Sonic 2 HD

Other slightly-off things I noticed:

-It seemed like my timing was off with the boss. Like he should've been coming back on-screen more quickly. I've trampled Robotnik's Revenge a LOT, so I trust my sense of timing here.
-I didn't feel like I could quite reach the breakneck speeds normally experienced, though that might just be the widescreen throwing me off. Not that it was laggy, just that Sonic literally wasn't as fast as he should be.

And a compliment:

-That invincibility music? AWESOME. I absolutely LOVE the ramp-up sound at the beginning.

 

This HD remake is glorious the artwork and music is of a very high standard and it works even with it deviating slightly from the original style. I can only get 30fps but even that can't stop you enjoying the amazing animations in this, the flowers bobbing up and down really bring this level to life. As mentioned by others the physics need more work on them, especially the spring distance. I was trying to get onto the platform with the signpost and rings from the spring below and found myself trying to land it perfectly just to get up there. My only criticism on the art is that some of the metals look like cheap plastic. The springs and the capsule suffer from this mainly and parts of Robotnik's Eggomatic do as well. I can tell that Sonic's animations are not finished. His standing animation smile differs from the walking ones which I'm hoping you are going to change and are there going to be some running animations when going through the corkscrew? By the way I know you were (are?) going through problems with the sounds but I hope this is not the final product for the HD music. One of the things I am really hoping for is live time stretching but you have seemed to have done a sped up version much like how Sega did for Sonic 4 which just sucks. I made a post years ago to test and see if time stretching on zone music would work without sounding a complete mess and the results were great so it would be good to know if this is still going to be a feature in the future.

This is something the Sonic community is highly divided on. To me, the original jump sound is the only sound I will accept which I'm glad they are keeping in (hopefully keep in).

 

The official closing of the project perturbs me.

 

This is definitely quite nice. I let my little brothers try it (and they play Sonic 1-3&Knuckles all the time), and they liked it a lot too. Their first question was "How did they make it look so nice!?"
My only real issue: Although now I have a 1280x1024 monitor (so I can play in 720p), the scaling doesn't look particularly good (most notably around the edges). And I can't play in 1080p, if that wasn't made apparent by my screen resolution.

 

That's partially true... In the Beta he's giving a thumbs up, but it's really the GG one that's used with the peace sign (which is based on the s2 beta one blah blah blah)

And yes. It bugs me too. I want my bad ass sonic back k thx. I bitched to Gambit about that months ago and I'm still peeved about it. Seriously guys, just give me the bad ass rebellious pose. This isn't original pixelfaggery. This is staying true and paying proper homage. Is that too much to ask?

Anyway, ultimate feelings:

- It feels like there's a speed cap though this might just be an illusion based on the widened screen. (Might want to let Sonic run to the edge of the screen a little more, eh?)
- I checked against the original. This has to be a nerfed jump. I'll assume this is something you guys are still working to correct.
- The sprites and music are just fine. Really enjoying the Emerald Hill theme. Nice mix one something that was original a faux-disco style song.

 

Maybe they'll use the newer Sonic when the game is more complete? I personally don't mind either one but would not be against a change.

 

I love everything except the flickering of the monitors. It is distracting to the eye. Everything else is wonderful and I hope to play more of this in the future.

 

A few times, Act 2 would never load up, then when I finally cleared Act 2, the game never restarted. Other than that, everything I think has pretty much already been said.

 

I downloaded and played the Alpha Release just now. It acted just like it should. No broken files.

The engine's name is NakaSMK (combination of my pixel perfect idol, Yuji Naka, and the "SM&K" initialization string used in Sonic & Knuckles), and is the file Sonic2HD.exe. That is the portable part, takes care of graphics, input, sound, file I/O management, and the user interface. See it as the Megadrive/Genesis hardware.

The game is all run from S2HD.DLL. That is the cartridge. To have more than one cartridge, and to connect them (locking them onto eachother) is a possibility.


The physics can never be 100% like the original. The game is based off Sonic 3, with some changes "for the good" to limit some actions to Sonic 2. But it is a complete rewrite of a rewrite, more closer to something you would see in New Super Mario Bros DS/Wii/Mii. The key rule of the engine and game is pixel perfect movement. I have several proof that Naka had this rule when he first created Sonic, and throughout his Sonic engines.

