Line #41 VideoGame/SonicAdvanceTrilogy


1	[[quoteright:349:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/sonicadvancetrilogy.png]]
2	[[caption-width-right:350:Classic Sonic with a modern twist.]]
3
4	->''Sega's celebrity hedgehog makes his Nintendo debut in a hyperkinetic epic that looks like classic Sonic but has made the quantum leap to brand-new cool''.
5	-->--'''[[https://images.launchbox-app.com/755d0957-fb93-455b-bdfd-d721fcfc05e5.png Nintendo Power promo for the first game]]'''.
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7	On December 20, 2001, [[CueTheFlyingPigs pigs flew]] in the video game industry when Franchise/SonicTheHedgehog finally made his debut on a Creator/{{Nintendo}} system with the release of the first ever original Sonic/Creator/{{Sega}} game to appear on a Nintendo system after Sega's switch to software manufacturing. The game was also released the same day in Japan along with the Platform/NintendoGameCube port of ''VideoGame/SonicAdventure2'', known as ''Sonic Adventure 2: Battle'', with the Western version being released a few months later.
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9	The ''Sonic Advance'' trilogy is a trio of games in the ''Sonic the Hedgehog'' series for the Platform/GameBoyAdvance. Co-developed by Sega and Creator/{{Dimps}} and designed [[RevisitingTheRoots in the vein of the classic]] [[Platform/SegaGenesis Mega Drive/Genesis]] side-scrolling platformers, this trilogy is essentially lip-service for older fans, with some elements of ''VideoGame/SonicAdventure'' thrown in.
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11	The first game, ''Sonic Advance'' (2001), is perhaps the most reminiscent of the older games. The plot is very minimal (thwart [[BigBad Dr. Eggman]]!) and the gameplay is a bit slower than its successors but features a little more emphasis on platforming. This was the first 2D side-scroller in the series to feature Amy Rose as a playable character. The game was also ported to the short lived Nokia Platform/NGage as ''Sonic N'', but suffered from being transposed from the horizontal screen of the GBA to the ''vertical'' screen of the N-Gage (it also removed the Tiny Chao Garden).
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13	In ''Sonic Advance 2'' (2002), Cream the Rabbit and her Chao companion Cheese join Sonic and friends in the battle against Eggman after he abducts her mother and Tails. The gameplay is definitely the most extreme in the trilogy; the focus on speed is greater (to the point of making all but one boss a running battle), all of the characters now have the ability to grind on rails, and they can perform tricks with a press of the R button after going off a ramp/spring to gain more momentum.
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15	The first two games both feature a special condensed Chao Garden (from the start in the first, unlockable in the second), and the [=GameCube=]-GBA link cable can be used to import/export Chao from and to the [=GameCube=] ports of ''VideoGame/SonicAdventure'' and ''VideoGame/SonicAdventure2''.
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17	In ''Sonic Advance 3'' (2004), Eggman literally splits Earth into seven zones through the power of the Master Emerald, and uses [[VideoGame/SonicBattle a familiar robot]] that can emulate our heroes' abilities to try and take over the shattered world. Sonic and friends must reunite with each other in order to bring the planet back together and stop Eggman. The gameplay focuses on teamwork (kind of like ''VideoGame/SonicHeroes'' or ''VideoGame/KnucklesChaotix'') by having you select a player character and a partner character out of five characters (Sonic, Tails, Amy, Knuckles, Cream); the different combinations have different abilities. The stage design is like a fusion of its predecessors, combining the platforming action of the first game and the high-speed hijinks of the second. This game was especially notable for its AllThereInTheManual story. The black robot Gemerl is actually the robo-reincarnation of ''VideoGame/SonicBattle''[='s=] robot Emerl.
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19	Followed by a spiritual successor of sorts in ''VideoGame/SonicRush'' and ''VideoGame/SonicRushAdventure'' for the Platform/NintendoDS, which were also critical successes.
20	----
21	!!The ''Sonic Advance'' trilogy provides examples of:
22	%% * EleventhHourSuperpower: Super Sonic in all three games.
23	* ActionizedSequel: ''2'' has much bigger emphasis on speed and acrobatics than the first game, starting with the fact that the playable characters begin levels as if they were about to run in a track & field race. Combat options are also more diverse.
24	* AdaptedOut: The Android version of the first game only allows you to play as Sonic, with the other playable characters being either DemotedToExtra or completely absent.
25	* AirDashing: In ''3'', teaming up Sonic with Cream gives Sonic a move similar to the Homing Attack, which can be used without a target to simply dash forward.
26	* AntiFrustrationFeatures:
27	** To keep a player from getting too confused, ''Sonic Advance 3'' tells you which acts have Chao that you're missing if you look in the Chao Garden of the Sonic Factory.
28	** Since not every possible team-up can do tricks in ''3,'' there are no longer any areas that require tricks to access or get through in that game, avoiding the huge GuideDangIt its predecessor had with them.
29	* Area51: The TrueFinalBoss fight in the second game takes place in "True Area 53". What, if anything, it has to do with Area 51 is anyone's guess.
30	* AshFace: Knuckles gets one after the Egg Saucer he was piloting is defeated.
31	* BackFromTheDead: [[spoiler:Emerl, who was apparently rebuilt as Gemerl by Eggman, then reprogrammed by Tails back into his Emerl personality]] in ''3'', cheering up everyone after [[BittersweetEnding the ending]] of ''VideoGame/SonicBattle''.
32	* BackThatLightUp: The third game had different color settings to suit different Platform/GameBoyAdvance backlight arrangements.
33	* BalancePowerSkillGimmick:
34	** In the first game, Knuckles was the Balance, with a moveset oriented both for exploration and speed; Sonic was the Power, with a moveset oriented entirely for plowing through enemies and getting to the goal without frills; Tails was the Skill, with a moveset geared for exploration (both flying and swimming); Amy is the Gimmick, since she cannot curl into a ball like the boys and must attack and maneuver with her hammer, which has completely different mechanics and range.
35	** Inverted with ''Advance 2'', which pushes Amy into the background as a SecretCharacter and introduces Cream the Rabbit as the fourth main character in her stead. Cream is not a true Gimmick character but a MasterOfAll, with maneuvering ability second only to Tails[[note]]Cream covers horizontal distance faster than Tails while flying, but Tails can fly for longer before getting tired, meaning that Cream can cover greater horizontal distances, but Tails can cover greater vertical distances[[/note]] and better attacking options than the other characters thanks to Cheese.
