Level Differences

This is a sub-page of Proto:Spyro: Year of the Dragon/September 4th, 2000 build.

The content on this page represents in-game differences that are due to changes in a level's data, code, or otherwise represents differences a player will notice on a standard playthrough.

Sunrise Spring Worlds#

Sunrise Spring Home#

• One of the purple gems underneath the trees was moved very slightly.
• When collecting Ami, the camera tries to move to the left of Spyro, but hits into the wall and moves around awkwardly. In the final game, the camera more naturally sits to the right of Spyro, instead.
• After each of the levels have been completed, the player is teleported to the balloon. In this version, the character that greets the player at the balloon is Rocky, rather than Snappy the Seal.
• The instance of Zoe in this level which delivers the anti-piracy warning is missing, and thus the text used in this exchange is, too. Additionally, the code associated with this interaction hasn't been implemented, yet. The audio message is present in the STR and assigned to this level, however.
• Hunter’s (class 416) model was tweaked slightly in a similar manner to other levels:
  • There is a pink blotch on his right arm, which was recoloured in orange in the final.
  • The texture on his arm is blurred slightly in later builds so as to not look like something is wrapping around his arm. In this build, a more detailed texture is used on his arm instead, and this isn't seen in any other level.
  • Some of the vertex colouring on his back looks off, and was smoothed in the final.
• The final game includes a moby which sits at the top of the cave and cancels Spyro's superfly if he passes through it. In this version, as this moby is absent, if you make it past the whirlwind without the whirlwind cancelling your superfly, it's possible to leave the upper section of the cave with superfly and carry it into the rest of the level.
  • Moby 942 has the second lowest moby class of the non-modelled mobys, indicating that it's one of the last to have been added to the game. This moby is not placed in this level at all in this build, nor does the level contain the code to support this moby. It is not known to be placed or supported by any level in any pre-final build.

Sunny Villa#

• Oddly, one of the polygons on the door to Sheila’s area is invisible.
• The potted plant moby (class 252) has a slightly simpler looking model when burnt. For some reason, PAL versions of the final game also used this model.
• The small Rhynoc (class 253) had its animations re-exported, for some reason. There are some minor differences in its vertex colouring in this version, most noticeably on the shield, which has somewhat flatter lighting in the final.
• Hunter’s (class 313) model was tweaked slightly in a similar manner to other levels:
  • There is a pink blotch on his right arm, which was recoloured in orange in the final.
  • Some of the vertex colouring on his back looks off, and was smoothed in the final.
• The large Rhynoc next to the "Vanessa" egg was moved slightly closer to the egg in later builds, though the difference is mostly negligible. The Rhynoc was rotated by around 50 degrees as well, but this is hard to notice due to it auto-rotating in-game.
• Oddly, if the player breaks the skateboarding course record, rather than displaying both the new record and the old record, both the old and new records in the record screen show the new record. Additionally, “No new record” is written at the top of the menu, instead of telling the player they’ve broken the record.
  • This bug is not present in any other skateboarding area.
• After starting the course record challenge, the pause menu says "Quit Race" instead of "Give Up". Similarly, once the challenge has been completed, the menu continues to say "Quit Race" instead of "Exit Area".
  • If "Quit Race" is selected after finishing the challenge, the option does nothing and returns to gameplay.
  • If "Quit Race" is selected during the challenge, the challenge is exited and pausing again will show "Exit Area" once again.
• Though Hunter cannot become trapped under normal means in this version, if the corresponding progress flag is set, Hunter will disappear from the skateboarding sublevel, just as in the final game. Unlike the final game, though, his skateboard is still visible in this state.

Cloud Spires#

• In the belfry area, the bells don't make a noise when the spirits are killed.
• The music that plays during the cutscene in the belfry area is absent. The level's theme continues playing in its place.

Molten Crater#

• The flower model (class 556) changed slightly later in development. In this build it's yellow instead of white, has different colouring on its stalk, and has slightly differently applied textures.
• A sublevel portal visual is placed behind Sgt. Byrd when you enter his sublevel, for some reason.
• Several of the gems were changed or moved around:
  • A yellow gem is present between the two sublevel platforms. This is removed in later builds.
  • There is a green gem on this plaform, too, which was replaced with a yellow gem in a basket in later builds.
  • Two extra red gems were added to a platform in later builds.

Seashell Shore#

• The extra life butterfly (class 211) model is present in areas 0 and 1 (the main area and the Sheila sublevel), in this build. In the final, it's present in all of them, though it doesn't seem to be used in areas 2 and 3.
• The sand castle explosion cutscene is skippable with the triangle button. In the final, it is unskippable.

Mushroom Speedway#

• All of Sparx's audio dialogue is absent.
• As in other speedways, all of the race and time attack menu sound effects are absent.
• The spider death sound often plays doubled or tripled for some reason.
• Hunter’s (class 377) model was tweaked slightly in a similar manner to other levels:
  • There is a pink blotch on his right arm, which was recoloured in orange in the final.
  • Some of the vertex colouring on his back looks off, and was smoothed in the final.
  • The same issues are also present on the model that is used when he falls out of the plane - these were not corrected in the final, however.
  • His falling animations appear to have been re-exported in the final, for some reason.
• The finish flag model (class 383) is textured slightly differently, using a darker black. This can appear transparent in-game, so the texture would be fixed in later builds.
• After completing Hunter's challenge and collecting his egg, rather than respawning you next to Sparx, you respawn in front of Hunter.
  • Speaking to Hunter again repeats his dialogue and respawns you again, but does not give the player the egg again.
  • The player can walk around the level freely at this point. If the player gets close enough to Sparx, the controls will lock whilst Sparx attempts to find you - it's possible to speak to Sparx once again by walking close enough to his initial spawn.
  • Playing and completing one of the other speedway minigames (e.g. the race) and collecting the corresponding egg will not correct the player's spawn position - only exiting and re-entering will.
  • This behaviour has not been observed in any other speedway.

