A FAN FAVOURITE THAT HAS BEEN ABSENT FOR OVER A DECADE, SONIC 3 & KNUCKLES IS FINALLY GETTING THE RETRO ENGINE REMASTER TREATMENT IN SONIC ORIGINS. HOW DID THE MUCH-REQUESTED PROJECT FINALLY GET THE GO AHEAD?

When you go back and read contemporary coverage of Sonic 3, it’s plain to see that a certain sense of fatigue had started to accompany the rapid growth of the Sonic series. Mean Machines Sega said it would be “a tricky game for Sega to pull off”. Sega Power was “sceptical”, fearing a “tired reworking” of the formula, while CVG’s Deniz Ahmet admitted that he was “all set to be highly critical of Sonic 3 after hearing that it was more of the same”. All three magazines ultimately awarded the game scores of 90% or more. Sega Pro even alleged that Sonic 3 was “a game Sega admits is not supposed to be the mass-market success Sonic 2 was”, but awarded the game 87% in spite of its hefty £59.99 price tag.

That goes a long way to encapsulating the odd position Sonic 3 is in. Critics responded well because the game did meaningfully improve on its predecessors, with longer and more elaborate stages, a greater number of boss fights with more interesting designs, and two new bonus stages. But while it was a sales hit, it wasn’t a success on the scale of either of the first two games. There are a few ways to explain that – you could talk about the high price, the fact that it wasn’t as commonly bundled with hardware as the previous games, or even point to that sense of fatigue with the series. In any case, the result is that while Sonic 2 is the iconic game, Sonic 3 is the game that the hardcore fans are more likely to point to as the best of the bunch. Or more accurately, it’s half of that game.

» [Mega Drive] Sonic fights this boss in Sonic 3, but it’s exclusive to Knuckles in the combined game.

Mean Machines Sega’s review of Sonic 3 mentioned the existence of “a deluxe 24- meg edition of the game, with extra levels and enhanced play”. That never quite came to pass, but the magazine also hinted at the potential for “an upgrade for the 16-meg edition”, which likely sounds much more familiar to you as it describes Sonic & Knuckles. “Sonic 3 was famously split into two parts that could be physically connected to create the complete game, with the same ‘lock-on technology’ having the ability to bring Knuckles into Sonic 2 and providing a nigh infinite number of Blue Spheres minigame stages as well as spawning the ‘& Knuckles’ meme that was embraced by even Sega themselves,” says Simon. So where Sonic 3 was more than just more of the same, Sonic & Knuckles was precisely more of the same because it was the second half of the game as planned.