[Crappy Blue Luigi]

Do you guys really want to get into the semantics of zone names? Alright, I'm game.

Let's run down the S3&K zones.

Angel Island - One of only three interesting zone names—then again, there is an island named Angel Island in San Fransisco Bay.

Hydro City - It's an underwater city—therefore, Hydro City.

Marble Garden - It's a garden with marble rock in place of normal sedimentary rock.

Carnival Night - It's a carnival. At night!

Ice Cap - Previously mentioned. Ice caps are a natural phenomenon.

Launch Base - It's the base of the Death Egg's launch.

Mushroom Hill - Also previously mentioned. A hilly landscape with giant mushrooms.

Flying Battery - It's a battery-powered aircraft that's taken flight.

Sandopolis - Portmanteau of sand and metropolis. Kinda creative, I guess.

Lava Reef - It's a reef cave full of lava. (technically magma but SEMANTICS)

Hidden Palace - It's a palace that's hidden.

Sky Sanctuary - It's a sanctuary that's in the sky.

Death Egg - Not even sure if this one counts, considering it was in Sonic 2 originally. But hey, being a pun on Death Star, it's still at least somewhat creative.

Doomsday - Doomsday! Fate of the world and all.

Zone names have rarely been "creative." I could seriously go on with examples from other games if I wanted to: Aquatic Ruin, Flame Core, Rusty Ruin, Windmile Isle, Collision Chaos... Yeah, I'm done.

[Aerosol]

It's that simplicity that I adore, personally.

[bluejayfusion]

AerosolSP, on 05 March 2012 - 09:01 PM, said:

It's that simplicity that I adore, personally.

Amen to that. No disrespect to anyone, but I cringe a little when I see the names of some fan-made zones.

People are grasping for complicated, vocab-word stuff or bizarre juxtapositions.

The best Sonic zones are interesting in themselves.

The banal names become remarkable in retrospect because the level itself made an impression.

[Hinchy]

XCubed, on 05 March 2012 - 01:51 PM, said:

Vid 1 @ 00:11

Vid 2 @ 00:17

I never want this to happen ever again with this series. Utilizing a controller button that is NEVER used with the exception of one level and without proper instruction is beyond disgusting. I'm happy this level of BS was a one off.

I'm pretty sure that you don't actually fall into a bottomless pit if you fall there. Because, surprise surprise, the Advance games had alternate paths. (EDIT: Not trying to imply the level design is as good as the Genesis games, but rather that it's better than some other commonly disparaged games in the series.)

The various trick movements (forward/backward/up/down, the move you're seeing is the up-trick) are also in every level off any ramp or spring, and are actually extremely useful, and IMO add to the game rather than detract from it.

Even if it is required in a few instances I'd expect the player at that point in the game to be aware of it. There is a reason that games come with manuals. Would you rather have Omochao there to drill it into your head?

This post has been edited by Hinchy: 05 March 2012 - 09:46 PM

[Hitlersaurus Christ]

I think that Sylvania Castle sounds pretty dumb, but so do a ton of Zone names. The fact is, they were named by people who are native English speakers, so words like Sylvania to them are just cooler-sounding ways of saying their synonyms.

This post has been edited by Hitlersaurus Christ: 05 March 2012 - 10:01 PM

[Ashram]

Crappy Blue Luigi, on 05 March 2012 - 08:33 PM, said:

Do you guys really want to get into the semantics of zone names? Alright, I'm game.

Let's run down the S3&K zones.

Angel Island - One of only three interesting zone names—then again, there is an island named Angel Island in San Fransisco Bay.

Hydro City - It's an underwater city—therefore, Hydro City.

Marble Garden - It's a garden with marble rock in place of normal sedimentary rock.

Carnival Night - It's a carnival. At night!

Ice Cap - Previously mentioned. Ice caps are a natural phenomenon.

Launch Base - It's the base of the Death Egg's launch.

Mushroom Hill - Also previously mentioned. A hilly landscape with giant mushrooms.

