This review is from the perspective of someone who NEVER PLAYED THE GENESIS ORIGINALS. I got into Sonic in the 2000's with Adventure 2, fell out of it after Generations, and got back into it with Frontiers. But I never played the games that started it all, and this collection happened to be on sale on Switch, so...

I'm going to review each game individually, the collection's score being the average of all of them.

Sonic 1: 2/5.

Sonic 1 is a classic case of "first game syndrome." SEGA had an amazing concept for a platformer protagonist, and pulled it off brilliantly. Sonic's speed, rolling gimmicks and fast-paced action were like nothing seen at the time. And Green Hill Zone was the PERFECT first level to showcase their new mascot's strengths: wide open areas to build up speed, loops to show the physics, multiple paths, enemies and bosses used perfectly to show off Sonic's skills...

And then someone thought: what if, for Level 2, we throw him into HIS WORST POSSIBLE ENVIRONMENT!!!

The jump from Green Hill to Marble Zone is one of the most jarring I've felt in a platformer. Marble is a slow, cramped, puzzle-based level that doesn't play to Sonic's strengths at all. I'm not against more methodical platforming in Sonic, but this isn't the way to do it. It's telling that even speedruns have to wait on some traps.

And then there's Labyrinth Zone. Which is at least more INTERESTING than Marble, but is still slow, frustrating... and you can drown due to bad bubble rng. (It's far more consistent in later 2D games) And it gets reskinned for the final level because of course.

Starlight and Green Hill are the only levels in Sonic 1 that feel "Sonic-like" to me. This is clearly a case of throwing things at the wall to see what stuck, and later games sure realized what did and, well, stuck to it. Worth playing to see where it all began, but I'd recommend cheesing this one with Tails or Amy.
There's a REASON not much in this game gets referenced except Green Hill.

Sonic CD: 4.5/5

The oddball of the original tetralogy, but you know me and underdogs. Is it any surprise I ended up loving it? What I love about CD is its levels work both for speed and exploration, letting you pick and choose which approach you prefer. Want to explore each area in all timelines, saving the past to create a Good Future? You can do that. Want to blaze through quickly? Just get enough rings for the Special Stages, having all the Time Stones will guarantee Good Futures for the rest of the game.

I was surprised at the variety in level gimmicks and concepts here. Wacky Workbench is my favourite, a level I love and hate in equal measure.

Sonic has new speed tech here, but this game benefits the most from the Origins Plus re-release, as it adds not only Amy but also Knuckles.

CD's presentation is also top-notch. The wacky, colorful environments may not be everyone, but they're beautiful, and the MUSIC is incredible, both the Jp/EU and US soundtracks. (Origins lets you swap between both)
Oh, and I see now why people love the Metal Sonic race. One of the series' greatest bosses.

My only gripe is the "pseudo-3D" special stages... aren't great. The hitboxes on the UFOs are endlessly frustrating.

Sonic 2: 5/5

Sonic 2 basically took the few good levels of Sonic 1 and made that the entire game. The moment I first played Chemical Plant, I knew I was going to LOVE this game. Going so fast you nearly outrun the camera... in 1992. And this game DOES have slower, more platform-focused levels, but they feel far more natural. Aquatic Ruin is what Labyrinth Zone should've been. Metropolis is EVIL but still decently fun. Wing Fortress is obtuse at first but really fun once you know where to go. The boss fights are more elaborate, dynamic, and fun, even the infamous final gauntlet that gives you no Rings. (Though I admit, that must've sucked without the infinite lives mode)

This game introduced Tails, but it's hard to judge him in this context as, apparently, playable Tails in the original version was just a Sonic clone with no flight. Origins backports in S3 Tails, along with Knuckles and Amy, adding replay value.

Sonic 2 has the perfect length for firing up a run on Switch on the go, and it's got an "elegant simplicity" to it that makes it imo the objective best of this collection. I DEFINITELY see why this game defined so many childhoods.