Sheila's Alp#

• The fodder in this level make loud footstep sounds, whereas in the final they don't.
• The Billygoat taunting sound that plays in the final area is absent in this version.

Buzz's Dungeon#

• Grayson's animation shows him sneezing out bubbles. In the final, he instead casts a rainbow between his hands.
• Buzz is able to escape the lava and survive a hit, on occasion. This seems to primarily happen the first time he enters the lava, and mostly happens when the player gets close enough to the edge of the arena, but it's somewhat inconsistent.

Midday Gardens Worlds#

Midday Garden Home#

• The model for the Enchanted Towers NPC (class 662) has a slightly different design, with brown hair and a longer fringe. The hair colour still appears to be visible in its low poly LOD model in the final game.
  • This model is present in the later September 11th build, too, but goes unseen in-game in that version.
• Bianca's audio dialogue message is missing.
• One of Hunter's audio messages (Type 8 Msg 0, "When you see a ladder...") seems to be a dev recording.
• Hunter’s (class 499) model was tweaked slightly in a similar manner to other levels:
  • There is a pink blotch on his right arm, which was recoloured in orange in the final.
  • Some of the vertex colouring on his back looks off, and was smoothed in the final.

Icy Peak#

• The final game features a single frame of an unused sprite of a Rhynoc. In this build, the sprite has 5 frames, which animate to make the Rhynoc blink. The sprite is thought to have been intended for use in the Nancy sublevel.
• The ice dance music is not present in this build. In addition, the Nancy moby is not programmed to change the music, as it would normally be.
• There is an extra line of audio dialogue in this build, associated with Bob. The audio message in question is Type 0 Msg 5, and it's a duplicate of Type 0 Msg 4. It's not known why this is present.
• The TNT enemy (class 316) had all its animations re-exported in later builds. Several of the animations had their frame counts decreased after this build, too:
  • Animation 1 (idling) was decreased from 17 frames to 13 frames.
  • Animation 2 (walking) was decreased from 8 frames to 5 frames.
  • Animation 4 (riding TNT) was decreased from 10 frames to 5 frames.
• The gun Rhynoc (class 301) had all its animations re-exported in later builds. Several of the animations had their frame counts decreased after this build, too:
  • Animation 1 (idling) was decreased from 20 frames to 16 frames.
  • Animation 4 (aiming) was decreased from 16 frames to 6 frames.
  • Animation 6 (lifting gun) was decreased from 14 frames to 10 frames.
• The pick Rhynoc (class 634) had all its animations re-exported in later builds. Several of the animations had their frame counts decreased after this build, too:
  • Animation 3 (walking) was decreased from 16 frames to 11 frames.
  • Animation 4 (lifting pick) was decreased from 6 frames to 4 frames.
  • Animation 6 (lowering pick) was decreased from 6 frames to 4 frames.
  • Animation 7 (taunting) was decreased from 13 frames to 9 frames.
• For some reason, Spyro's model in the main section of the level is larger in later builds than in this one. This suggests that an animation was added to the level after this build, though it's not currently known which specifically or why.

Enchanted Towers#

• The explosion sound effect which plays when the sorceress statue gets hit is notorious for how loud it is in the final game. In this version, if anything, it's too quiet!
• The bone dance music is not present in this build. In addition, there is no code present in this level to change the music as it normally would during the bone dance cutscene, as there would normally be.
• After collecting all of the bones, entering and exiting a sublevel will rebuild the skeleton and the bones will briefly be visible flying through the air around the player as this happens. In the final, the skeleton is immediately rebuilt without the need for an animation to play.
• The initial spawn points of Farley and his ball were tweaked slightly in the final.
  • In addition, one of the gems nearby moved much closer to another nearby gem in the final.
• Hunter’s (class 560) model was tweaked slightly in a similar manner to other levels:
  • There is a pink blotch on his right arm, which was recoloured in orange in the final.
  • Some of the vertex colouring on his back looks off, and was smoothed in the final.
• Similarly to Sunny Villa's skateoarding area, after starting the course record challenge, the pause menu says "Quit Race" instead of "Give Up". Similarly, once the challenge has been completed, the menu continues to say "Quit Race" instead of "Exit Area".
  • If "Quit Race" is selected after finishing the challenge, the option does nothing and returns to gameplay.
  • If "Quit Race" is selected during the challenge, the challenge is exited and pausing again will show "Exit Area" once again.

Spooky Swamp#

• In this build, there is a gem basket very close to the "Michael" on the island. This basket can get in the way of the camera when the egg animation is playing, which can look a little unusual. In later versions, this basket was changed into a gem and moved to the land nearby.
• If the player lights all of the tea lamps and enters and exits a sublevel, an inivisible tea lamp at the start of the level will suddenly have collision, and can be interacted with (probably due to being put into the wrong state on re-entry).
  • The invisible tea lamp probably handles some of the interactions between the visible tea lamps. In the final game, it's put into an inactive state, which is why it's not usually bonkable.
• The Sheila sign contains an extra 9 characters of whitespace in its "Come on in." message, for a total of 17. This is lowered to 8 in later builds.
  • However, this doesn't appear to be visible in practice, anyway. For some reason, the sign will always auto read and display a blank message, as if the player had reached the level without freeing Sheila first. This doesn't appear to be related to the whitespace difference at all, as the September 11th build also has this issue despite having the final dialogue message.
• In Sheila's area, if you speak to one of the fireflies by either failing the task or by completing the task and then speak to one of them again, they will erroneously play the animation and sound effect they're supposed to play when they get kicked.
• The extra life butterfly model is missing from the Sheila area. This moby doesn't spawn in this area during normal play, anyway.

