Are the Sonic Advance games good? Why or why not?

Are the Sonic Advance games good? Why or why not?

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They're like regular sonic but a little worse, also on gameboy I would rate them a solid 9.5/10

yes

but only because i was young and impressionable desu

second and third are fun as fuck

first i do not care for

apparently the level design is pretty lackluster

Yes they're good. Contrary to popular belief 2D Sonic never left, he just nonchalantly slithered by while the 3D games were busy destroying his reputation.

They were impressive at the time because of the large sprites and it being more 2D Sonic after Sega stopped doing 2D Sonic. The games themselves are pretty mediocre though, tons of flawed design and just aren't very good Sonic games.

Not at all. They have insanely bad physics and the level design isn't particularly good either.

The Sonic Advance trilogy is well worth playing. The first one is most like the classic games while the second one is about going really fast and having good reflexes and the third one is a more modern and less shitty take on Knuckles Chaotix.
I also recommend Rush and Rush Adventure.

The games are just more challenging Sonic games.

Advance 1 is like the classics with worse level design, not great but better than Sonic 4 at least.

Advance 2 is a prototype for Sonic Rush, just skip to Rush and don't bother with it.

Advance 3 is just a mediocre platformer that happens to have Sonic

They were good games. The main problem is Sonic Team switching to 3D and having to outsource to other companies. Hell technically Mania is outsourced too.

Isn't Advance 3 just a normal Sonic game with an expanded Sonic+Tails mode?

Sonic Advance 1 was my first Sonic. I liked it a lot.

Sonic Advance 1 is basically like the DS New Super Mario Bros: It was created as a throwback and was probably the closest thing to a Sonic 4 until Mania happened. It has a few neat features like Amy Rose and certain character abilities (Sonic can grind rails, Knuckles can tread water), but the derivative zones and questionable level design (especially in the later half of the game) hold it back somewhat.

Sonic Advance 2 introduced Cream The Rabbit. The game has more of a focus on speed (which would hold true for the rest of the series) and the level tropes are more original (having music and cyberspace themed zones for example) giving it more of a unique identity. I haven't played this one, but I heard getting the Chaos Emeralds (or at least, getting to the Special stages themselves) is horrible.

Sonic Advance 3 added a tag team system (like Knuckles' Chaotix but good) and some other features. There are some neat ideas the true final boss is Super Sonic & Eggman for example but the level design is far more brutal and, in general, the game's reception is more diverse compared to the others. That said, the game still has neat ideas or little touches like in the animations and it's still plenty beatable.

tl;dr They're good to varying levels.

Two characters working together to get through the stages but without a ring tether, gaining different abilities through the different teams.

I came to this thread to say exactly this.

Though I probably think A1 is a bit better than you do and A3 is a lot worse.

pros
>good graphics
>make the best of the GBA soundfont, remixes sound better
>momentum feels as you would expect old sonics to feel
>fun ass bosses
>characters all have fun abilities

cons
>gba screen resolution
>abundance of pits in later games
>advance 2 and 3 arent as diverse level design wise as advance 1 is
>special stages are hair-pullingly tedious just to get to, and God help you when you actually get in them

The conditions to get to the special stages in Advance 2 and Advance 3 are pretty shitty, though just finding the secret spring in the Advance 1 levels was okay. Advance 1's special stage has glaring depth of field issues where you feel like you go through rings while the other two game's special stages are pretty okay. Everything's based on that damn Sonic 2 one which I hate.

R-Remember me, guys?

They're not challenging though, they're just flawed. They're easy as fuck just annoying because you will make a leap of faith and fall into a death pit because you literally could not see where the platform was, but after dying and knowing where it is you're not going to die there. You would need to be pretty shit to actually game over, but the game will constantly steal a life from you because it's designed poorly, but that's the extent of it killing you. Other than that Sonic is just far too big and takes up too much screen space and seeing shit coming at you is fucking impossible, a lot of the levels have too many hold right to win sections, there's very few actual platforming sections, there's not an emphasis on multiple paths, they are thoroughly uninteresting Sonic games.

They're pretty good. Not fantastic but fun.
Advance 1 is really basic, most of the zones are pretty generic and similar to ones from other games. It's also short as fuck with only 6 zones. Still, it's pretty good. The levels are fun.
Special stages suck though.

Advance 2 is a bit more creative with its levels than 1 and was the first game to actually take "gotta go fast" seriously. But it can be very "hold right to win" until Sky Canyon Zone. If you're going for speedruns though, it's amazing. The levels flow so nicely if you're trying to stay on the top paths and the trick system they added adds to that.
It's probably the fastest 2D sonic game. Even more than the Rush games despite them having boost.
I don't even know how good the special stages are because getting to them is such a pain in the ass.

Advance 3 kinda reminds me of CD. Levels are very vertical and have a focus on exploration. There's a bunch of cheap traps and enemy placements though. In terms of level design it's easily the weakest of the three. The different tag abilities make exploration pretty fun though. You have a second character follow you around like how Tails does in 2 and 3, but you also have this tag move which lets you do something different depending on your partner. It's neat stuff.
Special stages are still kinda whatever.

