Since RUclips algorithm has suddenly been pushing this video l, guess I should say that while I haven’t released another video in some time, I do have plans for this year to get back into making more, hopefully sooner rather than later! Appreciate any praises and critiques for this one regardless, I look forward to sharing more in the future
Great video! The ranking system is a huge reason why I love treasure hunting in Sonic Adventure 2 and prefer it to Knuckles in Sonic Adventure. In the first game, the hunting stages end up being kinda boring to me because I’m not thinking about deciphering hints or planning my route to the next piece, I’m just following the radar. There isn’t a drive to go fast outside one of the secondary missions.
How does this video have so few views?? This is an amazing breakdown of the SA2 rank system and a really solid production all around. The ranking system is something that I have only recently come to appreciate in recent years after finally going for and getting all 180 emblems. The whole Score Attack aspect has given me a really fresh perspective on the game and is really the thing that ties the whole game together. Like straight up, I always found SA2 really overrated compared to SA1. I always liked the game, but I never truly loved it like the first Sonic Adventure. But after being forced to interact with the rank system for the A ranks, do the extra missions for each stage, and even raise chao, I can honestly say that SA2 is superior to SA1 as a complete package. I'll always hold that SA1 has the better level design, is a better conversion of the classics, has a more "adventurous" feel, etc. But SA2 is a more focused and robust game that just has so much more content. In my opinion, the rank system and Score aspect of SA2 raise the game beyond just "one of the best 3d sonic games" to "one of the best 3d platformers ever created." It is that much of a game changer.
@Blanktester685 The story forcing alt playstyles in SA2 as opposed to just being able to play Sonic if you want, the emerald radar being worse, the levels not being as open as SA1, etc. I am not saying I dislike SA2 at all. Just that on release, I didn't like it as much as SA1 because of these reasons. Now, I can appreciate its tighter design philosophy and especially its score attack system. The minor complaints listed above are still things I think SA1 has over SA2, but nowadays, I think both games are equally good for different reasons.
21:56 that ring is most likely placed there for the 100 ring mission, as without it, the next ring set is two 20 ring capsules placed nearly 20 seconds further into the level, when you have about 20 seconds on near perfect pace to that point
WOW amazing video. Couldn't have said it all better myself. Your journey was much like mine as a child, I remember taking months on things like crazy gadget and the biolizard. I managed to get every emblem as a kid but could never get all A ranks. I revisited it in my early teenage years, and went through a similar journey of learning how the ranking system works intuitively. People crap on the mech stages, but you get such an appreciation for all the elements of the game when you go for 180. I very much enjoyed your description of the ranking system while throwing the vibes in the whole thing as well. I will say, it is easy to look up the hard mode emeralds now, but I did manage as a kid without looking and that shit took me eons. Seeing all this Sa2 content on youtube lately has me wanting to go back and do it all over again, but I think your video has easily resonated with me the most in a way where I think you just get it. BTW, I NEVER knew about the perfect ring thing- jaw dropped
absolutely great video i will always praise the ranking system for sa2 for the hunting stages, the limited radar makes sense due to the fact of the better mobility you have in the games and the hints as well. its nice being challenged with knowing your moveset and learning the best way to navigate the level such as the trick where you can maintain your acceleration and speed in your glide with knuckles and rouge by drilling down for just a second and jumping back to your altitude or using punches and combos to get to different places! the learning the level design is a pain (i remember spending almost half an hour on death chamber and mad space my first time playing them) but after you figure it out its really fun to play
Yeah, the biggest issue with Treasure hunting is that it’s only fun once you’re at least somewhat good at it, and the game doesn’t really push you to become good at it before you get thrown into Egg Quarters and Aquatic Mine
@@spindash64 i had a harder time with mad space (who didnt) and death chamber tbh 😭 i remember clocking in at 36 minutes my first time for death chamber it was horrible but at least the music hits for them
@@kahuna_44 Oh, don't get me wrong, those are worse. The two I mentioned are just where players get thrown into the ocean with an uninflated pool floaty
Treasure stage "hard" missions were actually the easiest to A rank because the emeralds aren't randomized on those missions. For shadow the hedgehog you can just abuse chaos control, it's so overpowered that you can easily make up for having to do "heroic" actions in the dark missions.
