My review for this week is:

Sonic The Hedgehog 2

June 24, 2002
Week 2

Sonic The Hedgehog 2
Platform:  Genesis
Publisher:  Sega
Designer:  Sega
Genre:  Action
Players:  2 (Simultaneous)
Published Date  1992

Well, if it isn't the heroic hedgehog, who's back for more against the forces of the returning Doc Robotnik! This time, the fat doctor brings to light his ultimate creation (which comes back again and again), The Death Egg! Real funny, huh? Really, I'm not kidding, he must have been watching The Star Wars Trilogy last night or something. Well, he goes and kidnaps the little wimpy animals and converts them into even more robots to construct this Death Star rip off. It's up to Sonic and his new buddy, Tails, to stop him. Tails is a baby, two-tailed fox, who has a big head and feet like Sonic, but he looks so cute! The instructions say he watched and copied Sonic's abilities. He moves just as fast and everything! I guess Sonic must not be all that great if any animal that copies him can do the same things and move as fast. Better stop at the counselor's Sonic, we got maybe a fake image problem. Anyway, the game itself is quite good and is a worthy sequel to the original. It's pretty much more of the same, actually.
Sonic races through about 11 total zones, each with anywhere from 1 to 3 acts. The game starts out with you racing through what seems like an endless list of 2-act zones. They're quick and boring after a while, but some zones are real neat, like the popular Casino Night Zone (pinballs and slot machines!) or the Chemical Plant Zone (icky gooey stuff.) There's even a level where you stand on an airplace, with Tails piloting it. A few new obstacles, like corkscrews, have been added in addition to the famous loops.

The game has better scrolling and moves faster than the first, especially with the new Spin Dash move when holding down and any button. There's even a cool two player split screen mode to race the other in 3 different zones from the game. The problem with this is that it suffers extreme slow down and is jerky with all the sprites the Genesis is striving to put up. Tails can also join in during the 1 player mode, making it easy to beat Robotnik, since Tails is invincible! Cheater! Since the action focuses on Sonic, it's hard to keep up otherwise. When a friend isn't controlling Tails, the computer does, coping every single thing Sonic does. It's so ANNOYING!!!

The Chaos Emeralds are back, now with 7 of them and once again a slightly changed ending (which even isn't worth the effort, although you can change into a neat yellow Super Sonic for awhile.) is awaiting when you get them all. You now have to mark lampposts when you have 50+ rings and you jump into a special stage, where you race down tracks in 3D and dodging mines to retrieve enough rings to be rewarded the Chaos Emerald. These are tough though, and you lose all of your rings when you exit...so there's almost no point to them.

The sound is better than the original, but would you believe it, the EXACT same horrible SEGA voice still bellows a horrible, scratchy mess of a word. I love the music here, which contributes to my high praise of this game. Nice tunes accompany the levels better then hoped and new music for the boss and special stages light up the action. The jumping sound remained though, so expect to hear it 20,000 more times. The controls are the same, only with the added Spin Dash that's it, easy as could be.

The difficulty is one that mirrors a novel. It starts out slow and easy, but eventually gets harder and more frustrating until it reaches the last zones, weher the action is up there, dare I say it, the climax. I'm afraid to make it sound like something else that it's not. The difficulty in the Death Egg is hard, with the last boss taking 12 hits and no rings back you up! Timing is the key that can lead to your demise in a blink of an eye. There's also limited continues, depending on how many you got through the game (depends on your score at the end of each level.) Otherwise, it's one that will keep you going for a while, quite entertaining to outrun the little s!&$ of a fox that follows you everywhere. You might never beat that last boss, but you ain't missing anything. I would tell you the ending, but I'll leave the disappointment up to you, alright?
 

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this information came from

http://www.classicgaming.com/reviews/genesis/sonic2.htm