Sonic the Hedgehog (2006)/Unused Layouts
This is a sub-page of Sonic the Hedgehog (2006).
 | To do: There's a lot more unused set files scattered throughout the game's scripts.arc file, though some seem to be for test stages that no longer exist. |
Contents
Tokyo Game Show 2006 Leftovers
Surprisingly, all three layouts for the Tokyo Game Show 2006 version of Kingdom Valley are on the disc. Sonic's seems to be identical to the XBLA demo, while Shadow's showcases some alternate hints.
Early Levels
Soleanna Forest
Using a glitch, Sonic can access the blocked portion of Soleanna Castle Town and enter Soleanna Forest before the Wave Ocean level. Doing so reveals several oddities:
- Double sets of doors are found in several locations, including the entrance to the Forest, that can only be seen by clipping through walls.
- The Forest itself spawns a multitude of signs, including the "no" symbol, checkered strips, stop signs, and speed limit designations. The former two have layering issues. Interestingly, the checkered strips are used in a sidequest (although positioned incorrectly), and both the stop sign and speed limit signs are subject to physics and can be destroyed with homing attacks. Only the stop sign is unused, but both it and the speed limit signs are a remnant of the cars planned for New City (see below).
- No other objects are loaded, suggesting that this may have simply been a test layout.
New City
Using a glitch, Shadow can access New City before the Dusty Desert level is unlocked, when it is normally blocked off. Doing so reveals an early version of New City with several oddities:
- Vehicles that drive around. However, their AI is unfinished, and they often drive into buildings.
- A town mission that isn't available anywhere else in the game.
- Crisis City and Flame Core warp gates (in the normal game, these two levels don't have warp gates), however they cannot be entered.
- A pigeon NPC called Hatsun, normally only seen after Silver's ninth town mission, that the player can speak to. The brooding little creature has but one thing to say: "Coo..."
Unused Hard Mode Layouts
Three unused layouts for hard mode exist in the game's files which can be seen on the side; it's unknown why these went unused as most stages in the final have hard mode equivalents.
Unused Sections
Dusty Desert "B" Section - Sonic
An unused layout file for the B section of Sonic's Dusty Desert, though it doesn't quite align with the stage model correctly. In the final game, only Shadow goes through both sections. Sonic's stage is rather short and would have benefited from another section.
Dusty Desert "A" Section - Silver
Mirroring Sonic's unused layout for this level, Silver has an unused layout file for the A section. Silver does actually go through part of the A section during End of the World, but that uses a different layout.
Dusty Desert "C" Section - Sonic/Shadow
The game contains a layout file with the name dtd_c_sonic, a set layout for a completely unused section, as well as a scene file that controls the bloom and lighting for Shadow, called scene_dtd_c_shadow, and it calls for the same lighting used in the first section, however no terrain or collision seems to exist. It's possible to load it into Silver's unused Dusty Desert A section, but trying to load it into Sonic's will cause issues. Unlike Crisis City Section D below, Dusty Desert's section C spawns mostly within the boundaries of section A. There's even a few points in the path that match up to various parts of section A, including split paths, a wall-running section, and a tower climb, though nothing in the stage and the set file matches up quite properly, with what appears to be the end of the level almost always being out of bounds.
White Acropolis "C" Section - Sonic
Perhaps even more elusive than both Dusty Desert C and Crisis City D is White Acropolis C. There is nothing leftover from when the section was in development except for a lua in scrips.arc/scripts/stage/wap called c_sonic.lua. Section C is also called in the file sonic.lua in the same folder. It uses an entirely different format than other stage files. You can read the contents of the file here. Unfortunately, that seems to be all that's left of White Acropolis C.
Crisis City "D" Section - Sonic
The game contains a layout file with the name csc_D_sonic, and it is possible to load it into the second section of Crisis City, but the objects spawn far off from the stage's starting point. The actual terrain and collision files that went with this have long since been removed or edited into something that no longer matches up with this. The presence of a planned but scrapped section to Crisis City would explain the XMA file oddities it exhibits.
Other
test_enemy - Shadow
A test level that can be loaded by modifying internal files, which can be downloaded for Xbox 360 in the video's description. It's intended specifically for Shadow and is in a directory containing other test levels. The actual stage mesh doesn't exist, so the one in the video was recreated based on the collision map, and this is included in the download. The area itself contains vehicles, a grind spline, and a few item boxes, in addition to enemies.
Crisis City E3 Layout - Silver
The layout used at E3 2006 for Silver's Crisis City is still present on the disc, one of the surprisingly few E3 leftovers.
