As any fan of the series knows, Sonic the Hedgehog has had plenty of mainline and side games, even by the end of 1993, where it not only had two platformers for the Sega Genesis, but also two other platformers for the Sega Master System, one for the Sega CD, and some other weird things that I am kinda afraid of looking at or talking about. Of course though, ignoring those weird things, Sonic wouldn’t just be known for just sticking to the run ‘n jump gameplay, as he would also dive head first into the wonderful and weird world of spin-off territory. There have been plenty of Sonic spin-offs made over the years, and as with any major video game franchise, a good number of these spin-offs could be seen as pretty good, while a lot of others can be seen as pretty bad. And then we have those that fall right in the middle in terms of quality, such as with the first proper Sonic spin-off game ever made, Sonic the Hedgehog: Spinball, or just Sonic Spinball for short.
I have previously mentioned this before in my Kirby’s Pinball Land review, but it bears repeating here, I am not a fan of pinball, so for the longest time, I had no desire to really dive into Sonic Spinball to see what it was all about. It looked good from what I had seen and briefly played of it before, but it wasn’t enough to truly convince me it was something that I absolutely needed to check out. But, seeing as Sega loves to re-release this title over and over again (even though most people don’t care), I decided one day to eventually give it a shot, and it was just as fun and frustrating as I could’ve expected. As a whole, this game encapsulates everything I love about Classic Sonic games, but also everything that I hate about pinball, leading to what I could only consider to be an ok game and nothing more.
The story is the same as every other Sonic game so far: Dr. Robotnik is being a dick, and Sonic has to go stop him, which is as basic as can be, but then again, if you are playing a pinball game for a story, then why are you playing a pinball game, the graphics are pretty good, having plenty of detailed environments and enemy sprites for the tables and enemies that you will be blasting through in the game, the music is half-’n-half in terms of quality, where half of the music is pretty awesome, and great to listen to while going through these tables, and the other half is MY EARS ARE BLEEDING, the control is mostly what you would expect from a pinball game, but there are moments where you can control Sonic normally, and it is… fucking awful, but we will get there, and the gameplay is also mostly what you would expect, but with a little extra in there to not make it too simple or boring.
The game is primarily a pinball game, where you take “control” of Sonic, of course, go through a set of four pinball levels, which makes it sound like the game is lacking in content, but trust me, it is ENOUGH, propel Sonic around in various sections of the pinball table to defeat enemies and gather plenty of points to boost your high score, activate plenty of switches and mechanisms to progress further in the tables and gather Chaos Emeralds, take on plenty of different bosses created by Robotnik that will most likely give you nightmares, and go through several different bonus stages to gain more points while also continuing to question what the fuck you are looking at currently. It is a pinball game at its core, with not too much else to offer in terms of content, but it does manage to keep the hectic and fast pinball gameplay you would expect from a table intact… which may be a good or a bad thing depending on who you ask.
Like with Kirby’s Pinball Land, this game isn’t just simply a pinball game that just so happens to have Sonic in it, as it has plenty of different objectives and puzzle elements to be seen. Through each of the four tables, there will be plenty of puzzles that you will need to solve by controlling where Sonic goes and what he hits in the pinball table, which all primarily leads you to collecting the Chaos Emeralds of each stage (which are all blue, for some reason) to take on the boss waiting for you at the end. This does make the game a little more exciting to go through, and there are even several moments where you have to do a little bit of platforming to get to where you need to be… and by a little bit, I mean a LITTLE bit, as these sections generally don’t last long at all. Once again, this all leads to the bosses, which are about as fun to fight as you would think they are, and while plenty of them have different strategies to beat them, a lot of the time, you are at the pinball table’s mercy, which determines whether or not you actually succeed.