36	** Zigzagged with ''Advance 3'', where all five characters can mix-and-match attributes depending on who they TagTeam with.
37	* {{Balloonacy}}: When teamed up with Tails or Cream in the third game, Amy can pull out a pair of balloons in midair, [[DownplayedTrope though they only slow her descent and give no lift]].
38	* BandLand: Music Plant Zone in the second game.
39	* BonusFeatureFailure:
40	** In an odd example, ''Sonic Advance 2'' let you unlock the Tiny Chao Garden by meeting certain conditions in the game... Even though the first ''Sonic Advance'' had the exact same mode available from the start. The third game has a seven Tiny Chao Gardens (one for each Zone), but unlike the first game, you cannot interact with them, only collect them.
41	** Also from ''Sonic Advance 2'', there is Amy, who is unlocked after the game is 100% completed. She (who in the first game was slow and couldn't roll, but had her own advantages) is little more than an alternate skin of Sonic.
42	* BorderOccupyingDecorations: The ''Sonic N'' release of the first game lets players choose between the N-Gage's unusual 11:13 and a scaled-down 4:3 ratio. For the latter, the game fills the borders with blue, plus Sonic and his name at the top.
43	* BossBonanza: The final level of each game consists of one.
44	** In ''Sonic Advance'' the "X-Zone" doubles as a NostalgiaLevel by presenting you with the first bosses of the original ''VideoGame/SonicTheHedgehog1'' and ''VideoGame/SonicTheHedgehog2'' before the actual FinalBoss, the Egg-X.
45	** In ''Sonic Advance 2'', the "XX" stage consists of a {{High Speed\|Battle}} BossRush against every previous boss in the game before confronting the Super Eggrobo Z.
46	** In ''Sonic Advance 3'', the "Altar Emerald" features the final fight against G-merl and the Hyper Eggrobo.
47	* BossOnlyLevel:
48	** While ''Advance'' puts {{Boss Battle}}s at the end of the second Act of each zone, ''Advance 2'' and ''Advance 3'' completely separate their boss battles into "Boss Attack!" and "VS Boss" stages, respectively.
49	** The TrueFinalBoss of each game gets their own stage, "The Moon Zone", "True Area 53", and "Nonaggression", respectively.
50	* BigBad: Eggman serves as this in all three games.
51	* BlindIdiotTranslation: The Master Emerald's shrine in ''Advance 3'' was given a wooden English rendering as the "Altar of Emerald", rather than the more natural Emerald Altar or Emerald's Altar.
52	* BossRush: The first two games feature this. In the X-Zone in the first, before you fight the Egg X, you must go through [[NostalgiaLevel memory lane]] by battling the ball-and-chain mobile from ''[[VideoGame/SonicTheHedgehog1 Sonic the Hedgehog]]'' and the [[WarmupBoss infamous]] drill mobile from ''VideoGame/SonicTheHedgehog2'' in that order, both made easier by taking half the number of hits to beat (both bosses are accompanied by GBA-style rearrangements of the boss themes from their respective games). In XX (yes, it's really called that) in the second, you must go through ''all'' of the bosses you fought so far in the game before you get to fight the Super Eggrobo Z (again, the BossRush bosses only take half the hits they originally required).
53	* BottomlessPits: Present in all of the regular levels of these games (the only exceptions being Neo Green Hill Zone in the first one, Leaf Forest in the second and Ocean Base in the third), though they are more common in the second and third games (looking at you, Sky Canyon).
54	** Did we mention that these bottomless pits are insanely long? You find yourself falling for quite a while.
55	** The final Act of Chaos Angel from the third game is nothing but a bottomless pit, you just stand on a platform and avoid obstacles or die.
56	** The second game suffers from "Bottomless Pit Syndrome", mainly because most of the levels have that as the only obstacle with the occasional Badnik or two.
57	* BreakingOldTrends: ''Advance 3'' doesn't begin with the GreenHillZone or end with SpaceZone like in the standard ''Sonic'' game. Instead, the first level is a MetropolisLevel, with the game's own GreenHillZone serving as the ''second'' level, and TheVeryDefinitelyFinalDungeon is an EldritchLocation.
58	* CallBack: For ''no particular reason'', characters '''must''' stay paired in ''Sonic Advance 3'', which combined with the other gimmick of changeable movesets makes this game a SpiritualSuccessor to ''VideoGame/KnucklesChaotix''. Not to mention [[MechaMook Badniks]] are powered by rings.
59	* CasinoPark: Casino Paradise.
60	* CharacterSelectForcing:
61	** Clearing the third act of every even-numbered zone in the third game (Sunset Hill, Toy Kingdom, & Cyber Track) unlocks Knuckles, Amy and Cream, respectively -- but only if you're playing as Sonic. Players that prefer playing as Tails could play through the entire game without ever seeing these unlockable characters until they appear in the credits sequence.
62	** Accessing the TrueFinalBoss in ''Advance 3'' also requires that you defeat the penultimate boss with Sonic in the lead. Anyone else simply gives Eggman a DisneyVillainDeath and gets the regular ending.
63	** The 2011 Android port of the first game removes all but one of the playable characters, meaning Sonic is the only playable character in that version.
64	* ClumsyCopyrightCensorship: The 2011 Android port replaces the remix of the Invincibility theme from ''Sonic 1'' with the game's intro theme, and the ''Sonic 1'' and ''2'' boss remixes in X-Zone with boss songs from ''VideoGame/SonicTheHedgehog4'' due to the rights to the music from ''Sonic 1'' and ''2'' being owned by Dreams Come True and meaning Sega has to pay royalties to them every time they use the songs.
65	* CollapsingCeilingBoss: The first game's Egg Spider's sole attack is to drill into the ice ceiling and make stalactites fall on the player's head. These stalactites must be used as platforms to reach the machine and bop it.
66	* ColorCodedCharacters: Life icons in ''Advance 3'' are colored differently in accordance to each character:
67	** Sonic: Blue
68	** Tails: Orange
69	** Knuckles: Red
70	** Amy: Pink
71	** Cream: Beige
72	** [[spoiler:Super Sonic: Yellow]]
73	** [[spoiler:Dr. Eggman: Gray]]
74	* ContinueYourMissionDammit: The playable characters actually grow impatient and start scolding you if you leave them idle in ''Advance 1''.
