Name: Sonic Advance 2
Platform: Gameboy Advance


Well as i have with the last few reviews, I have been taking a look back at some of the ups (and downs of course) of the last couple Sonic titles. I brought you Sonic Adventure 2 Battle and Shadow the Hedgehog for the GameCube, now I shall bring you one of Sonic's Gameboy Advance titles, Sonic Advance 2.


Dr Eggman wants the Chaos Emeralds so he can take over the world, we've all heard it before and this time it's no exception.. At the start, you will play as Sonic and only Sonic. But as you clear boss stages, you will rescue his furry little pals and they will become available as playable characters as well. Each character has their own special abilities, Knuckles can glide and climb walls, Tails and Cream can fly and Sonic...... well he just runs. Although many of the abilities are character specific, all the characters run at the same speed making for a pretty repeated experience when you play through with all the characters. What gets really challenging is getting the Chaos Emeralds. In each action stage, there are 7 Star Rings hidden throughout the level. most of them can only be spotted by slowing down and searching for them which can really become annoying and seeing as how some characters can't back track certain areas because they can't fly or climb walls it can be a matter of abandoning running and taking it slow throughout each level. If you do manage to to get all 7, you will be taken to a 3D Stage where you must run and collect 300 rings in the time limit. Sound easy? Well there is a guard robot who chases you down and steals you're rings if he touches you, he starts off easy enough to avoid but in the later levels hes hard to get rid of. If you manage to obtain 300 rings when the timer hits 0, then you will be rewarded with a Chaos Emerald. It can be annoying knowing you just managed to find the 7 Star Rings and then get owned by the robot in the bonus stage. When you find all 7 Chaos Emeralds with each character, you will unlock new things, such as Tiny Chao Garden, Sound Test, Amy and if you manage to collect them all with Sonic, you will unlock the Super Sonic ending.

Sound

Well it's a Sonic game and we all know that Sonic games are known for their good music. Music sits nicely in the game, many familiar sound effects from the previous Sonic titles are also here in all their glory!

Graphics

The visuals are very smooth and well animated. The levels are huge and colourful and the characters have a huge range of realistic sprites that truly are nice to look at, even on the GBA's small screen.

Lifespan

Beating every stage with every character can be fun, even though they all move the same speed, some of the individual skills the characters have can add some life to the game as well as collecting the 7 Chaos Emeralds for all the characters and unlocking all the goodies. If that doesn't float you're boat you could always go to the Tiny Chao Garden and play some Mini Games and raise a Chao. It will have you coming back for more I assure you!

Conclusion

This game is one of the best Sonic games in existence, I'm glad that Sega didn't dry this one up with Sonic Rush for the Nintendo DS. This game is fast, and that's really all we ask for, everything else you could say is just a bonus!

Gameplay: 4/5- It can get annoying at times, but it's fun at the same time.

Graphics: 5/5- Very nice use of sprites and colourful levels.

Sound: 4/5- Remixed sounds from the older Sonic games and a very nice soundtrack.

Lifespan: 4/5- Finding all the Chaos Emeralds, Tiny Chao Garden, you will be playing for quite a while.

OVERALL: 17/20