Sonic 2 Development Lore

re: coconuts we can actually pinpoint a time where they were added in, too. snails were present in the Nick Arcade prototype but were then replaced with Coconuts ad nauseum in the Simon Wai prototype, so kind of early in the timeline of the prototypes we have. (for some reason I was thinking maybe they were added in the later betas but nope!)

I decided to go look into where badnik lists were changed between protos:
- Aquatic Ruin Zone: Nothing [Simon Wai] -> Chop Chops, Grounders, Whisps [Beta 4]
- Emerald Hill Zone: Snails [Nick Arcade] -> Coconuts [Simon Wai]
- Casino Night Zone: Nothing, though the Crawl graphics are present [Simon Wai] -> Crawl is an enemy but still unreferenced [August 1992 Proto] -> Crawl [Beta 4]
- Chemical Plant Zone: Nothing [Nick Arcade] -> Spinies [Sept 1992 proto] -> Grabbers [Beta 4]
- Hidden Palace Zone: Dinosaurs, bats, debug has pirahna, Stego, Gator, Octus, Aquis [Nick Arcade] -> Nothing, it's all gone [CENSOR]
- Hill Top Zone: Nothing, debug has Buzzer, Snail, Masher [Nick Arcade] -> Spikers, Rexon [Beta 4]
- Metropolis Zone: Nothing [Simon Wai] -> Shellcracker, Asterons, Slicers [Beta 4]
- Mystic Cave Zone: Nothing [Simon Wai] -> Crawlton, Flashers [August 1992 Proto]
- Oil Ocean Zone: Nothing, debug has Octus, Aquis [Simon Wai] -> for some reason not mentioned anywhere, though obviously those badniks are in the final
- Sky Chase Zone: Valkyrie, those turtle ones [Sept 1992 proto]
- Wing Fortress Zone: Nothing, debug has Cluckers [Sept 1992 proto] -> Cluckers [Beta 4]
- Wood Zone: Nothing [Simon Wai]

So the tldr, at the risk of also repeating known info,

The levels to appear first were Emerald Hill, Chemical Plant, Hidden Palace, and Hill Top. Of those levels, only Emerald Hill and Hidden Palace actually have enemies placed with Chemical Plant seemingly having nothing and Hill Top having the enemies from Emerald Hill in debug. This implies that Emerald Hill and Hidden Palace were worked on first, since they actually have some of the most...objects present.

Then in Simon Wai, we get Aquatic Ruin, Casino Night, Metropolis Zone, Mystic Cave Zone, Oil Ocean Zone, and Wood Zone. Literally all of these "new" zones have no enemies in them, though there are some inklings of planning (what with the occasional item in the debug list), with the exception of Wood Zone which has nearly nothing and stays that way. Of note, Oil Ocean Zone already has the aquatic enemies in debug that were also present in Hidden Palace's list too, and that combined with hidden palace not having any changes implies to me that HP was already scrapped and they were going to see which assets they could reuse in levels that would actually make it in. Also, of the zones introduced in the Nick Arcade proto, only Emerald Hill actually got any changes (snails -> coconuts).

In the space between Simon Wai and the near-done testing betas (of which Beta 4 is the first of), we see an enemy get added to Casino Night's debug list, Spinies added to Chemical Plant, the final enemy set finally added to Mystic Cave Zone, and Sky Chase and Wing Fortress first make their initial appearances here, with the note that Sky Chase Zone already has its badniks from the final present from the outset. Wing Fortress does also have its final enemy "list" in the debug as well albeit unplaced.

And then in Beta 4, everyone has their final badniks by that point (though of course things like placements and behavior will vary).

(I skimmed the articles about the prototypes and looked at screenshots so I would not be surprised if I messed this up lmao)

 

Here's an interesting quote from Craig Stitt that I found from a Sonic Spinball thread, seems to confirm that the portfolio's level is indeed Underground Caves:

No wonder she doesn't like answering Sonic questions, this series has treated her like garbage. I wonder if this was simply a case of workplace misogyny?

 

Nebula's movement reminds me of a jellyfish. In SCZ, there are banks of Nebula floating around.