Sonic 3 & Knuckles: 4.5/5

The game so big, one cartridge couldn't contain it, they say. "Big" is the key word here, Sonic 3 really went all-out to end the tetralogy: more playable characters, more levels, LONGER levels, not just Super forms but HYPER forms, more dramatic boss fights, and a bigger focus on story with higher stakes.

Thing is, bigger doesn't always mean better. Sometimes I feel 3&K is too ambitious for its own good.

Take the story, for example. People complain about excessive story in some modern Sonic games, and I think the seeds of that started here. While I love how each Act and Zone seamlessly transitions into the next, many levels have sequences that essentially amount to unskippable cutscenes. See the airship bombing run before Angel Island Act 2's boss, for example. These are nice at first, but you have to sit through them on every replay, and every time you die.

And while there's some GREAT levels here (Hydrocity, Ice Cap, Mushroom Hill, Flying Battery, Lava Reef, to name a few), several are too long to the point of overstaying their welcome. Case in point: the Time Bonus scoring doesn't seem changed from Sonic 1, CD and 2, so beating a level in over 5 minutes is considered "too slow". This was reasonable there. But hitting 5 minutes is a legit challenge in a lot of 3&K levels, and in some the original game's 10 minute death timer was a real threat. (Looking at you, Sandopolis Act 2, the second coming of Marble Zone...)

Then there's the Special Stages, Blue Sphere. Probably the most mechanically solid of the 2D games, but man are the Super Emerald ones BRUTAL. The reward is worth it, but yikes.

The boss fights are a real highlight though (my jaw dropped when I saw Marble Garden's boss, which has you carried by Tails the whole time to fight in the sky), and Knuckles having his own campaign with slightly different levels and a new final boss was a cool touch. (That'd influence the series' approach to characters in the future)

So Sonic 3 & Knuckles isn't my favourite of these games, but it's still excellent.

As for Origins' own additions, besides 4 playable characters in all 4 games (which is amazing), there's Boss Rushes, Mirror Mode, and short challenges remixing content. (Oh, there's also 12 Game Gear games in Plus, I haven't tried most of them yet) They also added amazing new cutscenes to start and end each of the 4 games, tying them together. And that last one, unlocked by beating all 4... man, I nearly teared up as it framed the collection as the story of how these 4 best friends met.

The collection gets a LOT of negative press online and experiencing it in a vacuum I'm not sure why. Maybe its issues are more noticeable if you played the originals, or people hate the DLC pricing scheme or delisting of old versions. But as someone who just wanted to experience some old games he missed, and see where Sonic began... I don't regret my purchase. (I'd recommend waiting for a sale on the Plus bundle though) And I'm going to continue enjoying these classics for years to come. (Maybe not Sonic 1 though...)

Sonic Origins Plus contains Sonic 1, 2, 3 & Knuckles, and Sonic CD. Each title plays largely as you would expect them to, with quality of life features which include the elimination of lives to retry and the ability to save your progress at every checkpoint. As for the games themselves, they're fun and challenging, if a bit inconsistent. Some levels have better design than others, with some not so fun levels in the mix, and bosses can at times be a trial to defeat.

In place of lives, you collect coins with which you can unlock illustrations, music, and movies in the game's Museum. (This means you have infinite continues/retries.) It was fun to look through all of the old concept art and various promotional materials from the series' early life.

You have many different ways to play in this collection. Apart from being able to play each title as four different characters (Sonic, Tails, Knuckles, Amy), there is also Mirror Mode and a variety of brand new Missions for each title. Missions can range from eliminating X number of enemies in a short time or completing a stage without taking damage. It was fun to challenge myself to aim for S rank times in these Missions.

One of the more significant additions of the Plus contents in this version is the collection of Sonic titles on Game Gear. I found these titles to be little more than a diversion at best, and could not feel compelled to play any of them for a significant period of time. They feel like something of a time capsule and are certainly much better suited to being played handheld on the bus or train.

In terms of display options, I was very disappointed that there is no CRT filter available. Sonic Mania had this, and I see no excuse for the lack of this feature if they intend for this collection to be the best way to enjoy these games. Personally, no CRT filter loses significant points on this release for me.

