What really was the Sound Test #10 in STH2 going to be used for?

I've just checked and, unsurprisingly, the placeholder Special Stage in the Simon Wai prototype will play the final Special Stage music already. So it was indeed added and correctly assigned as soon as they could.

Pro Action Replay code: FFF600:10

 

Isn't the Oil Ocean track in one of the prototypes despite the Oil Ocean level incorrectly using the 2 Player track music? Shoots a hole in the theory that they correctly assigned the tracks when they were available.

The Oil Ocean track was definitely intended for that level, it has Arabic influences and the level itself has Arabic itself. I still find it hilarious how an oil level equated to middle eastern.

 

Still, kind of a really big coincidence that it was added to the same slot where the Special Stage music used to be in Sonic 1:

Sonic 1/Sonic 2 Nick Arcade
$81 Green Hill Zone
$82 Labyrinth Zone
$83 Marble Zone
$84 Star Light Zone
$85 Spring Yard Zone
$86 Scrap Brain Zone
$87 Invincibility
$88 1-Up
$89 Special Stage
$8A Title
$8B Ending
$8C Boss
$8D Final Zone
$8E Act Complete
$8F Game Over
$90 Continue
$91 Credits
$92 Drowning
$93 Chaos Emerald

Sonic 2 Simon Wai
$81 Casino Night 2-Player
$82 Emerald Hill Zone
$83 Metropolis Zone
$84 Casino Night Zone
$85 Mystic Cave Zone
$86 Mystic Cave 2-Player
$87 Aquatic Ruin Zone
$88 Death Egg Zone
$89 Special Stage
$8A Stage Select
$8B Stage Select
$8C Final Boss
$8D Chemical Plant Zone
$8E Boss
$8F Sky Chase Zone
$90 Oil Ocean Zone
$91 Oil Ocean Zone
$92 Wing Fortress Zone
$93 Emerald Hill 2-Player
$94 2-Player Results
$95 Super Sonic
$96 Hill Top Zone
$97 Hill Top Zone
$98 1-Up
$99 Title Screen
$9A Act Complete
$9B Game Over
$9C Continue
$9D Chaos Emerald
$9E Chaos Emerald
$9F Chaos Emerald


Might be a special case due to it not being a regular level but more of a game mode.

 

I just think that trying to guess what was going to happen through which level plays which track is very dubious. Oil Ocean uses the wrong music track. Similarly, Mystic Cave is called Dust Hill and it seems very unlikely it was ever going to be called that.

I don't think the Special Stage was ever going to play track 10 mind.

 

Gonna have to disagree with you on this one. Oil Ocean uses the 2P Casino Night track while slot 03 (Sand Shower/desert) uses Oil Ocean's track in the Wai proto. Oil Ocean's track could've been composed for the desert zone originally since we know it got far enough into development to have art assets and a palette swap concept created for it.

Using your own logic regarding Arabic influences, Sonic Team equated a desert level to middle eastern.

In context to the final game, Dust Hill as a name doesn't make sense. That's likely why the eventually changed it to Mystic Cave.

But in context to the original time travel concept that the name originated from, it kinda does. If it was meant to be a "ruined present" of Green Hill, then that explains the hill part of the name. And if Green Hill has been reduced to nothing but dust it would make sense to have the level take place in the caverns below. This is nothing but theorizing on my part here, but it's an example for how the name could've worked. Alternatively, Sonic Team can't do english (Genocide City, get blue balls, etc).

 

Maybe we've been wrong assuming and Brenda's desert was actually Rock World while Sand Shower was indeed more of an Arabian desert? =P

But yeah, I don't think that every level had the correct music track assigned anyway (e.g.: Wood Zone sharing Metropolis' music).

 

It's strange that the music was rearranged from the wai proto to the final but Wood zone still uses Metropolis music. Are all the other slots the same?

 

How does this shoot any holes? The discussion of these tunes is literally based around how some tracks were switched around. In my opinion, Oil Oceans theme never fit the zone. Even as a child I thought this.

On topic -- I'd love to see the concept art given to Nakamura. I'd also be willing to bet more music was probably composed than used.

 

Same here. The music was very unfitting for Oil Ocean, was there any documentations regarding to the music? I don't see that much around, all I see are speculations and such.

 

Yuzo Koshiro made more tunes for Streets of Rage 1 than what made it into the final game - Apparently he just made track after track and presumably let the developers choose the ones that would fit the stages best.

Maybe it was a similar story for Sonic 2 and there's indeed a number of demo tracks we haven't heard yet.

