Sonic 2: Return of Shadow

Its finally about time I show you guys my 2 year project, this is not a release, there is a video but no release, I need some feedback and there are some things that are planed that are not in it yet. Now for info.

[SIZE=12pt]Follow Sonic, Tails, and Knuckles as they try to stop Eggman’s plans, and get back Shadows memory. New art, New moves, old and new gimmicks, Boss edits,(brand new bosses coming soon).[/SIZE]

[SIZE=12pt]Unplayable Characters:[/SIZE]

[SIZE=12pt]G.U.N Commander (not in current version): The leader of the G.U.N, he has caught word of Shadows evil and wants to stop him, while playing as Shadow he will appear from time to time.[/SIZE]

[SIZE=12pt]Eggman: Evil Genius who is the reason for Shadows Brainwashing, will stop at nothing to destroy Sonic and take over the world, shows up when playing as Sonic, Tails, or Knuckles.[/SIZE]

[SIZE=12pt]Mecha Series: Mecha versions of Sonic, Knuckles, and Shadow.[/SIZE]

[SIZE=12pt]Metal Tails:[/SIZE]

[SIZE=12pt]Playable Characters:[/SIZE]

[SIZE=12pt]Sonic[/SIZE]

[SIZE=12pt]Tails[/SIZE]

[SIZE=12pt]Knuckles[/SIZE]

[SIZE=12pt]Shadow[/SIZE]

[SIZE=12pt]Moves for Sonic:[/SIZE]

[SIZE=12pt]Shield moves: Double Jump Spark, Fireball, Bubble Bounce, Homing attack. For lightning shield, Fire Shield, Bubble Bounce, press A, B, or C while in the air, Yellow Shield, press A,B, or C while in the air by an object to homing attack.[/SIZE]

[SIZE=12pt]Instashield: Press A, B, or C while in the air without a shield, it will protect Sonic for a quick second against attacks.[/SIZE]

[SIZE=12pt]Super Peelout: Hold up and press A, B, or C to rev it up[/SIZE]

[SIZE=12pt]Moves for Tails:[/SIZE]

[SIZE=12pt]Flight: Jump and press A, B, or C to gain height[/SIZE]

[SIZE=12pt]Moves for Knuckles:[/SIZE]

[SIZE=12pt]Glide: Jump and Hold A, or C[/SIZE]

[SIZE=12pt]Drill Claw: While gliding, Hold B while still holding A or C[/SIZE]

[SIZE=12pt]Dig: When in a drill claw and hitting the ground Knuckles will dig underground and look for an item.[/SIZE]

[SIZE=12pt]Wall Climbing: While gliding, hit a wall to start climbing[/SIZE]

[SIZE=12pt]Moves for Shadow:[/SIZE]

[SIZE=12pt]Double Jump Kick: Jump and Press A to make Shadow kick and gain height, and be invulnerable to attacks until he goes into his falling animation.[/SIZE]

[SIZE=12pt]Chaos Control (unfinished): Hold C to stop the time and slow down objects and music, best for use when trying to get through places that seem [/SIZE][SIZE=12pt]impossible to pass without being hurt. Also causes the level to have a wavy effect, as if Shadow is moving faster than everything else.[/SIZE]

[SIZE=12pt]Hover: Jump and hold up[/SIZE]

[SIZE=12pt]Gun Shot: While in a hover, hold A, to shoot a bullet.[/SIZE]

[SIZE=12pt]Moves for all Characters:[/SIZE]

[SIZE=12pt]Spindash: for Sonic and Shadow, hold down and press A, B, or C to rev up and for Tails and knuckles,  hold up or down and press A, B, or C.[/SIZE]

[SIZE=12pt]Zones: [/SIZE]

[SIZE=12pt]Bayside Atoll               Marble Fields[/SIZE]

[SIZE=12pt]Ice Cap                        Collision Chaos[/SIZE]

[SIZE=12pt]Starry Night                 Robotnik Corp.[/SIZE]

[SIZE=12pt]Wacky Base                 Hidden Palace[/SIZE]

[SIZE=12pt]Utopian City                Insane Skies[/SIZE]

[SIZE=12pt]Royal Ruins                 Reckless Fleet[/SIZE]

[SIZE=12pt]Vegas Square              Space Colony[/SIZE]

