Sonic CD

The Good
Sonic CD, released in 1993 for the short-lived Sega CD system, is the pinnacle of the long-running Sonic franchise for a number of reasons. First and most important, Sonic CD introduced a brilliant Time-travel aspect that alters the look, lay-out and music for each stage. Upon touching a special pole ( Either Past or Future) Sonic can gain momentum- trail of light following his tracks- and zoom to the distant past or future. In the past, Sonic must find and destroy the robot generating mechanism to free his animal friends and save the future for that act. But if he fails... the future in the act will be taken-over by Eggman, and many enemy robots abound.

The music may be a mixed-bag for some, because both regional versions have their own unique soundtrack. The American version has a more organic flair to it. The Japanese version is a crazy mix of techno, hip-hop and pop, and must be experienced to get a good idea of it. Personally, I prefer the Japanese version, but the American soundtrack is great, as well.

As with any Sonic game, the graphics are very pleasing. The effects for the special stage are nice, as well.

The Bad
As with the other 2D Sonic games, the main adventure is considerably short, although the time-travel aspect and unlockable features extend the replay value a bit. The game is also pretty easy, as the game's acts and bosses can be cleared without a sweat.

The Bottom Line
Without a doubt, Sonic CD is the best Sonic game yet- possibly ever. Track it down for PC or GameCube (in Sonic Gems Collection) and revel in the games speedy brilliance!

The Good
Sonic CD is truly a good enough game to warrant the purchase of a SegaCD. The vibrant graphics, the stellar Japanese soundtrack, and the innovative time-travel mechanic all combine to make this my favorite Sonic game ever.

The game is split into 6 zones, each made up of the traditional two acts, and beginning with the ubiquitous "green" zone. The level design is excellent, and this contains some the fastest levels you'll see this side of Sonic Advance 2.

But it's not just a speed-fest. This time around, the Chaos emeralds are replaced by Time Stones, and it's not just a matter of collecting 50 rings anymore. To fully save each zone, Sonic must use his speed to literally warp to the past and future of each zone, in order to destroy Dr. Robotnik's and Metal Sonic's evil history altering machines. This means each act has a "past" and a "future", each with a slightly different layout. Of course, like all Sonic games, you don't HAVE to free all the zones and collect all the Time Stones to beat the game, but you do to truly "complete" the game.

The Bad
The negatives..well, 6 zones is a little too few, in my opinion. But the past/future mechanic pads these quite well. My other minor niggle involves the slightly non-traditional spin dash mechanic. This game was developed in parallel with Sonic 2, and both games implement it differently. Sonic 2's version was the one adopted by future games, making this one feel like the odd one out. But you get used to it.

Also, be warned that this game has two soundtracks. The Japanese and European releases had the original, and best, soundtrack. For some reason, Sega decided to totally replace the soundtrack for the US version, with a decent but inferior soundtrack. The original Japanese/EU soundtrack is the best Sonic music I've heard, and fits the game much better. For this reason, if at all possible, get the JP/EU SegaCD version, and stay away from the US SegaCD and PC port versions.

The Bottom Line
This game is matched only by Sonic 2, and that should be enough to make you want to play it.

The Good
In Sonic CD you play as Sonic again who must stop Dr. Robotnik From taking the time stone from a planet that only appears on the last month of the year and Sonic must get the time stones and destroy the robots to restore piece to little planet on you’re adventure you run into Princess Sally (Amy Rose) and a new robotic version of Sonic kidnaps her so you also have to rescue her.

The graphics are Sega CD quality which means it looks better than Previous Genesis Sonic games but the odd thing is Sonic looks more like he did in Sonic 1 because he is a lighter tone of blue and is more tight in control than in Sonic 2.

The music as in all Sonic games is good with better quality sound since its Sega CD but none of the tunes compare to great songs from previous Sonic games like Starlight Zone or Metropolis Zone and Chemical Plant.

Since the game has time zones and making a better future by destroying the robot dispenser in every level and past, present, and future versions of the stages makes the game for good replay value.

The Bad
There’s really nothing too bad about this game other than mentioned above the lack of great tunes.

