Sonic the Hedgehog 2

Yea i dont get Sonic. Why make a game which plays so well at high speed, and yet have level design that effectively punishes you for going fast. Everything in this one is so polished, from the fluid gameplay to the adrenaline pumped music. I dont understand why they choose to give the player so many tools for speed and then place enemies and traps in the middle of the course, and there is no way someone is fast enough to react to those. I played and enjoyed a couple of sonic games when i was a kid, but playing this one now it becomes apparent how flawed of a concept this is.

This sequel was made during hectic conditions, considering Sonic's creator felt misused by Sega of Japan and went to America to make this sequel with the help of the Sega Technical Institute (who, believe it or not, don't make calculators). The overall improved speed, fluidity of movement, and refinement of small things -- such as, air bubbles being more frequent, less luck-based -- make this a great sequel.

However, it lacks the polish of the first. The visuals are too busy at times, the soundtrack isn't anywhere near as good as the first -- yes, Chemical Plant is amazing but the rest isn't -- and the later levels feel cheap and confused. The game focuses on speed yet it throws in enemies who you'll hit while zipping down a lane, counteracting its intended goal. I didn't have this problem with the first and it sours me here. A good sequel but not superior to the first, even if it is much faster and colorful.

Genuinely do not understand the hype behind this game to this day, it makes me believe the way to draw in an audience is make a game look really good and sound really good and they'll just accept it. The control is decent, the visuals are good, and the music is good, but then the level design is absolutely awful. I feel like with something like a highspeed platformer the idea to get across is rewarding a player for going fast while also dealing with the obstacles ahead, but that's not possible for Sonic 2 without repeated playthroughs as trying to go fast will result in you crashing into an enemy without any real reaction time. The game also has questionable collision, with several times where I was crushed in Chemical Plant while being on top of the block. At the end of the day it's cool that the control is good, but the level design itself is just plain bad and it makes the levels a chore to go through. I lost interest the minute I got to Chemical Plant and my interest slowly fell more and more the more zones I went through.

The first Sonic the Hedgehog did not succeed in swaying me. Sega thought that their audacity to spurn the undisputed video game champ of Nintendo was totally justified because they claimed Sonic’s unequivocal awesomeness would render the likes of Mario null and void. All we had to do as gamers was take a chance on its competition and help usher in Sega’s gaming empire. While Sonic and the Sega Genesis/Mega Drive provided a worthy alternative to Nintendo’s systems, the company did not eclipse Nintendo’s presence and dethrone them from their seat as the king of the gaming medium. Given that Sonic was the juggernaut that Sega paraded in this battle they created, it’s a wonder how they ever fathomed a chance of winning. Admittedly, Sonic had charisma, appeal, and a performative prowess that outmatched anyone from Nintendo’s mascot line up. However, the “blast-processing” mumbo-jumbo Sega touted was nothing but a cheap gimmick (what a surprise). As lame as it sounds, Mario has persisted because his platforming is practical and suitable for the world he resides in. Sonic’s blisteringly fast momentum did not bode well with the constant obstacles that constantly halted his trajectory. In fact, the first Sonic title presented so many walls, enemies, and awkward platforming sections in Sonic’s way that it seemed as if speed was discouraged. Fortunately, gaming is littered with sequels that strive in mending the blemishes of the previous title. Considering Sonic’s popularity, the release of one was inevitable. One year after Sonic’s debut, Sonic the Hedgehog 2 was the sequel that could potentially convert skeptics like myself by overhauling all of Sonic’s flaws and finally impact Nintendo’s reign over the industry.

One can only tweak Sonic so much before going overboard. He’s a simple character with a restrained array of abilities. The blue hedgehog’s prime asset is his speed which can get bogged down from over complicating it with the frills of upgrades. Sonic would have faltered even more if Sega granted Sonic with as many power ups as Nintendo did for Mario in Super Mario Bros. 3. Any enhancement to Sonic would have to expand and or accommodate his sprightly nature. Given that Sonic already zooms across the map like a bat out of hell, making him faster would’ve rendered him unplayable. The developers wisely decided to augment a component of Sonic’s speed that wasn’t his maximum potential. Climbing up inclined ledges in the first game tended to be awkward due to not having enough innate momentum to scale up the next platform. The game assumes that the player should be blazing through the level, but fails to consider all the assorted enemies and numerous collisions with the walls along the way that upset the rate of movement. Sega’s solution to this common dilemma was the spin dash, a manual method of gaining momentum for getting over those stubbornly steep ledges or simply for a quick boost. Crouching and holding down the jump button will cause Sonic to rev up enough kinetic energy by spinning in place, and releasing him will cause Sonic to dash while curled up in a ball with enough speed to overcome a number of platforming hurdles. Sonic can also utilize this move for the assorted roller coaster loops and plow over most ground-floor enemies. The spin dash is a stroke of genius that compliments Sonic’s swift and alert gameplay while also greatly compensating for the abrupt cessations at the core of Sonic’s faulty design. In the grand scheme of Sonic ingenuity, the introduction of the spin dash is akin to inventing the wheel: a requisite for any Sonic game whose inclusion in Sonic 2 consigns the first game to the prehistoric dark ages.

