My first video game that I have ever played was Sonic the Hedgehog. I was a little over twelve or so months old; having held a Sega Genesis controller and never looking back. I've grown up alongside Sonic, and his series and I have had a long lasting friendship. However, my experiences with the latest Sonic games; Sonic Mania and Sonic Forces, left me with conflicting emotions. Sonic Mania is a classic 2D Sonic game; sprite based and physics oriented. Sonic Forces tied into Mania, yes, but that game uses a modern Boost formula. my grievances with Sonic Forces are long, but I have no doubt that its failure critically speaking cause Sega to rethink its Sonic plan.
this got me thinking: what's the best Sonic game? to answer this question, we have to explain what a Sonic game was and is, and to do that we have to format the entire franchise into two types: Classic and Modern.
Well, at least that's what Sega - more specifically, Takashi Iizuka, head of the Sonic franchise, wants you to do, but we'll get there shortly.
for reference, the games in the Classic series start at Sonic The Hedgehog for Genesis/Megadrive, as well as the Master System and Game Gear versions of that game (a very different take on Sonic, let's not kid ourselves) and end, officially, at 2017's Sonic Mania and its update Sonic Mania Plus. meanwhile the Modern Sonic timeline begins at Sonic Adventure, first debuting in 1998 for the Sega Dreamcast in Japan, and then a year later in North America; and ends at Sonic Forces, also of 2017; with a heretofore unannounced game at time of writing in development.
Classic Sonic has a very distinct, yet codified feel to it. You travel the series through a 2D plane, utilizing Sonic's trademark speed to rush through each level as fast as possible, collect rings to act as a shield and to buy into the Special Stages for a chance to gain a Chaos Emerald, fight Ivo Robotnik's boss machines at the end of each two act zone (three in Sonic 1, with a few notable exceptions). That is the entire basic point of the Classic Sonic series, but there's more. Classic Sonic utilizes physics and momentum in such a way that using Sonic's speed feels flowy, almost smooth.
Modern Sonic fleshes out the world and utilizes concepts that are very alien to Classic. acting as something of a soft reboot, Modern Sonic takes place in an altered timeline to the Classic universe. Ivo Robotnik is now called Eggman, there's a lot more mythical beasts flying around, Chaos Emeralds have more story significance, the cast is further expanded and mechanics are added and traded at will. while the Classic Sonic uses momentum and the level layout to allow Sonic to breeze right past the stage, the Modern Sonic uses various tricks such as the Light Speed Dash, the Rush Boost and notably the Homing Attack to both allow for quick speedrun traversal and more varied combat capability.
Note: Bear in mind that Sonic Boom Rise of Lyric and its 3DS ancillary titles Shattered Crystal, and Fire & Ice do not count towards either series and are in fact based off of the then-airing Cartoon Network TV show. Sonic Boom is also its own continuity and is therefore not included in the overall Sonic timeline, much as how the discontinued Archie Sonic, the successor IDW Sonic, and the various other television shows act.
What Sega does not want you to know is that there is a third Sonic type, and no I'm not referring to spinoffs. I call it the Advance Type, so named for the game that codified it, 2001's Sonic Advance. this takes the Classic format and throws in Modern character designs and mechanics, for instance Sonic cannot use Super Sonic, his high powered transformation ability, in the stages themselves, saving that form for the end of the game after all seven chaos emeralds have been picked up. there's a greater emphasis on pitfalls over setpieces or character specific abilities; and the Special Stages themselves are harder to access. in short, if Sonic 1 is Super Mario Brothers and Sonic Adventure is Super Maio 64, I'd say the Advance series is the New Super Mario Brothers line.
comparing Mario to Sonic is no accident, as Sonic was created specifically to be the anti-Mario. Yuji Naka, one of the two people credited as being the "father of Sonic the Hedgehog" stated in an interview that Sonic's speed was a direct result of him trying to rush through World 1-1 of the original Super Mario Brothers on the Famicom. it is also no accident that Sonic 1 8-bit is more Mario like in level structure, which we will get to shortly.