The only Sonic game where I felt really rewarded by playing it well. Mastering the tricks is really tough, I could never pull off the rocket launch fast enough, so I resolved to get A rank without it. Surprisingly its possible. I never use the hints in treasure hunting stages. In fact I played these stages so much I often have a fifth sense about where the next piece is gonna be, because I think RNG generally favors distributing them evenly, for example after I get emerald up high, the next is probably in the middle. But sometimes Id judt get a feeling its hiding in a completely different location. That feeling is really cool, its like youre really a treasure hunter. Just circling the area and going up and down methodically youll get really good at it. Youre not trying to just find the emerald, youre learning the layout and get a feel of the level and how to cover the ground optimally. The monitors make you stop and interrupt that flow and I think it makes you think "wrong" about the level by focusing on one piece at a time. This is the reason I believe why people are so bothered by the locked emerald radar, and why I was never bothered by it because I would focus on my path and flow.
spin dash + jump over the chain of enemies quickly, it's the best way. Metal harbor is the easiest one to get the a rank, since all you need is to get all the 174 rings :)
yeah i could never get the rocket myself either. i found out that you can actually jump and destroy the jets that swoop down to attack you partway through the level and it gives you a boatload of points. it has some tricky timing, but was much easier for me. thats what i love so much about the ranking system; it involves a lot of strategy with planning your route, where to go, what to prioritize, what to skip for time, what you can personally accomplish, etc. figure out that route and execute it as perfectly and quickly as possible! ditto on the treasure hunting stages too. it honestly surprises me that theyre the least favorite for a lot of people. i love exploration in my games and this has the unique challenge of randomization. yeah its annoying to get bad emerald placements and having to reset, but it was never that big of a deal to me. the only thing i dont like is when the levels arent open enough, like death chamber. that level is annoying as hell to memorize. also mad spaces everything
@@AL4IGH5 im a huge fan of the treasure hunting, its my specialty whenever i go back to replay the game and i even got some scores i was happy with on Xbox 360, but i always found the hint system frustratingly useless even when i knew every level in and out like i did 6 or 7 years ago. mad space is the WORST offender of all, because not only are they as vague as other hints, if you dont have them memorized you have to decode them which can add extra minutes per attempt. when the difference between an A and B rank can be 5 or 10 seconds and you got bad peice rng, thats decoding time wasted for no benefit other than maybe pattern recognition if mad space continues to screw with you for 20 or so attempts, like it did during my most recent M1 A rank attempts. M4 was much nicer to me though.
and @GordieKat i like the feel and flow of SA2's treasure hunting more, the levels are much more catered to the movesets and dont take to long to explore outside of mad space, death chamber and meteor herd, which all wouldve benefitted from SA1's emerald radar pretty significantly.
@@AL4IGH5 I love the hint system and the fact that it often doesn't give the location away. I like how getting A-ranks in those stages is a matter of replaying and learning the stages and various treasure locations to the point that you should be able to find them using just 1 hint (if you use more you'll lose points). The hard mode for them kinda sucks though. Fun for the first time around, but they're always placed in the same place so it's easy to get A-ranks.
Honestly, Mech stages can be analyzed pretty simply: Eggman levels: good Tails levels: not good Okay, maybe it’s not QUITE that simple, but Tails tends to run into some real bullshit, while Eggman is the one who throws the bullshit at people. I find it glorious fun to plow thru Eggman’s stages at lightning speed, using the Hover to cheese past slow platforming areas or to “Mary poppins” down as I rain destruction. Hell, I remember very briefly considering trying to seriously Speedrun Eggman’s stages Tails, by contrast, has levels with far fewer openings to let you cruise by, and far MORE situations where you get blindsided by enemies you couldn’t possibly have reacted to in time. Of his 4 stages, I only enjoy 1, while of Eggman’s 6, I enjoy ALL of them As far as Hard mode goes, I’m not a HUGE fan, simply because the flow is naturally a bit less polished than Missions 1 and 4, but for the Treasure Hunting stages, I do appreciate that they set aside RNG to create puzzles for you to solve. Yes, it becomes super easy to A rank once you’ve beaten them once, but I find that to be a nice reward in and of itself for having pushed thru mastering Treasure Hunting
I think it’s because Tails was not originally planned to be playable, so Eggman’s stages were probably more planned out and Tails’ stages were just thrown together late in development
@@vytrondevofficial Absolutely. His stages aren’t unplayable by any means, but it’s very clear that less time was spent for Tails considering how players might interact with the stage, and that results in it feeling a lot “cheaper”
I think the mission street spring is a leftover from Radical Highway's use of that same bridge prop, where that spring was used as a shortcut to the top of the bridge
Seeing you do that Crazy Gadget route... makes me feel justified. I did that EXACT same route as a kid, although I didn't take the spring back to the start to do another run through, and instead made the dangerous jump to the end platform itself.
delightfuk video, thank you!! i'm super slow and verrrrry trial-and-error with all videogames but i have a lot of fun with my extremely low rankings and never really thought about the higher ones.
I’ll be honest in the grand scheme of things I’m not really that interested in how this game works in its scoring system but this guy’s buttery smooth voice is the only real reason I stayed on this video after randomly getting auto played onto it
I love the emerald hunting stages personally. Wouldn't have minded if they expanded on it and released a Rouge treasure hunting game spinoff or something (like what Nintendo did with Toad's Treasure Tracker).
