Doctor Robotnik’s Jet Drill Pod


 * Not to be confused with Drill Eggman or Drill Eggman 2 from Sonic the Hedgehog 2.

The Drill Mobile is a boss from Sonic the Hedgehog 3, as well as its locked-on form, Sonic 3 & Knuckles. You fight the boss in the second act of Marble Garden Zone.

Playing as Sonic
Sonic arrives at a flat portion of ground with a few pieces of scenery. Eggman will descend from above with the Drill Mobile, stop in mid air, pivot the drill so it is pointing downwards and then slam into the ground. This destroys the land causing Sonic to fall, after which, Tails arrives (whether or not the player is playing with Tails following Sonic), carrying him through the air. The Drill Mobile will charge across the screen from three different angles, either from above, below or from the left, in a random fashion, but can be pre-empted by looking to see which way Eggman goes in the background. The player can move around the screen using any direction on the D-pad.

Playing as Tails
The same sequence of events happens as with Sonic, but this time Tails does not have anyone to carry and must attack the Drill Mobile himself using his spinning tails.

Playing as Knuckles (Sonic 3 & Knuckles only)
The EggRobo version of this boss is very much different to when playing with Sonic or Tails. Instead, the battle is fought in a tunnel. The Drill Mobile will fire a spiky chain from one of four different locations (either from the ceiling or the floor) which then re-emerges from another location. The Drill Mobile itself will then travel along this chain before repeating the process.

Defeating the Drill Mobile
When playing as Sonic or Tails, Eggman can be hit a few times in the opening scene where he destroys the land the player is standing on. When playing as Super Sonic, Eggman can actually be hit more than the eight times that is normally required to defeat a main boss. If this is done, Eggman's mobile will be destroyed after just one hit in the main flying sequence. In any case, Sonic must jump from Tails' arms to attack Eggman, taking care to avoid the drill and the flames from the engines.

As mentioned above, Tails must use his spinning tails to attack Eggman from below. This is best done when Eggman is traveling from left to right.

Knuckles attacks the boss in a similar way to Sonic, with eight hits being required to destroy it.