Sonic 2 Beta, dumped!

http://www.hidden-palace.org/?news/c/9

Title says it all, sorry if this has been already posted or in wrong forum

 

Uh... correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't that some famous pop song playing in the background? Can't remember the name of it, but it sounds really familiar.

 

A prototype of Sonic 2 was dumped and massively distributed online before the game was even released in 1992, this isn't the same build?

 

No, this is another slightly different dump that is probably the same one that appeared on the US show, Nicks Arcade. Personally I can't see what the big fuss is over this game since it's not really that different from the previously released beat. Yeah, it has leftovers from Sonic 1 and other crap but it doesn't contain (as of yet and probably doesn't anyway) any of the never made levels such as the desert one. The way the guys over at Sonic Cult are going on you'd expect this to be some massive orgasmic beast such as Saturn Shenmue or Virtua Fighter 3!! Still, each to their own.

Yakumo

 

To Sonic fans this *is* as big as the above mentioned ;-)

And what's up with 'Spring Yard Zone'? Looks to be a VERY early Mystic Cave Zone ...and having the Sonic 1 Boss music in Sonic 2 is cool, I always much preferred it ;-)

 

Apocalypse will unfold if such a thing were to happen to be Saturn Shenmue... IT will be Sonic Xtreme x 1000.

 

Found this in Hex:

Code:

SEGA MEGA DRIVE (C)SEGA 1991.APR SONIC THE             HEDGEHOG 2

Seems to have been built in April '91 ...

The final was released in Nov' '92 so this alpha was from 20 months before release! VERY early indeed!

 

That's the same date from Sonic 1, they just didn't bother to change it yet.

 

I tried it out and while it is somewhat intresing its not too exciting. I wouldn't be suprised if a dump thats later but earlyer then the beta that been ciculated before shows up. I do know from various articals found that they have made multiple versions depending on progress.

 

What would be great to see is a very early version of Sonic 1 when it did look unlike the final game. Anyone remember the shot of Sonic standing on a ball in Green Hill Zone?

Yakumo

 

Most the screens of early Sonic 1 were mock-ups, like this one with a ball. But I agree, finding an early Sonic 1 proto would be very very nice.

PS. Enjoy the release.

 

Thanks drx! It's good to see some people are willing to share what they find ...

 

They said they had to cut out the rolling ball due to it not being able to work into the game well or something like that. Sonic Team sure does leave a ton of stuff on the cutting room floor. Just goes to show how much effort they put into these sonic games. I am curious to find out if they kept any of the code they deleted of the original soundtest.

 

The rolling ball has already been implemented back into the game by hackers, along with a similar object in Sonic 2 as well. The leaking of an earlier version than the one we've all come to know and love keeps me optimistic that a real breakthrough may still yet happen (such as a build with the Genocide City, Dust Hill, Circus or Winter stages playable - if these weren't just mock-ups, that is), but I really wish the people supposedly in charge of archiving such prototypes would use better descriptions than alpha, beta and final. There will come a point in the future when several different "beta" revisions will exist, so maybe a less confusing system needs to be considered now before it all gets out of hand?

As much as I'd like collectors to go mad for a leak of Saturn Virtua Fighter 3 or Shenmue Saturn Version, the chance of these surfacing is very low. Besides, compared to Sonic X-Treme (or what exists of it) they're not exactly high profile or well placed on most peoples' wanted lists. I fear that even Sonic The Fighters may have a greater rank in some minds than geniune missed opportunities such as AM2's other cancelled Saturn conversions and projects of this period.

Speaking of AM2 and the Saturn, does anybody know what happened to Chicago? If you've not heard of this before, don't worry - it was a rarely discussed idea by Yu Suzuki to include Jacky and Sarah Bryant (from the Virtua Fighter series) in their own spin-off, similar to how Akira Yuki formed the basis for what later became Shenmue. The background music and some level designs from this abandoned project were later resurrected for the Chicago stage in VF2, which can only be accessed if both players select the Bryant siblings. Finally, has anybody else noticed that Akira Yuki would have been the same age as Ryo Hazuki if he'd still been used as the central role in Shenmue? If ever there was proof that Shenmue was originally meant to be a Virtua Fighter RPG...

 

Yea the shenmue dojo disccused that heavily and found that the orignal virtua fighter idea would have fitted perefectly with shenmue.

The desiginers probably decided to make it its own story so it could stand on its own and not interfer with virtua fighters story line (though in game there is literaly no story at all).

As for genocide zone, the person who worked on that stage stated it didn't go further then a drawing and that the reason metroplis zone had a 3rd level was due to him having extra time to work on one.

You can read about it here as well as see the concept drawing for it when it was known as cyber city
http://www.shadowsoft-games.com/sonicdatabase/S2CD/s2clevels.html

 

I would like to see the earliest Sonic beta, the one with the big "Welcome" sign, etc. Here's one from Mid-1990:

 

Despite still being in the final released version, I've yet to see anybody properly implement many the "let's go" sign that remains from Sonic 1's alpha period of development. As for the link between Virtua Fighter and Shenmue, you only have to look at the warriors Akira (sorry... I meant Ryo) must face in the second Dreamcast game to conclude there was a strong connection that was never really severed. Besides, it doesn't take a hardcore VF fan to figure out Lan Di was based on Lau Chan as well, though I don't really want to list every possible example or I'll end up being here all night writing!

 

This should be fun to toy with for a few minutes... anyone ever try that hack that trys to add all the levels back into it? I got stuck playing through it on mystic caverns cause they fucked it up while they were at it.

 

Given that both Sega and AM2 referred to the project as "Virtua Fighter RPG" long before it was called Shenmue, I don't think one really needs to "dig up proof" that VF had an influence on the game.

-hl718

 

Pretty nice find, if it is real. I wonder how they got hold of it?