Cannon's Core

Cannon's Core is the only stage in the Last story on Sonic Adventure 2. There are 5 sections in the stage, with Tails, Eggman, Rouge, Knuckles, and Sonic each taking a turn.

Speed Tips

Note: There's a glitch that takes advantage of the game's internal level-numbering system being improperly reset in order to skip entire sections of the stage. If you complete mission 2 of Cannon's Core normally with a character other than Sonic, then immediately select Chao World (which counts as mission 1) or Route 101 or Route 280 (whichever mission you select), upon completing the chosen level (in the case of Chao World, just getting back on the portal and warping out), you'll be brought back to Cannon's Core, starting with the next character in line and with the timer you had upon exiting the last stage you played (the timer is invisible in Chao World, but it's still counting). When abused to the fullest, this warp can provide a time less than 7 seconds on mission 1 and less than 6 seconds on mission 2. In 3 and 5 it's slower than the best non-warping path. This trick is banned from the main competition, and relegated to a side competition not unlike Mario Kart shortcut divisions.

Mission 1

Tails

Lock onto one dynamite pack on the left, and one on the right. Residual damage will take out the other two (provided you have the Laser Blaster; go get it if you don't!) and open the door. You can ignore the enemy ahead; go through the next door and fire a shot left to stop time. Under 6 seconds at the switch is good. Pass it and the stopped spikeballs, then fire a shot backwards to hit the time stop switch again. Run through the curve, shoot the stationary hiding Chaos enemy, then go through the door and jump off the balcony.

You'll want to avoid breaking out the hover as long as you can. The camera makes that hard to judge, but keep locking on down the middle until you lock on to the center dynamite pack on the door. If you're lucky, you can lock on to the next time stop switch before the door opens. Hover when you get the lock-on so that you don't fall into the pit, and go through the door when it opens. If you haven't already, stop time at the switch. Proceed through this curve, and turn backwards to lock on again so that you can have time stopped for the next segment. Walk out into space, fall down until you're level with the dynamite, and hover as you lock onto those.

You can even have time stopped long enough to dispose of the Chaos enemy ahead while it's still in its shell. Try jumping and locking on to the robots that are about to fall. Time will restart, so dispose of both robots then run through the door to shoot the next switch. When time stops here, you can finish this section with whatever the time reads, which should be under 15 seconds.

In the last room, shoot the Hornet to get it out of the way, then shoot the switch to keep the clock stopped. Jump on one of the (non)moving platforms, then onto the raised blocks, from there to the platform floating in front of the switch, shoot the switch again for good measure, jump onto the rail of this platform, and jump from there to the top. Now you can fire shots into the door, then after a few shots turn around and shoot the switch to keep the clock stopped. Repeat until you've shot the door 12 times, destroying it.

Eggman

TODO

Rouge

TODO

Knuckles

TODO

Sonic

The relevant part of this stage is extremely short, as like Rouge, Sonic can stop the clock forever. You gain control of Sonic after landing from the overhead rail. Push forward, and shortly after you start to do that, tap B and then A. This will do a somersault jump, which is the fastest way to boost that bit forward into the first switch. Be careful--it takes you a bit beyond that switch and into the air, and you have to land back on the small ledge to avoid dying. If you do, take out the first Chaos enemy in front of you, then return to the switch. Stand on the switch's base and do a single spindash jump across the gap. This will put the switch out of draw distance, and you shouldn't hear beeps starting up again. Now you can do everything else in the stage at your own leisure, as long as you don't hit the remaining switches, and claim your time.

There is one thing to watch out for: as you go down the (nonmoving) slide of orange Kool-Aid, the first downslope takes you through a small opening that takes the form of a snake's mouth. If you're not going fast enough through this opening, Sonic will just stop right there...and you'll be unable to control him. He's considered to be underwater, so you have no choice but to wait until drowning and start over from the beginning of segment 5.

Best video: 1:32.02 by blaze

Mission 2

TODO

Mission 3

The first four parts of this level play out identically to mission 1. You don't even need to stop at any of the mystic shrines. With Sonic, stop time as usual and continue until you reach the Kool-Aid slide. Run up the hill to just before the top, and do a full-height spindash jump. You should end up grabbing the ledge far above the ramp. If you miss, just run back to your jumping point and try again.

Kill both enemies up on the ledge to open the door, then make an easy run to the Chao.

Mission 5

TODO