Sonic the Hedgehog 3

"And so, the first half to the greatest Sonic storyline of ALL TIME."

Sonic was a huge hit. Everybody who was anybody had played the Mega Drive games of him, and most had even played the Master System and Game Gear versions too. Sonic 1 was a brilliant platformer, full of quirky sounds, imaginative bad guys, and challenging bosses, not to mention the seriously trippy bonus levels. But, the levels were a bit short.

Then came Sonic 2, with the new character, Miles Prower (Get it? Miles Per Hour!), better known as Tails. This game was a massive improvement, with better graphics, 3-D bonus levels, bigger and more challenging levels, and with even more unique badniks and bosses to fight. But, it was a bit on the easy side. To make things more imaginative though, Sega threw in Super Sonic, a golden from of Sonic who was invincible and could fly (slightly) who you could get when you had all of the chaos emeralds.

Sonic 3 had, as you can see, quite a name to live up to. What could they bring in that was new? What could they improve upon? Surely they had run out of ideas for badniks by now!

Anyway, with that background information out of the way, on with the review.

Graphics - 10
Ok. I know, I know, I am biased towards cartoon graphics. I love them. But these are just incredible. Bad guys are amazingly animated, bosses are incredibly detailed, levels have a slightly darker feel to them if they need it, and of course Sonic and Tails look as good as ever.

As well as this, there are the new bonus stages. Unlike Sonic 2, where you had to have fifty rings and go through a checkpoint and get the stars above it, now you have to find bonus rings, similar to in Sonic 1, except now you do not have to have any rings at all. Once the ring has been collected you are warped to a fully 3D globe, where you need to collect blue spheres and avoid red ones. Sounds a bit strange, I know, but it has to be played to be believed.

All in all, the graphics aer much better than the previous games. They have even updated the television boxes with bonus items in! But, even with all of this, it has to be said that my personal favorite part of the graphics is the jaw dropping ascent into space at the end of the game. Just... wow.

Sounds - 10
The sounds ae really really good! Admittedly, the music isn't quite as catchy as in the first two games, but the feeling it adds to the levels is great. When the new enemy arrives, (more on him later), a mysterious tune plays that just screams evil plays. Boss music is tense, and the bonus level music is brilliant as well.

All in all, the sounds are good, with some reused and fine tuned from past Sonic games. But a remix of the Sonic 2 bonus levels would have been nice.

Controls - 10
It's a Mega Drive game, and a 2D platformer at that, how complicated do you want them? It is really simple. Left, Right, Look up, and Look down I am pretty suer you can work out for yourself. A, B, or even if you feel daring, C are jump. The controls are a bit different in the bonus level. Left is turn left, Right is turn right, A, B, C, are still all jump, and Up makes you go forward if you hit a bouncer.

Now. With the arrival of three new shields, you can do special things by pressing jump while in the air. With the Electric shield, you can do a double jump, with the Fire shield you can do a sudden launch forward, and with the bubble shield you can bounce like a ball.

Story - 10. easily!
This is one of the best storylines in a game. Gone is the "Robotnik is trapping all your friends, go save them" storyline we know and love. Now it is far more deep than that.

The game starts with Tails flying above the sea in his plane with Sonic on it. Sonic jumps off and becomes Super Sonic, flying along the water as we saw him do in Sonic 2. But then he flys through a growth of bushes, and smacks into a strange, you-know-it-is-meant-to-be-red-but-never-the-less-is-pink echidna. For those of you who don't know, an echidna is similar to a hedgehog. Anyway, Super Sonic bounces off him, but the echidna doesn't even seem to feel it. As Sonic drops the emeralds, returning to normal, Knuckles speeds past him, collecting all of them, running back to where he started, laughing for a while at Sonic, then running off with speed that matches Sonics.

The echidna is called Knuckles. Robotnik has found the Floating Island, and wants the 7 Great Emeralds from it. Knuckles guards these emeralds, and along with them, the grand prize which Robotnik wants - the Master Emerald. Robotnik wants the master emerald because he wants to harness its power in a massive robot.

Robotnik finds Knuckles and learns that he guards the emeralds. Robotnik, being the smart science type guy that he is, tells Knuckles of a blue hedgehog and yellow fox coming to steal the emeralds. Knuckles is a tough guy, but he isn't smart. At all. So he goes along, and works for Robotnik. Sonic now has to try and get all of his emeralds back before Robotnik uses them for evil.

Gameplay - 10
The levels are now absolutely MASSIVE. Seriously. As in come close to the ten minute time limit to beat, massive. Also, now as opposed to being able to just run right, the levels are set out like a maze, so you are as clueless as Sonic as to where to go. Now, the best thing in my opinion is the save feature. Once you have beaten all the levels, you can replay any of them to collect all the emeralds. Once you have done that, you can once again become Super Sonic.

There is a new bonus level as well, but one that you don't collect emeralds in. It is like a big gumball machine that you collect rings, lives, and shields from. It is accessed in the same way as the bonus levels were in Sonic 2.

Also, as I mentioned before, there are 3 new shields. Fire, Electric, and Bubble. All of them deflect bullets, and protect you from one attack, as well as grant the abilities mentioned in the Controls section, plus each has its own unique feature. The Electric shield draws rings towards you once you get close enough. The Fire shield protects you from fire attacks, and the Bubble shield lets you breathe underwater.

Replayivity - 9
There are three ways to beat this game. Sonic, Tails, and Both can play. There are about eight save slots, so you can easily have a level for each of them. After you have cleared everything though, there isnt much to come abck to, other than to explore the huge levels.

Overall - 10
This game is a must have. If you don't have a Mega Drive, download the ROM (but delete after 24 hours if you do not own the original game), but either way, everybody has to play this game, it is that good!

Final Word - I don't usually do these, but I will this time.

Now, Sonic 3 is, I have to warn you, half a game. The second installment, Sonic and Knuckles, is also required to get the full storyline. But that is for another review...

Reviewer's Score: 10/10, Originally Posted: 08/22/04