[SIZE=12pt]Towering Hills[/SIZE]

[SIZE=12pt]Forgotten Cave[/SIZE]

[SIZE=12pt]Locust Dunes[/SIZE]

[SIZE=12pt]Credits:[/SIZE]

[SIZE=12pt]Music and Sound: Karate Cat, Amphobius, Varion Icaria, Nineko, Tweaker, Cinossu, Flamewing, Crash[/SIZE]

[SIZE=12pt]Sounddriver: Flamewings S3K driver[/SIZE]

[SIZE=12pt]Art: Blazer, Bakayote, Karate Cat,[/SIZE][SIZE=12pt] JoenickROS[/SIZE]

[SIZE=12pt]Layout: Markeyjester, JoenickROS, Electroball[/SIZE]

[SIZE=12pt]Minor Coding: JoenickROS[/SIZE]

[SIZE=12pt]Major Coding: Shockwave, Varion Icaria[/SIZE]

[SIZE=12pt]Beta Testers: Mike B Berry, ThomasSpeedrunner, Bakayote, Shockwave, Varion Icaria[/SIZE]

[SIZE=12pt]Special Thanks: Shockwave, and Varion Icaria, without them, I might have not been able to fix coding bugs, or have some of the awesome features in this.[/SIZE] Various guides from Retro. RedHotSonic for helping me understand how end poses work.

Video: Now for the reveal



Edit: If you were a part of this and I forgot to credit you, let me know.

 

That's art is beautiful(good job for the guys who worked in the art), I'm very excited to play this hack when that got a release, also love the badniks and objects from other games in levels, It makes the game more variety. Good work joe.

 

This looks very promising. The only issue I see is that tails has no new abilities, while all the other characters have a range of new moves. Please don't ditch the moveset of my favorite sonic character!

 

Very awesome! Looks to be a very promising hack. A few things to note:

* All the news things in the hack look great! Your coders are very talented!

* It seems to me that you didn't change the layout of Ice Cap, which is frankly boring. Please change it.

* Are super emeralds in the game or not? I see that Sonic can turn hyper.

* There are some minor graphical glitches such as one of Sonic's sprites being a recolored version of one of Hyper Sonic's sprite. You didn't even change the eye color. You can see it at 2:06 in the video.

* I like the new teams, Tails leading + Sonic, Knuckles leading + Tails, and Sonic leading + Knuckles.

* There is one more problem I have with this hack: at the end of BAZ, I see that you added a mini boss. The thing I'm concerned with is that is seems to be copied straight from Sonic 2: S3 edition. I would hate for your hack to be demolished by everyone in this forum just because you added a shockingly similar thing from a hack years ago. :<

All in all, I can not wait!

 

Amazing!! This hack is completely full.

 

Oh there are more levels than that, but it would of spoiled some things, so I left them out.

 

Not bad, may play this when it comes out. Good job.

 

I cannot wait for this hack's release! I'll be keeping an eye on this hack. ^_^

 

Can cross this off my list, just wait till I have PCM support lol

Edit: "Where is that damn forth chaos emerald!"

 

Shit just got real >:3

I am excited about this, in all honesty. Also pretty cool you're referencing Shadow The Hedgehog by adding guns and stuff.

Since the focus here is Shadow, I'd like to ask: Any chance we'll be seeing Chaos Blast or any of Shadow's other signature abilities? =P

 

Joe, shadow can make that like X can make in Megaman X4?

Edit: I'm talking about Shadow's boots.
 

 

New Moves; comment, criticize, or not.

Edit: Also sprite artist needed for Knuckles digging, if you would like to help with that shoot me a PM.

 

Shadows moves look badass 0.o

These abilities might be a bit to over powered, though. The ability to summon free items should not be treated lightly. I'd personally lower the odds of obtaining good items (or make it so that half the time, nothing comes up at all)

 

Some times you get streaks and sometimes you get little to nothing, It buzzed one time, if you heard, so you don't always get items.

 

But will it give me steaks? That is all I ask?

 

As many stakes, your stomach can take.

 

I don't think much of the speed shoes theme, but that dig move for the walls and floor is great so far (even if it does currently lack an animation), I did beg MainMemory to do the same thing in one of his hacks, but well... I don't think he ever got around to it =(

 

Sonic 2:​

Return of Shadow​

 ​

Well since it seems there have been people wanting to play this I decided to finally release a public demo. In this Demo there are 3 acts available.