Bamboo Terrace#

• The Bentley sign contains an extra 8 characters of whitespace in two of its messages, for a total of 16 in each case. This is lowered to 8 in later builds.
  • Specifically, this refers to the two lines that are signed by Bentley - msg 1 and msg 2 ("Dreadfully sorry to inconvenience you, Spyro..." and "Welcome, most esteemed dragon.").
• One of Li's text dialogue messages (Type 4, Msg 0) still reflects the tiger enemy the level originally had, rather than the water buffalo it was replaced with. This difference is not also present in the audio message for this dialogue.

• There are several differences with regard to the audio dialogue messages used by this level:
  • One of Shui's audio messages (Type 1 Msg 6, "Thank you for offering to help Spyro...") is absent. Interestingly, this dialogue message is unused, so it's not clear why it was given audio at this stage of development.
  • One of Sing Sing's audio messages (Type 2 Msg 2, "Would you care for a cup of my medicinal herbal tea?") is absent. This dialogue message is also unused, and would have been used by the end-of-level NPC if they hadn't left the level.
  • One of Ling Ling's audio messages (Type 3 Msg 0, "Spyro! Rhynocs have been harassing us all day...") is a different recording to the final version. Rather than referring to "Evening Lake", Ling Ling says "Sunset Shore", a name for the level that wasn't known until this build was discovered. Given that builds from around 3 months earlier than this one called the level "Evening Lake", this dialogue is very, very out of date.
• The bamboo model (class 9) appears to have some minor shading differences, versus the final.
• The four butterfly jars inside the secret underwater cave were shifted slightly.
• The Rhynoc in the middle of the emergency bridge was moved and rotated slightly between this version and the next. In this version, he seems to have a habit of falling off the platform - in later builds it's still possible for him to do this, though perhaps slightly less often.

Country Speedway#

• All of Sparx's audio dialogue is absent.
• As in other speedways, all of the race and time attack menu sound effects are absent.
• Hunter's mission is missing near enough all of its sound effects.
• The reticle controls in the Hunter mission are not up-down inverted as they are in later builds. This control difference is also reflected on the Help menu.
• Two of Hunter's audio dialogue messages (Type 1, Msgs 1 and 2) diverge completely from his text dialogue, and seem to describe a version of the minigame used in the level which would have been closer to the Mushroom Speedway minigame (even going as far as to mention his plane, which doesn't appear in the mission otherwise).
  • One of the messages is word-for-word identical to one that is used in Mushroom Speedway, but seems to be an entirely different recording.
• The finish flag model (class 383) is textured slightly differently, using a darker black. This can appear transparent in-game, so the texture would be fixed in later builds.
• Hunter’s model (class 653) was tweaked slightly in a similar manner to other levels. These changes only affect the model he uses in his standard animations (i.e. not when flying):
  • There is a pink blotch on his right arm, which was recoloured in orange in the final.
  • Some of the vertex colouring on his back looks off, and was smoothed in the final.
• The space cow model (class 673) would receive some extremely subtle tweaks to some of the vertices in a few of its animation frames in later builds.
• the biplane model (class 303) has an 8-frame animation, which was re-exported as a 5-frame animation in later builds. The effect of this is negligible in-game.

Sgt. Byrd's Base#

• In Sigfried's hatching animation, he scratches his ear. In the final, a shell lands on his head, instead.
• All five instances of the "Before I was captured, I recovered this egg from the enemy, sir!" line were altered between this build and the final, to fix some punctuation issues.
  • The line that Pvt. Claire uses is identical to the final line, but with an extra period at the end - "Before I was captured, I recovered this egg from the enemy, sir!."
  • The other four are the same, but lack the first comma - "Before I was captured I recovered this egg from the enemy, sir!."
• Sgt. Byrd's opening dialogue also received a minor punctuation tweak - in later builds, a comma was replaced with a period, and the following letter was capitalised:

Spike's Arena#

• Neither the code nor the model for the balloon moby (class 514) is present.

Spider Town#

• Collecting a key and then dying before being able to use it will replace the key's HUD sprite with a placeholder "0" sprite upon respawning. This doesn't have any impact on the key's functionality, though.

Evening Lake Worlds#

Evening Lake Home#

• The underwater visuals are notably different in this level due to the underwater screen darkening. In particular, the portals appear much darker and cloudier than they do in the final game, and the underside of the surface of the water appears much brighter against the darkened skybox.
  • This effect is not seen if you re-enter the homeworld via one of the underwater level portals. As the effect is only activated when entering a plane of water, the visuals are treated as though you are still above the water if the level is entered through one of the underwater portals. The appearance of the underwater section of the level matches the final game when in this state.
• Hunter's cage cutscene triggers every time the player enters the level once they get close to the area it happens in. In the final game, this only happens once, and it only happens once the player has completed three of the Evening Lake levels.
  • It's also normally shown immediately once entering the level, rather than only when Spyro gets close to where this cutscene happens. Spyro can sometimes be seen in this cutscene, as a result.
  • The progress flag indicating that Hunter is trapped is never written to in this version, so this cutscene is purely visual and never actually impacts gameplay. The flag in question does still have some functionality if it is set, however.
  • Most of the sound effects are missing - only Hunter's footsteps and the button sound can be heard.
• The cage model (class 721) is blue, untextured and clearly unfinished in this version. In the final, it was retextured and given more of a grey colour.
• Hunter’s model (class 717) was tweaked slightly in a similar manner to other levels:
  • There is a pink blotch on his right arm, which was made slightly smaller in the final. This is a deviation from other levels, as most of the time this blotch was recoloured entirely.
  • Some of the vertex colouring on his back looks off, and was smoothed in the final.
• Neither the code nor the model for the balloon moby (class 514) is present.
• Jonah's animation shows him landing on his backside. In the final, he instead walks backwards on his hands.
• Bianca's audio dialogue message is missing.
• In the final game, there are two unused lines of audio dialogue for the Professor (Type 6 Msg 0 and 1), a character that has never been seen to actually feature in this level in any known build. In this version, he has a third audio message, for some reason:

What? You built the rocket without me? Why didn't you invite me to see the launch?

