* CompleteMonster: The Directorate of The Corporation. A man shown to be a greedy sadist. The mastermind behind Operation: OMEGA, which would have released a deadly plague worldwide just so he could make billions on the distribution of the only cure. When Dr. Caine discovers the truth of Operation: OMEGA, the Directorate sadistically injects toxic waste into his body, which causes Dr. Caine’s body to ''melt''. If the player gets a Game Over, he imprisons Dr. Caine in a lava lamp. It is ''extremely'' satisfying to see the Game Over fate befall the Directorate when the player beats the game and thwarts his evil plan.
* HilariousInHindsight:
** Dr. Caine looks strikingly like an older version of [[WesternAnimation/AtlantisTheLostEmpire Milo Thatch]].
** Some people have noted that some parts of the soundtrack sound disturbingly similar to the [[WesternAnimation/DannyPhantom Danny Phantom]] theme song.
* SugarWiki/MostWonderfulSound:
** Caine's BigYes whenever he picks up a DNA helix and the "WHOO!" he makes whenever he gets a powerup.
** Ironically, the sound of a toilet flushing that can be heard whenever you travel between levels.
* NintendoHard: This game is known for being a really hard game, for several reasons.
** You can't haul a ranged attack without [[CastFromHitPoints sacrificing a part of your body]], and "punching" with extendable arms become [[UnstableEquilibrium less effective when you are smaller and more damaged]].
** Any enemy attack can OneHitKill you, if it hits the head.
** If you want to obtain the good ending, [[spoiler: you have to obtain all 50 DNA helices.]] They are well-hidden, and missing even one of them will lock you out from the good ending.
* PortingDisaster: While the game still runs fine, the version included in ''Sonic Mega Collection Plus'' for [=PlayStation=] 2 and Xbox suffers from a heavily mangled graphic issues, causing major discrepancies such as the title screen being a blinding green that glows with The Ooze himself rather than being a close-to-pitch black like in the original, or the ground in the Toxic Dump looking like wet mud instead of the desert orange the Genesis version had.
* SoBadItsGood: The Japanese box art, which isn't "art" at all, but a WallOfText selling it off as a dirty magazine (despite its CERO rating contradicting this). The manual reinforces this with a nude construction worker and a PlayboyBunny, [[LadyNotAppearingInThisGame neither of whom appear in the game proper]]. While the game [[AmericansHateTingle sold dismally in Japan]], in part because of this, it nonetheless became a CultClassic in part because of the [[CoversAlwaysLie bizarre disparity between the cover and the game itself]].