They've actually been released in the past, on the Yuzo Koshiro Early Collection box set And here they are:
I’ve never heard those before, it’s so cool that we’ve got all this unused music from Sonic 1 8-bit, and from Yuzo Koshiro! I’d love to see a prototype of the game to see what’s different, as it was originally going to include bits from Marble Zone. I get the feeling though that there probably isn’t a leak of this out there, seeing as development was handled by essentially Koshiro’s family and it wasn’t as hyped as the 16-bit version.
This has probably been said before and doesn't add much to the dicussion, so seemed like a good fit for this topic! I was watcing this interview with Masato Nakamura about composing the music for Sonic, and he explains how he had to compose the music from concept art alone, and gives an example of having to create "icy" music. He might just be using this as an example, but it struck me that the first two games didn't have any ice levels - except, of course, for the discarded snow level in Sonic 2. I guess this adds support to the idea that the music in Sonic 2 was generally messed around with a little, and that the 2P music was just using up leftover tracks, one of which was probably written with this level in mind.
Oil Ocean's final theme was definitely intended for Sand Shower as well, as Nakamura's demo versions have a really Egyptian feel to them. Plus, the Casino Night 2-Player music was used in Oil Ocean in the prototypes, which makes me think that was OO's original theme.
I guessed someone would have said it already . Great post though, I agree with what you said. We're treading old ground here, but I feel the jury's still out on that one. Arab-themed music is equally applicable to oil drilling, and the song does have a suitably industrial sound. And wasn't there are a lot of confusion about whether the levels actually matched their are music slots anyway? Whatever the case I remember there being a lot of strong views either way...
I mean, the slot that was intended for Sand Shower uses Oil Ocean's music. And this isn't just in the final, this is how it was as far back as the Simon Wai prototype.
The demo does sound rather Egyptian, but Sand Shower was more of a western desert. I suppose it's possible that the original SS concept art looked ambiguous enough to pass off as an eastern desert in Namakura's eyes. If only we had access to it...
This works for a western desert. Maybe he wasn't sure which it would be and made one for each just in case?
I think you guys missed what I said earlier: Also given that Sandopolis was Egyptian-themed in Sonic 3&K (and we know unused Sonic 2 concepts made it into S3), it's entirely possible that the Japanese developers envisioned Sand Shower as Egyptian-themed. Just a hunch though.
I did consider that possibility too. The language barrier was a huge obstacle, and it was reported that the western artists' level art didn't always perfectly match the zone concepts (ie: Craig Stitt came to regret not making HPZ look more palace-like once he learned its name).
It sounds like they just got a press package from SEGA, and mashed up details of both Sonic CD and Sonic 2. It's not hard to imagine the "Death Eggs" referring to the Egg Capsules you find in the Sonic CD past levels. This is baseless speculation, of course.
Last Minute Continue is posting a lot of SEGA media over on Twitter: https://twitter.com/lastmincontinue/status/1270490042381799425 Some notable stuff:
That Werehog concept art makes me disappointed because it shows how Sega could've made Sonic look like a werewolf without (A) completely butchering his design and (B) keeping the gameplay fast. Classy.
Wow that is some good shitty temp logo lol. Interesting the concept art used the Heroes Egg Pawn design though.
