That's a good idea, see if he could get us an interview with anyone else that was working on S2. (Or any other Sonic game I suppose, it seems as though S2 is the most sought after though.)
Sonic 2 is the only game for which we have American correspondents. Sonic 1 and Sonic 3K were all made by all-Japanese teams. We can ask others about Sonic Xtreme and Sonic R because those were made by American teams. That question has already been answered! It's a Sega proprietary system. Besides, why would you want that clunky piece of rubbish? I quote:
Yeah good point, I'd forgotten that he'd gone into so much detail, and I was struggling to think of unanswered questions :P. As for the people suggesting getting other team members' contact details out of him, I don't think this is very likely to produce results, because the team have all gone their separate ways in the last 10 years. I suppose you could try, but I doubt he'll know any.
Why did Metropolis have 3 act when the other levels only had 2? Why was Hill Top developed in the first place when it uses most of Emerald Hill's foreground art? Who programmed the bosses for all the zones? And how long did it take to make all the bosses and art for it until they were done?
This was already answered. The guy was going to make another zone, but they cut the idea so he had extra time to develop another act.
Perhaps I'm missing something, but this doesn't answer WHY. It tells how MZ got a third act, not the actual reason for it.
There wasn't enough time to make Genocide City, so he made another act for his other level instead... I don't think it's too hard to understand.
I believe the version used on Nick Arcade may be the same version used at CES 1992 - this magazine scan, found on Sonic CulT, details the unveiling of Sonic 2 at CES and lists many similarities with the "Nick Arcade" version, such as Sonic 1 music. This might explain why SEGA would have given Nick Arcade this version of the game - the show would have been filmed quite far in advance of its air date, so possibly the version used at CES would have been the only development copy they had that had been optimised for non-internal use (such as the disabling of Tails in 1-player mode when, from the videos, you can see him in the CPZ and EHZ demos - his coding was far from complete at that stage, as our much later prototype shows, so he would not have been fit for the media to see in action at that time). It's interesting to note that although according to the magazine only one level (GHZ) was available for normal play in this version (as opposed to the four in our prototype), it was very far along in development - even at the early stage it was at, both level maps must have been completed enough to play through (though from the NA vids we can see they were quite different in places), and the boss was reportedly active aswell. Just thought this was interesting to note, although it's not exactly relevant to the topic come to think of it. =/ If anyone thinks this is important enough / irrelevant enough to split off into it's own topic, be my guest. EDIT: Linked to a mirror of the file, instead of the original. Check out CulT's Sonic 2 section if you really want to be nitpicky. ;P
Ask him if it was planned for Sonic and Tails to have different routes throughout the levels, like in S3&K.
Just a note... it isn't on the secret Digitizer page itself, but it's a quote by Tom Payne that appears very briefly after destroying the wasps, in the original index page.
Did you even read what this topic is about? Anyway, if you want help, post in the hacking section. And don't bump topics. And if you really try, type better. I'm not trying to be mean, it's just that this way you will get approved.