Sonic 2: Advanced Edit - Discussion

(I have to keep this short as it's 5 AM and I should be in bed.)

After 11 years, Sonic 2: Advanced Edit is back! Featuring 7 all-original Zones with new art, badniks, objects, and bosses! While many people have contributed to make this hack , this absolutely would never have happened if not for both Qiuu and ICEknight - I want to make sure they both get the credit they deserve. If we forgot to credit anyone, please let us know! (it's been a long time and hard to remember!)

We really hope everyone has fun with this!


From the contest entry:

Screenshots!

Spoiler

Neo south Island Zone!


Neo south Island Zone! - Zone art by Phoebius!



Bamboo Jungle Zone! - Zone foreground art by Matwek



Blue Mountain Zone! - Zone art by Resel! (originally made for project Sonic Retro)



Robotic Ruin Zone! - Original Zone concept by Kilometers Prower



Dusty Desert Zone!



Eggquarium Zone!

 

You all have made me so incredibly happy, I can't wait to be done with today so I can get into this. Thank you so much.

 

Amazing! Played three zones so far and man, this feels so polished in every possible way; I especially dig how gimmicks mesh with layouts really well. although I somehow managed to clip through spikes at Neo South Island Act 2's beginning. Anyway, I really enjoyed this hack 11 years ago, and never thought this would get another update. Props and thanks to y'all!

 

I am looking forward to this~

I might just go back and play the last release to remind myself of what it was like, and make a personal comparison. I saw a few brief things in redhotsonic's video, but other than that, I will be attempting to avoid spoiling anything =3

 

This is really amazing! Some of the gimmicks in Cosmic City were a little frustrating to deal with, though.
And then I crashed the game by transforming into Super Sonic Emulator used: BizHawk 2.3.2/Genesis Plus GX r874

 

It´s incredible to see the hack returning after so long hiatus... Maybe should I revive my Sonic Gaiden hack? XD

Everything looks incredible and new bosses are amazing (except the last one, it´s frustrating, specially playing with Amy.). I caused a bug after get over 10 minutes on a stage and when I arrived at the end sign, it didn´t finishes the level. The I died and the timer got locked at 0:00:00 (also, after this I lost Super transformation)

 

Amazing work!

I can't wait to get back home tonight and play this on Kega

 

-In Bamboo Jungle 2, dying and restarting from the first checkpoint causes a camera freeze on the first water slide later on. This will kill the player and repeat until a game over.
-In Blue Montain, it is possible to get pushed inside walls by the blocks floating over lava pools. This softlocks the game.

Had to restart from a Bamboo Jungle save state thanks to that glitch but it's been a fun game so far. Loved the horizontal wrap around thing in the second zone's end.

 

I tried this out for a few zones. The presence of original gimmicks, badniks and bosses really elevates this hack to a level I don't often see. The unique level art and variety of setpieces in each tileset is a welcome sight as well, and the courses I played through didn't have any cheap enemy or spike placements. That snail ramp enemy in particular is really clever - When it catapulted me into the air instead of making me lose all my rings I grinned in a "Yes! These guys get it!" sort of way.

Some nitpicks/suggestions based on things I've noticed during my playthrough:

- Fixing the softlocks and death loops mentioned so far; I fell victim to a couple of them, specifically the Bamboo Jungle death loop mentioned by Yoritoshi and 10 minute softlock on stage completion that Yuski mentioned
- Adjusting the centiseconds on the timer to be base 100 instead of base 60
- Fixing the music when collecting speed shoes so that it speeds up instead of slows down

I'll be surprised if this doesn't win something in the hacking contest!

 

Wow, that's something unexpected. I played the last release to death and I really loved Neo Gigapolis and the Dangerous Seed ending theme on it. I'll play it ASAP and looking from the screenshots alone it looks amazing!

 

It's a good hack, but too superestimated, like Megamix.

 

Damn I remember playing this hack back when I first joined the community! I'm extremely happy to see that it's returned and brought some old faces back to the forums too! I'm definitely giving this a go!

 

Unfortunately, it doesn't seem to play on real hardware (at least my Model 2 with an Everdrive x5). I'll have to give it a play on an emulator soon.

 

There is a checkpoint in Robotic Ruin 1 that, if you restart from, the water level lowers to the point that the following section is made impossible thanks to the water level being at just the right level to make it impossible to jump up onto a higher platform needed to progress.

Also, really like Dusty Desert Zone - how it's a desert level Act 1 and a cave level Act 2!

 

Oh man! I remember playing this and loving that hack, especially with that gigapolis zone and its music.

What a big surprise to see it back! Cannot wait to play this, this will be the first sonic hack I play in years.

 

Wow, what a throwback! The Level Design, the revamped art... everything looks amazing. Great job, guys! I can’t wait to give this a try later today.

 

Oh wow, this is certainly a surprise to see, especially after 11 years since the last update. That said, the level design is a bit rough in places, and I did run into a few issues:

- Power Sneakers will sometimes slow down music instead of speeding it up.
- Blue Mountain Act 2 glitched up on me, displaying corrupted level graphics. This happened to me in BizHawk 2.3.2:

- The game itself won't work on real hardware for me. The sound driver breaks, then the game hangs on a black screen after selecting "START". This happened on a Mega Everdrive X5 on a US Model 1 Genesis.
- Didn't the third release have some grey springs in Crystal Cavern Zone Act 1? They're red springs for some reason, which makes certain powerups harder to get to.

Also, why is the Spin Dash disabled for Tails? It feels so weird for the move to be disabled for him when it's normally a standard for him in many 2D games.

 

This is quite the achievement... but some of your level designs and bosses really aren't much fun. I think maybe you're stretching things out for too long - there's not enough variety to support 4-5 minutes for an Act (which is I guess why Sonic 2 avoided doing that). The last release did it better in terms of emulating the pacing of Sonic games.


But a pleasant surprise otherwise!

 

There is a point for that - Look at Dusty Desert Zone 1 - it's about the length of two whole Sonic 2 zones - and larger than Lava Reef Zone 1. Probably the largest act in any Sonic hack to date.