Whether you play it as a stand alone title or as a lock-on package Sonic & Knuckles is a great game.
The story of Sonic & Knuckles picks up from the ending of Sonic 3. Doctor Robotnik's orbital weapon, the Death Egg, was been badly damaged as a result of the climactic battle between himself and Sonic at the end of Sonic 3. As the satellite falls back to the Floating Island, landing in a volcanic crater, Sonic jumps off, landing in mushroom filled woodland. Sonic knows there are many Chaos Emeralds hidden on the island, including the powerful Super Emeralds and the Master Emerald, the secret to the island's levitation powers. Worried that Robotnik may try to harness this power to fuel a repaired Death Egg, he sets off to try and destroy the Death Egg once and for all, keeping an eye out for Knuckles the Echidna who is still angry after his Launch Base defeat.
One of the biggest features of Sonic & Knuckles is that you can play as Knuckles and see the game from his point of view, meaning while playing as Knuckles the games story will differ. Knuckles' story starts after the end of Sonic's story. After the destruction of Doctor Robotnik's Death Egg, Mecha Sonic, the Eggrobos, Doctor Robotnik himself staged a last-ditch effort to steal the Master Emerald again. So Knuckles goes all over the island to search for the Master Emerald and EggRobo. They start by attacking Knuckles and the forest dwellers in Mushroom Hill zone as a sign of both revenge and further betrayal. After progressing through the Floating Island in the same order Sonic did previously, he is taken by EggRobo to Sky Sanctuary, where Mecha Sonic absorbs the power of the Master Emerald and becomes Super Mecha Sonic. Knuckles defeats him nonetheless, and depending on the amount of emeralds that have been collected, Knuckles will emerge with Sonic in his plane with the Master Emerald (which he puts back on Angel Island as it rises up in the sky), or without it (which means that Angel Island falls back into the ocean and after the credits, a scene occurs in which Mecha Sonic is with the Master Emerald, and jumps on top of it.)
Sonic and Knuckles is a great game. In general I found it not to be as good as the three previous titles, but I liked how you could now play as Knuckles because he is my favourite Sonic character. The game has seven acts consisting of twelve zones (with one extra special zone afterwards that only opens if you've collected all the Chaos Emeralds), and it is considerably more difficult then the previous games. One disappointing aspect of the game though is that it lacks a save feature, meaning you'll have to play the game in one whole sitting, which will be very difficult considering it is harder then any of the previous titles.
One of the biggest things about Sonic & Knuckles is that the Sonic & Knuckles cartridge has a lock-on attachment on the top of it, in to which you can plug either Sonic the Hedgehog 2 or Sonic 3. If you plug either of those games in to it you'll unlock stuff that was previously un-accessible in both games.
The lock-on technology was actually a way of making up for the fact that the developers could not meet the deadline for Sonic 3. Originally, Sonic 3 was to be released with Knuckles as a playable character, and with all the Sonic & Knuckles levels but time constraints and cartridge limitations forced them to split the project in two, releasing Sonic 3 with the completed levels and continuing work on the uncompleted ones, plus adding the Super Emeralds, and the lock-on feature. Indeed Sonic the Hedgehog 2 had once run into similar problems, resulting in the original Hidden Palace and several other levels being removed. This kind of "lock-on" functionality has rarely been seen elsewhere in video game history.
Different things happen depending on which game you plug in to the adapter. If you plug in Sonic 3 you get to play through a game called 'Sonic 3 & Knuckles.'
When playing Sonic 3 & Knuckles there are ten immediate differences between that and the original Sonic 3:
- The player can play as Knuckles in the normal Sonic 3 levels.
- The player can play as Tails in the Sonic & Knuckles levels or have Tails follow Sonic throughout the entire game.
- After the levels of Sonic 3 are finished, the Death Egg was seen to fall intact instead of being destroyed, the player continues straight to the levels of Sonic & Knuckles. In addition, these levels now have additional introductory sections to account for the scenery change, in line with those for all other levels.