Which can pretty much summarize my main concerns when talking about this game. Like with any pinball game, a lot of how you do and where you go in this game all boils down to luck, and sometimes, you can have incredible luck in the tables and get pretty far, but in many other cases, you won’t be so lucky. Granted, this factor isn’t too offensive in this case, considering you have a lot more control over where Sonic goes rather than any other kind of pinball game, but there are still plenty of bullshit moments and parts that can stop that from happening. This is especially annoying when you get to some certain bosses, who have certain attacks and patterns that can have you sent back alllllllllll the way to the start of the table, even after you had spent so long trying to get up there in the first place. Also, on a brief side note, controlling Sonic in the platforming segments also feels horrible, as he has dogshit movement speed, and feels incredibly heavy when jumping. Then again, this isn’t that much of an issue considering that it focuses on the pinball mechanics more than the platforming ones.
Overall, despite its general appeal, creative gameplay for the genre, and some banging tunes here or there, I can’t necessarily say that I got into Sonic Spinball all that much. It is mostly because it is a pinball game, so that is to be expected from me, but I will admit, it does have a lot of admirable qualities that do make it one of the stand-out spin-offs from Sonic’s history, one that I’m sure any fan of his would enjoy all the same. I would recommend it for those who are big fans of pinball games, for those who are big Sonic games, or both, because this game has enough here to satisfy all of those crowds while not overstaying its welcome. One last thing I will say though is that, even though I don’t like the game itself, I do love the little bar that is constantly at the top of the screen giving you a lot of 90s-ass messages. That should be in every Sonic game, pinball or otherwise.
Game #464
I have previously mentioned this before in my Kirby’s Pinball Land review, but it bears repeating here, I am not a fan of pinball, so for the longest time, I had no desire to really dive into Sonic Spinball to see what it was all about. It looked good from what I had seen and briefly played of it before, but it wasn’t enough to truly convince me it was something that I absolutely needed to check out. But, seeing as Sega loves to re-release this title over and over again (even though most people don’t care), I decided one day to eventually give it a shot, and it was just as fun and frustrating as I could’ve expected. As a whole, this game encapsulates everything I love about Classic Sonic games, but also everything that I hate about pinball, leading to what I could only consider to be an ok game and nothing more.
The story is the same as every other Sonic game so far: Dr. Robotnik is being a dick, and Sonic has to go stop him, which is as basic as can be, but then again, if you are playing a pinball game for a story, then why are you playing a pinball game, the graphics are pretty good, having plenty of detailed environments and enemy sprites for the tables and enemies that you will be blasting through in the game, the music is half-’n-half in terms of quality, where half of the music is pretty awesome, and great to listen to while going through these tables, and the other half is MY EARS ARE BLEEDING, the control is mostly what you would expect from a pinball game, but there are moments where you can control Sonic normally, and it is… fucking awful, but we will get there, and the gameplay is also mostly what you would expect, but with a little extra in there to not make it too simple or boring.
The game is primarily a pinball game, where you take “control” of Sonic, of course, go through a set of four pinball levels, which makes it sound like the game is lacking in content, but trust me, it is ENOUGH, propel Sonic around in various sections of the pinball table to defeat enemies and gather plenty of points to boost your high score, activate plenty of switches and mechanisms to progress further in the tables and gather Chaos Emeralds, take on plenty of different bosses created by Robotnik that will most likely give you nightmares, and go through several different bonus stages to gain more points while also continuing to question what the fuck you are looking at currently. It is a pinball game at its core, with not too much else to offer in terms of content, but it does manage to keep the hectic and fast pinball gameplay you would expect from a table intact… which may be a good or a bad thing depending on who you ask.
Like with Kirby’s Pinball Land, this game isn’t just simply a pinball game that just so happens to have Sonic in it, as it has plenty of different objectives and puzzle elements to be seen. Through each of the four tables, there will be plenty of puzzles that you will need to solve by controlling where Sonic goes and what he hits in the pinball table, which all primarily leads you to collecting the Chaos Emeralds of each stage (which are all blue, for some reason) to take on the boss waiting for you at the end. This does make the game a little more exciting to go through, and there are even several moments where you have to do a little bit of platforming to get to where you need to be… and by a little bit, I mean a LITTLE bit, as these sections generally don’t last long at all. Once again, this all leads to the bosses, which are about as fun to fight as you would think they are, and while plenty of them have different strategies to beat them, a lot of the time, you are at the pinball table’s mercy, which determines whether or not you actually succeed.
