Sonic Mania

[DANGERMAN]

I bought the Encore Mode dlc so have gone back to this. It's a bit of a weird thing as it's very slight, but also means playing the whole game again (if you want to), so you get a decent amount for whatever the discounted price was.

 

The way Encore Mode works, it's a remix of the main game, but rather than have lives you have characters, there's 5 now, and you pick them up through special stages. I'm a fair few levels in and have only just lost a "life", I got crushed, so it's the first time I've actually lost a character. I'd heard the game was harder now, and granted I didn't think it was especially hard first time round, but even saying that I seem to be struggling less than first time

 

The 2 new characters are good, they're from the Sonic Arcade game that I actually played when I was a kid a couple of times, but I can barely remember anything about it, I think it was a bit like 3D Blast. Anyway, Mighty, initially he seems like the better choice, he can smash down from a jump, and early on (I've not seen them as the game has progressed) there's floors he can break through.  Ray is easily the best, he might be the best of all the friends. His skill is that he can glide, but not like Knuckles, more a halfway house between him and Tails. You tilt forward and back to stay in the air, you can't get as high as Tails, but you can glide forever like Knuckles.

 

Also his monkey bar animation has loads of character

 

 

[Maf]

As much as Sonic Mania is one of my favourite games of the past few years I still prefer the standard mode over the remix mode. Some of that is just because I played so much of the base game that’s just what I know, but also the character swapping was kind of annoying, they moved all the special stages around, and the special stages were so much harder.

 

I really like playing as Mighty because he was always one of my favourite side characters in Sonic, and I think the remix mode is ok for what it is, but I only played it a couple of times where as the base game I have played probably upwards of 15 across PS4 and Switch 

 

Shameless showing off here is my awesome run at Hydrocity Act 2 and Chemical Plant Zone Act 2

 

 

 

 

[DANGERMAN]

Finished it, and I definitely found it easier overall. I didn't see the section on the airship level where half the forum got stuck, not sure if they've removed it from encore or if I just ended up going a different route, but it is a sign that it's less demanding. I lost a character a couple of times getting through the game, usually to being crushed, but would generally just get them back whenever I hit a checkpoint and could go to the special stage. I did lose everyone bar sonic on the final boss though.

 

I'm still terrible at the UFO special stages, can't do them, I kind of wish there was a way to just revisit them without having to find the giant ring in game, I'd be more willing to practice them and learn what I'm supposed to be doing then, as it is I just started to avoid them on the few occasions I stumbled across them

 

It's good though, maybe one day I'll replay the main mode as one of the new characters