Carls493
Sonic the Hedgehog 3 - Carnival Night Act 1 Alt Mix (Ver. 1.0)
updated
Except... when I come back... MERYL'S GONE! Where did she go?! No time to think about it, just fight Sniper Wolf.
Remember, if you want an easier time against Wolf, use a Diazepam to temporarily stop Snake's hands from fumbling around with holding the PSG1.
You can hit Sniper Wolf while she's moving, or when she's about to take her shot at you. For me, it was kinda hard to hit her without her hitting me.
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When Sniper Wolf is down, you can finally walk forward and past Meryl's empty blood puddle.
Making a few calls, Snake tells Colonel & Meryl that he's gonna get Wolf to tell him where Meryl is. If I called Otacon, he strangely won't say a word...
But most concerningly, Mei Ling will warn you that you should REALLY save your progress at this point. She has a bad feeling of what could happen to Snake next...
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As soon as Snake gets close to the door on the other side, one get can't even go through because it's a Level 6 door...
...he gets ambushed from behind!
Sniper Wolf quickly healed from her injuries from Snake and wanted to take a look at her up close. She forced him to drop his gun.
At least Meryl was still alive, according to her, but where was she taken off to...?
Sniper Wolf leaves a painful mark on Snake. She was now 100% focused on killing him, but not right now...
She instead had one of her Genome Soldiers knock Snake out, and then he was dragged away...
Poor Snake... *Poor Meryl...!*
Along the way in this section, you'll run into some wolf-dogs. Half-wolf, half-huskie. The puppies won't hurt you, but I can't say the same for their parents.
It's been a long time since I last played this game. I somehow felt lost in this section for a moment, despite it being such a relatively small room.
Even if the wolf-dogs don't like Snake, they DO seem to love Meryl.
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In the next room, Snake & Meryl gets the sight of one of the Communications Towers.
Meryl carves out a path you can take to avoid Claymore mines, since the Mine Detector won't work. This would be a little bit more impressive if you didn't have Thermal Goggles, or... y'know, just CRAWL over the mines.
But then... Meryl is suddenly targeted by a laser sight... and then shot! One to the legs, one to the abdomen, and one more right at her arm to keep her from picking up her gun.
Between the troubles with her previous disguise, Psycho Mantis controlling her mind, and now being sniped down and lying in her own blood, Meryl felt like she wasn't worthy to be a soldier anymore. She truly felt the cruelty of war from this short time with Snake...
She wanted Snake to finish her off, or if not, let her lie there and die on her own...
VERY understandably, the Colonel panicked. His niece was in grave danger, but he also realized that she was being used as a trap to draw out Snake.
According to Colonel & Naomi, this was the work of FOXHOUND's greatest shooter: Sniper Wolf. She is extremely patient with targeting her prey; able to wait hours, days, or even weeks to pick someone off. She was now waiting to pick off Snake from the Communications Tower.
As such, she was way too far away for Snake to shoot back at her. He needed a new weapon if he wanted to stand a chance of beating her and saving Meryl. Naomi was taken aback by this newfound selflessness from a him...
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It's completely impossible to approach Meryl, because if you do, Sniper Wolf will just instantly shoot at you.
If you call Otacon, he'll tell you that a sniper rifle you can find is a PSG1 located somewhere in the Tank Hanger's 2nd Floor Basement. That's in the first big building of this game.
Though... it sounds like Octcon was a bit sheepish to tell Snake about this. He even sounded like he recognizes the sniper Snake is trying to fight...
So unfortunately, you'll have to leave the bleeding Meryl behind and go all the way back to that Nuclear Disposal Facility.
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I go about this slightly different than just running back between the building. I first wanted to show another use for Cardboard Boxes.
In the Nuclear Warhead Storage Building, if you use Cardboard Box A (the red one) inside a truck and just sit in there, it will bring you to the truck where the front of the Disposal Facility is. Use the B Box (the green one), it will take you back to the Storage Building.
Then I go into the Storage Building via the lower vent instead of the upper hatch. This portion is flooded for a moment, an accurately your Gasmask WON'T work underwater.
Inside the building, go to the B2 Floor and see what doors your Level 5 Security Card can get you in now.
That Card will let you into the room that contains the PSG1. Be careful of the infrared lasers here, including ones that touch the floor.
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When you equip the PSG1, you automatically have to crawl to the ground to take aim. It's a clunky weapon to use, but it hits regular enemies hard.
Snake will also have his hands fumble and tremble around with this sniper rifle. Feed him a Diazepam and the trembling will stop for a little while. This will help with fighting Sniper Wolf.
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Besides that, I also get to use the Security Card to reach a Camera. This is a completely optional item where you can take pictures at your own leisure.
There's also a secondary use of this Camera where you can use it to hunt down ghosts of the game's staff.
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Now, it's time to return to Sniper Wolf's site to fight her and save Meryl!
I must emphasize that you should try to explore everywhere for possible goodies that could be missed, here. There's a Heart Fragment right under the Goal Heart, for example, and a whole bonus stage involve nothing but those Donkey Kong Country-like (barrel) cannons.
What you have to do is aim and throw the bomb at steel blocks. This is the only way to break them down. You'll also at times need to throw them a longer distance away in order to hit far switches.
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In the final leg of this level, you have to outrun an advancing wall of of a toxic living substance. One touch and Globule instantly becomes woodchipper fodder (poor puppet!).
You not only have to outrun this wall, but will also have to use bombs to clear the way forward. If you screw this up in some spots, then you're likely already dead.
The creepy owner of the place, Collector D., wanted her to back off from his collection. He HATED how the arcades were all scrapped and sent to the Junk World and wanted to give them all a second lease of life. He thought that the witch was trying to steal the arcades back, think that she wouldn't be punished for it in Esperanto.
The Collector then pulls out an unreleased prototype and converts its code into a arm weapon to use against Macy!
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In what looks like a tribute to Mega Man, D will give himself different Robot Master-like weapons, such as a snaking electric shot, a flamethrower, and a meteor spread. He'll switch between all of them as he takes more and more damage.
Beating him leads to him losing his robot arm, and then you get to see him freak out from his unreleased prototype game blowing up, too!
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Collector D. favorite arcade hardware blows up to pieces. He gets pretty depressed about it, so much so that Macy even gives him a hug, apologizing for leaving his machine in a mess like this.
