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Hopefully it isn't here already, but for all who don't know about it yet, a member "doc eggfan" over at sonicretro is making a "true Master System port of the 16-bit Mega Drive/Genesis title Sonic the Hedgehog 2 using the engine of the 8-bit version of Sonic the Hedgehog 2"!
Check out this thread, the hack is comming VERY soon:
http://forums.sonicretro.org/index.php?showtopic=11789

Sonic 2 LD Episode 01 - EHZ.zip (190.64 KB)

Beta 1

That's marvellous news! Are there any screenshots of the project?

No screenshots, I think there's a youtube video somewhere in the topic, check the last message from doc eggfan

Thanks for the video! Woah! Seems pretty colourful, it's incredible that is a 8 bit hack! Hope we can taste it soon! =)

(By the way, I hope Tails show up in this adaptation!)

Awesome!

Is it an inaccurate emulator only "hack" ? You'd think he'd be pushing it with "64 colors" and 256x224 resolution?*

*goes off to make unrealistic emulation mode in RetroCopy so this thing works. ;)

RetroRalph wrote

Is it an inaccurate emulator only "hack" ? You'd think he'd be pushing it with "64 colors" and 256x224 resolution?*

*goes off to make unrealistic emulation mode in RetroCopy so this thing works. ;)

You can do that on the SMS2 though, it has the 256x224 and 256x240 modes, and with some background gradient raster effects I'm sure the color count gets pushed up. Though probably not near 64 on screen.

The video's just repeating the "maximum" specs from Wikipedia. (That 10 octaves thing was my edit :) ) I think it wasn't made by the guy actually doing the hack.

Charles MacDonald wrote

You can do that on the SMS2 though, it has the 256x224 and 256x240 modes, and with some background gradient raster effects I'm sure the color count gets pushed up. Though probably not near 64 on screen.

Yeah I'm aware of the technical limitations. I just question if you can have a 4way scrolling game like Sonic 2 at that resolution able to fit within the video memory bandwidth. The Sonic 2 engine is already tight at 256x192 without the extra stuff (NTSC Sonic 2 has bugs due to too much needing updating iirc). Of course modern day optimization and knowledge might give it enough. And the other point may be as Maxim pointed out, the guy that made the video just used some max spec sheet and wrote it on the video.

I read some of the thread last night though and the author doesn't appear to have done any testing on a real system or something like RetroCopy, so I'm assuming it's not a priority to have it work on a real system currently. IMO if you're going to do a SMS game or hack it should work on the real thing to be classified a SMS game. Otherwise it's really just made for something that doesn't exist, and if it doesn't exist, why not be a bit more fanciful with the conversion (ie move it to C++/Java and use original graphics/music). Hopefully the author does make it compatible with the real machines at some point if it isn't currently because it is a COOL project with a lot of effort put into it.

I would like to see a game that does some fancy tricks to increase the color count, one thing I could think of is having different colors in a status area, blank for a line after it and update the palette to your usual colors. It's a bit hard to have the gameplay area affected by it unless you have well defined background areas.

*edit* A demo rom has been released, I tried it in RetroCopy and it works fine so it likely works on the real system too. NTSC has same issues as real Sonic 2 but PAL is fine. It's also 256x192. All in all though probably one of the best SMS hacks out there. :)

Going up to 224 pixels height would really just mean four more tiles to update on horizontal scrolling. Given that these games are typically also updating sprite tiles, that's not a lot of VBlank time (relatively). You could even get away with doing the later rows during the display period, although not particularly easy.

Maxim wrote

Going up to 224 pixels height would really just mean four more tiles to update on horizontal scrolling. Given that these games are typically also updating sprite tiles, that's not a lot of VBlank time (relatively). You could even get away with doing the later rows during the display period, although not particularly easy.

Yeah but you also have less VRAM space, so if you're using methods whereby you're caching certain sprites it increases upload pressure..... If only the SMS allowed Z80 writing directly to VRAM you could get away with plenty of tricks. The Sega-E is pretty much how the SMS should have been, minus the extra VDP and faster Z80.

I've just played through the beta, and I gotta say that, while unfinished (duh!) it does show some promise.
BTW: I laughed out loud at the easter egg... XD

I attached the beta to the first post.

Author	Message
jpx072 Joined: 08 Feb 2008 Posts: 75 Location: Slovakia	Sonic 2 LD (fomerly "Project: H") coming out! Posted: Tue Nov 23, 2010 8:59 am
jpx072 Joined: 08 Feb 2008 Posts: 75 Location: Slovakia	Hopefully it isn't here already, but for all who don't know about it yet, a member "doc eggfan" over at sonicretro is making a "true Master System port of the 16-bit Mega Drive/Genesis title Sonic the Hedgehog 2 using the engine of the 8-bit version of Sonic the Hedgehog 2"! Check out this thread, the hack is comming VERY soon: http://forums.sonicretro.org/index.php?showtopic=11789 Sonic 2 LD Episode 01 - EHZ.zip (190.64 KB) Beta 1

Ron_Stard Joined: 01 Apr 2008 Posts: 197 Location: Spain	Posted: Tue Nov 23, 2010 11:52 am
Ron_Stard Joined: 01 Apr 2008 Posts: 197 Location: Spain	That's marvellous news! Are there any screenshots of the project?

jpx072 Joined: 08 Feb 2008 Posts: 75 Location: Slovakia	Posted: Tue Nov 23, 2010 12:54 pm
jpx072 Joined: 08 Feb 2008 Posts: 75 Location: Slovakia	No screenshots, I think there's a youtube video somewhere in the topic, check the last message from doc eggfan

Maxim Site Admin Joined: 19 Oct 1999 Posts: 14752 Location: London	Posted: Wed Nov 24, 2010 8:51 am


Ron_Stard Joined: 01 Apr 2008 Posts: 197 Location: Spain	Posted: Wed Nov 24, 2010 10:12 am
Ron_Stard Joined: 01 Apr 2008 Posts: 197 Location: Spain	Thanks for the video! Woah! Seems pretty colourful, it's incredible that is a 8 bit hack! Hope we can taste it soon! =) (By the way, I hope Tails show up in this adaptation!)

