The Supreme Topic of 'Other' Knowledge.

Putting this into Google translate tells me that the odd numbered zones were meant to be "speed stages" while the even numbered zones were meant to be "technical stages," although it's extremely unreadable so I'm not sure. Is anyone able to properly translate what this tweet is saying?

 

Google Translate does act up a lot when translating Japanese, but looking through the game's zones I'm 99% sure that's accurate. Think about it. Palmtree Panic (1), Collision Chaos (3), Quartz Quadrant (5), and Stardust Speedway (7) are all significantly speedier than the even-numbered zones.

Another funny thing I just realized? R2 explains why there are eight special stages in Sonic CD instead of just seven. The game was intended to have eight zones, so there are eight special stages... I feel foolish for never realizing this.

 

what

There are eight stages because they had a layout left over. It doesn't even have unique graphics, it just reuses stage 1's tiles along with a silly BG clearly made for a laugh. S3 and S&K both have eight stages too bro.

EDIT: Everybody always brings up R2 but people seem to forget there was also an R9 at one point. disregard I suck cocks

 

There was a R9 planned? Hate to say it, but that's news to me (unless you're talking about Taxman's Final Fever, which I'm assuming you're not). Why isn't it mentioned on the wiki?

 

No 'R9' labels were ever found, unlike R2. AFAIK the R9 rumours come from the fact the Final boss song is named 'Final Fever' in the DA Garden.

 

There were eight zones planned, so they made eight special stages, one for each zone. It's as simple as that. Your claim about R9 is also completely baseless, as Master Emerald said there were no R9 labels ever found.

 

Welp, I think my mind conflated the stuff Christian was working on for the 2011 remake with remarks from Hoshino-san (?) that the final level was to take place in the Eggman-shaped mountain. Disregard the edit then since there's no evidence to back it up.

No, your claim that the developers made eight special stages because there were eight rounds planned is what's completely baseless. You didn't work on the game, and to my knowledge nobody in the development team has ever made any claim of that sort. Being wrong about the second thing I said in no way contradicts the first.

 

Looking into the tweet myself, yeah I can see the odd/even numbered stages representing faster/slower paced stages. The tweet also mentions that there was scheduling and disc storage space worries, leading to the stage being cut, and leaving its theme for the D.A. Garden.

 

I’m sorry, but how on earth do you think that I said your claim is baseless? I called the R9 one baseless, not the special stage one. You didn’t work on the game either, so what you’re saying is hypocritical. I’m allowed to make an observation and you’re allowed to disagree. Just don't act like your opinion is the objectively correct one. End of story.

 

You're also talking like your claim is objectively correct, though? Huh?

 

I'm not, but if you guys think otherwise then I'll concede. My opinion remains unchanged, though, and I still think Fred responded to my comment (which was clearly just my observation) in a sort of jerky fashion.

 

literally what is the word "also"

You didn't make an observation, you made a claim.

My observations were the following:

1. Unlike the rest of the special stages, the secret eighth stage does not have a tileset of its own, and reuses the tiles from the first stage
2. The background used in the secret special stage is clearly not serious in nature, and for that matter is the only one without any scrolling effects
3. Sonic 3 and Sonic & Knuckles each also have a hidden eighth special stage, which thanks to the 3C prototypes, we actually know the S&K one is a scrapped layout that at one point was part of the main seven.

Your claim, on the other hand, is based on two occurrences of the number 8.


EDIT: I'm done defending myself at this point so do what you will with this post

 

That wasn't my intent; I probably shouldn't have said "also"

 

Y'all got several Japanese speakers in the Sonic community, and you're still using google translate?

Edit: Here, translated:

So there you go. Seems like "Little Planet" is one of the R2 audio tracks.

Edit 2: I admit, the last sentence is a little confusing (I'm not a native speaker, I just live in Japan). It could also be something like "We planned to use rhe song that was listed in the DA [digital audio] compilation called Little Planet on that screen," but then it's unclear what screen [その面] he's referring to, that it was used on. Of course, we know it was used on the DA Garden screen. In any case, the part about the track called "Little Planet" being a remnant from R2 is clear.

In other news, I found a Wakuwaku Sonic Patrol Car yesterday and took it for a spin.

https://photos.google.com/photo/AF1QipPFw9wNj4VKFiozb3lZIdFVTXUCIbAgyko8AWxS

 

The 3rd stage was an underwater level? Wasn't Collision Chaos supposed to be the 3rd stage with Tidal Tempest being the 4th? That's odd..

 

I noticed that too. Nishimura probably misremembered the level order. Can't blame him, Sonic CD was already nearly 2 decades old when he posted that.

 

Feels nice to have my own suspicions confirmed. All I can wonder myself is if it's three accompanying alternate tracks still exist somewhere...

 

I think Yasuhara once mentioned balancing more traditional platform levels with speedy levels in Sonic 1. The final Zone order certainly matches the "odd = speed, even = technical" design philosophy.

Green Hill
Marble
Spring Yard
Labyrinth
Starlight
Scrap Brain

The original Zone order didn't match that philosophy at all, of course, but the back and forth between speed and technical looks to be an intentional choice when they shuffled things around.

It's a bit odd. Assuming no levels were shuffled around (is it possible they were?) it looks like the pattern broke down because R2 was removed.

Palmtree Panic
R2
Collision Chaos
Tidal Tempest
Quartz Quadrant
Wacky Workbench
Stardust Speedway
Metallic Madness

 

Listening to that song again, I think it was most likely intended for R2's good future. It's slow like most GF tracks, and sounds pretty utopian and soothing, with the peaceful bird chirps and all. Not to mention that these go with the eco-friendly nature of the good futures.

This is supported by Sonic the Hedgehog - Remix, which contains remixes of the Japanese Sonic CD tracks by the original composers. One of its tracks, Miracle Blue ~Little Planet~, is a medley made up mostly of reprises of the good future tracks, and the D.A. Garden song is among them, bird chirps included.

Anyone feel like making fan remixes or reprises for the other time zones?

 

So you know how it's mentioned in Sonic's profile in the Adventure manual that immediately prior to the game's events he was on "A long journey?"

Well, I've wondered for years exactly what this "journey" entailed. I got my answer by chance whilst I was looking through the JP strategy guide to find something else as a translation request from an anon on Tumblr;



According to the text next to the screenshot of Station Square's title, the purpose of Sonic's long journey was specifically to train himself.

This makes me inclined to think that this might explain in-series why Modern Sonic has more moves and is generally faster than his Classic self.