Flying Battery - It's a battery-powered aircraft that's taken flight.

Sandopolis - Portmanteau of sand and metropolis. Kinda creative, I guess.

Lava Reef - It's a reef cave full of lava. (technically magma but SEMANTICS)

Hidden Palace - It's a palace that's hidden.

Sky Sanctuary - It's a sanctuary that's in the sky.

Death Egg - Not even sure if this one counts, considering it was in Sonic 2 originally. But hey, being a pun on Death Star, it's still at least somewhat creative.

Doomsday - Doomsday! Fate of the world and all.

Zone names have rarely been "creative." I could seriously go on with examples from other games if I wanted to: Aquatic Ruin, Flame Core, Rusty Ruin, Windmile Isle, Collision Chaos... Yeah, I'm done.

"Battery" in this sense also means a group of machines. "Flying Battery" is less "hurr durr AA batteries" and more like "A fleet of Robotnik's airships".

[Irixion]

Ashram, on 05 March 2012 - 10:03 PM, said:

Crappy Blue Luigi, on 05 March 2012 - 08:33 PM, said:

Do you guys really want to get into the semantics of zone names? Alright, I'm game.

Let's run down the S3&K zones.

Angel Island - One of only three interesting zone names—then again, there is an island named Angel Island in San Fransisco Bay.

Hydro City - It's an underwater city—therefore, Hydro City.

Marble Garden - It's a garden with marble rock in place of normal sedimentary rock.

Carnival Night - It's a carnival. At night!

Ice Cap - Previously mentioned. Ice caps are a natural phenomenon.

Launch Base - It's the base of the Death Egg's launch.

Mushroom Hill - Also previously mentioned. A hilly landscape with giant mushrooms.

Flying Battery - It's a battery-powered aircraft that's taken flight.

Sandopolis - Portmanteau of sand and metropolis. Kinda creative, I guess.

Lava Reef - It's a reef cave full of lava. (technically magma but SEMANTICS)

Hidden Palace - It's a palace that's hidden.

Sky Sanctuary - It's a sanctuary that's in the sky.

Death Egg - Not even sure if this one counts, considering it was in Sonic 2 originally. But hey, being a pun on Death Star, it's still at least somewhat creative.

Doomsday - Doomsday! Fate of the world and all.

Zone names have rarely been "creative." I could seriously go on with examples from other games if I wanted to: Aquatic Ruin, Flame Core, Rusty Ruin, Windmile Isle, Collision Chaos... Yeah, I'm done.

"Battery" in this sense also means a group of machines. "Flying Battery" is less "hurr durr AA batteries" and more like "A fleet of Robotnik's airships".

Clearly it's a plug for Duracell. Those little thing never ever die :3. Seriously though, zone names are just that. The whole Sylvania Castle thing might be puntastic to gamers, but it's just a name, and should really be treated as such.

[Blue Blood]

I don't know why we're talking about stage names, but I don't have a problem with Sylvania Castle. If anything, I like it for being a bit different. Like Savannah Citadel and Cool Edge. Different, but interesting. Also new vid. Listen closely to hear the music:

[Aerobian-Angel]

Sure is hard to analyze those physics with that guy air-dashing and team-ability-ing all over the place. But hey, that music sounds a LOT less cat-like.

[StriCNYN3]

The music sounds like it uses more instruments than that meow noise from what I can hear. And I don't think the music is as short this time around either

This post has been edited by StriCNYN3: 05 March 2012 - 10:42 PM

[StreakThunderstorm]

I raged at the spindash sound being wrong YET AGAIN.

[Lambda]

I love how NONE of these people can play the game. I mean, dude, there's a sign right there telling you how to move forward.Looks like these mobile gamersneed to lay off the Angry Birds and play a real videogame sometime.

Anyways, the music sounds better! Though I really wish we'd get a cleaner listen to it.

