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Sonic was probably one of the most popular gaming icons of the 90's, and true to everything 90's, he had the cool and the attitude. He isn't as big as he was back then but he is still alive and zooming around levels. I never had a Genesis, my first exposure to Sonic was on the Game Gear and later on someones Genesis. In school we used to talk about who was better, Mario or Sonic, and you either pledged your allegiance to either Nintendo or Sega. I always chose Nintendo, but I never had a grudge or anything against Sonic and Sega. I even used to joke about what if Sonic was on a Nintendo system one day alongside Mario, imagine that. And look what happened. I did play Sonic games over the years and I do like both the 2D and 3D Sonic games, but there is something about the 2D games that envoke nostalgia. I'm going to talk about my favorite 2D Sonic games, but before I do, here are some links to blogs Sonic zoomed past by:

Travis Hawk's Kong a Day 20

NintendoFanJon talks bugs and glitches

gigantor21 tries Tearaway

mothman tried Deadly Premonition

HomelessRook wants Batman on Vita

C.S.3590SquadLeader says Ragnarok was a bust

KnightDriver wants to shoot you

And with that out of the way, here are my favorite 2D Sonic games:

Sonic the Hedgehog Game Gear: This was my first exposure to Sonic the Hedgehog. One day I came from school and my dad came from work, he brought this case with him. He gave it to me and I unzipped it and inside was this game system, it said Game Gear on it and it came with 5 games, I remember one being Tetris, the other 3 I don't remember, but one of them was Sonic the Hedgehog. I finally was able to see what all the hubbub was about. Granted it wasn't on the Genesis but it was still Sonic. I loved that game, it was really fun

 

Sonic Rush Series: Sonic Rush were games that brought back to Sonic's 2D platforming roots since the Sonic Advance games. The games are really fast-paced and have pretty good platforming, but they are a blast to play. And they have some pretty good sound tracks on the stages too.

 

Sonic Advance series: The first portable Sonic games I ever played since Sonic on the Game Gear. My brother has the games but I did play 1 and 3, still haven't gotten on 2 yet. The games are really good, if not the best Sonic portable games out there, they have everything a fan of 2D Sonic could want. They have colorful stages, enough challenge, great music, cool bosses, that sense of speed and different playable characters for different playstyles and variety. All the games are worth checking out if you want some good Sonic portable games.

 

Sonic the Hedgehog: The classic game that started it all. This is pretty much the game that put Sega on the map and the game that posed a threat to Nintendo and Mario. Granted I never played this version in it's heyday. I did try it when I was 6-7 years old during a trip to Mexico. I think we were travelling there with some family members and stopped by Texas to rest on some friends/family members of the family members we were travelling there. A kid there was playing Sonic, I was just watching and said if I wanted a turn and said why not? I loved the game, I've played Mario before but this was something else. I did try the whole game years later when my brother gotMega Collection on the GCN.

 

Sonic the Hedgehog 3: I never tried the game back then either, I did try it as part of the Mega Collection disc and had fun. It did introduce some new gameplay mechanics/gimmicks but it's still a fun game. Plus the opening showed me that Super Sonic isn't as powerful as he thinks he is, ince Knuckles beat him. That was awesome, plus it introduced us to Knuckles and he is really awesome, he's my second favorite Sonic character.

 

Sonic the Hedgehog 2: The sequel to Sonic 1 brought a ton of new improvements, most importantly the spin dash and most importantly, Tails. Sonic's best friend/sidekick  brought new gameplay ideas like flying which means you could now go over obstacles, and fly to explore areas Sonic otherwise couldn't get to. I mean why play as Sonic since Tails could run as fast as him, and he can fly? I also tried this on Mega Collection.

 

Sonic CD: This is without a doubt my most favorite 2D Sonic I have ever played. The first time I played this was on the Sonic Gems Collection disc for the Gamecube. From the collection discs, this was the first 2D Sonic game I tried from those. The game has all your basic zones and play as Sonic but there's alot of things different in this one. Sonic has this move to charge up speed to run even faster, which is really handy for getting back some speed incase you had to stop. And he can also travel through time. You always start in the present but you can travel through either the past or future, and that's one of the things I liked the most about this game. If you go to the past, you see the whole stage before anything that is the present, as in Robotnik trying to take over, but if you go to the future, you can see the results of Robotnik's conquest. That and the levels change depending on the time period you're on. Let's say you see a nice looking field and landscape, but in the future you see machinery, factories, and toxic waste. That and the game has what I consider the best music from the 2D games. It also introduces to Sonic's rival, Metal Sonic, a robot created by Dr. Robotnik to match Sonic's speed and power, heck I think Metal Sonic even faster and stronger than Sonic. There's even a whole level dedicated to fighting him, it's a zone that's a boss fight and a race to the finish. It's a really great game, I consider this the best 2D Sonic game ever made, and you don't have to find a gems Collection CD, you can get it on PSN, XBLA, and Steam.

What are your favorite 2D Sonic games? Did I miss any? Thanks for reading and later.