Sonic the Hedgehog 2 (mobile)

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Sonic the Hedgehog 2
System(s): i-mode 90x, EZweb (BREW 3.1)
Publisher: Sega
Developer: Sonic Team
Distribution portal: Sonic Cafe Puyo Puyo! Sega
Number of players: 1
Release Date RRP Code Rating JP 2006-11-01 ¥? ? JP 2009-02-19 ¥? ?

Sonic the Hedgehog 2 (ソニック ザ ヘッジホッグ２) is a mobile phone game originally released in Japan for DoJa (i-mode 90x) devices through the Sonic Cafe portal. This game is a port of Sonic the Hedgehog 2 (16-bit) based on the original assets and source code. The game was ported to J2ME by Rockpool Games and released in two parts by Glu Mobile, called Sonic the Hedgehog 2: Dash! and Sonic the Hedgehog 2: Crash!. Versions for phones with the BREW runtime have also been released; the overseas release was made by Distinctive Developments and published by EA Mobile, and it appears to be based on the J2ME version. The Japanese version for DoJa is the only feature phone version to have some additional features, such as simultaneous music and sound effects, submitting high scores to a national league table, and an "Attack Mode" where the player fights the game's bosses in sequential order.

BREW versions

The BREW versions of the game by Distinctive Developments are largely along the same lines as the DoJa and J2ME versions. The Zone title cards and various other graphics are shared with these feature phone versions, and so is the camera, which is noticeably different compared to the Mega Drive version and follows Sonic more closely. While the BREW versions feature a larger viewport than any other feature phone versions (which are letterboxed), the auto-scrolling Sky Chase Zone is played with its J2ME screen view with a black bar at the bottom. The view change also means that the HUD is different from the DoJa and J2ME versions, and is a mixture of the original Mega Drive graphics and graphics from Distinctive's J2ME/BREW port of Sonic Spinball.

A software-rendered version of the half-pipe Special Stage is also present, with a MIDI rendition of the corresponding theme from the original that is arguably lower quality than other songs in the game, which are borrowed from the J2ME version. Unlike the DoJa version, the Special Stage is not rendered in 3D.

It appears that the lack of the bottleneck in the form of the Java Virtual Machine allowed a larger amount of BREW phones than J2ME phones to receive the high-end version that is based on the original game. However, various phones did still receive versions of the low-end version, which is a recreated approximation of Sonic 2.

Other things to note include Casino Night Zone being referred to as "Casino Nights Zone" on the level select screen, and the addition of a set of Rings to the beginning of Death Egg Zone. In addition, a developer .CFG file is present with the other files of the game, and it would've allowed developers and QA to enable settings such as the invincibility mode and launching the game with a completed save file.

Screenshots

DoJa version

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External links

• Sonic the Hedgehog 2 at Sonic Cafe's website (archive)