75	* ContinuityNod:
76	** Angel Island Zone in ''Advance 1'' is a throwback to both ''VideoGame/Sonic3AndKnuckles'' and ''VideoGame/SonicAdventure''. The level itself consists of {{floating\|Continent}} {{ruins\|For ruins sake}} like the Sky Sanctuary Zone from ''Sonic 3'', but with {{Mayincatec}} flair adopted from the Echidna civilization depicted in ''Sonic Adventure''--further, the far right of the background depicts the Lost World temple rising out of the forest below, revealing the level to be floating above the Mystic Ruins.
77	** In ''Sonic Advance 2'', [[VideoGame/SonicTheHedgehog28Bit Tails is kidnapped by Eggman]]! Now where have we heard this before?
78	** The icons replacing characters' portraits by the life counter in ''Sonic Advance 3'' are a stylistic throwback to the ''[[VideoGame/Sonic3AndKnuckles Sonic and Knuckles]]'' logo. Selecting Knuckles as the main character and Sonic as the supporting character reconstitutes its horizontally mirrored version.
79	* CoOpMultiplayer: In addition to the usual race-style multiplayer the previous games had, ''Sonic Advance 3'' takes advantage to its pair up based gameplay to have a co-op mode where a second player can run through a level individually controlling the paired up character.
80	* {{Cyberspace}}: Techno Base from ''2'', Cyber Track from ''3''.
81	* DamnYouMuscleMemory:
82	** In the first game, pressing down while dashing throws the brake on Amy's momentum by making her crouch, as opposed to having her roll into a ball like it does for the other three characters (see also: like it does in ''every'' 2D Sonic game up until then). As you might reckon, this little handicap got removed in ''2'' and ''3''.
83	** Amy's moveset was retooled in ''Sonic Advance 2'', which requires some adjustment for anyone familiar with her ''Sonic Advance'' playstyle.
84	** The character you choose as a partner in ''3'' can drastically change how the main character plays in a way that can take some getting used to.
85	** Despite the physics of the game being a close replica of those of [[VideoGame/SonicTheHedgehog1 the]] [[VideoGame/SonicTheHedgehog2 Classic]] [[VideoGame/Sonic3AndKnuckles games]], there's still a few minor differences that can make it feel ''off'' for those who have mainly played the Genesis games. Most notably, the characters feel more weighty than they do in the Classic Sonic games, taking longer to get to top speed and the jump arcs lasting far shorter, making it easy to throw off those expecting lighter physics like the old games.
86	* DarkReprise:
87	** Act 3 of Sunset Hill Zone tosses in [[MusicalNod bits and pieces]] of the melody from Central City in ''VideoGame/SonicBattle'' for its remix, which ends up giving Green Hill Zone's normally upbeat melody a good dash of mystery and darkness.
88	** The theme of the third game's boss theme and final zone, Altar Emerald, is an ominous remix of Holy Summit from ''VideoGame/SonicBattle''. [[spoiler:The music that plays during Nonaggression likewise reprises Emerl's theme.]]
89	* DegradedBoss: The Super Eggrobo, the TrueFinalBoss of ''Sonic Advance'', returns in upgraded form, the Super Eggrobo Z, as the FinalBoss of ''Sonic Advance 2''. Ironically, as the FinalBoss, the Super Eggrobo Z can be faced by any character without any Chaos Emeralds, [[ClippedWingAngel a decided step down]] from the first game where only Super Sonic could fight it.
90	* DemotedToExtra:
91	** Amy Rose doesn't show up at all in any cutscene from Sonic Advance 2. She's relegated to being a secret character, and doesn't even show up in the character select screen at first.
92	** Since the 2011 Android version of the first game forces you to play as Sonic, the rest of the playable cast fell victim to this.
93	* DisneyVillainDeath: In ''Advance 3'', defeating Eggman at Chaos Angel without triggering the TrueFinalBoss will lead to your main character jumping and hitting Eggman's vehicle as he tries to escape, which goes down in flames into a pit while travelling offscreen. Gemerl then shakes his head at your duo before jumping in after him.
94	* DownTheDrain: Ocean Base in the third game.
95	* EarlyInstallmentWeirdness: The Boost mechanic originated in ''2,'' but it functions quite differently from how it later would - it triggers automatically from running fast enough rather than manually (with your ring count affecting how fast you can enter it), doesn't hurt enemies, and allows for upgraded "boost attacks" by pressing the attack button.
96	* EarthShatteringKaboom: In the third game, Eggman's plan starts with him splitting the world into seven pieces.
97	* EnemyMine: In the third game, [[spoiler:Super Sonic and Eggman team up for the TrueFinalBoss, fittingly titled "Nonaggression", after Gemerl turns renegade and claims the Chaos Emeralds for himself.]]
98	* {{Engrish}}: For some reason ''Advance 3'' decided to not only describe the Master Emerald's altar in GratuitousEnglish, but to render it with a ''postpositive adjectival noun'' of all things, giving it the outlandish name of "Altar Emerald".
99	* EquippableAlly: ''Advance 3'' has Tag Actions done by holding R, where your teammate jumps into your character's hands and uses their abilities to help your character.
100	** Sonic [[SuperSpeed launches them forward at high speed and immediately puts them in Boost Mode]].
101	** Tails [[InASingleBound leapfrogs them high into the air]] when used on the ground. In the air, [[VideoGameFlight he instead begins flying while carrying them]].
102	** Knuckles [[FastballSpecial is chucked forward by your character]] when used on the ground. In the air, [[VideoGameFlight he glides forward while they ride on his back]].
103	** Cream briefly lets them borrow her own Equippable Ally in the form of Cheese, who replaces the normal attack with a ranged one done by Cheese. When done in the air, she also [[DoubleJump doubles the character's upwards momentum]] in addition to lending them Cheese.
104	** Amy uses her hammer to [[InASingleBound launch your character into the air]]. When done in the air, she [[DoubleJump launches them upwards (though not as high)]] using the same hammer.
105	** There's also one more Tag Action saved for the TrueFinalBoss: [[spoiler:Dr. Eggman [[FastballSpecial is launched forward]] by Super Sonic, which can expose Ultimate Gemerl's weak point for Sonic to hit]].
106	* EternalEngine: It wouldn't be a ''Sonic'' game without such levels.
107	** Secret Base, Egg Rocket, and Cosmic Angel in the first game.
108	** Hot Crater and Egg Utopia in the second game.
109	** Ocean Base in the third game.