The Bottom Line
I’m going to be honest with you I didn’t play this game until the Sonic Gems Collection for the Gamecube came out cause getting a Sega CD isn’t exactly easy and this game, but if you have the opportunity to play this game I say go for it.

The Good
Sonic CD was the first and only Sonic The Hedgehog game to be released on Sega’s excellent and underrated Sega CD console. It is not the best Sonic game, but it is hardly the worst.

On a small planet outside of a Mobius, time stones have been discovered that as the name implies have the power of time. The evil Dr. Robotnik plans to steal these gems. It is up to Sonic to foil his nefarious scheme. Sonic CD spans time and space. And pits Metal Sonic up against Sonic. And introduces Amy Rose, a pink hedgehog that has the hots for Sonic.

The most unique element of Sonic CD is the time traveling aspect. In any given level Sonic can visit the Past, Present, or Future. To truly complete the game Sonic must conquer all time periods and collect all the Time Stones.

The Graphics in Sonic CD are good. They seem to be slightly better than Sonic 2. Yet not as good a Sonic & Knuckles. The graphics are gorgeous in a 16-bit kind of way.

The music and sound effects are good. As we would expect from and old-skool Sonic game. The main theme “Sonic Boom” is the first Sonic song to feature lyrics. It is a far cry from the lame songs of the Sonic Adventure games. But this is a good thing.

The Game plays like all classic Sonic titles. The action is fast and furious. And very fun. Each stage boss has a unique strategy you will need to employ in order to defeat. Collecting Time Stones replace collecting Chaos Emeralds and add and extra challenge.

The Bad
The bad of this game comes from it’s unbalanced difficulty. I do not mind a challenge. But I hate when games go from easy to difficult suddenly. This game jumps in difficulty in the last two stages. Why do game developers always pull this shit?

The Bottom Line
Sonic CD is a welcome addition to the series. Sega CD gamers could do worse than to add Sonic CD to there library.

The Good
My family has been cursed since the dawn of electronic media. We always hop upon the wrong bandwagon; we had betamax, 8-Tracks, Divx discs, Laserdisc, HD-DVD, etc. Although it would see success down the road, we also rode the very early Data CD train. We had a 3D0 and a SegaCD attachment for our genesis. I actually think the system itself isn't THAT bad, sure there's a lot of crap, but that was simply developers trying their hardest to make "Interactive movies" and other such pursuits and at the time it seemed like a cool idea. Yet there were still some very, VERY good games for the Sega CD that get buried underneath the disastrous Sega CD lifespan. One of them happens to be the best Sonic game out there.

What makes Sonic CD great? Well, for one, Sonic is at the top of his game. Everyone knows that Sonic is all about speed, and Sonic CD can sometimes get dizzying at how fast it gets. It also includes a time trial mode, which is always a blast in Sonic games, even for people like me who normally aren't completionists. Like any good game the level design is great. Like other Sonic titles, levels have various routes that can take you to your goal faster or slower, and the levels here have a bit more variety. Sometimes you'll replay a level and accidentally stumble upon a route that finally gets you that bonus for beating a level in 40 seconds.

Another interesting level mechanic is the time travel feature. Scattered around the level are "Past" and "Future" posts. Pick up one of these posts and it will be saved in your inventory for a little while. In order to activate them, you have to do.. well, what else? Run really, really fast. Go top speed without losing momentum. If you come to a halt mid-travel, you'll lose the post, but the levels often have special areas tucked away that make it impossible to lose the momentum for easier time travel. This adds a lot of variety as well as replay value because the three possible time periods shake up the level design and style. One level has a dam, but in the future where Robotnik has taken over, the dam is broken and the level is flooded. Go back into the past, and there is no dam but there's streams and lakes. Another cool thing is you can get special bonuses for changing the timelines, if you find a certain spot in the past and destroy it you might make the future a better place. This once again changes the levels design up a bit. It's a creative concept, and its done well.

Although it doesn't really affect gameplay, another clever aspect of the past/present/future aspects are changes in graphics and music. The future, ruled by Robotnik, is a ravished dystopia, often with much darker and moodier soundscapes. The past is technologically underdeveloped both in theme and literal console technology, the developers added in a clever element to the past where the graphics and music are all played by the genesis rather than the Sega CD, which also shows the player the difference in graphics/music as well.

