What if DCZ was combined with GEZ?

[ZarroTsu]

IRC:

Spoiler

<ZarroTsu> why not merge dark city and grand eggship
<ZarroTsu> I mean you have skyboxes now
<Nev3r> ZarroTsu, grand eggship was previously removed from the plan
<Nev3r> it was called doomship
<ZarroTsu> having an entire city lift off the ground is possible now
<Nev3r> XD
<Nev3r> that's
<HellHawkX> Quantum locking?
<Nev3r> actually a pretty good idea
<HellHawkX> It's possible in real life as well
<HellHawkX> if we had that much energy...
<@SpiritCrusher> Don't give Nev3r ideas! He'll never make RVZ2 now!
<HellHawkX> and budget to make it as well...
<Badz> oh man
<ZarroTsu> he'll make grand city eggship instead
<Badz> Dark City turning into a spaceship would be hilarious
<D00D64-X> just lift the entire map into space
<D00D64-X> call it a different zone
<XSpeedGodX> and make volume 2 already :<
<MonsterIestyn> Dark Eggship Zone
<MonsterIestyn> DEZ
<MonsterIestyn> Death Egg Zone
<HellHawkX> DUN DUN DUN
<MonsterIestyn> [15:41] <Badz> Dark City turning into a spaceship would be hilarious <-- City on spaceship
<ZarroTsu> PSO2 shit
<ZarroTsu> with eggman at the helm
<MonsterIestyn> Dark City is rocketed into space along with Sonic
<XSpeedGodX> <MonsterIestyn> Dark Eggship Zone <-- Now that I think about it... wouldn't that be cool? I mean, a bunch of buildings flying on the edge of the atmosphere all somehow intertwined with one giant ship
<MonsterIestyn> Intertwined?
<MonsterIestyn> I imagine it more like the rocket is taking all the ground with Dark City on with it
<XSpeedGodX> Like, connected somehow
<Badz> If dark-boring city is going to happen, it should at least have that
<XSpeedGodX> maybe through large tubs or rods or w/e
<@SpiritCrusher> What makes you think DCZ will be boring?
<ZarroTsu> and besides that I don't know how you guys would fit two more zones into the structure with there being special stages based off of the zones
<XSpeedGodX> and maybe flip gravity or 0 gravity can be introduced
<Badz> It's a city that's dark
<XSpeedGodX> So that ERZ wouldn't be such a stunning shift
<Badz> Dunno, the name just sounds really uninteresting
<@SpiritCrusher> Red Volcano, however, sounds really exciting and creative ;)
<Warpshade_> Ah yes, name interestingness, the most useful of measuring sticks.
<Badz> Well if you ask me
<Badz> a volcano that's red is still more interesting than a city that's dark
<ZarroTsu> no see, dark city zone doesn't sound like it would be very good because the facts stand that it is (a) after the volcano level, and (b) doesn't have any gimmicks I can think of aside from sewers and bottomless pits. Possible gangster robots, but you could just ignore them anyway.
<XSpeedGodX> Badz has a point
<Badz> But then again, there's a lot of stuff in a city
<Badz> It could probably make an interesting level
<D00D64-X> The city's gimmick would be just falling apart all the time
<D00D64-X> like the newer donkey kong games or that one adventure mod
<XSpeedGodX> no
<MonsterIestyn> Abandoned Metropolis Zone
<D00D64-X> it would al just colapse constantly
<ZarroTsu> dark city x grand eggship would be more interesting because you still get the city gimmicks but don't have to drag it out into two acts when the 2nd act involves the entire city crumbling away into a giant spaceship
<Badz> What ZarroTsu said
<ZarroTsu> which would be awesome
<MonsterIestyn> dark city x grand eggship, SRB2 Zone shipping
<D00D64-X> but the problem with all this
<ZarroTsu> I'd rather awesome over SRB1
<D00D64-X> is that grand eggship would then be more powerful than eggrock
<D00D64-X> I mean, te Grand Eggship just PICKS UP a city
<ZarroTsu> no the city is the eggship
<D00D64-X> what does Egg Rock do? Blast one? Boring.
<MonsterIestyn> Grand Eggship is all ship and no power
<D00D64-X> Why would the city not just be egg rock
<ZarroTsu> because eggman is transporting the city TO eggrock
<Badz> Because egg rock is an asteroid
<D00D64-X> That all sounds ridiculously stupid
<MonsterIestyn> No rooom for massive weapons WHEN YOURE CARRYING A CITY
<D00D64-X> parody level stupid
<ZarroTsu> and then eggman has to break parts of the city off because sonic is getting closer
<Badz> You could take a simpler approach
<Badz> At the end of DCZ1, you find yourself upon eggman's base that is a gargantuan metallic building
<Badz> And then act 2 reveals that it's actually a spaceship
<ZarroTsu> d00d which would you prefer, a level that is borderline parody but fucking awesome, or two levels that are dull and don't really have their own gimmicks that other levels already did better
<MonsterIestyn> Egg Rock sounds like it stole all of Grand Eggship's ideas anyway
<MonsterIestyn> I always imagined Grand Eggship as a rocket leading towards Egg Rock
<ZarroTsu> <MonsterIestyn> Egg Rock sounds like it stole all of Grand Eggship's ideas anyway <- that's kind of my point there
<MonsterIestyn> With *some* space gimmicks but not with Egg Rock style technology
<ZarroTsu> at least if dark city and eggship combined you could have the city falling apart as the gimmick

