Sonic CD

The 2011 release of Sonic the Hedgehog CD is an enhanced downloadable remaster of the 1993 Sega Mega-CD game Sonic the Hedgehog CD. It was developed by The Taxman using a proprietary game engine named the "Retro Engine", an updated version of the engine used in Retro Sonic Nexus. His efforts were picked up by Sega who published it for Xbox Live Arcade, PlayStation Network, iOS and Android devices and Steam in late 2011 and early 2012.

As of May 20, 2022, this version of Sonic CD has been delisted from the PlayStation Store, Xbox Live and Steam alongside other re-releases of Sonic games on these platforms in preparation for the release of Sonic Origins[29][30], which includes this version. The iOS and Android versions currently remain available.

Gameplay

Unlike other attempts at bringing classic Sonic games to new platforms in the late 2000s (usually handled by Backbone Entertainment), this Sonic CD is neither a port of the original game nor an emulated version. It was re-built from scratch, allowing for a number of enhancements such as widescreen support, online features (such as leaderboards), filters to change the way the game is displayed and a Sonic the Hedgehog 2-styled Spin Dash option. When the game is beaten once, Miles "Tails" Prower is unlocked as a playable character. It is otherwise faithful to the original game.

Other changes include reduced loading times, better scaling for the UFOs in the Special Stages, a number of bugfixes and a constant framerate of 60FPS.