Racketboy

How far have you gotten so far?
Are you using save states other than saving progress?

I started playing as soon as this was voted to be the next entry, as I knew I was going to be short on time.

I'm using save states at the start of each stage. I only use them elsewhere when I have repeated a certain part of a stage 2 or 3 times without difficulty and reach a silver star power-up (i.e. even if I had messed up a bit in getting to that point, the "mistake" would be erased there). I think this way isn't giving me any extra advantage other than pure time saving, as I effectively never save after getting lucky through a section, only when I proved that I can do it as many times as I want.

I progressed to the lava world I think (world 4 or 5?)
I don't know my score(but I believe score is, once again, just as "relatively" meaningless as in Kid Icarus, as you can easily get as much score as you want just by "grinding" it and a little bit of skill and lots of patience - there is no time limit in the stages as far as I can see, and the enemies re-spawn). I have managed to get a bunch of extra lives, finished each stage without losing a life (when I lose one I just restart the level, though) and found 2 of the secret levels (assuming there is one per world).

Ivo.

I made it to the third world, the fire one.

Don't try this using just a keyboard. The parts where you need to angle your attacks...not happening. This game is tough, and I absolutely hate this level.

I played it on the SEGA collection for ps2. It's pretty fun, but the controls are kinda sluggish. It's really hard to avoid enemies and projectiles. It plays alot like Astal for Saturn. Does anyone know if they are by the same developer?

Anyhow, I got to the second world. The levels are fairly easy if you breeze through them. If you try to kill all the enemies they get me with cheap shots. The first boss was fairly easy as well. So far, I'd have to say I like it better than Kid Icarus.

Sonic Team did Ristar. I'm pretty sure somebody else at Sega did Astal.

I still haven't gotten through level 3 without savestates....

A little tip if you're having a hard time:
Try knocking yourself into just about every wall you see. Some of them will give you points, a star, or even a full life refill.

There are a lot of extra lives scattered around the levels too, I think I counted about 20 of them throughout the game.

Holy cow, that level is frustrating.
The freakin' vultures drive me insane.

On the bright side, Ristar has one of the only water levels I enjoyed.

I was surprised by the water levels as well. They were the weakest levels in the Sonic games, glad Team Sonic found a way to make them fun.

I've never played this game before. Last night I cruised through the first level. I can say, it's not a game I'm greatly compelled to play a lot more. Hope it gets better. BTW, I'm playing it via Sega Genesis Collection on my PS2.