Ever since the release of Sonic 3 and Knuckles, Sonic has failed to capture the attention of his original audience. The four cornerstones of the franchise: Sonic The Hedgehog, Sonic The Hedgehog 2, Sonic the Hedgehog 3, and Sonic and Knuckles are all loved by Sonic enthusiasts despite them being almost thirty years old. After these games came out, Sonic became slow, glitchy, and three-dimensional. The franchise suffered through the release of sub-par games that failed to instill a love for the famous blue hedgehog quite like the originals. In 2011, Sonic Generations tried to bring all of this nostalgia back by reintroducing a two-dimensional Sonic, however, it wasn’t as good as it could have been. Now though, 2D Sonic is back.

Released in late August of this year, Sonic Mania has brought back the classic Sonic appeal but remastered for the modern era. It was designed by the likes of Christian “The Taxman” Whitehead alongside Stealth, people who have been engaged in the Sonic community for quite some time, and they did a fantastic job with it. They remixed beloved classic levels, but also added in four brand new levels. While the classic Genesis games had small levels with little to explore, the levels in Mania are exponentially larger with so many fun secrets and easter eggs to look for. The only thing better than the levels themselves is possibly the music.

The soundtrack for Sonic Mania was done by Portuguese artist Tee Lopes, who has been making exquisite remixes of Sonic soundtracks for many years. I have too many favorites from this game to even consider picking one, but the first one that really caught my attention was the mini-boss theme: Danger on the Dancefloor. A masterpiece Tee Lopes soundtrack combined with a brilliant level design from the developers makes Sonic Mania a perfect return to classic Sonic.

In addition to all of the great aspects of Mania, there are so many little references to past Sonic games that make you stop Sonic right in his tracks just to awe at them. Most notably there’s a reference to an obscure Sonic themed Tetris remix known as Dr. Robotnik’s "Mean Bean Machine" featured as a boss to the second level. This was an absolutely hysterical reference and I had to pause the game just to laugh at and admire the genius of the developers. Another great reference comes in the Hydrocity Zone, where the mini boss is a spinoff of the boss from the original hydrocity zone, except the tables have turned. Sonic is in Robotnik’s Egg-o-Matic while Robotnik is on the ground.

Sonic Mania is a great game, and is certainly in the conversation for the best Sonic game that’s ever been made, however no game is perfect and Mania certainly has some things that made me a little bit annoyed. The first of these things is that if you’re simply running around and going fast, you’re sometimes at risk of being crushed to death by something you didn’t even see coming. This happened to me twice during my first play through. One of these instances happened in the Chemical Plant Zone. I was spin-dashing around, going fast, and having a good time when I got into an area with moving blocks and I was crushed by a block that I legitimately didn’t see coming. Some warning, like a door opening to the moving blocks would have been great, especially since this is a Sonic Game that prides itself on having fast-paced gameplay and usually rewards people for going quickly. In older Sonic games the normal thing was to usually have whatever moving block or platform you needed to jump on in a position that was blocking you when you reached, this would have been a good addition.

The Oil Ocean Zone Mini Boss is another sticking point that I have. If you’ve never played it before, standing in the wrong spot will cause you to get crushed unexpectedly, and that seems like really poor design in my opinion. While the boss can be beaten before it even gets to this attack, it still poses issues to people that don’t know any better. The design of it, is reminiscent of the mini-boss from Mushroom Hill Zone in Sonic and Knuckles, so I guess that makes up for it.

All in all, Sonic Mania is a great game that gets nostalgia flowing. The gameplay and graphics are stellar and the music is even better. Everyone who played a role in its creation did a fantastic job. Even though it has a couple of small issues, I’m just happy a Sonic game of old exists agin.