[serpx]

Idea came from the Sonic 4 thread in regards to 2 player mode. Didn't want to bring it up there so derailing could be avoided. So, unless you think the 2 player mode in the 2D games were made perfect, what would you do different? This mainly regards co-op play and versus play.

For co-op, I'd be curious on seeing the screen split in two -- player 1 on top, player 2 on bottom. Level doesn't end till both characters have finished the level. To keep characters together (when needed), perhaps a button can be pressed to unite the characters. For example, Player 2 presses Y, and spawns by Player 1. (Idea from the New Super Mario Bros Wii). Maybe a requirement of rings could be necessary if any problems of abuse made game somehow easier, or for other reasons.

Anyways, I'm just curious on your ideas, or your perspective on the 2-player (or more) modes for the 2D games. With online gaming being the norm now, I hope SEGA takes advantage of any kind of possibility in order to lengthen the lives of these new 2D titles. Maybe our thoughts could even reach the developers, if they are truly researching into fan feedback these days.

[Chimpo]

So basically, Sonic Advance 3's co-op mode?

[serpx]

So basically, Sonic Advance 3's co-op mode?

Haha, shows how much I play these newer Sonic games. That's really cool. Definitely makes it more likely for Dimps to implement such a design in these new console titles for co-op, awesome!

[DigitalDuck]

You haven't specified co-op, so I'll give both:


Co-op - pretty much like a cross between SAdv1's team battle mode and SAdv3's co-op. Players play on separate screens (if possible, split screen otherwise), with each player having access to the other's "special ability".

Sonic: Peelout, being faster than the normal max running speed, can be used by one player as Sonic, while the second player grabs hold of Sonic as he passes at high speed, thus getting a speed boost. This could also result in higher jumps if Sonic throws the second character.

Tails: When Tails flies, another character can grab hold of him to be carried. Pretty simple, really.

Knuckles: When Knuckles glides, another character can jump on his back for a free ride. When he hits a wall, the other character grabs hold of his feet while climbing. When Knuckles reaches the top of a wall, the other character gets pulled up with him.

Amy: Amy can hit another character with her hammer to launch them into the air. Also, by doing the Hammer Whirl, Amy can bounce off another character, while they grab hold for a free ride up in the air. This is some weird combination of Sonic's and Tails' abilities.


Versus - pretty much the same as Sonic 2's versus, with some adjustments, like an option to base the result purely on time, or rings, or score, or to set all item boxes to Robotnik boxes, or to their usual in-game version. Also, with the use of all players, routes will have to be made fairly even for all characters, to stop any one character becoming overpowered.

Alternatively, a team battle, like SAdv1, could be used, implementing the team moves listed above.

[Namo]

Personally, I'd go for the "Toejam and Earl" approach, with some tweaks that help it get adjusted with the speed. If anyone here hasn't played Toejam and Earl, it's like this: When both players are close together, the action is on one screen. When the players get far apart, the screen splits in two.

Only, it would be a better idea for the screens to split up and down, that way, whoever is on the right stays in front. With wide-screen, it wouldn't be too much of an issue, I'd think.

[Chimpo]

Personally, I'd go for the "Toejam and Earl" approach, with some tweaks that help it get adjusted with the speed. If anyone here hasn't played Toejam and Earl, it's like this: When both players are close together, the action is on one screen. When the players get far apart, the screen splits in two.

Only, it would be a better idea for the screens to split up and down, that way, whoever is on the right stays in front. With wide-screen, it wouldn't be too much of an issue, I'd think.

Using a modern game as an example:

[Felik]

Personally I like Sonic Rivals 2's multiplayer modes. But characters shouldn't be as similars as in SR2, they should have unique abilities.

[Vinchenz]

I've always wondered why someone hasn't hacked Sonic 2 and Sonic 3 & Knuckles to make it so that Tails has collision with the sides of the screen and can't move off camera.

I think that would make multiplayer a little more fun in those games.