If the player didn’t immediately launch themselves into the game with the pressing of the start button, they may have noticed that Sonic is sharing the space of the open-faced emblem in the game’s menu. His golden, furry compadre smiling at the player and gesturing his fist is Miles Prower, who is thankfully better recognized by his nickname “Tails” because his full name is a god awful pun. Long before Sega gave Sonic enough friends to fill a penthouse orgy, this plucky fox with a genetic mutation was his first and only aid in saving the woodland critters of Mobius from becoming Robotnik’s mechanized slaves. As subsequent entries in the Sonic franchise were released, Tails' role as the mechanical wizkid and his quest for self confidence is extrapolated, but not so much here. All we see pertaining to this in his debut here is him escorting Sonic through the sky via a biplane. However, one aspect of Tails seen here that remains consistent throughout the series is his supporting, second banana status to Sonic. Like Luigi before him, Tails is the “little brother” character for the second player, intending to have significantly less impact and precedence. Tails even takes the secondary role a step beyond Luigi as the game sets Sonic and Tails on the field simultaneously. The second player will hardly get the sensation that they are playing as Tails because the camera will solely focus on Sonic, leaving Tails in the dust as Sonic zips around at the speed of light. Tails also cannot die, which ultimately makes the second player ideal for dealing with the Robotnik encounters while Sonic sits back and fondles his chili dog. Talk about being insignificant! Player 1 also has the option of playing as Tails as a solo venture, but who would want to play as a character that is slower than Sonic without any special attributes? Adding Tails to the experience was a slight sampler of the bloated character roster that Sega always planned for Sonic.

The first game’s core problem was not the lack of the spin dash or a buddy that follows Sonic around like a dog. Sonic’s debut title misfired due to the questionable designs seen across most levels in the game. Lethargic platforming sections and trudging slowly through water was completely counterintuitive to Sonic’s ideal purpose of sprinting through levels. Green Hill Zone, the starting level of the first Sonic game, was the only area that granted Sonic reasonable legroom to strut his stuff. Unfortunately, the game peaked at Green Hill Zone as every following level decided to inhibit Sonic at seemingly every step of the way. Emerald Hill Zone, Sonic 2’s first level, treats the player to the same standard of quality as Green Hill did, but there is something peculiar about it. It doesn’t take a staunch Sonic enthusiast to notice that Emerald Hill Zone looks exactly like Green Hill Zone, almost down to the name. Emerald Hill possesses the same tropical foliage, mountainous towers of earth, a sparkling body of water in the background, etc. A few minor differences include a color pallet swap for the wasp bots, monkeys flinging coconuts from the tops of trees, and corkscrew sections that share the space with the inverted roller coaster loops. Starting the game with a remixed Green Hill Zone is refreshing and all, but it might signify that not only is the game repeating itself, but Sonic is already out of ideas.

When I stated that I’d be happy with the first Sonic game if it only included Green Hill Zone, I was being hyperbolic. Repeating Green Hill Zone to the extent of a full game would be like a cereal that has nothing but marshmallows: the nuance is completely gone. Upon further consideration, perhaps Sonic 2 upholds the idea of only offering Green Hill Zone. No, I don’t mean almost the exact same level repeated ad nauseam like Emerald Hill, but levels that recreate the design and essence of Green Hill Zone using it as a template. My worries of Sonic 2 repeating the mistakes of its predecessor were relieved with Chemical Zone, the level that follows Emerald Hill. Despite Chemical Zone displaying a more sterile, urban setting, the fabric of Green Hill Zone is interwoven in Chemical Zone’s industrial intricacies. Double helixed ramps zigzag through several connecting routes as complex as the DNA structures they are modeled after. Pneumatic energy pushes Sonic through a series of tubes whose channels are so roundabout that it's liable to make the player feel dizzy. Downward ramps are so steep that it’s a wonder that Sonic’s inclined acceleration doesn’t make him catch fire. When Sonic reaches the bottom of these slopes, he jets off so vigorously that the camera struggles to catch up, hitting the wall on the right side of the screen as a result. One moment in the second act that breaks this whirlwind pacing is when Sonic must climb a series of moving blocks to avoid drowning in the rising pink water.(?) Somehow, platforming sections involving ascension don’t feel as jarring as those found in the first game, most likely because they still require movement. Chemical Plant Zone is an electrifying playground that exemplifies the pinnacle of Sonic’s level design. If not for Green Hill Zone serving as the precedent an entire game earlier, I’d declare Chemical Plant as the ultimate classic Sonic level.