110	* EvilIsPetty: [[spoiler:After completing the second game as every character and by obtaining all 7 Chaos Emeralds as Sonic, the unlocked final boss will have Eggman kidnap Cream's mother, Vanilla, before the heroes' eyes, seemingly for no other purpose than to [[ItsPersonal goad Sonic into a revenge face off]].]]
111	* ExcusePlot: The first two games (the plot for both is "Dr. Eggman is up to his old tricks again!"). The third game's opening cutscene is this (Eggman actually ''does'' use the emeralds, and splits the world into seven zones), but as AllThereInTheManual states, there's more to the plot than meets the eye.
112	* {{Expy}}: The rabbit that sometimes pops out of Badniks is an expy of Pocky, one of the animals from the Genesis games. See FurryConfusion below.
113	* FanRemake: [[https://gamejolt.com/games/sonicadvanceandroid/478588 One]] exists for the Android version of the first game, fixing the problems the original port had, as well as making all the other playable characters available like in the [=GBA=] version. Doubles as a FanTranslation because the original port was Japan-only.
114	* FakeDifficulty: ''Sonic Advance 2'' and ''Sonic Advance 3'' are loaded with level design tricks and trial-and-error habits designed to frustrate the player:
115	** There are numerous bits of cheap obstacle placement, like crushing blocks that come off screen to kill you after you were boosted into a wall, Bottomless Pits that you either can't see coming until it's too late or constantly have to be on the watch for because the entire level is loaded with them and chances to unfairly fall or get knocked into them (Sky Canyon, Cyber Track and Chaos Angel's third act are especially bad about this), etc. Making matters worse is that the small screen size combined with the high speeds means you'll take a lot of cheap hits unless you know what you're doing. Making matters worse is that [[CheckpointStarvation checkpoints are much more scarce]] than in other Sonic installments.
116	** Compounding this is the cheap enemy placement, such as enemies right above springs, enemies shooting at you off-screen hitting you off a platform they're edge guarding, and the enemies being small and hard to hit consciously (as opposed to just blindly running into them) due to their [[HitboxDissonance inconsistent hitbox detection.]] Like with the obstacles, the small screen and high speeds are ''not'' conductive to you fighting against them without memorization.
117	** The bizarre physics don't help, either--the characters get more acceleration from ''jumping'' than from ''running''[[labelnote:*]]Standard 2D ''Sonic'' physics rules do require air acceleration to be higher, but ''Advance 3'' exaggerates this.[[/labelnote]], which makes it very, very easy to overshoot a jump or slide off a platform while trying to halt your momentum, and makes it easy to accidentally crash into the aforementioned obstacles and enemies.
118	** Even the first game isn't totally free of this. Egg Rocket Zone and Cosmic Angel Zone have very cheap enemy placement, the former has bits where one slip up will send you falling way back down the level (and remember, the time limit is split in half for each part, so every second counts), and setpieces full of leaps of faith which can easily send you flying right into an offscreen spike or enemy.
119	* FastballSpecial: In ''3'', Knuckles' tag action when the player is on the ground has their character pick up Knuckles and chuck him forward.
120	* FightingYourFriend: Knuckles is the pilot of the Egg Saucer if you play as anyone else, as he was tricked ''again''. Sonic is quite peeved about this after the fight is over.
121	* FloatingContinent: Features in all three games as floating ruins. Angel Island from the first one and Chaos Angel from the third one are set on the very same Angel Island that is featured in ''VideoGame/Sonic3AndKnuckles'' and ''VideoGame/SonicAdventure''.
122	* FlunkyBoss: The Egg Cube in Toy Kingdom spews out a bunch of toy soldiers at random intervals and uses Gemerl as a bomb and mace. After pushing the machine back far enough to initiate the "Pinch" music, the soldiers start coming out at a much faster pace.
123	* FriendlyFire: In 2, Sonic has to destroy the robot boss holding his friends hostage. He manages to save Cream and Tails by destroying the robots holding them. For Knuckles, however, who was sealed inside the robot, Sonic destroys said robot, but burns Knuckles in the process. Knuckles chases Sonic in anger for this.
124	* FrigidWaterIsHarmless: Ice Mountain Zone and Twinkle Snow, respectively in the first and third games, which are both half-underwater and allow Sonic to swim freely in the icy water.
125	* FurryConfusion: Cream the Rabbit is a playable character in the second game. When Badniks are defeated, the animal used to power it pops out. One of the animals that can pop out is a significantly less anthropomorphic rabbit.
126	* GameBreakingBug: Erasing the save file in ''1'' or ''2'' (sometimes?) causes the Tiny Chao Garden to stop collecting rings. It can only be fixed by collecting as many rings as you had when you erased the file, or transferring your rings to a ''VideoGame/SonicAdventure game''. Fortunately, ''VideoGame/SonicPinballParty'', which also features this minigame, does not have this glitch.
127	* GameplayAndStorySegregation: In ''Advance 3'', in the cutscene [[spoiler:preceding the TrueFinalBoss, Ultimate Gemerl]], Sonic gets hit twice--complete with MercyInvincibility flashing--and even if he has no Rings, he's none the worse for wear.
128	* GetBackHereBoss: Every boss except the last in ''Advance 2''.
129	* GravityScrew: Cyber Track in the third game, Egg Utopia in the second, and Egg Rocket and Cosmic Angel in the first game. Also applies to Chaos Angel's boss in the third game via a tube on either side of the arena.
130	* GreenHillZone: Leaf Forest in the second game and Sunset Hill (which doubles as a NostalgiaLevel) in the third. Oddly enough, Neo Green Hill from the first is less like this and more like PalmtreePanic.
131	* GuideDangIt:
132	** Sky Canyon in the second game is almost as infamous for this as [[VideoGame/Sonic3AndKnuckles Carnival Night Zone's "Barrel of Doom"]], as there is a specific moment where it is ''mandatory'' to use an R-Button trick to get through part of the level as Sonic, a move you'll only know how to do if you read the manual.
133	** Some Special Springs in ''1'' (protip: Ice Mountain has two), Special Rings in ''2'' (''especially'' them) and the Chao in ''3'' might be very difficult for the player to locate. Bottomless pits, pesky speed boosters and [[{{Backtracking}} unbacktrackable]] areas tend to make exploration even more difficult.
134	** Unlocking characters in ''3''. Unlocking a character requires the player to beat certain levels with Sonic as the leader (Sunset Hill Act 3, Toy Kingdom Act 3 and Cyber Track Act 3). However, there is no clear indication that the player ''needs'' to be Sonic in order to unlock everyone, so the player could go through the game with Tails as the leader and reach the end without unlocking anybody else.