 

I'd imagine the concept art given to Nakamura is this set:



They're produced for aesthetic assessment over any gameplay/level design stuff, which would make it perfect to give to the musician.

 

Since there's theories all over this thread, I'd like to throw in my two cents. Looking back on Sonic 2, I find it surprising they would even bother including original tracks just for 2p mode. If they already had them composed for the extra levels that never came to be, it makes more sense to me that they used them because they had them, rather than getting them composed just for 2p mode. Especially considering the rush they were in.

Casino Night 2P sounds much more fitting for oil ocean zone, but perhaps a little too slow / empty for the main game, so it was moved?

 

I find it a bid odd that Oil Ocean was ever intended to use a 50's style Jazz inspired song. Again, it makes more sense going with 2 Player Casino Night.

I know this is very speculative, but the 2 Player music seems to go too well with the level themes to be a coincidence. Casino Night has a 50's style Jazz song, Emerald Hill has a first level sounding song (with the glimmering cresendo at the start that is like Green Hill and Palmtree Panic; a topos of Sonic opening levels at the time). Maybe Mystic Cave has the least clear fit, but I still think it sounds more like a cavern level than a hidden palace, albeit it probably sounds well with Hidden Palace because in all honesty they are similarish level themes.

Also, how does this fit with other levels? Do you think Metropolis was initially going to use something other than its final theme (its originally assigned to Wood Zone). I mean, that track is so clearly fit for a city style level (even more emphasised in Masa's demo). Was Wood Zone going to use a cyber style theme, I mean maybe it would work with Eggman's industrial shenanigans, but I dunno.

Interested to know what others think about this too.

Mind you, I believe the final Sonic 2 release uses Metropolis' theme in the Wood Zone level remnants, but maybe that's just because they never developed it much further than the prototypes. If anything that supports Hidden Palace using track 10, because it could suggest they assigned track 10 to Hidden Palace later in development (because otherwise it's fair to believe it would still use the 2 player mystic cave music).

 

I've been a subscriber to the notion that the 2P tracks were just leftovers from scrapped zones. Not because they don't fit the zones they were assigned to, but because of how many zones were initially planned and worked on. It makes far more sense to me that the 2P zones were originally going to play the standard tracks, but by crunch time it was decided to use the tracks from scrapped zones instead of letting them go unused. The 2P music for Emerald Hill could have fit with Tropical Sun before it was scrapped, for instance.

I've speculated that music beyond the 2P tracks were repurposed as well. For example, Sky Chase has always sounded more aquatic than airy to me. It could have been a good fit for an underwater zone like Blue Ocean. The Competition Results music may have been meant for another zone as well.

I don't think any zones would have had overlapping music, so I bet Woods would have ended up with a different theme than Metropolis had it not been axed. It does fit both zones quite well though, and also happens to be my favorite song from Sonic 2, so I certainly wouldn't have minded if it was heard more than once.

Hidden Palace using Mystic Cave 2P makes more sense than track 10 to me as well. Track 10 sounds more suited for a perfect ending or some other cutscene. Perhaps one day we'll know for sure.

 

Since were on the top of Sonic 2 prototypes, why do Genocide City Zone and Metropolis Zone Act 3 both exist alongside each other in the Wai prototype? Wasn't Metropolis Act 3 reworked from the layout of Genocide City? Is it possible that Genocide/Cyber City has already been removed by this build and is just a leftover? Metropolis Act 3 also gets an an entire level slot devoted to it, which makes me wonder if there was once something else in it's place.

Anyway, I thought it might be useful to list which tracks the zones in the Simon Wai uses (sorry for ugly formatting):

Green Hill Zone ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Emerald Hill
ID $01 (Labyrinth in NA) ~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Emerald Hill
Wood Zone ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Metropolis
ID $03 (Desert Zone?) ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Oil Ocean
Metropolis ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Metropolis
Metropolis Act 3 & unused 4 ~~~~~~~~~~~ Metropolis
ID $06 (Ending in NA then crashes)~~~~~~ Emerald Hill 2P
Hill Top Zone ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Hill Top
Hidden Palace Zone ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Mystic Cave 2P
ID $09 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Sky Chase
Oil Ocean Zone ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Casino Night 2P
Dust Hill Zone ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Mystic Cave
Casino Night Zone ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Casino Night
Chemical Plant Zone ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Chemical Plant
Genocide City Zone ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Chemical Plant
Neo Green Hill ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Aquatic Ruin
Death Egg ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Nothing
ID $11 (Referenced in code. but nonexistent) ~~ Nothing

I agree with the notion that the 2P themes were originally meant for other 1P zones, especially when looking at this list. As for Hidden Palace's music, it was likely going to use MCZ 2P theme originally, but was changed later on in the development process. The same can also be said for Oil Ocean, although Oil Ocean's final theme seems to have been intended for $ID 03, whatever that may be.