Frozen Altars#

• Both of the dragons awarded in the boxing sublevel (Aly and Ricco) face Bentley instead of the camera, which looks a little awkward. The dragon models were re-exported with their animations rotated by 90 degrees to fix this issue in later builds.
• The skill point in the boxing area is completely absent in this version, even if you successfully manage to beat the challenge in a single round.
• The pit area at the end of the level usually contains three mammoths running around. These mammoths are absent in this version.

Lost Fleet#

• This level contains multiple oversights which all affect the overall gem total for the level:
  • The gems in the left tunnel in the subs area are all red instead of green, in this version. In actuality, they are set to be green gems according to their gem value field, but are erroneously set to state 1 instead of state 0. This state bypasses the code that sets the gems' value and appearance, so they behave as normal red gems. This results in the player being 5 gems worse off than they normally would be.
  • The enemy subs incorrectly use code pertaining to the subs in Super Bonus Round, and in later builds this code is only present in the SBR submarine code. Specifically, when hit, they check a value in their data to determine a progress flag to set, and if it's unset, the player is awarded an amount of gems equal to another value in the moby's data. All of the submarines have these values set to 0 (the first submarine flag) and 150 (i.e. 150 gems, which is less than the 175 that the SBR subs provide) respectively, meaning that destroying any of the subs in Lost Fleet will result in one of the Super Bonus Round submarines failing to give the player any gems. While this makes the player 150 gems better off in Lost Fleet, they'll be 25 gems worse off in Super Bonus Round, when they reach that point in the game. As such, the only way around this bug is to use cheat codes to visit Super Bonus Round first.
  • Hence, you can finish this level with a total of either 595 gems or 745 gems, the latter being under normal circumstances.
• For some reason, if you complete both sub challenges and then re-enter the acid, all of the submarines return. In the final, they all stay dead.
• Crazy Ed's "Has anyone seen my pick?" (Type 0 Msg 4) audio line, previously discovered in an earlier demo version of the game, and seen in text form as early as the April prototype, is still present. This dialogue is completely unused and was removed in the final game.
• Hunter’s (class 313) model was tweaked slightly in a similar manner to other levels:
  • There is a pink blotch on his right arm, which was recoloured in orange in the final.
  • Some of the vertex colouring on his back looks off, and was smoothed in the final.
• The boost skateboard model (class 660) had its wheels reshaped slightly in later builds. This difference probably isn't noticeable during gameplay.

Fireworks Factory#

• The large Rhynocs in the main and ninja HQ areas don't seem to drop gems if they're flamed. Instead, Spyro must spit a rocket at them in order to collect their gems. In later builds, gems will be dropped when the Rhynocs are either flamed or rocketed.
• A gem atop the ledge at the beginning of the ninja HQ area was moved further from the ledge in the final game. This was possibly done to avoid rendering issues, as this gem appears to be visible through the wall in this version.
• The Agent 9 area has some unusual sound effect bugs that can be heard during the minigame - notably, seemingly random high pitched beeping sounds, some of which won't stop unless the game is paused and unpaused.
• The HUD used in the Agent 9 mission is slightly unfinished:
  • The DOOM-styled box at the bottom of ths screen is slightly narrower than the screen, rather than being roughly the width of the screen as in later builds.
  • The ammo counter used by the secret weapon is placed too far to the right, going slightly off screen.
• The Agent 9 challenge behaves slightly differently if you complete the challenge and then immediately re-enter the area:
  • The egg at the end of the first challenge returns, as do all of the enemies. However, upon reaching the dynamite at the end of the second challenge, it does not explode and as such the challenge cannot be completed.
  • In the final, the first challenge's egg does not return, and thus the first challenge cannot be completed. Only the enemies in the first half of the challenge and one room of the second half of the challenge return.
• The cannon barrel model (class 643) has small shading differences in this build, versus the final game.
• The superflame powerup model (class 36) is absent from the dragons area, which means that the powerup gate will appear to be empty. In addition, it doesn't make a sound when you pass through it.

Charmed Ridge#

• For some reason, the cat witch HUD counter counts up and down erratically during gameplay, rendering it mostly useless.
• The whirlwind on one of the doors to the castle was lowered by 508 units in the final, which makes hovering onto the nearby platform a requirement. In this version, the whirlwind places Spyro comfortably atop the ledge.
  • This change is reverted to match this version in all final versions aside from the earliest.
• The visual effect in the Sgt. Byrd area portal was moved back slightly in later builds to prevent it from clipping out of the side of the portal frame.
• Moe's animation is 86 frames instead of the final's 43 frames. This has no significant visual difference during gameplay.
• Jack's model (class 384) has some subtle differences when compared to the models used in later versions, as all of its animations appear to have been re-exported.
• The undersides of the firework bottle model (class 207) are coloured grey in this version. In later builds, they're given more appropriate colours to align with the rest of the model, though this is hard to see in practice.

