Sonic 3 is 15 years old.

Sonic 3... oh wow. Put it with Sonic & Knuckles, and you have something most likely better than Sonic CD. (I haven't played either enough yet.) Awesome levels, amazing music (and innovative too: Angel Island Zone's BGM is in C Mixolydian. Tell me another video game song released before that is in that key), and it's just fun.

I first beat the game by itself in Sonic Mega Collection, with all seven Chaos Emeralds. I just got the cart a few days ago (in its plastic case and color-covered manual — pwned, Mega Hit Series owners!). I'll play it later today, and this time I'll win as Sonic and Tails with all seven Chaos Emeralds all got with perfect and all before Launch Base Zone.

Fuck yeah.

 

I think the first time I played Sonic 3 was when I was 7 or 8 (jebus!) in 1994. It was a different time back then. Happy meals galore. I remember seeing the Knuckles toy before I even knew who or what Knuckles was. My friend next door had it. I remember it being this red animal thing within a whirl cloud. I later learned that this was a misrepresentation of Knuckles and his abilities. We see later on that Espio would be the one to perform the real tornado attack.



I'm not exactly sure when I got a copy of Sonic 3, but I think it was around Christmas of 1994. By this time Sonic and Knuckles had come out although for some reason, my parents could NEVER find a copy of it. I did the next best thing and rented it. Someone had already completed everything, so I just explored what S&K had to offer and I thought it was very strange. I was confused because at the time I thought it was "Sonic 4" but by a different name. I remember thinking to myself that they were cheap and didn't update the graphics this time around and didn't realize the conspiracy until years later. So I basically grew up w/o S&K until I downloaded the roms. By the time I could get my hands on an S&K cart, I stopped caring :/. I had already moved on to my racing games and the N64 era.

I still have my original Sonic 3...it never got a S&K companion, but my other games keep it company. Although "technically" I own S&K now because of the Mega Collection.


When I first played Sonic 3, I was very confused because: Wtf, this is NOT the REAL Sonic theme song!, this red hip-hop laughing thing stole my emeralds, everything is on fire, and I "think" the music changes more often but I'm not sure? OMG they brought back Giant Rings but they are all over now!!! The star post sent me to a gumball machine? no emerald here! Wtf are with these shields? OH! I see, they are different colors! -- OH CRAP BOMBS, what? this is NOT what the Act Clear music is supposed to sound like!....and then I moved onto Hydrocity :D

I was scared to death by the beginning of Hydrocity Act 2, and was fascinated by the name "Marble Garden" was clever and liked the level better because of the lack of lava. Once I got to Carnival Night, I stopped playing for a year because I could not get past it. I went back and was so angry that I started mashing around all the buttons until I realized that pressing up made the Dentures (they seriously looked like rotating fake teeth to me back then!) move a little further! Then I started jumping and pressing up and down and realized that pressing up and down was what I needed to do. I had a baby when I made it to Ice Cap, I thought this was the coolest thing that they were ever going to put in a Sonic game.....I was pretty much right! When I made it to the Final Boss, it was scary as shit and made my heart pound at a million beats a second. I was happy that I finally did it....back in the summer of 1997! (THATS RIGHT, I was at my grandma's house btw). I don't know when I finally got super sonic, but it was a little bit after that even. The Carnival Night themed special stage was (and still is) a bitch because of the EXTREME slowdown (it happens in every version that I've played, I don't know why people that I've spoken to about this has never experienced it!). I was dissapointed as fuck after I beat the final boss, I was left wondering where the traditional end credits with level music was (didn't know about S&K's yet) and why the game was so damn short (again, I didn't realize that they were supposed to be one game, I just thought it was some off the wall bonus feature). I never really knew about Chaotix until much later, but I knew the 32X was a flop because I knew Sega's CD was not good (although I played Sonic CD's for 5 minutes once, not realizing what I was playing at Best Buy in 1994). 3D Blast was so damn annoying and literally would make me ill.

