Sonic 1 and 2 getting the Sonic CD treatment by Taxman and Stealth

Spoiler

Found a secret life in Oil Ocean Act 2, almost at the beginning when you start the game and start flying upwards

 

Any reason why I'm having problems with Wing Fortress Zone and the open/close platform part? Some of them are not opening at all.

 

I wanted to PM the person who did it the first time but the search topic thing sucks eggs so I'm just going to ask, any of you guys going to rip Sonic 2's soundtrack like you did with 1?

 

Could this have to do with the object synchronization issues we were talking about, at the other topic?

 

No, it's actually a problem that can occur with the original game too. The turret platforms pop out according to the global timer, but activate / deactivate according whether or not they are on screen. Therefore, if the player makes them activate at the wrong time they can have touble popping out correctly. We just did an easy fix.

 

In response to ICEKnight's query, I've got a list of all of the objects in the original Sonic 2 that use Oscillating values to control and sync either their movement, or other objects' movements. I can only assume that iOS Sonic 2 follows this as well. They are listed in order of their original object order listing:

• 15 - Swinging platform from ARZ
• 18 - Stationary floating platform from ARZ and EHZ
• 19 - Platform from CPZ, OOZ and WFZ
• 6B - Immobile platform from MTZ
• 6E - Platform moving in a circle (like at the start of MTZ3)
• B5 - Horizontal propeller from WFZ

They are also used with the ARZ water for water movement.

Funny enough, the object for the MTZ crusher we discussed prior, was not in my findings... which I kinda began to deduce anyway after playing in Debug mode, and also due to the fact that it was ALWAYS in the same position upon approach, and reapproach.

I may be missing some objects here so do help me figure this out. Obj 94 would appear to use something of an oscillating system to move horizontally, but in fact it does NOT use the same sync system that the other objects, do... rather it uses a precooked lookup table.

So... that said, your bug with this object (ObjBE is something else entirely.

This is easily noticable in many other objects... most obvious one I keep seeing is a series of 4 vertical spikes that pop up in MCZ, Act 2 IIRC. In the original, they pop up together. In this release, they usually seem to do so in a wave... most likely caused by something similar to what you just stated.

 

The original game activates objects in groups of 128 pixels IIRC. By default the Retro Engine activates them in a 'smooth sweep' according to the screen view (unless a different setting is used like always on etc). That explains the difference you're seeing. The aspect ratio of the screen will also affect the timing of how things activate compared to the original game so there isn't really a 'right' way for it.

 

Out of curiosity, do you know what future plans are in store for your relationship with SEGA? I'm guessing Sonic 3 might be on the cards, but after that, then what?

 

Being realistic, I don't think they'd be allowed to speak about any future projects even if they already knew about them. =|

Wouldn't adopting that "128-pixel system" make the object groups more consistent, though? That way, for example, those mentioned series of 4 pop-up spikes would always appear all at once as intended. Parts of other levels (and in other Sonic games) may have been designed with this "group synchronization", as well...

I mean, the current system allows you to actually modify the timing of some level hazards depending on the speed you're moving at, which is not desirable.



EDIT: By the way, perhaps posts #773211 onwards could be moved to the bugs/suggestions topic? They'd be far more relevant there.

 

OT: On the topic of the 2P VS levels on the MD, I had an interesting idea that I don't really have the skill to do, but that I thought I'd put out there. Perhaps it would be neat to see a hack that allows 2P VS between two consoles, using something like the Zero Tolerance cable. Assuming, of course, that the possible data rate would be sufficient for the case where both players are on screen simultaneously, to feed player metadata between consoles (and of course to feed the score and rings count between consoles per-frame or at least every other frame). This would definitely make all levels playable in 2P on the MD, but would require two consoles (or emulator support for the Zero Tolerance cable to connect two emulators together). An extra bonus would be the theoretical possibility of connecting a Zero Tolerance cable-supporting emulator to a real MD.

Alternately, one could play with the 128KB VRAM support that Nemesis discovered in the VDP, although that would be a much more ambitious undertaking due to the lack of support in hardware and emulation, and would not negate any of the other issues Stealth raised.

Edit: In other news, something I just noticed while reading old shit:

They were right. Good job, Retro.

 

Well I've tried going through the level countless times and I simply can't get past at all. I'm always getting to at least the third platform and getting nowhere after that.

