Sonic Gems Collection Review

By Tom Bramwell Published 6 October, 2005

Sonic CD. That's about it.

Version tested: GameCube

Right. This is about Sonic CD. You see that bit up there, where it says "Sonic Gems Collection"? That's rubbish. This is Sonic CD. Sonic CD is Sonic, a jump button, lots of robots, Dr Robotnik, and big levels with lots of hidden bits. You can run as fast as possible from left to right trying not to run into spiky stuff, if that's what you're into, but there's also a time-travel element - this lets you pop back into the green, fluffy past and jump around there, and then see how that affects the state of play in the grey, dystopian future. Thanks to levels that are just as comfortable going miles up as they are miles-right, you can spend ages mining each one for the sake of completion.

"For the sake of completion". This is what the rest of Sonic Gems Collection is about. Anybody with a love of 2D Sonic games - basically anybody who bought Sonic Mega Collection or the cheeky "Plus" version, or any of the GBA games - will enjoy Sonic CD. The levels are ace, the music's ace; and if you're anything like me you'll go "ooh!" when you see Sonic rotate as he jumps up in the air, or when the level rotates to show you running straight up a wall.

In fact, if you like old 2D Sonic games you might as well rent Gems and do as the boxquote says and "Rejoice for Sonic CD". Cheers NOM.

Just don't rejoice for anything else, because it's mostly rubbish.

Mostly. I've got lots of words left, so let's talk about it.

'Sonic Gems Collection' Screenshot cd

Sonic CD. It's the reason you might buy this.

The other stuff on the disc is Sonic the Fighters (a simple, Virtua Fighter-style 3D beat-'em-up that, to the best of my knowledge, only ever appeared in Japanese arcades), Sonic R (one of those dreaded "on-foot racing games" with Sonic characters, which came out on the Saturn), six Game Gear games (Sonic the Hedgehog 2, Sonic the Hedgehog Triple Trouble, Sonic Drift 2, Sonic Spinball, Tails' Skypatrol and Tails Adventures), and two unlockable Vectorman games. The Japanese Gems Collection also had Streets of Rage, but for some reason we don't get that. In the absence of any official explanation I'm going to assume it's SEGA's way of punishing us for killing the Dreamcast.

On the other hand, maybe what's on the disc is the punishment instead. Sonic the Fighters is quite novel - your 3D Sonic characters can punch, kick, block, jump and perform rudimentary combos - but it lacks fluidity and probably won't be much fun unless you have a proper arcade stick. In fact, I refuse to believe it's much fun compared to something like Virtua Fighter 4 even if you do have a stick. So, in conclusion: buy Virtua Fighter 4. It's cheaper than this right now because you all ignored it in the first place. Just like you hated the Dreamcast.

'Sonic Gems Collection' Screenshot fighters

Sonic the Fighters. You can punch Tails, I suppose.

Sonic R, meanwhile, is really odd. Each character steers like an actual car, so despite the way some of the levels have been designed for you to quickly turn back on yourself and run down a slope, you find yourself standing in the corner banging your head against the wall. That's pretty much what the writers of the music ought to be doing by now too - it's hilariously cheesy and full of sentiments about how everything makes the lady-vocalist feel so HIGH and how she generally wants to touch the SKY and so on. It also has a brilliant track about how I'm a diamond in the SKY set to a level, in the sky, which takes place on a throbbing chaos EMERALD. The game itself doesn't take long to finish, and that'll probably be the point you give up on it, even though you can go back and try to find vaguely hidden routes through levels and collect icons in the process. It's just too awkward to play for any length of time really.

As for the rest, they're principally educational. Think about some of the stuff we whinge about these days. "Oh boo hoo, Game X's representation of the ethical divide between the democratic peoples of the Mushroom Peninsula and the more nomadic Rainbow Forest-dwelling Floral Rangers is dispiritingly inarticulate. I want my money back." In Tails Adventures, the HEALTH BAR can be obscured by the WALLS. In Sonic Spinball, the game seems to pause for breath between frames. And in Sonic Drift 2, there's only one FRAME for turning, never mind it being animated.

'Sonic Gems Collection' Screenshot sonicr

Sonic R. Actually has a day/night cycle on levels. Coo.

They all look awful on a proper TV too because the resolution on the Game Gear wasn't much to start with. You can shrink them down to a box, but you could also just not play them altogether. Don't get me wrong - there were moments when I found Sonic 2, Triple Trouble and the two Tails games tolerable. Then they did whatever it was that I found intolerable about them just over ten years ago when I sold them all along with my Game Gear so I could finance Street Fighter II Turbo for the SNES. In Sonic 2's case, that's not showing me enough of what's going on off-screen in a game where going too fast to notice important things is pretty much the design. And so on.