While Chemical Plant is the stand out level in Sonic 2, the game does not suffer from a massive decline in quality after experiencing the best that the game has to offer. While not as intense and multifaceted as Chemical Plant, each subsequent level still uses Green Hill Zone as a source of inspiration. Just the name of Aquatic Ruin Zone may be enough to send shivers down the spines of anyone who was traumatized by the painful, underwater slog that was Labyrinth Zone. However, Aquatic Ruin might be a testament that the developers learned their lesson and adapted accordingly. Aquatic Ruin is modeled with two distinct layers, one being the rocky ruins over the water and one being submerged in the drink. Accidently dipping into the water while speeding through the dry route is a soft penalty, but traversing the underwater path is as viable a means to navigate the level. Sonic’s speed is only slightly reduced as opposed to wading through water at a snail’s pace, and bubbling spots for Sonic to breathe are seen more frequently. Eventually, the two paths will intersect by the end of the level, a fantastic conclusion to the zone and another example of the layered design from Green Hill Zone in full effect. Casino Night Zone is a fully realized version of Spring Yard Zone, a flashy nocturnal setting beaming with the pizzazz of city nightlife. This zone marks the beginning of Sonic levels themed around casinos, with pinball bumpers and slot machines galore as part of the level design. Hill Top is a craggy, volcanic crater that further expands on the ascension sections seen in Chemical Plant. Mystic Cave is the most labyrinthine level that still manages to offer multiple paths, and Oil Ocean presents a series of cannons whose implementation in the level is similar to the pipes in Chemical Zone. The only level that shits the bed is Metropolis Zone, the final fully-fledged level with multiple acts. This level’s unfair enemy placements and the sections involving the bolts where Sonic has to rev up them on the nut recalls some of the worst aspects from levels seen in the first game. Sega evidently didn’t grasp how to execute a Sonic’s game’s difficulty curve smoothly as Metropolis Zone and the finale level Wing Fortress digress back to Sonic 1’s flaws in the name of amping up the challenge near the end of the game.

I still find fault with the fact that Sega insists on crafting Sonic games with a punishing arcade difficulty in mind. Yet again, the player only has a piddly three lives to complete the game and losing all of them blows the player right back to the very bottom. Even though this still irritates me, I suppose I can’t fault the developers too much for at least making survival easier for the player. While boxes containing extra lives still aren’t placed generously, the player now has the opportunity to stack lives without having to collect 100 rings. If the player manages to finish a stage with an estimated ballpark of at least 50 rings, an icon of Sonic will appear. Doing this in succession will net the player an extra life. Having around the same amount of rings when reaching any checkpoint also transports the player to this game’s special zone in a haze of red light. Special zones in Sonic serve as opportunities to net one of seven prized Chaos Emeralds and since checkpoints are fairly commonplace, the player could potentially acquire all seven of them after the second zone to use Super Sonic. As lenient as that sounds, the half-pipe sections in the special stages are no cakewalk, but at least acquiring rings and avoiding bombs is feasible unlike the rotating game of chance presented in the first game.

I’m not sure the additional perks in Sonic 2 could prepare the player for the final bout against Robotnik. Just like the first game, the mustachioed mechanical madman will appear at the end of each level’s final act as a boss. He hovers around in the same pod, but he still has some crazy new ideas to conquer Sonic. Ultimately, every new trick Robotnik has up his sleeves results in the same easy roulette of boss encounters from the first game. That is, until Sonic reaches the zenith of his Death Egg battleship for the final duel. Before Robotnik must face his blue adversary for the last time, he decides to release an ugly, hostile robotic model of Sonic known colloquially as Metal Sonic. Metal Sonic has had many appearances in later Sonic titles with more coloring and a sharper-looking sheen, but his clunky bronze form shows his humble origins like Marvel’s Iron Man. He also doesn’t pose much of a challenge, but the same cannot be said for the Death Egg Robot that Robotnik scurries into once Sonic has defeated his mechanized mirror. Robotnik’s mech is unpredictable and punishing, and the player must flirt with the stingiest of high hitboxes to do any real damage to it. Super Sonic would’ve been nifty and apropos for this climactic confrontation, but the developers thought it wise to deprive the player of any rings. Not only will the player die upon getting hit even once, but they will also be forced to fight Metal Sonic again. The process of fighting both of these bots will most likely drain the player’s lives, causing the player to go back to square one even at the final bout. If you can claim that you’ve never lost all of your lives to the Death Egg Robot and were crestfallen at the result at any point while playing this game, you’re a liar.