All three games have great music. Especially 2 and 3. Some of the best the GBA has to offer.

I mean aside from having nothing to do with Sonic beyond the characters, this game is fucking awesome

Sonic should really revisit the "music" and "toyland" themes, maybe "cyberspace" as well.

Screen crunch is annoying as hell, but they definitely designed the games around it. It's not that bad.
A few levels have leap of faiths, Cyber Track and Chaos Angel come to mind, but they're a minority and usually near the end of the game.
Actually, I find the endgame zones tend to be worse for all three games.
It's like DIMPS didn't know how to make challenging platforming so they just put in a ton of pits.

Fun game. I liked it's aesthetics.

They still do that shit to this day. Dimps is trash at level design and they always have been.

Man don't remind me about getting the emeralds in 2 and 3. That shit was terrible and I could never get it with all characters.

Chaos Angel is still one of my favorite final zones atmosphere wise.

>All three games have great music.
This.
youtu.be/O8ABNL6w1uo
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youtu.be/9KU3i-BvQrU

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>Not Techno Base Act 2
That sweet amen break, though

Hell yeah. It's so fucking cool.
And that music.

youtube.com/watch?v=AY6WjFf0D6w

Beeeautiful.

My apologies user.
youtu.be/nC4_S10vNsM

They're all decent at worst. Worth playing.

Also Advance 3 had an amazing ability for Knuckles that I wish he always just had: the wall-dash. When climbing Knuckles could rev up a spin dash to quickly propel himself upwards along a wall.

There's nothing I want more in life than to see Music Plant in 3D.

If only they did actual level DLC for Generations.

Best story in a Sonic game. Gut-wrenching ending.

What questionable level design? I played it a few times but don't remember anything particularly wrong

Some stages like Egg Rocket (?) have a great gimmick

One of my favorite trilogies.

Advance 1 gets you more of what you expect. Pure Sonic with some fun alternative characters with their own playstyles.

Advance 2 decides to try something else and make the game go faster. It essentially is the boost formula, but without making it baby mode. You want to go into boost mode? Learn the levels. There's no freebies here either, boost won't save you from danger. Thankfully, the level design does a great job of not throwing enemies, spikes, or pitfalls in your way unless you jump into them. (I can say this for a fact because I speed ran the fuck out of these games).

Sonic Advance 3 changes it up again by becoming a whole other monster. Instead of staying with the status quo and going faster than the last one, the game mixes it up by focusing on the A.I partner mechanic introduced in Sonic 2, but giving it an actual gameplay mechanic. I spent hours trying out different teams, exploring the levels and finding the best combinations for each stage. Advance 3 is one of my favorite entries in the franchise alone because of this combo. I know people bitch about
>MUH JUMP
>MUH CONFUSING LEVEL DESIGN
But I really don't give a damn. The game was fucking fun.

All 3 games do a fantastic job of having replaybility thanks to the time attack mode, the versus modes, and co-op modes. I could spend hours playing the single player modes alone.

Music in all 3 games is solid because it didn't fall into the same trap that every other GBA game did and depend entirely on low quality samples.

The only thing I hate about the trilogy is the fucking special stages. They're all garbage to get into and garbage to play. Advance 2 is probably the most passable one of the three.

Overall, I rate them 2 > 3 > 1. I'm rating this trilogy without taking the classics into consideration. That seems to be the big problem people have with it. When you take them into account, most people go 1 > 2 > 3, but I honestly think that's the wrong way to look at them.

Common complaints are usually spikes, pits and enemy placement.
Granted, Advance 1 isn't as bad with it as later games are.

>We will never get a Sonic Battle 2

Only Advance 1 is particularly good, in my view. 2 and 3 are autistic, but not terrible.

>I also recommend Rush and Rush Adventure
liking boostshit

>All three games have great music.
As someone who pretty much dislikes all GBA music, I actually agree with this.

My problem is that I think Sonic Advance 2 had the best running sprite and Sonic Advance had the best top-speed sprite for Sonic and I'll never play a game that has both

Sonic Advanced 2 was the shit

Since it sounds like you spent way more time with the game than I did could you confirm that Sonic accelerates way differently in Advance 3 than in 1 or 2? It totally felt to me like he had way more inertia but no one else ever mentions it

Just make a simple romhack, user.

Are you ok with random unpredictable spikes and pitfalls at the end of jumps?

I remember this game getting shit on by critics and being utterly confused at that.

>As someone who pretty much dislikes all GBA music, I actually agree with this.

That's because most GBA games used the DAC channels and Sappy for music. Advance and Battle Network both used the DAC channels to play back samples while making heavy use of the GB's legacy hardware to play melodies and other instruments. The difference in style and sound quality is pretty obvious.