 

I was thinking yesterday that Blue Lake could've been a Mario Land-esque submarine minigame since Sky Chase is already so similar. But this is making me think that Act 2 could've maybe taken place on-foot on top of or inside the whale? I'm not sure but either way I think you've finally made sense of how mysteriously unprecedented Sky Chase and Wing Fortress were.

 

I'd like to add too that Sky Chase and Wing Fortress were added relatively "late", and also at the same time as the Death Egg Zone level (of course, what later turns out to be its music shows up much earlier due to incorrect music mappings in the Simon Wai proto). It seems like all three of those were decided upon and put in at the same time.

 

And now it seems that at least two of them might have either replaced or at the very least reused levels that Tom Payne has worked on.

Do we still not know who designed SCZ and WFZ? Because it's starting to seem increasingly likely that they might've been a result of Tom Payne repurposing his older work into smaller, less ambitious concepts.

 

I made an offhand speculative comment about the Blue Ocean / Lake concept drawings and Sky Chase yesterday, and I didn't realize just how much it adds up. I know its still just rough sketches but your overlay highlights all of Sky Chase's beats and the concept art matches pretty well to each beat. I'm kind of shocked!

Well that answers it then! Really cool to see a glimpse at the original Underground Caves stage. I never really put into perspective just how poorly Brenda's work seemed to have been treated at the time. Can't blame her resentment, heck I'd have it too if this had happened to me. Even outside of Sonic her work seemed to get consistently buried during her time at STI.

 

Given the newly revealed relationship between Sky Chase and Blue Ocean, I would love for somebody familiar with the Sonic 2 disassembly to go check the code responsible for Sky Chase Zone's autoscroll sequence. Just how much of it is hardcoded? Are other kinds of movements supported? Would it have been feasible to activate it in the middle of a level? Et cetera.

 

A bit amusing to think that Sky Chase and Wing Fortress could be derived from an ocean themed zone, considering what we would get later in the series...

 

The more I read this thread the more bad I feel for Brenda

 

I do too. Then if you think about it, name any other artist off the top of your head from Sonic 2 that did zone art. I'll admit I couldn't. I'd argue she's probably the most talked about and famous Sonic 2 artist due to what DIDN'T get put into the game. She got more publicity than she probably wanted.

 

(Somewhat baseless and half-remembered speculation incoming so feel free to discard as you wish)

My brain went on a thought process I couldn't stop and now I'm here. I've got a guess as to what order stages were added to the game and what happened to them, so if you don't mind indulging me:

-Conceptual Era-
The earliest stages thought of for the game, during the point in development before any real game work was done and when Time Travel was still on the table as a narrative framing device. A quite frankly ABSURD amount of levels are conceptualized during this period given the time allotted for the game's development, and there's a lot that seems inconsistent or just plain doesn't make sense based on what we have (Were Madness Mountain and Emerald Isle ever on the map? Are they Mystic Cave and Aquatic Ruin? What is Olympus? Three Cyber Cities???).

Most of the stages that made it to the final did originate in this era however, exceptions being the super-last-minute Sky Chase* and Wing Fortress. Aquatic Ruin is probably Emerald Isle, though the lack of presence on the world map is still. Kinda Weird. I have more to say on ARZ later.

So by this stage, we have quite the doozy of a zone list, only the bolded of which would make it to the final: Green Hill (later Emerald Hill) Zone, Woods Zone, Sand Shower Zone, Metropolis Zone, Warp Point (later Hidden Palace) Ocean Wind Zone, Chemical Plant Zone, Casino Night Zone, Genocide City Zones 1-3 (later Cyber City), Dust Hill Zone (later Mystic Cave), Rock World Zone, Oil Ocean Zone, Hill Top Zone, Blue Lake Zone, Tropical Plant Zone, and Olympus. In addition there are few stages not seen on the maps but have concept art: Death Egg, Last Battle in Space, Madness Mountain (potentially is the same as Dust Hill/Mystic Cave?) and Emerald Isle (later Aquatic Ruin, probably).

*Assuming of course that Sky Chase isn't the reanimated remains of Blue Lake, though the fact that doesn't feel unlikely is still baffling to me.

