Sonic CD's Mysterious Cut R2 Level Discussion - Post Origins Edition

I think it's wierd that Dubious Depths seems to be following the naming structures of the final level's names if it is a placeholder name.
Also, we know that Oshima said he didn't remember, and needed to check. Presumably, he went to check CD'S development documents, which we know he has in his possession.
It confuses me that he would misremember something written in those documents, and how his phrase was "the name is Dubious Depths", but we're going to document it as "it might have been named Dubious Depths".

 

Do we have scans or pictures of said documents?

The answer is no.

 

Yes, you do. I'm not saying you don't...in a discussion. But on a wiki, which should ideally be a collection of information provided by official sources, to be used by other people as its own source, implying "an official dev might be wrong about their own words" in that context is tacky. It's unnecessary bias.

And if you really stop and think about it, what evidence is there to doubt him? I mean really, let's think about this logically. Once you break everything down, the argument against him just boils down to "he's old".

It's pretty much the exact same situation as when Iizuka was asked about "Nazo" in Sonic X, and he said it was Super Sonic. There was a lot of doubt about that too, but at the end of the day, there aren't too many people who are prepared to say he's wrong.

That's true. But Sonic CD's development wasn't a complete shitshow like 2's was, either. For all we know, "Salad Plain" was just a joke title they chose for the Yuusei build and they simply didn't have any names at all yet at the time.

 

He literally made the game I see absolutely 0 reason to doubt him.

 

Okay, I follow you then. I just now had a proper opportunity to look at the R2 page for myself to read the text. And you're right, it doesn't strike the right tone:

Oshima did *not* say it "might" be Dubious Depths. He wasn't wishy-washy about it. He said it definitively. So if we are to exercise a healthy dose of doubt, we should be writing that as "levels name was Dubious Depths". If doubt needs to be conveyed, it should be in a separate sentence, because otherwise you're distorting what he actually said.

I don't want to change it without input from others though.

 

POV: you doubt the director of Sonic CD after he literally checks his own documents

 

This is why we don't ask people directly on Twitter.

 

I think a great compromise would be to state that “The name was Dubious Depths” and have a seperate line as you suggested stating in some form the words “there is no physical source to verify the name Ohshima has provided.”
Or perhaps leave the article as R2 and only ever refer to it as R2 in regards to CD and put “Mr. Ohshima has stated through a fan direct message the name was Dubious Depths” and not clarify further.
Then this still implies that it isn’t definitive end all be all.

 

By that logic, we should add "there is no physical source to verify his claims" for anything any developer has said, ever. Since obviously they're not going to hand over what might be classified company documents without permission.

 

I think your latter suggestion is good. Keep it R2, but mention in no uncertain terms that Oshima said through fan inquiry that it was Dubious Depths. Perfect.

 

In my opinion a wiki should not contain anything that has even the smallest shred of doubt. As there is no obtainable design document to verify it at this moment then it really shouldn't be stated as a definitive fact on the wiki. Rather it should be something more akin to a "Did you know?" or a trivia fact that way if we are later proven with a *Primary Source* such as hard physical evidence that we are wrong we don't need to amend the wiki to accommodate for that, and we also then don't contribute to any misinformation later down the line.

 

It's really interesting to see that the zones are basically a Sonic 1 remaster.

• Green Hill Zone -> Palmtree Panic
  
• Marble Zone -> Dubious Depths
  
• Spring Yard Zone -> Collision Chaos
  
• Labyrinth Zone -> Tidal Tempest
• Quartz Quadrant Zone and Wacky Workbench Zone are the new stuff.
  
• Star Light Zone -> Stardust Speedway
  
• Scrap Brain Zone -> Metallic Madness

From what I heard, the final boss in Sonic CD was supposed to be it's own act as well, so Final Zone would take its place.

 

Coming directly from Oshima-san, who directed the game and such, this is quite solid I'd wager. The extra space in the message text before the zone name even strikes me as an accidental space included before typing (or pasting) something preexisting into the message. Not an uncommon occurrence. But that's just my take on it.