I think that if anything, with the quality of life features and reduced difficulty of this collection, Sonic Origins Plus might be a good way for new players to experience Sonic's earlier endeavors. If you've played these games before, I'm not convinced that there is much draw to this collection on the whole.

After getting it physical, so everything is in and it’s free of that cruddy dlc model and cheaper, this is a solid collection after the updates. It’s not perfect, I’d still say sales are your friend, but they fixed it and listened to fans. I don’t love them delisting the classic games separately on Steam as a result of Origins, though. That’ll always suck. But this is fun, if maybe not the best way to play these games. For casual fans though, a great hop on point, and probably one of the best ways to play 1, 2, and CD. Just maybe not 3&K. But patches ironed out a lot of my issues.

I previously wrote an exhaustive and frankly unfocused review on the base version of Sonic Origins, a game I paid 45$ for because I just had to get at a disorganized collection of improperly labeled music and borders for the bastardized 4:3 mode. I won't bother to link that review and save you all the trouble of trying to parse my thoughts. The short version is this: I own these games across an obscene number of platforms, but to have them in 16:9 and playable on my TV sounded nice. It's just too bad Sega put a buggy product to market that was outshined by fan projects like Sonic A.I.R., which released years prior.

But that was way back in June of last year. Sonic Origins has now received its first and presumably only major content update and physical release in the form of Sonic Origins Plus, and as I've established numerous times throughout the last two years, I am bad with my finances. At least I waited for the physical edition to hit 20$ this time!

Plus is a mixed package. It proudly advertises new characters, plural, but only justifies this by adding Amy and making Knuckles playable in exactly one more game than he previously was, Sonic CD. Mechanically, Amy plays very similarly to Sonic, albeit with a wider insta-shield and a weaker drop dash. Though I wish her drop dash had more oomph and lasted longer, I can respect the fact that she doesn't play wildly different, as she needs to slot comfortably into the level design of four whole games. Amy's sprites are excellent, and she has a lot of cute animations, like her victory pose in Sonic 3. She is arguably the main draw to Plus and while she could've felt a bit better to play as, I had enough fun to justify another run through each game.

You also get all the Game Gear Sonics, and if you've been following me as I played through those this year, I think they're pretty bad. However, my problem isn't so much their inclusion (it's good they're on here at all), rather that Sega and Sonic Team still refuse to acknowledge the better Master System versions of some of these games. Sonic 3D Blast and Sonic Spinball are still absent despite being represented in the music gallery and in the main menus, and I know Sega has the ROMs and a good Genesis emulator. I guess they're saving those and Mean Bean for Sonic Origins Plus Deluxe.

I still think Origins is a disappointing collection, and I wouldn't recommend getting it or Plus at full price, but if you don't have multiple Sonic 3 carts laying around, can't be bothered to set up A.I.R., or an emulator for that matter, then... yeah I guess 20$ is ok.

Disappointing collection but a decent way to play the classic series on consoles. They could have done so much to make this truly special akin to the past Sonic collections, but instead they monetized it to death and forgot to add the charm. Oh well, maybe a 3D collection could be better…
Scores for each individual game for those curious
Sonic 1: 3.5/5
Sonic CD: 4/5
Sonic 2: 3/5
Sonic 3 & Knuckles: 4.5/5

For the longest time, I refrained from getting this game for principled reasons. Besides the content of the game itself, Sonic Origins launched with an MSRP of $40, and added insult to injury by having an (optional) Epic Digital Edition that came with meaningless extra trinkets that honestly could've come with the original game.

A year after that, some $10 DLC was added that added Knuckles in CD (he was unusually absent from that in the original release of Origins), Amy Rose in all four featured, and also a few Game Gear Sonic games. They also lowered the price of Origins itself, but that also means that latecomers would get an objectively better deal than fans who decided to jump in on Origins when it released. Sheesh... ...

So, for those reasons, I ignored the game. However, I was the target audience of it, and I knew that ultimately, I'd have liked to play Sonic 3 & Knuckles on my PlayStation 5.