Honey Speedway#

• All of Sparx's audio dialogue is absent.
• As in other speedways, all of the race and time attack menu sound effects are absent.
• Hunter's mission is missing near enough all of its sound effects.
• Seven instances of moby class 941 were added in the final game - they're all absent from this version.
  • These have the lowest moby class of the non-modelled mobys, which indicates that they were the last to be added to the game.
  • They don't have any code associated with them (in either this build or the final), so if they are used, they're probably used by another moby. Their purpose is currently unclear.
  • Each one sits at the bottom of each of the beehives hanging from the trees, in the final game.
• One of the logs in honey in the Hunter mission - one just before the second waterfall that Hunter goes over - was repositioned and rotated slightly. This is barely visible in-game.
• The camera appears to swing aggressively for a brief moment when the Hunter mission starts. This was fixed in the final.
  • Additionally, the camera appears to pan downwards when going over each of the waterfalls, in the final. This camera movement is not present in this version.
• After failing the Hunter mission, the player will spawn just far enough away from Hunter to walk away. If you crash during this, it restarts the time attack and you will continue to restart next to Hunter instead of at the intended start. This was fixed in the final.
• Hunter’s (class 376) model was tweaked slightly in a similar manner to other levels:
  • There is a pink blotch on his right arm, which was recoloured in orange in later builds.
  • Some of the vertex colouring on his back looks off, and was smoothed in later builds.
  • Curiously, these changes were made to Hunter's model before the September 11th build. Every other standard instance of Hunter would not be changed in this way until after that build.
  • His model is a little bit different in his boat animations. The same vertex colouring change would be applied to his boat animations in the final (and unlike his standard animations, the earlier colouring can be seen in the September 11th build, too).
  • Most of Hunter's animations were re-exported in later builds. In addition, Hunter seems to have an extra animation (animation 7) which was seemingly removed in later versions, with a new animation being added in position 8. The removed animation doesn't seem to match any of the ones in the final.
  • The aforementioned additional animation is used whenever Hunter jumps in his boat - it looks like he does a little hop just before the boat takes off. It doesn't look that great, so it's not too surprising that it was removed.
• The boat model (class 323) was tweaked in a couple of ways:
  • The boat has a 5-frame animation which makes its rudder spin in later versions. In this version, the animation is only a single frame, so when the boat is in the air the rudder can be seen to be perfectly static.
  • The centre of the model is further forwards in this version, when compared to later builds. This has the effect of making Hunter appear slightly further towards the front of the boat in this version, and further to the back in later builds.
• The finish flag model (class 383) is textured slightly differently, using a darker black. This can appear transparent in-game, so the texture would be fixed in later builds.

Bentley's Outpost#

• The sublevel portal visual model is absent from the level's data. In addition, the moby using this model (usually seen at the start of the level) is also not yet placed in the level.
• One of Bartholomew's dialogue messages (Type 0, Msg 0) had a small punctuation tweak:

Scorch's Pit#

• Neither the code nor the models for the balloon moby (class 514) or the whirligig moby (651) are present.

Midnight Mountain Worlds#

Midnight Mountain Home#

• Like most other instances of Bianca, all of her audio dialogue messages are missing.
• There is a large hole in the geometry on the back side of the building you start in. This hole was filled in in later builds, and in fact can be stood on, despite it clearly being part of the geometry the player is not supposed to access or interact with.
• The final encounter with Moneybags works somewhat differently:
  • Moneybags' final encounter model (class 179) had its animations re-exported in the final, and notably has a much shorter and less expressive jumping animation when attacked by Spyro.
  • Moneybags drops exactly 6 individual gems at a time in this build, whereas in later builds he drops many at a time. In addition, the gems he drops seem to be of any variety (with a bias in favour of pink (25) gems dropping more often), rather than only dropping a random selection of yellow (10) and pink gems until the final 100 gems, where he begins dropping gems of any variety. This results in the fight being much, much longer.
  • He does not make any sounds when hit, in this version.
  • In the final, the total that Moneybags drops is always deliberately less than or equal to the amount Moneybags has left to give the player. This count is not checked correctly in this build, so it's possible for Moneybags to spit out enough gems to make you go slightly over the intended gem count, causing the HUD and Atlas to desync on how many gems the player has obtained.
• The Sorceress' Lair door text was moved slightly, along with its requirements changing - in both review builds, this text sits inside the door, making it more awkward to read. The requirements were changed from 120 eggs in the review builds to 100 eggs in the final.
• Similarly, the Harbor Speedway portal text was moved slightly, as well as its requirements changing. The requirements were changed from 100 eggs in the review builds to 90 eggs in the final.
• Neither the code nor the model for the balloon moby (class 514) and the whirligig moby (class 651) are present.
• Miken's animation is 101 frames instead of the final's 67 frames. This has no significant visual difference during gameplay.

Crystal Islands#

• The gems in this level were redistributed slightly:
  • The flying beavers do not drop gems in this version. In later builds, all six of them drop red (1) gems.
  • One of the gems in the pool at the end of the level is green (2) in this version and red (1) in later versions.
  • An additional purple (5) gem is present in the middle of the pool at the end of the level in this version. This was removed in later builds.
• The fall plane height is at Z = 0 in this version, rather than Z = 5300. This allows you to fly or swim underneath each of the islands and usually up and inside of them. In later builds, attempting this will make you fall into the abyss.
• The thief plane can be heard from anywhere in the level once it's moving. In the final, it fades out the further Spyro gets from it, and becomes inaudible a relatively short distance away from it.
• The boxes in the Bentley area sometimes fall through the floor as soon as the area is entered. This causes the camera to shake and the boxes disappear. This doesn't seem to happen in later builds.
• In the Bentley area, each of the "Yes" and "No" options provided to the player by The Amazing Randini end with periods. In later versions, these periods have been removed.
  • There are multiple dialogue messages which give the player these options - all of them have been changed.
• The undersides of the firework bottle model (class 207) are coloured grey in this version. In later builds, they're given more appropriate colours to align with the rest of the model, though this is hard to see in practice.

