-hour, it gets boring, and you want to play the amazing Single Player.

The Special Stage, while iconic, and used in a lot of other Sonic games like Rush, and recently, 4 Episode 2, is my other problem with the game. I do like the look, and music of it, but it's frustrating! It forces you to memorize the stages, and while that may not seem so bad, it will get on your nerves if you want the Chaos Emeralds to get Super Sonic. Speaking of Super Sonic, he is EPIC! When you manage to get the 7 Chaos Emeralds, get 50 Rings, and jump in the air, you become the shiny Super Sonic, who's invincible, and is SUPER fast, managing to outrun the screen. However, can get killed by being crushed, falling into a pit, or drowning.

Anyway, that's my thoughts on Sonic 2. A perfect example of a sequel that is a lot better than the original, making improvements in every way. The fact that is game is on my Top 5 favorite Sonic games list is saying something, since this is a game that is impossible to waste your money on. If you haven't played this game, go play it, because you're missing out on an important game. I give this game a 9 out of 10. Buy it, now!

[Law]

It's alright, much better than Sonic 1.

Except for Sonic CD <3

[UltDevilDoom]

Sonic 2 wasn't just the first Sonic game I played. It was the first video game I ever played. Captivating is an understatement.

[Sonictrainer]

This was my first videogame ever.

[Old dead account]

Super special awesome game, 3rd IMO aside from S3&K and CD. I couldn't get past chemical plant at first so I decided not to play it until I beat Sonic 1 and got better. It was a great improvement on the first, longer faster, much less simple than the first. A great Improvement from the first, only bested by S3&k in terms of improvement. Overall a fun experience made even funner by that hack with the scrapped levels that the guy completed (though he could've put more effort into it).

[Stritix]

It's ok. It was good for its time, but rather dull and bland now. It's my least favorite classic title.

[Tornado]

Sonic 2 has the worst level design of the set. Yes, that includes CD; and yes, I also mean before they stopped caring (ie. Hill Top).

That alone drives me to play all of the other ones (or Sonic Advance, or Sonic 2 SMS) before I even think about playing it nowadays.

Edited July 26, 2012 by Gilda

[Soniman]

Implying any of Sonic 2's levels are worst than Wacky Workbench.

[Tornado]

Implying any of Sonic 2's levels are worst than Wacky Workbench.

I'm not implying it:

I'm stating it outright.

Edited July 26, 2012 by Gilda

[Soniman]

Id argue that isolated hiccups in level design are better than an entire level of horrible design.

[Tornado]

They aren't isolated. Those were just the most immediate examples of dickishness that came to mind. The Dimps-esque (Sonic 2-esque?) "We're going to encourage you to go fast with springs, boosters and speedy loops but then punish you by placing things just right so they nail you when you open 'er up" theory of game difficulty is prevalent throughout the entire game. It's not Rush-bad (and CERTAINLY not Advance 3-bad), but it is there. If even pops up in Emerald Hill once or twice; and by the time Metropolis comes around the game is openly taunting you.

That's quite a bit worse to me than one slow platforming level being obnoxious to get through if you refuse to play it like a slow platforming level.

Edited July 26, 2012 by Gilda

[Plasmette]

This game has cheap enemy placements and feels rushed.

Nuff said.

[Burnt Ash]

Sonic 2 was okay, I guess. Then again, while I like the classics to an extent, I'm not a huge fan of them. Sonic 2 is still pretty fun from time to time. I particularly like Emerald Hill, Chemical Plant, Metropolis, and the final boss zone thing.

[SilJeff]

I personally think (keywords: "personally" and "think") Sonic the Hedgehog 2 is the second best game in the series, I put it between Sonic 3 & Knuckles (this is what I consider to be THE best) and Sonic Adventure 2 (IMO the 3rd best one) *activates flame shield*

I hate the final boss, though, along with the special stages, because of #1 they get reused ALL the time and #2 I find them too tedious.

also, I never cared for Mystic Cave Zone

[Milo]

This game has cheap enemy placements and feels rushed.

Nuff said.

Actually, it was rushed, considering the one-year development time it had. But it still ended up being a critical and commercial success.

[Kiah]

Discuss anything generally about Sonic 2!

Will do. Great opening post by the way Felix...

My thoughts on Sonic 2? I absolutely loved it! As much as I loved Sonic 1, Sonic 2 was better. Sonic 2 gave us more zones and the spin dash (which is my only gripe playing Sonic 1 since it wasn't there and I'm still trying to make Sonic spin dash in the game). The only zone I didn't like was Hill Top Zone. I didn't like the music and it looked so bland with all of that blue:

Ugh, it's like overkill with all that blue...That is my only complaint about the game honestly. Everything else was either admired (music, level design) by me or easily tolerated (Tails in the Special Stages).

My favorite zone in the game I think had to be Casino Night Zone. The beautiful bright colors and lights amid a night background was absolutely gorgeous. I honestly got a kick out of boosting up points via the tiles and getting rings via the slot machines. Don't tell me I was the only one who got "Time Over" doing this over and over again in Casino Night Zone with the slot machines:

I would get so caught up trying to get the jackpot, racking up on rings and extra lives that I would lose track of time and run out of it. Oh well. Good times.

And Tails! As obnoxious as he was during the Special stages, I was glad that he was in the game accompaning Sonic. Tails proved to be helpful at times, although it wasn't much. I thought Sonic 2 was a good debut for Tails, I am glad that he is still around as Sonic's faithful sidesick and best friend almost 2 decades later.

The kid is flying an airplane...how cool and impressive is that?!

So in short, Sonic 2 is a great game in my opinion, definitely one of my favorites. I loved Sonic 2 then back in 1992 and I still love it nearly 20 years later.

[Jmh]

I love it. Definitely in my top five.

[Solkia]

Short answer: Enemy placement.

Long answer: Sonic 2 is an example of a game slightly fucked over by deadlines. So much potential, so little time. If the game had been finished, and didn't have anything cut from it, it could have possibly been the best of the Classic series. Yes, even better than S3K.

However, you can tell there was more to the game then what time allowed. Enemy placement is fucking terrible, and just screams "Oh shit we don't have much time to finish this, better hurry". Super Sonic, while fun, is incredibly glitchy, and is unavoidable once you have 50 rings.

Also, fuck the pallet glitch in Emerald Hill and that fucking fan character "Asura" that it shat into the minds of the fans.

All this said, it was my first Sonic game ever, so it has a place in my heart.

Edited July 26, 2012 by Solkia-kun

[Soniman]

Was I the only person ever who actually liked Hill Top?

[Solkia]

I like everything about Hill Top but the music. The Music is awful.