"Dust Hill" meaning researched

I wanted to make a research on the Internet about the meaning of the words "Dust Hill" and "Hill of Dust" to see what I can find and what the other people think about this.
With a lot of objectivity and without any existence of Sonic and Sega, or their related levels, there is the results I found all over the Internet, all over the world:

Extract "Faliraki Rhodes Hotels Uncovere":
(Faliraki is a city near the bay of Kallithea in Rhodes, Greece)

"(...) the pool is of a average size next to a hill of dust and cactus with excellent views of the building sites. the bar was a hot and dusty little hut with a tv you couldnt watch as the owners sons sat all day with there hands on the remote. it is also VERY EXPENSIVE. A bag of crisps and a can of coke costing 3E 50C/?3. it also took 4 days and a complaint for us to get our linen changed and bin emptied. (yes the toilet bin) it not nice at all. there are also resident chickens living in the small garden. good alarm clocks if you get up at 6am.?
we found the staff to be loud and unhelpfull. (...)"
http://www.holidaysuncovered.co.uk/holiday..._faliraki_a.htm

Extract from Peace Corp Online-December 1st:

"(...) My forehead resting on the window glass, I try to concentrate on the paper-thin moon following me out of Kerak and the mysterious black cloud resting next to it. A moving figure in blue holds a child?s hand; they?re looking toward bundles of Bedouin tents settled in a sea of sand. Scenery changes so quickly here, from the smallest concrete home on a hill of dust to rows of olive trees surrounding a grandiose mansion. Should I absorb everything I can, watching each object that passes by the car window, since it?s probably the last time I will ever see it? Or should I close my eyes, pretend this isn?t real, and try to focus on still being in Jordan? (...) "

Extract of an article, The Examiner-World tour-13:

"(...) Hundreds of rescuers worked night and day, digging away the hill of dust and shards by the clattering bucketful rather than move in heavy machinery where there might be victims.
The six floor building collapsed early Thursday morning, trapping 70 to 75 people (...)"

Canyon Country, Adventure cyclists tame the 'beast' on White Rim Trail.
Read the full article here: http://www.coloradoanticket.com/xplore/archive/t011302.html

"(...) At the bottom we let out a sigh and continued riding. It would be our longest day and we needed to get to our campsite at Potato Bottom by dark. We passed one camping area and then later in the afternoon another. Then in front of us appeared our first uphill test. We named it the "hill of dust or sand". We ended up having to team up and push each rig together for much of this hill. It was tough going. At the top we were rewarded with a beautiful high traverse over to our camp area for the night. (...)"

Others images:
http://home.tele2.fr/s2long/screenshots/DH...e/Colorado1.jpg
http://home.tele2.fr/s2long/screenshots/DH...e/Colorado3.jpg

Random images and photos, with their names:

EricPeterDustHill.jpg


RunnerOnDustHill.jpg


DustStorm.jpg


Dust.jpg


Other links to some images:
HillDust.jpg
SecondHill.jpg
WhatDust.jpg

Obviously, this proves absolutely nothing about the desert level, but now, you know what some others think about the words "Dust Hill"...
Another word: I found nothing about caves, BUT I read (In a French magazine) "travailler dans ces collines de poussi?re..." ("work in these dust hills...") talking about workers in a mine of Diamonds.

Make your opinion about this research, or try to find some others informations to post here...

 

That's why I post them.
There is almost nothing about caves or mines or underground locations when you talk about a dust hill or a hill of dust. This expression, "Dust Hill", seems to be a metaphor, an image to talk about sandhills, dunes or also powdery snow, everywhere in books, photos, articles, musics...

There is some things else found this afternoon:
Powdery snow comes from powder, and the word "poudreuse" in French, referring to this powdery snow, can be translated as dusty...
A sand storm can be called also as a dust storm. I see it in a lot of articles talking about this and the beginning of the war in Iraq.
...
At last, the word "dust" is highly used as a metaphor to talk about very quick and fine sand.

Another time, this is very objective. This is all I can find about "dust hill" so far.

