The Sonic Adventure 2 that almost was...

I recall the justification you have for #4; it was definitely mentioned in either GamesMaster, an Electronics Boutique buyer's guide, or Official Dreamcast Magazine, in the UK.

#1 seems stupefyingly unbelievable, until you remember what they tried years later. If you're absolutely certain of the employee's story, then believe it, but I'm justifiably unconvinced.

Those trailers alone dispelled doubts about #3, but #2 doesn't seem to have a logical means of truly believing it unless someone produces the magazine in question.

This thread is probably going to be bursting with conjecture, but thankfully it's about something from the past, rather than something still upcoming (you know of what I speak). Those trailers are pretty amazing, and should the rumours you've provided turn out to be true, then discovering significant information about this very different, very early version of the game could be on-par with the impact that the dumps of Sonic X-Treme had.

 

This is hardly the only evidence we have for this. For one, we have the early trailers, the very same you posted, which only show Sonic, Knuckles and Eggman. Furthermore, it doesn't take a genius to realise the three additional characters are carbon clones of the original three, which supports their late addition to the game (too late to design three new gameplay styles from scratch, as was present in the original Sonic Adventure).

I honestly believe that the lack of a playable Tails and possibly Shadow were the cause behind the shift in the game's design, and Rouge might have very well been a brand new character created solely for the purpose of ensuring a nemesis for Knuckles. Funny to think that after hearing complaints about Tails' appearance in the game, they shoehorned him into a mech, which only generated MORE complaints.

This is another piece of evidence which supports the claim that the game was originally only half the size. Have you never noticed how a great deal of the stages are copies of eachother? Green Forest and White Jungle, Egg Quarters and Death Chamber, Sand Ocean and Hidden Base, and the list goes on. Granted, early media clearly showed both Knuckles in Pumpkin Hill and Sonic in Sky Rail, but I have to wonder how many "copy" stages they introduced in order to encompass the newcoming characters.

You may have noticed I don't refer to this as a possibility, but a downright certainty. All arrows point to it, and nothing seems to suggest otherwise.

Everything else is up in the air. I wouldn't dismiss the idea of a branching storyline, because as you said, it was later reused for Shadow the Hedgehog, but there's really nothing to prove that and/or Adventure Fields ever existed in the game, apart from being in the prequel. "Nails the Bat" just sounds stupid and is probably fake.

 

I could definitely see #3 being plausible, especially for Tails. If you notice Tails's levels, the reasoning for most all of them is something along the lines of "I'll go see if it's safe," which wold hint that his levels have no purpose in the plot.

So did "Silver the Hedgehog," but look what we got. :v:

 

I remember a lot of what you said there from long ago, before I was a regular to places like sfghq or other sonic news websites, the submarine choice I remember reading about in I believe the official DCUK magazine and some friends also spoke about it, we were both DCUK readers.

Adventure fields is new to me but a long time ago I did wonder, some of the cut scene areas look like they could have been used for mini hubs such as the area where shadow, eggman and rouge plan their attack on prison island, the streets where sonic and friends all talk before tails drives off and the desert area outside the pyramids, all 3 of those areas are next to the main stage areas, but it could just be me taking a wild pot shot.

I don't know where to find any hard proof and I do not own any DCUK magazines any more.

 

I recall hearing somewhere that Rouge's original name was Nails, but I don't remember where I got that information or how long ago. I just know it sounds familiar.

 

The S/K/E thing looks very plausible; Shadow would work great as the main antagonist. Making a set of clones for S/K/E was a bit odd I guess.

What's with Knuckles' garb in the second video?

 

This is pretty interesting. I also remember that Nails rumour, and also, that shadow's name was going to be Terios the Tenrec. I wish I could remember more from those times.

 

Official Dreamcast Magazine. I forget which issue, it was probably the one that ran their first look at SA2. I remember reading these details quite vividly.

Probably still have the magazine somewhere... Getting it would be a major bitch, though.

 

Holy shit, that makes a lot of fucking sense. I always wondered why the hell Tails was in a mech all of the sudden. I never knew this. Wow. So that's why the gameplay in SA2 was repetitive. We were just playing re-skinned versions of each character all along, in levels that were meant to be played once, through the branching story.

It all fits, doesn't it? Man, I wonder how the story would have went if the original trio were only playable. I really wish they would have done that. SA1 sort of failed because of too many characters, and what do you know, they were actually going to try and fix that for SA2 before the fans butted in.

Sad, really. Ah well, what might have been...

 

I wonder if stages that were similar to others were meant to be second Acts, if you will.

I've always enjoyed reading about SA2's development history, and it's cool this thread is here to make us really think about a few things.

