Sonic the Hedgehog Pocket Adventure

"Feel the need for speed!!! Sonic is back at his best for the NEOGEO POCKET COLOR!"

- Tagline in the game's back cover.

Sonic the Hedgehog Pocket Adventure (ソニック・ザ・ヘッジホッグポケットアドベンチャー), also called simply as Sonic Pocket Adventure, is a platforming game in the Sonic the Hedgehog series and only Sonic-themed title released for Neo Geo Pocket Color handheld console. First released on November 3rd, 1999 in United States, the game is developed by SNK Product Development Dept. Division 1 along with Yuji Naka being as supervisor and producer and is the second Sonic game to be released for a non-Sega system (the first being Sonic Jam for Game.com).

Sonic Pocket Adventure contains conventionally the same gameplay from original main Sonic the Hedgehog titles for the Sega Genesis, as relying on similar graphics, music tracks, Zones and enemies along having several extra content such as puzzles and new multiplayer modes being added to the game.

Gameplay
Sonic Pocket Adventure is a side-scrolling platforming game that heavily features the gameplay similar to original Sonic the Hedgehog titles. The game stars Sonic as only playable character in the single player mode with the same control scheme and moveset from Sonic the Hedgehog 3 &amp; Knuckles with inclusion of Spin Jump, Spin Attack and Spin Dash. Momentum physics in the game are closely accurate to earlier games with Sonic only being slightly heavier.

Many items and gimmicks are taken directly from Sonic the Hedgehog (1991) and Sonic the Hedgehog 2. Rings function closely the same like in earlier main titles, as collecting 100 grants extra life and points at end-of-Act score tally. Item Boxes have the basic power-up set: Super Rings, Shields, 1UPs, Power-Sneakers and an Invinsible Protect. Each Act has several Star Posts to save the player's progress or sends to the latest one after Sonic dies. As a addition, there are 96 Photo pieces hidden in the game, which are used to to assemble one of six puzzle images.

Despite many Zones being similar to ones featured in Sonic the Hedgehog 2, the level design is different while only loosely replicating the level layout at times. As having familiar Zones, several gimmicks from Sonic the Hedgehog 2 are also featured and function closely the same. At the end of each first Act, the Bonus Plate falls down and after defeating one of Dr. Eggman's machines, the player has to open the Capsule to finish the second Act.

Items

 * Rings
 * Item Boxes
 * Super Rings
 * Shields
 * 1UP
 * Power-Sneakers
 * An Invinsible Protect
 * Star Posts
 * Photo pieces

Other modes
Aside the single player mode, Sonic Pocket Adventure features other different modes by choosing "Go To Room" option on the title screen by pressing down on the controller stick. In each mode of the game, the player can choose whatever Zone that is available depending how far the player has reached in single player mode.

Trial Room
There are two types of Time Attack mode to choose in this game. Best times are inscribed onto a high score screen with overall performance graded with medals: bronze, silver, gold, or platinum.
 * Time Trial: The basic Time Attack mode for each Act available.
 * Advanced: Same as the Time Trial mode, but the player is required to reach the end of the Act with at least 50 Rings on hand for your score to be recorded.
 * Rankings: Top five records for each Act of the Zone are found here from both Time Trial and Advanced modes. The player can exchange score data to other player by using link cable of the Neo Geo Pocket Color.

Duel Room
Duel Room functions as a place for the game's two multiplayer modes. In order to play, two players must have the link cable to insert it along with two Neo Geo Pocket Color handhelds and having own copies of the game. In both two player versus modes, the player one controls Sonic and the second player has Tails, who controls with the same moveset from Sonic the Hedgehog 2 just like Sonic.


 * Sonic Rush: The simple race to the goal at the end of each Act.
 * Get the Rings: Similar to previous mode, but both players have to race on amassing a quota of Rings.

Puzzle Room
All 96 photo pieces found in the game are gathered and placed into six character images, each required to have 16 photo pieces. All puzzle pictures can be initialized at any time, returning all your collected photo pieces back into the game. By assembling all six images completely unlocks on separated Special Stage mode in the game to play through all six Special Stages in succession.

Game Option
By choosing the separated Game Option menu below the Room Select, the player can change the difficulty of the game from either Easy or Normal (easy mode removes several obstacles away from each Zone), turn on or off the Time Out, choose the player start the game with either single, three or five lives, or turn on or off the Auto Power. After the player has cleared the game once, the Sound Test becomes available to listen music tracks or sound effects of the game.