I love it when developers can take some time to honestly reflect on the faults of their games and use what they’ve learned to craft a smoother experience for the next title. One would not expect this type of introspection with Sonic the Hedgehog as Sega basically used their new mascot to bite their thumbs at Nintendo like rude little miscreants. Upon seeing the final product that was Sonic’s debut, Sega realized that all the boasting they did made them look like total jackasses as they didn’t have a leg to stand on. Sonic the Hedgehog 2 is an exemplary sequel that finally proves Sonic’s capabilities with expanding on the first game’s one exceptional attribute: Green Hill Zone. Using the multilayered design and lenient range of obstacles of Green Hill Zone, Sega formulated a bevy of levels that arguably surpass Green Hill Zone in complementing Sonic’s lighting-fast velocity. I still think that some aspects of this game are rather harsh, but the overall product wouldn’t make me feel duped if I hypothetically cheated on Nintendo with Sega by purchasing a Genesis console back in the day.

Thee Sonic game, or the one I always think of whenever the franchise is mentioned. And a vast improvement from the first in every single way, if I could honestly nit pick, Tails does feel rather superfluous unless you are playing 2 player. Also, one of the best soundtracks, period. Casino Zone, Chemical Zone, Hill Top. Yeah, no duds here.

Sonic 2 is wonderful, it's a game that takes the best elements from its first entry and spends the vast majority of the runtime simply expanding upon those ideas and transforming them into the dominant experience rather than balancing them out with some more messy ones. Above all it feels as if the designers, having had the experience from the first game in terms of understanding how to build a game around the incredible speed and momentum that the player was able to craft, were able to make something that was a much more consistently engaging time where there were less harsh pacebreakers and far greater heights that could be reached as well. While a big part of this comes from the much tighter level design, the changes to Sonic's own movement are just as significant as well, feeling a bit less slippery while still playing into a strong sense of momentum, along with no longer having a speed cap and being able to spin dash. This all not only allows for far more control to make it a bit easier to maintain your speed, but it also leads to those moments to feel far more rewarding due to how absurdly quick you can get. This culminates in an experience that feels inherently more engaging from the beginning due to basically all the changes made being ones that play into the more unique qualities of how you play as Sonic and make it a less cumbersome, frustrating experience in the process.

This is of course all heightened further by the level design being as good as it is, with stages often being sprawling, mazelike settings that never quite make you feel lost, but certainly make it hard to exactly pinpoint where you are. While this initially sounds like a bad thing, it ends up contributing to the game in a largely positive way thanks to how it essentially tells the player to just pick a direction that feels right and roll with it, with stages very rarely looping back in on themselves in a way that would cause things to become confusing. The way that so many of the branching paths can also act as rewards for good play is an interesting dynamic as well, with the reward for being able to make certain tricky jumps often being an opportunity to more easily maintain what momentum you have with punishment for failure on these sections more often than not simply being taking a slower path that requires more methodical play. This not only contributes to the insane scope of many of these levels, but also provides a more compelling punishment for a mistake than just killing the player, and while that does happen from time to time, it's forgiving enough in most cases to not become a point of frustration.

The visuals have also taken quite a jump in quality from the first, still often depicting these bleak, industrial hellscapes to signify Eggman's attempts at conquering the world, but adding far more detail and colour to the world as well to make it an absolute treat for the eyes in places. The seemingly endless cityscape background of Casino Night zone is especially a highlight in this regard, adding a sense of pure majesty to contrast the damage that's already been done by Eggman, while also being a deeply evocative experience. Even most of the slower pacebreaker stages are great here, often utilising ideas and gimmicks that still allow for bursts of speed in between these calmer moments, often messing around with the physics in one way or another to further add a sense of depth to what you're doing so you very rarely get the sensation that you're just waiting around for something to happen.

