The main goal of this hack is to improve the flow of the first Sonic for MD/GEN while keeping the original level design mostly intact, keeping the player on the move or occupied with something interesting as often as possible.
Initially meant to just do something about the slower segments in marble zone, and the elevators in spring yard zone, it later grew into something more, with changes to every act.
The hack works with the below rom in Kega Fusion, using the auto fix checksum option. It also works with the github disassembly rom.
It is compatible with Esrael's spindash hack, but not the spike bug & spindash one, and not with the recent bug fixes hack. However, it wasn't designed with either in mind.
You can send the author a PM (send it to PresidentLeever at RHDN) if you know how to fix this, or if you have any other comments that can help improve the hack.
See the readme for more info.
Changes:
*Tweaked ring, item, obstacle/gimmick, hazard and enemy placement (for better flow, less trial & error and more consistent difficulty)
*Tweaked moving platform positions and speeds (same)
*Tweaked speeds for some hazards (same)
*Alternate ways of traversing the slower segments in marble zone and spring yard zone
*Removed some points of no return and improved path connectivity either by removing doors or fans, or adding platforms (example: added platform path to beginning of starlight 3 so players who screwed up the one shot slope movement and/or following jump could get another chance to take the top path
*Easier jump at the beginning of spring yard act 3 (also moved a few rings to the beginning to avoid death from missing the jump)
*Better visual clues for some hidden paths and detours (for example the vanishing platforms in scrap brain 2 leading to the 1-up will spawn more frequently)
*Added enemy or hazard to a few uneventful segments ("boat" segments in marble zone, labyrinth zone 1 shortcut, moving platform path in spring yard zone, scrab brain 3 shortcut, etc),
*Added some second chance platforms in pits (green hill zone 2, marble zone 3, spring yard zone 3, starlight zone, scrap brain zone)
*Two new hidden paths near the top of the screen
*Two new somewhat hidden speed shoes monitors, and a shield in a hidden dead end path in spring yard zone which only had a few rings
0.91 changes and to do:
-Tweaked some ring placement in labyrinth act 1
-Tweaked "ducking part" w/ the spiky enemy in labyrinth act 2 (also moved and removed some bubble spawners in this act to make battling those enemies less frustrating)
-Re-tweaked bumper position before the big halfpipe in spring yard act 3 so you won't bounce back instead of down when rolling into it at highest speed
-Moved added newtron at top of green hill act 1 further left and added 2 "chameleon newtrons" to platform path below that part
-More breakable blocks as bridge at end of swinging platforms segment in marble act 3 (looks a bit better and is easier to adjust to on first try)
-Tweaked the falling platforms position at the end of the top path of SLZ1 so that you can roll over them while holding down without stopping as the wall curves up
-Tweaked the position of a yellow spring in SLZ2 to avoid getting stuck between it and a wall
To do (hacking needed?):
-Somewhat faster underwater movement
-Somewhat faster green glass pillars and lava block boats moving to the left, faster sideways pizza cutters in scrap brain 2 (no speed setting in sonlvl)
-Faster spring yard and scrap brain elevators/block obstacles and floating spikeballs in spring yard (or turn those spikeballs into rubber balls or bumpers instead)
-Somewhat slower blue robots in spring yard zone
-Make sonic not automatically let go of the wheels in scrap brain 2
-Make starlight zone's spiky enemies either shoot their spike balls or have only three spinning balls so it's not super hard to hit them without getting hurt
-Three block wide (from 1 block) green moving platform above the lava river with the spring in marble act 3 - it's either that or two 3 block wide platforms?
Luv Da Flo Edition v0.9 (Sonic The Hedgehog (MD/GEN) Hack)
The main goal of this hack is to improve the flow of the first Sonic for MD/GEN while keeping the original level design mostly intact, keeping the player on the move or occupied with something interesting as often as possible.
Initially I wanted to just do something about the slower segments in marble zone and elevators in spring yard zone, but after finishing those I started tweaking other zones and eventually did some changes to each act of the game.
As I was working on it, I decided to also increase the connectivity in some levels, letting the player backtrack through more paths to fully explore each level in one go.
Finally I've also tweaked the difficulty slightly by for example making the reward for taking some detours slightly bigger, adding an enemy or hazard to uneventful segments, adding visual clues to some hidden paths or out of view items, and making it slightly harder to take the fastest route through Scrap Brain Act 3.
The hack works with the below rom in Kega Fusion, using the auto fix cheksum option. It also works with the github disassembly rom.
It is compatible with Esrael's spindash hack, but not the spike bug & spindash one, and not with the recent bug fixes hack. However, it wasn't designed with either in mind.
You can send me a PM (PresidentLeever at RHDN) if you know how to fix this, or if you have any other comments that can help me improve the hack.
Why 0.9 and not 1.0? The hack was done using SonLVL and therefore limited by its features, so in some cases I had to do the second best solution for an idea.
For example, I wasn't able to change the speed for certain obstacles like the glass pillars, or the speed of movable blocks in lava moving to the left, both appearing in marble zone.
I also wasn't able to go into detail and tweak every single tile, due to how the editor uses "chunks", about a screen's worth of various level elements in the foreground instead.
These issues lead both to a somewhat less aesthetically pleasing hack, and level design that feels more like a hack than the original game. Hopefully I'll be able to improve it some more in the future.
Changes:
*Tweaked ring, item, obstacle/gimmick, hazard and enemy placement (for better flow, less trial & error and more consistent difficulty)
*Tweaked moving platform positions and speeds (same)
*Tweaked speeds for some hazards (same)
*Alternate ways of traversing the slower segments in marble zone and spring yard zone
*Removed some points of no return and improved path connectivity either by removing doors or fans, or adding platforms (example: added platform path to beginning of starlight 3 so players who screwed up the one shot slope movement and/or following jump could get another chance to take the top path
*Easier jump at the beginning of spring yard act 3 (also moved a few rings to the beginning to avoid death from missing the jump)
*Better visual clues for some hidden paths and detours (for example the vanishing platforms in scrap brain 2 leading to the 1-up will spawn more frequently)
*Added enemy or hazard to a few uneventful segments ("boat" segments in marble zone, labyrinth zone 1 shortcut, moving platform path in spring yard zone, scrab brain 3 shortcut, etc),
*Added some second chance platforms in pits (green hill zone 2, marble zone 3, spring yard zone 3, starlight zone, scrap brain zone)
*Two new hidden paths near the top of the screen
*Two new somewhat hidden speed shoes monitors, and a shield in a hidden dead end path in spring yard zone which only had a few rings
Rom Info:
Sonic the Hedgehog (JUE) [!]
CRC32: F9394E97
Size: 524 288 bytes
Sonic the Hedgehog (JUE) [!]
CRC32: F9394E97
Size: 524 288 bytes
