Sonic Battle

"Sonic and pals are gearing up for some brawling action!"

- Tagline

Sonic Battle (ソニックバトル) is a fighting game for the Game Boy Advance. The game play consists of 2D sprites fighting in three dimensional environments similar to the Double Dragon games. Unlike traditional fighters, it is easy to play and there are no complicated combos that need to be memorized to perform special moves.

Story
About 4,000 years ago, a sentient weapon was created by an ancient civilization. After being lost for millenniums, the weapon, called a Gizoid, was unearthed and researched by Prof. Gerald Robotnik. It remained dormant for another half century before being discovered by, of all people, resident would-be ruler of the world and Gerald's grandson, Dr. Eggman. Frustrated at his inability to get the dormant Gizoid to work properly, Eggman dumped the contraption at Emerald Beach where it was discovered once again, this time by Sonic the Hedgehog.

The Gizoid, which Sonic dubs Emerl, gets wrapped up in the affairs of Sonic's friends, allies and rivals. Through his encounters with Sonic, Tails, Knuckles, Amy, Cream, Gamma, Rouge, and Shadow, Emerl grows and evolves from a soulless robot into a fun-loving mech with personality traits from all of the above. But while the gang is having fun raising their new mechanical toy, there are those who recognize Emerl's true power. Now that the Gizoid is working again, Eggman's got his eye on it, Rouge wants to turn it into a master thief, and Shadow senses that, despite their efforts to humanize him, Emerl is still designed and programmed to be a weapon of mass destruction.

The story comes to a close when Dr. Eggman challenges Emerl to a battle aboard his new Death Egg. While Emerl is able to defeat the mad doctor, Eggman takes advantage of Emerl's core programming - to obey whoever is strongest - by using the Death Egg's Final Egg Blaster to take out several stars. However, the programming conflict between Emerl's new personality and weapon design cause Emerl to lose control. He knocks out Eggman and turns the Final Egg Blaster on Earth. Sonic attempts to use the Master Emerald to neutralize Emerl's Chaos Emerald powers, but when that fails, he's forced to defeat him in combat. With a final goodbye, Emerl is destroyed, but Sonic believes that they'll see him again someday.

Gameplay
Sonic Battle is very different from normal Sonic games in terms of gameplay. Players can explore the overworld, which is made up of "Emerald Town", "Holy Summit", "Central City", "Night Babylon", and "Gimme Shelter", though during each part of the story only certain maps can be visited. By going to a selectable area, the player may train with other characters, fight E-121 Phi's, or continue the plot.

Battles take place on 3D arenas with 2D sprites, and are split up into Point, Survival and Time. Point Battles require the player to be the first to get a certain amount of points by KO'ing other characters participating in the battle. Survival requires the player to defeat all opposing characters by KO'ing them until they run out of lives. Time Battles require the player to reach a certain objective within a certain amount of time.

Before the battle starts and before the player re-enters the battle after being KO'ed, they are able to select from three different move types; "Shot", "Power" and "Trap". Shot attacks are mid- to long-range attacks, which can be directed north, south, east, or west. Power attacks are typically signature attacks of the character, and vary between each character. Trap attacks involve the character placing or releasing an explosive device. During selection, the player selects which attacks will be Ground, Aerial, and Guard. Ground is the basic Special Attack, used when the character is on the ground. Aerial is a variant of a special attack used while the character is up in the air, which is often an air-to-ground attack. The Special Attack selected as "Guard" protects you from opponent's move in the same category. for example if guard is on shot, all shot moves are automatically blocked until you die. All characters are also capable of Healing themselves at varying speeds. Defending from special attacks and Healing allows characters to fill up Ichikoro Gauge situated above the HP bar. When this gauge is full, the character flashes and their next special attack is a one-hit K.O. if it hits. Blocking these attacks however immediately fills the other character's gauge.

After a battle when Emerl is present, Emerl gains Skill Points based on how well the player fought. Winning the battle earns 1 point. Winning without losing a life earns 2 points. Winning without losing a life or any health earns 5 points. Giving an Emerald Shard to Emerl earns 10 points, These points allow skills that Emerl has copied from the battle to be selected as part of Emerl's moveset. These skills are ranked by stars from 1-to-5, with each star being worth 5 points. The total point worth of the skills cannot exceed the total number of Skill Points Emerl has.