Battle Network: Sound and samples are all pretty crisp.
youtube.com/watch?v=_GRY3WNJCIM

Golden Sun: Not knocking it, but GS suffered from the same issue most GBA titles have, muffled sound.
youtube.com/watch?v=wb_zLitqH1o

I have no idea how to sprite swap a gba game. My dream game would be sonic advance 2 exactly as-is except sonic has his advance 1 wheel-feet when he hits boost speed.

Another touch I like a lot is the way the characters all stop spinning just before they land from a jump

They're pretty good, and I think for SA2 & SA3 you can link up to adventure 1 & 2 for chao garden as well. Apparently that is a good thing for some females.

man I fucked up this gif

eh.

Let us talk about the real GBA sonic.

that incomprehensible geometric background thing is fucking pissed

>Sonic has not one, not two, not three, but FIVE(5) walk cycle animations in Sonic Advance 2

Absolute mad men.

SA1 and SA2 have tiny chao garden, but you have to unlock it in SA2 by getting all the chaos emeralds, which involves finding a run through each level that lets you collect 7 hidden rings in order to even access it.

I have no idea why they hid such a basic feature behind such a ridiculous gate

Sadly there's not much info out there on hacking Adv 1 and 2. Maybe one day your dream game will become a reality.

Tiny Chao Garden is only in Adv 1, Adv 2, and Sonic Pinball Party, not in Adv 3.

shit you're right

It definitely helps.

I have no idea what the fuck Sonic's walk animation is in SA1, it looks like he's sliding around in socks.

Sonic Advance 1 is good
Sonic Advance 2 is fucking great
Sonic Advance 3 is okay at best.

Didn't fans remake that port just to show how to properly port a game?

I have no idea why they hid Amy, a playable character in the last game, behind essentially 28 fucking emeralds. They even homogenized the fuck out of how she played.

>fans

It was one guy. He did an actual faithful port with Tails and Knuckles playable. SEGA would later go on to hire him.

youtube.com/watch?v=bFwxF-7vSrQ

Fuck I completely forgot

how many people have to get blown to bring the Sonic 2 android port to pc

INITIATING RECOVERY MODE

I really liked the soundtrack to Advance 2, good use of GBA sound. It also has that great cutscene where Sonic calls out Knuckles for being a fuckwit and makes him cry.

How many people have to get blown to bring the Sonic CD Android/PC port to the Switch or 3DS?

both would be fucking nice

The guy you're talking about ended up being one of the lead programmers on Mania.

>Those faster-paced remixes of Green Hill in Advance 3

>Since it sounds like you spent way more time with the game than I did could you confirm that Sonic accelerates way differently in Advance 3 than in 1 or 2?

It's been a while but I do remember there is a difference between all 3 of them. 1 has a very low speed cap so the acceleration to top speed seems really fucking sluggish. 2's much faster with 3's just slightly behind 2 but far faster than 1.

The biggest difference between 1/2 and 3 is the jump. Jumping in SAdv3 is sluggish as hell. Jumping is way faster than Adv2 and 3, you can really pick up some speed with it, but slowing down is a pain int he ass. You cannot come to a halt as easily as any of the other titles. The best way I can describe the jumping in Adv3 is like if you were in an ice level, all the time.

I don't think they want to relicense music for more platforms so CD and all of Sega's other nice 7th gen ports are going to rot forever

>blocking has to be timed
>AI is handicapped to the point that the only way to win is to spam specials
>kill me 5 times, loljk now kill me 10 times
Emerl saves this game from being repetitive shit.

at least I'm not just crazy

...

youtube.com/watch?v=shvZSpl-V1Q

LISTEN TO THIS FUCKING JAM JESUS FUCKING CHRIST

>Get the card
>Oh wow, this is a really good card. I'll put it on my Emerl
>MFW I have to fight him

I feel like SEGA's consistently had some of the best soundtracks for games I can remember off the top of my head. If not just done a good job on them.

What's so bad about this port? I never played it.

Its shit desu, only entertaining for some of the character interaction in story mode. They should've just made a VN

Slow down, broken physics, screen crunch to the max, music is trash, the list goes on.
Supposedly it's like that because they used the Sonic Advance engine or something and the Genesis parts couldn't handle it.
In fact, watch some of this:
youtu.be/FXFMQ_qyZEQ

>horrible lag and slowdown
>horrible music
I've tried playing through it once. I couldn't make it past Labyrinth Zone.

>fight ultimate Emerl
>Only way to get even close to him or do any damage on him is spam L/R attacks

I pray for a remake or more remixes of the music from that game every day but there are good reasons why it wasn't well received.

Ocean Base had the best music

youtu.be/sagOXL0ziFk
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>Be autistic and raise a Chao to the level caps in Advance 1
>Port it to SA2B
>Apparently there's a bug where a Chao raised exclusively in the Tiny Chao Garden doesn't gain points in Stamina.

fuck

Advance is a 9, Advance 2 is a 7, Advance 3 is a 6.

All 3 of them are so different that giving them a blanket rating is just stupid.

This bug only occurs if you raise its stamina to 10 or higher, iirc.

GBA really cut corners when it came to audio.