Some this to note about the background:
The background now has the mini clouds that were originally in the design of EHZ (as seen in the earliest mockup).
The background uses the best implementation of original Sonic's technology, which is from Sonic 1 Version 2's Marble Zone and Scrap Brain Zone (but not Spring Yard Zone, hehe)!
The technology also uses a very cool thing from Sonic Advance 2's Music Plant, which was only used there, and never reused, BUT totally kicks ass, especially performance wise.

There are minor chanages in the level design. Some of them are forced, because of the data used is not 100% like the original. Some objects have been moved. Most slopes are generated with higher precision and real angles instead of being hand made like in the original, thus the experience you feel is a little different. I do agree that while some choices made things better, others made things worse. But there is no way of doing everyting perfect, as if you push something in one direction, alot of other things fall apart. Finding the right balance is a hard job of days and sometimes weeks. If you look for bugs, you will find bug, and that applies to original Sonic as well. Please remember what an Alpha version stands for.


I'll try to upload a smooth gameplay video within the weeks that follow. It is too early for me to show gameplay from my point of view (I simply have too much to show and talk about).

EDIT: Oh, did you all see the PDF file? I do love game manuals. I'll have to print this one.

 

All right, cool. Downloaded it, played the regular version on a 64-bit computer, everything ran very well. Played through again just because. Then I closed it, only to find out about the secret in the readme.

Tried to open it and the level never loaded. Tried the 64-bit version TWICE, both never loaded the level. And now it's been closing for about 2 minutes now.

I love it, but I'd love to play it more than once before closing. Oh, and I'm running Windows 7 Ultimate 64-bit if that matters.

Edit: Okay, I just deleted the folder I extracted it to and just re-extracted it. Works fine now, even after closing out.

 

I think there must be a curse. It seems we can't keep more than one community fangame project at a time . Think about it; Project Retro fell, leaving only Sonic 2 HD, then just after the Mobius Engine becomes a community project, Sonic 2 HD goes private.

On the game itself. Plays fantastic on my machine (Windows 7 Home Premium, 3.10 GHZ, 4GB of Ram). Also, managed to use it on my 360 controller and it was very smooth.

 

Just downloaded this and played the demo through - runs fine on my computer (which is getting on a bit now) except during fade-ins/fade-outs when it stutters occasionally. = )

LOVING what I'm playing - it looks, feels and sounds a real treat! The music especially is a really great interpretation. = ) Gameplay-wise it felt faithful, though I especially loved some of the little differences, such as a few monitors being slightly repositioned due to your engine allowing objects to interact with moving platforms.

A couple of things could do with further visual polish, though:

- When in his Eggmobile, Dr. Eggman needs a right-facing version of his sprite so that the "EG" symbol on his chair isn't mirrored when facing that direction.
- Since Sonic's in-game sprite has been recoloured to closer match the official Japanese art of the 1990's, his title-screen sprite should probably be updated to match.
- The Invincibility monitor icon is very unclear - the stars are very small and hard to make out. I'd suggest making them bigger, or redesigning the icon in some way to make them more prominent.

Aside from that, looking very good indeed! Nice to have something to play after the very long wait. I'm guessing it'll be a long while before we see anything else playable - are there any plans to release further visual updates showcasing further artwork during development? = )

 

Me and a bud (Also a member here) had our fun with the alpha. Some things-such as difficulty-can make one consider Sonic 2 the 3rd best sonic game.
Look ma—no jumping.

Also, since no one has pointed out many of the flaws, and I still believe in feedback, here's a list:

• Sonic's looking up sprite is rediculous. Just watch the spines.
• Looking down isn't much better.
• Sonic's hand on the title screen is really derpy. The closed fingers don't move naturally AT ALL.
• That grin when sonic is about to fall doesn't live up to the quality of the rest of the game.
• The yellow springs don't seem quite as powerful. Getting to the starpost on the platform seems more difficult.
• It was mentioned before, but one can't fall into roll whilst holding forward or backward.
• Input lag seems to still be a slight issue. But using raw input greatly improves it—and this is a moot point. The 60hz input limitation doesn't exist like it does in all the unity fangames, and that is a feature in itself.
• Looking up/down camera movement hasn't been implemented just yet.
• Some of tails sprites seem to be better than those of Sonic's. Odd.
• Sonic's feet cut in and out of the grass very noticeably between tiles.

