This is the most underrated Sonic game ever. What's wrong with you people? This is a great game!
Story: The story is nothing special. Basically, Dr. Eggman has built a fleet of ships to blow sh*t up and also kidnapped Froggy (Big's frog), and a chao named Chocola. He also tricked the detective agency, Team Chaotix (Espio the Chameleon, Charmy Bee, and Vector the Crocodile.) into helping him. The heroes of the game all go to beat the crap out of him (Though only Chaotix succeeds in kicking the living daylights out of him.). It turns out that the old antagonist, Metal Sonic, is behind this whole thing and HOLY CHEESE HE LOOKS AWESOME! This is hands down the coolest version of Metal Sonic in existence. Granted, there aren't many versions of Metal Sonic because most of them are Mecha Sonic (Yes, they are two different characters.), but this version is awesome. He transforms into, sigh... the coolest boss in Sonic history. Yeah. He's got flamethrowers, spikes, ice cannons, rocket launchers, lasers, and Chaos Control (For those who've not played other Sonic games, chaos control is the ability to control time and space.). The entire reason Metal Sonic transformed was to fufill his life's purpose, kill Sonic. Why is it that the only villain to canonically kill Sonic was not only introduced in a bad game, but a complete coward as well? Metal Sonic should kill Sonic and then become super powerful! So what happens? Sonic turns into super sonic to fight Metal Sonic. And he dies. After killing Sonic, Metal Sonic finally realizes how empty his life truly is without Sonic and tries to cope with the world around him. He truly learns what life is like for a machine. NAH! Just kidding! Sonic wins! Everyone goes home while Eggman gets the sh*t kicked out of him once again by Chaotix.
Design: The graphics are pretty good, but they don't show off the Gamecube's full potential. We know it's capable of great graphics because we played Metroid Prime and Resident Evil 4! I'm annoying myself again. The level design is pretty damn cool too. Depending on which team you play as, the layout of the level will be completely different. There are 7 zones, with 2 stages and 1 boss stage. And then the final boss, which has two forms. The first form has three parts, one as Team Rose, one as Team Chaotix, then one as Team Dark. The second form is the Super Sonic battle. Those are becoming standard now. Each level is designed with interesting layouts. You have to adjust to the objects found in each zone. There's an oceanic palace zone, a futuristic city zone, a casino zone, a canyon base zone, a forest zone, a castle zone, and finally, Eggman's fleet. The music in the game is also quite memorable. You'll never forget Metal Sonic's theme once you hear it. What I'm Made Of. It's a good song, and it perfectly fits the character. His one ambition to be the best. The game is well designed. Just so people know, by holding A and X before a match in the multiplayer, you can play as metallic versions of the playable characters.
Gameplay: The gameplay itself is team-based. You have three characters that you need to switch between. You have all of the things that you've come to expect, spinning, the homing attack, flying, gliding, grinding on rails, all of that's here. We now also have Team Blast. Each Team Blast has a different effect. Team Sonic's team blast allows Sonic to use an ultimate homing attack by jumping into the air and pressing B after using the team blast. Team Dark's team blast causes chaos control, stopping time. Team Rose's nabs you power ups. And Team Chaotix's gets you rings. Each stage is fun to play, each extra mission challenging, each boss fight rewarding, each multiplayer mode fun, and each team different. I also noticed that the boss battles have a pattern. First, you fight one of the Doctor's machines, then you fight another team, then you fight waves of small enemies. Rinse and repeat. There are 7 multiplayer modes: Action Race, Battle, Special Stage, Ring Race, Bobsled Race, Quick Race, and Expert Race. In Action Race, you race your opponent to the goal in 3 stages: Seaside Hill, Grand Metropolis, and BINGO Highway. The Battle mode is unlocked after gaining 20 emblems. Two teams fight to the death on three small arenas: City Top, Casino Ring, and Turtle Shell. Special Stage is the same as the special stages in the main game. This mode requires 40 emblems. In the ring race, the object is to collect as many rings as possible (Duh). The stages are Egg Treat: A ring spouting boss from the main game. 60 seconds. Pinball Match: Collect Rings from the pinball machine. 120 seconds. And Hot Elevator: Collect rings from the Power Plant elevator. 60 Seconds. This mode requires 60 emblems. In Bobsled Race, you use the bobsled from Seaside Hill and Bullet Station for a race. You race through a Seaside, City, or Casino course. This mode requires 80 emblems. Quick Race sends you into a short enemy-filled course with the goal being to get to the goal. The stages are Road Rock, Mad Express, and Terror Hall. This mode requires 100 emblems. The Expert race, I've never played, so I had to look this up. You race through shortened versions of Rail Canyon, Frog Forest, or Egg Fleet. This requires 120 emblems. There's not much reason to play the multiplayer mode because it's not like the Sonic Adventure 2 multiplayer because it has few stages, different modes require emblems, every stage is too short, and several other problems. Stick to the main game.
Overall, this truly is a great addition to the series. This is the last Sonic game made before the time he started falling in 2005. If you want to play the last great console Sonic game, this is it, Sonic Heroes