Review: Sonic Origins is a tragic example of good classics ruined by greed - Ars Technica

Here's a gamer version of "guess how many gumballs are in the jar": How many times has Sega re-released the very first Sonic the Hedgehog game.

That count includes a port of the home version for early '90s arcades, the Sonic Jam compilation for the Sonic-starved Saturn, versions on various mobile platforms, multiple plug-and-play TV boxes, and a version exclusively playable in Tesla automobiles.

Many of these releases came with other 16-bit Sonic games as well.

If you've missed any of the other 30-plus ways to play the series over the years—or have kids who want as much Sonic content as possible after seeing the series' live-action films—Sonic Origins launches later this week on PC and all console families.

Sadly, I'm reviewing this $40 (or, honestly, up to $48) compilation of 16-bit Sonic games not because it's great but because it's weird.

The biggest issue is that Sonic Origins includes just four games: Sonic 1, Sonic CD, Sonic 2, and the "complete" version of Sonic 3 (meaning "and Knuckles" as a locked-on combination of two cartridges).

(Unsurprisingly, they were assisted by Christian Whitehead, a developer who helped Sega officially port Sonic CD to iOS many years ago.) Every game's "anniversary" mode in Sonic Origins natively supports a 16:9 screen ratio, which makes the series' high-speed exploration a lot easier to track visually. This mode also includes perks that range from obvious (infinite lives) to subtle (adding the "drop dash" maneuver to older games or supporting a "Knuckles and Tails" mode).