SONIC MANIA - Special Stages, Bonus, and Time Attack

[molul]

The special stage is lovely, but sorry, I'm more hyped by the blue spheres return! Only 12 days!

[Sonictrainer]

Here's an image of the Purple Chaos Emerald Special Stage.

[McGroose]

I love how they're trying to emulate 3D Sonic gameplay from the Saturn, down to the models and the pop ups. It's both cute and charming. I love these special stages so much. The game's special stages feel like a combo of every special stage design ever used in a Sonic game, even Sonic 1 because of those trippy backgrounds.

Blue Spheres... do these bonus stages have the exact same level design as their Classic counterpart in S3&K? If so, that means that they'll be a breeze for me since I've memorized them all down pretty much perfectly. I never got the appeal in the Blue Sphere stages though. They just felt boring sometimes. To be fair, the boost in speed the longer you stay in the level almost always makes it more enjoyable for me.

I almost never bother with a Time attack mode in any game, just too indifferent towards it. The idea of an instant restart is a genius idea though and might even encourage me use it.

[TheOcelot]

33 minutes ago, McGroose said:

Blue Spheres... do these bonus stages have the exact same level design as their Classic counterpart in S3&K? If so, that means that they'll be a breeze for me since I've memorized them all down pretty much perfectly. 

It's a mixture. The blue-sphere bonus stage shown-off with Sonic is the same as the first special stage in Sonic 3. Whereas the blue-phere bonus stages shown with Tails & Knuckles are completely new.

Something to note is that for all the blue-sphere bonus stages shown-off in Mania; the ring counter (top right) counts down as you collect the rings which is how it was designed in the original Blue sphere lock-on to S&K cart. Whereas in the Sonic 3&K special stages the ring counter counts upwards as you collect them. 

[Natie]

1 hour ago, Detective Kaito said:

Honestly, this looks great. I was fighting the temptation to click on the video to avoid spoilers, but obviously, I've failed. I was hoping they'd announce something like split-screen multiplayer or something, but oh well.

The steam page says something about a 2-P "Competition Mode" so you may be in luck.

 

Also, Blue Spheres seems a bit too involved for a bonus stage. Hope those Gold and Silver medals amount to something neat.

[QuantumEdge]

I'm not too big a fan of the Sonic 3 style special stages, but the rest look awesome.  Really hope Taxman can someday build his way up to getting the chance at a full on 3D Sonic because clearly he has a better, clear cut vision that Sonic Team.  I mean, he at least knows how to weaponise nostalgia better

[molul]

1 hour ago, McGroose said:

Blue Spheres... do these bonus stages have the exact same level design as their Classic counterpart in S3&K? If so, that means that they'll be a breeze for me since I've memorized them all down pretty much perfectly. 

Sounds weird that you memorized all blue sphere stages and didn't notice that these were new (except Sonic's bit)

I hope those coins you collect in bluespheres-land are used to unlock something (other than achievements).

[Clewis]

Special stage looks great! I love that they decided to stick with the concept of having various surrealistic backgrounds like in CD's special stages.

Also, for those who were wondering if they should go on a Mania blackout from this point going forward:

Glad they decided to not reveal too much about the game before release. It's been a nice change of pace.

[Detective Kaito]

Found this. It's not much but it's interesting.

[Cornelius Fudge]

5 minutes ago, Detective Kaito said:

Found this. It's not much but it's interesting.

This really makes me appreciate the Drop Dash in the game.

[TheOcelot]

IGN: Special stage gameplay

This is probably one of the first special stages as the course seems kind of short and loops.

 

IGN: Blue Sphere bonus stage (Sonic 3 special stage 4)

[Detective Kaito]

14 minutes ago, OcelotBot said:

IGN: Special stage gameplay

 

Quote

Collect rings and hit pegs to build up your momentum and catch the diamond in Sonic Mania's Special Stages.

Oh, IGN. Why am I not surprised.

[Tenko]

30 minutes ago, Clewis said:

Special stage looks great! I love that they decided to stick with the concept of having various surrealistic backgrounds like in CD's special stages.

Also, in case you were wondering if you should go on a Mania blackout from this point going forward:

Glad they decided to not reveal too much about the game before release. It's been a nice change of pace.