Appearances

 * Sonic the Hedgehog (playable character)
 * Miles "Tails" Prower (playable character, multiplayer only)
 * Dr. Robotnik
 * Knuckles the Echidna
 * Mecha Sonic
 * Animals
 * Flicky
 * Ricky
 * Pocky
 * Picky
 * Cucky
 * Pecky

Zones
Sonic Pocket Adventure consists nine Zones, many of them having two Acts and several Zones only containing one. All Zones in the game are directly inspired by Zones of Sonic the Hedgehog 2 with graphics of the first Zone being duplicate from Sonic the Hedgehog (1991) and music tracks being 8-bit renditions of Sonic the Hedgehog 3 & Knuckles and Sonic Jam. At the end of each second Act contains usually the conformation with Dr. Robotnik in one of his created machines, which are completely new to this game.

In order to access the last, ninth Zone in the game, the player has to gather all seven Chaos Emeralds (see the Special Stages sub-section) to receive the extra fight and alternative ending. All Zones in order are:


 * Neo South Island
 * Secret Plant
 * Cosmic Casino
 * Aquatic Relix
 * Sky Chase
 * Aerobase
 * Gigantic Angel
 * Last Utopia
 * Chaotic Space (required to have all seven Chaos Emeralds)

Special Stages
In Sonic Pocket Adventure, there are total six changes to enter all six Special Stages. For this tough challenge, the player has to collect 50 Rings and head to the end of each Zone's first Act (also including Sky Chase Zone) and leap to the Large Ring. Although there are seven Chaos Emeralds in this game, the last purple one is on hands of Dr. Eggman and the player has to catch it separately during the climatic battle in Last Utopia Zone.

Special Stages in Sonic Pocket Adventure are heavily reminiscent to ones included in Sonic the Hedgehog 2 with similar tasks to collect certain amount of Rings in order to access the next phase or collect the Chaos Emerald at the half-pipe-structured pathway. There are also bombs to avoided and also exclusively sparkling flowers, which the player can earn Continues.

Development
SNK Product Development Dept. Division 1 is the developer team behind making Sonic Pocket Adventure, as well Yuji Naka from Sonic Team being credited as supervisor and producer.

The game was originally announced in February 1999, when SNK revealed Sonic to be among the upcoming titles for their handheld system. The game was then first unveiled in early August of the same year, revealing plenty of the game's first level (Neo South Island) as well some of the various gameplay modes (with the misnomer "Pazzle Mode"). The game was revealed more shortly afterwards up until its release.

With the game being released on November 30th in North America and on December 3rd 1999 in Europe, the original release in Japan was originally set to be December 1st. However, the release date was moved to the 16th and again to its final release on 11 January 2000.

Reception
Sonic Pocket Adventure received high positive reviews during its release. IGN acclaimed it with the 10 out of 10 score, praising the game's high capabilities on the handheld, multiplayer modes and replay value. Gamespot also praised the game for graphics, multiplayer mode and puzzle finding, while the only criticism being the game's short length. Daily Radar gave also positive review, as stating the game being "awfully good. We'd love to say it's the single best reason to buy a Neo Geo Pocket." Retro Gamer has stated the game for being reasonably substantial and concludes the review: "If you're a Sonic fan, this is definitely high on the roll of honour in his CV, and you owe it to yourself to play it."

Trivia

 * There's common misconception for the game being developed by Dimps, the game developer studio behind Sonic Advance and Sonic Rush games. The development studio itself wasn't found until several mouths later after the game's release in March 2000, though many of studio's people are known to be former SNK and Capcom employees.
 * Sonic Pocket Adventure is notably the only game to this day for mixing both the classic SegaSonic and the recent modern post-Dreamcast designs. Sonic, Tails and Knuckles in-game sprites are seen based on their classic proportions now with multicolored eye pupils given since Sonic Adventure, but the title screen, menu, puzzles and cutscenes show them having post-Dreamcast designs. Dr. Robotnik, who is wearing his classic outfit while riding Egg Mobile and many of his vehicles, changed his outfit to post-Dreamcast attire minus grey goggles when Sonic has got to the Gigantic Angel Zone. Only Animals and Badniks are shown to have designs from original games. Both designs are implemented together again many years later in Sonic Generations.
 * The title screen in the game is directly duplicated from the title screen of Sonic the Hedgehog 3 along with the 8-bit variation of the same music track.
 * Sonic Pocket Adventure is the last game for eight years to feature Sonic as a playable character until 2007 spin-off Sonic and the Secret Rings.
 * Many Badniks from Sonic the Hedgehog 2 are featured in Zones similar to ones, where they originally appeared. However, certain Badniks like Crawls and Turtloids do not appear in Cosmic Casino Zone or Sky Chase Zone, leaving the first mentioned Zone completely empty for Badniks.
 * For unknown reasons, Rocky is the only Animal who does not appear in this game.
 * In North American version of the game, Advanced menu picture on the Trial Room shows Sonic having blue arms. Also, one of the puzzle photos with Sonic and Tails on green background shows Sonic having blue arms as well.