Which can pretty much summarize my main concerns when talking about this game. Like with any pinball game, a lot of how you do and where you go in this game all boils down to luck, and sometimes, you can have incredible luck in the tables and get pretty far, but in many other cases, you won’t be so lucky. Granted, this factor isn’t too offensive in this case, considering you have a lot more control over where Sonic goes rather than any other kind of pinball game, but there are still plenty of bullshit moments and parts that can stop that from happening. This is especially annoying when you get to some certain bosses, who have certain attacks and patterns that can have you sent back alllllllllll the way to the start of the table, even after you had spent so long trying to get up there in the first place. Also, on a brief side note, controlling Sonic in the platforming segments also feels horrible, as he has dogshit movement speed, and feels incredibly heavy when jumping. Then again, this isn’t that much of an issue considering that it focuses on the pinball mechanics more than the platforming ones.
Overall, despite its general appeal, creative gameplay for the genre, and some banging tunes here or there, I can’t necessarily say that I got into Sonic Spinball all that much. It is mostly because it is a pinball game, so that is to be expected from me, but I will admit, it does have a lot of admirable qualities that do make it one of the stand-out spin-offs from Sonic’s history, one that I’m sure any fan of his would enjoy all the same. I would recommend it for those who are big fans of pinball games, for those who are big Sonic games, or both, because this game has enough here to satisfy all of those crowds while not overstaying its welcome. One last thing I will say though is that, even though I don’t like the game itself, I do love the little bar that is constantly at the top of the screen giving you a lot of 90s-ass messages. That should be in every Sonic game, pinball or otherwise.
Game #464
It's a really crappy pinball game that is hard as hell to beat, but also it's incredibly fun. The stages are interesting but also frustrating, and the mini games that happen can kick you in the ass. If you're playing this on the Genesis Collection with a save state/rewind ability, then the game is a hell lot more bearable.
Regardless, I loved the game as a kid, still love it as an adult, no matter how glitchy it is.
Regardless, I loved the game as a kid, still love it as an adult, no matter how glitchy it is.
Arguably the first truly broken Sonic game. long before the rough transition to 3d age where i grew up with sonic.
This game is fun to play but not to beat, not to get a highscore, but its bonkers fun to try and break via speedrun.
This game is fun to play but not to beat, not to get a highscore, but its bonkers fun to try and break via speedrun.
As a pinball game Sonic Spinball isn't very good, not allowing you to see the full table and giving you control of Sonic and influence over the "ball" while it's in motion, requiring that influence to get where you need to go. As a Sonic game Sonic Spinball also isn't very good, Sonic being heavy and unresponsive in the rare instances he isn't wildly bouncing around the level. Spinball is a mess of odd controls, glitchy physics and confusing (often tedious) level design. In spite of all this it's often still a lot of fun, but it's just as often plain frustrating.
During one Games Done Quick event running this game, a donation comment said "There are more levels after Toxic Caves?"
I fucking felt that.
I fucking felt that.
i just like playing pinball :)
Best spindash sound effect in the series
This game traumatized me as a kid. 10/10
I have no idea why I finished this, and worse yet, why I enjoyed a Sonic the Hedgehog spin off game, but I was addicted to it for a little while, despite the garbage physics in a game that is all physics. But since there's a 95% chance you arent paying for this, it's worth a shot if you like video pinball, at least for being ambitious.
I HIGHLY recommend save states. I got to the last level on Wii VC, but the difficulty, randomness of pinball and very, very sparce extra lives made finishing it unrealistic. The NSO Switch app's save states really helped and made the final level tolerable. (Yet still pretty hard, even with unlimited retries)
This is a review from someone who has no nostalgia for this game nor love for Sonic's irritating smugness, so I would call this praise.
I HIGHLY recommend save states. I got to the last level on Wii VC, but the difficulty, randomness of pinball and very, very sparce extra lives made finishing it unrealistic. The NSO Switch app's save states really helped and made the final level tolerable. (Yet still pretty hard, even with unlimited retries)
This is a review from someone who has no nostalgia for this game nor love for Sonic's irritating smugness, so I would call this praise.
Another oddball entry in the series, Sonic Spinball for consoles is a pretty unique game that I do like, but is absolutely not something I go back to a whole lot.
