Sonic the Hedgehog for Mega Drive. The game that started it all is still one of the best. If there is someone around here who never played a Sonic game, this is a great starting point. Not bad for a franchise with so many highs and lows.
This game is full of little tricks for you to discover, which is very rewarding for those who put their time into it (as I will show along this post). Exploration is encouraged since a experienced player will manage to collect more 1-ups and other hidden things. There is a very interesting site, vgmaps, where you can find many game maps. I haven't looked Sonic the Hedgehog maps yet because until recently I felt there was still more I wanted to discover by myself.
Here we see the ring system for the first time, a mark of the series. When the player is hit he loses his rings, with a possibility of recovering some; if he has no rings he loses a life. This feature diminishes frustration since there is a tolerance for error. When collecting 100 rings the player receives a life. This system will have a few variations along the series; in Sonic the Hedgehog for Master System, for example, if you have 99 rings and catch one more you'll get an extra life as usual but will go to zero rings instead of 101 and when you are hit there is no chance of getting rings back. In Shadow the Hedgehog you lose only some rings when hit.
Now, imagine you're hearing the familiar SEGA! yell and let's go for some random comments on the stages:
Green Hill Zone
I like how this part allows many styles of play: you can try to take the high path without falling, take the bottom path or even the middle one; you can try to finish as fast as you can or get all the rings and hidden 1-ups - a wise choice if you're having trouble with later stages.
I don't like taking the invincibility monitor hidden behind the first palm tree on the following screenshot because the first time I did this I got carried away and fell into the abyss that comes next.
Marble Zone
The music here is a real earworm.
I remember around 2005 when I was twelve spending a long time looking the bugs/glitches section on the Powersonic site at my aunt's house (I didn't have my own computer yet). It really took a long time, because the internet was still dial-up and the images loaded slowly. The "Sonic pushing air" bug in particular made me happy because I could easily replicate it by myself.
Marble Zone is a treacherous place, around each corner a spike trap could fall on your head, bats could come out of nowhere right in front of you or a piston could flatten you just as you pass under it. But it seems there is always a shield to help you before a tricky spot.
Here we have an example of how Sonic the Hedgehog rewards experience. The first time you see this caterpillar you may try to jump on its body and end up taking damage, seeing afterwards that you can destroy it by hitting the head. Then you realize it is usually better to leave it alone as it is easy to accidently hit the body while going for the head. Only after a long time I discovered you can safely take it out of the picture by rolling into it.
Spring Yard Zone
The beginning of a long tradition of casino/pinball stages in Sonic games. Bouncing everywhere on the springs and bumpers is loads of fun and an impressive demonstration of this game's physics.
To this day I always jump on my seat when this guy suddenly pops up behind me ^ _ ^
Here we have another trick. The first time you get to this block you most likely won't get to the exit on the right before it gets closed - you'll then have to go up by jumping on the spring. When you know what you're doing there's the reward - one shield and two 10 ring monitors along with an alternative, more pleasant path.
Labyrinth Zone
Water stages in Sonic games are always tense as there's the constant need of resurfacing or finding bubbles to avoid drowning. But I have a feeling this game is quite generous in this regard, except in a couple spots. Soon we shall see how it compares with the Master System version at least.
Around 2007 I had a folder with many Sonic ROMs in different versions. I could swear in one of those the spiked ball you see below was not there, but I never found any info about it on the internet and neither can I confirm it with the versions I have now. Maybe I am misremembering it?
While it is not necessary to hit it even one time, this zone's boss is probably the hardest in the game, as the water is constantly rising and you have to go fast so you don't drown while being careful about the deadly obstacles ahead.
Star Light Zone
After going through some tough spots on Labyrinth Zone we come to a more easygoing set of stages with a very inspiring tune :)
On previous stages we are introduced to enemies best dealt with by jumping or rolling into them. Here we have a third kind of enemy: invulnerable bombs that explode after a set time when you get too close.
Another little thing it took me long to realize: it seems impossible to get the 1-up here after the stairs are already down, but if you go ahead for a bit then come back they return to their original position and the life is yours.
This boss is very interesting. You don't hit it directly, but send back the spiked balls he releases by using the seesaws. I remember the first time I played taking many tries until I could do it, it was hard avoiding the balls and the shrapnel that comes from them when they explode while getting the timing needed to hit Robotnik.
(Well, at least that was how I did it the first time. Now I know you can use the balls falling on the seesaws to give you impulse to send you flying and hit Robotnik directly)
Scrap Brain Zone
Scrap Brain's music is so energetic, always makes me want to play.
I like how each act has a different identity. My favorite is act 1 - you try to take the upper path and if you stumble you can end up on a lower path or fall into the abyss, very exciting.
At the end of act 2 we have a little cut scene. It may not be much for today's standards, but at the time it was a great way of showing how close you were to defeating Robotnik.
Final Zone
An adequate final confrontation, although a little on the easy side.
Some general observations:
- Special Stages are tricky. You need to go through them in order to get all the Chaos Emeralds, but I can't do it legitimately to this day; to see the good ending I need to use the stage select cheat and collect them after many tries. My little sister is much better at this than me.
- I had lyrics I sung along with the Special Stage music. Because of the background, it begins with "Eu queria tanto ser / Um passarinho idiota" - that is, "Oh, how I wanted to be / A dumb little bird"
- It is impressive how many animals are released when you destroy the post boss capsules, specially compared with Sonic the Hedgehog for the Master System (which I played first).
- When I was playing Marble Zone while I prepared for this post I accidentally pressed the fast forward button of the emulator. I ended up with very little time to go through the stage and just barely got to a checkpoint with two seconds to spare, thinking I was safe. But then I discovered that in this game, unlike the others, the timer doesn't reset after a death by time over. End result - I lost all my lives, one after the other.
- Another thing this game does differently is you don't get invincibility frames after falling on spikes - one error can be deadly.
- I only noticed recently when playing with my headphones on that the sound played when you catch a ring alternates between coming from the left and the right.
- The end credits music has pieces from every stage music in the game, but in a slightly different order from the one in which you go through them. This is not the last time this will happen.
- I like this little animation at the end of Robotnik juggling the emeralds you did not collect.
- This is maybe the Sonic game with less differences between the bad ending and the good ending - to do the latter you need to collect all Chaos Emeralds, as always. After defeating Robotnik, Sonic comes running across Green Hill from left to right while many animals are jumping on the background. He stops and, only on the good ending, uses the Chaos Emeralds to make more flowers appear. We then have the credits alternate with gameplay clips from each zone followed at the end by the animation above for the bad ending or angry Robotnik trampling the word "end" in the good ending.
What about you, do you have good memories of Sonic the Hedgehog?
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