Here's where things get dicey. Sonic the Hedgehog, from his inception, has been in spinoffs and supplementary works, in fact his first appearance in an official Sega title was in the Sega System 32 game Rad Mobile; or Gale Racer in Japan, in 1990. He was meant to be created as "The World's Most Famous Hedgehog" and Sega wanted you to know this. good examples are Sonic Spinball, SegaSonic The Hedgehog, Sonic Drift (all from 1993); Sonic R (1997); the Sonic Storybook duology of Secret Rings and Black Knight (2006, 2008) and of course the Sonic Riders trilogy (2005-2010). These have added characters and lore to Sonic but I will not count them. after all, SegaSonic the Hedgehog is purported to never have launched in America and its control scheme makes it hard to play and emulate on modern systems; Sonic Spinball and its pseudo-sequel Pinball Party are sub-par, and the Sonic Racing games are just that, Sonic Racing games, tied to the main cast but not necessarily part of the timeline.
for brevity's sake, here's where each game in the chronology stands
Modern: Sonic Adventure (DC), Sonic Adventure 2 (DC), Sonic Heroes (6th Gen), Shadow the Hedgehog (6th Gen), SONIC THE HEDGEHOG (2006, 7th Gen), Sonic Unleashed (7th Gen/PS2), Sonic the Hedgehog 4 Episode 1&2 (7th Gen), Sonic Colors (Wii), Sonic Generations (360/PS3), Sonic Lost World (Wii U), Sonic Forces (8th Gen)
Advance: Sonic Pocket Adventure (Neo Geo Pocket Color), Sonic Advance (GBA), Sonic Advance 2 (GBA), Sonic Battle (GBA), Sonic Advance 3 (GBA), Sonic Rush (NDS), Sonic Rush Adventure (NDS), Sonic Colors (NDS), Sonic Generations (3DS)
Let's go over the big standouts from each of the three Sonic types.
Sonic Colors, released in 2010 exclusively for the Wii, is what I consider the best Modern Sonic game, having established once and for all what a Modern Sonic game could be. this is a Sonic that does not take things seriously, this is a Tails that puts up with Sonic's shenanigans and a Dr. Eggman that has the best personality, largely in part to the returning Mike Pollock.
Sonic Colors fortunately controls like a charm. this was the first game to introduce the Wisps (certainly won't be the last game with them); and tho it wasn't the first game to have the Rush Boost (which would be Sonic Rush), this was the first game to really perfect that sense of speed that Modern Sonic is known for. an honorable mention goes to the soundtrack which honestly is one of the best Modern Type OSTs
Sonic Advance bears the distinction of being the first Sonic game to ever come out on a Nintendo console (though it is not the first time Sonic has ever left a Sega platform). coming to us from DIMPS, a band of ex-SNK developers who worked on Sonic Pocket Adventure (the same DIMPS behind Street Fighter IV and Dragon Ball Xenoverse, by the by); Sonic Advance is the first Advance Sonic game to nail that feeling of wonder from the Classic Era, while still being its own thing.
Each of the four playable characters feels different with their own unique attributes. Sonic is the fastest and jumps the highest, Tails covers a lot of vertical space and is the easiest to control, Knuckles has a lot of power and can glide, and Amy is a lot more technical and acrobatic but also has a learning curve to her. knocks against Sonic Advance are the OST (which, though compositionally great, suffer from the GBA soundchip) and the special stages.
Sonic Mania is a masterpiece, but looking back on it, we didn't have to have got it in the first place. this is a game that caters directly to the fans of the franchise (which makes sense given the development team) and specifically pays attention to nostalgia. Moreover, there are plenty of callbacks, references and little Easter eggs that those unfamiliar with the franchise will understand.
The difference between Sonic Mania and an ordinary romhack that does the same job is that Sonic Mania knows who it's catering to, and as a result leans into it like a Kawasaki superbike. This is a game that knows exactly what it is, which is a Sonic game meant to play like the original Genesis trilogy; warts and all. Tee Lopes' compositions are an absolute unit of a soundtrack on top of that.
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