Dr Robotnick has built a trap tower built with the power of Chaos Emeralds, and it’s up to Sonic to collect them and stop him. Not much there but I do think the aesthetic and vibe of this one is very different to what you would expect. The sound effects for one, are super crunchy and piercing, the enemies are pretty vicious looking and the overall energy is a lot more dank compared to the classics.
The game is pinball with a twist, you play pinball as you would anywhere else, but your aim is to not just get a high score, it’s to collect the chaos emeralds in every stage. You have influence over Sonic’s movement and when not on the pinball table you can control Sonic on the ground Spindash and all. But despite this you are gonna go flying all over the place trying to find your way around. Doesn’t help that the game is pretty glitchy and sometimes death can just happen.
There’s only 4 stages but it gets pretty brutal towards the end of the game. Boss fights can go either way, you can get lucky or often get ejected from the boss arena. The amount of precision required in some parts is rediculous, so like I said, it’s a fun game when it works, but it’s a hard sell to come back to.
I like the music and the vibe the game gives off, but definitely approach this one with caution.
Dr Robotnick has built a trap tower built with the power of Chaos Emeralds, and it’s up to Sonic to collect them and stop him. Not much there but I do think the aesthetic and vibe of this one is very different to what you would expect. The sound effects for one, are super crunchy and piercing, the enemies are pretty vicious looking and the overall energy is a lot more dank compared to the classics.
The game is pinball with a twist, you play pinball as you would anywhere else, but your aim is to not just get a high score, it’s to collect the chaos emeralds in every stage. You have influence over Sonic’s movement and when not on the pinball table you can control Sonic on the ground Spindash and all. But despite this you are gonna go flying all over the place trying to find your way around. Doesn’t help that the game is pretty glitchy and sometimes death can just happen.
There’s only 4 stages but it gets pretty brutal towards the end of the game. Boss fights can go either way, you can get lucky or often get ejected from the boss arena. The amount of precision required in some parts is rediculous, so like I said, it’s a fun game when it works, but it’s a hard sell to come back to.
I like the music and the vibe the game gives off, but definitely approach this one with caution.
The final boss almost made me kill myself
2 STARS: I LIKED A COUPLE THINGS
I also played this on the Sonic Gems Collection for PS2, which has an Extras menu that gives you secrets for this game. The game sucks, but there's a crazy button input that lets you move Sonic statically and move through walls. Doing this, you can find in every stage, a secret item that, when acquired, triggers a tickerbox message in Japanese. I never found out what any of them said, but finding those as a kid was creepy.
I also used that cheat to beat the game, I'm glad I can say I beat it.
I also played this on the Sonic Gems Collection for PS2, which has an Extras menu that gives you secrets for this game. The game sucks, but there's a crazy button input that lets you move Sonic statically and move through walls. Doing this, you can find in every stage, a secret item that, when acquired, triggers a tickerbox message in Japanese. I never found out what any of them said, but finding those as a kid was creepy.
I also used that cheat to beat the game, I'm glad I can say I beat it.
I don't like pinball. Also there's only one (1) good song.
Okay, I know that everyone complains about the Options/Ending music being ear rape or grating, but I don't mind it that much actually. I can tolerate it lmao. Also I did not know anything about this game after the first level, and I didn't even know this game had more levels. I legit had to look at a TAS speedrun of this game to even see what else this game had. Maybe i'll replay this game on mega collection again, idk.
I've never hated Sonic Spinball, but it was never my kind of thing, It's not a horrible game, but I just don't like pinball enough to see it to the end. I'm also just not good at pinball so story-based pinball titles are kind of not so fun for me. I see that there is appeal and people do like it, so it's not like I wouldn't recommend it. Try it and see what you think.
Sonic Spinball is a fun idea in concept, but in execution it's frustrating beyond belief. Collecting emeralds in this game is almost puzzle-esque, but Sonic's terrible physics get in the way of any potential fun to be had figuring out how these levels work. Game's way too punishing as well, one slip-up can send you back to the start of the stage. Not too fun, but not the worst.
