Metal Reign (Level Demo) 1.1

hello.
i have, an update;
for metal reign.
many changes;

okay, to start!

biggest change: the maps.

NEW MAP!
find it in crystal cove act 2.

frozen forest

a snowy... place. found in the jolly crystals of crystal cove. (blue tails? wtf??)

this and sun shore were always intended to be in the game, im just now getting around to them. sun shore will be in the next update, maybe.

i've been looking over the maps and i've tried to make them less annoying to play without completely redoing them. many "puzzles" have been changed up to be less confusing. no more button hunt.
i've also been decorating them a little more; adding some better skyboxes, y'know, just a bunch of changes to make them feel a little better.
moon monsoon's music has also been changed drastically to be actually good. take a listen:
(act 1)

(act 2) (really like this one)

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other change: the characters.
sonic: not much done with him. he's pretty much entirely the same, but his insta-shield can now reflect projectiles like i wanted. nothin else. he's fast, get used to it.

(won't work on every projectile. like arrows, lasers, n stuff. the game crashes whenever i try, so... eh.)

knuckles: his damn dive move. no more multplicative speed. way too op, and kinda makes him a non-character in my opinion. it's been replaced with something more akin to a drill dive.
you keep your momentum, but you dive down quickly. useful for slopes.

amy: i couldn't find out why she spins when a level is starting. fuck it, she balls.
her moves are pretty much exactly the same, but her hammer twister (new name) now has a color indication to show how much longer you have until the move runs out.

fang: mega fang? metal reign yellow? deltareign? mr8bdm? eh, not really.
fang's buster can now be charged. it does triple damage and pierces enemies. costs 5 ammo, tho.
ALSO, you can now reload by holding tossflag whenever you have no ammo left. it'll give you 32.

metal sonic: idk he's still perfect.

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there've been quite a bit more changes, but i don't know what else to highlight in this update specifically. you really gotta play it for yourself to see how different it is. most changes start after blue bushes, though.
so
here's a changelog of all the stuff i bothered to log while i was working on this:

Spoiler: changelog (big changes)

momentum works for 2.14 and above. stopped working after 2.13, tragically.
added frozen forest; a jolly update indeed.
includes a route to it via crystal cove act 2.
edited most level designs quite a bit to be a little more clear and forgiving. a little. might still need work.
these include:
bbz2, ccz1, ccz2, ppz1, ppz2, ffz
remade the intro to bbz1 cutscene. now i can place custom objects in zone builder.
updated Moon Monsoon's zone theme.
act 1 is no longer mid, genesiSF music.
act 2 also went with it.
finished/edited some skyboxes in mmz1 and the entirety of palace peak.
fixed that lightning shield/force shield bug where you could constantly re-use your air ability. at least, it seems to be fixed from what i've done.
got rid of every lightning shield you can reasonably find because ofc it didn't get fixed.
not including sonic's rebound dash.
i tried running the numbers... and they started giving me smack...
changed knuckles' ability to somewhat of a drill dive. original was op, even though i knew it was.
the second dash is now a static one that propels you forward for a second, before wearing out your glide.
fixed special stage 5's wrong loop point.
how embarrassing from a musician myself...
removed the extra armageddon ability for now. it's buggy, and it's not too useful in this mod where we have characters like amy.

Spoiler: changelog (small changes)

fixed that one speed crystal in crystal cove 2's other section which now leads to the frozen forest route. the one that now has points in it.
slightly edited sonic's win sprite. might do more with this.
lowered tails' thrustfactor by ONE. just one.
gave knuckles a stronger spindash for the sake of having an actually fun experience.
metal's jet dash now retains dashmode as well as its properties in the second dash.
checkpoint sectors made so that touching the actual checkpoint is no longer necessary most of the time.
did a magical method that made a bunch of textures, like, a quarter of their original filesizes.
it did not affect the overall filesize that much, sadly.
added resolve to self to conclude that metal reign is simply a spiritual successor to sonic cd level design, and totally not directionless at times.
effect changes:
amy's trail is now additive instead of multiplicative. i also got rid of her run sprites. the 2.14 ones are very well done.
fang's gun trail looks a tiny bit better.
changed knuckles' drill dive particles from dust to sparks.
changed sonic's rebound dash circle... thing. back to its original shape. was barely visible.
changed metal's jet dash stuff.
i didn't do anything for tails here, i just like having all 6 chars talked about here.
changed several sprites according to available 2.14 sprites.
added an actual version number that isn't under 0. thanks me.
ppz3 has a more appropriate introduction.
made sonic's sprite changes actually palette consistent. more of an internal thing.
fixed that one thing where the camera would start bugging out towards the end of the fatal fleet elevator.
raised metal's normalspeed to 47, instead of 43.
fixed a bug where custom debris wouldn't appear. spr bug.
updated spr2's to sorta mesh with 3d models (custom, kinda) better.
added captions for some custom sounds.
also added a lot more custom sounds.
forcibly removed fang boss.
remade the little scene in fatal fleet section 3.

guys can you please speedrun more than blue bushes i promise it's fun