Anybody beat Sonic 2 bonus stages without level select practice?

Because I just revisited these bane of my childhood to finally conquer via level select just moments ago. Don't remember if I thought of this back in the day. Might have since eventually at one point the later mags reposted Sonic 2 cheat codes I missed from my earlier non gaming mag days (I got Sonic 2 with Genesis 2 Bundle when it came out, and only started getting mags around mid 1994 :|). But I disliked these bonus stages so much I probably didn't even care about beating this game properly by then (besides, back then to me Sonic 2 was challenge enough without bonus stages to beat. Because it took me some time to finally beat Sonic 2, as strange as that may sound).

And no wonder, from practicing them today, these stages get way to memorizer heavy. With that last stage mixing memorization with timing skill based dodging & weaving through obstacles to get from side to side. This last stage took by far the longest to get down today. Namely the part I just described in the very first section. After memorizing the sides I needed to be on, it took some time to get my timing and focus consistent enough to weave back and forth through incoming center obstacles.


So yeah, lets talk about these crazy Sonic 2 bonus stages, and who loved to replay Sonic 2 enough to finally learn these stages the hard way? No me. :p

Yeah. I did it a couple of times. I did it with Sonic alone. Don't remember if I did tails too. But I recall getting the good ending the "honest" way.

As a huge fan of the 16 bit Sonic games, i played all of them so obsessively as kid/boy that i memorized all of their bonus stages! Nowdays I can still get 6 emeralds by emerald hill act 2 then the last one at first starpost in chemical plant :D (I THINK you can get all of 7 by emerald hill act2? But i must be skipping a starpost somewhere

I liked to play with Sonic and Tails but because you need more rings than with playing as Sonic only and the insane stupidity of the computer controlled Tails I often ended up playing the bonus stages with two controllers just by myself.

man, sonic 2 is the only one ive never gone super sonic in!

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Originally Posted by QuickSciFi

Yeah. I did it a couple of times. I did it with Sonic alone. Don't remember if I did tails too. But I recall getting the good ending the "honest" way.

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this is literally why, in every iteration i forget to play dolo. tails fucks up the last emerald or two, every single time

I never learned to use both characters in sonic2 bonus stages, i simply play according to tails delayed reaction time, on later bonuses has limited success but at least you should be able to prevent the dumbass to get any relevant amount of rings. In sonic3+K I was able to use both characters in normal stages though, but I can't really do it anymore

Not me, I absolutely despise the special stages in Sonic 2, they ruin that game.

Yeah, always beaten in solo mode, even years after.
Tails is just too much a burden on the bonus stages, not worth it.

Yep, when playing with both Tails keeps losing rings, which in itself may not be bad (just ignore Tails) except that the ring count is increased too. So yeah, go solo. That said, I never practiced using the level select... being sent back to Emerald Hill 1 makes me lazy =P (S3K has it better, since you can actually choose which special stage to play)

Also on the last special stage: does anybody else just hold down the D-pad when the swarm of randomly placed rings comes up?

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Originally Posted by Thief

And no wonder, from practicing them today, these stages get way to memorizer heavy. With that last stage mixing memorization with timing skill based dodging & weaving through obstacles to get from side to side. This last stage took by far the longest to get down today. Namely the part I just described in the very first section. After memorizing the sides I needed to be on, it took some time to get my timing and focus consistent enough to weave back and forth through incoming center obstacles.

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Do a short jump (do a quick tap, i.e. not hold down the jump button). You'll land on the same spot on the opposite side without much trouble. This is pretty much a must to keep your sanity for any special stage where you're constantly switching lanes.

Sonic 2 bonus stage is easier compared with sonic 1 and sonic 3, until today i take all esmeralds without problem. Sonic 3 bonus is more challing and you have to memorize alot of things to finish all

Oh yeah, and it was with solo Sonic. Once I compared and seen that Tails adds about 10 more rings to the total, he got ditched real fast.

Yes, I managed to get all the Emeralds in Sonic 3 myself too. That's my fave bonus stage design because it's more skill based over blind memorization (though I practiced Sonic 3 bonus stages by accident since I attached Knuckles to Sonic 1 until I became an expert at them. After that, Sonic 3 & K bonus stages were pure cakewalk).

The reason so much memorization didn't work for me in Sonic 2 was because you always needed to hunt down 50 more rings through a stage for another shot. And I simply never came close to wanting to play Sonic 2 that much + so much memorization and delay in time to until you get another shot didn't click with me. That and it ruined the pacing for the first few stages, since you would waste so much extra time on the first few stages you know best, so that would contribute to things getting old faster for me when replaying the regular stages. I much prefer the pacing of Sonic 1, where you only need to collect 50 rings for a stage once instead of 3x. I guess for the longer stages in Sonic 2 it's not as back-tracky, but for the later stages holding on to rings gets harder too. So yeah, great idea for Sonic 2 replay value, but it's execution failed on me back then because I replayed Sonic 3 & Knuckles more.

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Originally Posted by QuickSciFi

Yeah. I did it a couple of times. I did it with Sonic alone. Don't remember if I did tails too. But I recall getting the good ending the "honest" way.

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Was this during childhood years or adult years? (Ditto for the rest of you. Should of added this in the opening post)

Anyway, congrats on you and the rest doing it the honest way.

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Originally Posted by Guntz

Not me, I absolutely despise the special stages in Sonic 2, they ruin that game.

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Well you can always practice them via level select as I did. Though still feels like I need more practice as I just got by on the skin o' my teeth.

No, and I'm hopeless at it even in solo mode. I really don't like Sonic 2 special stages so there is no incentive to practice them, that's my problem.

Give me Sonic 3's or Sonic CD's special stages any day - and that goes for the main games as well :)

^ I think the Sonic 2 stages were american dev side of Sonic 2's idea (I read yesterday they did the graphics from a Sonic Jam dev comment on Sonic Retro). Ditto for Oil Ocean, among who knows what else. These american influences give Sonic 2 a vibe that rub me the wrong way, personally. Noticed this vibe since back when I got my Genesis and was able to play Sonic 1 briefly at a friends cousin house and rental or two before I eventually owned it via Classic re-release edition to finally complete my Genesis Sonic Collection back in those days. Why I prefer Sonic 2 the least of the Genesis outings so far, though am now replaying these games to see if this is still the case. Namely comparing Sonic 1 and 2, so playing these back to back/back and forth.

It's been a long time since I've played the first Sonic. When I did have it as a kid, it was the slow-ass PAL version.

Last year I picked up the sexy NTSCJ versions of 2, 3, S&K and CD but didn't bother with part 1 for whatever reason. Had an epic time playing through them and from that, definitely came out thinking 3 was the best. Sonic CD gets some criticism around here it seems but it's far more interesting than 2 for me.

CD also has the best special stage IMO Once you get past the initial WTF learning curve with the timing on hitting those UFOs, it feels the most satisfying to play.

The problem with Sonic CD is not that much the UFOs but that it's a pain to control Sonic - he runs too fast for his turning speed, and as such you're going to have a pretty hard time actually going in the direction you want to go, which means missed UFOs and landing in the water constantly (!@#$%&). That said, if I recall correctly you could press ↓ to make Sonic slow down, right? (which would be useful precisely to make it easier when turning around) Can't be bothered to go check right now though =P