This has always been a strength in the Sonic games, at least in my opinion, but boss fights are always clever and fun. Although some may have inconsistent difficulty aspects, Robotnik's machines are still a ton of fun to see and fight against and there's still a somewhat silly sense of humour with them as well. One level you can't actually hit him, but his protective shell is being ground away by a sander and as it grinds away he starts to freak out. No two boss fight here is alike, and yet again it adds a ton to the variety.

Although it's not the greatest soundtrack in the world, there are a few cool tracks on the soundtrack (I like the main theme "Sonic Boom," even if it gets stuck in your head...), and the sound quality is awesome. Sega claimed there was a mechanic called "Q-Sound," but my theory is simply that the data was fairly small so they made use of the extra data on the disc for higher quality sounds and music. There are various classic sound effects as well as some revamped ones too.

The graphics are colourful and varied. While it's not as good looking as Sonic 3 or Sonic & Knuckles (Though this game came before those, so it makes sense that they'd look better), the graphics look cool and the sprites are great. They also have some great animations and there's a wider variety of things happening on screen thanks to the Sega CD's extra horsepower. There are also some cool background effects and special effects that play with your mind, including an effect seen early on and later on where Sonic goes into a massive loop-de-loop and the camera turns around and it shows you a pseudo-3D effect of him running up and launching into the sky after getting off the ramp.

Great controls. They are very tight and there's a little more precision than the earlier Sonic games, you are even given a bit more control over Sonic's spin-boost move and can alter how fast the boost is. Despite the dizzying speed, you can always slow it down quick and precise if you are about to hit a spiked wall, although there will still be times that you make an unexpected stop but that's not really a negative since its always been a part of the gameplay in Sonic games.

The auto-save feature is nice.

The Bad
This is partially a problem with the Sega CD itself, but load times are a pain in the ass. The game takes awhile to boot up and sometimes level load times are inconsistent, often when loading an auto-save the game will take up to 2 minutes. Boss levels, despite often having less action on screen have an annoying load time too. I can't slight the game for this, but the load times have actually gotten LONGER over time since obviously the disc has gotten a little dirty and my SegaCD has gotten older.

There are a few bugs. Sometimes Sonic will get trapped in a confusing animation loop where he will stand still, but still move. One time he got stuck in his spinning animation loop, and I bumped into an enemy and expected it to die, but instead the spinning animation stopped in place and all the rings scattered. The framerate also takes a few hits, particularly on the 3rd act, the "Tidal Tempest" levels. When in the water, the game seems to slow down a bit and sometimes it'll even skip. This is especially annoying when fighting the third act boss, which is also underwater. That effect that distorts the background visuals is cool, but maybe they should've cut it back a bit.

The music isn't the best. A lot of the tracks annoy me a little or just sound silly. One track is comprised of annoying "Ladde-dadde-doos" and girls going "Ahh, ping pong poing" as well. It's also annoying how the songs often restart and then loop if you can't get through a level fast enough, and if you have a scratch on the disc sometimes when a song restarts you'll be treated to a skipping noise; at its worst this will actually cause the game to freeze. I've heard that the Japanese/European releases have a better soundtrack, but I wouldn't know.

God help you on the "Wacky Workbench" levels. Dear god, someone was taking a bit too much LSD on that level. It took me a literal month to figure out how to beat them when I first played the game since you constantly bounce off of the walls without any control over where you go or when you bounce or how you bounce.

The Bottom Line
Sonic CD is awesome! I know I'm not the only Sonic the hedgehog fan out there, and back in the day I played this more than I did Sonic 2 or even 3. It has tons of replay value and variety thanks to the well implemented time travel aspect, time trial, and just the fact that its really fun to play! The sad thing is not many people played it because of how the Sega CD crashed and burned, and when the game was released on Windows 95 three years later no one played it because that port sucked royal thanks to the fact that its framerate was totally busted even on a brand spanking new Pentium processor, making the game unplayable. If you are a Sonic fan and have a SegaCD or are interested in collecting a segaCD, get it with this game! This game alone is worth it! Although I am praying that Sega will re-release it on the Wii or Xbox 360 as part of their vintage collection.

