Sonic the Hedgehog 4: Episode II Prototypes Found with Unused Ending

Is that Knuckles with the master emerald?

 

This reminds me that I need to learn how to use Unity in order to make S4E3 out of Superstars.

 

Oh wow, finally we get to see the cutscene behind that unused audio track years later!

Also, that room containing the Master Emerald looks incredibly similar to the end-of-level areas in Crash Bandicoot 2. I can't possibly be the only person noticing this similarity, right? Very likely just a coincidence, but I couldn't help noticing that.

 

Ah so Eggman would've tricked Knuckles again. I'm sure people would've loved that.

Honestly, I think from time to time that it's a shame that Sonic 4 will probably never see a proper ending. Sure, the games sucked ass and I really don't think there's anything of worth to be mined from them that couldn't be more flexibly done with just an entirely new game, but it's just a bit sad to see it left undone. Ah well, I'm sure 10 years down the line we'll see it announced when kids with nostalgia for it and Colours control the fanbase discourse.

 

haha yeah that was my thought too, probably a coincidence.

pretty cool that this was found, I don't really think we missed out on much but Ep II was a pretty big improvement over Ep I so maybe this might've been cool.

hey speaking of Crash, there are two completely different games in Japan called "Crash Bandicoot 4". If SEGA were feeling pretty ballsy they could just release a full new game called Sonic 4 lol

 

Sega has released 3 games under the name Sonic the Hedgehog so never say never

 

I knew. I just KNEW we’d would finally get to see this eventually but a whopping 13 YEARS later is par for the course when uncovering the secrets of the franchise!

 

Awesome to finally see it. It’s pretty much exactly how I imagined it in my head over the years but it’s nice to see they actually got as far as making the cutscene.

 

I've had a slight suspicion that Frozen Base was based on ideas intended for a first level for S4E3. It's interesting that there are a lot of funny spacecraft showing up at the end and they...well, don't look completely different to the one you see in Frozen Base...

It would also be mostly in keeping with series standards to have act 1 be a relatively simple introductory stage and have act 2 start introducing the abilities you gain with Tails as a partner, I suppose. I suspect the level design would look fairly different if the level were intended to appear earlier in the game though. Act Tails is pretty gnarly!

 

I’m already here, we are growing in number!

I’m the biggest Sonic 4 fan I know, so this is an awesome thing for me to see as someone who desperately wanted Episode 3 for so many years. And I posted on Sonic Retro a long time ago asking about ripping animation files from Sonic 4 as I was starting out my game dev degree and wanted to try my hand at remaking Sonic 4. Gave up on that idea pretty quick considering I sucked at coding at the time. But now I might try and give it another go especially with the source code being out there now.

 

Yea I certainly have made my opinion known that I enjoy Sonic 4. I have a soft spot for it. I was always sad that we never got a proper conclusion for the storyline, and the gameplay actually got pretty fun in episode II. I hope that some day we get the basic story template that was allegedly completed.

 

• Knuckles is teased at the end of the mobile port of Sonic 2, mobile port of Sonic 3 never comes out
• Knuckles is teased at the end of season 2 of Sonic SatAM, season 3 never comes out
• Knuckles is teased at the end of Sonic 4 Episode 2, Episode 3 never comes out

Knuckles is such a jinx!

 

There are a lot of implications based on this scene! It shows Eggman tricked Knuckles and had him on standby to repower the Death Egg Mk.II, which means he was tricked in advanced. Perhaps Eggman convinced Knuckles that he was somehow trying to save Little Planet or something.

I imagine, because of this, Knuckles would have taken the role that Metal Sonic had in Episode 2. So he’d be a reoccurring boss, and probably have an Episode Knuckles where he plays through the Episode 2 stages and we’d see cutscenes of him getting tricked and following Eggman to “Mirage Island” and him gathering materials for Eggman or something for his plans. I also imagine Angel Island would have been a level that appeared on the world map in the same way Sky Fortress did in Episode 2.

These are just my educated guesses because both Episode 1 and 2 share a lot of DNA and structure so I imagine that same DNA would have been in Episode 3. I just don’t know what kind of significant gameplay gimmick they would have added for Episode 3. Maybe just even more Tails combo moves, or maybe Knuckles would have been added to Sonic and Tails make it a trio and he wouldn’t have been a boss. Who knows!

EDIT: It’s also likely the physics would have actually been fairly accurate to the Genesis games because Taxman was potentially going to work on the game. With his influence, it’s also possible Episode 3 could have had significant changes to the structure (Special Stage Rings hidden in stages, all individual characters fully playable for the entire game, elemental shields, etc.) but I feel the general game design and structure were probably set already and he wouldn’t have just helped with the physics. But I don’t know!

 

If I had to guess they were finally having Little Planet be more than a reference, Eggman uses the Master Emerald together with it to manipulate space and time so those egg station looking ships are being warped in from a bad future.

 

Imagine if we actually had the past and future signs from CD with good and bad futures or something

 

Absolutely fascinating. I really wonder what that cutscene was setting up for (aside from Knuckles' appearance, of course). Was that space fleet going to attack Earth, maybe? Would ep 3's plot have been about Sonic somehow stopping it to prevent an apocalyptic scenario??

I wish someone at Sega would open up and reveal what they had planned, but as I understand it they're under a non-disclosure agreement not to speak about it?

Interesting theory, but to me it looks less like they timewarped and more like they hyperspaced or something, as you see them pop up in a flash and then move forward at high speed a short while before stopping, as if they had been traveling beforehand.

Maybe they were Chaos Controlled there with the Master Emerald's energy? Shadow the Hedgehog depicted CC as propulsing you forward in a hyperspace manner.

Classic old schooler here and I enjoyed ep 2

 

Yeah it’s got that classic hyperspace effect going on but it also reminds me of the Back to the Future time warp effect which they originally wanted to do for CD.

 

Good thing they only teased Tails at the end of the first movie despite Knuckles being the main focus of the 2nd movie