However, her mood changed when the destruction ended up leaving a big hole in the wall. She finally saw a much closer view of the place she was trying to reach this whole time,
Jericho Tower!
There was no time to waste. The young witch quickly jetted off towards the site of that tower so she can finally get her wish to go back home!
Meanwhile, D was left to realize... he has NOT been outside in a very long time...
After quick obstacle course, you'll end up in a room with four different arcades to enter into. Each of these arcades are based on different game genres.
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The first arcade I play is based on Rhythm Games. Jump into an arrow and then aim at the direction it's point and you'll launch in that direction, and how fast you input this determines the rating you get for each of them, though you'll want to deliberately fail one of them in order to progress.
Some NPCs here get their own Character Cards. The guy at 3:20 talking about music chords is named Kuzo (likely based on Yuzo Koshiro), and the blonde girl groovin' at 4:04 is named Tamir.
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The second Arcade I play is based on Platformers. Specifically, it's based on SEGA's Flicky.
Just like in Flicky, you have to gather together a group of chicks to progress in a wraparound screen. Of course, that means feeding more of them to a gator gate.
This happens twice, though the second gate gets to eat something else, instead. SUCKER!
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The third Arcade I play is based on Fighting Games!
Here, you have a 1v1 fight against a guy named Brandi. He's pretty much a midboss for this level, so just keep smacking him with the broom and he'll eventually get KO'd.
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The fourth and last Arcade I played is also the most inspired, since this game's developer actually worked on a previous game like this called Cycle Chaser H-5.
You fly "Macy"/"Dolores" in a Shoot 'em Up! You pick the difficulty and then you have to shoot your way through a swarm of enemies and then eventually face off against a boss to finish the Arcade.
I didn't know this when I recorded this, but besides your Straight Shot, if you attempt to Broomburst, the witch will switch to a Spread Shot, which is objectively better due to the larger amount of shots you get to unleash through the screen.
Lastly, I more recently learned that all of Somnabuster was initially going to be a SHMUP, especially those on the Sega Genesis. I can feel that.
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After all four Arcades are beaten, you finally get to continue on to the last leg of this level and then finally reach its boss.
It seems like Macy is getting kinda tired of being detoured...
There is another treasure door that's locked. In order to unlock it, you have to use the Blue Dragon Key, which you can pick up from the Dark Palace of Waterfalls.
This will lead to the Tool Bag, which will increase you Accessory slots from 2 to 3. That's all there is to it, but if you're one to track what Accessories you want to equip, this may be a godsend!
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Raleigh throws a quite tantrum over having an uninvited guest in his quarters, let alone one that is a Cooper. Likewise, Sly, even with his smooth voice, sounds FURIOUS over the Fiendish Five killing his father stealing away his family's generational legacy.
Raleigh's plan to deal with him? To make amends by...
*BLOATING TO GARGANTUAN SIZE, AND SQUASHING YOU LIKE THE INSIGNIFICANT BUG THAT YOU ARE!!!*
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He wasn't kidding about that threat. This frog has a freaky move where he eats a fly that somehow turns him into a bouncing blimp. Don't get flatten by his attack. Jump to different platforms if you have to, but stay out of the water since Sly can't swim.
After Raleigh bounces enough times, he'll shrink back to normal size. Smack him with the cape before he hops away for damage.
After taking enough damage, more tricks will come in for this fight. The platforms will sink as Raleigh lands on him, or he'll try to attack you with his tongue.
Since this is the first fight, it's not really a hard one, but it is kinda hilarious.
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Even after Raleigh is beaten, he warns Sly of one of his cohorts: Mugshot, who's somewhere in Mesa City, Utah, USA.
And then he croaked... and then passed out.
Winning against this boss automatically gives Sly another page of the Thievius Raccoonus. This will give him Rioichi Cooper's Ninja Spire Jump technique, which will let him stand against thin peaks on the top of buildings and structures.
Sly then had to sneak his way back out from Raleigh's hideout, as Carmelita Fox and her troops have arrived to raid the place and arrest Raleigh. She was actually trying to hunt down Sly, so Raleigh was just an unsatisfactory consolation prize for her.
Sly's efforts of destroying Raleigh's storm machine also heroically put an end to the violent storm along the Welsh Triangle. From there, the Cooper Gang hung out at England before returning to their own hideout to prepare for their heist against Mugshot.
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After clearing the map of one area, Murray will move out of the way for the next area's map...
...which will then have him block the next map after that. This time, the hippo's busting some moves!
In the same room where I fought the Devil in the A Version, the B Version instead has a much more horrifying boss for Juste to defeat: *LEGION!*
Specifically, this is called "Legion (saint)", which tells me that this isn't its only form. Either way, for now, use your weapon and powers to tear its bodies off of it, and then keep striking at the hideous core within to finally beat it.
The rest of the video past this is mainly focused on me exploring more of Sky Walkway B and seeing what else I can fight and pick up.
Shadow suddenly encountered Eggman on the ARK. The doctor demanded that Shadow gives him his 6 Chaos Emeralds. He continued on explaining that Shadow was indeed a creation of his Grandfather Gerald Robotnik, and that he was destined to continue that legacy in his own way.
Once again, Shadow refused. He needed the emeralds to uncover the truth to his past and fulfill a promise to all of the ARK's victims.
Eggman was angered by Shadow's apparent disobedience, and decided to fight him with his Egg Dealer.
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Even in a completely different stage and a completely different Hero character this time, this fight still plays out in the exact same way.
Whatever. Get your fevers going on that mad doctor!
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The fourth and final time I fight this boss before the credits. This time I have Mr. Computer Room with me for advice and cheerleading.
Blah blah blah hit the lights blah blah blah FEVER FEVER FEVER!
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After Shadow collected all 7 Chaos Emeralds, Eggman continued to remind him of the disrespect he was showing to him as one of Gerald's grandchildren.
This is Shadow's Slightly Hero - Dark resolve of who he is:
"I am Shadow the Hedgehog. The ultimate life form born and raised aboard the ARK! I shall live on... I am the protector of the ARK.... I am living proof of the ultimate life form...
This is *WHO I AM.*"
And then... compared to other endings involving Eggman... Shadow decided to spare Eggman's life, this time. He simply commanded him to leave the ARK and never return. Shadow decided that he'll stay on the ARK as its eternal guardian...
