I'd just like to clarify: we dont hate the Origins music because its not the original soundtrack, its because they took the prototype songs and actively made them sound a billion times worse, the ones in the prototype roms sound great, the Origins "remixes" sound like cut songs from Sonic 4

2:28 bro really dodge the bullet of the whole hydrocity pronounciation thing lol

13:06 Correction: Knuckles campaign is not the games events from his POV, it takes place AFTER Sonic campaign. Fun fact: The doomsday zone was originaly intended to be unlocked after completing both Knuckles and Sonic campaigns and collecting all the emeralds. Kinda like a "Last story" when you think about it.

Just to clarify on Death Egg boss with the elevator, you can totally spin dash those little spiky dudes when they’re upside down and they’ll fly at the boss. That should cut the completion time of the boss in half and cure some of that boredom

Hide your kitties is my favorite zone in any Videogame ever. So glad it got the recognition it deserves.

"flooded ruins of hidderockity" finally, a compromise can be reached

9:30 The reason people hate the origins tracks is because they actually sound worse than the prototype tracks. The proto version of carnival night act 2 is actually really good but in origins it just sounds awful. EDIT: Nvm you mention that like 10 seconds later

Third pronunciation of Hydrocity unlocked

I'm 41 years old. Played every sonic on Genesis without the CD or 32x. Every sonic game on Game Gear. Sonic 3 and Knuckles WAS the best, but sadly I think Sonic Mania is the creme de la creme.

I can't believe bro pronounced it hydrocity instead of hydrocity 😏

Perhaps my favorite game ever. Just nostalgic and so replayable. Excited for this! I see why people find Marble Garden Zone a drag…but fucking Sandopolis 2 can fuck right off the bat

Great video, but I'm surprised you didn't mention the multiplayer. Also, I definitely recommend trying the original release version of Sonic 3&K, if you haven't already. I'd recommend Knuckles in Sonic 2, but I don't think you'd like that very much lol

I love how you didn't pronounce Hyrdocity the same twice. Also you missed a final boss, Super Mecha Sonic Mk2 for Knuckles

I'm sorry- "Hi-do-ro-crit-y"?! "Hi-drock-i-die"?!?!

Respect for saying the 3 sprites are more on model. Don’t see that opinion very much - always thought they resembled the Japanese art more than the 1/2 look, which in turn looks more like the American art imo with the rounded head and such. Also like your use of chill dnb/jungle

I always considered Knuckles the hard mode. His jump is shorter, climbing and gliding are more restrictive than flying, and it's physics can hinder instead of help if used aimlessly. I only disagree about it being an issue having to jump yourself to activate it, for Tails flight have the same rules and "if on the move" physics. A little detail is that Sonic 3 alone have 6 save files, while S3&K have 8: I remember this from my Genesis days, it allowed exactly two save slots for each possible composition (S, T, S&T, K). And I so wish Origins had the option to play solo S3 and solo S&K: honestly, Knuckles campaign feels just like a "what if", that has him starting in Mushroom Hill like solo S&K: in the "complete" game, why he starts in Mushroom then suddenly is on Angel Forest, only to go through the stages and he back in Mushroom Hill?

Pro: gave us Knuckles. Con: Carnival Night Zone.

15:09 “so lets start with Sonic 3” proceeds to talk about sonic 1, 2 and CD 😂😂

Sonic 3&K like I’ve stayed before is one of my favorite sonic games and even what I consider the best classic sonic game. Your review definitely did justice, and the criticisms you bring up are valid and I’m happy your reason is to show how even when things can’t seem to be better there are still higher places to go. Great vid can’t wait for the next one.

Sonic 3 Complete, despite being a ROM hack technically, is the best way to play this game as originally intended.

LOVE YOUR VIDEOS SO MUCH. THANKS BRO. You made my day bro. This makes me sosososo happy and I love it!

I guess the original Sonic 3 music fell on Hard Times.

Cant believe it's 30 years.... feels like yesterday.

