I honestly don't think this game is really as bad as everyone claims to say it is. A lot of people like to trash this game purely due to its concept being that this is a sonic game where you can't run fast and must rely on the spin dash in order to effectively move. While that is certainly not the most well-thought-out concept for a sonic game IMO, I think the levels are designed semi around it as they are large and explorative, where spinballing around really won't accidentally get you killed in most instances. A good way to think about this games control is like billiards where you kinda launch sonic around. The only unfun parts were the last level being way too unnecessarily confusing and some of the bosses being kinda annoying to deal with. One of the worst sonic games this is very clearly not imo. instead of being bad its just okay

A bad game to me is one that's poorly designed, and never really meets its intention. Never once did this game make me feel cheated, or felt like it was poorly designed. The game just felt overall boring. I couldn't even finish it because of how boring it was. I thought it was fair to drop this mid-review, as the game has nothing else to offer. It's honestly just the same gameplay with different key placement and boss gimmicks.

The levels are all vomit-colored, with a nice topping of seizure inducing hues. The music is awful; it all sounds the same! I wouldn't be surprised if it were used in a torture chamber somewhere.

By all means, this game isn't good at all. It's just a cheaply made puzzle game with "WHAT IF SONIC WAS SLOW" used as a marketing tool. The gameplay feels comparable to that of Sonic 3D Blast, except way worse. It's like Sonic 3D Blast in beta.

All and all, 1.5/5. This game doesn't suck, it just isn't fun to play.

Motherfucker got his shoes stole.

Besides the two Tails-centric games, Sonic Labyrinth is the only Game Gear Sonic title I haven't played on real hardware. Not that any of them are worth running out and buying off the secondhand market, especially not for the ~40 dollars people are asking to unburden themselves of Sonic Labyrinth. Why would I cough up that kind of money for a cart when I could buy Sonic Origins for the same price and play it with messed up audio balancing instead? C'mon. Get real!

Back in the early-to-mid 90s, Sonic was known for a couple of things: go fast and roll into ball. There's plenty you could do with these elements - like make a proper Sonic the Hedgehog game - but some developers, like Minato Giken, saw a lot of value in the ball rolling mechanic and its potential application in different gameplay styles. For example, maybe you want to make like, Kirby's Dream Course but starring Sonic. That sounds pretty neat, right? Only you're hamstrung to horrible mid-90s handheld hardware, so you have to strip out every interesting element until you're just left with rolling and bouncing around barren environments. Uhh, well crap. That doesn't sound too fun, actually. Try not to feel bad, though. Worst case scenario your studio goes out of business in two years.

Robotnik stole Sonic's shoes and along with them his ability to go fast, so this entire game is spent rolling around at the speed of whatever through profoundly unimaginative courses. To call these "labyrinths" would be a misnomer considering how small in scale and bereft of challenge they are. Even the last few acts - which introduce teleporters - are so simple as to be navigable without any forethought in where you should go or what you should be doing. Collect three keys and reach the goal, that's your objective. I promise you can do this at 6am with a head cold and four hours of sleep, and all you'll be is 25 minutes poorer for the experience.

The two most common complaints levied against this game are that Sonic moves too slow and is uncontrollable when in a roll. This is something I've heard both contemporary with the original release and echoed for nearly three decades since, and I personally just don't see it. Sonic moves slowly because you aren't meant to be running around by design, and spinning around feels pretty stiff. To Labyrinth's credit, I never felt like I lacked control over Sonic. Even a bad spindash can be easily broken out of, and you really have to go out of your way to lose a life. The real issue is that Labyrinth is so lacking in vision as to be a baby sensory Sonic game. Occasionally you'll see a moving platform you can ride, or a pad that halts Sonic's momentum if he travels over it, or a five-pixel wide pinball bumper awkwardly placed in the corner of a single act that doesn't really do anything. Vestigial level gimmicks, we love to see them.

I don't know if Minato Giken's mandate was to just get a cart out to market with "Sonic" on it, but it certainly feels that way. It's so thoughtlessly designed and empty that I questioned if I was mistakenly playing a beta build more than once. But, no, that's just Sonic Labyrinth. Far from the worst entry in the Hedgehog's Game Gear library but not really worth playing even as a curiosity.

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played on Retroarch

Yet another entry in my Sonic marathon, and one that before playing I heard numerous negative reviews consider this one among some of the worst Sonic games ever made. After playing for myself...I don't really understand the hate? I mean it's not great, but it's not bad either, just pretty mid.

To get the negatives out the way, 3-3 is a bit annoying with how to get the last key, the 2nd and 3rd boss can be a bit annoying with the spindash but nothing that would make me hate it, and the way to get the 6th emerald is pretty dumb. That's really about it for negatives.

