Super Emerald

The Super Emeralds are a set of 7 Emeralds that transformed from the Chaos Emeralds with the help of the Master Emerald. The Emeralds made their first and only appearance in Sonic 3 & Knuckles, in which they were the collectible items (replacing the Chaos Emeralds) in the second half of the game (the Sonic & Knuckles levels).

The Super Emeralds are shaped in a brilliant diamond cut. This is the first instance of Emeralds being cut in this shape (the Master Emerald, which also has a brilliant diamond cut, was also introduced in Sonic & Knuckles). Starting with Sonic Adventure, the Chaos Emeralds themselves took on a brilliant diamond cut which has been game canon ever since. The color of the Super Emeralds match the colors used in Sonic 3. The only difference between this and current canon colors is that an orange Emerald is used in place of yellow.

In Sonic 3 & Knuckles, when a player enters a flashing giant ring for the first time, they are transported to the Hidden Palace Zone, where a number of giant, dull grey Emeralds will appear depending on the number of Chaos Emeralds that the players have collected to date. When the players step on these dull Emeralds, they are transported to a new Blue Sphere-style Special Stage (identical to those that appeared in the unconnected Sonic & Knuckles), where they have a chance of winning a Super Emerald... if they succeed, the Emerald in the Hidden Palace that they originally stepped on will light up to their original colors. Jumping through another flashing giant ring will again tranport the player to the Hidden Palace for a chance to win another Super Emerald, until all seven Super Emeralds have been collected. (Note that travelling to the Hidden Palace for the first time disables the player's ability to activate a super transformation, if all Chaos Emeralds had already been collected.)

Getting all the Super Emeralds makes the Master Emerald glow, and enables Sonic to transform into Hyper Sonic, Tails to transform into Super Tails, and Knuckles to transform into Hyper Knuckles. These "Hyper" forms are improvements over the usual "Super" forms, with increased speed and power, along with powerful new abilities.

Trivia

 * In Mushroom Hill zone, it is possible to collect all 7 Super Emeralds. 3 in Act 1 and 4 in Act 2.
 * Strangly,When you get the red Emerald,the blue one,or the yellow one(having already obtained the red one)the red emerald appears dark violet.
 * The reason these were never seen after Sonic 3 and Knuckles is because one of the tranformations they provided caused some kids to have seizures.