So yeah, Sonic 3 was the downfall for me. We have grown to have a love/hate relationship. I love Sonic 3 now, but not as a little kid. It was a shark jumper for me back then and the next Sonic game I got after Sonic 3 was Sonic Adventure 2 Battle, which shows you how disconnected I became. I had a friend with Sonic Adventure and I thought the game was horrendous and that it had terrible music (again, things change!).

My Sonic 3 cart currently sits in a TV cabinet in "my" room at my parents house...along with my Genesis, NES, and various games. Every so often I would play it for old times sake, but it's been a few years now. I'm sure it still works perfectly fine too.

Would you care to elaborate on this? I'm curious as to what this is.

 

Since when was the up button used for anything useful?!

 

Would you care to elaborate? I'm curious to know what this is. I've taken a music theory coure, but we didn't cover this. I found a youtube video explaining it, but I'm still having trouble understanding.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AkYNTNIFd3Q

(good god, you know SHE is a music instructor)

 

What exactly don't you understand: what mixolydian mode is or why AIZ is that mode?

I did, and on my own. The only time I ever used GameFAQs to finish the game was to look at a map of a few of the Special Stages to see how to get the Perfect. Everything else (including all the other Perfects) was on my own. And I'm still finding stuff on my own (two days ago, I found another Big Ring in AIZ2).

 

Right! Me and Marc just finished our individual playthroughs. I opted to play as Sonic alone with the No Save option checked. For the first time in literally ever, I actually got a Game Over. I can't really explain how it happened, but it... well, did. Since I collected all the Emeralds, I just opened up my Sonic alone save file and continued from where I was; as it seems, I was bitched at violently by several of the crowd with several blasphemous accusations of me cheating.

This is, of course, ignoring that if I had used a save file, I could have just continued in the same way.

Anyway, I eventually made it to the end with the best possible ending. We oggled the credits and pointed out familiar names, and I made the mistake of thinking Cirocco was black. Apparently, he's not, even though he makes rap beats and to my knowledge his website shows him as a black man. Weird, but I can dig it! I guess. :v:

Still it was some good fun! Nice to revisit an old classic in the name of celebration. You all owe it to yourselves to coordinate your own playthrough—you won't regret it. :v:

 

Right, just won as Tails. And it was the cheating that made us yell, but the Game Over. We just had to give you crap. Also, you forgot the fact that in the conversation, we all got to know that Qjimbo didn't know how Sonic became Super Sonic with seven Emeralds. =X

 

S3&K: still my fave Sonic game of all time. Period.

That bug where you die as tails sliding down on the ice rock in ICZ only the first time round is not pretty though.

 

Sonic 3 (&K) is the best game ever !!!

I should actually give it a good playthrough again (for some 50th time or so :P).

 

I've been in the middle of a perfect (RE: All Emeralds) playthrough with all characters for awhile now. I'm finishing off the Super Emeralds with Knuckles, and I haven't even touched Sonic, Tails, or Sonic & Tails. But yeah, wish me luck.

Anyway, this was the first Sonic game I ever owned. I got S&K Collection for my 3rd Xmas, and while I liked Sonic 2 better at the time, Sonic 3K is my favorite Sonic game today. Just talking about it makes me want to play it, and I still find secrets in it 13 years after I first played. How many games give you that?

 

Now try and get Super Sonic on the Ice Cap snowboard without savestates. Took me ages to manage that, and then it just glitches up!

 

That's the difference between most of you and me. You all played it when it was in its prime. I was a year old when it first came out. I started with the Genesis (3) about ten years ago, and found out about Sonic from not for resale Sonic 1, not for resale Sonic 2, and Sonic Spinball (all from resale, lol) a year or two later, but I only found out about Sonic 3 between three to five (how do I know?) years ago, when I got Sonic Mega Collection for the GameCube. And now I have a new Genesis (2, with Sega CD), and just got Sonic 3 a few days ago.

 

Talk about Ironic. When I first woke up today I decided to go up stairs instead of going on my computer so I grabbed my PSP and started playing S3K. I ended up beating it with all Super Emeralds (9 continues and 15 lives for Sonic, and 6 continutes and 10 Lives for Knuckles) and come to find out, today is the the anniversary of it's release. XD

 

I never played sonic 3 on the actual genesis, regardless of the fact that I actually owned a sega, sonic, sonic 2, AND S&K. I only played it many, many years later due to the wonders of emulation. To this day I have yet to play S3 on hardware, even though I've beaten every game I've owned All Emeralds except for the original.

