Special Stage (Sonic the Hedgehog 3 & Knuckles)

In Sonic 3, Sonic & Knuckles and Sonic 3 & Knuckles, the Special Stages (sometimes known as Blue Sphere, the name of the standalone game featuring only such special stages) are used to collect Chaos Emeralds and Super Emeralds in the game. There are seven Chaos Emeralds, seven Super Emeralds and one Special Stage for each one. To enter the Special Stage, you need to find a giant ring in the regular game and jump into it. These rings are well hidden - usually in secret rooms. Luckily, there are giant rings in every act and many more than there are Special Stages, so if you find most of them, you should be able to fail a few times to collect a Chaos Emerald in a Special Stage and still stand a chance of getting them all.

Gameplay

All the Special Stages are in the form of a gigantic globe that you run on as it turns beneath your feet. The globe's checkered colors differ in each stage. There are individual intersections, or points on the globe where you can turn. To turn press, left or right on the directional pad when you come to a point. It's best to hold left or right when you're going between points if you want to turn rather than just tap it. You can also jump at any time, but cannot turn when jumping. These are your only means of control in the Special Stage. You run very quickly so keep control of yourself. The Special Stage is like a board of points with various things on them that stretches so far, and if you walk off of it, you come out on the other side (in other words, the stage repeats itself if you go too far in one direction.)

Some points are empty but most have something on them. There are red spheres, blue spheres, white spheres with red stars on them, and gold rings. Your goal is to avoid red spheres at all costs and collect blue spheres. If you touch a red sphere, the stage immediately ends. If you touch a blue sphere, it turns into a red sphere. If you touch a white sphere with a red star you get bounced backward and walk backward until you press up; then you return to walking forward. Red star spheres are bumpers that often seal off masses of red spheres. The number of blue spheres remaining is shown in the top left corner. Once you collect every one and there are no blue spheres remaining in the Special Stage, all the spheres disappear and you collect a Chaos Emerald.

Rings are sometimes found at the beginning of a Special Stage, but usually you get them by transforming spheres into them. To do this you must have a mass of blue spheres in a square or rectangle that is at least 3 by 3 in size (there must be blue spheres in the middle for this to work). Collect ONLY the blue spheres on the OUTSIDE of the square or rectangle, and when you've turned all the ones on the perimeter to red spheres, the whole formation turns into rings. Be careful not to collect any spheres in the inside, though—if any of them are red, it will not work. This is also possible in a formation of the appropriate size in which some of the spheres on the perimeter are already red. This sounds tricky but soon becomes second nature. It is never necessary to collect rings but it is usually best to do so if you can, both to eliminate a mass of red spheres and because rings give you points at the end of a Special Stage. They do not, however, do anything like protect you from damage like in the regular game.

At the end of a Special Stage you score 100 points per ring, even if you did not collect the Chaos Emerald. If you collected all the rings possible in the stage, you get a Perfect Bonus of 50,000 points, which will result in one free life. Collecting 50 or more rings is also worth a continue. (If you see a picture of Sonic dancing after your points are tallied while a tune plays, you got a continue). The second time you enter a Special Stage you will go to the second one - even if you did not collect the first Chaos Emerald in the first stage. The only way to collect emeralds you miss is to go all the way through the cycle of stages until you come back to them. You never replay a Special Stage once you collect the Chaos Emerald in it.

Gold Spheres

Sonic and Knuckles adds a gold-colored sphere. Hitting it will bounce you forward in the current direction, over about three or four spheres.

Special Stage in Sonic 3 & Knuckles

When playing Sonic 3 & Knuckles, Once you enter Sonic & Knuckles you can no longer become Super Sonic even if you collected all the Chaos Emeralds in Sonic 3. All giant rings now flash rainbow colors, and instead of transporting you to a Special Stage, they transport you to the emerald room of Hidden Palace Zone. The first time you enter a giant ring, all the Chaos Emeralds you collected in Sonic 3 will disappear, but for each one you collected, a gray Super Emerald will be beamed down onto a pedestal in the room corresponding to the emerald you got. When in this room, every time you enter it by entering a giant ring, you can choose to jump on a gray Super Emerald or an empty pedestal. If you jump on an empty pedestal you will play the Sonic 3 Special Stage corresponding to it and if you collect a Chaos Emerald in that stage, a gray Super Emerald will appear on the pedestal. If you jump on a gray Super Emerald you will play a Sonic & Knuckles Special Stage corresponding to the pedestal the emerald was on, and if you complete the stage successfully, you will collect a Super Emerald and that gray Super Emerald will become colored in.

Your goal is to collect all seven Super Emeralds, although doing so may require you to play more than seven Special Stages if you did not collect all the emeralds in Sonic 3. However, you cannot collect any Super Emeralds until you enter Sonic & Knuckles. You can also exit the room in Hidden Palace without playing any Special Stage by stepping on the spot you get beamed down onto again (since you probably always do want to collect a Chaos Emerald or Super Emerald, avoid this most of the time). Each pedestal corresponds to a number of Special Stage from one to seven. If you collect all the Super Emeralds the room is inaccessible, and any future giant rings you touch will instead give you 50 rings. When you reach this room in the regular game, the Super Emeralds you have made appear and the ones you have collected will be shown.