25:00 you can spin dash into the upside down ones if doing the anti gravity missed, not as efficient as cheesing camping at the switch, but a bit more fun

Carival Night Zones music fits that stage perfectly, even if its annoying, the circus sample just belongs i cant picture the stage without it, in fact i cant picture any of the stages without the retail songs

Great video! I love hearing new and fresh opinions on my favorite game of all time. Good video structure and a voice I can stand to listen to for long periods of time

Absolutely incredible video as always. Your unique writing style always keeps me invested. oh and btw, it was confirmed by Masa himself in a tweet that MJ did in fact work on some of the OSTs for the game. You said it was just a rumor. (7:24)

Great review man, also love the liquid dnb backing tracks. ☝️🙏

9:02 That mini boss theme is badass, one of the best 16bit video game compositions ever 🔥🔥

5:29, 8:24, 18:05 Those pronuniciations of "Hydrocity"'s name, I love it. 😂

8:24 was *genius* and I might need to start using that. Also great video! Shame about the Knuckles bit though. But I get it for sure, it doesn't allow for a seamless flow. You might like a mod to Sonic Mania called Sonic Megamix Mania. It lets you go into and out of a glide at will, and exiting a glide gives a small double jump

"with that amount it's inevitable that a few stinkers slipped through the crack" you got me with that line.

when it comes to speedrunning and getting good this game is absolutley insane. its one of hardest games to speedrun. this video doesnt say anything about that so just wanted to mention this. so this game can have long lasting lifetime overall

I’m so in love with this game

The prototype soundtracks were also used for the PC version, which was my first version of Sonic 3. I'm a little thrilled to see them make a come back. Fun fact: For the finger portion of the final boss fight you can spin dash and it counts the hits without killing you.

Sonic 3 sprite is the best i love it

Good review, great points!

Great video and channel. Subbed.

To be fair in the comparisons to the soundtrack the reason people are complaining about the Origins soundtrack is due to a distinct compressed audio compared to the original and that the replacement / original tracks had better sounding versions Edit I see that you just mentioned this in the video and in the comments and in my opinion I like to use the origins version for Act 2 and use the MJ ones for act 1

It was not due to limited space. It was because they had a deal with McDonald’s and ran out of time so they had to get Sonic 3 in stores

I call it Hydrocity (hydrawcity), Not Hydro-city. Because its one word and I think it sounds cooler

One of the rare games I would give my highest grade: EXCEPTIONAL. It's certainly rough in places, but it does so much right that they don't matter much in the long run. Also, it looks GORGEOUS! Playing on a Mega Drive with an RGB Scart cable brought out the best in the visuals, and I couldn't take my eyes off the screen. It's honestly as visually striking and inspiring as a 1950s Chuck Jones cartoon. Great video, albeit one with too many "in my opinion" moments.

23:26 FINALLY SOMEONE WHO FELT MY PAIN AFTER DOING THAT 😭

As Mushroom Hill Zone's #1 enjoyer i have got to say you are doing that zone so dirty. You only have to actually use the pulley once and that's at the very end of act 2, yes its slow but you can avoid 90% of them. Imo its one of the best zones in the game

You could also, attach Sonic 2, to Sonic & Knuckles. Would allow you to play as Knuckles in Sonic 2.

13:05: (alright, lemme get the book out) Knuckles' campaign takes place AFTER Sonic & Tails' campaign.

The first Boss on Death egg you can trow the fliped spiky bombs into the Boos using spindash after making them fall upside down after changing gravity. For the second Boss you can shred the finger making the hands fall close to the other and using Spindash, you would bonce on them over and over again doing a ton of damage. And I prefer the Sonic 2 Special stages, the ones in 3 and Knuckles are STRESS, incarnated, they always made my hands sweet a lot, and the stupid music and the speed going faster if you take to long is just evil, but oh boy, when I got the seven emeralds for the first tome when I was 9, I became a Super Sonic abuser every time I played and didn't regret a thing XD.

One of the greatest games ever made

11:05 the super peelout made sense in sonic cd, where if you try to get the good ending(without the time stones) you have to use the time traveling mechanic. Also the super peelout moves faster and charges faster and better. In my tails playthrough, there were times where I took damage or was inconvenienced due to not having the super peelout, flying doesn't even help that much in sonic cd like tails and sonic are equal difficulty there.

i agree, I just finished this game last night on twitch with the 14 chaos emeralds... its a masterpiece...

You can actually make the death egg zone act 1 boss fun by spin dashing instead of just going up and down in the elevators the entire time, just my opinion tho 🤷

23:30 lightnign playtedo utside as soon as this happened

Rewatching Acts 1 and 2 of Angel Island now, it looks like a documentary of the town of Lahaina (which I visited once) being ravaged by wildfires last summer.

