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Sonic CD's Mysterious Cut R2 Level Discussion - Post Origins Edition

Discussion in 'General Sonic Discussion' started by HEDGESMFG, Jul 12, 2022.

  1. saxman

    saxman

    Oldbie Tech Member
    Actually, I think it's likely that since each zone is more or less it's own "game" (basically), perhaps each person just worked on their zone within the #1 slot, and Salad Plain is simply the one they chose to show off to the public for any number of reasons (more complete; first level; whatever). At some point after the demo, they then integrated everything and created the physical level slots for each. But this means there could have been more than one "v0.02" (so-called) internally.
     
  2. YuTwo

    YuTwo

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    Thank you for at least verifying this for me. Foolish me forgot that Chaotix actually has a level select which also allows you to even choose the time of day so I finally took some footage of the waterfalls in case anyone else wants to see it. I used a filter to make it look like as if it was running on a TV so the waterfalls can have actual transparency:
    https://web.archive.org/web/20220714231913if_/https://i.imgur.com/xb4Unhh.mp4

    By the way I have found that Masato Nishimura has already answered someone who questioned if the angel statue and the tiles surrounding it were from R2 assets and he said that they were not made for that zone:
    https://web.archive.org/web/20201129014752/https://twitter.com/Mazin__/status/1332863572389478400
     
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  3. Palas

    Palas

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  4. Blue Spikeball

    Blue Spikeball

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    Maybe it was inspired by R2, but deliberately drawn for Wacky Workbench? I can see them creating that section as a homage/development gag after R2 was cut.
     
  5. Hez

    Hez

    Oldbie
    I'm...not sure if I actually buy it? He also said RD2. They're so secretive about this stuff that I almost feel like it was done on purpose opposed to a typo/translation error. It's too inconsistant with the rest of the levels. There's no way it's not remenence of SOMETHING.
     
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  6. CaseyAH_

    CaseyAH_

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    I remember awhile ago during a discussion on R2 in another thread, someone speculated the reason the dev team was so secretive about R2 was because it was outsourced (or something along those lines) to someone else which is why they act to weirdly secretive about it. I don't know if there is anything to support this theory at all but I find it at least interesting.
     
  7. Aesculapius Piranha

    Aesculapius Piranha

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    Makes sense since they are so well tucked away. I guess someone really liked them and felt they needed to be used somewhere. Makes the secret more interesting since you are discovering a relic of a lost level in either future.
     
  8. Hez

    Hez

    Oldbie
    Or they were let go on not so good terms. It's common in the work place. If the employee was made aware, it could come back and bite them in the butt.
     
  9. Vertekins

    Vertekins

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    Midlands, England, UK, over there in Europe.
    Translating Sonic info. Working on Concept Mobius. Also, trying to find extant footage of original Sonic CD special stage.
    Not sure if this has been mentioned but concept art for Amy's sound effects in Origins indicated that Amy was supposed to follow Sonic into R2 and fall into a pitfall;

    [​IMG]

    This is consistent with the ending sequence wherein Sonic falls into a pitfall and almost becomes an Antilion Badnik's lunch. Personally, I imagine that the "Falling into pitfall" thing may have been incorporated into the beginning of R2's act 2 as the other piece of concept art shows that the second part seems to take place underground. She was also intended to be kidnapped in R2. The last box states that she's a highschool student who is also a cheerleader.
     
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  10. Blue Spikeball

    Blue Spikeball

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    I don't think they need a reason like that to be hush-hush about scrapped content. They were just like that regarding Selph from NiGHTS. Fans have asked Iizuka about this one more than once, and every time he responded by carefully picking his words and saying something like "It was a scrapped boss" while avoiding going into detail. The devs seem to be obligated to stay quiet about stuff like that.
     
    Last edited: Jul 15, 2022
  11. Vertekins

    Vertekins

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    Midlands, England, UK, over there in Europe.
    Translating Sonic info. Working on Concept Mobius. Also, trying to find extant footage of original Sonic CD special stage.
    Something that crossed my mind when reading the TCRF page for v0.02 is that strange gimmick that causes level structure to "collapse";



    I get a feeling that this may have been a gimmick present in R2. It was a technical stage afterall. Heh, maybe platforms were supposed to sink into pitfalls or something.
     