When I finally did play it, the first words out of my mouth were "Wow, this is awesome!". And indeed, it was. Sonic 3 is an awesome game, even by itself. The music is kicking awesome, especially that which is replaced in S3K (why did they replace it in the first place? I loved those boss musics!) By the time I played it, I recognized many of the S&K gimmicks, such as elemental shields and instashield, in addition with the only time in genesis history that tails's flying is able to be controlled by the player. The new special stages were icing on the glorious cake S3 had become. Difficult, frustrating icing, but deliciously sweet, nonetheless.

I was on launch base when my computer died, forcing me to lose my savestate. I only got it later as the PC version, containing all three games (that is, S3, S&K, and S3&K) so, having beaten S&K, and nearly beating S3, I decided to play the combined version.
ABSOLUTE PERFECTION IN GAME FORM.
Everything is perfectly in it's place, story-wise, to gameplay wise, to HOLY FUCK YOU CAN PLAY AS TAILS IN S&K!
Yes, I was a tails-whore playing through, because his flying is absolutely invaluable to a newbie. When I finally beat launch base, knocked knucks into the abyss, and destroyed Robotnik for the final (I believed) time, It happened.
I wasn't good enough to get all the emeralds in S3 just yet, so I didn't get to do the super emerald cutscene, but tails in Mushroom Hill totally made up for it. Having been disappointed at him not being in s&k, this was absolute, saturated, condensed awesome.

Secrets I'd never seen before that only tails could get to, playing through S&K as Tails was as awesome as it could get.
Until I found out about Hyper Sonic.
And Golden Tails.
And MOTHERFUCKING SUPERKNUCKS.

I had to play it again. I had to get these characters.

I started with sonic, to see what could possibly be better than Super Sonic.
It was a long and arduous journey, but I finally got back to the launchbase, killed the Robo-puncher, and made it to Mushroom Hill.
But wait... This isn't mushroom hill! I've never seen this place before! Another big ring? Wait, it's flashing? Holy shit, Could this be it?
Seven Super Emeralds, each to a much more difficult special stage than the first 7. After getting THESE, I was in Sandopolis, which is notorious (At least in my eyes) for being difficult to keep rings. I did manage to get 50 in time for the Boss of act 2, though.
IT WAS GLORIOUS.

And awesome jumpdash that could be aimed, a flash that cleared the screen, flashing like no one's business, it was the height of awesome.

Until I beat the Death Egg V2.
DOOMSDAY. HOLY FUCK.
I can't tell you what I was thinking at the time, having gone all this way, killing the biggest of the bad, and jumping off the edge...
AND TRANSFORMING.
And fighting the biggest robotnik-mobile I'd ever seen. Missiles, lasers, rocks which slowed you down, a limited supply of rings, all made Doomsday zone the most epic boss battle EVER.

And then it was over. I'd won, and was treated to the most glorious Game Over screen I'd ever seen.

Sonic 3 is a masterpiece of technology, no doubt.

 

OK, everybody seemed to be playing Sonic 3 today (all Chaos Emeralds included) so I went onto play it too.

Good game never gets old =P

 

I was with my mum and sister at a friends house and was tipped off by the friends dad that Sonic 3 was coming out in a few days, we phoned the game rental service near us (not blockbuster) to hold onto a copy on launch day for us to rent, and so they did!

A good game but it feels like the most rushed game out of them all, shit ending and felt half as long as sonic 2 in terms of beginning to end (not amount of acts, though that was also a suck factor).

As for the stupid up-down barrels, no other level in a sonic game used the d-pad in such way and it's one reason why I became stuck at that point for multiple rent's of the game, one time when renting it soneone left the complete save on there so I could play ice cap and onwards without a problem.

 

One of my favorites from childhood. When added on to Sonic & Knuckles there was more fun to be played. I've played this game atleast a hundred times. Or so I think.