I haven't even watched this yet, but YES! It's the only ranking system Sonic has ever had that I felt was properly challenging and felt good to master. I'd go so far as to say that the game doesn't even feel that good to play unless you're trying to achieve higher ranks since they force you to play stylishly
great video! you prob get this alot but its honestly criminal you only have around 200 subs, this video is so well put together i loved every second of it
I never engaged with scorechasing, but as a kid i LOVED the emerald hunt stages. I LOVED exploring each level at my own pace and just playing around in them.
Huh, i wonder what happened that the algorithm is suddenly pushing this 2 year old video on everyone. Great video though! While i agree that the scoring system for the emerald hunting levels is a bit broken, i actually love those levels. I admit it's entirely nostalgia, but i remember when i first got SA2 i was about 12 or 13 years old, and while he wouldn't pay much attention to any other levels, my Dad would watch and help me find the emerald pieces, decipher the hints, etc for the emerald levels. The space levels in particular, we replayed a bunch, because he really enjoyed those levels. So i will always love playing the treasure hunt levels.
Sonic adventure 2 was the last 3d sonic game where the speed of the character felt like it was enough it matched the pace of the level..forever thankful for being able to experience this game
It seemed even cooler as I got older and really looked at what "CHAOS CONTROL" meant. Creation is chaos the the birds, bees, cars, people, are chaotic and when shadow freezes time, he literally puts the chaos under control.
Ironically the hunting stages are the ones I actually did full A rank as a kid I really liked how big and weird they were, the levels were full of little fascinating secrets and the hard mode missions using those were really cool, just, "here here's a completely different whole secret part of the level you never knew about", playground rumor fascinating stuff. I love Death Chamber's super weird secret area, or spending a day figuring out the puzzles for Aquatic Mine --we just don't talk about Mad Space-- Ironically I actually liked the Big levels in Adventure 1 for a similar reason. They have these super weird secret sections you'd never find out. You can pull out a plug from a secret area and drain the Egg Carrier whihc lets you reach the inside of the aquarium glasses and get out of there to the top of Hot Shelter where after wandering around you reach a secret aquarium where you can fish a robot coelacanth of all things (which you may consider the game's secret boss). Just, wild playground rumor stuff.
My big roadblocks as a kid were getting the chaos emeralds as Rouge because that level is huge and the areas are rather non-distinct. And for some reason finding the keys with Knuckles. I figured it out after doing finding the keys with Rouge, only to get stuck again on meteor herd. So I guess I just sucked at hunting, funnily those are my favorite alternate gamemode in the series now.
1:30 the fucking WHAT now? I've even used Action Replay on this game to cheat having everything as a kid, and only today am I learning there's alternate costumes for multiplayer???
It this kinda stuff that really makes me wonder how my friend in 2004 knew about all these secrets and was so good at the game. He SHOW me himself that 1 hidden ring in Metal Harbor and said it's just to make it harder to find all the rings. I didn't even consider one would want to find every ring. He also had the most extreme Choas that my little brain ever did see, obviously.
I've been playing this game a lot recently, and after getting all the A ranks (and while trying to raise my Chao) I thought it'd be interesting to try to beat all my best scores/times from my previous save files. In the speed stages (and the hard modes of the treasure hunting stages) it's interesting to see what it's worth it to go out of your way for.
Regarding the All Rings challenge, a lot of levels have a big cluster of rings at the level’s 0,0,0 point since any extra assets in the level were just turned into the default item (rings) and sent there. That’s another way tons of rings aren’t accessible
I was thinking about this too. It’s kind of messed up that the developers did that and made getting all rings impossible. Very lazy and thoughtless of them, in my opinion.
Some levels also include the layouts of other levels in them like White Jungle for example includes an early layout for Green Forest out of bounds, rings included.
I did get all the emblems on gamecube. What annoyed me was that rings only counted for scoring if you kept them to the end of the level. So getting hit toward the end would ruin my run. Also, I remember needing to use the spin jump on a hard treasure hunt level... except I didn't even know there was such a technique. That took a long time and I only got it because I raged and started doing nonsense on my controller... which surprisingly worked.
Adding to the part where you mentioned you can “skip whole parts if done correctly,” my hack is Tails in Windy Valley in SA1. Right off the start, if you turn to your 7/8 o’clock and fly off, you can reach the end of the level without touching absolutely anything.
not sure if you know this by now but the treasure hunting stages all have back exit rings that respawn all enemies and rings and doesn't increase the ring total like checkpoint rings or buried rings
honestly i found myself in the same boat when i was younger where i felt as though i somehow had to do something unintended to continue each time because i couldn't figure out exactly what it wanted from me specifically until later on or after looking it up or something.
me and my friend played for the first time a few days ago. never played a sonic game in our lives (except a racing game i played when i was younger..) and we are god awful at it LOL we didnt get a single a rank outside of a single rouge and eggman level. maybe one day i'll be able to sit down and try to get A ranks on everything ... maybe . ill be honest this is the only game we've ever felt motion sickness playing and both of us actively play vr a bit embarrassing to know we're struggling on the same level as a 5-6 year old but it is what it is,, im ashamed to admit we spent a good 40 minutes on the first knuckles level its fun to see the perspective of someone who grew up with the game and has much more experience than we do :) thanks for taking the time to make a video about this!