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  12. Linkabel

    Linkabel

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    Tbh, I always saw the Angel statue part as representation where modern civilization is built on top of the ruins of those before them. But remnants of it are left intact.

    Anyways, I really don't see a reason to doubt him. Why lie when he can just ignore the question?
     
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  13. Cool getting new nuggets of info.

    R2 is up there alongside my fav solved and unsolved Sonic dev mysteries. I'd love to see something playable one day.

    Dust Hill, Hidden Palace, Sonic 1 welcome signpost demo (tokyo toy show?), SA1 beta Windy Valley, Sonic 1 beta Spring Yard, giant rolling ball & Marble Zone ufo's - so many inspiring mysteries over the years, it's kinda sad to see most of them solved now. I love a good development mystery.
     
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  14. Devon

    Devon

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    I'm not so sure I would count on it, but who knows. Each level in Sonic CD was its own contained file with its own set of objects and functions. It could be possible that they were implemented in R1 for testing purposes, though. Internally, according to the Sonic Gems Collection symbol data, the object ID that was used for that effect is called "jisin", which is translated into "earthquake". It's located in a source file called "TAKI", which also contains the scrapped waterfall effect ("taki" translates to "waterfall"). The code for the earthquake effect was taken out (leaving just code to immediately exit out of the object), but the waterfall code still remains in R1. They do not appear in any other zone.
     
    Last edited: Jul 15, 2022
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  15. Hez

    Hez

    Oldbie
    I was literally just thinking of that waterfall effect today, and wondering if it wasn't a lava effect instead. The lava pouring down while the earthquake happens?
     
  16. Devon

    Devon

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    Honestly, I don't know. It might be possible that they could've been related. Maybe not. They don't reference each other. The effect is *specifically* called "taki"/waterfall. The object uses a splashing animation that scrolls down, and as it does, it overwrites existing block data with water blocks (or well, that's what was intended, it uses a super outdated block ID).



    It's really hard to say what the developers were specifically intending to do with this stuff with the lack of documentation.
     
    Last edited: Dec 26, 2022
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  17. Mastered Realm

    Mastered Realm

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    Just some comments on this image:

    [​IMG]

    • H4.3.12 is a date. H4 is "Heisei 4" (平成 4 年 ), literally the Japanese name for the year 1992.

    • The varying percentages near the zone seem to be related to the mechanization of each stage.

    So the translated text should be:

    GAME IMAGE OF THE ROUNDS March 12th, 1992

    Future + 20%
    Past - 30%

    START
    [1R] (Morning) 0%
    [2R] 10%
    [3R] Evening 30%
    [4R] Night 50%
    [5R] Morning 70%
    [6R] Evening 90%
    [7R] (Night) 100%
    [8R] Morning 100%
    BOSS

    LITTLE PLANET
     
    Last edited: Jul 15, 2022
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  18. Battons

    Battons

    Shining Force Fan Member
    Have they documented much about how they made content for Sonic CD? Example maybe they made all the sprite art first before scrapping it, which could be why we’ve never seen level geometry or tile sets. That could also provide some insight to exactly when they decided to cut it, which would help determine if they even made it playable in any form.
     
  19. saxman

    saxman

    Oldbie Tech Member
    To be honest, I think the lack of R2 information is nothing short of frustrating. We usually have a lot more to go off of for so many other development mysteries. R2 still captures the interest of many, including myself. But it has also become a little stale, at least for me.

    That's what makes this thread so wonderful is its attempt to rejuvenate it a bit. But in the end, we are still only left with wild speculation. We have absolutely no concrete idea what this stage looked like, or would have looked like, nearly 30 years later. And that's just crazy to me.
     
    Last edited: Jul 15, 2022
  20. The Joebro64

    The Joebro64

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    I remember Jim Trethway, who worked on the Windows 95 port, mentioned talking to the original developers and saying there seemed to be some bad blood over R2; from what he gathered, the designer didn’t do a good job so they just decided to bin it entirely. He also confirmed that each round was essentially developed as a separate game, and a single programmer stitched them together to create the full product. So what you say is 100% plausible to me.
     
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