Sonic Drift 2 Speedrun FAQ

Sonic Drift 2 FAQ by Zewing

Q: How do you get those boost starts?
A: When the countdown is almost at Blue, hold accelerate.  I don't know the leeway of performing this but it's simple enough.

Q: Who's the optimal character to use?
A: There are only 2 characters that can be considered optimal since they're the only ones whose power up is a boost, and they are Sonic and Metal Sonic.

Sonic is used the majority of the time due to his power up requiring 2 rings.  Without any other stat needing to be known, this boost alone makes him impossible to pass up.

Metal Sonic has very sparse use and his stats are very similar to Sonic except the following:

1) Metal Sonic requires 3 rings to use his boost, but his boost is more powerful and lasts longer
2) Metal Sonic has a slightly higher top speed when not boosting (his other stats are close enough to Sonic to be identical)

The bottom line is all the records will be set with these 2 characters.  It's just a matter of testing to see which courses Metal Sonic can overtake Sonic in.

Q: What are you doing around corners?  I thought this was called Sonic Drift?
A: Essentially, I'm tapping the brake while corning, which initiates a drift, but only very briefly.  By doing this, you maintain a speed close to 100% at all times.  Without this technique, times would be much slower since you dip below 80% around corners otherwise.  Every little bit counts in this game.  A general rule for this game is, unless you are on a straightaway, always brake tap (drift tap).

Q: How are you playing this?
A: I'm playing this on an Analogue Mega SG using the Game Gear Adapter.  Gives quality about as good as emulation while still playing it authentically.  I used to play this on a PS2 but the quality suffered greatly due to how poor Game Gear resolution scaled at the time.

Q: What's the record for each course?
A: All records in this game are done by 2 players, me and Werster.  So I'll most likely tell you if asked.

Q: What's your sum of best?
A: Most games this is a fairly easy question to answer.  In this game, it's not.

This game has 2 types of courses, 3 lap circuits and 3 checkpoint sprints.  In addition, using boosts optimally will have boost bleed into another lap / checkpoint, which means changing up how you boost even by a frame is enough to add / subtract a frame from the 2 laps.  So it's not really possible to answer that on most courses.