PrOfUnD Darkness Joined: 29 Jun 1999 Posts: 383 Location: Brazil	Posted: Wed Nov 24, 2010 5:13 pm
	Awesome!

RetroRalph Joined: 27 Oct 2009 Posts: 138	Posted: Wed Nov 24, 2010 7:18 pm
RetroRalph Joined: 27 Oct 2009 Posts: 138	Is it an inaccurate emulator only "hack" ? You'd think he'd be pushing it with "64 colors" and 256x224 resolution?* *goes off to make unrealistic emulation mode in RetroCopy so this thing works. ;)

Charles MacDonald Joined: 28 Sep 1999 Posts: 1197	Posted: Thu Nov 25, 2010 4:23 am
Charles MacDonald Joined: 28 Sep 1999 Posts: 1197	RetroRalph wrote Is it an inaccurate emulator only "hack" ? You'd think he'd be pushing it with "64 colors" and 256x224 resolution?* *goes off to make unrealistic emulation mode in RetroCopy so this thing works. ;) You can do that on the SMS2 though, it has the 256x224 and 256x240 modes, and with some background gradient raster effects I'm sure the color count gets pushed up. Though probably not near 64 on screen.

Maxim Site Admin Joined: 19 Oct 1999 Posts: 14752 Location: London	Posted: Thu Nov 25, 2010 7:28 am
	The video's just repeating the "maximum" specs from Wikipedia. (That 10 octaves thing was my edit :) ) I think it wasn't made by the guy actually doing the hack.

RetroRalph Joined: 27 Oct 2009 Posts: 138	Posted: Thu Nov 25, 2010 2:36 pm
RetroRalph Joined: 27 Oct 2009 Posts: 138	Charles MacDonald wrote You can do that on the SMS2 though, it has the 256x224 and 256x240 modes, and with some background gradient raster effects I'm sure the color count gets pushed up. Though probably not near 64 on screen. Yeah I'm aware of the technical limitations. I just question if you can have a 4way scrolling game like Sonic 2 at that resolution able to fit within the video memory bandwidth. The Sonic 2 engine is already tight at 256x192 without the extra stuff (NTSC Sonic 2 has bugs due to too much needing updating iirc). Of course modern day optimization and knowledge might give it enough. And the other point may be as Maxim pointed out, the guy that made the video just used some max spec sheet and wrote it on the video. I read some of the thread last night though and the author doesn't appear to have done any testing on a real system or something like RetroCopy, so I'm assuming it's not a priority to have it work on a real system currently. IMO if you're going to do a SMS game or hack it should work on the real thing to be classified a SMS game. Otherwise it's really just made for something that doesn't exist, and if it doesn't exist, why not be a bit more fanciful with the conversion (ie move it to C++/Java and use original graphics/music). Hopefully the author does make it compatible with the real machines at some point if it isn't currently because it is a COOL project with a lot of effort put into it. I would like to see a game that does some fancy tricks to increase the color count, one thing I could think of is having different colors in a status area, blank for a line after it and update the palette to your usual colors. It's a bit hard to have the gameplay area affected by it unless you have well defined background areas. edit A demo rom has been released, I tried it in RetroCopy and it works fine so it likely works on the real system too. NTSC has same issues as real Sonic 2 but PAL is fine. It's also 256x192. All in all though probably one of the best SMS hacks out there. :)

Maxim Site Admin Joined: 19 Oct 1999 Posts: 14752 Location: London	Posted: Thu Nov 25, 2010 3:46 pm
	Going up to 224 pixels height would really just mean four more tiles to update on horizontal scrolling. Given that these games are typically also updating sprite tiles, that's not a lot of VBlank time (relatively). You could even get away with doing the later rows during the display period, although not particularly easy.

RetroRalph Joined: 27 Oct 2009 Posts: 138	Posted: Thu Nov 25, 2010 10:46 pm
RetroRalph Joined: 27 Oct 2009 Posts: 138	Maxim wrote Going up to 224 pixels height would really just mean four more tiles to update on horizontal scrolling. Given that these games are typically also updating sprite tiles, that's not a lot of VBlank time (relatively). You could even get away with doing the later rows during the display period, although not particularly easy. Yeah but you also have less VRAM space, so if you're using methods whereby you're caching certain sprites it increases upload pressure..... If only the SMS allowed Z80 writing directly to VRAM you could get away with plenty of tricks. The Sega-E is pretty much how the SMS should have been, minus the extra VDP and faster Z80.

haroldoop Joined: 25 Feb 2006 Posts: 874 Location: Belo Horizonte, MG, Brazil	Posted: Fri Nov 26, 2010 12:23 am
	I've just played through the beta, and I gotta say that, while unfinished (duh!) it does show some promise. BTW: I laughed out loud at the easter egg... XD

Maxim Site Admin Joined: 19 Oct 1999 Posts: 14752 Location: London	Posted: Fri Nov 26, 2010 9:04 am
	I attached the beta to the first post.

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