You can make the bones in the models bounce around by making your character do a hard stop by either landing or pulling back after running. Rouge just has jiggle physics because I guess she was planted furry sex appeal?
I think more games need SA2's ranking system. The only other one I can think that does it right is Pizza Tower. Perfection isn't what it takes to get the best rank, but you do gotta get damn near close!
I legit thought my brother made up that getting every ring for an A rank thing when we were kids, I have no idea how he found that out because I guarantee you he didn't do it himself
Dude just yesterday, I spent several hours trying to get an A rank on Metal Harbor by running the rocket route at the very end. I kept being HALF a SECOND too late to grab the rocket, over and over, until FINALLY I got it in time, ran through the skiing part, to finish out aaaand... got a B 😐
Honestly, the emerald hunt stages were by far the easiest and most chill thing for me that A rank, they used to even be my favorite type of stage. But overall I think the speed stages are my favorite now. I still find the mech stages to be the worst and most clunky.
personally i hated the tails and eggman stages in SA2 they were the road block to me. i personally really enjoy and enjoyed the emerald search levels, mind you i never played for ranks i just loved exploring and vibing in the levels. id honestly play a game that was just them
I liked sonic shadow levels, tails egg man was ok but would rather few more sonic zones . Be coool see eggman one game more in depth weapons n eggman bosses
Yeah man, you're supposed to suck until you get better. Even speed runners and trick runners of this game screw up all the ti- *Crazy Gadget has entered the chat* Uh, look guys, I gotta go...
Since RUclips algorithm has suddenly been pushing this video l, guess I should say that while I haven’t released another video in some time, I do have plans for this year to get back into making more, hopefully sooner rather than later!
Appreciate any praises and critiques for this one regardless, I look forward to sharing more in the future
Looking forward to it!
Doesn't collecting all the animals give an A rank
"epitome" isn't pronounced the way you said it. great video regardless
@@dranziken Came here to say exactly this. (6:49 for those curious)
I stumbled on it. No doubt its because its a SA2 video next to Sonic 3 movie. Anyways, loved the video and want to see more from you!
Using the ranking to write out B.A.S.E.D. is worth a like, comment, and all of the engagement. It’s really quite… based.
its the only reason im here lolol
For a second, I thought that was all the letters.
Great video! The ranking system is a huge reason why I love treasure hunting in Sonic Adventure 2 and prefer it to Knuckles in Sonic Adventure. In the first game, the hunting stages end up being kinda boring to me because I’m not thinking about deciphering hints or planning my route to the next piece, I’m just following the radar. There isn’t a drive to go fast outside one of the secondary missions.
How does this video have so few views?? This is an amazing breakdown of the SA2 rank system and a really solid production all around. The ranking system is something that I have only recently come to appreciate in recent years after finally going for and getting all 180 emblems. The whole Score Attack aspect has given me a really fresh perspective on the game and is really the thing that ties the whole game together. Like straight up, I always found SA2 really overrated compared to SA1. I always liked the game, but I never truly loved it like the first Sonic Adventure. But after being forced to interact with the rank system for the A ranks, do the extra missions for each stage, and even raise chao, I can honestly say that SA2 is superior to SA1 as a complete package. I'll always hold that SA1 has the better level design, is a better conversion of the classics, has a more "adventurous" feel, etc. But SA2 is a more focused and robust game that just has so much more content. In my opinion, the rank system and Score aspect of SA2 raise the game beyond just "one of the best 3d sonic games" to "one of the best 3d platformers ever created." It is that much of a game changer.
its not overrated when it does damn near everything better then sa1 in terms of gameplay lmao.
@Blanktester685 The story forcing alt playstyles in SA2 as opposed to just being able to play Sonic if you want, the emerald radar being worse, the levels not being as open as SA1, etc. I am not saying I dislike SA2 at all. Just that on release, I didn't like it as much as SA1 because of these reasons. Now, I can appreciate its tighter design philosophy and especially its score attack system. The minor complaints listed above are still things I think SA1 has over SA2, but nowadays, I think both games are equally good for different reasons.