 

It's honestly more like Labyrinth and Star Light both got split into two separate zones. Labyrinth was a water level taking place in an underground ruin full of crystals, so you have a "water/ruin" level and a "crystal" level. Star Light was a construction site with a city backdrop, so you have a "construction/factory" level and a "city" level.

 

I agree that unless other information surfaces to contradict otherwise, we have to accept the word of the game's director for "Dubious Depths", especially since he did not state uncertainty in his response. Otherwise, we may as well question other items on the wiki for R2, such as:

We're presuming the claims on Twitter by Masato Nishimura (the landscape designer rather than the musician), is that the music he is referencing that did not fit into the CD-ROM belonged to R2. Rather than that the music that didn't fit belonged to something else (e.g. not associated with R2, but rather just some random music files that got cut, maybe a theme something else).

Is that true? Can he produce a piece of media from 30 years ago on a tape/disc/something explicitly stating "R2" or something pointing to the zone? We don't know, so it should be written as "the music might be related to the zone" because maybe Nishimura misremembered what he listened to. Otherwise, if we're accepting Nishimura's claim, then the name of the zone "Dubious Depths" should be accepted.

I think we're being a bit too conservative with deciding how to place the name in the Wiki, thinking that we're conducting some scientific research and making sure we don't spread misinformation about something. Like the "Dust Hill is the desert zone's name" debacle from the past interviews with Brenda Ross. I'm guessing this is why we don't want a repeat of it.

Hindsight is only 20/20. What we know/discover now can change in the future when new material surfaces. That's normal, we don't know what the future holds. This is current news in development. Exercising some caution is okay, but weighing claims (until hard copy/documentation is provided) is the only thing we can do for now.

Some claims, especially from people directly involved with the development, weigh heavily versus a fan making a claim (for example). A hard media/document showing what it was 30 years ago would weigh even more heavily than a claim made by a someone developing for the game (certainly). But that may not always exist, maybe never be shown, or may be lost. So do we wait until such material surfaces before making a definite claim that "Dubious Depths was the name given to R2 during development"? Possibly not, because who knows how long it will take to get other material.

Heck, even old school book encyclopedias back then made assertions as if it were fact. It could have been curated by select people because of their educational background or expertise. Yet even then, facts can change later on when more information comes about. The good thing about our Wikipedia is that it can be changed dynamically, and tracking of the changes occurs to show that information is added or removed. So if someone really wants to do research and write papers about the R2 level, they should be citing their sources based on the day and time it was retrieved.

EDIT 1:

How about this as an entry...

"Dubious Depths is a level name associated by Sonic CD's game developer, Naoto Oshima, to the scrapped level R2, following the alliterative naming convention given to other zones throughout game."

By saying that, it can be taken as fact that the game developer recognizes the scrapped zone as that (assuming there are no more scrapped zones in existence, haha), while maintaining that it's not necessarily something written that can be found in documentation (yet) from 30 years ago.

EDIT 2:

I'd like to extend my gratitude, @MasterDreamcaster, for taking the time to share these things with us (along with the other thread about Oshima's art). Your efforts to cater to such speculative/cautious/nit-picky folks like us, I presume, is much appreciated. I hope you don't take our hard-lined approaches as something that might negatively impact the research you are doing for us. We're slowly getting older and forgetting what it's like to dream of obtaining the unobtainable, haha.

 

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Figured I would follow up the previous post I made earlier in the thread with a new lovely little mock up created by Jon San on Twitter, which provides a very fun "guess-timate" of R2/Dubious Depths. Always appreciate when these kinds of mock ups take consideration into the concept art, art style of Sonic CD, and other various factors.

Would certainly love to see a full blown hack try to tackle this stage someday.

 

Who said, that R2 was the desert stage?
It easily could be random sapce to make planet larger, or less empty.

Anyway, I think that we see the same shit that was with Dust Hill. We know name, and really not sure with that, what have used it. It's sad. I don't like criteria, that "we need to see more", but, who said that you'll see more? Have you saw Dust Hill documentation? Or, at least, concept art? Name for zones can go crazy, developers could use anything for anyone. Who said that one zone can't have a 100500 names in development process, and change it day by day?

P.S.: What if D.A. Garden theme it's a not pure DDZ music, but remix? This birdies is makes me unsure, that it should be so..