[RGamer2009]

Well...now with the wonders of widescreen, I think that should split screen be offered again, there should be two options:

- For standard 4:3 TVs, have it like the old games with player 1 on top and player 2 on bottom.
- For Widescreen TVs, have player 1 on the left and player 2 on the right, making use of the added width for bigger separate screens.

Also Online Co-Op with separate screens and a split-screen mode for two screens becoming one options could work well too.

This post has been edited by RGamer2009: 02 August 2010 - 12:34 PM

[DigitalDuck]

- For Widescreen TVs, have player 1 on the left, and player 2 on the right, making use of the added width for bigger screens.

The problem with that on a 2D side-scrolling game, is that your screen area is now in the ratio 8:9, meaning it's taller than it is wide. Not particularly helpful for a game in which you spend much more time moving left and right than up and down.

[Namo]

But you must admit it's easier than on a standard 4:3 TV. That gives you a mere sliver of a view point.

In many N64 games with multiplayer, there was an option to set whether you want the screen to split horizontally or vertically. Maybe if they do redesign it they could add that option in. Not likely in the day and age of Online Play, but still.

[Neo]

I've always wondered why someone hasn't hacked Sonic 2 and Sonic 3 & Knuckles to make it so that Tails has collision with the sides of the screen and can't move off camera.

I think that would make multiplayer a little more fun in those games.

Now let's say Sonic hits that first horizontal spring in Emerald Hill Zone 1, and Tails doesn't. What happens next?

You're the one not thinking. The high-speed gameplay of Sonic games does not lend itself well to having both characters being forced to stay together at all times. They attempted to find a solution with Chaotix, but that turned into a completely different beast, becoming highly focused on manipulating the rubber-band physics rather than just cooperative Sonic gameplay.

I've thought about this in the past, and the only solution I've come across is to split the stages into action parts and puzzle parts. While in action parts, the screen is split and each player can travel at their own pace. Cooperation regresses into simply not getting into the other player's way and not making their life harder (causing platforms to fall, setting off traps, etc.). After a bit of running, the level design causes the players to slow down and enter a section where they must cooperate in order to get through. When the first player gets here, he is stuck waiting for the second player to reach the same spot. At this point, the screens merge back together and the players cannot get too far away from eachother (and the level design should be so that such a situation isn't prone to happening) until they solve the puzzle and are able to enter the next action segment. A similiar philosophy would be used for boss battles.

You can clearly see the problems with this scenario. The leading player is stuck having to wait for the trailing player to catch up, which actually promotes both players travelling at a similar pace, but the fact that players need to eventually end up at the same location means the the level design cannot be as open-ended as a standard single player map. Alternate paths may (and should) exist, but eventually they must all converge into a single puzzle area, meaning they can't stray as far away from eachother and thusly can't be as varied.

It's an idea I've given plenty of thought, and I've come to the conclusion that you can't have proper, helping-eachother-out cooperative gameplay in a Sonic game without it necessarily becoming less fun. You could do it the way SRB2 does it, and simply let every player get to the end at their own pace through whichever path they choose, but then it kinda loses the point of it being a "cooperative" game, doesn't it?

[DTX]

I've always wondered why someone hasn't hacked Sonic 2 and Sonic 3 & Knuckles to make it so that Tails has collision with the sides of the screen and can't move off camera.

I think that would make multiplayer a little more fun in those games.

Now let's say Sonic hits that first horizontal spring in Emerald Hill Zone 1, and Tails doesn't. What happens next?

Do you remember the part in AIZ Act 2 immediately preceding the boss? The part where the camera unceasingly pans to the the right until the ship drops all of its bombs and flies off? Remember how Sonic and Tails are dragged along by the left side of the screen if they do not keep running? I may be wrong, but I think this may have been what Vinchenz was trying to suggest, that if Sonic keeps going to the right or the left, Tails will naturally get dragged along by the left side/right side of the screen, respectively, without slowing Sonic down at all -- and Tails can choose to pick up the pace at any time and catch up to the middle of the screen with Sonic.