21:56 that ring is most likely placed there for the 100 ring mission, as without it, the next ring set is two 20 ring capsules placed nearly 20 seconds further into the level, when you have about 20 seconds on near perfect pace to that point
WOW amazing video. Couldn't have said it all better myself. Your journey was much like mine as a child, I remember taking months on things like crazy gadget and the biolizard. I managed to get every emblem as a kid but could never get all A ranks. I revisited it in my early teenage years, and went through a similar journey of learning how the ranking system works intuitively. People crap on the mech stages, but you get such an appreciation for all the elements of the game when you go for 180. I very much enjoyed your description of the ranking system while throwing the vibes in the whole thing as well. I will say, it is easy to look up the hard mode emeralds now, but I did manage as a kid without looking and that shit took me eons. Seeing all this Sa2 content on youtube lately has me wanting to go back and do it all over again, but I think your video has easily resonated with me the most in a way where I think you just get it. BTW, I NEVER knew about the perfect ring thing- jaw dropped
absolutely great video i will always praise the ranking system for sa2
for the hunting stages, the limited radar makes sense due to the fact of the better mobility you have in the games and the hints as well. its nice being challenged with knowing your moveset and learning the best way to navigate the level such as the trick where you can maintain your acceleration and speed in your glide with knuckles and rouge by drilling down for just a second and jumping back to your altitude or using punches and combos to get to different places! the learning the level design is a pain (i remember spending almost half an hour on death chamber and mad space my first time playing them) but after you figure it out its really fun to play
Yeah, the biggest issue with Treasure hunting is that it’s only fun once you’re at least somewhat good at it, and the game doesn’t really push you to become good at it before you get thrown into Egg Quarters and Aquatic Mine
@@spindash64 i had a harder time with mad space (who didnt) and death chamber tbh 😭 i remember clocking in at 36 minutes my first time for death chamber it was horrible but at least the music hits for them
@@kahuna_44 Oh, don't get me wrong, those are worse. The two I mentioned are just where players get thrown into the ocean with an uninflated pool floaty
I’m trash at Sonic’s stages now 😩
Treasure stage "hard" missions were actually the easiest to A rank because the emeralds aren't randomized on those missions.
For shadow the hedgehog you can just abuse chaos control, it's so overpowered that you can easily make up for having to do "heroic" actions in the dark missions.
Are you a bot? Either way, you failed my turing test.
@seisveintiocho-x9e Is your life really so devoid of joy you just insult random people on the internet?
@@fnln3011 Sorry, I thought you were a bot.
My dude. That sonic mega collection music from the history section is hitting me right in the feels man
It’s sad how late it seems the algo picked this video up, genuinely a great piece of content
The only Sonic game where I felt really rewarded by playing it well. Mastering the tricks is really tough, I could never pull off the rocket launch fast enough, so I resolved to get A rank without it. Surprisingly its possible.
I never use the hints in treasure hunting stages. In fact I played these stages so much I often have a fifth sense about where the next piece is gonna be, because I think RNG generally favors distributing them evenly, for example after I get emerald up high, the next is probably in the middle. But sometimes Id judt get a feeling its hiding in a completely different location. That feeling is really cool, its like youre really a treasure hunter.
Just circling the area and going up and down methodically youll get really good at it. Youre not trying to just find the emerald, youre learning the layout and get a feel of the level and how to cover the ground optimally. The monitors make you stop and interrupt that flow and I think it makes you think "wrong" about the level by focusing on one piece at a time. This is the reason I believe why people are so bothered by the locked emerald radar, and why I was never bothered by it because I would focus on my path and flow.
spin dash + jump over the chain of enemies quickly, it's the best way. Metal harbor is the easiest one to get the a rank, since all you need is to get all the 174 rings :)
yeah i could never get the rocket myself either. i found out that you can actually jump and destroy the jets that swoop down to attack you partway through the level and it gives you a boatload of points. it has some tricky timing, but was much easier for me. thats what i love so much about the ranking system; it involves a lot of strategy with planning your route, where to go, what to prioritize, what to skip for time, what you can personally accomplish, etc. figure out that route and execute it as perfectly and quickly as possible!
ditto on the treasure hunting stages too. it honestly surprises me that theyre the least favorite for a lot of people. i love exploration in my games and this has the unique challenge of randomization. yeah its annoying to get bad emerald placements and having to reset, but it was never that big of a deal to me. the only thing i dont like is when the levels arent open enough, like death chamber. that level is annoying as hell to memorize. also mad spaces everything
This game is SO AWESOME! Very nice video btw! ^^
6:50 I’ve never heard someone say epitome like that.
the epitome of mispronunciations
I say it CONSTANTLY lol
I've never heard it *not* said like that
now that's just hyper bowl
I have, but yeah it's E-Peh-to-me not Eppy-tome
I loved this video and the funny transition scenes. Very well done, wow, a lot of youtubers cant do it this funny and smoothly.
fantastic video of fantastic quality hope the algorithm picks you up
Treasure hunting in SA2 is sooo much better than in SA1 imo. It's so small and basically over in 30 seconds in SA1.
the problem are the hints, the hints are SOOO ASS. Whoever made them didnt think of how it made sense
I know right? Some people just need to get good instead of blaming their problems on the game.
