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TASVideoAgent
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This topic is for the purpose of discussing #9019: pedro's Genesis Sonic 2 Extended "Any%" in 16:29.87
Spikestuff
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Hello pedro and welcome to TASVideos. The Sonic series is a fairly technical one, something that I question here by you as there is some things still possible to shave. But... what is the purpose of this ROMHack? There's no information that's been provided about this ROMHack and to me it's a mix mash of Sonic 1 elements from Sonic 2 plus a few extras. The only other thing is that this ROMHack is now a apparently 3 year old demo, but because of how hard it's to find information about this ROMHack let alone the devs themselves about any progress. Also in regards to the title the only two videos I found online referred to the hack as "Extended" whilst another "Extension". I'm lost. Abstained.
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Since it's so obscure, I think it makes sense to copy this great review here because I can't link to it.
Random-cm9qm wrote:
As a Demo, this looks intresting. I'll leave my thoughts here: {Zones Score: 4/10} These Zones feel pretty alright for the most part, mainly because a good majority of those weren't changed or had been edited from pre-existing Sonic 2 Zones (CNZ, ARZ, Etc). I will say that Wood Zone/Secret Jungle Zone was pretty barebones, it didn't feel as open as I've seen in previous hacks & it doesn't expand over you just jumping over spikes & onto platforms without that push that sort of makes it more intresting or fun to play, hence why the score was capped at 4. So my wish would be to modify that so it uses platforming and puzzling gimmicks whilst also providing you with speed as its reward rather than it being used as a tool to jump over repeated spikes & platforms, as well as adding alternate paths for Zones. (Music Score: 2/10} The music wasn't the best, alot of the time it felt like slightly high-pitched (or what people like to call "nightcore") variants of the base songs, each song didn't really stick out to me, apart from Wood Zone/Secret Jungle Zone. Specifically because this track just sounded terrible, it felt like the instruments were clashing with eachother without any sense of rhythm attached to them. Not to mention it used the exact same sort of note progression throughout the song. Also, the boss theme in HTZ might be bugged, something about the start just sounded a little too off to me, which didn't help the already low score. Just take a listen to this 16:40. I'd say space your music out more, so that it's a little more bearable on the ears. {Colour Palettes/Colour Schemes Score: 3/10} I'll be honest, most of the palettes weren't really that good, with GHZ's Act 3 having an orange background without the clouds being properly shaded, CPZ's Act 1's single colour type patterns & CNZ having barely any changes to it lead this to being my final score. Most of the times, Act 2s of the zones would have a decent looking colour palette, albeit looking a little too close to that one Sonic 2 Enhancement RomHack. But I think the worst one of all of them had to be HTZ Act 2, Whilst it was cool that they had implemented design quirks from Sonic 2 SMS/GG, it didn't really feel like anything was really changed apart from the fact that it looked like it was night by the dull-looking dark blue sky. I feel like stars or some kind of symbolise that there might be a moon in the sky would greatly help. Along with modifying and redesigning some of these backgrounds. {Boss Fights: 3/10} A whole lot of these are just dumbed down variants of the original, not much to comment on other than making them feel more challenging and fun to mess around with. You can even see in this timestamp 10:52 that the boss fight didn't cover-up a specific spot, giving you free hits to defeat it easily. WZ/SJZ was the only one that, for the most part, helped provide a little bit of a challenge for the player, although, it does fall flat as it's not entirely that memorable. It gets the same point as I previously mentioned before. {Final Score: 4/10} This Hack does have potential, I've seen hacks that are styled like this do a great job, even if at any point those have been long gone, you can't deny that it may have inspired the devs to make these more expansive. Which I think they did an okay job to say the least. Just fix up the previous mistakes and you should be golden, I hope the development of this hack goes swell & I hope the details get improved upon greatly. {Bonus Mentions} • I like the animations at the end, though I do think Tails' one should be worked on, he just looks a little off to me. This also applies to Sonic's balancing animation, it's just too fucking fast. • The Title Screen is alright, though I don't know if I like Tails' face, it just seems like he's the most broken looking one out of the whole romhack.
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
CoolHandMike
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I would encourage you to take a look at the existing Sonic tases on this site. There a lot of tricks to go fast! I would not mind watching this tas normally since you do some stuff that makes me chuckle like walking through the bouncing pad in Casino, but when it comes to tas it usually comes down to either speed and/or entertainment. If you were able to maybe focus exclusively on entertainment alongside tightening up sections to be much faster this might work well. Although as others noted this romhack might not be a good choice so maybe take a look at the original games or more extensive well known romhacks.
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