Sonic the Hedgehog 2 (DoJa, J2ME, BREW)

Sonic and Tails jump into your Nokia brick - now you can play Sonic the Hedgehog 2 at a vastly reduced framerate.

This port was first released in Japan on DoCoMo i-Mode phones for the DoJa platform, and then overseas on J2ME (MIDP) in a slightly downgraded form - again, without sound effects or Special Stages and in two parts (Dash! and Crash!), though BREW gamers got the one singular game with Special Stages included. However, the actual issue is that most phones instead got an entirely different, vastly inferior port that doesn't nearly have as much in common with the actual Sonic 2. This is in contrast to the previous game, where the developer iFone attempted to pull off the Sisyphean task of porting the "big" version to most devices. A remaster of the original that wasn't let down by tech limitations, and brought the complete game to a larger range of mobile devices, was released in 2013 on smartphones.

This article will mainly be covering the high-end versions. For the low-end version, go to its respective sub-page.

Low-End VersionsSonic the Hedgehog Genesis doesn't seem so bad now.

Unobfuscated Versions#

The English versions of the game for Nokia N95, N73, and the 320x240 Nokia phones are notable for including a decent amount of development leftovers: there's a directory with classes named "Coral", which appears to be related to the engine used by the high-end J2ME versions, and in addition, the classes in these three versions have their original filenames and appear to not be obfuscated.

This needs some investigation. Discuss ideas and findings on the talk page. Specifically: There ought to be something interesting in those versions.

Unused Graphics#

Special Stage Leftovers#

With the removal of the Special Stages in the J2ME (MIDP) versions, several of these messages go unused in those versions. This concerns mainly the inverted-looking text that would've been displayed on the white screen after a Special Stage ends.

Chinese Intro Tails#

title_demo.png contains a large unused graphic of Tails for the Chinese versions' intro cutscene alongside used graphics of Sonic and Robotnik. It's likely that this graphic got used in versions released where the player controlled Sonic and Tails, however, all three dumped high-end versions (and all low-end versions) of the Chinese release have you play as Sonic alone. Various additional graphics go unused as well (though Tails running to the left still appears in the menu in the Nokia N73 and Motorola E6 versions).

MIDI Sequence Bugs#

Some MIDI files in the game have tracks that start with note data before issuing a Program Change, causing some notes at the beginning to be played with the Piano 1 instrument or the Standard drum kit. While extensive testing with phones has yet to be done, this issue can be heard on Nokia S60V3 FP2 phones in addition to MIDI players for PC. This is most noticeable with the main loop of the Mystic Cave theme (from Crash!). Curiously, the Sega Mobile BREW versions of Sonic 1 exhibit the same issue, where this is noticeable with the Star Light theme.

Unused MANIFEST.MF Properties#

This game has a few MANIFEST.MF properties that can be used to modify certain functionality of the game, and some of those are unused, at least in the dumped versions. Several of these (at the very least, all that are known to do something) are listed below. The properties have to be entered into the manifest or the JAD file in an ordinary format, e.g. "DevCreditDisable: true".

DevCreditDisable#

if this property is set to "true", then the game will hide all mentions of Rockpool Games, this includes their mention in the about page and the logo that shows up in the intro.

ms-upSell and ms-upSellURL#

If both of these properties are set to valid values (1 or 2, and a website URL respectively), then a button will be added to the title screen called Get More Games. Clicking this will try to open a link to the specified upsell URL.

ms-demoMode and ms-demoURL#

If both of these properties are set to valid values then the game will launch as a demo. While it is in demo mode, finishing the first Act will give you a message telling you to buy the full game before kicking you out of the game. If ms-demoMode is set to 1, it will tell you to contact your phone provider to purchase the full game; if it is set to 2, it will attempt to launch the website to purchase the full game.

It doesn't appear that any demo versions of this game have actually been released on J2ME (MIDP).

ms-skPos#

If this property is set to anything other than 0 then it will swap over the softkeys, Select will show up on the right and Back will show up on the left.

Rockpool-CheatCode and Glu-Cheats-Enable#

If Glu-Cheats-Enable (Sonic 2: Crash!) is set to "true", then cheats will be enabled, there are only two cheats within the game. While in-game, you can press 0 to instantly obtain 100 rings, or you can type in 5, 5, 4, 5, 4, 4 to instantly beat the current level.

