Sonic 2 Beta

Sonic 2 Beta is a prototype version of the video game Sonic the Hedgehog 2.
Description
This version of Sonic 2 was discovered by Simon Wai on a Chinese GeoCities site and widely distributed on the Internet as Sonic the Hedgehog 2 Beta. Only four levels can be played in "normal" gameplay; the rest (including several incomplete stages) have to be accessed through the level select code (which is accessed simply via A-Start; the final version requires entering a numeric code through the Sound Test). Many are not entirely playable, but can be explored using the debug code. Some of the acts are completely empty, causing Sonic and Tails to fall to their doom immediately after beginning the level. The prototype was examined by hackers for several years to determine how Sonic the Hedgehog 2 was developed. It was recently stated in an interview with Yuji Naka that this beta probably was from a demonstration cartridge that was stolen at a toy show in New York in 1992. Akinori Nishiyama has also stated that the leak was due to the lack of security at the time.
An earlier prototype has been dumped and released.
Zones
There are four Zones in this prototype that can be played to completion and eight that are not fully playable. The latter can only be accessed through level select. The only Zone that has a boss is Green Hill Zone. Parts of the Zones that have been placed were not modified very much afterwards, and are familiar to players of the final game.
Neo Green Hill Zone
What would later be moved up to Zone 3 in the final version (and renamed Aquatic Ruin Zone) is now the first Zone. Tails has no splash animation yet, and water doesn't affect him like it does Sonic.
Chemical Plant Zone
Not much is different about this Zone, except for a few sound effects, and smaller moving platforms. Loops have slanted corners rather than the full corners found in the final product.
Hill Top Zone
Autospin hasn't yet been implemented in the tubes Sonic rides through, and earthquakes don't yet have their sound effects. Act 2 is roughly half done, with an end-of-act signpost placed about the end of the second inside-the-hill section, close to where the stage boss is in the final version.
Green Hill Zone
This level is almost the same as the final version's Emerald Hill Zone, major differences include walls which are in Sonic's path, lack of the "Aiai" (Coconuts) Badnik and an unnamed snail Badnik similar to Sonic 1's "Motora" (Motobug). This is the only Zone that contains a boss; it behaves slightly differently than it does in the final version. After completing this Zone, the game returns to the title screen.
Wood Zone
Wood Zone is a dense forest; only the very beginning of Act 1 is filled in with tiles. It uses Metropolis Zone music. There are no enemies present in the Wood Zone. Without the debug mode activated, this level is cut very short due to the fact that it is impossible to get past the first ramp, the characters hit the floor above instead. However, using debug, it can be further explored. The stage suddenly ends halfway through an animated (though not active) conveyor belt. Act 2 does not have any data.
Metropolis Zone
This Zone contains no objects, and the lava doesn't affect Sonic. There is one major change to the zone's third Act: a rhombus-shaped lift that didn't make it to the final game. The pistons that emit steam do not give Sonic enough height to continue forward as they do in the final, so the debug mode must be activated to overcome this.
Hidden Palace Zone
This zone appears to be an underwater cavern with large crystals in it. It contains badniks never seen in the released version (although the object code remains intact, the art itself has been removed) such as a red dinosaur badnik. The large emerald found in this stage has at times been suggested to be the Master Emerald, however those who worked on the Zone have said it was just another block to break through (although analysis confirms it to be a minimally modified "pink rock" object from Sonic 1s Green Hill Zone, which some find contradictory given the existence of other breakable objects in the prototype).
At one point in the zone is a long shaft which appears as if it was intended to loop from the top to the bottom of the map and may have been intended as some sort of lift track. The end of this "lift" is the last area of the Zone that had been designed. The level layout ends on a section of an animated but nonfunctional water slide. Act 2 is identical to Act 1, except the player is stuck inside a wall at the start, and all objects and enemies are gone. While the art was removed from the final game, object and ring data remains, and the level itself can be accessed by entering the Game Genie code ACLA-ATD4 and using the Level Select to go to Death Egg Zone. The debug mode object list is identical to that of Oil Ocean Zone.
In a GameSpy interview, Yuji Naka said that Hidden Palace Zone would have been a secret level that could be entered by collecting all 7 Chaos Emeralds, implying that Hidden Palace is the place where the Chaos Emeralds originated. After this level was cleared, a cutscene would play showing Sonic gaining 50 rings and turning into Super Sonic.
