Sonic Mania: How To Beat Every Boss | All Boss Battles Guide

Eggman is back with big bosses both old and new in Sonic Mania. He has a whole crew of fresh Eggbots, along with classics like the Death Egg Walker and Metal Sonic. There’s a new boss battle after every act, and some of these guys aren’t totally easy. Well, most of them are — if you’ve got plenty of rings, that’ll help every time. Some bosses are bigger puzzles than others, and certain fights require more than just bouncing off the round center.

Below, we’ll provide quick tips on every single boss fight. There are two acts per zone. That’s two bosses, and the second boss is (almost) always the tougher of the two. You’ll fight weather forecasts, trash grabbing arms, bazooka-wielding cop-bots on helicopters, and lots of other weird stuff. If you’ve ever played Dr. Robotnik’s Mean Bean Machine, you’ll recognize one particular Puyo Puyo battle.

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Sonic Mania: How To Beat Every Boss | Battle Tips Guide

[Press CTRL+F and type the zone you’re looking for into the field to jump straight to the end-level boss.]

Green Hill Zone: Act 1

The first boss is a pair of Eggman-shaped robots attached to each other by a chain. They spin around the arena slowly and glow red. Don’t attack the red orbs — only attack the gray ones. Bounce off the gray one, and back-off when they transition to the center of the arena. and spin.

If both (or neither) of the orbs are red / gray, wait for one to turn red, then attack the gray orb until its destroyed. The first one only takes a few hits. The second one flies out of reach, so you’ll need to wait for it to come back down. It will bounce and stop on the found. When it’s gray, you can attack. This is the first boss, so it’s really, really easy.

Green Hill Zone: Act 2 – Boss

The Egg Walker stomps after Sonic, turning the stage into an auto-scroller. Periodically, it targets Sonic with a small Eggman-shaped bomb — bop the robot after it launches a bomb, or wait for him to thrust his claw out. It alternates between the two attacks. After launching the drill arm, it won’t hurt Sonic. You can jump right through it — just don’t touch the spikes.

Just for the bot to use one attack. Try to bait the bombs out — then bounce off the Walker’s head. A few more than a handful of attacks will take this big ugly robot down.

Chemical Plant Zone: Act 1 – Boss

The bouncing robot flies out of the blue goo, hops left and right following Sonic, then spawns a ring of blue balls. Don’t touch the blue chemicals — wait for the ring of goo to appear, and attack it from below. You can also attack it after it launches the blue goo balls in every direction, leaving it temporarily vulnerable. A quick boss — he takes about 6 hits to destroy.

Chemical Plant Zone: Act 2 – Boss

It’s Puyo Puyo time! You have to beat Eggman at his own Mean Bean Machine. Connect four of the same color delete a sequence — including any other connected colors when the Puyos disappear. It’s a simple little color-connecting game, and you need to outlast Eggman.

To do that, chain your Puyos together. Every time you complete a sequence, black Puyos are added to Eggman’s stack. Black Puyos can’t be so easily removed, you’ll need to connect (and disappear) Puyos next to black to get rid of those. Just keep adding black Puyos to Eggman’s side of the screen to win.

Studiopolis Zone: Act 1 – Boss

A helicopter-mounted Eggbot will fire rockets as Sonic runs through the city. Watch the order of the rockets as they fly right — top appears first, bottom last. Avoid the red rockets — Sonic needs to jump on the blue-gray rockets. They’re slow and don’t make very good targets, and if a red rocket is sharing space, you’ll take damage.

When jumping on a blue rocket, it will divert into one of the flying billy-club bots. After destroying all the bots, the last rocket will fly into the helicopter, forcing the Eggbot to bail. Take your time and jump over the rockets. The slopes can make jumps tricky. Sonic can lose a lot of forward momentum in this battle. Hang back and jump to avoid incoming rockets — they disappear when they touch the left screen. Wait until you get a clear blue rocket to jump on.

Studiopolis Zone: Act 2 – Boss

Watch the TV screen to see what type of attack is coming next. The windy forecast will blow trash up toward the sky — get caught and Sonic will fly into the spikes on the ceiling. Lightning forecast leads to lightning strikes. Avoid the cloud!