Sonic 2: Dash! instead looks for the property Rockpool-CheatCode that has to be an integer, but it doesn't appear to do anything.

Oddities#

Updated Ending Sprites#

In a strange twist not unlike what happened with Sonic Jam for the Game.com, Sonic the Hedgehog 2: Crash! features a different sets of graphics for the ending. Curiously, these graphics appear to be more polished than the Genesis version, particularly with the arms' shading and Super Sonic's highlights. Contrary to popular belief, this appears to be an edit intended for Crash!, as the sprites don't follow the Genesis' 16-color palette limit.

Genesis	Mobile

Version Differences#

DoJa#

The game was first ported to DoJa and released in Japan on DoCoMo i-Mode phones, with the port being first released as a preinstalled game on the Panasonic P902iS phone in June 2006 before being given a wider release on the Sonic Cafe service five months later.

The preinstalled Panasonic P902iS DoJa version (which uses the original title screen background instead of the updated one used in the Sonic Cafe version) only includes the base game data with Emerald Hill and Chemical Plant by default, requiring the level data for Aquatic Ruin onward to be downloaded from a now-dead server. Two dumps of this version are currently available: one including only the base game data with Emerald Hill and Chemical Plant, and another containing Aquatic Ruin and Casino Night.

As there is currently no complete dump of either DoJa version, the following will include comparisons of Genesis and J2ME, and the various J2ME releases.

However, it should be noted that the i-Mode (DoJa) version includes a set of sound effects and a 3D rendition of the game's Special Stages, which were removed from the overseas J2ME (MIDP) versions likely because of technical limitations. While the Special Stages are also included in the overseas BREW versions, they use the original pre-rendered stage graphics from the original game

Genesis vs. J2ME#

• By far the most noticeable change is the game's framerate cap, which has been drastically lowered. Closer examination appears to reveal that in the various versions, the framerate ranges from 9-12 FPS.
• The multiplayer mode is nowhere to be seen.
• The options menu doesn't include the character select option. Instead, most versions of the game have you play as Sonic and Tails, except for some versions for less powerful phones where you play as Sonic alone.
• The options menu does include a difficulty select option, which alters things like enemy placement and boss HP. It appears that Hard is equivalent to the original.
• Level title cards and HUD have been redrawn in a similar vein to Sonic 1 on J2ME and GBA, this time using Sonic Advance 2 assets.
• The backgrounds are simplified (in the versions that have backgrounds).
• The Chemical Plant doors look correct now. Similarly, the game now properly resumes Death Egg's music after you defeat Mecha Sonic (Silver Sonic).
• The game now holds you in place for a bit during the title cards before you can move while the stage is already active. This introduces a noticeable issue in which the game "drags" Sonic during the Wing Fortress title card, making the first jump harder.
• An attempt was made to work around the screen size for bosses. Notably, the Aquatic Ruin boss has the totem poles positioned at the edges of the screen - now they are narrower apart in the portrait-mode versions, and wider apart in the 320x240 Nokia version. You also can't jump on the totem poles anymore, making for a more frustrating fight.

J2ME Versions#

• In the Nokia N73, 6233, 6280, and Motorola E6 versions, Tails is absent. They went the extra mile to remove the "Sonic and Miles "Tails" Prower in" screen and redraw the title screen to only feature Sonic.
• The Nokia 6233, 6280, Sony Ericsson W810 versions lack backgrounds. Those are present in the other versions.
• The 176x220 and 320x240 versions use a scaled-down set of graphics because of the reduced screen size. These also have a new semi-transparent background effect on the stage completion screen.

To do: Record these again at native resolution.

• The Chinese versions for Nokia N73 and Motorola E6 have an additional animated intro cinematic, and a more interesting (but less faithful) title screen. Various versions from the "low-end" set got the intro cinematic as well.
• The Chinese versions had a version for 640x360. It has a touch screen,but the game graphic size still in 240x320. The game-pad's sprite just like S1J2me and other Chinese touch-screen version SEGA games. And this version has change the jump button to the OK/Num5 key.
• The Chinese versions translate pretty much all text and graphics. The East Europe versions (Czech/Russian) only translate text, and notably the ending is still in English and French.
• The Samsung 240x400 version prints some debug stuff into the standard output.