Twenty-odd years ago, many a Saturday morning would be spent playing Sonic. Or Sonic 2. Or Sonic 3. And today, a Saturday, I played and completed 3D Sonic the Hedgehog 2 on the Nintendo 3DS. It was awesome.
Like Gunstar Heroes and the first 3D Sonic the Hedgehog, the 3D here is mostly subtle. The original parallax layers are now given actual depth, and although this makes it feel more like a pop-up diorama than properly 3D it still makes the lovely 2D sprites look fantastic. Where the 3D really shines, however, is in the Special Stages. At first, they make your eyes bleed, but when you get used to them the into-the-screen 3D is fantastic and really adds to the stages.
Apart from all that, 3D Sonic the Hedgehog 2 is still Sonic the Hedgehog too. Complete with all the bugs, but without any of the slowdown (which was only really noticeable in Mystic Cave Zone anyway). It’s still a great game, and it’s still a joy to play.
I did find it incredibly easy, mopping up all the Chaos Emeralds early on. Which actually makes the game a little harder as you don’t pick up so many extra lives as once you hit 50 rings and jump in the air, you become Super Sonic and your rings start counting down – it’s unlikely you’ll hit 100. You also feel the need to rush through the levels once you’re Super Sonic as you don’t want your rings to run out, especially if they do so when you make it to a boss!
And in just over an hour, it was all done. Eggman beaten (or possibly scrambled), and ending sequence go. Woo! So, Sega – when are we getting 3D Sonic the Hedgehog 3, eh?
Sadly, I do not believe we will get a 3D Sonic 3, as it actively contradicts the series’s current tone and there may also be licensing issues.
“Current tone” being “as awful as possible”, I assume? What licensing issues anyway? It’s been re-released so many times on many platforms, you’d think it would have been an issue already.