@@AL4IGH5 im a huge fan of the treasure hunting, its my specialty whenever i go back to replay the game and i even got some scores i was happy with on Xbox 360, but i always found the hint system frustratingly useless even when i knew every level in and out like i did 6 or 7 years ago. mad space is the WORST offender of all, because not only are they as vague as other hints, if you dont have them memorized you have to decode them which can add extra minutes per attempt. when the difference between an A and B rank can be 5 or 10 seconds and you got bad peice rng, thats decoding time wasted for no benefit other than maybe pattern recognition if mad space continues to screw with you for 20 or so attempts, like it did during my most recent M1 A rank attempts. M4 was much nicer to me though.
and @GordieKat i like the feel and flow of SA2's treasure hunting more, the levels are much more catered to the movesets and dont take to long to explore outside of mad space, death chamber and meteor herd, which all wouldve benefitted from SA1's emerald radar pretty significantly.
@@AL4IGH5 I love the hint system and the fact that it often doesn't give the location away. I like how getting A-ranks in those stages is a matter of replaying and learning the stages and various treasure locations to the point that you should be able to find them using just 1 hint (if you use more you'll lose points). The hard mode for them kinda sucks though. Fun for the first time around, but they're always placed in the same place so it's easy to get A-ranks.
Honestly, Mech stages can be analyzed pretty simply:
Eggman levels: good
Tails levels: not good
Okay, maybe it’s not QUITE that simple, but Tails tends to run into some real bullshit, while Eggman is the one who throws the bullshit at people. I find it glorious fun to plow thru Eggman’s stages at lightning speed, using the Hover to cheese past slow platforming areas or to “Mary poppins” down as I rain destruction. Hell, I remember very briefly considering trying to seriously Speedrun Eggman’s stages
Tails, by contrast, has levels with far fewer openings to let you cruise by, and far MORE situations where you get blindsided by enemies you couldn’t possibly have reacted to in time. Of his 4 stages, I only enjoy 1, while of Eggman’s 6, I enjoy ALL of them
As far as Hard mode goes, I’m not a HUGE fan, simply because the flow is naturally a bit less polished than Missions 1 and 4, but for the Treasure Hunting stages, I do appreciate that they set aside RNG to create puzzles for you to solve. Yes, it becomes super easy to A rank once you’ve beaten them once, but I find that to be a nice reward in and of itself for having pushed thru mastering Treasure Hunting
I think it’s because Tails was not originally planned to be playable, so Eggman’s stages were probably more planned out and Tails’ stages were just thrown together late in development
@@vytrondevofficial
Absolutely. His stages aren’t unplayable by any means, but it’s very clear that less time was spent for Tails considering how players might interact with the stage, and that results in it feeling a lot “cheaper”
I liked all of Tails' stages except Route 101.
@@4nrew Only Mission Street is somewhat boring. I mean, every mech level is boring, but this one takes the first place in the podium.
@@lks19 I haven't played SA2 in a while. But I found mission street to be kinda annoying, even while speedrunning(I think?)
Dang, this is really good. Also I personally love the treasure hunting stages lol
I think the mission street spring is a leftover from Radical Highway's use of that same bridge prop, where that spring was used as a shortcut to the top of the bridge
Seeing you do that Crazy Gadget route... makes me feel justified. I did that EXACT same route as a kid, although I didn't take the spring back to the start to do another run through, and instead made the dangerous jump to the end platform itself.
Never in all my years playing SA2 (even 100% completing the game twice) did I know about the Perfect Ring thing.
delightfuk video, thank you!! i'm super slow and verrrrry trial-and-error with all videogames but i have a lot of fun with my extremely low rankings and never really thought about the higher ones.
I’ll be honest in the grand scheme of things I’m not really that interested in how this game works in its scoring system but this guy’s buttery smooth voice is the only real reason I stayed on this video after randomly getting auto played onto it
Kk
Jm
Butter isn't smooth bro 💀
I am not interested in his voice, but I want to hear about the ranking system of Sonic Adventure 2.
@seisveintiocho-x9eI agree. I’m 3:43 in and he hasn’t really explained the ranking’s intricacies yet
I love the emerald hunting stages personally. Wouldn't have minded if they expanded on it and released a Rouge treasure hunting game spinoff or something (like what Nintendo did with Toad's Treasure Tracker).
I haven't even watched this yet, but YES! It's the only ranking system Sonic has ever had that I felt was properly challenging and felt good to master. I'd go so far as to say that the game doesn't even feel that good to play unless you're trying to achieve higher ranks since they force you to play stylishly
great video! you prob get this alot but its honestly criminal you only have around 200 subs, this video is so well put together i loved every second of it
I never engaged with scorechasing, but as a kid i LOVED the emerald hunt stages. I LOVED exploring each level at my own pace and just playing around in them.
Great video nice editing great voice and conversation and sick channel name, im in 💯🔥
This video needs more exposure, good editing
6:50 your pronunciation of epitome reminds me of Brian Regan.