Desert Ruins#

• The wall breaking sound that plays in the end-of-level cutscene is absent in this version.
• The surface of the water in the sharks area is almost invisible.
• The visuals in the sharks area are particularly heavily affected by the underwater visual effect. The skybox appears much brighter and cloudier than it does normally.
• Some of the polygons on the floor of the castle in the sharks area seem to have zero depth in the final game, causing Z-fighting visual issues. In this version, these visual issues are not present.
• Hunter's underwater model (class 277) has brown eyes, matching the Japanese version of Spyro 2, rather than green ones.

Haunted Tomb#

• MJ's animation shows him jumping and spreading his arms, instead of the unique juggling animation used in later builds.
• The dog enemies don't drop their gems when defeated, but will still drop them if they are despawned as a result of the adaptive difficulty. Four of them still remain even on the lowest difficulty, however, meaning 20 gems (four purple (5) gems) are strictly unobtainable.
  • Sparx will also point at the dogs when using the gem finder ability if there aren't any other gems left in the level.
• Usually, re-entering the level after completion re-opens all of the doors. In this version, it doesn't.
• The room with the "Climb the wall" egg (Christine) was rearranged significantly in later builds.
  • The earthshaper in the upper section is placed in front of egg, rather than at the top of the ladder.
  • The coffin is placed in front of ladder facing the entrance to room, rather then on the left side of the room.
  • The mummy linked to the coffin moved across the room with it.
  • The dog in front of egg had its position tweaked slightly.
  • One of the bugs at the top of the ladder is initially placed further from the egg in this version.
• The button at the start of the first falling rocks room is missing. The door after this button remains open constantly, and returning to the previous room involves pressing the button in the next room first.
• The skill point sound effect is absent.
• The HUD counter in the Agent 9 area has no icon in the final game. No icon is defined for it in this version either, but a "0" is used as a placeholder instead of it being blank.
• One of Allgeier's audio dialogue messages (Type 3 Msg 4, "I've waited 7000 years...") is absent. The text dialogue for this interaction is still present, however.
• The tanks are controlled differently, in this version:
  • The tank will only strafe if the player holds the shoulder buttons and moves in the direction they wish to strafe; in later builds, the shoulder buttons alone move the player in the corresponding direction instead.
  • Similarly, holding backwards (when not strafing) turns the tank, rather than moving it backwards.
  • Similar changes were applied to the tanks in Sorceress' Lair.
  • The green text in two of Jamal's dialogue messages (Type 2, Msgs 2 and 7) are altered to reflect the different tank controls used in this build. This was changed in later builds, along with the controls.

• The tanks can often be seen hovering outside the arena, sometimes way out of bounds, during the second round. This has been observed in the final too, but only extremely infrequently.
• Whilst using the tank, the player can shoot the cannon momentarily after dying.
• The dog enemy (class 490) model was updated slightly between this version and the final. Notably, in this version, the chest texture matches the neck texture, rather than seemingly being a blank grey colour. The model itself was also tweaked slightly in later versions. The fragments released when the dogs are defeated (class 481) were not changed accordingly.
• The tank model (class 595) had all of its animations re-exported in later versions. Notably, its shooting animation was increased from 9 frames to 10 frames in later builds.
• The cannonball (class 596) model appears to have been updated in later builds, seemingly rotating by 90 degrees around its Z-axis, for unknown reasons.

Dino Mines#

• Romey's animation has it landing on all fours with its legs spread. In later builds, it is sucking a dummy instead.
  • Romey also has more textures assigned to it (i.e. mouth and eyebrow hair textures) in this build, as a result.
• The blue dinosaur inside the building was moved closer to the doorway in the final, possibly to allow it to reach the player with its dynamite. In addition, it can be seen (and attacked) through the wall behind it in this version, too.
• The dinosaur in the first building was rotated - originally, it faced the prison, whereas in later builds it would face the walkway. This doesn't seem to have much impact in-game due to the dinosaur's miraculous ability to rotate.
• A number of changes were made to the gem placement in the main area of this level, after this build:
  • A gem vase in the building near the start of the level (on the right of the entrance) had its value reduced from 10 to 5, after this build.
  • There's a barrel near to the first bridge, with a dynamite dinosaur nearby. In this build, there's also a basket containing a purple (5) gem nearby.
  • A purple (5) gem on the ground next to the turret dinosaur inside the building would be removed in later builds.
  • A purple (5) gem on the ground shortly before the entrance to the underwater section was removed, after this build.
  • Originally, along the left wall as you enter the underwater section, there were two gem bottles, the first containing 10 gems and the second containing 5 gems. The 5 gem bottle was removed and the 10 gem bottle was moved to be around the midpoint of where the two bottles originally were.
  • One of the underwater gem bottles (next to the pillar, on the opposite side to the bottle facing the "Romey" egg) had its value decreased from 5 to 2.
  • Another underwater gem bottle on the circular pad at the end of the water section had its value decreased from 10 all the way down to 2.
  • The yellow (10) gem next to the "Romey" egg was made purple (5).
• The portal visuals to the Agent 9 area can be seen very easily through the entrance door when it's closed. The visuals were moved back slightly in later builds to account for this.
• In the underwater sublevel, there is an extra falling rocks moby just before the first wooden wall. This doesn't appear to have any effect or visual impact in-game, and it was removed in later builds.
• The gem placement in the Agent 9 area was changed in a number of ways:
  • Two red (1) gems and two purple (5) gems were added in later builds.
  • Two green (2) gems were moved (one slightly, one significantly) in later builds.
  • Two purple gem baskets were replaced with yellow (10) gem baskets and moved somewhat in later builds.
  • A purple gem opposite to the "Sergio" egg had its y-coordinate tweaked and was replaced with a multi-gem basket in later versions.
  • A basket atop a barrel in the first area of the level and a basket near the cliff edge in the second area, each containing yellow gems in this build, were changed into multi-gem baskets in later versions.
  • 11 gem spawn points for multi-gem baskets were added in later builds, whereas they are absent in this version (in fact, this moby is only placed in the main area, in this version). This corresponds with three red gems, three green gems and five purple gems.
• The Agent 9 area uses a moby which acts as the centre for where glass particles should originate from when a window is smashed. In this build, all of these appear to be in their correct positions, but in later versions one of these mobys in the final area of this sublevel was mistakenly moved to the left side of the building, causing the glass to appear to originate from the wrong place when the window is smashed, if watched closely.
• The reticle controls in the Agent 9 mission are not up-down inverted as they are in later builds.
• Oddly, one of the rooms in the Agent 9 area has a large polygon that is only visible when you're very close to it.
• In the final game, hitting any of the seahorses in the underwater minigame area will immediately save them as collected, and they will therefore not reappear should you fail the challenge and have to restart. This makes getting the skill point easier, as defeating all of them does not need to be done in a single sitting. In each of the review builds, the seahorses are only saved upon getting a checkpoint, and this only happens upon collecting the egg. Thus, any seahorses that are defeated will return should the player fail the challenge before collecting the egg.
  • The egg does not reappear after collecting it once, so any collected seahorses will only be saved upon the first completion of the challenge.
• One of Deputy Roy's text dialogue lines (type 2, msg 5) was reworded slightly:

Harbor Speedway#

• All of Sparx's audio dialogue is absent.
• As in other speedways, all of the race and time attack menu sound effects are absent.
• The gull squawking sound is absent.
• Hunter is, for some reason, standing on the aircraft carrier instead of inside the lighthouse.
• Hunter's mission is missing near enough all of its sound effects, with only his wing flapping sound audible.
• The rings in the Hunter minigame don't have a strict time limit. In the final, you can only last a few seconds with a ring active before you fail the challenge.
  • Once a ring appears, the player can fly around for as long as they'd like to before collecting the ring. The only way to fail the challenge is to fly past the ring, missing it.
  • As a result of this, you can fly into a wall for a possibly indefinite amount of time, and the next few rings will appear but stay put. Interestingly, the UFO slows down the further it gets from the player, a fact that can't generally be observed in normal gameplay.
• The rings in the Hunter mission are exceptionally lenient in this version - the player can miss the ring by a very significant margin and still have it count as collected. In the final, you need to at least touch the very outer part of the ring, whereas in this build they barely even have to be on screen.
• After completing the Hunter mission, the player will spawn just far enough away from Hunter to walk away. If you crash during this, it restarts the time attack and you will continue to restart next to Hunter instead of at the intended start. This was fixed in later builds.
  • Also, Hunter has no collision for some reason in this state. Maybe he does in the final too, but you can only notice it in this build.
• Hunter’s (class 12) model was tweaked slightly in a similar manner to other levels:
  • There is a pink blotch on his right arm, which was recoloured in orange in the final. This applies to both his standing model and his flying model.
  • Some of the vertex colouring on his back looks off, and was smoothed in the final. This applies to both his standing model and his flying model.
  • Interestingly, his flying model also features brown eyes, as in his Japanese Spyro 2 model. This was changed to green in the final.
  • Hunter's wings were retextured in the final. In this build, they're relatively basic looking polygonal wings, whereas in the final he uses more bat-like wings. Additionally, a couple of polygons on Hunter's left arm use the wing texture in this build, and this was also fixed in the final.
• The finish flag model (class 383) is textured slightly differently, using a darker black. This can appear transparent in-game, so the texture would be fixed in later builds.

Agent 9's Lab#

• There is a basket at the end of the level that spits out five yellow gems. In this version, rather than being placed on the floor, it's placed on an inaccessible ledge far above its usual position, and can only be shot in first person mode. When shot, the gems will land on the floor beneath, able to be collected.
• Collecting a bomb whilst on 9 or fewer bombs increases your bomb count to 11. This appears as 10 in-game.
• For some reason, the "?" Jar (class 206) code is present in the overlay for this level. Not only is this moby not placed in this level in any known build, but its model isn't even present in this version.

Sorceress's Lair#

• Like other pre-release builds and builds after the initial final release, this level is called "Sorceress's Lair". In the earliest final build only, this is called "Sorceress' Lair" instead.
• For some reason, Spyro's model is larger in later builds than in this one. This suggests that an animation was added to the level after this build, though it's not currently known which specifically or why.
• Much of the sound effects are missing:
  • The tank and UFO shooting sound effects are absent.
  • All of the Sorceress's sound effects, including the sound she makes while drowning and the ones she makes when reaching out of the lava, are absent.
• The HUD sprites for the cannon and tank are absent. A "0" is used as a placeholder.
• The tanks are controlled differently, in this version:
  • The tank will only strafe if the player holds the shoulder buttons and moves in the direction they wish to strafe; in later builds, the shoulder buttons alone move the player in the corresponding direction instead.
  • Similarly, holding backwards (when not strafing) turns the tank, rather than moving it backwards.
  • Similar changes were applied to the tanks in Haunted Tomb.
• Like the final, a force field surrounds the arena, and attempting to move into it will result in the player being pushed back. This force field is narrower in this build, and this can be seen by standing on the ring around the outside of the arena - Spyro will slide inwards and be pushed into the lava.
• The whirlwind which usually takes the player at the end of the level is absent. In fact, the level doesn't even support whirlwinds within its code, in this build.
  • Instead of the whirlwind spawning, the player has to wait for a bit before the screen fades out and the cutscene plays.
  • If you die during this period, the game crashes. In the final, it doesn't seem like there's enough time to die, as the whirlwind grabs you before you're able to hit the lava.
  • The Sorceress's health bar also remains on screen while the player is waiting, unlike later builds.
• Attempting to defeat the Sorceress a second time after she has already been defeated once will make the egg immediately disappear and the player gets stuck. In the final, the egg sticks around long enough to be collected.
  • The UFOs behave weirdly while in this state, too, and will flash rapidly if they're stood upon. This can also be seen after collecting the egg on the first time you've finished the level before the cutscene starts (even in the final game), but only very briefly.
• The animation that plays when the level ends is visually a bit different:
  • The Sorceress reaches out of the middle of the lava, and doesn't grab edge. In the final, she's closer to the edge of the lava, and is able to grab onto it.
  • The camera angle used for this cutscene is also quite a bit different to later builds.
• The Sorceress (class 753) has a couple of notable model changes:
  • A large black polygon can be seen where her wand would usually be held. This polygon is not visible in the final game.
  • A polygon on the left side of her face erroneously uses her teeth texture, making it slightly transparent.
• The cannonball (class 596) model appears to have been updated, seemingly rotating by 90 degrees around its Z-axis, for unknown reasons.

