The screen crunch destroys this game. You move so quickly and enemy placement is so dogshit I genuinely just wish there weren't any enemies at all; the game would be more fun. Bosses start okay but get to be rather bullshit around the halfway mark. The level design itself isn't great because they had to try and accommodate for the screen crunch so, in an attempt to not make the game torture, they made it super automated, except for the parts where it isn't. Funnily enough, the parts where it isn't are the parts that're the least fun, because who would have thought when you can cross the distance of the whole screen in three frames that you wouldn't be able to react to a bottomless pit. Whoops. Skill issue, I guess.

Sad to say, I'm not too crazy about this one! After playing Advance 1 and finding it to be one of my favorite 2D Sonics so far, I had high hopes for Advance 2.

It's not awful; the visuals are even better now, my favorite addition being the "act start" animations for the characters, it controls a lot better and there are new movement options when jumping off springs or rails. Speeding around here feels good! ... Until you fall down a bottomless pit.

Also, uh. Possibly the worst emerald hunt in the series so far? The SP Rings SUCK.
Look, I don't mind a larger emphasis on exploration. Sonic CD is still my favorite 2D game in the series, but the difference between that game and Advance 2 is that CD was built with that exploration in mind. Not only that, but CD only had you finding 2 thingamabobs in each past version of the acts. Here, you have to find 7 of these fucking special rings before you can enter a special stage. Got 6? Tough shit, you're not going in. SP Rings don't carry between acts either, even though you can only nab one emerald per zone. Oh, and emeralds aren't shared between characters. Just dickheaded decisions all around.

Pretty disappointed ngl. Here's hoping Advance 3 wraps the trilogy up nicely.

O Boost Mode é facilmente a melhor mecânica dessa franquia, para mim devia ser integrada permanentemente no moveset do Sonic assim como do drop dash. Mas o level design desse jogo é TERRIVÉL, sendo só uma linha reta com varias armadilhas de passividade que são impossíveis de ver por causa da resolução do GBA. Por causa disso as habilidades dos outros personagens são inúteis já que todos tem o boost mode e tem a mesma velocidade do Sonic. Única coisa positiva que eu posso falar a mais, é que esse jogo introduziu a Cream, ela é legal no Rush.

I remember when I played this game for the first time a couple of years ago, and I remember it being one of those games that worse and worse the more it went on, but still found it a decent time.

I decided to replay it recently, since I just beat Advance 1, because why not?

While my general opinion on the game has not changed since then, I find Sonic Advance 2 a bit worse than before, because aside from its fast speed, it doesn't really have much going for it.

The level design can get pretty basic, and the bosses are not my cup of tea, and some of them just outright suck.

All of this culminates in XX, one of the worse levels I've experienced in a Sonic game.
Do you want to beat all of the games' bosses again, back to back, and then do the final boss?

I remember dying so many times to that final zone during my first playthrough, and while I didn't die as much this time around, I just wasn't having fun unlike previously.

Yes, in spite of the level design being basic, I still had fun going through the levels, especially during the first half.
But this game has its issues, and I don't really feel like replaying it anytime soon.

I like this game, I like it a lot, I think the level design is much better than advance 1, but it does have issues. For some reason any time a different company works on a sonic game they think the biggest issue with sonic is its boss fights, and they need to change them.

That's not a thing though, sure bosses in sonic games are easy as hell and you can just juggle yourself on them until they die in 5 seconds. That's fun though being able to cheese boss fights is fun. This game tries to make them last longer and harder by putting you in auto run sections where you catch up and hit the boss. This doesn't always work a lot of them can be beaten immediately still and I actually like almost all of them except that stupid one in the sky level with the insta kill hand. It's harder than the final boss of the game. In fact the only reason XX is the hardest level in the game is because it makes you fight that one again.

Anyways outside of that I actually liked this game, though I would have put it down after 2 playthroughs if the game didn't give me the funniest completion reward in any game ever.

I never wanted to 100% any of the advance games because the special stage requirements and the stages themselves are the worst in the series, but I did so for this one because I wanted to play as Amy Rose, literally the only reason. Sadly she isn't as different as advance 1 but she is still fun mostly because this game overall is better than 1.

Honestly I think I like this game more than I should, but I also hate it more than I should at the same time because of the bosses.
Overall a great sonic game though.

Sonic Advance 2 was the first time a sonic game prioritised pure speed over everything else. It’s a precursor to the boost formula while still retaining plenty of what made the previous Sonic Advance so much fun.

There’s not much going in story wise, but the presentation in those comic strip like moments are great, alongside easily one of the coolest Super Sonic transformations ever.

Gameplay is Classic Sonic with a twist, as either Sonic, Tails, Knuckles, Amy (when unlocked) or newcomer Cream, you race to the end of levels designed less to be explored and more to go as fast as possible and keep the speed going. If your able to stay at top speed for a few seconds you enter a boost like state in which you move even faster until you come to a stop, and with the new acrobatic abilities each character have, it’s very fun to just keep moving, honestly I love the levels in this game. Not the boss fights though, the constant movement is energetic but makes most of these fights feel the exact same, unless you’re playing as Cream where nothing can stop you.

This games biggest fault is with the chaos emeralds, collecting them involves hunting down 7 gold medals in a stage, and this requires you to go against the whole games design, forcing you to slow down and explore. Emeralds also aren’t shared between characters so if you want to unlock everything you need to do it with every character, not a fun time let me tell you. The special stages themselves are pretty simply, but it’s really a shame these are so hard to get too.

The game looks great and the OST is ace, Sonic Advance 2 stumbles with its completion process, but as a game to just jump into, it’s fantastic.