A fun game for it's time, this was supposed to be Sega's answer to Mario (while Sonic HAS become a world wide success.....it still pales in comparison to the mustachioed one) The worst part of the game is going super fast and not having control and smashing into a bumblebee or some shit and losing all of your coins. My gold! My sweet gold! My precious!

Going fast is fun. Not going fast sucks. Why does this game rely so much on not going fast? Seriously, the design seems like it was made by two different teams who at the last minute had to combine their games into one and ship it.

Though I like Sonic this first game is not one that has aged extremely well to me. The first level Green Hill Zone is still a blast, but then later levels are not as well designed around the speed mechanic, and become a bit more frustrating. Still a solid debut for the blue blur though.

Not as bad as retrospectives claim

There's a lot of well-considered, polished design there — enough that the series' instant popularity is easy to understand in hindsight — as well as some elements that obviously work against the game's primary ethos: precision platforming with character physics built around gaining speed and inertia, overlong boss battles circumscribed to a single screen's width, etc. The now-familiar art direction is impressive in the context of 1991 releases, with an especially attractive and tasteful palette.

Really liked this game as a kid. Then you compare these to the first 3 Mario games on nes.. These all of a sudden become trash. The main thing I don't like they advertise speed but you really need to go slow in these games.

Mindblowingly fun for a while, then frustrating for another while. The screen was too small to fully enjoy it tbh.

Sonic the Hedgehog is fast and fun. The high point of Sega platformers and the best of a long running franchise.

/completed

A perfectly nice, colorful platformer with a simple yet engaging moveset and memorable soundtrack. Also (by no fault of its own) the harbinger of strange things to come, in the form of a decade's worth of increasingly desperate "mascots" with attitude.

I was never a fan of Sonic but no doubt a quality game.

High speed. Great rush. Fun game.

I personally think this series died almost as soon as it arrived, but when I got my Genesis, and I played Sonic for the first time, I was absolutely floored by how beautiful this game was. It changed the dynamic of the sidescroller. I used to beat this on an almost daily basis. Now it's not so hot, and doesn't stand up against other, better games, but it used to be super solid. One big negative? Any time when Sonic has to stop and wait for something.

Was this innovative? Yes, that's fair to say. Was it good? Not really.

Good times with this game.

This game laid the groundwork for the series but compared to its successors it's lacking. The game allows you to go fast but the level design has a lot of blocky shit in it that stops momentum and forces waiting. I don't take much issue with the heavy platforming approach in Sonic games but Sonic 1's approach was pretty damn bleh.

No one ever wanted to play on my Genesis until this game came out. It wasn't genre-bending but it was a lot of fun.

The only game that made the Nintendo kids jealous of the Sega kids.