So, really, it all comes down to Sonic CD. And the Vectorman games, which are fun if you can get round to unlocking them. Since you can buy this for less than twenty quid if you shop around, it's a nice way to experience a game sadly marginalised on the stillborn Mega Drive CD-ROM add-on, and it's also pleasantly rebellious in the current climate of 3D gang warfare action games with 80 billion polygons. In other words, if this sort of thing matters to you, if you still can't bear to unplug your Dreamcast, and you do own Virtua Fighter 4 and all the others and think they're brilliant, this is for you. If you're dying for another 2D Sonic game, it might be for you too. But if you genuinely want a collection, perhaps a MEGA collection, of several 2D Sonic games, and you can't really imagine spending an evening using your WaveBird as a sort of prosthetic syringe to draw the blue blood out of all the minced royalty, go for Sonic Mega Collection instead. It's much better.

7 / 10

Read the Eurogamer.net scoring policy
Picture of Tom.

About Tom Bramwell

Tom is Operations director of Eurogamer Network and Editor-at-Large of Eurogamer.net. He joined the company in February 2000.

Read more articles from Tom by visiting the Tom Bramwell archive page.

You may also like...

Comments (39) Latest comment 6 years ago

Comments threads automatically close after 30 days, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • tengu #1 6 years ago

    No Streets of Rage means NO SALE!

  • Blerk #2 6 years ago

    Chronic.

    I never get bored of saying that! \o/

  • Cloudane #3 6 years ago

    Sega is just as bad as Nintendo milking Mario.

    Just stop Sega. Stop.

  • Dizzy #4 6 years ago

    Oooohh.. Vectorman!

  • Hog-lumps #5 6 years ago

    Why couldn't they of just bunged Sonic CD with the first 'megacollection'. This collection seems a bit pointless to me...........................!

  • zErOb_cOOl #6 6 years ago

    " if you still can't bear to unplug your Dreamcast"

    What?! EG, are you saying the Dreamcast is pants and should be thrown out. I beg to differ.

  • myiagros #7 6 years ago

    Sonic CD is worth the admission alone. Yes it would have been nice if it had been on MegaCollection+, but oh well
    Its much cheaper than buying a Mega CD and the game!!

  • Kon #8 6 years ago

    Couldn't bear to read past the bit of SOR not beeing included with this.

    Comix Zone was the reason i got SMC+. I loved the Sonic games back in the day, but they just didn't age as well as the Mario ones. A Mario mega collection would be grand indeed.

    I'm somewhat suprised with the final score too.

  • Kay #9 6 years ago

    'Its much cheaper than buying a Mega CD and the game!!'

    But not as cheap as downloading the ISO off the net.

  • smelly #10 6 years ago

    "Sega is just as bad as Nintendo milking Mario. "

    Well i've not seen nintendo re-releasing old mario games on 20 different compliations yet (Each with different ones on).

    I mean.. im all for sonic.. but why not just put out a collection with EVERY sonic game on it and be done.. none of this "some of these, some of those" bullshit.

  • #11 6 years ago

    'cause they make more money this way?

  • Kay #12 6 years ago

    Actually, Nintendo are worse as they release all the Mario games seperately on the GBA, and charge £35 each for them. And they have the cheek to charge £15 for 20-year-old games in their NES Classics range.

  • Mr_Whacker #13 6 years ago

    I got Sonic Mega Collection and I don't envy anyone HAVING to play though all the Game Gear tat for a review. Ha ha.

  • Psi #14 6 years ago

    yey they've left the life support machine on long enough to get this out. RIP sonic

    stillborn consoles.... ooo eurogamer you're getting dark :p

  • PearOfAnguish #15 6 years ago

    7/10 is a bit generous, the review came across as far more negative.

  • theidiotsarewinning #16 6 years ago

    funny how they changed robotnik's name to dr. eggman somewhere in there too. russian-sounding evil fat doctor a bit un-pc maybe?

  • Foxxlet #17 6 years ago

    I think these retro compilations are great, its like a library, and as technology and emulation gets better we can add more and more games to the library. Its history, and fun for people who had the games (i loved sonic r! but my saturn is now boxed up and unloved in another country, same for my mega cd) and I can't wait to play them again for nostalgic reasons. Also I never had a game gear and although there are PC emulators why not add them too for completeness sake?

    What I want to know is just how good the emulations are? Can anyone tell me how accurate music/sound/speed etc is?

  • Aretak #18 6 years ago

    In other words, if this sort of thing matters to you, if you still can't bear to unplug your Dreamcast, and you do own Virtua Fighter 4 and all the others and think they're brilliant, this is for you.

    Down to a T, baby.

  • Sabre #19 6 years ago

    Sonic CD doesn't have its original PAL/JP music, that was failed to be mentioned in the review! Also there's no 60Hz mode!

  • Lothar Hex #20 6 years ago

    I ponder why this is not out on the Xbox.

  • finian #21 6 years ago

    No streets of rage has finaly killed my love for sega games. Ive suffered through them killing the saturn and then the dreamcast and still remained boyant when they decided to go mulitformat but most of their games now are fucking shit

  • myiagros #22 6 years ago

    finian i am sad to say, but i agree. Hopefuly they will be able to turn it around
    (i won't get my hopes up)

  • smelly #23 6 years ago

    "go mulitformat but most of their games now are fucking shit "

    Which is why i hope the same thing never happens to nintendo.