The Tails life monitor was the source of some theories regarding the level's plot — some people maintained that Tails was to be the "guardian" of the Master Emerald. A second prototype reveals that this monitor was placed very early in development, since it was still using the extra life attribute code from Sonic 1. This shows that Hidden Palace Zone may have been one of the first levels created. It also shows that the level was hardly worked on at all after the alpha build, and development may have stalled even before then. But examining the remaints in a hacking tool shows that the autospin objects have been added to the start.
Oil Ocean Zone
This level remains superficially the same as its final counterpart, except for the background, which is not complete. It doesn't wrap properly, and one of the pipes sucks oil up rather than dumping it out.
Checkered balls on springs can be found throughout the level. They are paired with switches that cause the balls to pop out and roll to the right. It is sufficient to jump within a vertical corridor centered on the switch, meaning that they can be activated by accident before the player has encountered them. Both the switch and the ball are placeable in debug mode in the final game. The ball looks like a smaller version of the "wrecking ball" that Robotnik used as the boss of Green Hill Zone in Sonic 1. The green flames and spikes on the green lifts that boost Sonic into the air haven't yet been implemented.
This Zone plays the 2 player Casino Night Zone music. The music used in the final release is present in the sound test.
Dust Hill Zone
This level pointer actually brings players to what is known as Mystic Cave Zone in the final game, and not to the "legendary" desert level that was to become Dust Hill Zone. (see Miscellaneous for more information on Dust Hill Zone's controversy) This is due to the fact that when Dust Hill was axed from production, the name in the level select was not updated. At the beginning of the zone, there are some odd object arrangements, such as a set of three swinging platforms. Gates are opened by ground-based switches rather than ceiling-based pull switches as seen in the final game.
Casino Night Zone
This level's color palette is completely different, composed of more bright colors than the final version's. Act 2 has the pinball/slot machine parts in its background instead of the city. There are no objects in this level, meaning that none of the flippers, charge springs, or slots have been implemented yet. The level's music has a different intro and features slightly different instrumentation.
Genocide City Zone
Genocide City Zone has no data at all, and as soon as the player enters it, he falls to his death. No data that could possibly have been used for this Zone has been recovered from the ROM image.
Tom Payne has provided concept sketches showing that at some point in development, this level was called "Cyber City Zone". It would have been a metallic-themed Zone similar to Sonic 1 ' s Scrap Brain Zone or Sonic Spinball ' s The Machine. Payne reports that Genocide City was scrapped due to time constraints, and the designers added a third Act to Metropolis Zone instead.
Death Egg Zone
According to the level select, this zone originally had two acts (unlike in the final version). However, like Genocide City, neither act has any data and the player merely falls and dies immediately. The Zone's music pointer is invalid, causing the Z80 program to slowly crash as it plays data that wasn't intended to be played.
Miscellaneous
A mock-up picture exists which suggests that at one stage in development, a desert-like zone was planned for Sonic 2, but there is nothing to suggest that the level has ever existed in a playable format. Whether or not the level was to be named Dust Hill Zone has been under debate for as long as the beta has been around. on September 13th, 2008 Tweaker unearthed an interview with Hirokazu Yasuhara, game director and worked on object placement for Sonic the Hedgehog 2. In a post on Sonic Retro / the Sonic 2 Beta Page He confirmed what many members had argued all along that the Desert Level was indeed to be named Dust Hill. The reasoning behind the appearance of Mystic Caves Zone when selecting Dust Hill Zone became a simple matter of the level being removed, and the level title in the level select menu not being updated. This is why in the Wai prototype Emerald Hill Zone was titled Green Hill (The DRX / Nick Arcade prototype still had Sonic 1's Green Hill Zone in the level select, and in the game itself), and why in later betas "Sky Fortress Zone" would lead to "Winge Fortress Zone".
The zone's artist has stated that the Desert Zone artwork was intended to be reused in a different level a winter-themed Zone, featuring Christmas trees instead of cacti.
If one collects 100 rings in any zone, the music changes into a prototype of the Death Egg track due to an incorrect pointer — the original Sonic 1 1-Up music was at the address now occupied by this music; the same phenomenon occurs in Chemical Plant Zone and Aquatic Ruin Zone where the music which plays during the drowning countdown is actually a prototype of the level select music.
Piracy
In Asia and Brazil, the prototype version was put on cartridges and passed off as the final version by pirates who have altered it slightly to stop the Sega logo from showing when the game boots up, as was common practice. Nothing else seems to have been changed.

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See Also

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