Sonic 3&knuckles is a masterpiece the best sonic ever made for the sega genesis there are so many secrets that need to be discovered yet

Huge points both for acknowledging the Origins remixes as actually being prototype versions and not just being like "just play Sonic 3 A.I.R. lol" with the Origins version, much appreciated!

Sonic 3&K was always my favorite to play from the originals.. it was the one I played the most as a kid, despite never being able to finish the game. After picking up Origins and completing with every character + grabbing the super emeralds I had an absolute blast. The points you brought up were good and valid, also (I agree, the sprites for this game are superior)

10:06 - I paused the video just to comment about Snow Cap music, decided to unpaused to at least finish the music section of the video, and was not disappointed.

10:00 Ice Cap Zone was sequenced by Buxer, but he took the melody from the 1982 song "Hard Times" by The Jetzons, who he had previously worked with. Also, it's almost without a doubt Jackson helped with the sound track (voice and some melodies), but did not fully compose any songs, thus not credited (unfairly). Nonetheless, most music wasn't brought over to the releases due to copyright restrictions, because of these involvements.

I’ve learned to like Launch Base Prototype, Buxter’s Icecap is irreplaceable, but I 100% prefer Prototype Carnival Night. Sonic 3 Complete has my favorite rendition of Act 2 and was my introduction to it. Do recommend

The Deathball gravity reverse boss was actually a great idea with two flaws. The first is that nothing tells you the spiked rollers are the way to damage the boss unless you manage to by accident. The second is that you should not be able to go back through the same elevator. You should have to switch sides each time by jumping over the rolers. It's a much better idea for the challenge. I suppose they could have made 2 rollers hitting it do 2 damage for a quick kill strategy.

You should play Sonic Superstars with Knuckles since he can wall jump by pressing jump and up while being attached to a wall. Basically Mightys wall jump from chaotix but with Knuckles.

I feel the same way about knuckles. Classic sonic level design is all about the three core elements: speed, platforming, and exploration. Knuckles' moveset does not work well at all with the speed aspect of these games at all, seeing how the climb does not work with slopes at all and how gliding makes you lose all speed. However his moveset works well enough with exploration and platforming which is why I still think he's still enjoyable.

Well? We're waitinnggg the whole video sounds way more like a praise. Awesome game.

7:39 As I understand it, Michael Jackson wasn't happy with how the music came out and requested to be left uncredited.

I love how you put the japanese versions of sonic and his friends on the titles of your videos 😊. The best ones on my opinion.

"we're almost done here alex" LMAO

One of my favorite genesis games when I was a kid.

That's got to be the best pronunciation of Hydrocity i've heard 😂

I heard somewhere that MJ didn’t like the way his music sounded on the genesis and since sega couldn’t make the music sound better due to the genesis hardware at the time he didn’t want his name credited in the music

Hydro- what now? 😲

6:21 I agree But for some reason, the sprites look like if Modern Sonic (more of sonic from SA2) was short and didn't have green eyes

HI-DO-ROCK-ITY You win an internets.

25:25 you can spindash into eggman when he bounces back up after he comes down from the top of the screen for one hit (as shown in the timestamp) but you can also hit him with your insta-shield if you're not super sonic for a couple more hits.

There really isn't proof that these prototype songs (as-is) were supposed to be in the game. They wouldn't contract with Michael Jackson and just throw away some intended music last minute, they always intended it to be placeholder music. These things take planning, and Sega obviously intended the Sonic 3 we have today. For instance Sonic 3 Prototype has a really awful knuckles song, that never made it to Sonic & Knuckles Replacement.

The sphere levels were my absolute fav bonus levels.......except for I grew up in the 90s and tv's weren't the cheapest thing back then. So I had a hand me down 13" Black and White tv........ I learned how to tell the shades of grey apart in the end :D

Can you drop the track playlist you used for this video. Every track is really good 😅

24:14 Hyper Sonic and the bosses are the best things about S3K

Sonic 3&K's not a game without flaws, but that's such a thing with every game. This review was quite fair and I don't think you were actually too negative here. (also I agree that the sonic 3 origins soundtrack hate is quite overblown, if you listen to the versions from the leaked sonic 3 prototype that was found in 2019, it sounds really good!)

Spontman Sonic 3 Hype

I think Spontman doesn't know the "super glide move" that Knuckles have. I don't know if he still has it in Sonic Origins, though.

6:18 TRUE.

Marble Garden Zone is my favorite level in S3&K. Sandopolis Zone is my second favorite level in S3&K.