Finally, the return of "Chosen One" by A2, but also the last time this will play for this run.
Beating both of Cosmic Fall's endings should maximize your Omochao Gun's level.
FINALLY! I just need to get one more ending in this game before I actually advance through this game's actual story. So stay tuned for Story Cycle 10!
"DAMN IT!", shouted Shadow, as he was still trying to process the old memories that were gathering back into his mind.
Approaching him was the GUN Commander. No soldiers or weapons with him. All he came with was a solo pistol to take revenge on Shadow for what happened 50 years ago, especially in regards to Maria.
Ever since the Commander was a young boy, he'd often played games with Maria all over the ARK. This made him accidentally run into Professor Gerald Robotnik's experiment to create Shadow. It turned out that Black Doom was also involved in Shadow's creation.
At present, the GUN Commander blamed Shadow for all of the disasters that happened on that ARK. Everyone, including Maria and the Commander's own family were all killed.
The GUN Commander then tried to shoot Shadow, but Shadow quickly dodged it.
He solemnly accepted this blame and his apparent crimes, but he wanted to explore the ARK in its present state to look for more answers. The Commander could only fall to his knees over this response (or his failure to kill the hedgehog).
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Cosmic Fall is aptly-named because for some reason, the ARK is falling apart. You have 15 minutes to complete a mission in this level before the entire ARK blows up or something.
Since this is a Stage 6, there are only two missions you can choose from:
Dark Mission: Travel with Black Doom to reach the Sixth Chaos Emerald that's located somewhere in the ARK.
Hero Mission: Team up with Vector to (say it with me, everyone) *FIND THE COMPUTER ROOM!*
This time, I went with the Dark Mission, and this time it was a Goal Ring objective for a 6th stage. GUN Fortress, Black Comet, Lava Shelter and Final Haunt's Dark Missions weren't like this.
Sorry Vector, but that there Computer Room will have to wait!
Shadow begged Eggman to give him an answer to how he was created. Eggman confirmed that both he and Omega are of his genius, but now he wants to destroy them both for turning against him.
Omega was certain that this would be the fight where he finally takes revenge against his own creator, while the Eggman's revelation made Shadow depressed, again, now knowing that he was an android...
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This is the absolute final time I'm going to fight this boss anywhere throughout this playthrough.
I'm getting closer and closer to my finish!
From there, he was scared backwards from seeing a legion of multiple Shadows. Eggman came in and called them all Shadow Androids, preparing them for a massive attack against the Black Arms.
This made Shadow wonder if he, himself, was an android...?
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Here are the three selectable missions of Iron Jungle:
- Dark Mission: Help Eggman destroy all 28 GUN robots.
- Normal Mission: Get to the Goal Ring and reach inside Eggman's base.
- Hero Mission: Help Omega take down Eggman's airship.
This time, I finally help Omega in this stage with his favorite pastime.
This is just like the Lethal Highway's Hero Mission and Air Fleet's (infamous) Dark Mission: Chase down the flying contraption and shoot the hell out of it! Take too long, and you fail!
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Leon passed through the boss door, and he noticed someone on the other side in his current room.
The person stood up and turned around and stepped towards Leon. He is a man named Joachim Armster, and he was turned into a vampire by Walter.
Walter used the power of his Ebony Stone to defeat Joachim in battle. Then he turned him into a vampire and sealed him away in that dark room. If Leon wanted to know more about the Ebony Stone, he would have to defeat Joachim himself, first, and Joachim was eager to warm himself up for a rematch against Walter.
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As soon as the fight starts, you'll realize that Joachim is completely invincible to all of your moves!
This is because there are three statues that are giving him a shield using a blue energy source. Destroy these energy sources, and you'll get to damage Joachim for a few seconds. When he sets up his sources again, just destroy them again.
Of course, do all of this while also being wary of Joachim's own attacks against you.
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Having defeated Joachim, Leon gets his answer from him about the Ebony Stone.
The Ebony Stone was made with alchemy. The Ebony Stone is what powers the neverending darkness - the Eternal Night - in the forest surrounding Walter's castle.
Before disintegrating, Joachim mourned that his only chance of beating Walter would've been for him to have the Crimson Stone...
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Defeating Joachim grants you the Green Orb. My roster of magic Subweapon moves just keeps going up!
Because of Joachim mentioning Alchemy in the creation of Walter's Ebony Stone, he decided he wanted to consult Rinaldo about what he knew about it.
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As soon as Leon brought up the Ebony and Crimson Stones to Rinaldo, Rinaldo sounded somewhat bitter... He then decided to explain them.
Those two stones were created accidentally during a deep desire to create the Philosopher's Stone, a stone that would grant its master eternal youth.
The Crimson Stone by itself, meanwhile, can turn vampires' souls into power for its master. However, the master themselves would then be turned into a vampire.
At present, with the Ebony Stone in Walter's possession, it also meant that the Crimson Stone must also have reappeared somewhere. Hopefully not in the wrong hands...
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Now with 4 of the main orbs acquired, I just needed to go through one more area, but first I wanted to check through older ones again...
Unfortunately, one of the GUN Soldiers caught up to them with a massive vehicle weapon: The Heavy Dog.
Shadow had recognized the soldier piloting this machine as the exact soldier that shot and killed Maria.
Maria next to Shadow had then vanished, and in her place was Doom's Eye, further reminding Shadow of the heartlessness of humans that had led to them killing one of their own, in this case Maria.
To complete this flashback staged by Black Doom, Shadow was ready to exact his revenge against Maria's would-be killer.
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One more battle against a GUN Solider boss. Strip him of his weapon and take it for yourself!
Suddenly, he was warped into outer space by Black Doom. Turns out he has sent Shadow through a flashback of Space Colony ARK of 50 years ago.
To Shadow's shock, he saw himself running with Maria away from threatening GUN Soldiers.
This stage is about Black Doom further trying to persuade Shadow about the sins of humanity...
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Like from me playing Final Haunt first before playing Black Comet, going from Lost Impact to The Doom here really shows some contrasts between the levels even as they share basically all of the same design assets.
Unlike Lost Impact, The Doom has 3 whole missions:
- Dark Mission: Carry out revenge against the humans for Black Doom by beating all 60 GUN Soldiers.
- Normal Mission: Help Maria escape from the invading GUN Soldiers by finding the Goal Ring.
