Sonic 3 and Knuckles is glitchy too...

[PKGaming]

So it's pretty common knowledge that Sonic 06 is a terrible game, one big reason being because of how unfinished and glitchy it is. In fact, a lot of modern Sonic games are glitchy like Sonic Adventure 1 and 2, Sonic Heroes, Shadow the Hedgehog, and even Generations has a few. The classic Sonic fans often use these kind of reasons to justify why they think modern Sonic sucks and classic Sonic is the best. But.....I played Sonic 3 and Knuckles recently and...that game's pretty dang glitchy too. I've run into multiple glitches without even trying and even though the game is part of my childhood and I want to love it, the bullcrap glitches really keep me from saying I had a totally positive experience with the game. Heck, I didn't even have this much trouble in Sonic 1. Let me name a few I ran into in Sonic 3 and Knuckles:

 

- There are a few graphical glitches I often see like when playing as Knuckles, when I'm supposed to be fighting the EggRobo, it shows Eggman's head on a robot instead or just a graphical mess. Speaking of graphical messes, often on the continue screen, Sonic or Knuckles turn into a graphical spritey mess when I hit continue.

- Once I was playing as Knuckles in Lava Reef Zone. I was doing just fine until I somehow fell tightly in between a spring and spikes. I was clearly not supposed to fit in between them and ended up getting stuck. I couldn't move at all. Knuckles just ran in place for a few seconds until he died as if he got crushed. That really ticked me off because it wasn't my fault I died.

- Once I was Hyper Sonic in Hydrocity Zone 2. I was standing on one of those tall purple cylinder things that make you spin a little. It was about to lead me into some spikes, but since I was Hyper Sonic, I figured I'd be fine and just get pushed off. But no. The moment I touched the spikes, I died as if I got crushed. Even if I was normal Sonic, I should've just gotten hit and lost rings, there should've been no crushing involved.

- In Marble Garden Zone 2, I came to the end level boss where you fight in the sky with Tails. On the ground, I got a few hits on Eggman before he broke the ground like he should and flew into the air. After that, I was supposed to reappear on screen with Tails carrying me. I sat there waiting, but no Tails. I was nowhere on screen, but the fight was still going on. Occasionally, Eggman would go down and try to attack me, but get hit instead. So I was stuck on the bottom of the screen and I couldn't do anything. Minutes later, Eggman finally died after attempting to hit me enough times. The capsule appeared on screen, but since I was stuck on the bottom of the screen, I couldn't get it. I had no option but to restart the whole game. Bullcrap.

- There have also been plenty of moments when I get hit and fall through the stage and die, or my rings just fall through the stage.

 

Now, I'm willing to give the game the benefit of the doubt and maybe say it was the emulator's fault. I was playing it using the Sega Genesis & Mega Drive Classics emulator on Steam (which is a crappy emulator by the way because you can only save progress using save states). So I'm asking if anyone else has experienced stuff like this.

[Solkia]

Oh, believe me, playing the games on the original cart ofr MEga Collection is a hell of a lot glitchier than playing directly off the rom.

 

There's a reason why people say it's a bad idea to go Super Sonic in Sonic 2 and Hyper Sonic in Sonic 3. Lots of programming faults in the classics.

[Blue Blood]

Yeah, S3K is by far the buggiest of the classic games. But this isn't exactly anything new. Everything you've mentioned is well documented, as the second point in particular is even mentioned in the game's manual. This difference between S3K and and the likes of '06 and ShTH is that the bugs aren't anywhere near as a frequent and don't practically define the game. Plus S3K is still a great game glitches or no, while those other two are pretty terrible even if you do manage to ignore the glitches.

[PKGaming]

It's just that the glitches and how frequent they happen (at least for me) really makes the game feel broken and unstable, despite having neat levels, music, and features. I hate that feeling of playing a game extremely cautiously because I'm afraid of setting off a random glitch, I got that same feeling playing Sonic 06. Even though I heard from people that Sonic 1 had mediocre level design, at least I didn't run into nearly as many glitches. If I died, I felt responsible. I didn't feel like the game cheated me because of bad programming...

 

I think this game needs a re-release Christian Whitehead-style where everything's more polished and the glitches are fixed. If it weren't for the bugs, this could easily be my favorite Sonic game.

[Blue Blood]

I think you're getting unlucky and you're also playing a pretty buggy version of the game. I play through the game fairly regularly either on Sonic Classic Collection (warning: terribad, don't no buy) and Sonic 3 complete (hacked rom). I rarely run into any of he glitches you've mentioned. The only thing that will happen without fail is fighting Eggman Flying Battery act 2 as Knuckles, which is simply an error in the original game.

[Jovahexeon Jax Joranvexeon]

Huh, the Steam version apparently is more stable, despite some glitches here and there, as it gets the job done pretty well for moi. Sounds like you're just getting unlucky and/or a more buggy version.

[Kenny_Glover]

 People were more forgiving towards those kinds of problems back in the 1990s. Today, they're largely unacceptable.

