Sonic CD (1993)

Preliminary: I expected the graphics to be more imrpessively different from the Genesis games, but they're kinda clunky and weird looking. But I love the music so far and I prefer the level design to Sonic 2 so far. Sonic isn't a favorite series for me but this is on par with the first one (to me) so far... I'm on the third level though haha. And the things it's added don't seem to add much. Tho I will say I like that the orientation changes remind me of Tomba and Tomba 2. I haven't a clue what I'm doing with the time travel aspect, but as long as I clear the stage, I'm happy :-p (Ahhh, there's a different, best ending if you unlock the best futures for each stage. Interesting)

Oh wow turns out the music was changed for the later North American release, which is what I'm playing. Boooo. I technically should be playing the Japanese version then. Too bad cuz I was enjoying the music. (Ah yea the original music was much more... Sonic-ier) but one of the time versions of this first level has a good bossa nova rhythm haha.

Ok yea the Japanese music is great too. "Woo! Yea!" lol. Beautiful background grapnhcis too. The audio is definitely very busy and Sonic-y but good

Day 1

I love the colors in this level and lol at Sonic's face

I just had paused it to write in here but liked Sonic's face and was going to mention the Zone's colors :-p

It suffers from the usual Sonic gimmick of not being sure what walls can be gone through and background vs foregroudn is an issue like with many early platformers etc etc. But this at least earned its place with a 3 star as the most enjoyable Sonic so far since the first one and possibly even more than that one.

Tho the backgrounds and music continue to be good, the gameplay is starting the usual Sonic dry-ness (for me). It just doesn't embrace speed enough instead having tons of gocha moments if you're speeding along (tho this is probly my favorite so far in that regard) and hard-to-see enemies. Like I've said for the other 2, they should have encouraged just flying along and having fun, not discouraged it.

Part of me wants to stop after 7 zones, but the other part of me wants to see what other graphics and songs there will be. But then again I could experience that by watching a playthrough.

This is by far the furthers I've played in a Sonic but not lovign this mine dropping version of the boss. Never a big fan of "just wait out the attacks" mechanic.

Dang I feel like I'm flying through this. I'm on Wacky Workbench Zone III. This is my calm night where I'm only supposed to play for 45 mins at a time and then take 15 mins break, but this definitely is making me wanna finish it tonight! That's a good sign. Maybe this'll be the first 4-star Sonic for me tho the gameplay still has its clunkiness and non-preferred mechanics.

Day 2

The Look and Sound continue to be excellent. I didn't love the race against Metal Sonic but I didn't hate it either. And I believe I only have one area left! Mind you, I didn't explore each of the versions of each Zone, trying for best ending, etc. but I still am surprised I played a Sonic game this thoroughly. First of the series, in fact. Shows how much Sound affects a game to me, tho the level design was better than the others too. Still some very clunky mechanics that I'm sure Sonic lovers are used to but just don't make sense to me the way a jump on an incline is, the way you have so much momentum and sometimes it flies up an incline, other times you act like you had no momentum at all, etc. And if they want those kinda of mechanics, with chaos and fast speed, then the levels should be designed for them. instead, this time, the levels seemed to genuinely encourage slowing down and that helped me do so, rather than long stretches of nothing and then bam gocha enemies like the first one, this one had plenty of options on where you may end up if you embrace the chaos. And for people who love Sonic, they then can explore (no time limit hallelujah) and suss out every little bit of the game, and for those who wanted the game to embrace the chaos/not sure where you end up vibes, we are happy that we can just keep going on cuz we wound up on a new path and no biggie :-p

Ok how can somebody supposedly so fast walk that slowly up inclines? And these final levels are getting very tedious. And then Zone II of this final area is confusing, which is too bad cuz I was enjoying just sort of winging it and generally heading right in all levels. I guess it's acceptable for the final area but meh. Reminding me of the aspects of Sonic games I don't care for.

Lol okay right before I burned out, I was introduced to Tiny Sonic :-p And I suppose it's a positive that I keep intuitively/happening to find my way

Wow okay I finally had to referece a guide/faq and confirm that I really do have to take damage to hit the final boss? Kinda silly mechanic. Omg bahaha and right after typing that I lost all my Rings so I am basically a goner? (Nope, luckily I had knocked off 2 blades already... also, these blades should've looked more like.. blades)

Yesss a literal anime/cartoon at the end. And lolll "shoobydoo" singing for the ending wow "believe in yourself yourself!"

Look: 8.5/10

Sound: 9/10 Both versions of the soundtrack are solid, and that's impressive.

Play: 7.5/10 Best of the Sonics so far, but will never love love Sonics.