These problems are mostly art problems, and since the art assets were very audibly finished, they are fair game for whining.

 

So far, so good. Played it. Looks awesome and plays pretty awesome as well. Tails is adorable. <3

 

So, here's my specs first :
- CPU = Intel E8400 @ 3,00Ghz
- GPU = AMD HD5770
- RAM = 4Gb
- OS is Ubuntu 11.10 64bits


The 64bit version won't run at all in Wine.

The 32bit version does run, but suffers from sound issues to the point the music thread simply crashes and the game remains silent. Here's the Terminal output:

Code (Text):

1. fixme:heap:HeapSetInformation (nil) 1 (nil) 0
2. fixme:system:SetProcessDPIAware stub!
3. fixme:win:EnumDisplayDevicesW ((null),0,0x32f6ec,0x00000000), stub!
4. fixme:win:EnumDisplayDevicesW ((null),0,0x32f6ec,0x00000000), stub!
5. fixme:alsa:AudioClient_GetMixFormat Don't know what to do with 32 channels, pretending there's only 2 channels
6. fixme:alsa:AudioClient_GetMixFormat Don't know what to do with 8 channels, pretending there's only 2 channels
7. fixme:alsa:AudioClient_GetMixFormat Don't know what to do with 32 channels, pretending there's only 2 channels
8. fixme:mixer:ALSA_MixerInit No master control found on HD-Audio Generic, disabling mixer
9. err:alsa:ALSA_CheckSetVolume Could not find '{PCM,Line} Playback Volume' element
10. fixme:dsalsa:IDsDriverBufferImpl_SetVolumePan (0x18ddf8,0x18dd34): stub
11. fixme:d3d:swapchain_init Add OpenGL context recreation support to context_validate_onscreen_formats
12. fixme:d3d:resource_check_usage Unhandled usage flags 0x8.
13. fixme:d3d:resource_check_usage Unhandled usage flags 0x8.
14. fixme:d3d9:Direct3DShaderValidatorCreate9 stub
15. fixme:d3d:resource_check_usage Unhandled usage flags 0x8.
16. fixme:d3d:resource_check_usage Unhandled usage flags 0x8.
17. fixme:d3d:resource_check_usage Unhandled usage flags 0x8.
18. fixme:d3d:resource_check_usage Unhandled usage flags 0x8.
19. fixme:d3d:resource_check_usage Unhandled usage flags 0x8.
20. fixme:d3d:resource_check_usage Unhandled usage flags 0x8.
21. fixme:d3d:wined3d_buffer_preload Too many declaration changes or converting dynamic buffer, stopping converting
22. fixme:dsalsa:IDsDriverBufferImpl_SetVolumePan (0x18ddf8,0x18dd34): stub

The game itself feels a bit laggy on this setup. When the multi-sonic demo kicks in, it grinds to a slideshow. Apart from that, and the weird system requirements (minimum recommended settings are higher than Crysis' recommended ones), I'm really enjoying it.

The characters' shading in dark areas is a nice touch, but feels a bit off though - it's like the sprites are translucent or something.

 

Wasn't stated that it was supposed to run in Wine.

 

Like Sonic 2 HD was ever a public thing. :p

 

Give me a native Linux version then please.
And with no DRMs, thanks.

 

Wasn't able to play this game sadly, it only showed a green screen and black when pressing. Oh well... have to wait when someone uploads Tails gameplay too. Watched Sonic gameplay and I really loved the art style of it <3. Everything looks very beautiful. Sadly, I am unable to talk about the rest, cause my PC won't run it :C.

 

So uh.

What are you guys doing that requires a NVIDIA GeForce GTX 460 1GB / ATI Radeon HD 5850 1GB to be a "recommended" hardware requirement for a game that should just require a fixed function rendering pipeline (or something close to it, even if it's being emulated by shaders).