Last time we saw a 2d Sonic game was back in '94 when Sonic 3/ Sonic & Knuckles came out. It's been even longer since we saw a handheld Sonic game. Ever since SNK and Sega announced a NGPC Sonic game, all of us Sonic fans have been beating the Sonic games to death, practicing up on our old skills, getting the feel for the engine, memorizing the levels, and just generally getting back into the groove of things.

With Sonic fresh in my head, I was ready for Sonic Pocket Adventure as soon as I stuck it into the NGPC and turned the power on. I was greeted by a game that brought back memories, mostly impressed, but had a few flaws that somewhat dimmed the great experience the game could have been.

First off, the graphics and the music are all taken from the other Sonic games. The various themes of the zones (Green Hill Zone, Aquatic Ruin Zone etc.) are straight out of the other games. The graphics in fact are extremely close to the original, except for slightly different Sonic/Tails animation and there's no parallax scrolling. The music is also all out of the Genesis Sonic titles. It was fun hearing 6-tone PSG versions of those songs, and listening to see how they changed them to accomodate the limitations of the NGPC's sound chip. I'm glad they chose to keep the graphics and music from the 16-bit titles for us hardcore hedgehog lovers.

That last statement leads me to an important note: Sonic Pocket Adventure, as a whole, was clearly made for the hardcore Sonic fans. Beyond the nostalgic feelings brought on by the music and graphics, the gameplay, both in the engine's physics and the level design, is old-school. The first couple levels, based on Green Hill Zone, are open-ended, easily explored, and have plenty of slopes to run up and monitors to bash out of trees. The next zone, based on Chemical Plant Zone from Sonic 2, has a lot of loops, steep slopes, and fast gameplay.

As for the engine, it's very well done, especially when you compare it to the Game Gear Sonic titles, which really played nothing like the Genesis games. However, I have to make a few nit-pics about the engine. Keep in mind, these are things that only someone imtimately familiar with the engine would notice, so don't be deterred from picking up the game because of these things: first, the behavior when hitting enemies is different. When hitting them from below, instead of sweeping right through them, you bounce up above them as if you hit them from above. When hitting a monitor or enemy, the height at which you rebound is not proportional to the height from which you fell from, which it should be. When going up a steep slope, you can't run very well. However, when you're running up a vertical surface, you can go quite far. In fact, when in a big U (such as the ones in the Casino Night Zone in Sonic 2), it's better to just run up the sides instead of spinning to gradually gain momentum. Also, when you jump for a ledge, you can make jumps you should not be able to make, Sonic just seems to snap up onto the platform. Again, these are all nitpicking, but they were pretty much glaring faults to me right from the start.

The other problem I have with the game is in the level design. The levels are VERY difficult compared to the other Sonic titles, which had large, smooth-flowing map designs. In Sonic Pocket Adventure, the maps are focused way too much on making tricky jumps and navigating sections of goofy platforms. Complete with such irrational things as platforms that mash you into the cieling above when stepped on, to pits of bumpers that are next to impossible to escape from, the game is really only enjoyable to those well versed in the art of Sonic. After beating the game a few times, I had it memorized enough to play through it rather quickly, and then the levels are much more tolerable. But a novice to platformers, or even a casual Sonic fan, will just get frustrated and fire up the DC to play Sonic Adventure instead.

All in all, a decent Sonic title. I definately hope SNK and Sega agree to a sequel, hopefully fixing the somewhat frustrating levels and making the engine a bit more true to the originals. If you're a big Sonic fan, you don't wanna' miss this. Otherwise, stick with the Genesis titles or Sonic Adventure.