Revealed: Why Sonic can't swim

Actually, as much as I hated labyrinth zone, I have to agree with you. They had all the mechanics they needed in Adventure 1, but they never just put them together.
Honestly, right after I finished the first level for the first time, I stayed in the hotel area for a while screwing around with this marvel of sonic engineering. Remembering the classic games, I actually thought to jump in the water and stay for a while, thinking nothing would happen, but sure enough, the good old "Good god, surface, surface! You're going to drown!" music started playing. for a second, I thought it was playing mind games with me, so I stayed a while longer. The count started going, and I was a little scared. Would they actually do it? Maybe it's an actual part of the game. A bunch of questions prevented me from leaving that water until they were answered, and eventually, the music climaxed, the count hit zero, and the little blue hedgehog floated limp to the surface of the water.
Why do I feel so bad all of a sudden?

 

Ummm, because rules changed?
Basing to Mario games Mario still can swim without special breathe (Is there even any animation of that?). Sonic has still problems with this like a real animal. Why? Well, is that the point to move to Mario?
No!
They wanted to make Sonic much more faster. Simply. But he should at least get a fish or any water animal that would help him IMO. Because Sonic likes animals, huh?!

 

I never said that sonic should swim, just that water levels should make a return.

 

But I also haven't said that he should swim. I was thinking that you wanted to add something to water levels.
I only wanted to upgrade a bit the Sonic's swimming physics to be more real and a bit helpful - to make that not only water bubbles and water-shield monitor could help Sonic so this could enable to back water levels with more improvement and fun.

 

If Sonic could swim, what would his weakness be? Every hero needs to have a weakness to make him seem stronger. And by the way, real hedgehogs can float because their spines are hollow. if you want to see a hedgehog floating on his back for 6 minutes, click here.

 

Way to go. Now you've got me wanting a pet Hedgehog!

 

\me wiki's Lemmings..
Fair enough..

As soon as I read that first part, I found myself wondering if Lemmings was really before Sonic.. But, indeed it was.
Man, I feel old!!

Lemmings was Feb 14th 1991, apparently (Valentines Day!! luv da lem's :D )

Still.. That's not an awful lot of dev-time, there, is it?

 

...Err... I see a swimming hedgehog.

 

I guess that he's moving by some kind of wind. Of course the true Sonic animation should looks another, that he's rotating on the whole side. Looks like a ROM pirate, but I think it's Sonic for SMS, which just couldn't handle special sprite effects or graph editors were a bit limited so they drew him the simplier way.

 

LOL. Nay, 'tis Tidal Plant Zone for Game Gear Sonic Triple Trouble. Honest, he really is swimming. You knock an item box and Sonic gets these water-jet scuba-shoe things.

Tails, by contrast, got the Sea Fox, his cool little submarine.

 

Well, that was fast. I just finished looking in Chaos's water level, and was going to say that it had to be a Game Gear, and not a Master System game as PeCeT-full suggested because the HUDs in the Game Gear games are hidden behind objects, while in the Master System games they are not.

However, that still doesn't mean Sonic can swim, it just means he needs something that is only available in a single game.

 

Fair play. I just always thought that he gained his water wings suspiciously fast upon acquisition of said item. I mean, I'd like to see anyone else master rocket-powered-underwater-jet-shoes without first enjoying basic swimming ability.