This is the first of four rings that are all in roughly the same area, and you'll need to take the alternate route in Point #1 to get at them. Start from this route and head right until you must spin dash up this curve and go left. Before going left, stand on this edge, and spin dash toward the spiker and invincibility - you'll go right through the wall and find the ring there.

The next one has two possibile entrances. If you're Tails or you have him with you, fly straight up from the previous location, up through a hidden hole in the ceiling, indicated by the arrow. It leads into a ring-filled corridor. There's another open ceiling between the rings and item boxes at the end of the corridor - fly up there to get the ring. You can then exit through a hidden wall to the right of the ring for a pretty big shortcut, as it leads out to an external corridor with a speed-up item, later on in the route. However, you can also use this exit as an entrance from the other side as well, if you don't have Tails with you.

From the last rings, follow the route up, past the drilling robot and pair of crushers. Beyond the platforms leading up is a ring on a top left hand ledge. If you go over to the opposite ledge that has a fire shield on it, you can take a run up from there, hop to the chained rotating platforms and then take another big jump over to it. Using a double jump from that very fire shield may assist you.

Without Tails, this one is quite tricky. Carry on across the path below the ledge with the fire shield at the previous ring. Find a spinning top on the ground, get on it and go back to the left. Hover around the fire shield ledge, and aim toward the top right of this large room. There's a narrow corridor with a well-earned extra life and a big ring hidden behind it.

Continue on this alternate route as it winds back and forth. When you get to a loop and long blue pillar, go down it as normal so that you exit to the right. Shortly, there'll be another spinning top. Get on it and use it to ascend to the top left wall. Normally you would then switch your direction to the right in order to carry on to the ledge, but another ring can be found in a room hidden in the top left part of the wall here.

This is the first ring to be found if you took the main route at Point #1 (simply fall all the way to the bottom, off the start). The second spinning top object you come to will invite you to hover across to a higher ledge on the right, from an upper left hand one. Instead, drop to the bottom, where there is a fairly long pit of sludge. There's a ring hidden in the corner here on the left.

After the previous ring, at the bottom of the spiked slope over on the right, carry on to a checkpoint. There's a steep slope next to it where the route splits into two, each path of which has one more big ring left. The upper way may only be possible if you took the spinner that you just had to jump off of to get the previous ring. On the route going down the slope, wind through a loop, go to the left down the pillar, as normal, then you'll soon find this curve. Hit the nearby horizontal red spring to go along it and up in the air, where a ring can be found on an upper ledge to the right, past some spikes.

You begin this level by falling from a great height, and running at full speed down the incredibly steep slopes. About halfway down, to the far right of the area, you'll spring to a three-platform grouping, circling each other by chains. If you manage to land on one of these, try and head to the ledge on the right, and you'll be taken along the alternate route for Act 1, but if you miss, more slopes lead you down to the regular, main route all the way at the bottom. Map-wise, this bottom route is actually above the other one, because the initial drop is so long it occupies one and a half the height of the map (it loops over itself). There's no significant difference between them with regard to difficulty or speed, but if you don't take one of several sub-routes that link them at various points, they can potentially remain completely separate for pretty much the whole act.

No matter which route you took, you'll soon meet a large robot with twin drillers, ready to cause commotion by drilling up into the ceiling above him, and creating a small, harmless earthquake. Like the appearance of the flame pod during Act 1 of Angel Island Zone, you can give this guy as many hits as you like, but for the moment, he's got a job to do and there's nothing you can do about it. On the main route, he'll appear at the end of the first room after the long slopes, but will actually assist you by causing two large steps to descend, on the right, allowing you to exit the room. They'll settle on top of a pit of spikes, so for the love of God, do not impatiently jump into the spike pit before they do so. Meanwhile, on the alternate route, he doesn't really aid or hinder you in any way, so just carry on to the left, where there are a pair of mean crushers waiting for you. Pass under very carefully, and it may be wise to refrain from using your spin dash to get through the first one, in case you roll right under the second crusher as it comes down.

No matter what route or sub-route you took, you'll eventually find yourself going down one of these long vertical shafts, having broken into it by using a spinning top from either side. If you came in from the top right of it, you'll exit at the bottom left where you'll speed down a couple of slopes and appear in the final room before the Act 1 boss. If you came in at the top left of the shaft, you'll arrive on the bottom right, at a path that'll drop you off directly at the end of the final room. The trick is, you have to smash your way through the breakable areas of four separate floors to get there, and in order to do that, you need to stay on that spinning top you came in on. Keep it under control, and guide it to destroy the breakable floors, going down through them, one by one. If you jump off before breaking through all four floors, you won't be able to continue along this path, so you'll have to use the springs to go all the way back to the top, and then head back to the left to the bottom of the shaft. Leap over the long set of spikes there and take the other road, to the bottom left of the shaft.

Take the Tails shortcut expressed in Point #5, up to the top of the level, then when you go through the loop and down the long blue pillar, you need to try and jump off to the left rather than take it down to the right as normal. The big ring is found inside a right hand wall, down a small hole. Afterward, head left out of the room to rejoin the shortcut you were on.

