Sonic and Sega Retro Message Board: G3K - Viewing Profile - Sonic and Sega Retro Message Board

First of all, hi all, name's G3K. Now that the formalities are over...

Recently, I discovered a version of Sonic 2 available for download at French ROM site PlanetEmu named "Sonic 2 Omega"; now, I understand the "omega" version of a program or game to be the final release, but I downloaded it anyway. When loaded in my emulator (GenS), it looks like a perfectly normal version of Sonic 2 (screenshot).

Out of interest, I decided to try the Hidden Palace Zone savestate from this website, expecting to find the glitchy graphics which would occur in a normal Sonic 2 ROM. Needless to say, I was in for a fair surprise as the whole of Hidden Palace Zone was there, complete with graphics and a few additional things unseen in the beta. Here's a bunch of shots:

Zone title card.
Beginning of the zone.
Curling into a ball in pipes has been implimented.
Underwater life monitors and spring.
Tails monitor is still there, but gives Sonic no extra lives. (Sonic's transformed into Super Sonic, probably because of the savestate or something)
Glowing bridges.
Bat enemy.
(I entered debug mode for this screenshot, hence the ring in the middle of the air) Three ring monitors, spikes (slightly off-colour), spring and a platform not present in the beta. For comparison, this is a screenshot of the same area in the beta - no platform or anything, and Sonic falls to his death.
Probably the best discovery - the large emerald can be broken.
The tube from the breakable emerald leads back to the underwater area with the two life monitors and spring.
Stream of water still does nothing though.
It's possible to finish the level.
Yes, there's an Act 2 as well.
Strangely, no support for curling into a ball in pipes for Zone 2.
Hidden Palace boss reveals himself - turns out it's just the same as the Mystic Cave boss.
Hidden Palace Zone complete!
What the... Ore Processing Zone?! Turns out that it's Metropolis Zone with a different name, extremely interesting though.

I'm not a pro at ROM debugging/hacking, so this isn't very in-depth; judging by what I've found so far, though, this ROM could get pretty interesting! If you want to download it for yourself, just go to PlanetEmu, then click Megadrive -> ROMs -> GoodGen -> S -> "Sonic the Hedgehog 2 - Omega [h1]" -> Telecharger (firewall users may need to disable their firewall to download... also may want to disable pop-up blockers, as the button for downloading the ROM appears in a separate pop-up window). Then just fire it up in your favourite emulator, load the Sonic 2 Hidden Palace savestate, and there you go.

By the way, if the ROM turns out to be a hoax, I'll administer myself a slap as punishment :cool: