I can kinda agree that something about Sonic 2 often looks wrong, but in my case the reason might be different: I played it mostly in 2-player mode, so the grass in Emerald Hill looked less strikingly tall there. Playing it single-player at any time looked wrong to me (as, of course, that's the level you start on), and I always found the music unsettling. The 2P song felt appropriate to a first stage, the 1P song not so much.
I think some of it was not really managing to strike a balance with the detail like they did in Sonic 3 - in Sonic 1 in particular, objects and geometry are intended to look like early CGI, like the leaves of the palm trees just being these green polygons. They largely dropped that in Sonic 2 but that results in some truly ugly objects and busy art. The palm trees in Emerald Hill are technically more realistic (those are clearly fronds for instance) but I think they look ugly as sin. The level art (not even just the background, the level chunks) is just so overwhelmingly detailed in Chemical Plant that your eye doesn't really know where to look except for those blue pipes which is the one thing anyone actually remembers about this stage aside from the pink "water". And the artists were just absolutely obsessed with translucent tiles. There are lattices everywhere. Why are the bricks in Mystic Cave Zone so detailed? They just shoved so much damn design into this stuff and it results in the game kinda looking like shit in motion. Not even going into how there really are some clear aesthetic differences between zones or how the zones don't flow together at all*. Also the art being so busy means you're less inclined to react to hazards quickly enough. * Sonic 1's original level list does have the levels get more mechanical/artificial in nature - especially with Labyrinth's original cave background - the farther you get in the game, and the art in general is surreal enough that you're less inclined to question it IMO
I prefer Sonic 2's art style over Sonic 3's by a mile. Sonic 3 feels too colorless and bland in comparison.
This really puts things into perspective for me. Even back in the day, before I understood the behind-the-scenes details or paid attention to the credits, Sonic 2 always felt a bit off. It seemed more American in style and less cohesive compared to the others. I think the lack of flow between the zones is what made it not click for me. Spinball also had an American feel, but the design between its stages was more cohesive. For example Hill Top just feels like it comes from another game when you compared it to zones like Wing Fortress or Casino Night. I don’t have that issue with Sonic 1, 3 & Knuckles, CD, Chaotix, 3D Blast, or the Game Gear games.
I was always a big fan of the more naturalistic artwork and shading sonic 3 goes for, you can definitely tell how this evolved into the styles of the SA games and 06. I don't think any other sonic game quite matches the vibe of 3, Heroes is close but in execution that game always felt closer to the way 2 looked, and mania's original zones feel like they're going for their own style.
The boost games should punish you for trying to boost without any juice in your meter. Make Sonic trip instantly.
If I remember correctly, the Wii/PS2 versions of Unleashed does that - so something like how it was done there? I dig it.
Okay I see your point, and I will agree that Sonic 2 feels aimless in some parts, but the thing about lattices? I read through it exactly like this: I think it's one of the neater aspects of Sonic 2's art. It feels thinner than Sonic 1 in every regard (especilly soundwise), like it's Sonic in italics and Sonic 3 is Sonic in bold. I'll never be able to explain that, but it makes sense to me. Anyway. The way Sonic 2 layers foreground, the playable chunks and the background is very nice, I think, and still retains a lot of the faux-3D tricks you mentioned. Yes, Metropolis makes it especially hard to parse Asteron, but I like that! An actual camouflaging badnik of sorts, that forces you to juggle your attention between Sonic and his surroundings at all times. And it's on the last level? Absolutely, I expect nothing less from Eggman's fortress. Besides, the translucent tiles give the stages a three-dimensionality that it otherwise lacks (because everything feels thinner), and gives its machinery a very distinct flavor -- it's a clever combination of the geometric tendencies of Sonic 1's design with real world functionality. On Sonic 2 vs. Sonic 3 direction: it's not like the Sonic 3 part of Sonic 3 & Knuckles flows very well from stage to stage, either. If anything, the final stretch of Sonic 2 gives it a sense of progression after all, but Sonic 3 never does-- it's all outsourced to Sonic & Knuckles, which does it masterfully.
Sonic 1 and CD have the best way to enter special stages. I like that they reward playing skillfully and avoiding damage rather than exploration like 3&K and Mania, and they're much better than 2's bizarre, pace-breaking checkpoint entry system. Likewise, they're two of the best special stages in the series, particularly Sonic 1. I like how it's one of the few special stages to have Sonic in his normal 2D gameplay, just in a bizarre level layout where you're always rolling. Sonic 1 as a whole just rules, I think it's so much more than the "stepping stone to the real good stuff" that a lot of people see it as. Phenomenal music, super cool surreal art design, cool scoring quirks like the hidden goal bonuses and those blocks in Marble Zone you can get a huge chain bonus from, and a perfect short length that makes it endlessly replayable.
I feel like Knuckles chaotix really perfected this system. Same as in Sonic 1 and Sonic CD, but with so much more purpose and thought behind how it works. The special stages completely save Knuckles Chaotix from being terrible top to bottom, it gives the mostly barren and weird level design some actual purpose. The big change in KC is that the amount of rings you bring to the special stage is the amount of time you have to complete the stage. Like super sonic, your rings are constantly counting down in KC's special stages. You can get more in the stage, but it's a fixed number, so you either need to be perfect on each lap to minimize the amount of time you use, or you need to gather as many rings in the main levels as possible before going to the end goal. It would fit in really well with Sonic CD's more emphasis on exploration, as large amounts of ring boxes are super useful in KC. Sonic 1 is one of my favorite games in the series, I've definitely played it more than any other game by far. I love Sonic 1 top to bottom, every stage in the game is fun. I remember when Sonic 1 was brand new and Labryinth Zone was jaw dropping. It gets lost today because it's so rote, but that kind of special effect was brand new for home consoles. Seeing screen filling transparancy was so insane, especially since parallax in general was something big. This entirely additional layer of transparancy filling the screen, with no dither pattern? I can't express enough how much Labryinth Zone was a tech power house back then. It was the first time in any game that water looked *real* to me. Not like blue colored goo like cartoony games do water, like Wonder Boy III. No, Sonic's water had an almost green tint to it, just like Galveston where I lived. Sonic's water looked so cool to me, that stage was just as jaw dropping as, say, Emerald Coast on the Dreamcast. A real wow moment for gaming.
Okay I'm loving the Sonic 1 love in here right now. My favourite videogame ever, 10/10 no notes. Almost perfection.
Alot of arguments online tend to appeal to tradition. People (correctly) point out intentions and philosophy behind a work and a text, but then expect that to be authoritative. Folks who argue like this also assume that who they're arguing with doesn't know any better, and you know what, sometimes they really don't, but that doesn't mean policing their interpretations and preferences is justified, a lot of them are arguing in good faith and have good (or at least non-malicious) intentions. On that note, people who like Sonic 4 are valid lol.
I think this one is pretty unpopular especially given how well loved Mania is, but i've never been a huge fan of titanic monarch or the egg reverie. They both feel like a pretty generic sendoff to an otherwise very memorable game, titanic monarch especially just feels kind of underwhelming compared to the other amazing original zones that mania has to offer. I know the mania team had 0 access to forces design materials while developing the game which is why things like infinite don't appear, but I feel like something at least vaguely akin to null space would've been cooler than just another generic eggman base.
Egg Reverie was pretty disappointing to me because I was really hoping to fight the giant robot the entire last pair of levels was about.
