Such was the quandary when Sonic Mega Collection – a comprehensive coverage of Sonic’s Mega Drive days – was released earlier this year. In that particular title’s case, the answer was obvious. The four major titles on that collection were gold – classic platforming action then, and classic platforming action years later. With Sonic Gems Collection, however, the gems may have lost some of their sparkle.
Sonic Gems Collection offers three rare Sonic titles, a smattering of Game Gear games and a few bonuses to boot. The three main games on offer are Sonic CD - considered by many to be one of the best 2D Sonic platform games to date - Sonic the Fighters - an all-but unheard of arcade fighting game which never made it to Australian or European shores - and Sonic R - a bizarre action/racing title from the Sega Saturn. The “rarity” of these games is called into question, not simply because two of them – Sonic CD and Sonic R – were released on PC, but by the fact that games presented here ARE in fact the PC versions.
In an odd twist, arguably the most popular Sonic game of all time wasn’t in fact made by Sonic Team. Programmed by the mostly unheard of “Sega Technical Institute” around the same time as Sonic 2 for the Mega Drive, the release of Sonic CD for Sega’s ill-fated Mega CD system was held off so as to not adversely affect sales of its Mega Drive counterpart. Unlike many Mega CD games, Sonic’s debut was not merely an enhanced version of a Mega Drive game, but a wholly original and unique adventure. Combining the advantages of CD quality music and mode 7-style scaling effects for some (at the time) awesome psychedelic “3D” special stages, Sonic CD really was something special. Added into the mix was Sonic’s ability to travel through time – from the present to the distant past, and then onward to a dull brown polluted future, where Dr. Robotnik’s insane plans of world domination finally come to fruition. By backtracking to the past and destroying the Doc’s weapons of mass destruction (well, a kinda sorta egg-shaped toaster thing), you could re-write history, resulting in a blue-green happy smiley future, with rainbows and fluffy bunnys and so forth. It really expanded the exploration aspect of the truly immense levels, and you could quite literally spend 20 minutes on each stage trying to spread that Greenpeace love. Or you could just blast through the levels and leave the dumb bunnys to their fate.
Okay, that’s the good, now here’s the bad. Sonic CD has possibly one of the best soundtracks on any Sonic game ever. Each level’s theme is split into remixes which suit the time stream you’re in, from almost tribal beats in the past, to contemporary rhythms to hardcore techno remixes in the warped, noxious future. And that’s bad news? No. The bad news is that I’m talking about the Japanese soundtrack for the game, which we originally heard and loved back on the Mega CD. The soundtrack on Gems Collection is the ungodly US version, which is – in the nicest possible words – a travesty against God and nature. It’s a licensing issue apparently, that doesn’t allow the Japanese soundtrack to leave the country – which would make sense if the original PAL version didn’t have that very same soundtrack. Those of you who played the original will be dumbstruck, and those who haven’t won’t understand why this game had a reputation for having a great soundtrack.
Without this the compilation would be nothing
Sonic the Fighters originally began as a few guys at Sega fooling around with the Virtua Fighter game engine was eventually approved to become a fully fledged arcade game, albeit one to be released in extremely limited numbers in Japan and even more extremely limited numbers in the States. Taking the cast of Sonic characters, Sonic the Fighters throws in a few more and pits them against each other in hand-to-hand (spine-to-spine?) combat. The action is fast and frantic, with some humorous power moves to boot. Graphics are distinctly 90’s, bearing more resemblance to the Daytona arcade games than the more sophisticated graphics of today, and the same can be said of the game mechanics, which are a little simple and shallow. Whilst based on the Virtua Fighter engine, you won’t find that balance or depth of strategy here. What you WILL find is a game that you’ll tire of rather quickly in single-player, but find some chaotic fun in two player battles. What really makes this worth having is it’s historical value, for Sonic fans at least. Chances are, you ain’t going to be playing this game anywhere else. You might not be playing it for long, but at least you’ll be playing it.
Who needs Virtua Fighter?
Back in the day, Sega and Nintendo had a heated rivalry, and Sega just couldn’t resist bringing in their own reply to Nintendo’s Mario Kart. But having said that, why would anyone put a hedgehog with supersonic speed in a go-kart? Thus Sonic R was created – a bizarre hybrid racing/action/platforming game which has always been a point of contention for Sonic fans. Basically, you have Sonic and friends battling it out in a foot-race through sprawling 3D tracks with more short-cuts and secret passages than Labyrinth (no David Bowie in sight though, so that’s a plus). The character models are almost embarrassingly lacking in polygons, but the graphics are smooth, bright and colorful, and as this is the PC version, the disconcerting fogging effect of the Saturn version is gone, making for far more comfortable two player split screen sessions. The biggest problem with the game lies in the control, as Sonic and pals don’t control like you would expect – you accelerate with the B button and lean left and right with the triggers, giving you more of a Wipeout or F-Zero type of control than your standard Sonic platformer. This can lead to aggravation when you collide with a brick wall and spend half an hour trying to turn around, but then a racing game that didn’t punish you for such collisions would possibly be making an easy race even easier. The music, composed by Richard Jacques is cheesy, but unsettling catchy – unsettling in the sense that lyrics such as “Can you feel the sunshine, does it brighten up your day” should technically have you screaming and running for the hills, but instead gives you the sickening desire to sing along like a Japanese businessman after too many rounds of sake). All in all, it’s a fun but short experience.
The “hundreds of unlockables” mentioned on the back of the case are mostly pictures anyone with an internet connection can find themselves. There are a few remixes of songs, as well as some videos, but these can be found on other Sonic titles on the Gamecube. What happened to the side-splitting Japanese commercials we got with Sonic Jam? Maybe some footage of canned Sonic project, Sonic Xtreme? Something… anything we haven’t seen before?
The rest of the games on offer are basically filler. Game Gear titles that would be under your bed gathering dust if you ever had the unfortunate inclination to buy them in the first place. The only Sonic titles that were worth owning on the system were ports of the superior Master System versions, and why we weren’t given these instead is a bit of a puzzle, as the low-res Game Gear graphics are almost sickening to look at on a TV screen.
Bonus games include Vectorman 1 and 2 – a capable platformer from the end of the Mega Drive’s lifecycle. Both are fun, but having no connection to Sonic whatsoever makes them seem superfluous. And since the Japanese were given all three renditions of Streets of Rage and Bonanza Bros leaves one with a bitter taste. They got the superior Sonic CD soundtrack, they got Ian Thorpe – isn’t that enough?
As fun as it looks
And that’s what really defines this collection - not what’s there, but what’s missing. Where’s the elusive isometric Sonic Arcade? Where’s the Saturn version of Sonic 3D, with it’s enhanced graphics and excellent Richard Jacques soundtrack? What about Knuckles Chaotix for the failed, but undeniably mushroom-shaped 32X add-on? It may not have featured Sonic, but since Metal Sonic showed up as a featured boss, and as he’s also in the other three titles on display, it would have rounded off the collection nicely. And instead of giving us ten or so games we’ll look at once and never play again, how about a nice port of NiGHTS - another Sonic Team “gem” that a lot of people missed out on?
Basically, there will be two kinds of people looking at this game – Sonic fans and the rest of the world. For Sonic fans, getting the WRONG soundtrack for the stellar Sonic CD is blasphemy, and finally getting our hands on Sonic the Fighters is like being offered a Panadol after being creamed on the head with a mallet. Suck it up and buy it – or import the Japanese version. For the rest of you, there’s some classic and some not-so-classic gaming goodness here – just don’t expect too much of it.
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