The original release of Sonic Origins launched as a celebration of the blue blur’s 31st birthday, as well as introducing legions of new fans to the iconic franchise after the success of the first feature film. The games contained in the compilation are arguably still the series highpoint, even some 30+ years later, but came modernised and remastered for the first time.
Now, the celebration compilation has been further bolstered with 12 new games being added in, pushed out under the Sonic Origins Plus banner. The likes of Sonic Spinball, Dr. Robotnik’s Mean Bean Machine and Sonic Chaos are now included to bring the total of games to 16. But, there is a caveat. Rather than theses all being based on the SEGA Genesis/Master System/Mega Drive versions, they are all ports of Game Gear games.
And the problem with the Game Gear games is that they’re simply not very good.
Despite sharing various names with other Sonic games as mentioned above, as well as Sonic the Hedgehog and Sonic the Hedgehog 2, these are very different games. Originally released on handheld, their limitations are immediately apparent. They are also released here as they were back in the day too, unlike the others that have been remastered for this compilation.
Most of the new games added to Sonic Origins Plus bring the same 2D platforming that the franchise was built on, albeit massively pared down. The likes of Sonic the Hedgehog, Sonic the Hedgehog 2 and Sonic Blast offer next to nothing. The gameplay is poor in comparison, there is no real sense of speed (something fundamental for a Sonic game) and it is just frustrating all round.
There is hope in the form of Sonic Drift, Sonic Spinball and Dr. Robotnik’s Mean Bean Machine. But again, that hope quickly disappears; the latter two will make you wish you were playing their beefier counterparts, whilst the former is just a very bad driving game.
Sonic Drift 2 is a little better, but there is some blatant rubber banding going in there. It is another driving game, but with a slightly larger roster and tracks that bear the same names as some of the classic Sonic levels. The similarities between the original levels and the driving tracks end there though. The iconic music is gone and if it wasn’t for the name, they’d be barely recognisable.
On the subject of the music, the games featured from the Game Gear all sound terrible. There doesn’t appear to have been any attempt to clean up the sound from the original releases. It’s like someone has recorded the audio direct from a Game Gear using a potato, and then ported that into the collection.
It’s not all bad though, there are a couple of hidden gems in Sonic Origins Plus. Tails’ Skypatrol was only released in Japan previously and is the flying fox’s debut solo game. And it has him flying through levels using a ring to grab onto various objects and dodging others. It’s a trickier game that will have you attempting the training level a few times in order to just complete it. But it is something different; something which these new additions are badly missing.
Another good game also features Tails. Tails Adventure is a purposefully slower-paced platformer that has Tails attacking enemies by throwing bombs of all things at them. But it feels and plays differently, which is a good thing.
As for the original four games that were part of the initial release – Sonic the Hedgehog, Sonic 2, Sonic 3 and Sonic CD – a new playable character has been added in. Sonic’s on/off girlfriend Amy Rose joins the roster. Now, personally speaking, I have never liked Amy – mind you, modern Sonic is also infuriating – but in these games, she brings something new. Her hammer attacks on the ground and in the air allow for different traversal methods that, after playing these games for 30+ years, can mean you are finding different paths through the levels.
The same goes for Knuckles’ inclusion in Sonic CD. For some reason, this was never a feature in the initial Sonic Origins release, but has the ability to massively change how you play these levels. His glide ability is a game changer, giving you the chance to breeze right over many of them. As a result, you can get some very quick times now on these levels.
The Plus upgrade doesn’t bring any new achievements unfortunately. However, for those that feel like they need to work towards something – and I am ashamed to admit how true that is for me too – there is a little menu option underneath the Game Gear games called ‘Surprise’. This gives you ten objectives to complete, many of which utilise the newly added content. Completing each one will unlock a new section of an original piece of artwork. These challenges aren’t too demanding and offer something to work towards at least.
Sonic Origins was a wonderful celebration of all things Sonic the Hedgehog. Sonic Origins Plus however, causes the overall compilation to miss more than it hits. The inclusion of the Game Gear games adds very little aside from a couple of brief-but-fun titles. In fact, it turns out it is not these 12 ‘new’ games that are the biggest selling point of Sonic Origins Plus, but the inclusion of Amy as a playable character and Knuckles in Sonic CD. These can seriously change how you have approached these games, and once again show how timeless they still are, now more than 30 years on.
