Sonic the hedgehog Area 51

Introduction

This page is a collection of intriguing, mysterious and downright goofy infromation about the (official) Sonic the Hedgehog line of games. It deals with everything from Sonic the Hedgehog on the Master System to Sonic Adventure on SEGA Dreamcast.
It's basically an archive of weird STH data the author has collected since 1998, when Andre Alex Dirk had shown the world his interesting Sonic 2 cartridge. Most of the info here is exclusive unless it was "borrowed" by others. Meaning there is stuff here you won't find anywhere else!
The original authors of the finding have been listed where I myself am not the author.

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Sonic 2 (Page 1)

Welcome to possibly the biggest section of this site (most of it is copy/paste job from the old A51 ;D), for despite my efforts to make Sonic CD #1, Sonic 2 is the absolute juggernaut of mysterious stuff.

Hidden Palace Zone

Possibly the most famous lost zone of all, ~~finished version of Hidden Palace only existed in the beta of Sonic 2~~ (GRR. I know, I know; what about S&K?). The hangovers remain, but they are only accessible by using hexeditors and emulation, or by Action Replay code 1000080:322F (or something).

The remains of this level intrigue me more than the level itself; badniks are all gone without a trace, while the level objects, such as waterfalls, collapsing platforms and stuff like that still works. Why is beyond be, but it probably has something to do with SEGA's infamous "blast processing" technique, where the badniks' space was used for something else.

The infamous green emerald on the left pic is nothing but a tube blocker that was supoosed to be broken with jumps, like the blockers in Chemical Plant. It has nothing to do with Master Emerald from Sonic & Knuckles; just thought I'd point that out.

One of the strangest Sonic 2 Beta Hidden Palace Zone is certanly that impassable slope near the end of the level. You could get past it - if only there was an elevator there... But let's forget about all the theories about HPZ and the slope mystery and focus on a real fact. Throw your eyes (weird expression, I know) on a not so huge HPZ map below.

Not so big HPZ map

Well...at least the last part of HPZ...

The blue area is actually the underwater part of the slope, located on the very bottom of the zone. As you will soon see, it is located beyond the top of it too, but let's start at the beginning. Using Debug, I have placed one of those crumbling platforms just below of where the slide starts.

Like this:

First Pic

Then I jumped on it. The platform itself collapsed, but Sonic could walk up the slope!

Second Pic

Pressing Right, Sonic soon reached the top of zone.

Third Pic

I was still holding Right. Sonic went of the screen and the screen scrolled horizontally, but not vertically. Then I ran into a solid object. The pic below shows the exact location where it happened:

Fourth Pic

(Keep your eyes on the location display!) Wanting to get around it somehow, I pressed B and turned into a platform. Although Sonic or platform didn't move one bit, the screen started to scroll vertically. And the platform Sonic turned into has been warped here:

Fifth Pic

Seems familiar? This is the thing that stopped Sonic (right next to him):

Sixth Pic

The top position, which displays the horizontal position of Sonic in the playfield (X) didn't change. That means that there is another water-conveyor-belt-top-of-slope construction above the play area, but it isn't accessible! Well, it is, if you go DOWN. Looks like the programmers first set the X and Y size of Hidden Palace which allowed that kind of tall slopes, but when they later cut the top parts out due to memory lacks, but they didn't count on that the whole top construction, which CAN'T be placed in an area that doesn't exist, was moved DOWN. This thing was discovered with the help of 'items can't be placed outside' rule. If the item can't be placed outside, Debug mode can't be activated outside too, so it moves to where it SHOULD be. Remember, you can't go into debug and ouside the play area. No Sonic game would allow you to do that. Sonic itself, though, does not have that kind of programming. There have to be chasms, right? So, by examining the way Sonic acts up there, I'd say that the construction is what is left in memory - nothing else.

So, all what we need to do is to change the Y size of HPZ, and the top of the slope, complete with the 'water-conveyor-belt' will appear. I have done some more tests, and I can assure you, it is there. Try it out! Do what I did, and when you bump into an obstacle, try jumping. You'll sooner or later reach the end of it and fall down.

Legal Information

Page created in 1998 by Jan Abaza
First hosted by Academic Research Network of Slovenia, now part of Sonic Stuff Research Group
Sonic the Hedgehog and all related indicia are owned by Sonic Team
The author and the page are no way affiliated with SEGA or Sonic Team.
This site was created with MS Notepad. I hate the "make the page for me" programs.
And so freaking what if I link to the MS homepage. Boo.