- Hero Mission: Work with Maria to revitalize 10 captured ARK researchers.
This time, I took on the Hero Mission.
Immediately, if you want to make this mission much less tedious, I wanna hope you've already gotten a Final Haunt ending so that you can unlock the Heal Cannon as a weapon.
The Heal Units can be picked up and tossed, but this is kinda slow and you can possibly miss. With a Heal Cannon, you basically have a limited-yet-portable access to Heal Units.
This also means you have an easier time healing the GUN Soldiers that are trying to murder Shadow & especially Maria. Blast them with a heal and they'll automatically stop fighting you.
The A Rank requirement is pretty low because it implies you're focused entirely healing those missing researchers. A lot of extra Hero Points to get out of using the Heal Cannon!
Shadow encounters Eggman in his huge Egg Breaker mech. Shadow pleaded to Eggman that he needed all of the Chaos Emeralds to learn of his past, but Eggman, greedy as ever, wanted the emeralds for himself, holding on to the fourth one he had now.
If Shadow didn't stay out of his way, he'll crush him just like what he plans to do against the Black Arms.
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The last time I fight this Egg Breaker in this level, but there's still one more fight against him later that will be the absolute LAST time I deal with this boss ANYWHERE.
From the ceiling window. He spotted Dr. Eggman flying away. He decided to track the doctor down to see if he knew anything about the Black Arms.
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This level reminds me of Heroes' Hang Castle. There are even pumpkin ghosts to suddenly spoke you, though these are puppet fakes, instead.
Here are the three missions to Cryptic Castle:
- Dark Mission: Help Eggman light 5 giant torches.
- Normal Mission: Reach the Goal Ring and escape from Eggman's castle.
- Hero Mission: Help Amy find Cream.
This time I picked the picked the Normal Mission, finally showing off the rest of this level in the process.
At the last leg of the Normal route, you grind down a rail... and end up getting chased by a giant monster!
But follow the Rings (and try to keep an eye on a Key), and you should be fine and reach that Goal Ring in no time.
I first did this in the Castle B version, but Castle A has its own version of this challenge... and it's actually much harder. More enemies and hazards to platform through.
HOWEVER, the prizes for beating this AREN'T of the Fang of Vlad. That's actually somewhere else in this huge room. Even before them, one of the prizes you DO instead get is the Bolt Book, which gives me a pretty damn strong magic spell to use with the Holy Book Subweapon.
At 6:30, what you have to do is slide left to towards the wall. The lowest part of it is a fake wall that Juste can go through. Follow the path to the bottom on the other side to reach the Fang of Vlad, a bloody tooth which can apply a permanent DEF increase to Juste.
This makes three of Dracula's remain in my possession now. I'll eventually get the other three, as they are part of what is needed to get the best ending of this game.
Shadow decided to explore these ruins and see what more he can learn about those black creatures...
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Here are Glyphic Canyon's three selectable missions:
- Dark Mission: Help Black Doom touch 5 temple jewel to awaken their structures and lift them to the sky.
- Normal Mission: Head to the Goal Ring. It wields the third Chaos Emerald.
- Hero Mission: Help Knuckles kill all 60 Black Arms aliens in the stage.
I once again played the Dark Mission, which I haven't done since Story Cycle 2.
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Regardless of which second stage you complete in a Story Mode run, the following cutscene remains the same:
At the White House, the President, yes, the President of the United Federation gets a report from the CIA about the Black Arms' activity. They were pushed out from Westopolis by GUN troops and they were also able to drive them away from five other cities. The CIA also had their mainframe compromised (which is what Digital Circuit is).
The President still has high hopes that the United Federation will finish the fight against the aliens - the terrorists.
He also has a fondness for how Sonic and Shadow previously saved the world. He must've gotten that picture sometime after Sonic Heroes, right?
I'm almost to the end of these runs.
Here's Cycle 9.
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Every time you start a new Story Mode run, the beginning of the game will always be the same.
Sometime after the defeat of Metal Sonic in Sonic Heroes, Shadow the Hedgehog continued to wrestle with his lack of memories. He could only now remember a small amount of brief ones.
He was in some kind of space station... with him an a girl he was with being chased down by GUN soldiers.
And then suddenly... a gunshot...!
Shadow had yet to know what it all meant, or who he even was. He didn't even remember that that girl was his beloved Maria...
Suddenly, the skies were cloaked in jet black and crimson clouds, and they rained down with a new terrifying alien force known as the Black Arms. They quickly conquered the entire world in destroyed everything in sight.
Humanity was quickly at its knees, but Shadow didn't care.
But then... he was approached by the Black Arms' leader: Black Doom.
Black Doom mentioned about the "promised time" upon the Earth, but before then, he demanded Shadow to find, gather, and bring to him the 7 Chaos Emeralds.
Shadow had no clue what this was all leading up to, but he believed that searching for those emeralds will give him the answers, including the truths to his past!
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Westopolis' three missions are:
Dark: Team up with Black Doom's Eye and eliminate all of the GUN Soldiers.
Normal: Head to the Goal Ring and get the second Chaos Emerald.
Hero: Team up with Sonic and eliminate all of the Black Arms aliens.
For the last time, I go for the Normal Mission.
Which means "Be Yourself. Everyone else can suck it".
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No matter how you beat Westopolis, the next resulting cutscene plays out the same way.
Back at GUN headquarters, the GUN Commander is report of all of the destruction the Black Arms have caused. His attention didn't become extreme, however, until he was reported that Shadow was amongst the carnage.
The Gun Commander then commanded all of his troops to be deployed onto the scene to kill Shadow along with those black aliens. It seemed that getting rid of Shadow was a very personal mission for him.
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Following that, after beating Westopolis' Normal Mission, Shadow walks away with the first two Chaos Emeralds, making his way towards the next one.
Black Doom was irritated with Shadow not obeying his orders. Shadow still wanted to know who he even was, and Black Doom took note that Shadow couldn't even remember his creator: Professor Gerald Robotnik.
In the meantime, Black Doom wasn't going to let Shadow get away with his disobedience and warped him away to a distant land to teach him a lesson.
Which means Happy 30th Anniversary to Sonic & Knuckles. 30 years of the second half of my top favorite video game of all time!