(Also, in spite of the separation here I should note there is probably overlap between all of these eras to varying degrees. This games development was a Mess, nothing is neat and clean)

-In-Game Era-
The first four stages worked on for the game are Emerald Hill, Hidden Palace, Hill Top, and Chemical Plant. An interesting thing to note about this specific selection of stages is that they each seem to represent a different time period from the Conceptual Era; Emerald Hill is the present, Hill Top is the past, Chemical Plant is the future, and Hidden Palace... is the outlier, being the Warp Point pyramid that is present in multiple time zones (present, past, and ruined present). How intentional this was is anyone's guess.

Time Travel as a plot device was probably scrapped not too long after stages began to be implemented if not before proper programming work was being done in general, and between Nick Arcade and Simon Wai things get messy, even by S2's normal standards of rushed development. I suspect that the following stages from the Conceptual Era are worked on to some extent and than partially/fully discarded between the two protos: Cyber City, Sand Shower, Ocean Wind, Rock World, and Blue Lake. Winter Zone is probably conceptualized and discarded during this time period at the same time Sand Shower kicks the bucket, while Wood Zone somehow gets implemented with barely any layout work done and incomplete art. Cyber City briefly holds on as the third act of Metropolis and Hidden Palace is hanging by a thread.

The stages that actually make it in to Simon Wai that would survive to the final are as follows: Metropolis Zone, Oil Ocean Zone, Mystic Cave Zone, Casino Night Zone, Neo Green Hill Zone (later Aquatic Ruin) and Death Egg Zone (though only its name/music are present).

Aquatic Ruin is Kinda Weird, as I've stated before. It's lack-of-presence on the map is weird, though it can potentially be explained by Emerald Isle, but then that makes it weirder that that name isn't on the map either. It could be Olympus, but that stage seemed to have something of a grandiose/important quality to it given how much it sticks out on the map, while ARZ is just a standard stage. The fact it was originally called "Neo Green Hill", a name not seen anywhere else during 2's dev cycle, is kinda weird. If I were to guess, Aquatic Ruin was conceptualized during the mess between Nick Arcade and Simon Wai using previously discarded concepts (and potentially assets) as a base. "The designated water levels got scrapped? Throw some water in ARZ." That kind of deal.

-Wing Chase Egg Era-
Development is coming to a close by this point, there is not a whole lot of time left to do much of anything. But, for whatever reason, a decision is made to add two new zones to the endgame; Sky Chase Zone and Wing Fortress Zone. These things are made is a scramble, quick and dirty and even in the final feel somewhat half-baked. An increasing amount of evidence has also come forward that they're more or less slapped together from ideas initially meant for some of the scrapped zones (Blue Lake, Cyber City and Death Egg when it was a fleshed out level, specifically).

Hidden Palace is fully abandoned by this time, much to the team's dismay, though its unused music and level icon somehow make it into the final regardless.

It's somewhat ambiguous as to when the decision to scale back Death Egg was made but I'm putting it here just to be safe. Initially planned to be a proper zone with multiple acts and unique graphics, once the clock began to tick the team radically scaled the stage back into a Final Zone-esque deal made up of recycled Chemical Plant graphics where you run through a room and fight a boss.

Weeks later, the game is "finished" and eventually released. People all over the world love it, but some wonder where the heck that desert level they saw in the magazines is. Others find the unused song in the sound test and start to wonder. Other still delve abit deeper and discover the title card that simply reads "HIDDEN PALACE ZONE." In time, a guy named Simon stumbles upon a prototype showing off all kinds of things that seem beyond explanation at the time.

And now 30 years later, we are here.

 

While Genocide City and the winter level were the biggest deals of this whole ordeal for everyone else, I can't stop thinking about that water level. Hell, now I kinda regret initially labeling it as Blue Lake/Ocean, since the rest of this forum has latched onto that idea when we really don't know jack.