To get the next ring, you need to avoid the enticing quicker route of Point #7 and carry on down the main path. At the end of the first internal section you come to afterwards, there's an area below a raising platform with a Spiker badnik and a crusher. The ring sits in a room beyond them to the right. To get back out, destroy the Spiker to access the spring that's held captive underneath it.

Eventually all of the routes and shortcuts of the first half of the act meet and meander toward the top, at a couple of pulleys on steep inclines, and a checkpoint follows a little further down the path. But it's pretty much a long, linear path from here on out, right? Wrong. There's a red horizontal spring next to the checkpoint. Take it, then take a big leap as you climb the gentle slope and pass the arrow signpost, but before the slope drops. You'll find yourself at a higher ledge over to the right, with 20 rings and a fire shield in a brief internal area. In the general area below all of this, the level becomes much more speedy, through several loops that wind down into long pillars. As explained in the Level Structure section, each of these pillars offer two possible routes at the bottom of them - the second, hidden one can always be accessed by jumping off of the alternate side while on your way down the pillar.

To kick this section off near the end of Act 2 for Sonic and Tails, Eggman will appear through the ground in his drilling machine, like he did at the start of the act. He drilled up through the right-hand side then, but here he'll come up through the left, so don't stand there. He drills through the ceiling and creates another earthquake, but this one is serious. Move onward through another internal room below, and eventually you'll reach an area where the floor is moving upwards! Similar to the start of Hyrdocity Act 2, the ground will be able to crush you into the ceiling, so get moving to the right as fast as humanly possible. Watch out for the broken pillars that extend from the ceiling, because if you don't get under those quick enough, you'll be trapped behind them. The ground isn't flat, there are bumps and steps all over it, and sometimes you might have to wait a little bit for the floor to move up high enough that you can reach the next ledge. Watch out for a couple of springs at one point that will impede your progress. This section might take you one or two attempts, but at least it's relatively brief. Just keep moving as fast you can and squeeze under those pillars.

Knuckles has his own version of this, in a different area and it's quite a bit tougher because you also have to deal with opening a doorway via a blue wheel, and destroying a statue head, on top of everything else. These are fairly self-explanatory, but can be pretty hard and nerve-racking, so keep trying. Try not to panic for the statue head. Just keep your rhythm of hitting it, and then letting it throw an arrow before going for the next hit each time and you should be ok. Keeping your cool is definitely the key to beating these sections.

Not far on from that, and you'll find yourself in boss country. As Sonic and/or Tails, you'll be in an outdoors section, with a pillar and giant plantpot. Dr. Eggman will return from the top/middle, and you can get in some hits here, with best results from Sonic's insta-shield. A large drill mounted on the rear of his machine will face downwards and he'll charge into the ground from there, remaining in that place for a moment (continue hitting him), while the whole structure around you begins to crumble as a result of this action. The camera will then follow him as he flies upward, leaving our heroes behind for a second. With the whole area having collapsed, we now see Sonic and Tails giving chase through the air, using Tails' propellors. If you're playing as just Sonic, then Tails will make an appearance to aid you anyway. If you're playing as just Tails, see the next paragraph. You control your twin-tailed buddy with the directional buttons, tapping the up button to make him ascend, while you can also use the jump buttons to make Sonic leap out and attack Eggman, who's flying around. If you fall (and you probably will) then no worries, because Tails will swoop down to your aid, and unlike in the rest of the game, he appears to magically have infinite stamina, and never tires. At first, Eggman is just making his escape, heading to the right with his drill at the front. Get close enough to him and leap so that you hit him on the noggin. He'll move forward out of the screen, and then he can be seen retreating into the background. He'll come at you again from the left side and try to charge at you in the air, to which you should respond by giving him another whack to the skull. He dashes off into the upper part of the background now, and repeats the process but comes from above, with drill facing down. Stay on the right side and beam him again when you get the opportunity. Next, he'll come from below, with drill facing up, and then the pattern repeats, so hit him on every turn. As Sonic, this is relatively easy, if you get the hang of controlling Tails. Get as many hits in as you can in the initial phase where you're still on the ground and you may only need to get in three or four while in the air.

Speaking of Tails though, he now has a price to pay for all those shortcuts he's taken in this level - on his own, this fight is an awful lot tougher because of course you can't jump while flying, so you have to actually use your tails to attack him, but hit him from below rather than above. This requires very careful use of the jump button to monitor your altitude, staying just underneath Eggman so that when his craft is aligned with your tails, you can give a single tap on the button to raise yourself to just the right height and make the connection. It's very tough to do it without injuring yourself and of course if you do, ring recollection - even one of them - is unlikely. Definitely not for beginners. If/when you beat him, the upside down capsule will appear from above, so use Tails to hit the button. Our heroes continue flying on, as the sun begins to set on the forest, and nightfall creeps in..