The Good
First thing, the music KICKED ASS!!! The US sound like 90's modern hard rock music, the Japan/Europe version sound like Japan Pop, hip-hop music which I loved that kind of music. The graphics looked better than Sonic 2 due to the internal RAM of the SEGA CD. The animated intro and ending must not be missed. You may like the replay value.

The Bad
Some the fights with Eggman were easy but fun to kill. I can memorize the whole game mapped in my head but a bit easy than Sonic 2. Many people couldn't own the game due to the high price of the SEGA CD at the time. It sucked... The GameCube version I played had some problems. The Tidal Tempest level had a graphic issue. The color of the water was clear due to the PC code not matching to systems. The ending has some frame-rate issues.

The Bottom Line
I had a story were I first played the game. I just thought I will never play this game in my life. SEGA was meant to put the game on the mega collection but it was left out due to emulation problems of the SEGA CD to the Gamecube. Yuji Naka needed make up an excuse saying "There was not enough space". They only put the intro and ending. When I first saw it., I was amazed of the animation. I thought the game was like that. It wasn't until 2005 when I get the Gems Collection for the GameCube. It was a classic! over all...The game is perfect for your collection.

The Good
This game has a odd story line. To travel in time to stop the mad doc is great! The graphics is good and the music is very good.

The Bad
I didn't like how the bosses were made. They were very easy.

The Bottom Line
If you like Sonic you will LOVE it. If you hate sonic you will still LOVE it!

The Good
This is widely known as the best Sonic game ever released, and for good reason. On the surface, it seems like the same old Sonic 2, Sonic 3 gameplay. Same happy character, same joyful jumping and spinning, same beautiful levels, same catchy tunes, and the same innocent and nostalgic feel. But once level into this game, you notice all is not the same. The Sonic franchise has been given a shot of nitrious. The levels are darker, the music is cooler, and the character seems like he grew up a bit. The target audience seems to have changed from Pokemon playing GameBoy Kids, to those who are old enough to be Gran Turismo 4 and Madden 06' addicted. This is the action/adventure/platformer all us Genesis generation guys have been waiting for. True, like all Sonic games, this is a game for ALL ages.. but in this case, Sonic is a bit different, and we like him this way!

I'm sorry if I offend anyone when I say this, but this game is better than Super Mario Bros., better than Crash Bandicoot, better than Alex the Kidd, better than Rayman, better than Shinobi, better than Ghouls 'N Ghosts, and better than any other 2d, if not any platformer ever.

Sonic CD puts a cool aura, and a good hero together.

This is the kind of "smooth" game that made SEGA's name in the 90s.

Whether played on Sega CD or Windows.. you'll see how simple & clean yet so very good this game is.

The Bad
Why did they not expand and improve on this? SEGA..... I'm sure this would of sold much better than the 3d adventure (after Sonic Heroes) starring dark Knuckles and a machine gun!?

The Bottom Line
A benchmark in 2d gaming. Stands alongside other greats such as:

Gunstar Heroes, Earthworm Jim, Donkey Kong Country, Street Fighter II, Alladin, Super Punchout, Blood Bros., Samurai Showdown 2, Andy Sullivan's Indy Heat, Guardian Heroes, Metal Slug, Contra ...

The Good
I liked the part about when Robotnik (a.k.a. Eggman) built Metal Sonic and tries to defeat Sonic the Hedgehog. It's also very fun, and I also liked the idea of making a tiny world that orbits around...well...the planet Mobius every 6 months. It's also cool that you can travel through time.

The Bad
There is no Super Sonic, nor Super Metal Sonic, or the Chaos Emeralds. Instead, they put "Time Stones". How stupid is that!?!?

The Bottom Line
Well, I'd say it would probably get a 4.1 score, rather that a 3.6. it's a lot better then that. I don't know this game all the way, 'cause I haven't beaten it. I may post another thing IF I finish this game.