Makes sense, they have been revealing a little each week to keep the hype high, and they previously mentioned a launch trailer, so that will be next week's thing. With the sneak peak at the opening animation too!!

[molul]

18 minutes ago, Detective Kaito said:

Oh, IGN. Why am I not surprised.

Lol. The mayhem diamonds XDDD 

[StaticMania]

I don't see how Blue Spheres really work as bonus stages...but as long as they aren't they aren't the only bonus stages, it's whatever.

 

The new Special Stage looks neat.

[TheOcelot]

Ha, this is cool.

Mania's special stage with Sonic CD special stage music. Then Knuckles Chaotix, then 3D Blast (Saturn)!

 

[A super No.1 washedupgamer]

 

Oh man! Those special stage look so fun! Wish it was August 15th already!

 

[Milo]

Hands-on preview of a Mania demo featuring the bonus stages, special stages, and time-attack mode by GameCrate.

- Bonus Stages are activated by the player having at least 25 rings, and are randomly selected.
- Bonus Stages will have new layouts, as well as layouts reused from Sonic 3 & Knuckles.
- Completion of the Bonus Stages by getting all of the spheres results in the player earning a Silver Medallion. 
- Completion of the Bonus Stages by getting all of the spheres and all of the rings results in the player earning a Gold Medallion. (They don't know what the medallions do.)

- You can fall off the track in the Special Stages (a la Chaotix) and hitting obstacles slows down your speed.
- In order to earn the Chaos Emerald, you just need to catch up to the UFO (you don't need to attack it as in Sonic CD).

- Time Attack allows players to play through individual acts. Levels during this mode have no checkpoints, no bosses, and the clock acting as a timer.
- Completing Acts in Time Attack mode results in the game logs and saves your times. You can compare your record to your personal best times, or upload your record to an online leaderboard.
- Restarting levels during Time Attack mode is done by the player pressing and holding a single button (not specified which).
- Knuckles is said by the developers to have a slightly lower jump height than Sonic and Tails as in Sonic 3&K (though I assume we may know this already).

[Indigo Rush]

1 hour ago, Yeow said:

- Bonus Stages are activated by the player having at least 25 rings, and are randomly selected.

- Bonus Stages will have new layouts, as well as layouts reused from Sonic 3 & Knuckles.

I wonder if that algorithm that makes over 100 million unique Special Stages is factored into this.

Imagine entering the Bonus Stage and almost never seeing the same level twice.

 

[Celestia]

The special stages look pretty fun. Chasing after a UFO and collecting spheres to go faster, nice and simple. It'd be neat if there were slopes to roll on and stuff ala 3D Blast Saturn's special stages, since that was a neat idea and I think it'd fit in pretty well with a special stage where you have to catch up to the Emerald, but I digress. I only noticed watching the footage a second time that your Rings are a countdown and you presumably need to keep collecting 'em, I was wondering if they had any use in these aside from bonus points and well...there ya go.

I also love the sound effect for the spheres, way better than the grating one from Blue Spheres...which the bonus stages brought back anyway. Oops. Seriously though, Blue Spheres coming back as a bonus stage is great, but what I'm really interested in is finding out what the medallions are for...

[Tracker_TD]

The shading on the Blue Sphere globe is a segmented gradient, terrifyingly close to how the Saturn did it.

...I might be the one person that appreciates this.

[Muscles Maximum]

Oof. I am blown away. These special stages are making me feel some type of way. I really love what they did here.

At a loss for words.

[Dannymax440]

14 hours ago, Josh said:

 

0:58 Probably just me but those spikes and terrain of Studiopolis reminds me of Carnival Night Zone from S3. Special stage also seems really tamer than the previous classic ones.

[molul]

I don't think it's tamer at all. Maybe the first one or two, but from then, there are many ways to make it really challenging.

BTW, I'm gonna miss S3&K's bonus stages. Being able to get shields and rings during a small break from the game was really cool, and blue sphere will only give bronze, silver and gold medals/coins.

[Azure P]

I appreciate that they brought back the blue spheres game play from Sonic 3 & K.

 

15 hours ago, OcelotBot said:

You know what, I'm going to say it:

Sonic Mania is going to surpass Sonic 3&K!

 

Let's not get ahead of ourselves.