Bugbot Factory#

• While this level doesn't appear to have any particularly notable differences in this version, it is interesting in that it is the only level whose data is a perfect match for the corresponding data in the next known build, the September 11th build.

Super Bogus Worlds#

Super Bonus Round#

• The final dragon egg - normally named "Yin Yang" - is instead named "Zan Jayna" here. This is the only instance of a dragon with a different name in this build. The dragons are presumably named after the DC Comics Wonder Twins, Zan and Jayna.
• The sublevel visual effect used for each of the sublevel portals in the main area of the level are 512 units too low in this build. All of the sublevel visuals used for the exit portals inside each sublevel are absent, and in fact the model for this visual is only supported by the main area in this build.
• All sublevels can be entered early if a small out of bounds skip is used to obtain the superfly powerup and the player then flies into the space above the portals - all of the portals bleed slightly more than they do in the final game, making end-game skips possible. Note that this also allows the final area to be accessible under normal means, as this wouldn't normally be the case due to the lowered gem count in this version.
• The moby which acts as the entrance point to the submarine sublevel is also in a slightly different position, in addition to each of these area portals having their effect areas changed. Copies of this moby are present in each of the sublevels too, to act as the exit position from the submarines sublevel, so each of these have also moved in the same way.
• There are a few notable instances of misplaced or corrupted textures:
  • In the entrance to the final area, both the left door and part of the door frame on the left side of the door are mirrored incorrectly, i.e. such that the door handle is on the outside of the door instead of the inside.
  • If the player falls beneath the tracks at the bottom of the slope in the skateboarding sublevel, they might notice that there appear to be corrupted textures on the underside of the tracks. These textures still appear to be assigned incorrectly in the final game, but no longer appear to be corrupted, instead seemingly matching the snow texture on the upper side of the track.
  • There is a corrupted texture on the floor to the right of the player after entering the Sorceress sublevel.
• The main area of the level and the skateboarding area have different fall plane heights, in this build:
  • The main area has a fall plane height of 0 instead of 6500. This allows the player to fly down into the abyss and beneath the entire level, whereas in later builds the player is prevented from flying any lower once they're slightly above the lowest parts of the level geometry.
  • The skateboarding area has a fall plane height of 12000 instead of 14000. This allows the player to glide until they're beneath the lowest geometry in the level, whereas later builds make the player fall to their death around the point they reach the lowest geometry.
• For some reason, the submarine boost speed is incredibly fast. This extra speed may actually make the level harder to complete.
• While not strictly a difference in Super Bonus Round, it's notable that the submarine code in Lost Fleet reuses part of the code from Super Bonus Round's submarines that it is not supposed to. The result of this is that playing Lost Fleet before Super Bonus Round and hitting any submarine in that level will result in one of the submarines not dropping the 150 gems it is supposed to drop in this level.
• Super Bonus Round is the only level in the game where the player can come 7th place in a race. The "7th" sprite isn't present yet, and so if you are in 7th place, the HUD icon representing your place will simply disappear.
• In the final game, neither the gem basket moby (class 200) or its fragments (class 306) are modelled or supported in code by the level. In this version, they are supported in code and the basket model is present in skateboarding area's data. Many baskets are placed in this area, which were all replaced with their respective gems in the final version:
  • In later builds, 26 gem baskets in this area were replaced with gems of the same value in the same position of the basket.
  • 2 gem baskets in this area were moved slightly and replaced with gems of the same value.
• In addition to the gem baskets above, 6 gems in the skateboarding area were moved by varying amounts between this build and later builds.
• Hunter's models (classes 39 and 117) were tweaked slightly in a similar manner to other levels:
  • There is a pink blotch on his right arm, which was recoloured in orange in the final.
  • Some of the vertex colouring on his back looks off, and was smoothed in the final.
• In this build, Bianca has much longer, pointier fingers.
  • This isn't also true for her appearance in Midnight Mountain Home, which uses a model very similar to this one.

• All of Bianca's audio dialogue messages are absent.
• Bianca is absent from the final area of the level.
  • Her moby, her model (moby class 38), and two moby models assocatied with her appearance visuals (classes 426 and 427) are entirely unsupported by the final area of the level. They would all be added in the final.
  • Due to her moby being absent, her associated text dialogue is also not present.
• In the final area, almost all sound effects aside the standard ones are absent. In particular, during the fight, only the sound effects for the Sorceress's UFO firing and for Spyro getting hit are present.
• The final cutscene - "THE END", shown after collecting the final egg - does not play, in this build, leaving the player in Super Bonus Round instead.
  • In both this build and the September 11th build, a progress flag is read to determine whether to show the player the "THE END" cutscene after collecting the final egg (in the final, it plays unconditionally). Unfortunately, this was programmed incorrectly, so rather than showing the cutscene only if you haven't seen the cutscene yet, it shows it only if you have seen it, meaning the cutscene is never seen under normal means.