135	** As mentioned in BackThatLightUp, ''3'' offers multiple color suited for the Game Boy Advance, the SP and the Game Boy Player, but the most the manual hints at that is mentioning that the R button adjusts color settings. That you do this on the title screen is entirely up to the player to figure out on their own.
136	* HardLevelsEasyBosses: What Amy's playthrough in the first game amounts to. Since she moves slower than everyone else, can't turn into a ball to damage enemies, and doesn't have any midair abilities like flying or gliding, she has to take more care when planning routes through stages and fighting enemies. When you get to the bosses, though, the extra attack range granted by her hammer lets her make short work of them, often allowing her to hit the boss at times when the others couldn't quite reach.
137	* HighTechHexagons: Two of the three games featured high-tech, futuristic levels, both of which featured hexagons ad nauseum.
138	* HoppingMachine: The Egg Press, one of Eggman's mechs in the first game. It returns in the third game; see RecurringBoss below.
139	* HubLevel: For all seven zones in the third game, in a style not too dissimilar to the hubs of the ''Franchise/{{Kirby}}'' games.
140	* HumongousMecha: The Super Eggrobo, the TrueFinalBoss of ''Sonic Advance''. It returns as the Super Eggrobo Z and then the Hyper Eggrobo in ''Sonic Advance 2'' and ''Sonic Advance 3''.
141	* IdleAnimation:
142	** In the third game, since you play in teams of two, every character has at least two idle animations for whether they're in the lead or as support.
143	*** Sonic in the lead lays down on his side and closes his eyes while a [[VisibleSilence ... bubble]] appears over his head. In the back, he stands straight while scratching his ear and pointing at you to get moving.
144	*** Tails in the lead sits down and starts fiddling with his legs and looking around. In the back, he pulls out a pair of binoculars out of nowhere, looks around, and then turns to the screen and starts pointing to the direction he's sprite is facing as if telling you "look over there!"
145	*** Knuckles at the front makes some practice jabs and then starts doing pushups. In the back, he stands perfectly still with his arms crossed and his eyes closed, though he occasionally opens one eye to glare at the player.
146	*** Cream in the front sits down and falls asleep. In the back, she curiously stares at something on the ground.
147	*** Amy in the lead starts fiddling with her feet before sitting down, resting her face on her hands and skygazing. In the back, she appears to spot something in the distance and then turns to the screen and beckons you over. When she's paired up with Sonic (with him at the front), she leans down to look at something; if you position them right, as in, sonic in front of Amy with both pointed forward, it looks like she's observing him as he rests. She also has a different "about to move" animation with him, as she now has hearts floating off her head. Her animation doesn't change if she's in the lead and Sonic in the back.
148	** Bizarrely, the second game does have those as well, but they're only accessible by holding up on the D-Pad for whatever reason.
149	*** Sonic stretches out his legs and then starts repeatedly grinding his foot on the ground.
150	*** Cream gets an ice cream cone from... [[{{Hammerspace}} somewhere]] and starts licking it (while Cheese begs for some through PuppyDogEyes).
151	*** Tails falls asleep.
152	*** Knuckles adjusts his gloves and performs some practice jabs.
153	*** Amy briefly yawns, [[AsideGlance notices the player]] and begins hopping in place to keep herself active.
154	* JackOfAllStats: Knuckles. The first game's game guide gives him slightly above average in each of the three stats (Speed, Jumping, Special Skills). It also [[JustifiedTrope makes sense]] when you consider that he's normally a LightningBruiser.
155	* LegacyBossBattle:
156	** A Pre-FinalBoss example. In ''Sonic Advance''[='=]s [[spoiler:final stage, Dr. Eggman reprises the first bosses from both ''[[VideoGame/SonicTheHedgehog1 Sonic the Hedgehog]]'' and ''VideoGame/SonicTheHedgehog2'', complete with the boss themes from both games, before the actual FinalBoss battle occurs. And there seems to be no other reason for Eggman to go to the trouble of reenacting fights that he had lost before]].
157	** The first phase of the Mecha Knuckles fight is a direct imitation of Knuckles' boss fight from ''VideoGame/Sonic3AndKnuckles''.
158	* LethalJokeCharacter: Amy Rose in the first game is slow and can't roll. However, she has a high jump and can attack from standing without needing to build up speed (this includes an absurdly fast dash attack.) She also has a better attack range due to her Piko Piko Hammer. Her skills allow her to completely trivialize some bosses. For example, the underwater fight in Ice Mountain by high jumping to the top of the screen (and catching a breath) and smacking Eggman on the way down.
159	* LethalLavaLand: Hot Crater Zone in the second game is [[InformedAttribute claimed to be one]], but it's only indicated by the name and the warm glow of the background scenery - the player encounters no lava whatsoever in the actual stage. Played straight in Secret Base Zone of ''Advance'', on the other hand.
160	* LetsYouAndHimFight: Knuckles is tricked into fighting Sonic again by Eggman in ''Sonic Advance 2'', becoming the pilot of the boss machine in Sky Canyon when you're playing as Sonic for the first time. This only happens when you reach this boss (the Egg Saucer) as Sonic for the first time; if you reach this boss as any other character or you replay it as Sonic after beating Knuckles and unlocking him, the machine will have Eggman himself in the cockpit like all of the boss rush bosses and will use the standard boss theme.
161	* LoadBearingBoss: Beating 2's final boss causes Egg Utopia to fall and explode. Strange though, given said boss is fought in XX Zone, which is shown on the map to be a separate space station to Egg Utopia.
162	* LongSongShortScene:
163	** You're likely to blaze through [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xj_FcYVPa6c X-Zone]] in ''Sonic Advance'' and reach the bosses before you hear even 10 seconds of what's a 90 second song. This is likely why XX in ''Sonic Advance 2'' is one long song throughout the entire zone up until the final boss.
164	** ''Sonic Advance 2'' has the two tracks that play when Vanilla is kidnapped, and Sonic turns into his Super form. The theme of "True Area 53" is a BossRemix of those two songs.