 

The first thing I thought when you mentioned "Dark Sonic with missing eye or appendages" and "Monster made of eyes" was something for Pumkin Hill. Perhaps the concept art for the mangled Sonic was a generic Zombie Hedgehog enemy for the Pumpkin Hill Zone, and the Monster Made of eyes could easily replace that retarded fucking ghost boss, albeit with a different pattern.

 

Yeah, what Nomad said. I can't believe that in all the time I've played Sonic Adventure 2, this never occurred to me. Especially with the level copies.

I also always found it curious how Shadow, who was a pivotal part of the storyline, had so few levels dedicated to him. It was a big reason the Dark Story was such a chore to play through. If I remember right, Shadow only has four levels. I'm only really still familiar enough with the speed stages to do this, but...

City Escape to Radical Highway
Metal Harbor
Green Forest to White Jungle
Pyramid Cave
Crazy Gadget
Final Rush to Final Chase
Sky Rail

Yep, Sky Rail is the only one of Shadow's levels without a Hero Side analog. And we saw plenty of media in the trailers featuring Sonic in Sky Rail, which leads further credence to this theory.

 

Correct me if I'm wrong, but don't Sonic, Knuckles and Eggman have more stages than their counterparts, or at the very least more upgrades? Assumedly upgrades for Shadow, Rouge and Tails would have been more like afterthoughts compared to them if they were added in later, right?

 

The only thing I know is that on March 2001 a magazine called Next Level said that there were going to be only five main characters. Sonic, Tails and Knuckles were playable, Eggman may have been playable and then was what would turn out to be called Shadow (not playable?). No mention of Rouge at all.

 

Thank God they decided not to go through with this one. I've always had a passionate hatred for Adventure Fields ever since the the first one. The only thing I like about the adventure fields, is the fact that it's possible to glitch certain characters in stages that they can't access by normal means. Too bad that wasn't the case with Next-Gen Sonic/Sonic 2006 or Sonic Unleashed.

 

Knuckles and Eggman both have 5 stages, and Sonic has 6, making Shadow only have 4. Tails and Rouge also only have 4 because they both get shoved into a kart for one level (hmm...), giving exclusive level-up items to Knuckles and Eggman in the form of the Air Necklace and the Protective Armor respectively, while Sonic gets two more than Shadow: the Magic Gloves and the Bounce Bracelet.

So yes, the characters who were late to join the party got the short end of the stick.

 

Mission Street to Radical Highway
Prison Lane to Iron Gate
Metal Harbor to Weapons Bed
Green Forest to White Jungle
Pumpkin Hill to Sky Rail
Hidden Base to Sand Ocean
Wild Canyon to Dry Lagoon (to Pyramid Cave)
Meteor Herd to Mad Space
Death Chamber to Egg Quarters
Eternal Engine to Lost Colony
Final Rush to Final Chase to Cosmic Wall
Route 101 to Route 280

Singletons:
City Escape
Aquatic Mine
Security Hall
Crazy Gadget
Cannon's Core
Green Hill

 

Ninja'd, I don't care.

Though the Rouge/Tails disparity is more due to the fact that they both take Kart Racing stages instead. Only Shadow has a level drought, and only Sonic has a level surplus (and this is magnified if you consider that Shadow doesn't take part in Cannon's Core and the stage select screen considers it Sonic's level). You'll note that the sum of each gameplay type stages is about 10, with the total being about 30, similar to SA1's 11 stages among 3 characters each (or 2 for Lost World). So in terms of scope, they're pretty similar, just the implementation is different.

Regarding shared level thematics (if not outright architecture), consider SA1, where multiple characters entered the same level. It's not too hard to imagine some of the more same-y levels that cross over gameplay mechanic lines would still be in the "original" game, even perhaps under the same name or perhaps even the same areas. Speed Highway goes from Night to Day toward the end, so the lighting differences between Pumpkin Hill and Sky Rail aren't too far out, either.

On Rouge's assumed beta name, it's not that bad. Makes somewhat more sense than her current one, which could refer to a cosmetic, a famous French cabaret, or, if you reverse the name, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baton_Rouge,_Louisiana" target="_blank">the capital of Louisiana</a> (it's probably the first one). By contrast, "Nails the Bat" refers to her digging ability (her digging upgrade are the "Pick Nails"), fits with the nomenclature scheme of both Knuckles and Tails, and her name also sounds very similar to Tails', possibly hinting at a rivalry (which may or may not exist in their Kart Race chase sequence).

EDIT: Security Hall, the only Dark-exclusive level type, could be singled out as being relatively easy to create due to its small size and similar structure to the "Level 3" area of Iron Gate. The use of safes helped create more hiding places without having to develop a lot more level, but the time limit kept it exciting.