In fact, I have completely changed my mind on what I think the level is supposed to be. It's mainly just a theory that's heavy on my personal speculation, and I hope that people who see any inconsistencies in it would point them out. Okay, here it goes:

Assuming that the individual level concept art predates the maps, we can assume that Blue Ocean was changed to Blue Lake at some point. The sketch shows that the level was to be inhabited by whales and dolphins, which usually cannot survive in freshwater. Not that this series is known for biological accuracy, but the palmtrees near the goal post and the wreck of a sunken vessel that's way too large for the amount of water that we're seeing seem to imply that we're looking at a bay, cove or lagoon by the ocean.

And those palmtrees? If this were Blue Lake, then this would be the third past level with them, alongside Tropical Sun/Plant/Summer and Hill Top, which had palmtrees on the Past map. Somebody at STI must've realized how redundant this would've been, especially since Ross has said that their intention was to place similar levels far apart enough from one another. Therefore, I suspect that we're looking at a counterpart to one of the levels that we already know to have palmtrees.

I've already mentioned some of the stuff in the water, so let's address the rest of it. There's a small submarine in the water. It's listed in the sketch alongside the animals and has a pre-determimed path for its movement, back and forth in a small circle. Therefore it probably isn't a vehicle that Sonic himself can control, though he may be able to affect its movements somehow. This vessel is, however, very much modelled after the Yellow Submarine, so I don't think that it's a stretch to say that it belongs to the man whose name is a Beatles lyric and is seen making other classic rock references in later games (https://info.sonicretro.org/Gimme_Shelter). Considering his nature though, it's strange that the submarine has seemingly no offensive capabilities.

However, that might be answered by another object that's moving in the water - an ice floe. Yes, a platform made of ice in a level with palmtrees. And this isn't my personal opinion, the platform literally has an arrow that says 'ice' pointing towards it in the sketch.

Spoiler: Ice

So what is this ice platform doing here? Well, Sonic Triple Trouble's Robotnik Winter Zone is a level that's only covered in snow due to Robotnik himself using it as a test site for a super-weapon, according to the Japanese manual. Perhaps a similar thing has happened here, with a blast from the Death Egg completely transforming the climate of this zone overnight. Perhaps the whole water area was born from said blast destroying much of the ground, explaining why a weaponless Eggman vehicle is there; To observe the Death Egg's offensive potential.

So, to wrap it up, what do we factually know about this zone?

• It's mostly water-based
• It's a tropical location with palmtrees, albeit with ice too
• There's small caves at the level's edges
• There's independently moving animals and one independently moving submarine

And what are my personal deductions?

• The water area is most likely connected to the ocean, as it's inhabited by animals who wouldn't survive in freshwater and because there's an ocean-scale vessel sunken to its bottom
• It makes the most sense as a time period counterpart to a level that already has palmtrees, since another completely new zone with them would be way too redundant
• The zone has been ruined by a Death Egg blast, causing changes in terrain and climate, leading to Eggman sending a monitoring vehicle there

So, do we already know of a zone that fits all of these criteria? A zone on the coast that's had large chunks of terrain blown off, a zone that's a counterpart to some other palmtree zone, a zone that's associated with caves, a zone that exists in the same time period as a Death Egg?

Spoiler: *drumroll*

I think we do.

 

I always assumed Blue Lake being "Blue Ocean" tied back to the time travel element of having levels that were supposed to share assets or otherwise take place in the same geographical location were also supposed to share names. So Oil Ocean/Ocean Wind/Blue Ocean all took place in the same general locale, as did Emerald Hill/Hill Top/Dust Hill. If the level took place in the center of the island in an inlet from the sea, as the map suggested, "Ocean" would make more sense.

The theories in this thread are approaching Zelda Timeline levels of silliness.

 

Except it doesn't, it takes place in a small lake near a waterfall to the north of the inlet.

Spoiler: Blue Lake location

Besides, it's called Blue Lake here anyways.

 

I think you are putting way too much stock into how much thought a developer on a 90s mascot platformer would put into logical level design/theming

 

See:

Blue Ocean is literally set in the sea, unlike its earlier incarnation.

 

But which one came first, Ocean or Lake? I was under the impression that we didn't know.

 

The maps predate the timeline documents and level concept art.

So Lake came first.

 

It did? Where's your source for this, because as far as I know we've been never told which came first.