I've thought about this in the past, and the only solution I've come across is to split the stages into action parts and puzzle parts. While in action parts, the screen is split and each player can travel at their own pace. Cooperation regresses into simply not getting into the other player's way and not making their life harder (causing platforms to fall, setting off traps, etc.). After a bit of running, the level design causes the players to slow down and enter a section where they must cooperate in order to get through. When the first player gets here, he is stuck waiting for the second player to reach the same spot. At this point, the screens merge back together and the players cannot get too far away from eachother (and the level design should be so that such a situation isn't prone to happening) until they solve the puzzle and are able to enter the next action segment. A similiar philosophy would be used for boss battles.

You can clearly see the problems with this scenario. The leading player is stuck having to wait for the trailing player to catch up, which actually promotes both players travelling at a similar pace, but the fact that players need to eventually end up at the same location means the the level design cannot be as open-ended as a standard single player map. Alternate paths may (and should) exist, but eventually they must all converge into a single puzzle area, meaning they can't stray as far away from eachother and thusly can't be as varied.

I've also thought about that type of gameplay before, except I would take it a step further and have puzzle parts that make your characters split up to activate two different switches or mechanisms that are in separate locations from each other, but these would together open up the path ahead for both places simultaneously. And these two paths would then eventually meet up, and sometime have switches or gimmicks which open doors or remove obstacles from the other player's path, which would sometimes be necessary, sometimes just give the other player an easier time.
Or sometimes both players will be stopped by a door in one place, and 1P or 2P, depending on his their character's abilities, would go off on some side path that only Sonic or only Tails can get through to get to a switch that must be held down for the other player to get past the then open door, who then hits a switch that teleports the other character there. Also, should one character pass the goal signpost first, if the other isn't close to it the player may take him to a checkpoint signpost and it will teleport his character to the end; alternatively, 1P/2P might be able finish second immediately by hitting the Start button so as to cut to the chase and not make the other player not even wait half-a-minute.

Also, Co-op bosses where you have to distract the boss with one character and attack him/it in some way with the other would be cool, though not the majority of bosses. Another idea would be for 1P in one of the screens to fight one boss while 2P in the other screen fights another boss or a group of 20-50 enemies.

This post has been edited by DTX: 03 August 2010 - 10:45 AM

[Neo]

Do you remember the part in AIZ Act 2 immediately preceding the boss? The part where the camera unceasingly pans to the the right until the ship drops all of its bombs and flies off? Remember how Sonic and Tails are dragged along by the left side of the screen if they do not keep running? I may be wrong, but I think this may have been what Vinchenz was trying to suggest, that if Sonic keeps going to the right or the left, Tails will naturally get dragged along by the left side/right side of the screen, respectively, without slowing Sonic down at all -- and Tails can choose to pick up the pace at any time and catch up to the middle of the screen with Sonic.

I assume you've played enough of the game to know not all of it is flat horizontal terrain like that? How would you handle this in levels with steep slopes like Marble Garden while keeping the players' movement "correct"? (ie: keep them on the ground, preventing them from being pushed inside the ground, etc.) What would happen if one player went through a loop while the other stayed behind? Furthermore, how do you decide which player is "leading", that is, which player is "going the right way" and doesn't get dragged back to the other player's position?

Seriously, I've thought very seriously about this, even tested some stuff and you can't get Sonic co-op done right if you do not give each player their own screen. It just does not work.

1P or 2P, depending on his their character's abilities, would go off on some side path that only Sonic or only Tails can get through

This could work.

puzzle parts that make your characters split up to activate two different switches or mechanisms that are in separate locations from each other

This would not. There is no way to prevent players from taking the same route, leaving one end of the mechanism unattended. What you COULD do is have it both ways, where cooperation can be done with both characters in the same room or at the end of different branching paths, opening up the rest of the route for both players. Say, have two branching paths, which end up in a room with two switches each. In each of the rooms only one switch may be activated with Sonic, the other must be activated with Tails or Knuckles. However, as long as ANY two of the four switches are pressed at once, both paths open up.

Also, you know, it would just work better if the screen was split at all times. Sonic levels are just too large to fit something of interest to two players within a single screen.

[Diablohead]

You don't mess with perfection (sonic 2 2player)