So, when I got the game as a gift ... what was I going to do? Return it? I've got this collection 2 years after it originally launched, and for less than what someone would've got it for at that period ... and I won't look a gift horse in the mouth now that I've got four of the finest platformers ever made, in one package, on my console of choice.

Ultimately, when judging the actual content of the collection itself, and the fact that I received the physical release, which comes with a cute little art book... Maybe Origins Plus is alright ... I'd spend $20 on that. I most definitely enjoyed revisiting Sonic 1, CD, 2, and 3K in that order. I'd originally only played the Whitehead remake of CD on an iPad, and I find that playing CD with a proper controller makes for a world of a difference.

3K's remake is the most novel part, being made from the ground up rather than being a port of something already made for mobile phones. And, honestly? They did a stand-up job. The transition was not without its hiccups, but a stand-up job was done, for sure. So I applaud Christian Whitehead and Headcannon for the hard work. Sonic Team and SEGA... you guys are still getting the side-eye from me on this one.

I bought the base version of this game before eventually upgrading to Plus, both at default price. Was it worth it? Weirdly enough, yes, at least for me personally. Your mileage is definitely gonna vary with this collection. It has lots of great features but also some problems that might weigh it down for some people.

Pros:
There's four main games to play through with several ways to do so. Anniversary mode allows the player to pick from Sonic, Tails, Knuckles, and Amy on all of the games, and it trades the lives system for coins, which can be used in a few ways. I definitely appreciate the lack of a lives system, especially on Sonic 1 and CD. Anniversary mode also gives Sonic his drop dash move from Mania, which is without a doubt my favorite addition. If you do wanna play with lives though, Classic mode has got you covered. There is also Mirror mode which just flips the stages. It's not exciting, but it's a harmless addition that simply adds a new way to play. There's also a boss rush mode that is exactly what it sounds like.

As for the coins, you can use them to retry special stages in Anniversary mode. This use is absolutely more amazing than I thought it would be, because I would NOT in a million years have ever figured out how to beat some of the special stages without it. Look, Blue Sphere levels are stupid easy once you know what you're doing, but your first time around? Basically Dark Souls. Anyway, you can also spend coins to unlock new music tracks and images in the gallery.

Speaking of the gallery, there's a big catalogue with all the music from the games and then some, as well as a huge collection of concept art, promotional material, and even some videos, including full episodes of Sonic Mania Adventures. It's actually really cool!

There's some other neat miscellaneous features. There's time trails for all the games with associated leaderboards. There's cool little 3D backgrounds on the main menu. There's new animated beginning and ending cutscenes for all of the games. There's mini challenges for each of the games too, which are kind of eh, but they're still nice bits of extra content and a fast way to earn coins (maybe too fast, in all honesty). There is also a collection of Sonic Game Gear games to check out. They're uh... not great. They range from okay to quite literally unplayable. I am glad they added them though, as I probably would have never played them otherwise, and it's fun to at least say I did it. They also have save states for them which definitely help ease the pain. Lastly, in the main games, save points are created at each checkpoint, meaning you can leave a game and come back later and not have to restart the level. It's another feature I absolutely adore, especially with how mentally draining certain levels can be.

Cons:
I'm no Sonic expert so I'm sure there's more than the ones I'll list, but here's the problems I noticed. Classic mode on Sonic 1 fails to take out the spindash. Sonic 3&K has a bit of jank in the port. It's barely noticeable and I never had it effect gameplay, but it does show an unfortunate lack of polish for a game that desperately needed a good modern port. Though having a brand new playable character in the form of Amy is awesome in concept, the execution leaves a lot to be desired, and she's without a doubt the least interesting character to play as. There's also sadly not a way to costumize which Anniversary mode features you do and don't want, so if you want to play a game with the drop dash while also having lives, you're out of luck.

