Hirokazu Yasuhara revealing all kinds of Sonic development stuff

New scan!

 

Nice! That's a direct connection to Ice Cap Zone. But was it developed with Sonic 3 in mind or before?

 

What game is that from ? I didn't see any info .... >__<

 

I think he's just posting pre-Sonic 1 stuff until he says otherwise.

 

Awesome, a great coincidental 19th birthday present from Mr. Yas himself! :D

In all seriousness though, I wonder how many concepts were thought up for Sonic 1 that simply got recycled into later games. Although it seems Sonic 2 recycled a lot of unused elements into Sonic 3, it seems like the core basis for an 'Ice Zone' was in place since Sonic 1. Makes me wonder what Sonic 1's early game plan was like; I'd love to see how different the game universe may have turned out to be.

 

I can think of some others off the top of my head. For example, this previously found concept art of a stage with a bunson burner and pipes:
Most likely became chemical plant in the next game.


This cloudy, hilly, up-in-the-mountains stage with fireballs could have become hilltop. (Although the Japanse at the top mentions the stage being inspired by China. That could have been tossed out.)

 

That gimmick and set up looks like it was used in SYZ.

 

You're right. I see it now. But I still feel like the idea for a hilly area up in the clouds with mountains in the background probably inspired Hill Top, especially seeing now that hill top was planned from the very beginning and not just a last minute rehash of EHZ.

 

I have to wonder if the Chinese-inspired stage was at all related to the CG-inpsired stage (Which, of course, became Green Hill), given that the mountains are drawn in exactly the same style. I suppose it could simply be coincidence, though; there's little else similar. For reference:



And I think you might be onto something with the similarities to Hill Top. High mountains among drifting clouds, with fireballs. Certainly thematically similar.

 

I mean, Hill Top was pretty poorly done for something that was there from the beginning, in my opinion anyway. I hope I didn't offend any HTZ lovers. I mean, it's "alright" but it ain't no Chemical Plant Zone :v: They honestly seem like they came from 2 different games.

 

Sonic 2 is a strange game level progression wise, especially towards the beginning of the game. It's not as organic as Sonic 1 and definitely not as organic as Sonic 3 & Knuckles. You can almost kind of tell that it was development hell the game. Grass > Chemicals > Ruins > Casino > Mountain Top > Cave > Oil rig > Factory > Sky > Sky > Space. The last 3 levels make sense, although you could maybe argue that everything from Oil Ocean on makes sense and you could stretch everything from Hill Top onwards as making sense, but the first 4 levels... what the hell is with the first 4 levels.

 

No wonder Hidden Palace was cut! Sonic 2 honestly didn't deserve it. We were basically served crap on a platter with bits of gold and it still somehow became the "Standard" of Sonic :v:/>/> I guess we were lucky to even get Super Sonic. Sonic 3(&K) did a bang up job and it still wasn't perfect. They were able to get away with the split that time because the levels were massive. Could you imagine what a split Sonic 2 would have been? Sonic the Hedgehog 2, Sonic & Tails, Sonic the Hedgehog 2 and Tails. I guess Sonic Chaos and Sonic Triple Trouble would have been global titles instead. :v:



No wonder they've kept this information from us for years, they felt we were better off knowing. At this point it doesn't matter. Given 25 years later, we are already in too deep to really protest.

 

I wouldn't say that by any means. A lot of games are pretty indecisive about their direction until later on in development.

I'm sure finding out that Sonic CD was already incorporating time travel was what changed the direction of Sonic 2 so much in the end. Not only that, but the language barrier and communication difficulties of having Sega Japan run a project being made at SOA from overseas in the pre-internet age. Considering all that happened, they came up with an incredible product.

Making the most out of your limitations was what made games back then so great. It was common to include a lot of ideas that were too ambitious for the time and have to scale back. (Like, Yoshi having been planned for the NES Mario games)

 

I just thought something: What if Ocean Wind = Aquatic Ruin/Neo Green Hill? It may sound a bit random, but hear me out: When looking at the map, one may think that Olympus is a likely contender to be Aquatic Ruin, given that this one seems to be an ancient Greek-style structure reminiscent of Aquatic Ruin. However, Olympus is in the past, and the fact that Aquatic Ruin is an ancient ruin ravaged by time hints that it's in the present, otherwise they probably would have depicted it as a thriving place. And since Ocean Wind is the present counterpart to Olympus, it may have been intended to be the present time ruins of it.

This is supported by the background of Aquatic Ruin: It has a forest, and beyond it you can see mountains. This coincides with the location of Ocean Wind on the map, taking a look at it from the center to the north: it has a lake with small islands, which would be the foreground area of Aquatic Ruin (also coinciding with Olympus' location in the past); just to the north is a forest (Wood(s) Zone); and even further to the north are the mountains that house the Death Egg.

 

That could make sense, if only we definitively knew that Olympus (Atlantis) was an actual zone, and not simply a landmark on the past map. I will say that I do like that placement though. And furthermore, if Aquatic Ruin is Ocean Wind, then that would likely make Blue Lake the pristine version.

 

About that, I'll start referring to previous posts of mine:
//forums.sonicretro.org/index.php?showtopic=36719&view=findpost&p=893732
//forums.sonicretro.org/index.php?showtopic=36719&view=findpost&p=893756

Now, with that starting point, I have to say that I changed my mind a bit about that, but still disagree with Aquatic Ruin being in the present. Taking the level slots a bit more into account this time, Aquatic Ruin would have been at the end of the game, or, much more likely, it would have been that out of timeline place where Sonic became super, which could be easily Olympus as it is marked in the map in a different way than the others. To adjust my previous theory, Blue Lake would have been just a level they never started to develop, but still close to Aquatic Ruin.

If it was supposed to be something like Atlantis, it could still have been ruined in the past after being built in a more distant past; moreover, if it had to be like Atlantis, it would be acceptable for it to be on the surface in the past and sunken in the present.

 

I really think we shouldn't be placing Super Sonic anywere between this since it was a last minute addition.

 

https://tcrf.net/Proto:Sonic_the_Hedgehog_2_(Genesis)/Simon_Wai_Prototype#Super_Sonic

 

Adding to Neo's post, the demo track was done very early on too. This doesn't rule out the possibility it was repurposed, but it seems unlikely.

 

Aquatic Ruin is neither Ocean Wind nor Olympus, because level order-wise Ocean Wind would be second and Olympus around eighth-ish. Aquatic Ruin/Neo Green Hill Zone is placed sixteenth; none of the levels in any of these maps are Aquatic Ruin.