Launch Base Zone bosses

There are three bosses in Launch Base Zone. The first one normally can only be accessed by either Sonic or Tails (or both). Once that boss is defeated, Sonic and/or Tails is/are brought to another arena when he/them face another boss. in Sonic 3 & Knuckles, the level ends there; In Sonic 3 alone, there is one more boss, which can hurt Super Sonic.

Knuckles instead never faces the first boss, though he always faces the second and the third, although in a different location.

First Boss

The first boss in Launch Base Zone consists of Eggman elevating himself to a location outside of the player's reach. A door opens on the wall to the right of the player, deploying a large black ball in one of two compartments (top or bottom), intended to harm the player. These can be avoided by jumping over the balls that come out of the bottom compartment and ducking under the raised door when they come out of the top compartment. Alternatively, the player can jump over the balls from the top if already standing on top of the opened door.

In order to hurt the boss, the player should jump on top of the opened door when the black ball is shot out from the bottom compartment. Once raised, the player can simply jump on top of the opened door; this gives him enough of a boost to further jump high enough to hit Eggman for one of 8 hits.

Second Boss

The second boss in Launch Base Zone consists of Eggman in a tall weapon-laden rocket. There are lasers on the side of the rocket which fire lasers both left and right, and there is a small ball of spikes orbiting around the machine's vulnerable spot to prevent the player from simply jumping on top of it over and over again in succession. For every two hits of damage inflicted, the machine will drop a small portion of its essence; this continues for a total of 8 hits before the boss is defeated.

The fight starts with Eggman descending from the right side of the screen. Once descended all the way, he will disappear on the bottom of the screen and appear on the left side, this time moving upwards instead of downwards. This continues until the machine appears back on the right side of the screen as when the fight started. This pattern of movement continues until the boss is defeated.

Third Boss