165	** ''Sonic Advance 3'' has the two songs used in the cutscene that plays before the TrueFinalBoss, [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mGaPxKHR6Ic EX Demo 1]] and [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D2Qx63K1vGA EX Demo 2]]. The former is an extended version of the song that plays in the intro cutscene, while the latter is a TriumphantReprise of the opening theme used for [[spoiler:Super Sonic's transformation scene.]] The former song has more than a minute to it, but only plays for about 18 seconds and gets interrupted by the latter song, which plays for about 22 seconds before being cut off by the level completing, despite being roughly twice as long as the scene it's used for. Fortunately, if you want to hear them in full, they both exist in the SoundTest.
166	* MarathonLevel:
167	** Egg Rocket in the first game, which has you going through three sections with a 5-minute time limit for each.
168	** ''Advance 3's'' zones have three acts instead of two, which makes some of them feel quite long. The first two acts of Chaos Angel in particular can easily go up to 4 minutes.
169	* MechanicallyUnusualFighter: Given the precedent for playable characters to mostly play like Sonic, Amy mixes things up in ''Advance 1'' by a significant degree simply by being unable to curl up into a ball at all. In order to damage enemies she has to manually attack with her hammer, and instead of a spin dash she simply does a quick hop forward. She is brought more in line with everyone else in ''Advance 2'' and then regains some of her unique attributes in ''Advance 3'', even passing them on to the other characters if she is chosen as a partner.
170	* MemoryMatchMiniGame: The Tiny Chao Garden in ''Advance'', ''Advance 2'' and ''VideoGame/SonicPinballParty'' features the Chao Memory mini-game, where you try to match up seven pairs of cards while a Chao moves them around.
171	* MetropolisLevel: ''Sonic Advance 3'' opens with Route 99, a colourful highway littered with obstacles, with numerous modern skyscrapers filling the background.
172	* MiniMe: If Cream is equipped as a sidekick in ''Advance 3'', using her Tag Action will temporarily transform Cheese the Chao's appearance to resemble the character that's partnered with Cream. For Sonic, he becomes blue with spines and ears; for Tails, he turns yellow and gains ears, outwards-poking hair strands, and two tails; for Knuckles, he changes to red and gains Knuckles' hair and white chest marking; and for Amy, he turns pink and gains her hair and ears.
173	* MythologyGag:
174	** The first ''Sonic Advance'' has a cheat code that allows Tails to follow Sonic in normal play, à la ''VideoGame/SonicTheHedgehog2''.
175	** [[EvilKnockoff Mecha Knuckles]], the boss of ''Advance's'' Angel Island Zone, initially appears as a PaletteSwap of Knuckles--the palette in question is a throwback to ''VideoGame/Sonic3AndKnuckles'', where Knuckles' {{NPC}} appearances gave him magenta fur and, [[https://s3unlocked.blogspot.com/2017/06/why-is-knuckles-colored-different-in.html thanks to a glitch]], yellow socks. Mecha Knuckles even throws in yellow gloves, either for funsies or as a second throwback to Knuckles' [[UpgradeArtifact Fighting Gloves]] from ''VideoGame/SonicAdventure''.
176	** In ''Sonic Advance 2'', Tails is rescued from Dr. Eggman in [[BandLand Music Plant Zone]], calling back to [[VideoGame/TailsAndTheMusicMaker his own venture into music]].
177	** Knuckles' grounded tag action in ''3'' allows you to throw him forwards to attack enemies and walls, much like you could in ''VideoGame/KnucklesChaotix.''
178	* {{Nerf}}: Cream was a MasterOfAll and DiscOneNuke in one package in ''2,'' having flight, decent mobility, a spammable, ranged homing attack to effortlessly destroy bosses with, and was unlocked as early as the ''first zone.'' In ''3,'' not only is she the very ''last'' character to be found, but she was given the NecessaryDrawback of having mediocre-at-best tag teams with other characters (with Amy's and Tails' [[PowerupLetdown outright removing her Cheese attack and flight abilities]] respectively), and the more stationary and gimmicky nature of the bosses means that while playing as her can still make them easier, she won't CurbStompBattle them like before.
179	* NintendoHard: It is hard to meet the requirements to get to the Special Stages in all three, but this is compounded by:
180	** In the second game, you have to collect seven very well hidden SP Rings and not die at all before finishing a stage. Many of these rings were in difficult to access areas and backtracking was hard and, in some cases, impossible. Dying made you lose everything, forcing you to restart the entire stage. On top of that, you only got one shot a finishing the special stage; failing meant doing all of that over again.
181	** ''Sonic Advance 3'', on the other hand, had you searching for ''ten'' well hidden Chao spread between the three zones and the area map. Fortunately, the Chao garden will tell you the number of Chao in each zone and the map. ''Un''fortunately, there was no official strategy guide for this game, unlike the other two, meaning you had to look online or explore almost every path to find them all. You permanently collect a Chao once getting it, which is fortunate, because some require specific teams or multiple playthroughs. When you have all 10, you have to find a key hidden ''somewhere'' in that game's considerably expansive levels and finish the stage with it (losing it if you die). They were mercifully often out in the open, they also had multiple locations within a stage making dying not as much of a problem (although you could only collect one per run through a stage), and you could have up to nine at once (nine separate tries).
182	** ''Sonic Advance 2'' may have had the hardest activation of the Special Stages, but their stages were '''much''' easier than the ones in ''Sonic Advance 1'' or ''3''. ''3''[='=]s stages were incredibly difficult compared to the previous game, especially the last one, and while the first and second games had strategy guides published to walk you through the locations of everything important, the third game didn't have one to help you out, so you were completely on your own for that one.
183	* NoobBridge: In ''Sonic Advance 2'', first act of ''Sky Canyon Zone'', it's impossible to progress without using an air jump move that's only usable while not in ball form. (Up + R) If you miss it the first time, you'll end up in a pretty dangerous area with [[KaizoTrap blind platforming]]. Continue on and you'll reach another point where you must use the move or die, and the only hint is a bunch of rings shaped like an up arrow.
184	* NostalgiaLevel:
185	** Several from ''Sonic Advance'': Neo Green Hill Zone, Casino Paradise, Cosmic Angel/X-Zone and The Moon are all obvious homages to [[VideoGame/SonicTheHedgehog1 Green Hill Zone]], [[VideoGame/SonicTheHedgehog2 Casino Night]], [[VideoGame/Sonic3AndKnuckles the Death Egg and The Doomsday respectively.]]
186	** Angel Island from ''Advance 1'' and Chaos Angel from ''Advance 3'' are set in the same Angel Island from ''3'' and ''Adventure''.