EDIT: After verification on a map, this town near Northampton (UK) is "Dost Hill", not "Dust Hill". This mistake belongs to the site I saw it...Deleted from this research.

 

I can't say Dust Hill zone is the desert level. Obviously, in our beta, Dust Hill zone is the old name for Mystic Cave and nothing else. We can't say this is not true because...well...choose DHZ under the level select and you are in a cave level like MCZ, and that's all!

I think my opinion and theory about this desert level shouldn't be posted here (PM or e-mail me to have it, so I can talk with you easily). This topic is just to reveal what in real life, the words "dust hill" and "hill of dust" are used for. With this research, I'm convinced that this name is better for a sand/winter level than for a cave level. Maybe that's why Sega changed it after to Mystic Cave, we'll never know...

 

That was an edit, but you replied faster than me editing...

Anggun, Snow on the Sahara, 1998, extract of lyrics:

Only tell me that you still want me here
When you wander off out there
To those hills of dust and hard winds that blows
In that dry white ocean alone
? ?
Lost out in the desert...
You are lost out in the desert...
? ?
But to stand with you in a ring of fire
I'll forget the days gone by
I'll protect your body and guard your soul
From mirages in your sight
? ?
Lost out in the desert...
? ?
If your hopes scatter like the dust across your track
I'll be the moon that shines on your path
The sun may blind our eyes I'll pray the skies above
For snow to fall on the Sahara
If that's the only place where you can leave your doubts
I'll hold you up and be your way out
And if we burn away I'll pray the skies above
For snow to fall on the Sahara

 

Since others post their theories about the desert level anyway, I will post my mine, very understandable when you are a game developper I think:

First, this is obvious that this sand/snow level with a palette change existed, at an early stage than our beta. When you start writing a game, with the storyboard, you plan some levels you will make for the game, without chosing their definitive names. Some levels were planned at start: a Green Hill level (like Sonic 1 one), a Neo Green Hill (something a bit different than a Green Hill), an Hill Top level (at the top of a mountain, trough clouds), a Wood level (lost in a forest), a Casino level (at night, you usually go to casino at night), a Chemical Plant level (a plant with some odd substances), an hidden level (called Hidden Palace because this is a beautiful level with some gems), a Metropolis level (like the famous film Metropolis by Fritz Lang in 1927), a sky fortress level (a fortress in the sky), a death egg level (the last one, like Star Wars films), a sand/snow level, and then a city level (maybe with a catastrophe, we don't know...). This is where my theory start...

I think the cave level was not planned at start (12 levels planned already). Having 13 levels in a game is kinda odd...All level names under the beta were descriptive and not definitive, developpers certainly don't care so much about their names at this point. When you compare a desert with a snowy mountain, you can't find matches with the relief, or with the weather, or vegetables. The only thing matching is this idea of dust coming from the sand and the powdery snow. Then, why not call it Dust....Hill at start for developpers (Like Green Hill, Neo Green Hill, Hill Top, Whateveryouwant Hill)?

Now, we are highly thinking that Genocide City was out of the game developpement before sand/snow level. In fact, Wood zone was cut pretty early too, after the sand/snow level, and Brenda Ross remember it very well. BR can't remember GCZ (as well for Craig Stitt), because she never saw this level! It was cut before her level...So why they keep GCZ under the level select and not the sand/snow level? I think every levels planned at start are under this level select, and the cave level is again in an early developpement stage in our beta (2, 3 sprites and some tiles), not like the others not cutted out. Then, I think Dust Hill was the sand/snow level slot, and when they cut it from the game, planning another cave level instead, they put the cave level in this slot (instead of creating a new one, and Dust Hill is better for a cave level than Wood or Genocide City). They changed the developpement name after to Mystic Cave (like some others), before the release of Sonic 2 in 1992.

That's all what I think about this sand/snow level. This is 99% false for sure, but this maybe 99% true, unfortunately we will never know...


EDIT: In my first sentence, I mean existed on the paper at least.