- Players can collect seven Chaos Emeralds as well as seven Super Emeralds. Each Chaos Emerald must first be collected before the correspondingly colored Super Emerald can be collected.
- Passing a star post can now open up all 3 Bonus Stages, including the slot machine stage (20-34 rings required), the magnetic orbs stage (35–49 rings required) from Sonic & Knuckles as well as the gumball machine (50–64 rings required) from Sonic 3.
- Game progress can be saved during the Sonic & Knuckles levels using Sonic the Hedgehog 3's save feature.
- There are now eight save slots, rather than the original amount of six from Sonic 3.
- Save slots now display information about the number of continues, lives, and the Chaos Emeralds surround the player's character as the player collects them (the Chaos Emeralds are replaced with the correspondingly colored Super Emeralds when the player collects them).
- If a player already has Sonic 3 save files, these will be detected on first boot and copied to the corresponding blank slots. The player can pick up from where they left off in Sonic 3 and/or immediately begin playing the Sonic & Knuckles levels with the progress they may have already made in the Sonic 3 levels.
- The game uses Sonic & Knuckles' sound bank exclusively with the exception of the Sonic 3 levels' BGM, which means that the songs that were different between Sonic 3 and Sonic & Knuckles (which include the title screen, 1-up, and invincibility sounds, as well as the mid-level boss music, Knuckles' theme and end credits theme) use only the Sonic & Knuckles version.
Also when you start playing the game you'll notice even more differences. Knuckles' levels are different from Sonic and Tails' in most cases, with new areas and bosses. There are slight differences in object placement in some of the Sonic 3 Zones as well (Launch Base in particular). Sonic and Tails skips the final boss of Launch Base, while Knuckles still has to do it (although he skips the first true boss of Launch Base). The Sonic & Knuckles levels are the same, except that Mushroom Hill now has an introduction in which Tails airlifts Sonic in.
Collecting all the Chaos Emeralds in the Sonic 3 levels will turn Sonic or Knuckles into Super Sonic or Super Knuckles. However, these abilities will be lost once the player enters a Special Stage in the Sonic & Knuckles levels where their Chaos Emeralds are 'traded' for access to corresponding Super Emerald special stages, thus beginning the Super Emerald quest. If the player does not have all of the Chaos Emeralds prior to reaching Mushroom Hill, the acquired Chaos Emeralds will become Super Emeralds and the player is given the opportunity to acquire the first Super Emerald. However, the player will not be allowed to return to Hidden Palace via warp rings until they collect the remaining Chaos Emeralds.
The Super Emeralds allow Knuckles and Sonic to access Hyper modes, which are similar to their Super modes aside from graphical changes and a few additional abilities. Tails can't normally gain Emerald powers but does so when he collects all Super Emeralds, taking on the form of Super Tails. He has no Hyper form but simply remains Super, with four Super Flickies flying around him that automatically attack nearby enemies. Hyper Sonic and Hyper Knuckles have a few different abilities, like being unable to drown in the water. Hyper Sonic has a double jump instead of his normal air attack, which not only allows him to reach slightly higher areas, but any minor enemies on the screen will be defeated. Hyper Knuckles can use an earthquake which can be activated by hitting a wall while gliding, causing a quake that destroys all enemies on the screen.
When you plug in Sonic the Hedgehog 2 in to the top of the Sonic & Knuckles cartridge you get to play through a game called 'Knuckles the Echidna in Sonic the Hedgehog 2.' This version of Sonic 2 isn't any different to the original except for the fact that you play as Knuckles and for the fact that the games title screen is different to the original.
Sonic & Knuckles is a great game. As a stand alone title the game is another great addition to the Sonic series, but when you take the lock-on feature in to consideration, and all the extra stuff it lets you access in Sonic the Hedgehog 2 and Sonic 3, the game has much more depth and secrets then any of the previous titles. Sonic & Knuckles comes with a high recommendation.
Review by: James Widdowson
Score: 9/10