
He also retains his trademark ability of gliding, allowing him to create his own short cuts.

Knuckles is an all round character with decent speed and acceleration.

Tails has fairly good speed and acceleration and also retains his trademark ability of flight, enabling him to reach areas other characters may not. He has the ability to perform a double jump. Sonic is the fastest of the characters available at the beginning, with quick acceleration at the expense of handling. The playable characters are: Sonic the Hedgehog Each character has their own strengths and weaknesses, such as increased speed or the ability to run or glide over water. There are four playable characters available at the start of Sonic R, with five more that can be unlocked. There is also a Time Attack mode and a host of multiplayer options including a standard versus race, a tag style race where player's must chase after each other and capture them, and a balloon game, where the player must find and pop five balloons before their opponent. Most notably is the Grand Prix, where all four stages can be played in order. There are multiple game modes within Sonic R. Power ups are also a key feature of Sonic R, such as the lightning shield and water shield from Sonic the Hedgehog 3. As well as offering protection, rings are used to open up gates that lead to hidden areas and Chaos Emeralds, and are also used on speed boosts to increase the player's speed. These hidden areas also contain collectable items, such as finding special emblems and Chaos Emeralds which unlock extra characters and stages.Īs in most Sonic games, rings are an important element of Sonic R. The stages themselves are more expansive than traditional racing courses and offer many different routes through each level, leading to hidden short cuts and areas which can be explored. Robotnik, do not drive a car, but instead run through the stages. Unlike Sonic Drift, the main characters of Sonic R, with the exception of Amy Rose and Dr. Sonic R was also released on the PC and within the game compilation Sonic Gems Collection for the Gamecube and PS2 (Japan only).

Other racing games based on the Sonic franchise include Sonic Rivals, Sonic Rivals 2, Sonic Riders, Sonic Riders: Zero Gravity, Sonic Free Riders and more recently Sonic & Sega All-Stars Racing. Sonic R is a 3D racing game for the Sega Saturn that was developed by Sonic Team and Traveller's Tales, and is the third Sonic racing game to be created in the franchise, the first two being Sonic Drift and Sonic Drift 2 for the Sega Game Gear.
