Awesome game.....but a little too short.

Robotniks at it again! And again....and again..... okay, you know what the story here is right? Robotnik is after the Chaos Emeralds and it's up to you to get them back. Same old story, awesome new game.

Sonic Advance 3 is the first Sonic GBA game I bought and I am impressed! I was hoping for that same Sonic formula I was used to, as well as hopefully a co-op mode. I almost got exactly what I wanted. First off, the game does follow the basic Sonic formula, run to the right and get to the end of the level as fast as you can, however, new things have been added. There are grind rails and jumps as well as other minor thngs such as world flipping areas. Overall, I really liked the other things to run on and jump on and the such. Also, there are chaos scattered around each level that you muct find, once you find them you have to find a key that will allow you to enter the bonus stage for a shot at a Chaos Emerald. This makes the player explore the levels more, instead of just run through them. Luckily, for those hard to find Chaos, you can turn the time limit off so you don't die while trying to find them. Thankfully though, there is a 'call' feature. By simply pressing and holding a shoulder button, your teammate comes flying from wherever and lands in your hands. Also, by releasing the shoulder button, your partner gives you a special move then. Such as an upward boost, or an attack, or even a speed boost. Each character has an element, (Sonic's element is speed, Tails' element is flight) each element gives you a hint of what your team-move will be. The moves come in very handy, such as saving yourself from certain death down a pit, or using a boost to hit that jump at maximum speed. This adds lots of variety to the game, as well as replay value because it is fun to team up the characters in every possible way to see how they perform together.

The graphics in this game couldn't be better. Everything looks great! The characters are very detailed and move smoothly. I like the little character touches that were put in this game. When you sit for too long without moving, each character has a different 'waiting' animation. Also, when you are at the edge of a cliff, your character flails its arms struggling to stay up. The game never lags.....EVER. I have never once lagged in this game, even when moving at top speed, everything stays smooth and constant.

The sound is awesome! I have always loved Sonic music, it's so catchy and fits the mood perfectly. This game doesn't change that, it has the same catchy tunes that match the mood perfectly. Luckily, there is also a sound test you can unlock, so you can listen to these awesome tunes whenever you want. The sound effects are also good, but nothing spectacular. There are your usual 'ring' noises and jump sounds and stuff. The character voices however, are a little on the high-pitch side. I haven't been a big fan of Sonic voices and these are no excption. Everyone sounds like a little kid! These voices don't detract from the overall experience though. There are a few different modes for single-player and multi-player. For single-player, you have your standard mode and then a time attack mode. The time attack mode is actually better then I've seen in other Sonic games, because the levels have so much variety its easy to find a quicker path than last time!
For multi-player modes, you have a Single-Pak Find Chao mode. You and up to three friend go through a stage and try to find Chao. The person to find and hold Chao for the set amount of time, wins.
For the multi-pak mode, two players can go through the main game together, or race against each other. The co-op mode though, was a little dissapointing. You need two game paks and the levels are so huge and have so many different paths to take, you often loose track of your human partner. The racing though, is very fun versus competetion.....as long as you have someone who can keep up! It's pretty boring staying in the lead all the time, so make sure you have some good competetion. There are also multiplayer power ups that slow the other player down, blur their screen, or make everything very smooth and had to tell where to go next.

This game is great, it just left me begging for more as the game is over too quickly. Luckily, the replay value mostly saves this flaw.

Overall, Sonic Advance 3 is a great game with lots of replay value and a fairly decent multiplayer mode. I highly reccomend this game for anyone! Sonic fan or not.