Feel: 8/10

Attachment: 8/10 If I were to return to an early Sonic, this or the first one would be it. This would be the wiser choice considering that I prefer its level designs and it has more replayability!

Overall: 8.2/10

Completion: Main Story

Playtime: ~2h

Game created at the same time of Sonic the Hedgehog 2, but a much different experience. Scott the Woz once said that people thought of this game as a rare masterpiece because it was not easy to play it (not many people had the Sega CD). Now that the game is on the gem collection (Gamecube), mobile and steam... It's not really rare and many people can now see the flaws of it.

For sure, it has some issues. Too much going on at the same time with the past-future thing and metal sonic holograms. I still liked the game tho.

Many people say that the artworks are a bit too intense for a fast paced game but I love it's originality. I love the introduction of Amy Rose and the most famous Metal Sonic form. The cutscene at the beginning of the game is just gorgeous. Sonic looks like a freaking superhero about to save the world by entering the Death Egg. I still watch the animation from time to time cause it embraces what Sonic was supposed to be in the beginning : cool.

Biggest complaint is the lack of direction and understanding of the futur-past stuff. First time I finished the game I did not even understand why I had the "bad ending".

Sonic CD fits perfectly in the gem collection in my opinion because it is a diamond in the rough. Not perfect, but when you dig, it's actually pretty fun. 3.5 feels right for this one.

Oh boy. Lotsa mixed feelings with this one.

So, it is a better game than both Sonic the Hedgehog and Sonic the Hedgehog 2, no doubts about that. The gameplay is great (even, for once, the special stages!), the levels are fun, the soundtrack is amazing, and all in all it's an awesome game.

However, the thing I was more excited about, the time travel mechanic... could pretty much be considered nonexistent, as activating the switch signs is terribly difficult: the levels don't give you barely any space to get enough speed to switch, and any stop or obstacle is enough to just cancel the whole thing. I tried several times on the first few stages and I end up just ignoring the signs and just playing the standard levels by themselves (even knowing that this would condemn me to the bad ending.) instead of just keep getting frustrated about trying to get the time travel working.

A waste of a very cool idea implemented in a very sloppy way that could have been the final bow to a pretty great experience of a game.

(Look, people! I can actually like games! I know, I'm surprised too!)

Sonic The Hedgehog CD is one of the weirdest entries in the Sonic The Hedgehog series. It was made for the Mega CD Add-On for the Sega Genesis back in 1992 and was basically a powered-up Sega Genesis since it ran its own games, and was able to produce better sound. Most of which were these interactive movies such as the controversial game, Night Trap which brought a lot of legal attention to Sega. But the most sold game for the Mega CD was Sonic CD.

For the longest time, Sonic CD was seen as the hidden gem in the Genesis Sonic games due to the fact that it was so elusive. It was really hard to get your hands on the game because after a while, it was lost to time as it was stuck on the Mega CD and later PC.

It wasn't until the game practically released everywhere with the help of people like Christian Whitehead. Now that Sonic CD is so widely accessible now, does the game hold up to how people described it... Kinda

For starters, the animated cutscenes look beautiful and capture the personality of Sonic so well. And the music blows me away. They really utilized the audio power of the Mega CD. It's one of the best Sonic soundtracks I've listened to.

This game also introduces Amy Rose as a character. Sonic's obsessive, self-proclaimed girlfriend. It also introduces Sonic's first rival. Metal Sonic. A robotic Sonic that is nearly identical to Sonic in terms of attributes.

Now with gameplay, It's ok... The level design is all over the place and the game is way too overexposed with color. It's too hard to even know where enemies are because they blend to the backgrounds too well. Too much color. The bosses (With the exception of the insanely cool fight with Metal Sonic) are also way too easy.

Sonic is (I know this is ironic) too fast. He's a little slippery in this game and it can be frustrating. Tails is playable in the Christian Whitehead Remaster and he's basically easy mode. Still fun to play as

The cool thing about this game though is that you can time travel. By hitting a PAST or FUTURE sign and going fast for a certain amount of time without interruption, (Which can be done with a Spin-Dash or the new move, The Super Peel Out Basically a Spin-Dash but you can get hurt which makes it nearly useless). You will be transported to the "Bad Future" which is a redesigned version of the Zone and Act. Or the Past (Which is the same) but you can destroy these generators and Metal Sonic Machines to create a "Good Future". Doing this in all acts (Or collecting all 7 Time Stones) will unlock the good ending to the game.

However, it's the gameplay and sloppy level design that kills it for me

Sonic The Hedgehog CD has great animation, music, new characters, and a cool premise. But the game suffers from sloppy level design and graphics that make the game more of a chore to play. Didn't live up to the hype, but still a decent game

3/5

Would Lightly Recommend

This game is a fucking beauty to play.