24:55 You can spin dash the _piketurtles_ right at the right time and damage the boss, invert gravity is not the only way to turn its weapons against him

Outstanding video. Been playing this game for 30 years and everything you said is spot on. I've beaten this game more than any other and while it has it's objective flaws it's still perfect in my eyes. Sonic Mania is just as great, but lacks originality since nearly all the zones were just reused.

Making good music for the Genesis was an art and a science, the best chip tunes on the system were done by people who had both music experience and programming experience like Yuzo Koshiro for example was quite fluent in programming Z80 assembly getting his start making games for the PC 88. If the Brad Buxer guy was coming from a record label studio experience he must've lacked technical know-how.

I'm personally amused by the fact that most Sonic 3 zones have water, but there's not a single drop in S&K.

Angel Island Revisited makes this game perfect

The best way to experience Sonic 3 & Knuckles is the old PC version. Not only does it have all 3 games, it's bug-free (thanks Origins) and I'll defend to my death that the changed soundtracks are much better than the original Genesis/Mega Drive. Sorry Michael Jackson?

It was also interesting playing Sonic 2 and Knuckles.

Feels like in that window of Sonic 3 being stuck in limbo because of the music and its lack of availability on modern platforms until Origins, that modern/revisionist views of the classic series all said Sonic 2 was the best game, but I concur that S3K just blows 2 out of the water in every single facet. 2 is still fun of course, but like it's hard to play it outside of the Christian Whitehead versions.

Tails is my favorite character to play as. I love the ability to swim, and to fly. Super Tails is AWESOME! The Flickie Army Of Death is the best part.

Insta-Shield was always a weird name, especially considering it was originally called rhe Double Spin Attack

Damn, I've played this one more than any other, ever since it came out. Also, a tip for the "last boss" -> don't jump on its fingers, just spindash until they drop on you and then release. Kills them a lot faster.

wHaT dO yOu MeAn tAiLs CaN fLy iN tHiS gAmE!?

I feel like Sonic CD's concepts are worth revisiting/improving upon. I'm a huge fan of Sonic 2's approach, and Sonic 3&K is fine, but CD's approach to exploration, taking certain paths then implementing speed to change the level, the time travel... anyway I think Sega should look at CD more for at least one more sonic project. And of course dumping all the stuff people hate about superstars lol

25:00 While this doesn't invalidate your point, did you not know you could spin dash into the spike guys when they're flipped over in order to point them back towards the boss?

I don't think it's nitpicky, I think you did a good job with your points. Good video.

This is an excellent review of this game. To be honest I don't think I've really watched reviews of this game because I mean the game speaks for itself and I already played it so much. I mean I first played it on a PC disk I got back in the '90s and okay actually the first time I played Sonic 3 or Sonic and knuckles was thanks to the Sega channel but the first time I played Sonic 3 and knuckles was on that PC disk which had Sonic and knuckles, Sonic the Hedgehog 3, as well as Sonic 3 and knuckles and there was a way to play the game simply called Blue sphere which was just unlimited blue sphere special stages. This disc was part of a promotion going on at Jack In The box in the mid to late '90s where you could get some Sega games for PC with your kids meal. The first one I got was the PC version of Sonic 3D blast. First time I played that was also on Sega channel but it was very noticeable the difference in soundtrack. The second one I got was that disc that had Sonic the Hedgehog 3, Sonic and knuckles, and Sonic 3 and knuckles. And it actually did have that soundtrack that's used in Sonic Origins. So bottom line is I have already played this game since the '90s. I played it a lot more on Sonic Mega collection for the GameCube which did have the Michael Jackson soundtrack for Sonic 3 and knuckles but nevertheless I've played it so much I just didn't always feel any reason to watch reviews of it. But I decided to watch your review and I'm glad I did so. Really well done you really made a lot of sense and you were willing to actually point out issues with the game that yeah honestly I noticed as well. I mean I could go on about how annoying act two of that desert zone is in the pyramid. I remember when I first played that zone and even multiple times since I'd always lose a life from running out of time. Since then I could beat the zone without having that kind of problem but still it was kind of a chore to go through that level. Unless your knuckles and he just climb up the walls instead of having to hit that thing that causes the sand to rise up which brings you up but could crush you if you're too slow.

Hyddorockety Act 2 has my favorite music in the series.

why does the mj carnival night song give me anxiety