[Delta Starfire]

Well, in my experience, S3&K isn't nearly as buggy as that. But I'd be lying if I said I haven't run afoul of glitches. I played it last year, got all the Chaos Emeralds, and was about to go after the first Super Emerald, but the game seemed to have forgotten that I'd got ANY Chaos Emeralds. I was not amused. 

 

 

 People were more forgiving towards those kinds of problems back in the 1990s. Today, they're largely unacceptable.

 

 

Sorry. Had to.

[Blue Blood]

Oh bloody hell, how did I forget this? A whole video series dedicated to glitching every single stage in S3K.

Watch it. It'll provide you with some serious laughs.

[Tara]

Honestly, while I'm not denying there's a ton of glitches in the classics, many of them are self-initiated and really aren't a hindrance to the overall gameplay.  I'd still go so far as to say that the glitches really haven't done much to age them or make them feel inferior from the standpoint of a player in 2014.  Sonic '06, for example, had problems with core gameplay mechanics.  Climbing up walls was a mess and you couldn't eject yourself from a wall no matter how hard you tried, falling through the floor was a fairly common problem, etc.  Sonic Adventure, one of my favorite games, is guilty of some pretty negligent flaws as well, including the aforementioned falling through floors and occasional framerate stagnation.  If anything, that game probably feels the most broken of any of the "good" Sonic games, especially the more recent ports. (Steam version is nigh unplayable at times)

 

I don't get where people are saying that the classics feel unstable in the slightest.  The games feel pretty firm and well-designed to me, and all the games can be beaten without wrestling much, if at all, with the controls or having to work against the glitches that do exist.  So I really don't think the games were just passable for 90's standards; I think they're still good today.  Flawed, maybe, but you're never going to find a game that is completely free of imperfection or that couldn't use some added polish in some way.  The classic Sonics are no better or worse in this regard, at least from my own experiences, than any other game at the time or now, and I've played these games on their original carts, emulator, Sonic Mega Collection, and Steam.

[Emmett L. Brown]

The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim is a buggier game than Sonic 06.

 

I base that controversial opinion on the fact that I have never done a playthrough of Skyrim without an NPC, quest or location bugging out in some way that either crashes the game or makes the NPC, quest or location permanently inaccessible for the remainder of that playthrough. Sometimes all three of those in the same game. There isn't a single aspect of Skyrim that doesn't carry some risk of bugging out or being broken.

 

Yet Skyrim is one of my favourite games of all time, wheras Sonic 06 is deplorable. Why? Because when they work, one of them is incredibly fun to play and the other isn't any fun at all. Which goes to show that bugs and glitches can definitely ruin a good game, but that doesn't mean the game isn't good to begin with. It just means it shoulda seen a helluva lot more playtesting and bugfixing before release, Bethesda.

 

Mario 64 is a pretty buggy game, too. Exploiting bugs is the heart and soul of most speedruns. Still a much better game than Sonic 06.

[JezMM]

Tbh it does all come down to luck.  I've played Sonic 3 & Knuckles at least once or twice a year bare minimum via various ports and emulations since Mega Collection came out for Gamecube, and I literally have only ever suffered one of Dr. Robotnik's Deadly Speed Traps once.  On the holy grail, Sonic 3 Complete of all versions!

[Solkia]

Go to MArble Garden.

 

USe Hyper Sonic before the Act 2 boss.

 

Watch hell break loose. The screen will glitch the hell out and you'll lose a life.

[Spin Attaxx]

IIRC it only does that if you hit the boss during that part more than seven times as Hyper Sonic?

[JezMM]

Oh one thing that DOES happen to me all the time is skipping Eggman in Hydrocity by rolling right past him then being stuck on the act clear screen.  Always a pain.

[Mr Loopone]

It is known that Sonic 3 & Knuckles was rushed out to the point where the game had to be split into two (Sonic 3 regular is more buggier than S3&K however it still has a fair share of bugs) however a couple of these bugs mentioned could be emulation related but not the collision detection ones. In terms of actual hardware, depending on the condition of the console and the cartridge can cause further problems more than intended. With my fair few times of playing the game (I don't enjoy S3&K as much as the other classics), I didn't encounter a game breaking bug yet but a couple of minor graphical glitches however only got up to Marble Garden Act 2 and Flying Battery Act 2 so perhaps some of the bad bugs come later in the game.

 

There are various bugs in the classic Sonic games such as the jump bug in Sonic 1 (where when Sonic jumps he doesn't roll into a ball, easy to trigger in Marble zone but can also work at any other stage), the graphical glitch in Emerald Hill Zone in Sonic 2 as well as getting stuck in a pit in Mystic Cave Zone especially when Super, there are even some classic games such as Super Mario World where they have bugs like I actually got killed just by jumping as normal and the ground killed me or graphical glitches like many NES games due to system limitations.