I finally decided to release my "Act 2" take on the "Alt" mix I made for Sonic 3's Carnival Night Zone. Staying faithful to have "Act 2" themes work for Micheal Jackson-based Sonic Zone songs, this mainly involved just taking out sounds and samples from the Act 1 version, though I did slightly flourish a bit more of when this actually happened and by how much.
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The thumbnail comes straight out of my playthrough of an alternative hack of Sonic 3 & Knuckles called "Sonic 3: D.A. Garden Edition".
This theme itself was made in FL-Studio through the help of the VOPM and Genny plugins, as well as separate drum samples ripped from this level. Getting all the unique sounds from Carnival Night to make this mix would NOT have been possible without me doing all of this!
Just like with the Act 1 version, I feel like this could be tweaked further, hence the "Ver. 1.0", in the title.
Here's the link to download it!:
mediafire.com/file/oxqxoufbhax6nou/Sonic_the_Hedgehog_3_-_Carnival_Night_Act_2_Alt_Mix_%2528Ver._1.0%2529.mp3/file
If you wanna check out the "Act 1" version and its download link, see my video on it, here!:
youtu.be/BFk9Hv35CZI
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If you're curious about the other songs I tried to make and remake, I have a whole playlist of them for you to check out. I have to warn you that I'm still an amateur at this:
youtube.com/playlist?list=PL0C9E84D6AE70E5D3
Unbeknownst to here, these machines were arcades.
She then saw the arcades being taken somewhere else. She wanted to go see where.
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At times, this level can feel pretty cluttered in. Other times, it can feel very large and open, more than most other levels up to this point. It really has me exploring to see what I can find or get.
Through the music, the flippers, sometimes the top of the background graphics, and the indescribable billboards floating around in this level, I'm reminded of other levels such as Sonic 1's Spring Yard & Star Light, as well as Sonic CD's Collision Chaos. The music also kinda sounds like something I would hear in Streets of Rage.
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This level also features the 5th and final Arla cameo. If you've gotten all of them by this point, you should get an Achievement.
The jester girl herself finally found a spot should could relax in. Away from all of the losers, including Macy, who she calls "loser-y in a cool way", as if that makes it any less rude...
But don't expect this last cameo to be the last you see of her.
Sometimes, a Heart Fragment is gained by hitting an arrow box into its matching cage. The box always moves in the direction of your attack.
Whenever Globule dives underwater, she automatically begins a ride in a submarine shaped like one of her fists. It has a turbo function and can use a spinning fist attack, but you can't use any Special Attacks in this state.
The oil you'll find underwater will be darker than the oil you find on land, but it will still hurt you all the same.
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I'm VERY impressed by the emotional, melancholic feel of the deepsea music in 5:34. The piano play of it reminds me (almost... appropriately) of some of my FoxEye playthroughs both on and offscreen of my channel.
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Make sure you try and explore EVERYWHERE. There may be some doors that lead to obstacle courses with more upbeat music that will often earn you a Heart Fragment.
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Beating the Egg Eagle, Blaze regains her 5th Sol Emerald.
Following Altitude Limit, Blaze, Cream & Cheese finally catch up to Sonic & Tails. However, the two were somewhat cautious of Blaze since they've actually met her before and didn't know what she was up to at the time.
From Sonic's words, Blaze realized that Eggman Nega, an alternate version of Sonic's Eggman from Blaze's world, has also managed to find himself in Sonic's world.
She wanted to deal with Eggman Nega on her own, but Sonic wanted to help, especially since the tear in space-time continuum was affecting both of their worlds.
Blaze just kept rejecting Sonic & Tails' help and stormed off to find her remaining two missing Sol Emeralds. However, she was surprised that other people actually cared about her and her situation.
To Cream's words, she looked up to Sonic because... he's like the wind!
Despite being a cat that can control fire...
This watery stage does not AT ALL prevent Blaze from speeding through it as well as Sonic can. Her Fire Boost still completely works underwater. That's amazing!
This also applies to the fight against Eggman's Egg Turtle!
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After defeating the Egg Turtle, Blaze knocked Eggman away once more, retrieving her 4th Sol Emerald in the process.
Blaze then went with Cream & Cheese to keep looking for Sonic. They instead ran into Amy, who was also looking for Sonic.
After a bit of a scrap from Amy after Cream explaining to Blaze a little too much about her affection about Sonic, Blaze just couldn't entirely process how everyone around here looked up to this "Sonic" guy so much, or how they were all open about their feelings at all compared to herself...
Amy suggested that Sonic was with Tails right now. If all three girls can find Tails, then they'll surely find Sonic.
Cream's continued explanation of Amy's love towards Sonic was enough to finally make Blaze smile for once, though Blaze tried to deny it.
During Leon's travels through the Dark Palace of Waterfalls, he will encounter a midboss.
It's the Doppelganger! And how he fights is by taking on Leon's appearance and using some of his own techniques on him!
If you do manage to beat him, however, he quickly leaves via the stream below. This definitely will not be the last Leon sees of his shadow clone.
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The rest of this video has me going through even more places in the Dark Palace, such as acquiring the Blue Dragon Key, and using the red ride to get from B2F back to B1F. I get quite lost here and end up doing this twice.
Eventually, though, I do everything I need to do in order to unlock this area's boss door.
It was Sultan Mehmed's army trying to catch up to them, as he did say such a thing would occur one day after Elcin left his palace. However, the flames were fanned by the arrival of an unexpected but highly-dangerous guest...
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So after going through a few more enemies and into the Sultan's tent, you'll see that this guest was none other than Prince Dracula, Vlad the Impaler, himself!
Elcin came just in time to save the Sultan from being gutted open by Vlad. He will then sic his army on you that you then have to fight off.
Afterwards, Vlad decides to take his explosive leave for now, promising revenge later for both Mehmed and Elcin!
Mehmed then urged Elcin to go after The Impaler, but Elcin still had a grudge against the Sultan, himself, for his sharp tongue at her earlier in regards to allowing her to take on this mission in the first place.
She WILL have her revenge against Prince Dracula. She saw her Sultan nothing more than as a coward that made others do his bidding.
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Go for a big fall and keep taking down the enemies you run into there. Watch out for spiked fences and catapults along the way. Your ears absolutely won't miss those catapults!
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At the end of the stage, you will fight a massive weapon made by Vlad's army: The War Dragon.
You first destroy its head and claw in the front, and then its tail in the back. This is also while killing some more enemies.
