This is a very fun, pretty polished hidden gem from this series! The combat mechanics are very simple, but they utilize a very interesting special moves system where each stock you can block one of the three types of moves. The 3D arenas are also really cool for a GBA game, especially if playing it on a handheld like a GBA or 3DS where it won't look too chunky.

The story is pretty good too, as it's basically just "Sonic and Co. literally raise a child together". You can imagine pretty well how that goes, although it tying back into SA2's story with Gerald Robotnik and Shadow was pretty cool. Really goes to show how much SEGA was committing to the continuity of this series back in the day.

The main appeal of this game is customizing the robot playable character that the characters raise, Emerl. He has a super cool ability where you can equip him with moves from other characters you get from fighting those characters, where the only issue is that they don't drop enough. From what I've seen, it's nearly impossible to get all of the cards in a reasonable time, which is my main critique of the game. After trying (in vain) for about 2 hours to get anywhere in the Virtual Training mode for new cards, I just gave up and cheated them in because I have better things to do.

Overall though, really fun time that gets a solid recommendation for me! Good length, good difficulty, genuinely just a really fun, although not perfect, game.

I started Unleashed as my next big lunge into this series but I found myself really wanting to play some smaller shit here and there, Ive been wanting to take a stab at larger games less and less if i already have so much media im consuming already on my plate
So naturally that's why youll see bursts of me messing around with things such as 007 GoldenEye tiger electronics or the Home Improvement Game or peeking at the Postal series
Or even swinging into something that has a gnarly hook thats totally off base from anything else i've been doing :)
It's the spice of life, babes.. spice of life

With that being said, Sonic Battle is something Fiercly different.. it's an arena fighter on the fucking Gameboy Advance and it plays like it in every way youd expect
You get some fun combos and fine enough looking stages, though only a couple of them were really stand-out as visually interesting to me with others just kind of devolving into "Gee I hope I get to play on one that Doesnt have annoying terrain blocking my depth of field all the time"

This gameplay is very unique but the tedium here is so harsh it makes me grit my teeth in agony..the execution of it all is effective enough in short bursts but when youre playing this shit back to back to back to back against CPUs you start to notice little.. cracks in it all..
the depth of field misses, getting juggled, the guessing game of how strong you are against your opponent because you can't see their HP bar.. all of this and more really wears on you.

And thats all just shit you find in the multiplayer
I played all of the story mode stuff almost in one sitting and let me tell you

DONT. DO. THAT.. DONT DO IT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!1

And ill explain Why

Sonic Battle's campaign presents itself as this sort of Sonic Adventure style story structuring at first glance
each character having a different perspective in the overall narrative with one consistent thread that ties them all together and unites all the perspectives in the final showdown of tearing some colossal threat's ass asunder(which rocks)

But the most baffling thing to me is that when you beat the first story you get booted out to the title screen for picking another one, and this is in a completely linear fashion too. You dont really get the whole "Oh i finished sonic now alll these are open" kind of feel, when the stories youre playing through are more conjoined like chapters of the overarching story than perspectives you can watch in any order
you can replay them as much as you want(not sure why you would)
but for the first time experience it's absolutely railed into the script

But.. it's a nice script im ngl
Apart from Amy's characterization of being flighty and nearly psychotically in love with sonic
( ermm, jodie you cant say that..,, god forbid women do ANYTHING jodie, what da heck.. loser. )
and yes u in the back youre right, i dont have a problem with Amy crushing on Sonic. I just think there's something cataclysmically ironic and funny about how Shadow has better characterization than her in this game

There is a moment in this game when Amy straight up hallucinates up a Sonic ghost to try to beat Rouge's ass
FOR SOME REASON and then hes gone and its like what just happened lmfaoooo
I love her though just pointing it out because the actual narrative of the game and interactions are kinda fun
I really like Emerl as a main character and how each character has something important to rub off on him with.

from sonic he gets that heroic kinda charisma and not giving up, tails that independency, knuckles the willpower to be tough for himself, rouge the quick thinking and kinda wound up makin him a bit zesty which was hilarious LMAO
amy reaffirmed his dedication to protecting but cream helped him have a reasoning for that protecting with genuine love and understanding
and that understanding is brought home with shadow's affirmations of existence and the pursuit of life

It's dope! It's aggravating being told it through a series of
"ok kill that guy 10 times maybe"
[dialogue inbetween]
"ok now kill that guy 10 More times.. maybe"
and then you do that and it just goes and goesss
The best thing about this game is by far the customization though and the sheer amount of characters you can play as is a double edged sword

On one hand, you have so many different kits to mess around with and apply to your Emerl build... on the Other Hand.. this game is too FUCKING L O N G!!!!!!!!!!!! oH MY G O D.
I enjoyed the narrative and the conclusion to it is actually really sad, one of the more bittersweet ones in the series actually that I don't think is talked about in how beautiful it is enough even though it's similar to SA2's ending in a handful of ways

final thoughts: this game can fucking SUCK a lot of the time, some fights got stupidly unfair for no reason at ALLLLLLLLLLLLL bleaugh. I almost wanna just give it 2/5 stars but I really do like a handful of things about it as a side game
the art is nice, the story is simple and sweet and i like how satisfying some of the ass kicking is for the characters
my favorites to play as were cream, rouge and shadow
im incredibly surprised this game is gamma's true final throes, its... confusing.. like why did they do him like that..
Oh well, atleast Omega is funny
Emerl fits right at home and exemplifies some of the best aspects about Shadow, Sonic and Gamma all rolled into one which is W E I R R RR RR RR D but hey it works for me, i like the little dude

Gosto do modo de batalha desse jogo que utiliza um 3D com 2D, pra um jogo de GBA isso é bem incrivel.

>> Prós
• PERSONAGENS : Tem um elenco dos melhores personagens existentes da época ( faltando o Metal Sonic ).
• JOGABILIDADE : É bem legal e divertido de jogar pelos cenários do modo de batalha do game.
• MODO BATALHA.

>> Contras
• ARENAS : Dava pra ter um pouco mais.

>> Perso Favorito = Shadow.

I honestly wish I could play this with friends because I'm sure it would be so fun in multiplayer! Singleplayer mode is fine but it's really only needed just so you can unlock characters and gain more moves for Emerl to learn. Emerl being a customizable fighter is so cool since you can have him learn other characters moves and create unique combos like Sonic 1, into shadow 2, and finish it with Knuckles 3. So much room for customization! I'd like to see another attempt at this sort of game one day.

every day i wake up and think about playing sonic battle again. my friends have to avoid arguing with me over any aspect of the quality of this game because they know that if you told me to my face that you didn't like Sonic Battle (2003) for the Game Boy Advance i would tear your head off like a grape from the stem. so they have to be like "haha yeah that's so true sonic battle is one of the greatest works of art of our generation hahaha... can you untie us now and let us go!!" and the answer is no. the answer is you're going to sit here and talk about sonic battle with me until i say we're done