17:40 onscreen text made me laugh
Huh, i wonder what happened that the algorithm is suddenly pushing this 2 year old video on everyone. Great video though!
While i agree that the scoring system for the emerald hunting levels is a bit broken, i actually love those levels. I admit it's entirely nostalgia, but i remember when i first got SA2 i was about 12 or 13 years old, and while he wouldn't pay much attention to any other levels, my Dad would watch and help me find the emerald pieces, decipher the hints, etc for the emerald levels. The space levels in particular, we replayed a bunch, because he really enjoyed those levels. So i will always love playing the treasure hunt levels.
Sonic adventure 2 was the last 3d sonic game where the speed of the character felt like it was enough it matched the pace of the level..forever thankful for being able to experience this game
shadow using chaos control to slow down time was the coolest thing ever for my teenage brain.
It seemed even cooler as I got older and really looked at what "CHAOS CONTROL" meant. Creation is chaos the the birds, bees, cars, people, are chaotic and when shadow freezes time, he literally puts the chaos under control.
This video is so well made!
11:42 "Metal Bed" 💀
Bro's not sleeping well tonight with that one 🔥🔥🔥
6:50 “ehpihtome”
this guy needs more subs, great and amazing vid!
this video deserves so many more views!
My comment keeps disappearing. Anybody else use the old Dreamcast web browser to get the A-rank tips on the website?
Ironically the hunting stages are the ones I actually did full A rank as a kid
I really liked how big and weird they were, the levels were full of little fascinating secrets
and the hard mode missions using those were really cool, just, "here here's a completely different whole secret part of the level you never knew about", playground rumor fascinating stuff. I love Death Chamber's super weird secret area, or spending a day figuring out the puzzles for Aquatic Mine
--we just don't talk about Mad Space--
Ironically I actually liked the Big levels in Adventure 1 for a similar reason. They have these super weird secret sections you'd never find out. You can pull out a plug from a secret area and drain the Egg Carrier whihc lets you reach the inside of the aquarium glasses and get out of there to the top of Hot Shelter where after wandering around you reach a secret aquarium where you can fish a robot coelacanth of all things (which you may consider the game's secret boss). Just, wild playground rumor stuff.
My big roadblocks as a kid were getting the chaos emeralds as Rouge because that level is huge and the areas are rather non-distinct. And for some reason finding the keys with Knuckles. I figured it out after doing finding the keys with Rouge, only to get stuck again on meteor herd. So I guess I just sucked at hunting, funnily those are my favorite alternate gamemode in the series now.
1:30 the fucking WHAT now? I've even used Action Replay on this game to cheat having everything as a kid, and only today am I learning there's alternate costumes for multiplayer???
it's cool when I don't miss A Rank by 300 POINTS after feeling like I did a flawless run.
Sick video brother
It this kinda stuff that really makes me wonder how my friend in 2004 knew about all these secrets and was so good at the game.
He SHOW me himself that 1 hidden ring in Metal Harbor and said it's just to make it harder to find all the rings. I didn't even consider one would want to find every ring.
He also had the most extreme Choas that my little brain ever did see, obviously.
The ranking system so cool, it for the most part stuck around to this very day.
Epitome is pronounced uh pi tuh mee not Epi tome
ironically, the word is the Epitome of "ive only seen that word Written, never heard it Spoken"
“I’ll always remember my first memories”
3:13 Im sorry, im trying to pay attention but that Chaotix music is just ✨️😌👌✨️
"This reminds me of pumpkin hill
Doo doo-"
-shadow
SA2 was my introduction to the franchise in elementary school so I was at the same first boss road block
12:00 creator “MayHAM”😂😂😂
I've been playing this game a lot recently, and after getting all the A ranks (and while trying to raise my Chao) I thought it'd be interesting to try to beat all my best scores/times from my previous save files. In the speed stages (and the hard modes of the treasure hunting stages) it's interesting to see what it's worth it to go out of your way for.
Regarding the All Rings challenge, a lot of levels have a big cluster of rings at the level’s 0,0,0 point since any extra assets in the level were just turned into the default item (rings) and sent there. That’s another way tons of rings aren’t accessible
I was thinking about this too. It’s kind of messed up that the developers did that and made getting all rings impossible. Very lazy and thoughtless of them, in my opinion.
@@Halo2glitchlover22At least there's mods on PC that can take those rings out
Some levels also include the layouts of other levels in them like White Jungle for example includes an early layout for Green Forest out of bounds, rings included.
10:05 *sigh* "I miss my wife, tails. I miss her a lot. I'll be back."
the monkey billiards 2 theme goes so hard lol🎉🥳
I never liked Rouge's music when I as a kid. But now I love it
I did get all the emblems on gamecube. What annoyed me was that rings only counted for scoring if you kept them to the end of the level. So getting hit toward the end would ruin my run.