187	** Sunset Hill in ''Advance 3'' is what Green Hill became after Eggman's reality warping experiments at the beginning of the game. Oddly enough, despite playing Green Hill's theme song it has nothing that evokes the original Green Hill in its level design and instead is reminiscent of Neo Green Hill and Angel Island from ''Advance 1''.
188	* NotTheFallThatKillsYou: In ''Advance 2'', [[spoiler:after clearing True Area 53, Sonic loses his Super form and has to desperately dive to catch Vanilla. How exactly this constitutes saving her is not made clear, though the ending cutscene seems to suggest that he ''can'' fly in his normal state, [[NewPowersAsThePlotDemands suddenly]]]].
189	%%* OneWingedAngel: [[spoiler:Gemerl is the TrueFinalBoss of the third game, though granted he changes form for nearly every boss anyway.]]
190	%%* OxygenMeter: As is typical of 2D Sonic games.
191	%%* PinballZone: Casino Paradise in the first game.
192	* PlatformBattle: The Egg Chaser from ''Advance 3''. This one had Sonic and co. jumping up a series of platforms that fall under them, and the goal is to get the platforms to drop onto Eggman. He was equipped with a spiked ball and chain that could cause you to lose your balance, and missing a jump meant falling into a bottomless pit (the pit goes away when the Egg Chaser is destroyed).
193	* RecurringBoss:
194	** The [=EggHammerTank=] from ''VideoGame/SonicPocketAdventure'' appears in both Sonic ''Advance 1'' and ''2'', and gets a SpiritualSuccessor in ''3''.[[note]]The third game's hammer boss also shows up in ''VideoGame/SonicRush''.[[/note]] There are other throwbacks as well: ''Advance 2''[='=]s Techno Base Boss is a improved version of ''Pocket Adventure''[='=]s Secret Plant Boss, for example.
195	** It also applies across the games themselves: The boss of Cosmic Angel from the first is slightly altered and appears as Chaos Angel's boss from the 3rd. Ocean Base's boss feels like a [[JustForFun/XMeetsY cross]] between the bosses of Secret Base in the first game and Egg Utopia in the second game.
196	* RevisitingTheRoots: The Advance games are heavily based on the Genesis trilogy of old, albeit with a few minor physics tweaks thanks to the Platform/GameBoyAdvance's hardware.
197	* RingOutBoss: The boss in the third game's Toy Kingdom Zone, the Egg Cube. This one does not have a health meter; you just have to keep hitting Eggman and his cockpit when it's exposed to push him and the machine into a bottomless pit.
198	* RiseToTheChallenge: The boss in Twinkle Snow (in the third game) does this with a [[BottomlessPits bottomless pit]]. It, along with the Toy Kingdom, Cyber Track and Altar Emerald bosses, are the only boss fights in the trilogy with Bottomless Pits involved.
199	* RoboticReveal: Mecha Knuckles in the first game, halfway through the fight.
200	* SchrodingersCanon: While the games are not considered mainline platformers which normally have dubious continuity placement, most people tend to consider them canon anyway because of Cream's introduction and first meeting with Sonic in the second game. They were later confirmed canon when the game-canon ''WesternAnimation/SonicPrime'' flashed back to the third installment in a third season episode.
201	* ScreenCrunch: ''Sonic N'' was a victim of the N-Gage's vertically oriented screen--you can ''barely'' see ahead of Sonic making the whole game one giant LuckBasedMission. There is an option to letterbox the screen allowing you to see more but it's too small to make anything out, making it useless.
202	* SecretCharacter:
203	** Amy Rose has become this in ''Advance 2''. Only becoming playable after completing and collecting the 7 Chaos Emeralds with all 4 characters.
204	** Knuckles, Amy and Cream in ''Advance 3'' can only be playable after beating Act 3 of Sunset Hill, Toy Kingdom and Cyber Track as Sonic specifically.
205	* ShoutOut:
206	** Where have we seen a [[BandLand music level]] in [[VideoGame/{{Ristar}} a SEGA game]] before?
207	** The HumongousMecha that serves as the FinalBoss of ''Sonic Advance 2'' is called the Super [[Anime/MazingerZ EggRobo Z]].
208	* SkyscraperCity: Route 99 in the third game. A similar city also appears in ''Advance 2's'' Ice Paradise Zone, but is only a background element to an otherwise ordinary ice level.
209	* SlippySlideyIceWorld: All three games feature this kind of zone, the ones in the first (Ice Mountain Zone) and the third (Twinkle Snow) doubling as water levels.
210	* SoLastSeason: Downplayed. The upgraded versions of the HumongousMecha TrueFinalBoss from ''Sonic Advance'' are {{Degraded\|Boss}} to merely the {{Final Boss}}es of ''Advance 2'' and ''Advance 3''.
211	* SoundTest: All three games feature one in their respective Options menus. The first game has it available from the beginning (with extra tracks unlocked after beating the TrueFinalBoss), the second game has it unlockable by beating the game with all Chaos Emeralds for two characters, and the third game has it unlockable by beating the FinalBoss.
212	* SoundtrackDissonance: Chaos Angel Act 1 has appropriate music for the setting, but Act 2 is a bit too slow and atmospheric for the action you get, and Act 3's music is way too frantic for the floating platform ride that the level is.
213	* SpaceZone: The TrueFinalBoss in all three, along with X-Zone from the first, and Egg Utopia and XX from the second.
214	* SpeedEchoes: Get fast enough in the second and third games, and afterimages follow you. The distance between the echo and the character depends on how fast they're moving. Sonic has to be on the team to achieve this in the third game.
215	** ''Sonic Advance 3'', with its two-man team gameplay, is one for ''VideoGame/KnucklesChaotix''.
216	* StationaryBoss: The final boss of the main game in ''Sonic Advance 2'' is a giant robot that stays on the right of the room that fires its arms and shoots lasers from its eyes. It won't move; the player has to use rising platforms to reach and smack the bot in the head.
217	* TheStarscream: [[spoiler:Gemerl, similar to his original, goes berserk from the Emeralds' power and turns on Eggman in the climax of the third game.]]
218	* StealthSequel: ''Advance 3'' to ''VideoGame/SonicBattle'', since the game reuses more than a few tracks from the latter and features a reincarnated Emerl as Eggman's right-hand man [[spoiler:and ultimately concludes his story arc as he's reprogrammed to his old self in the game's true ending.]]
219	* SuperMode: Super Sonic appears in every game to defeat the TrueFinalBoss.
