Sonic and the Secret Extended Edition (v4.2) Review by: Stevie 764 - 8/10
Sonic: The SECRET Extended Edition. Staff review #6.Sonic and the secret Extended edition, a great hack that sadly got discontinued before finishing the hack. It stopped in 2009, and started in 2006. The version this review is for is version 4.2 released in 2009, the final release before it ended.
Instructions: Nothing about Robotnik, and not much to say, but you do get 4 character select files. 3 of them are glitchy. Knuckles is blue, tails is not shown, but you get sonic, and a glitchy ring file that also gives sonic. If you get a negative score in your file select screen, some emulators or people have the problem. I used Gens 11 and I had a clean file select screen when licking my file for the first time. You have 5 minutes to beat a act in any level, and 2 minutes for the boss. Seems to strict, but with trial and error, you can beat it eventually thanks to the life counter being infinite. Instead, you have a star counter that goes up every time you find a star box, every 100 rings, and every 10k points.
Graphics - 7
The differences are the level layouts, the new but glitched graphics in the hub world, sonic sprites from sonic 3, and that's probably it.
Sound - 7
Same sounds, all the same music has come back. Except for a bonus track that can be heard by entering a cheat that is shown during the character select screen if you wait long enough, and several unused tracks, like the 1-up, the Game Over, and other tracks.
Addictiveness - 6
Although it does get a little repetitive, it's fun trying to figure out how to beat some levels. Some levels crash, like Scrap Brain act 1, and some levels can't be completed, such as the boss of spring yard, the boss of star light, act 1 of scrap brain with red screen, and star light act 2 at times in a red screen.
Depth - 4
Only 6 zones, 2 are 100% completable. Green Hill, and Marble. All 6 zones have 4 acts, so if all zones were completable and finished, that's 24 acts that could've been finished, but around 10 are completable.
Difficulty - 9
It is hard not because of the controls, but the challenge is in the game itself. Stuff appears out of nowhere, and there's rarely a time when you can go super fast. But to fix that, if you get 50 rings and hit either the A, B, or C button about 3 times, you can become super for the rest of the act. It didn't say that anywhere, but it doesn't tell you how to do it.
Story - N/A
Well, no story since without robotnik, a story can't be made, but robotnik was taking over the world, but it is no where near that. It's like Sonic: The Omochao Edition. No robotnik = no story.
Overall - 8
Well, despite it being unfinished, it is a great hack. With it's good attempt at trying to work hard to change stuff, and more obstacles for increased difficulty, a 5 minute timer, a 2 minute timer for special stages and bosses, and a random star counter that can go to A-D for tens and 01-89 (shown from up to down ingame), which after loops to 0. There is no life limit, and the star counter seems a little useless. Other than that, I recommend the hack for those who are desperate to play a secret sequel to the regular extended edition hack. Also recommended to anyone.