And then to finish it off, you have to destroy its exposed core in the middle, but watch out for the flames it spreads.
Watch how a charged-up, upgraded Exploding Arrow destroys this thing in one shot! I suggest saving these for bosses, as taking damage will only undue the upgrade on the arrow you had equipped by the time you got hit.
There's only one Charm to find here, but you're gonna have to fight a sasquatch to get to it. There's also an obstacle course at 4:55 that leads to another health upgrade.
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The boss of Stage 6 is a giant witch. Watch out for all of the different incantations she calls upon to turn you into bloody chum, including summoning skulls.
Eggman caught up to Shadow in the Black Comet, and demanded that he handed his 6 Chaos Emeralds over to him. Naturally, Shadow refused.
So now Eggman will just have to try and take them from him!
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Even in a completely different stage and a completely different Hero character this time, this fight still plays out in the exact same way.
Whatever. Get your fevers going on that mad doctor!
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Once again, for the third time, Eggman's Egg Dealer played a bad hand and lost to Shadow because of it.
This is Shadow's Slightly Dark - Hero resolve of who he is:
"I am Shadow the Hedgehog. I and only I know what is best. No one can tell me what to do.
This is *WHO I AM.*"
Shadow realized that Eggman annoyed him too much, and decided to finish him off with a deadly chop.
*"Nooooooo..."*
Here's the fourth and final time you'll have to hear "Almost Dead" by Powerman 5000 in my entire playthrough of this game.
And for completing both Black Comet endings, the Satellite Laser special weapon will be fully upgraded.
Moving on to Story Cycle 9! From this point on, the only endings I need to reach left are within the Heroic side of levels!
Then suddenly, Black Doom called out to Shadow. He needed his assistance to clear out an invasion that has occur at the Black Arms' home base...
The Black Comet, itself!
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I gotta say, playing this version of the Black Comet setting AFTER going through the Final Haunt take on it gave me quite the whiplash.
The music is more sinister, there's more than one type of enemy to fight, and worse of all, the entire level is flooded with a lethal poison that you'll have to constantly surf over with Flying Saucers, making the whole level feel slower-paced yet easier to screw up in compared to Final Haunt.
Here are its only two missions:
- Dark Mission: Help Black Doom destroy all 50 GUN robots found throughout the Black Comet.
- Hero Mission: Help Knuckles plunge deep through the Black Comet and reach the 6th Chaos Emerald at a Goal Ring.
I took on the Hero Mission this time, which means I get to show off the entirety of this stage now.
Chaos Control should be very handy, here.
One other thing Blaze DOES have in common with Sonic in this game? Mirage Road is the 3rd Zone for BOTH of them.
It's somewhat fun to fiddle around with Blaze's hover in the "3D" ride in the end of Act 2.
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After defeating the Egg Scarab, Blaze uses her awesome skills to knock the 3rd Sol Emerald out of it. She then continued her quest to find the remaining 4.
Her quest with Cream & Cheese led them to end up meeting up with Knuckles. It's been a while since Knuckles saw Cream, but he was suspicious of her new friend.
When Blaze was thinking about her Sol Emeralds, Knuckles had confused them for the Chaos Emeralds that exist in their world. Both sets of emeralds radiate with a similar power.
Knuckles suggest that, regardless of what jewels Blaze possessed in her hands, she should give them to Sonic for safekeeping. Blaze didn't know who Sonic was... even though she literally met him before. Must've never gotten his name...
Shadow begged Eggman to give him an answer to how he was created. Eggman confirmed that both he and Omega are of his genius, but now he wants to destroy them both for turning against him.
Omega was certain that this would be the fight where he finally takes revenge against his own creator, while the Eggman's revelation made Shadow depressed, again, now knowing that he was an android...
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This is my second Egg Breaker fight in a row for this Story Cycle. You can at most face two out of the three of them per run.
This time, if you wanna take down this version fast, go to the edge and look for a turret. Shred his health down that way.
And even if Eggman destroys your turret, that'll just transform it into a weapon that you can pick up, instead!
From there, he was scared backwards from seeing a legion of multiple Shadows. Eggman came in and called them all Shadow Androids, preparing them for a massive attack against the Black Arms.
This made Shadow wonder if he, himself, was an android...?
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Here are the three selectable missions of Iron Jungle:
- Dark Mission: Help Eggman destroy all 28 GUN robots.
- Normal Mission: Get to the Goal Ring and reach inside Eggman's base.
- Hero Mission: Help Omega take down Eggman's airship.
This time, I help Eggman make his steel forest a little bit more GUN-less.
It's kinda crazy how strong the gatling guns from the Big Foots are, yet I can shred their health down in meme seconds. I can't believe these enemies were originally bosses in Adventure 2.
You'll be going through multiple floors of these mummies and other creatures of the night. If you see water at the bottom, don't worry. It will not hurt you.
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The boss of this stage is a chained up Golem. It can create shockwaves that dash towards you, unleash uppercuts and pound the ground, slam its whole body to the ground, and shoot rocks from its hands.
To beat it, you have to attack the red gem that will either shine on its chest or forehead. If you need to reach the forehead, you can jump on its arms for a boost, or throw an Axe at it.
First off, in B1F, you need to trick an Axe Armor into smashing opening a seal door.
Eventually, the path ahead will lead to a vertical cave complex. With awkward platforming and whip ledge grabbing to do, you can eventually reach an icy portion of the cave with the door that leads to the Ice Elemental.
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Unlike the other two Elementals, this one is female, but don't underestimate her. Melt her down with the Whip of Flame if you have it.
Then with her beaten, you gain the Whip of Ice! Use all three Whips of Flame, Lightning and Ice to your advantage against different enemies!
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Later one, I finally reach one of those rides that will take me to the other floor.
During this ride, while avoiding hazards, you have to try and collect all of the coins that you find here. If you can get them all, you'll get a prize, but you'll have to make sure you're lined up right to get it, or you'll have to go all the way back to that same ride and try again.
The blue ride takes Leon from B1F to B2F. There's a red ride that does vice-versa.
One of these paths leads to the Wind-based Green Stone for Juste's whip.
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Another path least Juste to another Warp Gate, except this one was more extravagant compared to other ones.
Death was here, and he was searching for Maxim, of all people. But why...?
Death had realized that Maxim was searching for Dracula's remains after Juste brought them up. From there, Death explained to Juste that this time, Dracula's castle was created from Maxim's own will.