Arenas/Unlockable
All arenas except for Death Egg can be used in Multiplayer.
 * Emerald Beach (Sonic, Tails and Emerl's story)
 * Tails' Lab (Tails, enter to virtual training in Emerl's story)
 * Chao Ruins (Knuckles)
 * Battle Highway (Shadow)
 * Club Rouge (Rouge)
 * Amy's Room (Amy)
 * Library (Cream)
 * Metal Depot (Chaos Gamma)
 * Holy Summit (Chaos)
 * Death Egg (Dr. Eggman)
 * Colosseum (used during virtual training, only available during Emerl's story)
 * Green Hill (can be unlocked by completing story mode)

Mini Games
In addition to the principal Story Mode with overworld exploration and battle arena fights, there are a number of other game modes available in Sonic Battle for single or multiplayer (by connecting the Game Boy Advance with up to 3 others via a link cable). These include "Battle", "Challenge", and "Training" modes, where one can specify the specific characters, opponents, and arenas to spar in, as well as a selection of 2D mini games largely unrelated to the fighting motif. These include:

Secret Combo Cards
Combo Cards representing each character can be obtained by entering a code in the Sonic Team building in the Central City area during Emerl's story.

Note: when having the cards, they cost six stars (30 skill points). When using them in a battle, Emerl will do either 1st and 2nd, 2nd or 3rd or 1st and 3rd attack and have the heavy attack or a special attack at the end, he will not stop attacking until the move finishes.
 * Sonic: 75619
 * Tails: OTrOI
 * Knuckles: yU3Da
 * Amy: alogK
 * Cream: ZAhan
 * Shadow: ArmIa
 * Rouge: AhnVo
 * Gamma: tSueT
 * Chaos: EkiTa

Note: Shadow's and Chaos's cards are anagrams of Maria and Tikal respectively.

Chronology and Legacy
The storyline of Sonic Battle was loosely adapted for TV in episodes 45 and 46 of Sonic X, entitled "Prize Fights" and "A Wild Win" respectively. The story is later continued in Sonic Advance 3 (in which a new robot, Gemerl, is built from Emerl's data) and heavily referenced in Sonic Chronicles: The Dark Brotherhood.

Trivia

 * Oddly, the seven Chaos Emeralds are all green in this game, and the Master Emerald does not have its own separate sprite, while the shattered Emerald has its own sprite for the shards.
 * Strangely, when Sonic gets the Master Emerald, he states "A Master Emerald" but this might be a typo.
 * When Chaos Gamma appears before Sonic, Tails and Emerl, Sonic and Tails quickly recognize Gamma, who they haven't seen since Sonic Adventure. Knuckles and Amy also remember Gamma. Rouge notes that he looks similar to Omega.
 * Even though Knuckles seems to remember Gamma, the two have never actually met. Knuckles merely followed him to get to the Egg Carrier.
 * When entering Central City, a blue sign that reads "Sonic Team" is easily seen. Emerl can also enter it in his story but requires various passwords which unlock battle cards.
 * The Japanese version has a language option where players can choose from Japanese to English. Some differences and mistranslations can be seen.
 * One example is in the beginning of Rouge's story where Rouge calls the hacker, which is Eggman, a "dirty bastard" for hacking the Central Computer.
 * Another example is the menu where the game asks if the player is going to continue the story or play a different episode. The whole menu text itself is different in the English releases of the game and has a massive mistranslation (pictured on the right).Sonic battle story difference.png
 * Knuckles' walking animation is similar to his running animation in Sonic & Knuckles.
 * This is the first Sonic game with 2D artwork not done by Yuji Uekawa.
 * Although this game was released before Sonic Heroes, there are several references to the game including Rouge mentioning Omega and Shadow's presence there. This game appears to take place after the events of that game.
 * If that is the case, it is unknown how Shadow remembers his past, given that during the events of Sonic Heroes and Shadow the Hedgehog he could not remember anything beside Maria. This probably means that the game takes place sometime after Shadow the Hedgehog.
 * Shadow is faster than Sonic in this game, but his battle card states it's because his Air Shoes propel himself faster.
 * It's undetermined how Shadow got his air shoes to move faster, but it has drawbacks as he skids before he stops and has slightly less control over where he goes.
 * Dr. Eggman's base in the game, "Gimme Shelter", shares the name with the popular Rolling Stones song.
 * In the Shibuya Downtown course in Sonic & Sega All-Stars Racing, Sonic Battle artwork can be seen on a plane.
 * In the Virtual Training, even though the player gets multiple lives, one K.O. will still end the Virtual Training.
 * It should be noted that the little fireball head on the cover of Sonic Battle bears resemblance to Sonic as the Red Burst Color Power, which first appeared on the Nintendo DS version of Sonic Colors.
 * This is the only Game Boy Advance game in which Shadow makes an appearance.