Hardest Sonic Games to 100% Complete

Most of the time, Sonic games aren’t too much of a strain to beat. Just jump a few times here, spindash or boost there, and with enough care and attention, players will get to the end pretty quickly. But it’s never enough to just "beat" a Sonic game. There’s always a set of Chaos Emeralds to collect, or side-missions to do, time trials to complete, and other extras that need attention.

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Doing some of these activities often just gets the player an extra achievement, or it can get them a whole new ending. Either way, they’re needed if the player wants to do everything they can possibly do in the game. However, completing some Sonic games 100% are more difficult than others, with these being the hardest of the bunch.

8 Sonic the Hedgehog 2

Unlocking The Game True Ending

Beating Sonic the Hedgehog 2 isn't too bad, no matter how hard Metropolis Zone gets. Its true challenge comes in collecting all 7 Chaos Emeralds to get Super Sonic and the game's true ending. To do this, the player has to collect 50 rings, pass by a checkpoint, and then jump into the stars that appear above it. This will send them to a special stage, where Sonic has to collect enough rings to earn the Emerald. Repeat that 6 more times to get them all.

In the original Genesis game, the rough draw distance made it just as easy to run into a bomb as a set of rings. This is something Tails would often do anyway, causing players to lose their precious rings. The player would then have to collect another set of 50 rings and find another checkpoint to give it another go if they failed. Thankfully, later ports of the game would fix this by either implementing save states or by remaking the stages entirely to make them fairer.

7 Sonic ‘06

Broken Sections, Poor Controls, & A Challenging Final Stage

Sonic the Hedgehog for the Xbox 360 & PS3, or Sonic ’06 for short, is infamous for its bugs, wonky gameplay, rough level design, and iffy story. Some think it’s over-hated, pointing out its rather nice music and neat character moments as some of its positive features. But overall, it’s still the Blue Blur’s nadir in gaming.

It’s also pretty tricky to complete because of its issues. Sonic’s campaign has the awkward Mach Speed sections that can send him breakdancing into obstacles. Shadow’s vehicles are awkward to control, and Silver’s telekinetic puzzles can be quite broken. That's without getting into its tense final story mission. Compared to that, the side activities are a relief, but beating Sonic '06 100% is a lot of work for a small reward.

6 Shadow the Hedgehog

Need To Beat Levels Multiple Times To Unlock Final Mission

That said, Sonic’s reputation had already taken a few hits by the time Sonic ’06 came out, or shots in this case. Shadow the Hedgehog gave Sonic’s rival guns and a bunch of vehicles to use, since it worked for Grand Theft Auto. But then GTA wasn't made up of five linear pathways determined by good, evil, and neutral missions. Sometimes they’re as simple as "get to the Chaos Emerald," or "destroy the President's plane."

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Other times, it requires going back and forth in a linear section to beat 40-50+ goons or collect the same number of collectibles. Each path has to be beaten twice to get its two different endings, and players have to get all 10 endings before they can get the Last Story mission. Overall, the game has to be beaten 11 times just to fully complete it once. There are harder games, though there are few that drain the player's patience as much as this one.

5 Sonic Frontiers

The Final Horizon DLC

One of the problems with Sonic games is that they replace a working formula with room for improvement with a completely new one that can end up being a bit of a mess. The Adventure games were replaced with the trio-based gameplay in Sonic Heroes. The boost games were replaced with Sonic: Lost World’s cylindrical parkour. Then Sonic Frontiers introduced a wide-open world for the hedgehog to explore.

The new combat gameplay, bullet hell segments, and cyberspace levels could be pains in the neck, but they weren’t exactly a nightmare to deal with, unlike the Final Horizon DLC. Its challenges include climbing a tall tower in one go with no checkpoints, and defeating every boss in the game without taking a hit. It’s since been toned down a touch with a patch, but for a while, it was the biggest obstacle keeping players from platinuming the game.

4 Sonic Adventure 2

Need To Get A-Ranks For All Missions

Completing all three story campaigns in Sonic Adventure 2 is a challenge in itself. Sonic and Shadow’s levels are fun and fine enough, but the mech levels with Dr Eggman and Tails are clunky, and Knuckles and Rouge's Emerald Hunting levels are chores to get through. The Chao Garden games are much more easygoing, though if players aren't into virtual pet sims, these can require more patience to get through.

The real challenge is getting all the emblems which, on top of doing all that, also requires beating every level and its missions with A-ranks. This involves finding missing Chaos, finishing the races without hitting other cars, beating the levels on Hard mode, and more, with the most points in the quickest amount of time. The completionist’s reward for all this is a 3D version of Green Hill Zone from Sonic 1. It's sweet, but not worth the investment.

3 Sonic Unleashed

Long & Exhausting Final Stage + Plenty Of Side Content

Sonic has used all sorts of techniques to gain more speed, from the Peel-Out in Sonic CD to the Super Spindash in Sonic 2 onwards. The most famous one nowadays is the Boost which, after debuting in Sonic Rush, made its way into the main games via Sonic Unleashed. The game was considered an improvement over the likes of Shadow and Sonic '06, or half an improvement anyway.

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Sonic rushing around the world during the day was received with praise. Him turning into a Werehog and pummeling monsters God of War-style at night was less praise-worthy. Both came with tricky side missions and testing Hot Dog time trials. Throw in Eggmanland, the difficult final level (complete with time trials!) And janky Dark Gaia boss, and players will wish they had the smaller but much easier Wii port in their hands instead.

2 Sonic Advance 3

Frustrating Collectibles

Before Sonic Rush made boosting a full-on mechanic, Dimps made it a feature in the Sonic Advance trilogy. If the player kept their momentum going, they could move faster and perform extra attacks. Sonic Advance 3 limited this to speed-type characters like Sonic himself, but they could still be done via the special Tag Actions the different character combinations could do.

Unfortunately, SA3 is considered the weakest of the trilogy, with more slippery controls and awkward level design that the new tag gameplay can’t always mitigate. This is a shame, as beating the game 100% means exploring those dodgy levels for 10 Chao per Zone, and its hidden key, just to access the special stage for a Chaos Emerald. Then they have to collect enough rings while riding the Tornado plane, where the biggest enemy is depth perception.

1 Sonic Advance 2

Collect All The Special Rings Without Failure

That said, at least SA3 offers the player some mercy. They don’t have to find all 10 Chao or the hidden key in one go. Then, if they fail the special stage, they can jump on its special spring and try again. Its predecessor, Sonic Advance 2, is considered the better game in terms of controls and level design, but much worse for completionists. This time, they’d have to find 7 special rings hidden per stage to access the special stage and get a shot at the Chaos Emerald.

The stages themselves weren’t too hard to beat once they were accessed, as they were an open-world section where the player could rush around, smash badniks, and grab rings. But the special rings were hard to find, and failing the stage meant having to collect them all over again from scratch. Even worse, players had to get all the Chaos Emeralds with all four characters individually just to unlock Amy Rose for one more playthrough. Needless to say, most of them don't find it worth the effort.

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