However, not only that, but there were actually TWO castles formed from both Maxim's will and from the Dracula remains that he urgently desires. This second spirit is the more aggressive Maxim that Juste encountered before.
For now, it was time for Death to take his leave and plan towards his Lord's revival.
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Go though the gate yourself, and you'll be in Castle B's Clock Tower.
At this point, I've already traveled through a bit of Castle B before, but now this is full recognized by the game by altering how the map displays the whole castle. You can either view just the A or B versions of the castle, or both together, and see what separate progress you've made in both.
Between Castle A & B and vice-versa, some areas in one castle may be tougher than the other. The general layouts are mostly the same, but placement of enemies, bosses, items, and other intractable elements may be completely different between castles.
There may be certain obstructions that you can't do anything about in one castle, that is until you find a weak version of that obstruction in the other castle and destroy it, allowing you a new path through both sides.
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At 10:13, I reach a special room where I have to outun a giant ball before it seals a prize path towards some goodies. It completes its roll at 11:20.
You'll be seeing that I prioritize raising Juste's Luck more than anything else. The higher the Luck, the more often he will land Critical Hits, which do DOUBLE DAMAGE!
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A boss I fight in Clock Tower B is the Peeping Big, a big Peeping Eye. I bring him down pretty fast.
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At 18:27, it's another special room that contains a special stone for Juste's whip, you're gonna have to go through a course that will lead you to a different room that will let you break down a bit of the spiraling structure that whole that item.
Then you can go back and pick it up. It is the Crushing Stone, which allows you to charge your whip for more power. You can use this to destroy cracked walls that likely annoying you throughout the playthrough.
Since the Crushing Stone is a Whip item instead of a Relic, you'll have to switch out any of your elemental stones in order to use it.
The layouts of the Zones are the same between characters, yes, but I now noticed that the Zones will have slightly different-sounding tunes depending on who's being played. Sonic's versions are the regular ones, while Blaze's versions are called "Blazy Mixes".
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No opening cutscene against Dr. Eggman for this boss fight after Act 2, and yes, Blaze also gets to fight the actual Eggman here instead of Eggman Nega like she did in Night Carnival.
His Egg Hammer Mega is fought the exact same way, though Blaze's hover should make it easier you jump over his barrel roll move. The only real big difference here is that Cream & Cheese will be your cheerleaders, now.
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After this fight, the following cutscene still start out being framed as if Sonic defeated the Egg Hammer Mega, with Eggman flying away from him in a rage.
Eggman dropped the Blue Sol Emerald. Blaze then appears from a pillar of flame, picks it up, and then takes her leave after looking at Sonic for a moment.
Focusing entirely back on the fire cat, Blaze was very quickly on the move towards searching for her 5 other missing Sol Emeralds.
Shadow & Espio were on their way out from Mad Matrix, but they were stopped and finally discovered by Dr. Eggman.
"DAMN!" shouted Espio. "We've been detected!"
Shadow took the time to ask the mad doctor some questions about his past, and who he actually is.
Eggman shrugged him off and told him that Shadow doesn't actually have any past. Espio thought Eggman was just tricking Shadow and made him focus on just fighting him, for now.
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The second and also the last time I face this version of this boss. I consider Mad Matrix's Egg Breaker the most annoying of the three.
I didn't even need Chaos Control this time.
Shadow conveniently stepped in just in time to help them out, and he was also curious of what Eggman was hiding away this time.
With a mighty karate chop, Shadow unlocked a portal into the computer. Vector assigned Espio to follow him in.
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Mad Matrix is a more aggressive version of Digital Circuit. Seems to be mostly red instead of mostly blue or purple.
Here are its three missions:
Dark Mission: Help Black Doom detonate all of the bombs to destroy the matrix's entire grid system.
Normal Mission: Get to the Goal Ring and escape from this stage!
Hero Mission: Team up with Espio to access all four terminals in the stage.
This time, I instead went with the Dark Mission. Unfortunately, it's one of the most tedious or monotonous missions in the game.
You need to keep a sharp eye on where all of those Black Bombs are. If you miss one, it may take a little go back to it.
However, probably an oversight, as long as you don't die during this mission, you're absolutely guaranteed to get an A Rank in it no matter how long you take.
You have 30 bombs to blast, and hitting each gives you 200 Dark Points. That a free 6000 for a mission that gives you an A at 4000.
I'm still not over how enemy morality works in this stage, though...
The Dark Palace of Waterfalls has the most serene music in the game, but also the most confusing layout.
In order to advance through some rooms, you need to hit switches in certain other rooms within the area's two floors in order to stop a hard flow of water blocking certain doors.
The confusing deal here is that the floors are easily traversed between each other. You have to find special rides in order to go back and forth between them. A lot of rooms are also 3-way forks that lead to different doors. For example one of them is a sealed path that can only be smashed open by tricking an Armor to do the job.
This Part just mainly focuses on 1F, but I’ll show how 2F is reached.
There will be several pools of oil that will hurt Globule if she touches them. A lot of them will have it poured in by huge faucets, and their flows can't be airdodged through. Just hit their handles to turn them off so you can progress.
There are even enemies here called Batrashias that are just literal living trash bags that jump up to dump garbage down onto our cute puppet. Try countering them!
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A reminder that the developer of this game gave me early access to this game, and all of my coverage of Former Fields was from its pre-release period.
Recording this at this point, it looks like the game received some small cosmetic updates I noticed past its full release.
- Enemies now have their names above their health bars as you hit them. More beat 'em up/Subspace Emissary influence there.
- If you manage to trigger Globule's deadly counter, the screen will now slightly flash.
More substantial updates are expected to happen past my video in the future. Including massive content additions such as new stages and characters!
This game inherited another Mega Man trait of having those Gear-Gears shoot up from the bottom of the screen when you're about to jump over a gap. Good thing you can do a full body Spinjump attack against them in midair. When they're on the ground, however, they will chase you down and chase you FAST.
One gimmick this level has is that you can use a midair attack to to climb up walls of scrap. Another gimmick is using the Spinjump to unwind tall bolts for height.
A more annoying gimmick is the Fester bugs that can't be killed, but can be knocked away. They get a bit funner if you're using them to fill your Flight Meter, though.
