MEGA DRIVE SONIC 2: EARLY PROTOTYPE VERSION FOUND
And released webwards by world-famous ROM collector. If you’re new to all this, you need an emulator like Gens to make it work, and a PC made since 1998. And preferably a joypad of some sort, as Sonic’s magic is diminished significantly when ‘X’ is down and ‘D’ is right and ‘Space’ is jump.
Now you don’t have to pretend to like the Sonic games released since 1995 any more!
GET IT HERE:
Hidden Palace – News / Sonic 2 early prototype
OR HERE:
The site hosting it appears to have died. Allow us to ‘help out’ by hosting the ROM here.
filed in HISTORY on Nov.08, 2006
November 8th, 2006 on 3:56 pm
1992? Christ I feel old. I remember the hype about Sonic 2sday, and seeing some kid on the BBC who’d finished it about 4 hours after it was released. I wonder what he’s doing now? I bet he’s got a blog.
November 8th, 2006 on 5:31 pm
It wasn’t BBC, It was Gamesmaster, and It was me.
Bought it at 9 in the morning from Dixons (which I’d preordered what seems like eons before, even sold my Lynx 2 to get the money for it), Went home, was finished by 12.
Next day I see a page on the game page on ORACLE (yes, we’re talking pre-digitiser) saying that Gamesmaster were looking for people who’d already finished it to phone them up, so, being a spotty 17 year old with delusions of grandure, and of course wanting the FAME AND GLORY associated with it, I phoned up.
I was given a grilling from the researcher, about what happened at the end, etc, and was told I’d be phoned back, and sure enough I was, with them saying “Sega doesn’t believe you”
..So I put my money where my mouth is, I said I’d boot up my MD right now, play it through to the end, ring em up just before I finished and tell them exactly what was happening on the screen. The researcher went one further, and said that while I did that he’d drive the 90 miles from London to Cheltenham to get a photo of me for the show (which was being aired on the Thursday), and would phone me every so often to get directions and an update on how far I was into the game.
I managed to finish the game in about 1:30, I think it was, before he even got to Oxford.
He phoned up and told me he wasn’t coming for the photo after all, but the story was indeed shown on Gamesmaster the next day.
As for what I’m doing now, I’m a jobless manic depressive, but yes, I do have a blog. Which I hate, and don’t update due to being high on drugs all the time.
November 8th, 2006 on 6:33 pm
Ahh the hopes and dreams of being finger punked by dominic diamond crushed by the steel toe-capped doc martin of brutal reality.
no wonder you’re on drugs now.
November 8th, 2006 on 8:26 pm
Looking back now, I can’t help but laught that “Sega didn’t believe me”
Its not like games were hard in those days, especially things like Sonic where you can’t die if you’ve always got one ring on you (oh, and you don’t fall off the map… and there aren’t that many “bottomless pits” in sonic 2)
Aside from RPGs with their lovely battery backed up RAM, most games were short and had no save option, they were MADE to be finished in one session, for fucks sake…
November 8th, 2006 on 11:10 pm
i remember that episode!
i think they gave it 65% for that, too.
i don’t see what all the fuss was about – noone’s crying about mario being finished in 10 minutes or whatever it took on the youtube video :)
but kudos for finishing it so quickly anyway, and for cussing it down over the phone to a gamesmaster guy
November 8th, 2006 on 11:18 pm
Didn’t they? It was reported on SPOnG. That’s something.
November 9th, 2006 on 5:18 am
ummmmmmm…..wasn’t this rom released about 6 years ago? i’m gonna go play it now and find out, but there has definitely, without a doubt, been a beat version of sonic 2 out since at least the year 2000.
November 9th, 2006 on 5:20 am
ummmmmmm…..wasn’t this rom released about 6 years ago? i’m gonna go play it now and find out, but there has definitely, without a doubt, been a beta version of sonic 2 out since at least the year 2000.
November 9th, 2006 on 5:26 am
ok never mind this is fucking AWESOME. now i got an alpha AND a beta pre release. damn i wish they had kept hidden palace zone in that game.
November 9th, 2006 on 5:27 am
ok never mind this is fucking AWESOME. now i got an alpha AND a beta pre release. damn i wish they had kept hidden palace zone in that game.
November 9th, 2006 on 12:50 pm
I was on GamesWorld completing the first level of Sonic 2 in the fastest time. 21 seconds, I think it was. Could probably still do it if I tried.
Awesome game. Probably the most excited I ever was about a game release.
November 9th, 2006 on 11:13 pm
I haven’t got a fucking clue about this Gens business. Anyone care to help? Why can’t it be easy like ZSnes?
I once came top at Goldeneye in an official nintendo magazine table. Nintendo sent me a free red controller, but was in a display box made of thin card. Cheapskates
November 9th, 2006 on 11:46 pm
How do I get this in my fucking Megadrive? I’ve opened in in notepad, printed out the text but all the letters I’ve got to type it in with on the controller are A, B and C. Fucking Sega no wonder they went bust.
November 10th, 2006 on 2:44 am
Gens is about as easy. What are you having a problem with?
November 10th, 2006 on 12:03 pm
Cheers!
Well it’s just some files, no .exe or anything. I assume I need to run them with something else? Do I need to download something to use them?
November 10th, 2006 on 2:58 pm
You need the Win32 Binary download. That has an exe that will just work.
November 10th, 2006 on 7:05 pm
Ta very much like. Looks like its working fine now.
Is it morally acceptable to put it in the nintendo folder with ZSnes and the gBA emulator?