Bayside Attoll





Royal Ruins





Utopian City, Only act 1 is playable

Known Issues:

Sometimes when the game lags and single object load takes place the game will crash, this happens in every emulator, might have to do with the s2 object manager, this will be fixed later, I apologize if it happens to you.

The ring art will load over the explosion, Kos module will be in on a later date.

Immense Slow downs.

Chaos Control can sometimes speed up the music with out even starting it.

Other Info: Included in the zip file in a text file

Download​

Comments and Criticisms welcomed as usual.

 

Links been updated again, had the wrong explosion sound.

 

The moment I saw the post, I downloaded and played this. And while I was definately impressed by your hard work, I also found some extreme issues that prevent me from making a full play through.

General:

Since a big feature was the amount of characters the hack had to offer, I went to the options screen and took a look. And by golly, there's a lot of options. The fact that you can have any character follow any other character is awesome, and I had a lot of fun playing through as tails with sonic trailing behind However, this has its problems. Sonic has none of his special abilities as a two player character, and attempts to enter tails flying mode when you die, making him flip between his standing and rolling animations while floating towards you. As for the rest of the game, I can some up the biggest issue with one word: laaaaaag. From what I can tell, you seem to have taken all the steps required to help eradicate this (porting S3K stuffs and all that), but it still lags extremely in some areas, likely because you placed a lot of objects in a small area all at once. I'd recommend making sure that not too many objects are loaded on the screen all at once, and as a last resort, removing the S1 rev01 water effects (that stuff lags the hell out of things)! Also, explosions and animals that appear after bosses load the wrong graphics; explosions display the special stage ring art, and the animals after a boss fight still have the bosses explosion effects on them.

Bayside Atoll:

A great custom layout for emerald hill! I had a lot of fun exploring this level. It had several good secrets to find, and some very smooth speedy layouts. Enemies are well paced, and challenging, but not to tough. As for the bosses, the mini boss is okay (the GHZ boss with slight edits how the ball works has become something of a cliche), but challenging, which is okay, for a boss, but its the first one. I had to abuse second player sonic in order to pass this boss without getting a game over. As for the main boss of the zone, its just an easier EHZ boss with an obnoxious amount of hits. Also, when I killed it, the boss health meter said it still had one hit left.

Royal Ruins:

Damn, this place is scarry! SOZ ghosts, edited rev01 water deformation for AIZ styled fire effects, those palletes, that music; it really set this atmosphere. It's really hard, as well. I wasn't able to get through it. My only real complaint is that it's the second zone in the game. This should be much, much later on.

Hidden Palace:

I cheated to get here, and found that it was what hidden palace should be: a smooth, fun experience that takes advantage of its original beta layout. The raised water adds difficulty as well, making it a more acceptable as a mid game level. As for issues, I was unable to get through Act 1 due to the fact that I kept getting stuck in a long, underwater pipe. I'd go down, get slowed by the water, and not have enough momentum to get up. I'd either drown, or glitch through the pipe to an outside area, at which point I gave up on this level.

Forgotten Cave zone:

I used the leftover S2 2-player level select to get here (available by pressing start on the 2 player options in the options menu). The music is absolutely wonderful, and palletes and level layout are very pleasant. If it weren't for the fact that the crawltons (the blue sectioned badniks) were sped up, I'd say this would make a great second level. As is, the crawltons act as dick moves, hitting you before you can realize they are even there.

Edit: Also part of the music seems to seize up for a bit, playing a death tone behind the normal theme, then eventually returns to playing normally. It repeats this over and over again as the theme loops.

Edit: The boss area for act 1 needs to be checked for bugs and broken bubble graphics. Also:

HOLY MOTHER OF SHIT AM I IMPRESSED BY ACT 2!!I!I!

Vega Square:

A layout edited Casino night zone with purple palletes. I'd love to say more, but for some reason, this loaded S2's actual 2-player mode, complete with the old seperate 2 player object layouts, rendering this level unplayable.

The level order, some dick moves, glitches, and so much lag need to be fixed, but once that's out of the way, I think this could pass as a finished product. Of course, I have no idea what the other levels look like, as the level select has been changed, but from what I've seen, this has infinitesimal amounts of potential :3