Also, why is everyone complaining about the spindash sound? It doesn't sound EXACTLY like the one from the Genesis games, but I have no clue as to why a sound effect is rage worthy...

This post has been edited by Lambda: 05 March 2012 - 11:22 PM

[Lanzer]

I sware to god the entire fucking internet needs to read Cooljerk's rules to awesome video game recording. Simple little steps that make a world of difference!

[W.A.C.]

ICEknight, on 05 March 2012 - 10:53 AM, said:

Of course it's more fun when playing as Tails, and it might as well be even more fun when playing as the Debug object placement, because playing that level as Sonic was damn frustrating, something that should hint at the game not being that great.

I can't understand how anybody can say have Sonic Advance 2 as one of the greatest 2D Sonics ever made, while admitting to some levels being only possible to beat through trial and error... This is not Dragon's Lair, you're supposed to be able to beat the game in your first try, if you're good enough at it.

I know that some people enjoy frustrating games, but that's certainly not something I'm looking for in Sonic games, nor is something Dimps or Sonic Team have been actively looking forward to make... I hope.

I like playing it as Sonic as well, but it's definitely much less frustrating with Tails. Same applies to the new version of Sonic CD as well and yet Sonic CD is declared the best Sonic game ever made by a lot of media outlets. That game has some of the cheapest enemy placement of any Sonic game I've ever played and it's the only Sonic game I've played where the time limit is a massive problem. The game encourages me to explore the levels thanks to things like the robot teleporters, Metal Sonic holograms, and time travel, but then punishes me for trying to spend more than ten minutes to find those generators. I frequently don't even have enough time to check out the good future version of the stage I'm on after destroying those two things in the past. What bullshit.

A lot of the games in the series has some seriously cheap game design flaws. The only major titles in the franchise that I can think of that largely escapes those issues is the main Genesis games, yet I find Sonic Advance 2 more fun than Sonic the Hedgehog 2. Go figure. Actually, Sonic 3D Blast probably escapes that cheapness issue rather well, yet a lot of people on this site view that game in a negative light. Shame really. It's difficult for the game designers to not make the level design cheap since Sonic goes so damn fast. Kind of amazing Sonic 1-3 managed to design their levels well enough to where the levels weren't as cheap as they were in nearly every Sonic game released afterwards.

XCubed, on 05 March 2012 - 11:27 AM, said:

Exactly what is that "jumping jack" floating move that Tails is doing at the beginning of both of those videos? I'm being facetious here, but this, the slap hand of death, and extremely hard special stage access were the reasons I could NEVER see this series on par with the originals. I played all 3 while I was in high school and I never want to go back to either.

XCubed, on 05 March 2012 - 01:51 PM, said:

Vid 1 @ 00:11

Vid 2 @ 00:17

I never want this to happen ever again with this series. Utilizing a controller button that is NEVER used with the exception of one level and without proper instruction is beyond disgusting. I'm happy this level of BS was a one off.

wtf? First time I played the game, I was using that move in the first zone. I love SA2's tricks system and it's one of the biggest reasons why I loved the game so much when I was a kid. One of the reasons why I like SA3 less than 2 is because the tricks system got nerfed a bit since the partners and tricks system were assigned to the R button. Why Dimps didn't just have those moves with separate buttons, I'll never know.

Machenstein, on 05 March 2012 - 02:28 PM, said:

If I recall, Sonic 2 Retro Remix uses those trick moves as well. They come in quite handy for reaching ledges you could have missed after jumping on a spring.

Yep. The addition of that move to that rom hack was a fantastic idea.

[HarrisonJ]

On the topic of zone naming, I think CD had some pretty creative stage names. More than just a simple description of the zone. Most of the other games in the series have at least one sorta creative stage name (Diamond Dust, Bingo Highway, Mirage Road, Leaf Storm, Cosmic Fall, and Terminal Velocity come to mind).

As for the music, we should perhaps get someone with audio editing skills to see if they can reduce the noise in that video. I can't hear shit, even at max volume.