 

Gotcha, well the update landed in the UK today so all is well :-)

 

I had a similar thought but by the time I got through explaining interlace 2, I had forgotten to mention it. It'd be an interesting thing to see, for sure. Anyone who has one of Mask of Destiny's transfer cables handy might be able to try that for emulator-MD, but again the transfer rate could be an issue. On that note, though, the iOS/Android version seems steady enough with a good internet connection, and due to the unreliability of internet communication and the need for corrective measures that add transfer and processing overhead, it only transfers information every fourth frame, and has to process the remote player locally and use guesswork in the mean-time, which for some reason is all accepted as ok and it's expected that that's what everyone should do. Until they change the underlying nature of the internet, I guess there's nothing else to be done

Is this only a function of the VDP and not supported by the other hardware and possibly lacking physical storage? Can you direct me to where that came up?

It all comes down to the timing of when you happen to get to that area and start jumping across. As in the original version, it helps if you stay on the elevator platforms until the first retracting platform retracts once and extends again

 

Sure thing. It's over at SpritesMind. It appears only to require the extra 64KB of VRAM be wired into unused lines. Key quote from Nem:

Tiido added the extra 64KB to his clone MD, but from a cursory search I don't see where he's talked about it much since then, although I may have missed it.

Register support inside of the VDP appears complete, however. VDP$01 bit 7 enables the extended VRAM support, this also adds a bit 16 to all nametable addresses. VDP$06 bit 5 serves as the high bit to shift sprite pattern data into the upper 64KB, and the previously unused VDP$0E serves to rebase both layer A and B pattern data - bit 0 for layer A only, and bit 4 along with bit 0 for both layer A and B. Seems that the only real restriction is not being able to rebase layer B without also moving layer A.

Doing some reading, it also seems that the Teradrive has 128KB of VRAM, so I would imagine support for it in that system would be complete and functional (albeit undocumented until somewhat recently).

 

Not sure who did 1, but here you go:
http://www.filedropper.com/s2remastered

These are the original unmodified ogg files. If you want them looping, here are the loop points (ones without loop points loop to beginning):

Spoiler

Data/Music/CasinoNight.ogg - 93.bin LOOPSTART: 62820
Data/Music/CasinoNight2.ogg - 94.bin LOOPSTART: 95868
Data/Music/CasinoNight2_F.ogg - 95.bin LOOPSTART: 76718
Data/Music/CasinoNight_F.ogg - 96.bin LOOPSTART: 50312
Data/Music/ChemicalPlant.ogg - 97.bin LOOPSTART: 684580
Data/Music/ChemicalPlant_F.ogg - 98.bin LOOPSTART: 547578
Data/Music/EmeraldHill.ogg - 103.bin LOOPSTART: 152750
Data/Music/EmeraldHill2.ogg - 104.bin LOOPSTART: 99572
Data/Music/EmeraldHill2_F.ogg - 105.bin LOOPSTART: 79604
Data/Music/EmeraldHill_F.ogg - 106.bin LOOPSTART: 122240
Data/Music/Extra.ogg - 108.bin LOOPSTART: 59852
Data/Music/Invincibility.ogg - 113.bin LOOPSTART: 39528
Data/Music/Invincibility_F.ogg - 114.bin LOOPSTART: 30436
Data/Music/Metropolis.ogg - 117.bin LOOPSTART: 309378
Data/Music/Metropolis_F.ogg - 118.bin LOOPSTART: 247394
Data/Music/MysticCave.ogg - 119.bin LOOPSTART: 99356
Data/Music/MysticCave2.ogg - 120.bin LOOPSTART: 18671
Data/Music/MysticCave2_F.ogg - 121.bin LOOPSTART: 15272
Data/Music/MysticCave_F.ogg - 122.bin LOOPSTART: 79574
Data/Music/OilOcean.ogg - 123.bin LOOPSTART: 293572
Data/Music/OilOcean_F.ogg - 124.bin LOOPSTART: 235236
Data/Music/SkyChase.ogg - 127.bin LOOPSTART: 198253
Data/Music/SpecialStage.ogg - 128.bin LOOPSTART: 496644
Data/Music/WingFortress.ogg - 131.bin LOOPSTART: 99874
Data/Music/WingFortress_F.ogg - 132.bin LOOPSTART: 80074

 

Thanks!!

Do we have a link for the S1 soundtrack here? I didn't know we had a rip!

I usually rename the oggs to logg and add the LOOPSTART/LOOPPOINT tag.

 

A nice review of all the historical Hidden Palace Zone events from Gametrailer's PopFiction. I love how they lay everything out via video.

 

Wasn't there a unique Grounder sprite in ARZ? Would be neat to see it, along with any other graphics in here you don't get from the original game. I don't have a phone to download this and no one seems t be posting any extras that were in the game besides Hidden Palace, so this is a formal request