Sky Chase and Wing Fortress were late additions and neither the stage designs nor their music were in the original plans, they were simply slotted in where cut levels used to be.

Emerald Hill's 2P meanwhile was for a cut stage, likely Blue Ocean Zone or Tropical Sun Zone. 2P's Casino Night was actually for that stage and 2P's Mystic Cave was for Hidden Palace. Oil Ocean's music doesn't fit you say? Yeah, because it was for Sand Shower Zone. Everyone complains Hill Top is an Emerald Hill reskin right? Well that's because it was a past stage for EH. What really doesn't help that some of the songs are really ill fitting because of how they were outright composed for different stages, then repurposed once the ambitious time travelling Sonic 2 got heavily scaled down and they cobbled together something out of whatever was most complete. The thing is though, even 'just ok' for a Sonic song is better than a lot of other games, so it's still a top Mega Drive soundtrack. Mystic Cave, Chemical Plant, Aquatic Ruin and the Death Egg Robot are the real standouts with the rest being decent/ok. Emerald Hill is super bland, Hill Top is on par with GEMS junk, Death Egg you literally can't hear in-game without really trying (and even then doesn't really fit the stage well).

It's not 'crappy', but it is the weakest of the mainline Mega Drive games (I only say mainline because lol Spinball).

Casino night zone theme