Some changes and fixes for Sonic 2

E-122-Psi · Dec 1, 2024

nineko said:

E-122-Psi said:

All three activation checks are separate and can be given different timer settings ($3C3C represents the frames and seconds, 60). You could even add a handicap for one player, giving Sonic, say $1E1E (30 seconds) and Tails $5A5A (90 seconds). It's quite flexible, but remember it can only go up to double digits, so the timer won't display correctly past 99 seconds ($6363).
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Premise: I never hacked Sonic 2, and I wouldn't even know where to start to check this, but, if what you're saying is true, and that value holds both the seconds and the frames, you shouldn't change both of its bytes, otherwise you'd get things such as 30 seconds and 30 frames, or 90 seconds and 90 frames. Again, this is only a guess which might be entirely wrong (in which case I'll gladly blank out my post later), but I think you should only alter the first byte, while keeping the second byte as 3C.
I like how this is made even more confusing by the fact that the "second" byte isn't the byte which represents the seconds.
Coincidentally, giving 60 seconds and 60 frames would effectively give you 61 seconds, this is probably done as a placebo effect to make the countdown feel less confusing, many people freak out when they think that a countdown robbed them of a second, without realising that that second actually takes place during 00:whatever.
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Yeah admitedly this is the catch I see if it is representing seconds. The reason I edited both is because the second byte didn't seem to remotely affect the length of time for each number. If anyone is able to truly pinpoint check this theory and debunk this however, I'll revise the tutorial.

EDIT: As it turns out, the seconds byte IS being affected, but only for the first frame. Then coding within the HUD routine resets it to its default. (Makes sense for the NTSC settings at least).

In that case, for accuracy for that ONE frame at least, it should be set consistently to $3C.

Once again, thanx to MoDule for clarifying and nineko for pointing this out. I'll edit the guide accordingly.

Sonic Hachelle-Bee · Apr 3, 2025

Sorry for this small bump (I think a topic like this should be pinned as it is useful and timeless information).

Maybe this is old news, but while digging deep into the 2P mode, I think I understand the root cause of this:

Why do they put spikes over all bottomless pits in MCZ?

The answer may be in the 2P mode, as a poor attempt to quickly fix a major game quality issue with minimal costs. If you fall down a bottomless pit while invincible in 2P mode, as expected you will die and restart at your last checkpoint without being invincible. However, the invincibility music will still be playing indefinitely.

Yes, this bug also applies if you are crushed...

But anyways, even invincible, spikes stops you as you fall down a bottomless pit. This avoids this bug that is very likely to occur in MCZ with all its bottomless pits. Remember also that all monitors may be random in 2P mode which increases the chances to be invincible. The occurrence is even 100% if one of the player reached the goal.

If you look at the other 2P zones, CNZ doesn't have any bottomless pits. And EHZ... has 2 small bottomless pits in act 2! I guess, because they are easily avoidable, they forgot about these ones.

This is entirely speculation in the end, but at least this is a logical explanation.

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Some changes and fixes for Sonic 2

E-122-Psi

Sonic Hachelle-Bee

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