Otherwise it's a mid puzzle game. Yeah, the spindash can be a bit to get used to, but I got used to it pretty quickly and outside of the two bosses I mentioned being a bit annoying I didn't have much problem with the physics or anything, especially since you can stop Sonic from bouncing all over and also set how hard you want him to accel. Outside of the one time in 3-3, I was able to find all the keys pretty easily with some searching around with 4-3 being the hardest cause the maze but even still I didn't need to look it up.

If anything the problem with the game is just that it doesn't really take advantage of the more puzzle spinoff focus of things. I could see potential in a Sonic style puzzle game where you can't necessarily rely on your speed to get you through things, it's just that the game doesn't really take advantage of that and is pretty easy to clear stages without nearly running the clock out. It's super short too, I beat it in pretty much an hour of playing in one sitting, probably less if I didn't ever tab out or anything,

So yeah, don't really get why this is so hated? As I said it does have it's problems, but nothing that made it unbearable to play through, plus it doesn't overstay it's welcome, if anything it finishes way before reaching a point of settling down. It was nowhere near the likes of something like Sonic Spinball or Knuckles' Chaotix in where I just wanted to drop the game as I played. Just a mid Sonic game that's neither great nor bad.

There are two constants to internet culture: Impact font memes, and the insatiable bloodlust to ascribe solid-but-unconventional sonic games to an abomination against humanity. No case is more clear than with Labyrinth, which gets constantly lauded as the absolute bottom of the franchise's barrel because gamers have zero literacy and can only judge games in hypothetical voids.

Sonic Labyrinth is good.

"But you go so slow" No you don't, the spindash is right there. "But it's so wild and uncontrollable" Uh, get good? Sorry, can you say 'skill issue'? Filtrado? Shit and poop and fart?? It goes in a straight line, you curve it slightly with the d-pad, or stop it with a button. Sonic skids to stop and you have to anticipate that in advance when on the move. That's not janky controls. That's not a lack of testing. That's game design. Learn it, sillies. The contrast between slow walking and risky spindashes DEFINES Labyrinth's design economy: It's an intentional juxtaposition. You can't think of it as platforming, it's more akin to golf: Spindashes are your putt, and walking is for modifying your lay on the green. You are playing a nonstop, high-speed game of mini-golf. Every level is designed intimately around this, with wide boxed areas divided by slopes, doors, springs, and other railed transportation devices. You can't divorce control methods from the environments they are contained in; they're tangential to each other, and Sonic's controls work for these levels, period.

The REAL problem is the last few levels, which are just genuinely terrible, giving 'Labyrinth' its name, expecting you to trudge through poorly-directed mazes of teleporters and gates. 4-3 is basically unbeatable without a map and is what people THINK this game is.

Bosses ain't too hot either, but at least they're easy, with the one exception being 2-4's crab (which SUSPICIOUSLY looks like a gadget twins enemy). The Eggman robot with a feathered helmet is fucking ridiculous-looking; Robotnik commited too hard to the castle bit.

One other critique is the length and visual variety; 4 zones is kinda slim, even as someone who prefers short games. And of those levels, there's only a small amount of level palettes that they distribute between them. There's a lack of distinction per zone that creates the same sense of world other Sonic games have.

Anyway, bottom line, it's good. I stand my ground that careening through its levels is really cathartic, at least until endgame. If you took Kirby's Dream Course and made it a real-time platform game, this is it: The textbook example and a great exercise for it. I think people should have more open-mindedness for the way Sonic games are designed instead of shutting themselves off because it's dissimilar to the traditional speeds and flows that define the classics. People are fully capable of understanding divergent or intentionally discomforting gameplay schisms for so many other franchises, and I will never understand why Sonic specifically is the one who cannot be blessed with that same respect.

The year is 1994. You sit in the Sega boardroom, awaiting the start of the meeting with one of your fellow game designers, set to reveal what they'd told you shortly prior was a surefire hit of an idea.

As the door swings open, he seems beside himself. Rather than exuding confidence in his idea, he clearly looks to be holding back laugher. Before you can ask a question, he speaks.

"Hey, wouldn't it be funny if we made a Sonic game, where you couldn't run fast or jump, and instead had you find keys in an isometric puzzle game that had no reason to be a Sonic game?"

You swallow your pride a little bit. The idea at its very core was entirely antithetical to what made Sonic, well, Sonic. But you wanna keep your job, forcing a weary smile. Surely, entertaining this joke would be worth it for the revelation of his real idea.

"Heh, y-yeah, that sure would be funny. Good joke, Tim."

His face becomes entirely serious, not a dash of humour in his voice as he speaks his next, accursed words.

"What do you mean, 'joke'?"