It definitely limits its potential early on, structuring the levels around easy fast lanes and emphasis on speed despite the speed requiring very little skill to get to, and also shooting its foot in the exploration front by making it more annoying to get the best endings for every level.

Despite that, I can't deny how much fun I had with this game. It is just a pleasure to zoom through every level, and the level design is still super tight despite its shortcomings, with many ways to sequence break and speedrun the game to a point where it is at least better than some of its peers. The music and aesthetic adds tremendous quality to it too, especially with the JP soundtrack on (which you SHOULD have on). To me, this is one of a few cases where I think roller coaster design is only beneficial.

The bosses are fun too, they're not anything special but they complement rather than detach. The game's areas also have distinct feels to them on an aesthetical front that don't feel too similar to basic tropes in platformers. I definitely recommend giving this game a shot and hope you have a blast on it. (8/10)

Gameplay, Story and Value:

Functionally, Sonic CD works just like another other 16-bit Sonic games. All three face buttons jump, while holding down and jump will initiate a spin dash. New to the mix is holding up and jump to run in place, with a release resulting in a huge burst of speed, good for scaling inclines. Additionally, the way levels play out if just as familiar. You'll be running, jumping, bouncing and rolling your way to the goal post of two acts of each zone before facing off with Dr. Robotnik in the third.

It's strange, then, that despite all the familiarity of its concepts that it draws from fairly decent games that Sonic CD seemingly fails on all fronts.

The pieces are all there, but none of it really comes together. Running and jumping feel fine, but your spin dash is completely inconsistent. There's a bizarre charging period before you'll actually take off from it and even when you do there's a chance you'll just be stuck in place. As a result, there's a feeling of unresponsiveness in most things you do. The levels themselves aren't laid out very well, and even visually don't appear to be completely thought out. Any sense of speed you may start to get is immediately brought to a halt due to hidden springs or spikes, or sometimes for no reason at all! Other Sonic games have these speed traps as well, but Sonic CD seems to rely on the completely in order to break up any cohesion in its stages.

This is even more frustrating in Sonic CD, as it's key gameplay mechanic relies on getting solid runs it. Every act has three different variations to it: past, present and future. You start in the present, but by passing by either a Future or Past signpost and getting you hedgehog to 88 miles per hour, you can travel back or forward in time! The sub-objective of the first two acts of each zone is to travel to the past to destroy an evil robot machine in order to ensure a good future. Do this on acts one and two, and act three will be free of any and all enemies! Any enemies but Robotnik of course, which is fine as the boss fights are actually pretty good here.

Bonus stages are back, of course, though this time you're trying to destroy UFOs in a pseudo Mode 7 environment because... reasons. They're okay, but not particularly fun or interesting.

At the very least, Sonic CD does autosave your progress, so you won't have to suffer through a single sitting to finish it!

Presentation, Music and Sound:

Graphically, Sonic CD is pretty solid, even pretty good really. The problem lies is how these nice graphics are actually used. While the game, for the most part, aesthetically pleasing there are bizarre design elements scattered throughout the levels. These include rings floating in front of inaccessible surfaces and some questionable stitching and 3D effects. Enemies and items also have a tendency to blend in a little too much with their backgrounds on certain stages. It all just feels a bit... messy.

Stages after the first also blend together a bit visually, even when factoring in the different past and future tilesets for each zone. There are some fun exceptions such as a later zone that looks like it's made entirely of brass instruments though.

Sound effects are exactly what you'd expect from a Sonic game, which is to say they're familiar and distinct. That said, the game seems full of audio glitches that can result in annoyances such as the charging spin dash sound lasting several seconds after releasing. Other times, sounds just won't play at all, or will play when they shouldn't have.

Music ranges from passable to annoying. When you first turn on the game you're treated to the iconic, or infamous depending on how you feel about, Sonic Boom track, made possible due to the quality CD audio capabilities of the Sega CD. After that though, it's kind of all over the place. The introductory zone is all classic Sonic music stylings, while everything after that is a weird combination of forgettable tracks and weird voice sample filled mixes... It's not at all up to par with other Sonic games in terms of how good the music tracks actually are.

Afterthoughts:

I'm SO disappointed with a game I was so looking forward to. The whole game feels like the development team was given all the toys to make a Sega CD game, and really just didn't know what to do with them. It's not unplayable by any means, but between the mediocre level designs, audio and gameplay bugs and poor pacing, it's just not a game I want to come back to any time soon. It makes me think this might have been the point where Sonic really started going downhill...

Review:

Gameplay:

Note - My PVR crapped out after a good hour and a half of gameplay, so my session wasn't recorded. What's on display here is just for capturing screens and music samples. Includes the entire first zone and bits from others.