 

It really depends on the game in terms of bugs and glitches, rushed development or both; some games are very buggy or even crash prone however the game can be still enjoyable or so unstable that it causes frustration especially games that can also corrupt save data, cause the game to be unwinnable or cause problems with the console. Sonic 3&K while buggy was based on a solid engine and even included some improvements too both gameplay and technical wise. While something like 06 was based off a new(?) engine and with 3D development can be trickier (easier now with engines such as Unreal or CryEngine) plus that it had to be rushed for both Sonic's 15 anniversary and internal development problems are one of the reasons why the game is a bit of a mess.

 

Oh and there is a hack of Sonic 3 & Knuckles where many of the bugs and glitches are fixed called Sonic 3 Complete. While it doesn't fix every bug in the game, it makes it more stable and also includes bonus features as well.

[Solkia]

IIRC it only does that if you hit the boss during that part more than seven times as Hyper Sonic?

 

It happens in several areas under several reasons. I've had it happen in angel island, hydrocity, marble garden, basically any Sonic 3 stage.

[TheOcelot]

Sonic 3&K is famous for having a few game-breaking bugs, but most of them are quite hard to find and it doesn't hurt the overall experience of what is a wonderful game.

 

I recall a specific game-breaking glitch at the end of Launch Base Act 1 when playing with Knuckles. When Knuckles runs inside the building just before he fights the mid-zone boss, if he runs too fast then you can get stuck and can't escape. The funny thing about these glitches is that once you find them you never forget them. When I play with Knuckles I always remember that glitch and thus am far more cautious in that area. So you learn to avoid them.

 

You'd be amazed at the amount of bugs you can find in the other classic games as well, even in Taxman's Sonic CD and Sonic 2. Those ports are superb and fixed all the bugs that appeared in the originals, but there are still plenty of new bugs. It just shows how complex the classic games are and how hard it must be to programme them without any bugs appearing.

 

These days when I encounter a glitch I tend to think of it as endearing as opposed to being frustrating, due to how fond I am of the classics.

 

The best version of S3&K is the Sonic 3 Complete hack by Retro member Tiddles. He's done a shit ton of work on the game and fixed dozens of bugs. It's the definitive version of 3&K and everyone should play it.

[Shaddy Zaphod]

Glitches mean nothing in the overall structure of a game. Assuming they're avoidable and the whole thing isn't completely broken (i.e. Sonic 3 > 06), glitches don't do crap against your game if the design itself is good. Go play any Bethesda game. It's glitchy as fuck. Those games are broken. So why do people love games like Skyrim so much? Because they're well designed. They don't do as much stupid shit as...shitty games do, and so even with their glitches they largely remain good games because of how they are played from the get-go. If it's a well made game and you can't find glitches without looking for them, there's no issue.

[PKGaming]

I understand that no game is perfect and they all have bugs, but I guess my problem is how frequently I ran into them in S3K. Compared to games like Super Mario World or Super Mario 64, from my own personal experience, I never encountered a serious glitch or bug unless I was deliberately trying. If I just played the games normally, I ran into no glitches. S3K on the other hand, I casually run into glitches by just playing the game. Everything I mentioned happened as a result of me just playing the game, not wanting to find any glitches. I don't want to start any kind of Mario vs Sonic debate (I do like Sonic as a character more than Mario), but when playing a game like Mario, I can tell it was much more solidly made. Maybe I should give this Sonic 3 Complete a try. I just kind of wish fixes like this were official and not just a hack...

 

And I think I will agree that S3K was the buggiest of the classics, because while I recall running into bugs in Sonic 1 and 2, they weren't nearly as frequent and didn't hurt my overall experience. Sonic 1 might actually be my favorite classic title and I don't know why....

[StaticMania]

Most of these phasing through objects problems is a result of the Movement of the character being too fast for the game to process or the speed shift being a bit drastic, so its just possible to happens at a specific unfortunate moment. Sonic 1 and 2 don't really have this problem because you'll rarely ever go fast enough in those games.

[PKGaming]

I started playing Sonic 3 Complete and I must say, it is awesome. No glitches so far, even when I'm Super Sonic. I also dig the music customization.

[Jolt_TH]

While I will say that I haven't actually ever run into any glitches so far during any of my Sonic 3 & Knuckles playthroughs, SEGA themselves did know there were a few bugs and even mentioned it in the manual, the difference between these other games and 06 is that 06 has glitches literally out the ass. S3&K, adventure, adventure 2, Heroes and other games like Lost World, mainly have glitches that are either only found in specific places or require specific criteria to happen. 06 they just happen and the sheer amount of glitches is what pulls it down. Couple this with the bad design choices and it can make playing the game a chore as you can get an easy game over due to literally no fault of your own.

Like I said S3&K knew it was glitchy and they added in the manual to watch out for Eggman causing strange things to happen.

[Salamander]

Did they fix a lot of these bugs for the Sonic & Knuckles Collection on the PC?  I don't remember running into any of them.

[StaticMania]

Did they fix a lot of these bugs for the Sonic & Knuckles Collection on the PC?  I don't remember running into any of them.

You're not as likely to run into any of "Dr. Robotnik's deadly speed traps" in any of the ports. They can still happen, just less frequent.