Once again, Casino Night is a highlight in this regard for the way that the various pinball machine mechanics are used to cause you to go darting around the screen while not actually making all too much forward progress for the most part. It gives off the feeling of moving at a slower pace through the stage while still messing about and having you be sent flying in all sorts of directions. The aquatic ruin is another zone that does this pretty well by having the slower elements being confined almost exclusively to the lower paths that you'll only fall into if you fail to make the above jumps, once again playing back into this idea of punishment not being death, but rather making you have to play more methodically. While rather easy for the most part, I also quite enjoy most of the boss fights in the game with the way that they more often than not don't really go for being a big test of skill or anything like that but instead show off a variety of cool, clever little ideas that almost always require a slightly different approach to break through and win. I definitely prefer this method of boss design in a game like this for the way that they'll often feel more like extensions of the platforming gameplay than anything else, requiring you to better understand the fundamentals of your moveset and apply them in slightly more involved or time sensitive ways to succeed, such as with the drill boss that alternates its weak spot between places you need to spin dash into and those that you need to jump on.

In the end though, I'd love this game way more if not for a couple of frustrating issues that get in the way. The biggest problem is simply the fact that from oil ocean onward, the game takes a bit of a dip in quality and makes those last couple of zones feel a bit tedious. Oil ocean isn't really bad but none of the big unique points of it really appeal to me in any way beyond the dreary aesthetic setting up these late game areas really nicely. The oil itself weirdly just doesn't feel like a particularly big punishment unless you decide to completely stand still, with the way to escape it being a bit more finicky than it is actually difficult thanks to the weirdly telegraphed fan blades basically causing falling back down to be a bit of an inevitability, even if the only punishment is just wasting more time. The cannons appear to want to achieve a spectacle to the pipes in chemical plant zone, being this big scripted moment that takes you a really far distance, but it ends up falling a bit short due to the more predictable nature of where you're shot combined with the far slower speed of it all, feeling way more dull and being yet another thing that just takes time without a lot of payoff. Metropolis zone is definitely the worst of the lot however, feeling as if it took some serious inspiration from the bad bits of Sonic 1, with the stages having a multitude of gimmicks that either completely halt your momentum or blindside you entirely. Every enemy here sucks, especially with how many of them are place on the edges of platforms you need to reach, and the single block spear platforms and the nuts you need to run on for a reaaaallllyyy long time to get them all the way to the top are further examples of rather questionable level design, especially how once again they're often placed directly after somewhere that seems to suggest to the player that it's a good time to try going fast yet again, leading to further moments of frustration.

Sky chase is mostly just a bit too slow and too long but is a neat enough spectacle, and the flying fortress has similar issues with frustration as Metropolis but to a lesser extent at the cost of more bottomless pits, neither quite as bad as the area directly beforehand, but not especially great either to me. The final boss is also the one fight in the game that I just do not like in any capacity thanks to how little clarity there feels in terms of when it's safe to actually attack, leading to a fight that feels very trial and error at first (which is a big problem when there's another fight directly beforehand that you have to deal with every single time) and then far too simplistic afterwards while still almost always carrying the risk of you just getting hit because the game decided that it'd be a cool and funny idea.

It all makes for a less enjoyable time than I'd have liked when all of the lesser areas are basically back to back, even though it by no means ruins the game entirely given how much wonderful creativity is on display for a lot of the playthrough. Also, while I definitely prefer the way that accessing the special stages is handled here, not only rewarding exploration to a small extent, but also providing a much greater number of chances to succeed and collect all chaos emeralds this time around, the special stages themselves are only marginally better in my eyes. I like the idea of the halfpipes quite a bit and think that the janky, pseudo-3D effects are charming as hell, but actually playing them is where things get frustrating with how little time you're given to react to everything, making it an irritating game of trial and error that you'll lose more often than not, only to be booted back to the checkpoint but now without any rings or shields you might have had. It basically makes it another game where the effort to actually unlock Super Sonic is too much for me to want to bother with whatsoever, which is a shame since I really do want to go for completion on one of these at some point, it's just that it always seems like a miserable experience.

Even with all this said, Sonic 2 is basically a perfect sequel that understands the variety of ways to fully utilise the unique mobility of a character like Sonic to make for a fast paced, reasonably unique platformer filled to the brim with creativity. It's got its rough edges for sure, but I do have to appreciate the ambition for sure and also cannot deny how well crafted everything is up until the last couple of areas. Interested to see where the 3rd game takes all this stuff as well considering that's considered the best of the trilogy by a ton of people by a pretty decent margin. With this I am now one step closer to becoming a Sonic fan, was only a matter of time...