Sonic Advance 3: What to expect

Sonic Advance 3 was a highly anticipated title by both the sonic community, and everyone else who may have owned a GBASP… that is until a couple of months ago when the beta was openly leaked onto the internet. Its been a few months since then, and people have played through the game and such finding significant bugs, errors, and many things they weren’t pleased with. This was an obvious beta, but what was more puzzling was the fact that it was discovered there were 3 DIFFERENT beta’s of the game circling round the internet. While the story may have died down, not much is known of what to expect from Sonic Advance 3, as the bugs in the beta differed how the game played a bit. As well, some of the bosses in the game were extremely easy. The main question is… will sonic advance 3 really be as good as the first two, and will sega fix these problems.

In todays article, I will explore the possibilities of what Sonic Advance 3 can… and cannot be.

First of all, here is what we know about the game. Sega has basically tried to take what people have liked from certain sonic games, and tried to meld them together for a portable experience. While some people complained, others like the Adventure field concept from the original Sonic Adventure (not Gamecube version, Dreamcast version). As well, to differentiate the same old game play concept, Sega added in the buddy system. Basically you pick your character, and then you pick a buddy character to follow you. The buddy character helps you by giving you a special ability or certain things that you wouldn’t normally have. Suppose if Sonic hooked up with Tails as his buddy, Sonic can jump extremely high in the air if need be, as well as latch on to tails so he can fly up at places he cant reach, or if he needs to get over a chasm. The cool thing about the buddy system is that there are certain character combinations you can pull off that significantly alter many abilities. Like for example: Sonic and Knuckles… you get the buddy combination of “Fighting Buddies”. Basically now, Sonic is much stronger, his kick lasts longer, and is more versatile for attacking. Knuckles also gains speed somewhat in the process if he’s your main character. Not only that but both characters keep there special ability, knuckles being able to glide and Sonic giving his friend a speed boost. Overall they are 2 very cool additions.

Boss battles have also been somewhat switched around this game. You know longer only battle Eggman, you battle a robot called Gemerl (excuse me if I spelled that wrong or whatever. From time to time you’ll fight Gemerl alone and from time to time you’ll fight both Gemerl and Eggman. There are around 8 stages if Im not mistaken and the boss designs are pretty well done, as well as imaginative. You have also now a 2D Chao garden, but not like the previous games. You don’t get to pet Chao’s or anything, you collect Chao’s in the adventure field to open up things such as Special Stage springs. The special stages have also been made much easier which is good, because in the last two games there were a real pain in the @$$ to finish. The two player modes haven’t been tested yet(it’s a rom after all), but so far we have a battle mode, as well as the standard 2 player from the last two games. Whether the choice in the standard mode is different from regular, I’m not sure, but two player sure looks much more appealing. The good thing is, when the game comes out there will definitely be a co op mode, so it should be very fun.

However, while the game’s features sound very promising, there are flaws which hinder them partially in this beta. First being the adventure fields. Now, while I was personally very Excited about having the adventure fields make a return, especially in 2D, I was quite disappointed in the way they implemented them. The adventure fields are not very well done in the game. I believe it would be much more fun when Im actually playing on my GBA but I really think they could have done a much better job on these things, I mean, it would have been really kickass to trail around the city, see sights, be exactly like the Sonic Adventure’s. However, they look pretty shabbily put together.

Another problem has to do with the buddy system. Look, I like the system, its fun to use, but you don’t get to really use it enough. I mean, it makes an impact on gameplay, but not the biggest. Don’t get me wrong, Its damn fun to have these powers and all, as well as do different things with them, but it just feels like they could have added a lot more to it. Who knows, in the final version of the game, maybe they will… Im not sure.

Further more, is the boss battles. Now, I really love the imagination put into the design of these bosses, but the problem is in their current state… there TOO easy. I mean, the only thing stopping me from demolishing them is if Im not really trying or paying attention, you can beat a lot of them easily. Some of them are hard(I haven’t tried the super mode boss yet.), but I really do think they should crank up the difficulty on the bosses.

The levels in this game are much more difficult this time around than Sonic Advance 2, and that’s both a good and a bad thing. Its good because it gives the game somewhat of a lasting appeal. However the levels really do seem very unforgiving, which is what sometimes makes the beta harder to play sometimes. When I say more difficult than Sonic Advance 2, I mean quite a LOT more difficult. This isn’t really a problem, Im just saying.

Overall, the outlook on Sonic Advance 3 is both positive and negative. We know Sega can fix a bunch of these errors, but only time will tell if they do. But overall, its still an enjoyable experience in the beta, and we can enjoy it more if it just had a little bit more polish. Lets all hope Sega makes this really a game to remember.