This doesn't seem to be a fondly-viewed level and one of the game's lower points, but I didn't really have any trouble with it.
And it even starts with a contrast in and of itself, courtesy of Shadow's opening words:
"Where's that *DAMN* fourth Chaos Emerald?!"
And apparently... that DAMN fourth Chaos Emerald was busy powering Tails' Cyclone. It was probably an overcharge, though, as the Cyclone promptly malfunctioned and crash right afterwards.
Shadow was excited to find where that Emerald landed.
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The missions you can choose in Circus Park are:
- Normal Mission: Head to the Goal Ring and get the Gray Chaos Emerald
- Dark Mission: Help Eggman destroy all of the GUN robots that have invaded his park.
- Hero Mission: Help Tails collect 400 Rings from Eggman park.
For this video, I finally played the Normal Mission, which means I finally get to show off the level in its entirety.
The Hero & Dark Missions can be finished much sooner before reaching the Goal Ring and getting that *DAMN* 4th Chaos Emerald!
Shadow & Sonic catch up to Black Doom's Eye, as he had the third Chaos Emerald that Shadow was looking for.
To Doom's words, Shadow still didn't understand the goal he had with his army compared to his goal of learning more of his past. So Black Doom summoned his Black Bull to deal with the Hedgehogs.
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Yes. Round 3! You should know by now I how I take this fat freak down. So let the video itself do the explaining for it!
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Regardless of which second stage you complete in a Story Mode run, the following cutscene remains the same:
At the White House, the President, yes, the President of the United Federation gets a report from the CIA about the Black Arms' activity. They were pushed out from Westopolis by GUN troops and they were also able to drive them away from five other cities. The CIA also had their mainframe compromised (which is what Digital Circuit is).
The President still has high hopes that the United Federation will finish the fight against the aliens - the terrorists.
He also has a fondness for how Sonic and Shadow previously saved the world. He must've gotten that picture sometime after Sonic Heroes, right?
The nature of this level's placement in the game's level progression system means that it only has two missions:
- Hero Mission: Team up with Sonic to destroy a shielded flying tank. Let it escape, and you fail the mission.
- Dark Mission: Team up with Doom's Eye to escape from the city after his army has already laid waste to it. This just means heading for the Goal Ring at the very end of this stage.
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I took on the Hero Mission again, and also showed how getting all 5 Keys in a level can be beneficial towards getting an A Rank for a mission.
Those 5 Keys will let you reach a gatling gun. Yes those same massive barrel machine guns that you get from destroying Big Foots!
With this, you'll SHRED through that flying tank in no time flat! And there's STILL an even stronger weapon that can do this *EVEN FASTER!*
This will be one of my longest runs as I will try to reach stages with their own bosses as much as possible.
So here's the 8th run!
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Every time you start a new Story Mode run, the beginning of the game will always be the same.
Sometime after the defeat of Metal Sonic in Sonic Heroes, Shadow the Hedgehog continued to wrestle with his lack of memories. He could only now remember a small amount of brief ones.
He was in some kind of space station... with him an a girl he was with being chased down by GUN soldiers.
And then suddenly... a gunshot...!
Shadow had yet to know what it all meant, or who he even was. He didn't even remember that that girl was his beloved Maria...
Suddenly, the skies were cloaked in jet black and crimson clouds, and they rained down with a new terrifying alien force known as the Black Arms. They quickly conquered the entire world in destroyed everything in sight.
Humanity was quickly at its knees, but Shadow didn't care.
But then... he was approached by the Black Arms' leader: Black Doom.
Black Doom mentioned about the "promised time" upon the Earth, but before then, he demanded Shadow to find, gather, and bring to him the 7 Chaos Emeralds.
Shadow had no clue what this was all leading up to, but he believed that searching for those emeralds will give him the answers, including the truths to his past!
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For the 5th time, here are Westopolis' three missions:
Dark: Team up with Black Doom's Eye and eliminate all of the GUN Soldiers.
Normal: Head to the Goal Ring and get the second Chaos Emerald.
Hero: Team up with Sonic and eliminate all of the Black Arms aliens.
I once again AGAIN (!!!) go through the Hero Mission with Sonic.
I'm not sure how I missed an alien, but it occasionally happens and it's annoying!
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No matter how you beat Westopolis, the next resulting cutscene plays out the same way.
Back at GUN headquarters, the GUN Commander is report of all of the destruction the Black Arms have caused. His attention didn't become extreme, however, until he was reported that Shadow was amongst the carnage.
The Gun Commander then commanded all of his troops to be deployed onto the scene to kill Shadow along with those black aliens. It seemed that getting rid of Shadow was a very personal mission for him.
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Following that, after beating Westopolis' Hero Mission, Sonic gets impressed by Shadow's sick moves and challenges him to a new competition. Shadow wasn't interested.
Black Doom's Eye then reported that his army was done with the city and wanted Shadow to move on.
Sonic saw that as more fun to be had, but Shadow wasn't gonna let him outrun him!
First off, I go through a seal door that I had already unlocked, but forgot to use before. This leads to the Ring of Fire, an accessory that will increase your defense against fire attacks.
On a more important matter, one room at 9:42 that has a door that's too far to reach. To cross this, you need to get and use the Wolf's Foot from the Anti-Soul Mysteries Lab (which itself can only be reached with the Red Phoenix Key from the House of Sacred Remains), and use its extra speed to make a further jump towards where that door is.
This will lead into a battle room against some monsters, but then after that, and a dangerous hallway towards a treasure room, you'll finally reach the Saisei Incense.
The Saisei Incense basically trades your MP for more HP. Just take note that the MP drops faster than the HP rises.
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This time, I used a Memorial Ticket to bring me back into the Save Room at the Dark Abyss hub. This can save you even more time than using a Magical Ticket to go back to Rinaldo's cottage.
Now, I'm finally gonna go into another new area again.
Right at the start of this stage, you gain the Dash ability, which lets Krog shoot forward on the ground and in the air. One of the game's Charms will reduce the cooldown time of when he can Dash again.
I also get another Heal upgrade and two more Charms.
In this level, you can hang off of rings, and then time your jumps against swinging spiked rocks. The speed of these rocks can vary.
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Stage 5's boss is a two-headed gladiator. He can dash just like Krog, though he can also launch a triple-shot from midair and use a DIVEKICK!
Beat this boss, and you'll be halfway through this game!