Sonic the Hedgehog 3 (Sega Mega Drive)
Sonic 3 brought a few new things to the table… But is it better than the first 2?
The Sonic the Hedgehog series is obviously the diamond stud in Sega’s utility belt. Sonic has had a really strong appearance across all of Sega’s systems (except the Saturn… we have games like Sonic R and Jam but no platformers). Even the Master System got two Sonic games even though the Mega Drive was already released by this time, Sonic was called on to breathe new life into an older console that already embraced Alex Kidd and it totally succeeded.
So what took me so long to finally pull out a Sonic game? There’s a lot of awesome Sonic the Hedgehog games but it’s also hard to do the series justice on the Sega Mega Drive. I did have a look at the first 3D installments with Adventure 1 & 2 on the Dreamcast but you could consider Sonic 3 to be the last big 2D hurrah on the console he was born from. The action, graphics, enemies, bosses in Sonic 3 are just all bigger and better. I can’t say it makes the game much more memorable, all the Sonic games on the Mega Drive are great, but that first level in Sonic 3 opens up with a familiar lush green level, but once the forest was lit on fire, I knew this game could deliver a lot more than any of the previous games could.
Sonic the Hedgehog 3 came at a special time when the Sega Mega Drive was at its peak, but to put it into perspective, it was being developed alongside the 32x, Sega CD and Sega’s next big console, the Saturn.
Sonic 3 was so big, it was actually split into two games. Sonic 3 and Sonic & Knuckles. Sonic & Knuckles acts like a piggyback cartridge, unlocking new levels and letting the player select Knuckles as a character. I haven’t reviewed the Sonic & Knuckles piggyback cartridge here because I just wanted to focus on Sonic the Hedgehog 3.
The special thing about Sonic the Hedgehog 3 was that for a lot of people, they wouldn’t see Sonic again until he was tearing it up in 3D on the Dreamcast (unless they were super fans who caught him on the Sega CD or the PC). For a long time, this was the last memorable time Sonic blazed through a 2D world and it ended (what I refer to as) the original trilogy where it began, at home on the Sega Mega Drive.
If you were curious about the only Sonic ‘themed’ for the 32X (and a game all about Knuckles), you can check out Knuckles’ Chaotix here.