The trickiest is the sunny forecast. Heat lamps will appear and damage Sonic if he’s stuck in the light. Stand underneath Eggman and jump into the underside of his flyer. That’s the only time his flying machine will lower into jumping range. About three repeats of the heat forecast will end this fight.

Flying Battery Zone: Act 1 – Boss

The junk grabber boss is a quick one. Stay away from the grabber when it pulls out junk, bounce into the grabber when it isn’t busy grabbing, and this boss can be destroyed in less than a minute. Jump into the magnetic thing over and over to end the fight fast.

Flying Battery Zone: Act 2 – Boss

The spider bot is a lot more challenging. The annoying thing has a bumper for a butt, and shoots electricity when it rises up. To damage it, grab the spinning pole and release to hit the bumper and knock the spider into a wall of spikes.

NOTE: Sonic and friends can’t be crushed by the geometry holding the poles. Jump right through those!

It can only be damaged by spikes. Wait for it to lower in time with a fresh spinning pole. Don’t get on the spinning pole when it rises up or you’ll fling yourself into spikes / get blasted with electricity. Try to jump high and grab the upper portion of the poles so you can reach the top of the screen faster and blast the spider bot into spikes.

Press Garden Zone: Act 1 – Boss

The buzzsaw bot slowly follows Sonic around the warehouse. Damage it by hitting the center of the robot’s mass, but you can’t until you break one of the saw arms. When it makes a counting sound, aim to make the bot launch a saw blade into the metal (brown) boxes. These boxes break after two hits, but the metal exterior causes the saw blades to break.

Lead the saw blade arms into the metal crates, then attack the center of the bot while its vulnerable. Just be quick, a new saw blade will spawn to replace the broken one.

Press Garden Zone: Act 2 – Boss

The fencing Eggbot is the closest thing to a Mega Man-style boss fight– he throws exploding ninja stars and bounces around the arena, swinging his sword. His ice saber flash-freezes Sonic, so avoid the robot as he falls. His ninja stars explode into five spikes and they can be destroyed before they detonate if Sonic jumps on them.

To damage him, just attack when he’s jumping or right after a sword attack. There’s no real trick to this fight — stay stocked up on rings incase you get stabbed with the ice sword and avoid the bombs. Keep hitting him and he’ll go down.

Stardust Speedway Zone: Act 1 – Boss

The lightning bug boss summons tiny firefly bots to zip around the arena — they look like glowing balls of light, and the arena itself will get very dark. Hop on top of the tiny bots to destroy them, especially when they link together and create a long beam. Break one to stop the beam attack. The tiny single fireflies will also shoot lasers down, lowering slightly after each laser.

Eventually, the large bug bot will appear and shoot a laser at the floor while sweeping right. Hit him about 6 times to defeat it.

Stardust Speedway Zone: Act 2 – Boss

Phase 1: The Metal Sonic battle begins as a race. Sprint through the path, jumping and dodging when Metal Sonic glows and flies toward Sonic. There’s no way to hurt him now — the real fight won’t begin until you reach the Eggman factory.

Metal Sonic inserts himself into the Eggman Factory and begins spitting out crappy Sonic robo-clones. You can destroy them right when they spawn, but don’t do it yet — wait for them to start spinning into a gray ball. When they spin-up, charge into them to bounce the robo-clones back into Metal Sonic.

Meanwhile, Metal Sonic will launch plasma at Sonic, so you’ll need to keep moving. Be patient and wait for a good chance to hit the tiny Sonic robots back into Metal Sonic.

Phase 2: After breaking the factory, you’ll enter another quick chase with Metal Sonic. At the top of the speedway, Metal Sonic summons a wall of spikes on the left. Keep running right — if you slow down, the spikes will catch up to Sonic. The track is simple, with extra gold rings on the path.

NOTE: If you’re hit, use Sonic’s temporary invulnerability to collect rings stuck on the spike wall.

The problem is Metal Sonic. He’ll begin to spark, making him invulnerable, and will launch plasma attacks or charge into Sonic. When the sparks are gone, that’s your chance to jump off him and dish out damage. After every charge attack, Metal Sonic will slow down, but you can only damage him by jumping on his head.