Also, I remember needing to use the spin jump on a hard treasure hunt level... except I didn't even know there was such a technique. That took a long time and I only got it because I raged and started doing nonsense on my controller... which surprisingly worked.
Adding to the part where you mentioned you can “skip whole parts if done correctly,” my hack is Tails in Windy Valley in SA1. Right off the start, if you turn to your 7/8 o’clock and fly off, you can reach the end of the level without touching absolutely anything.
Just make sure you fly high enough at first and follow the path of the level at least. But yes, it’s the easiest way to finish that level
R.I.P. OasisDealer...
I just found your channel, and it turns out this was your last video...
I never knew ya, but I'll still miss ya 😢
not sure if you know this by now but the treasure hunting stages all have back exit rings that respawn all enemies and rings and doesn't increase the ring total like checkpoint rings or buried rings
honestly i found myself in the same boat when i was younger where i felt as though i somehow had to do something unintended to continue each time because i couldn't figure out exactly what it wanted from me specifically until later on or after looking it up or something.
THIS VIDEO IS AWESOME I LOVE SONIC
It never hit me that the ranking system can be used to spell out BASED lmfao good one
It actually can't, since Sonic Adventure 2 doesn't have 'S' ranks. Bit of a shame, that.
The Paper Mario music hit me over the head.
THE THUMBNAIL IS PRICELESS
me and my friend played for the first time a few days ago. never played a sonic game in our lives (except a racing game i played when i was younger..) and we are god awful at it LOL
we didnt get a single a rank outside of a single rouge and eggman level. maybe one day i'll be able to sit down and try to get A ranks on everything ... maybe . ill be honest this is the only game we've ever felt motion sickness playing and both of us actively play vr
a bit embarrassing to know we're struggling on the same level as a 5-6 year old but it is what it is,, im ashamed to admit we spent a good 40 minutes on the first knuckles level
its fun to see the perspective of someone who grew up with the game and has much more experience than we do :) thanks for taking the time to make a video about this!
why is no one talking about the rouge jiggle mod at 18:44😭😭
Probably because it isn’t a mod lol
You can make the bones in the models bounce around by making your character do a hard stop by either landing or pulling back after running. Rouge just has jiggle physics because I guess she was planted furry sex appeal?
I think more games need SA2's ranking system. The only other one I can think that does it right is Pizza Tower. Perfection isn't what it takes to get the best rank, but you do gotta get damn near close!
Great video
That gadget solution is big brain
bro said epitome
Epi tome
The first ranking system, and the best.
9:05 I DID THAT SAME ROUTE AS WELL LMAOOO
I legit thought my brother made up that getting every ring for an A rank thing when we were kids, I have no idea how he found that out because I guarantee you he didn't do it himself
6:48 "epitome" has 4 syllables, lol
Dude just yesterday, I spent several hours trying to get an A rank on Metal Harbor by running the rocket route at the very end. I kept being HALF a SECOND too late to grab the rocket, over and over, until FINALLY I got it in time, ran through the skiing part, to finish out aaaand... got a B 😐
Honestly, the emerald hunt stages were by far the easiest and most chill thing for me that A rank, they used to even be my favorite type of stage. But overall I think the speed stages are my favorite now. I still find the mech stages to be the worst and most clunky.
Unexpected paper mario music
I wish more people knew about this video
Thumbnail: BASED
Me: Why did he put the ranks in that order
Also me: Oh
Epitome. (Eh-pit-uh-me)
Please make more videos!
You'll get somewhere!
personally i hated the tails and eggman stages in SA2 they were the road block to me. i personally really enjoy and enjoyed the emerald search levels, mind you i never played for ranks i just loved exploring and vibing in the levels. id honestly play a game that was just them
Algorithm gave me something nice.
PLEASE make more videos
I liked sonic shadow levels, tails egg man was ok but would rather few more sonic zones . Be coool see eggman one game more in depth weapons n eggman bosses
6:50 Ep-it-oh-mee
preach mai Chao brother
I'm pretty sure I'm missing A rank on one of the racing stages in the car. So thanks for nothing.
B and A's are rare for me. but i DO gt them. WEEHEE YAAHOO
pls make more vids like this i wanna subscribe
Video starts at 3:52
Is a 4 minute intro really that hard to sit thru in a 24 minute video?
I think i found ZoomZike's second channel, lol
Blud pulled out the fake s rank 💀
SA2 doesn't have an S ranked, so it can't be BASED. But it is BAE'D.
I'd say that treasure hunting is better than mech stages
Use them hints
Yeah man, you're supposed to suck until you get better. Even speed runners and trick runners of this game screw up all the ti-
*Crazy Gadget has entered the chat*
Uh, look guys, I gotta go...
Epitome
sonic 06s ranking would be better if it gave me a cool pink square A instead of just a lame piss yellow letter S
"epitome" is pronounced "epitomy"