Possibly the biggest sin, though, is the changed music in Sonic 3&K. Look, I get why it had to be done, and if it's the price that had to be paid in order for me to play Sonic 3&K then I will accept it... but come ON couldn't they have composed better songs? Ice Cap's replacement is at least pretty decent, but Launch Base's is kind of whatever, and Carnival Night's is hilariously bad. I was never a fan of the original Carnival Night song, but I'd take it any day over the weak instruments and the generic stock clapping sound effects that they thought would be an okay replacement. Being funny is the only thing it does right. As I mentioned, Sonic 3&K was desperate for a good modern port, and to have this happen to it is just so sad.

Games:
Thought I'd also include mini reviews for the games themselves, since those are the main attractions of this collection.

Sonic 1 hardly delivers on the promise of a fast paced game, but I think it's still decent enough as a platformer. It's got its moments, but it's also got a lot of frustrating sections that turn the game into a slog. Not to mention it contains possibly the most infamous bad level in all of gaming. The anniversary mode changes do WONDERS to mitigate these issues though, especially with the lack of lives. 2.5/5 stars

Sonic CD is one of the most polarizing games in the series, and I lean on the side that doesn't like it. The game is really short and bland if you play it straight through, yet the level design feels like it fights you at every turn if you want to go for the true objective. It's got good concepts, but the execution sucks. At least the soundtracks are total bangers. 2/5 stars

Sonic 2 is a large step up from its predecessor and where the gameplay really finds its identity. It's got fast-paced and fun levels that are always a joy to replay. It's not perfect though, and it does have some moments that feel like complete duds, but overall, it's a solid game. 3.5/5 stars

Sonic 3 & Knuckles isn't considered one of the best games in the series for nothing. The levels are fantastic and more varied than ever before. There's great replay value thanks to a number of factors, and the little bits of story sprinkled throughout make it feel like a very complete experience. The side objective in the form of collecting the chaos emeralds is also actually fun to pursue this time. It does have its meh moments, but it's thankfully great most of the time. 4.5/5 stars

Conclusion:
I personally love this collection and have put over 80 hours into it over the past 2 or so years. Though I had Sonic 1 and 2, I didn't have a reliable way to play them, and I've certainly never owned CD or 3&K. I loved having ways to play all 4 games with all the fancy features Origins offers. I especially loved having them on my Switch to play on the go. If you're like me, then this collection could definitely be worth picking up. I would generally recommend getting it on sale though.

Sonic Origins Plus feels like a low effort cash grab that is not worth its price tag. Origins Plus contains Sonic 1, 2, 3&K, and CD, along with 12 game gear titles. Tails, Knuckles, and Amy are all now available to play in games that they previously weren't as well. I won't be reviewing the classic games, just the collection itself. Amy is playable now, she's got a different dropdash. S3&K is available in a collection again with remastered versions of the PC music replacing the works of MJ. The games themselves are good, however the Plus edition of the game has a $40 price tag, which raises some issues regarding the game's quality. The first issue is that these games are lacking simple features such as being able to play wide screen with lives. In this same vain Knuckles being in CD should have been base game or a patch, not locked behind DLC. The game has pretty severe performance issues in the menus on lower end PCs. The game gear games are a distraction and not a selling point, and most people will forget these exist if they haven't already. The Plus DLC contains all the content from the Digital Deluxe Edition of the game, which you were not reimbursed for with a discount if you bought it prior to Plus's release. This is all to say that Sonic Origins Plus is not worth the $40 it is asking for, especially if you bought the Digital Deluxe Edition prior to the Plus DLC's release. Since these games have been delisted from Steam, Origins is your only way of playing them if you did not own them prior to its launch. I don't think the DLC is worth an extra $10, get the base game and PLEASE get it on sale.

Sonic 1: Just stop playing after green hill zone.
Sonic 2: Love emerald hill and chemical plant, the rest were decent to good.
Sonic CD: Not very memeroble zones except palmtree panic, love the story and energy of the games, goated opening, future and past mechanic was eh. + amy and metal sonic were great.
Sonic 3 & K: Great overall, fun bosses, but a bit boring towards the end.

Overall great colllection and the best way to play these classics (except the soundtrack changes in Sonic 3 & K).