Hydrocity Zone: Act 1 – Boss

Sonic claims a hovercraft with a water-sucker in this battle against scuba-clad Eggman. Eggman drops underwater mines, and your goal is to suck up Eggman without collecting a mine and hurting yourself. Inevitably, mines -will- get sucked into your vortex, so after damaging Eggman, release the vortex and drop the mines before they touch your craft.

NOTE: Press [Down] to drop a depth charge and destroy Eggman’s mines!

Hydrocity Zone: Act 2 – Boss

Phase 1: In this underwater battle, Eggman comes equipped with a submarine. A giant propeller fan is his weapon — Sonic will be propelled down a passage with spikes and walls impeding progress. Dodge up and down to avoid the walls and escape the spikes, and eventually you’ll find a way to hurt Eggman.

Grab bubbles as you’re propelled to stay alive too. Look for the grey bombs with buttons on the side — these depth charges are the only way to harm Eggman’s submarine. Touch them to move them right into position to float into Eggman. Three hits will end the first phase.

Phase 2: Eggman traps Sonic in a small area with rounded edges — he’ll drop down from above in a “U”-shape. Jump while standing in the center to hopefully avoid him! When he connects to the center pole, the water will turn into a vortex. Swim up to jump into Eggman while he’s busy spinning. You can defeat him in one instance of this attack if you’re fast like Sonic!

Mirage Saloon Zone: Act 1 – Boss

Phase 1: The magical Hardboiled Heavy summons a giant sandworm to attack Sonic while riding on Tails’ plane. It jumps from the background, and the head is its weakpoint. Jump into the head — and avoid touching the rest of the spiked worm — to destroy this thing.

Phase 2: The giant worm is back! This time, it appears in a small saloon area and rolls / bounces the spiked sections of its body at Sonic. Jump or run underneath the spiked balls until the head is low enough for Sonic to jump into. Attack the head before new body-sections are summoned.

Mirage Saloon Zone: Act 2 – Boss

The magical Hardboiled Heavy returns and transforms into one of three desperados from Sonic’s past — a pistol-packing critter, a duck that throws bombs wildly, and a big bruiser that pounds the ground causing damaging-junk to fall from the ceiling.

For each of these forms, your best strategy is to get up close and personal. The further you are from them, the more likely they are to damage Sonic. Jump on their heads to deal damage to the boss, stay close, and you’ll win this simple fight.

Oil Ocean Zone: Act 1 – Boss

A very, very quick boss — the oil worker robot floats from the upper-left corner to the upper-right corner, tossing wrenches at Sonic. Attack him a couple times, and this guy will go down fast. Simple and straightforward. No tricks here. Defeating him will cause the oil facility to explode into a fireball, though.

Oil Ocean Zone: Act 2 – Boss

Eggman appears, piloting an Octobot. This multi-armed menace fires lasers that cause energy to rise up from the platforms. Duck under the high lasers, and jump over the lower ones — when Eggman appears proper, attack the tentacles with gray circles, and attack the main body of the octopus itself.

Eggman will shoot spike-mounted tentacles in an arc at certain platforms, and if you spot a tentacle wind around a platform, quickly jump off before it’s pulled back into the water. Stand on the platforms if they’re available.

Stay alive, bust both of the gray orb tentacles, and smash Eggman’s robot when it appears to end this fight. It should take three sequences to end.

Lava Reef Zone: Act 1 – Boss

Another simple boss fight. This one targets Sonic and drops down onto the rocks, drilling and knocking ceiling boulders loose. Aim to trick the driller robot into landing on the rocky sections of the arena — when the lava is exposed, it launches up and damages the robot.

While drilling, debris will fall from the ceiling. Weave and dodge, then lead the robot into drilling through four (counting the first) rock floor sections. After the fourth one, this battle is over.

Lava Reef Zone: Act 2 – Boss

The motorcycle riding Hardboiled Heavy is equipped with a giant spinning mace. Watch out for the glowing red areas between the raised ramps — if the heavy jumps those, lava will spit out onto the area below in a wide arc.

Stay on the ground and wait for the heavy to come to Sonic. Speed into the motorcycle from the ground to safely hit the heavy without accidentally touching that mace, and watch out for his charges. He’ll put away the mace and simply speed through Sonic. When he does, jump and prepare for more, he’ll usually repeat several times before reverting to his normal swinging mace attacks.