220	* SuperNotDrowningSkills: Sonic gets the ability to breathe underwater indefinitely if Cream is his partner in the third game.
221	* SuperTitle64Advance: A trademark of the Game Boy Advance was to give the "Advance" title to the games themselves. All three games do this.
222	* TacticalSuicideBoss: Ice Mountain Zone in the first game. In that boss battle, Dr. Robotnik's only attack in the underwater battle is to drop ice spikes from the ceiling, which allows Sonic to get additional air or in range of making attacks.
223	* TeethClenchedTeamwork: If you select Sonic and Knuckles as a team in the third game, both of their expressions are rather uncomfortable and disdainful. "Fighting Buddies" indeed. [[spoiler:Surprisingly this ''does not'' apply to Eggman, who encourages Super Sonic to use tag action to help defeat the TrueFinalBoss]].
224	* TempleOfDoom: Chaos Angel in the third game. Includes LiftOfDoom in Act 3, but there is an alternate route...
225	* TennisBoss: The Cyber Track boss in the third game, the Egg Pinball, where you must hit its projectiles and hope they bounce back into Eggman (he speeds up his shots with every hit he takes). The TrueFinalBoss in ''Advance 2'' is also defeated this way.
226	* TheVeryDefinitelyFinalDungeon: Cosmic Angel in ''1'', Egg Utopia in ''2'', and Chaos Angel in ''3'', but ''Advance 3's'' Chaos Angel goes above and beyond, floating high in the sky, with distorted skies and floating chunks of the planet above the clouds. With fitting doomy music to match.
227	* ThisIsADrill: The Egg Spider found in Ice Mountain Zone in ''1'' is equipped with a drill and drills the ceiling to make ice stalactites fall on the player. The player must use the stalactites to reach and hit the machine.
228	* TimedMission: As first seen in ''VideoGame/SonicPocketAdventure'', this series subverts the trope by letting the player disable the time limit at the options screen.
229	** Egg Rocket in the first game makes you go up a rocket and gives you five minutes to reach a certain point. When you reach that point, the timer resets and you now have five minutes to reach the next point. This continues until you eventually reach the goal.
230	* TitleScream: In the third game. And it is [[LargeHam hamtastic]]. (The title was softly spoken in the second game.)
231	* ToyTime: Toy Kingdom in the third game.
232	* TrialAndErrorGameplay: Probably the biggest fault of the ''Advance'' trilogy. Later stages in the games are ''infamous'' for abusing 'gotcha' traps that are impossible to see coming. While the original Genesis games could be guilty of this to a degree, ''Advance'' abuses such traps in its final stages that one will become wary of ''ever'' trusting a spring/boost pad.
233	* TrueFinalBoss: All three games have one if you collect all 7 Chaos Emeralds in the Special Stages. The games all have Sonic become Super Sonic for these fights. The first two games pit Sonic against a large robot and a shooting/sucking machine, respectively, [[spoiler:but the third game features a Super Sonic/Eggman team-up against Ultimate Gemerl]].
234	* TubeTravel: Secret Base, Egg Rocket, Music Plant, and Ocean Base all have such a gimmick.
235	* TurnsRed:
236	** The first Egghammer in Neo Green Hill Zone Act 2 is simple, but once Eggman's down to one hit, he'll use the hammer to propel his machine into the air and use '''it''' as a hammer.
237	** After delivering 6 hits to the Egg Press in Secret Base, Eggman will jump off the top of the screen. Be ready to spindash and jump when he comes down, as not only will he track the player, but he'll make the ground shake when he lands, which will damage the player if they are not in the air.
238	** After taking enough hits, the Egg Spider will start drilling down more stalactites, with the robot dropping four when it's down to one hit.
239	** After hitting Mecha Knuckles 4 times in Angel Island, he explodes, his synthetic skin comes off Terminator-style, and he starts firing homing missiles in addition to using punching attacks.
240	** The Ice Paradise boss in ''2'' begins dropping its bombs at a faster rate after 4 hits.
241	** There are two targets on the Egg Saucer in Sky Canyon: the cockpit, and a laser turret. Destroying the turret will cause the main hand to become more frantic when it attacks.
242	** The boss of Sunset Hill in ''3'', once it's down to one hit, will just roll around the arena rather than back and forth.
243	** After delivering 4 hits to the Egg Gravity in Chaos Angel, Eggman will start spinning his machine around with each subsequent hit until the last one, which destroys the machine.
244	* TwoGirlsToATeam: Played straight in 3 where Cream becomes the second playable female in the series and that Amy and Cream can be a team together. They even have a team name in "Team Jubilee".
245	* UnderTheSea: Ice Mountain, Ocean Base and Twinkle Snow. Despite the names, Ocean Base has much less underwater platforming than Twinkle Snow does (both are from ''3''), and ''Advance 2'' foregoes having a water zone entirely, with Leaf Forest Act 1 having a couple of pools of it making up all the water in the game.
246	* UnderwaterBase: Ocean Base in the third game.
247	* UnderwaterBossBattle: The fight against Eggman in the first game's Ice Mountain has your character submerged in water that reaches near the top of the screen, while Eggman, from up top, periodically causes icicles to fall into the water. After falling, they embed in the floor temporarily, allowing your character to use their flat tops to get extra height for both precious air and a chance to smack Eggman's machine.
248	* UnwillingSuspension: Tails in ''Sonic Advance 2'', at the boss of Music Plant Zone.
249	* UselessUsefulSpell:
250	** Played mostly straight in ''2''. When you go into boost mode, you can a special attack that would let you attack while losing a bit of speed and momentum. Most of these attacks were useless because there very rarely are any enemies in your path to use it on and since you're going that fast, you'll likely already be hit or react too late to use it. The only somewhat useful one (fittingly) is Cream's Chao rolling attack, which gives you a split second barrier and attacks enemies while still running. Even still, there are very few points in the game where you'll ever use the attacks.
251	** In ''2,'' even basic abilities like flying, gliding and attacking often fall to the wayside as the levels aren't really designed around exploration and your jump and roll will handle basic enemies just fine, so it's rarely worth killing your momentum to use them. Even against bosses, all but Cream's attack are useless as the boss moves away far too fast to ever hit with most attacks, and you can't enter Boost mode to use your boost attacks there, either.
252	* WarmUpBoss: All three games have their first boss be a mech with a giant hammer that tends to be easy.
253	* WheelOFeet: Used only with Sonic, and only in the first game.

Context VideoGame / SonicAdvanceTrilogy