 

Genocide City Zone never made it past conceptual design other than a level slot. There is no GCZ in the Wai beta, it's an empty level and anything in it is garbage data.

 

Everything becomes a bit clearer once you factor in Yasuhara's original timeline (full stage names taken from the island map illustrations):

Code (Text):

1. Timeline                Wai Proto               Final
2.  
3. Green Hill Zone         Green Hill Zone         Emerald Hill Zone
4. Ocean Wind Zone
5. Woods Zone              Wood Zone
6. Sand Shower Zone
7. Metropolis Zone         Metropolis Zone         Metropolis Zone
8. Tropical Plant Zone     Metropolis Zone         Metropolis Zone
9. Blue Lake Zone                                  Wing Fortress Zone
10. Hill Top Zone           Hill Top Zone           Hill Top Zone
11.                         Hidden Palace Zone
12. Rock World Zone
13. Oil Ocean Zone          Oil Ocean Zone          Oil Ocean Zone
14. Dust Hill Zone          Dust Hill Zone          Mystic Cave Zone
15. Casino Night Zone       Casino Night Zone       Casino Night Zone
16. Chemical Plant Zone     Chemical Plant Zone     Chemical Plant Zone
17. Genocide City 1 Zone    Genocide City Zone      Death Egg Zone
18. Genocide City 2 Zone*   Neo Green Hill Zone     Aquatic Ruin Zone
19.                         Death Egg Zone          Sky Chase Zone
20.  
21. * listed as Neo Death Egg Zone in the timeline

Evidently, at some point Metropolis' third act took over the slot for Tropical Plant, just like Neo Green Hill took the slot for Neo Death Egg -- funny about the name overlap. Then, when the three endgame stages were finalized, they took over unused slots seemingly at random.

Also, I just noticed that the Wai level select lists all the stages in internal ID order, simply skipping over a couple of the empty slots -- it is entirely likely that Mystic Cave started being built into the first empty slot already in the level select out of convenience, and they just never updated the text.

 

One thing that I am most tired of is hearing the DOUBTS about Oil Ocean. There is no mystery here. The music fits the zone as intended and was not a rush job. The beta was not accurate as we know things were moving around quite a bit during that time. Casino Night 2P was a place holder and the snapshot in time that we have with the SW-Beta is an example of the music being present and perhaps not yet properly placed. Please, I beg of you, just look at this and tell me otherwise:

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-02-20/saudi-arabia-quietly-decreasing-dependence-on-crude-exports-lee


The picture in this article doesn't get any more real than this. The music 100% fits the mimic'd location. It's the one we don't have to worry or speculate about as we all know what music from this part of the world sounds like.

 

Looking at Neo's post above you'll see that the internal level order closely matches the original time travel concept level order from the Wai beta onward and Oil Ocean was not moved around at all (slot 0A). The fact is that Oil Ocean was assigned CNZP2 at one point (which still fits IMO) and that slot 03 (desert) was assigned OOZ. Saying that Casino Night 2P was a placeholder track is simply you theorizing, you have no proof it was or wasn't. I personally find it hard to believe that the music was "not properly placed" when every other zone (minus HPZ) plays its final track. There is a mystery here, one that we might never know the answer to without more concept art or early protos.

We have yet to see Oil Ocean's or the desert stage's concept art that was shown to Nakamura when he composed the soundtrack. Oil Ocean could've looked vastly different in concept at that point in development. You can't definitively state "song was meant for this stage" by comparing it to the final game's art when they were composed based off of early concept art. Saying OOZ's track fits better than CNZP2 is just your opinion.

 

It's not an opinion when the level is literally making fun of Saudi Arabian oil mills/refineries. The CNZ2P is placeholder music whether you agree or disagree. The fact is that it isn't the music used in the final. This is one of the few cut and dry cases. It's pretty clear it was there for some reason or another before it's final assignment.

Edit: After thinking about it, Sand Shower was an original possibility, modeled after the same region. Part of the turmoil is the conflict with what seems to be the later developed western desert, which wouldn't have fit the same theme at all.