It exists
the options music in this was already a favorite piece of vgm for me but i just listened to the bungled emulation version that was on atgames plug and play's and oh my fucking god. I love this. It sounds like a chu ishikawa track.
i like toxic caves :]
Spinball does something that I don't quite see anywhere else: A pinball game, in which you're not constrained to just one static pinball table, but rather, you're plopped into an exploration-based level with pinball mechanics inside of it. Mild aspects of collect-a-thon gameplay are presented here, where you find ways to get to the Chaos Emeralds, eventually unlocking the boss once you've amassed them all, before you're thrown into the next of the game's 4 stages.
While unconventional, I think was a smart way to do a Sonic-themed pinball game, and could potentially make it more appealing for non-pinball fans. (or would it be more apt to say "pinball non-fans...?") But, I'm only talking about the non-pinball fans that have a chance of getting into pinball through this. I'm a non-pinball fan who has next to no chance of ever getting into pinball at all. The only other pinball game I played is that one that came free with Windows XP, and not even because I like playing it, the sounds just make me feel 8 years old again. And I only ever played this one because as a Sonic fan, we are clinically deranged.
Anyway, when it comes to pinball, I don't know how to make it work. I don't know the tricks. I might try my best to use the flippers at JUST the right time to launch the ball where I want it to go, but it'll end up somewhere else, probably in the bottomless pit. Spinball either requires a ridiculous amount of precision, or some semblance of luck, it's hard to tell, and I'm certainly not one to dissect the inner workings of it. Just ain't my thing.
While unconventional, I think was a smart way to do a Sonic-themed pinball game, and could potentially make it more appealing for non-pinball fans. (or would it be more apt to say "pinball non-fans...?") But, I'm only talking about the non-pinball fans that have a chance of getting into pinball through this. I'm a non-pinball fan who has next to no chance of ever getting into pinball at all. The only other pinball game I played is that one that came free with Windows XP, and not even because I like playing it, the sounds just make me feel 8 years old again. And I only ever played this one because as a Sonic fan, we are clinically deranged.
Anyway, when it comes to pinball, I don't know how to make it work. I don't know the tricks. I might try my best to use the flippers at JUST the right time to launch the ball where I want it to go, but it'll end up somewhere else, probably in the bottomless pit. Spinball either requires a ridiculous amount of precision, or some semblance of luck, it's hard to tell, and I'm certainly not one to dissect the inner workings of it. Just ain't my thing.
This is the best sonic game
Played it
Stage 1 was okay
stage 2 went terrible got lost and kept dying and then i gave up
Great Game holds up well. Music is great too the now the one boss fight i did partake in it was pretty fun ngl
Stage 1 was okay
stage 2 went terrible got lost and kept dying and then i gave up
Great Game holds up well. Music is great too the now the one boss fight i did partake in it was pretty fun ngl
Never managed to ever commit to finishing Sonic Spinball, so I finally decided to bite the bullet and take the time to do so.
Can safely say that it's one of the most aggressively annoying video games I've ever played, especially with the final level being an absolute trashfire, but at least the soundtrack is pretty solid. The general idea of the game is pretty sick, feeling like a natural conclusion to Sonic's pinball-like nature, so it's a shame it's still as much of a frustrating mess as I remember it being in my youth.
Can safely say that it's one of the most aggressively annoying video games I've ever played, especially with the final level being an absolute trashfire, but at least the soundtrack is pretty solid. The general idea of the game is pretty sick, feeling like a natural conclusion to Sonic's pinball-like nature, so it's a shame it's still as much of a frustrating mess as I remember it being in my youth.
The problem with story-centric pinball games is that you want to beat the game, but the pinball physics say no.
This game feels incorrect in a way that I cannot point out. It's like it works, but doesn't. It's fun, but at the same time infuriating. It's a mildly enjoyable romp.
I will never in good conscious call this game good but I have a strange attachment to it.
I was a huge Sonic fanboy when I was little so I'm biased, but this game slaps.
Toxic Caves is a pretty banger and catchy song but after that song ends wow i do not care for this soundtrack at all lol
It just feels slightly off... all the time. It's not a good feeling playing this.
what the fuck is this game