  • finian #24 6 years ago

    At least with nintendo their games have maintained a consistant level of goodness and they managed the translation to 3d, something which sega hasnt really managed to do with sonic etc. How I would love a new 2d sonic on console not handheld

  • Aretak #25 6 years ago

    Ive suffered through them killing... the dreamcast

    No, the ignorant general public killed the Dreamcast.

  • finian #26 6 years ago

    Remember the dreamcast adds, some robbie williams crap song playing over them, that would put anyone off buying a dreamcast. I dont blame the public for killing the dreamcast I blame Robby Williams. Come to think of it, Ill blame him for no sor in sonic gems aswell!!

  • caligari #27 6 years ago

    Powerstone is still the best fighting game I've ever played.

    No really!

  • Donglebomb #28 6 years ago

    > In Tails Adventures, the HEALTH BAR can be obscured by the WALLS.

    The quality of this whole paragraph makes me want to buy Sonic Gems Collection. Nothing beats a review where you can sense the palpable anger.

  • stephen111222 #29 6 years ago

    I think the hole thing just fell apart come on i no u can do better stafe Dame i wish it could of been better!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

  • zErOb_cOOl #30 6 years ago

    "Actually, Nintendo are worse as they release all the Mario games seperately on the GBA, and charge £35 each for them. And they have the cheek to charge £15 for 20-year-old games in their NES Classics range."

    Exactly.

    I also prefer Sonic to Mario. I just had more of a blast playing it. Mario is obviously an awesome game too but I found the difference between the two games to be (and the reason Sonic has the edge for me) is the platforming was just a little too anal in Mario. You may say the platforming was more difficult, but then there were some bloody difficult bits in Sonic games too. So I'm sticking with anal......can I rephrase that? Nah can't be arsed......I did it again. SOAB!

  • zErOb_cOOl #31 6 years ago

    "At least with nintendo their games have maintained a consistant level of goodness and they managed the translation to 3d, something which sega hasnt really managed to do with sonic etc. How I would love a new 2d sonic on console not handheld"

    Yeah its about time games producers realised people buy what they like. Not what they think people like (which is 100% 3D games.)

    Its like assuming the only property a Hollywood star would want is a $10 million house in Beverly Hills. Or the only car they want is a Ferrari.

    No, even celebrities own crap houses in the countryside, or crap cars, because they love them! No other reason.

    ***EDIT***

    No, I will go on. Your comfy shoes. Not pretty to look at but are comfy. They are irreplacable. People WILL BUY a new 2D Sonic game. My girlfriend definately would if I didn't! There would be a huge market. It would be an awesome move by Sega. Nothing too fancy, just a quality 2D Sonic game. Who's with finian and me?!
    Edited by 1 at 06/10/05 @ 15:31

  • caligari #32 6 years ago

    Well you could always buy a GBA/SP/DS if you want to play new Sonic 2D games (although I'm not too sure if they're actually any good).

    Sonic on the Neo Geo pocket was also more fun than Yoshi's Island on the Advance.

    /Sits back to watch the old Bob Hoskins Versus Sonic arguments all over again

  • myiagros #33 6 years ago

    NEW CONSOLE 2D SONIC!!!!

    GIVE IT TO US NOW SEGA!!!

  • X #34 6 years ago

    Harsh review I think. Very surprised you gave it 7 after what I read. I have Mega Collection Plus already and wanted to finish off the collection as it were.

    Sure not including Streets of Rage was a bit wank but all of the games still have their charm even if R and Fighters aren't the best of games. The Game Gear games should be taken for what they are - which are old handheld 2d games. If people liked the originals, they will of course want to play them again - but if you buy this game you should already know what to expect - a review shouldn't need to tell you how those games are going to be.

    Fair score (somehow) but too narrow minded views.

  • Malakhai #35 6 years ago

    What the hell, man? A 7? For a crappy rehash of Sonic Mega Collection with game gear titles? This deserves a 5 at best. Dont get me wrong, Sonic CD alone would earn a 7 or better. But the company it keeps these days...

  • smelly #36 6 years ago

    How to play sonic:

    Press right on dpad.
    Press jump occasionally
    tada!


    Gimme mario any day of the week :-)

  • Xerx3s #37 6 years ago

    needs more non sonic titles (altough im a sonic fan).

  • smelly #38 6 years ago

    I wouldnt mind a sonic collection with EVERY 2d sonic title in it...

    Im sure it'll come eventually... until that day, i'll keep my money in my wallet.

  • Malakhai #39 6 years ago

    Quantity does not add quality, wink.

  • Malakhai #40 6 years ago

    Really? Sonic R? A classic? I regretfully have played a lot of these so-called "classics" when they came out. What I am saying is if they put a few better games on the collection, the average quality of the would be higher. Surrounding 2 or 3 good games with a vast majority of bad ones is not my idea of quality. I wasn't saying that Sonic CD would be better than when it first came out, and perhaps I was blowing it's greatness out of proportion. It is a good Sonic game; nothing more, nothing less. If anything, Sonic CD is better on the new collection because of the comparison to the other games on the disc, and by COMPARISON alone.