Lave Reef Zone: Act 2 – Alternate Boss [7 Chaos Emeralds]

The boss of the hardcore heavies appears for a fight. His scepter will shoot a beam that sweeps across the floor — the beam itself won’t hurt you, but the explosions that emanate from the floor will. Stay on the floating crystal platforms, and don’t try attacking him when he lands on the central crystal — he’ll begin to spark, and touching him will harm Sonic and friends.

The heavy will also summon a spinning ring of plasma that he’ll also launch. Watch out for the revolving projectiles attack — take cover behind a crystal, the fast projectiles can’t fly through solid ground.

Metallic Madness Zone: Act 1 – Boss

Phase 1: Eggman traps Sonic and friends inside a chamber with five crushers. Watch for the red warning light on the right — when it flashes, four tracking plasma balls will appear and launch toward the player. Between each plasma launch, two of the ceiling crushers will lower — Eggman is hiding inside one of them.

NOTE: To avoid the plasma balls, look for the larger gap between two balls. Wait in this gap, and jump as the energy lowers to slip right through. Otherwise, stand in the center and run left / right to avoid.

Eggman randomly switches which crusher he’s hiding inside. Attack the crusher at is lowers (only the ones with Eggman inside will take damage) and dodge the energy projectiles. As the fight continues, the floor crushers will also raise up — but only ever two at a time.

Phase 2: When the plasma weapon breaks, the crushers will go haywire. Jump through and avoid the crushers — they’ll move slightly before launching — and attack Eggman where he randomly appears.

Metallic Madness Zone: Act 2 – Boss

The capsules machine Eggman pilots randomly summons three different types of enemies — robo-Amy that runs after Sonic, an Egg-car, and an Egg-flyer that zips across the screen. Break these enemies as they appear. Dash into the fake-Amy and bounce on the Eggman robots. When Eggman runs out of capsules he’ll retreat.

Titanic Monarch Zone: Act 1 – Boss

Phase 1: The control computer summons spinning metal orbs that protect the core. When the orbs lower, you’re free to attack the eye — just jump over and away from the orbs when they expand and fan out from the center of the arena. Every hit to the core breaks one of the metal orbs. When they’re all destroyed, phase 2 will begin.

Phase 2: The lift will begin to move. When the elevator stops, the core will slam into the ceiling or floor, then aim the blasts on its sides. Stay back or stand under / over the core as it fires bouncing energy balls. It can be attacked while it’s moving around the arena or embedded after the lift stops. Either way, just keep attacking it.

Titanic Monarch Zone: Act 2 – Boss

Phase 1: Eggman’s crystal-energized super-suit is the final boss. He launches tentacles to attach to the four corners of the arena and moves around until sending an electrical current through his suit and tentacles. Wait in the lower-left or lower-right corners. When the electricity stops, Eggman is vulnerable.

Next, he’ll target Sonic with missiles. Avoid the impact sites (helpfully marked with a countdown) and try to stay in the corner to avoid those lightning tentacles. When Eggman summons giant spectral hands, Sonic is transported to a different battle against one of the Hardboiled Heavies. Avoid the rocket attacks, spikes or other attacks until you return to face Eggman.

As you damage Eggman, his extra tentacles will shatter. After one tentacle breaks, you can attack Eggman -while- the electricity current is active. Rush to the left corner to attack from his vulnerable side, then the right. Break all four to end the fight.

NOTE: The battle will continue if you reach Eggman with 7 Chaos Emeralds, rewarded for completing at least 7 special stages as you progress through the game.

Secret Phase 2: At the end, Sonic transforms into Super Sonic to fight Eggman’s final robot. The true final battle allows Sonic to fly — but the Hard-boiled Heavy’s enhanced form can actually damage Super Sonic. As Super Sonic, your rings will gradually lower, too.

Each hit only takes off 1 ring (instead of all of them) so you can absorb some hits. Avoid the big energy blasts, but plow through the tiny pellets flying around the heavy. Collect the falling rings in the arena to stay stocked up.

Keep attacking Eggman and the heavy, avoiding attacks to collect rings when you’re low, and this final battle should be a cinch.