The idea is simple. Since Egg Rock took all the space gimmicks, and Dark City can't really be more difficult and interesting than a volcano without being unfair or counter-intuitive (Unless there's some crazy-good dev discussion that I'm unaware of), why not just merge the two?

The city is the Grand Eggship. Lifting off, breaking apart, Sonic and co. running from place to place as the city collapses and burns up in the atmosphere.

Discuss below, tell me it's a horrible idea, whathaveyou.

 

[SeventhSentinel]

Personally, I like it, but it sounds hard to execute properly.

 

[Larz T]

I'm assuming that these will be just one act zones?

 

[furythehog]

personally i'd rather see them remain separate, I know DCZ doesnt SOUND interesting, but I think i'd quite like to see the city as a city, not as some weird flying city battlestation, as the IRC log says, that would sort of overshadow ERZ, which wouldnt be right.

 

[ZX]

I actually quite like the idea of that. It would be interesting to see the various ways in which the gimmick could be executed. ex: Get close enough to one section of the level, and a huge chunk of it that you were about to go to crumbles away, forcing you to take another path. I think a lot of neat things could come from the idea.

 

[Unknownlight]

Man, I love this.

and besides that I don't know how you guys would fit two more zones into the structure with there being special stages based off of the zones

Let's say we take "Eggship City" Zone and make that SS7. Then, the ERZ assets can be used for the first phase of Final Fight Zone (the Super Sonic boss, which I'm assuming will be a NiGHTS level), before transitioning to outer space (or wherever) in the pinch phase.

 

[wolfs]

I think it's generally a good idea, although I would structure it differently. Maybe just have act 1 be Dark City Zone and have that end with you boarding the Grand Eggship to Egg Rock?

 

[Boom Sanic]

What if Act 1 was Dark City, Act 2 was boarding/ in Grand Eggship Zone, and Act 3 was the boss. Most likely Brak Eggman.

 

[Sergeant Brown]

I'm still hoping to have Grand Eggship-ish Zone have the same gimmick as Egg Rocket from Sonic Advance 1.

My idea is awesome devs, and you know it.

 

[Ice]

It sounds awesome! Everyone knows the dev team's level designers work slower than molasses, though, so we should just start making the zone ourselves and beg the devs to include it in the game

 

[Goldenhog]

This is an amazing idea. The game should totally be like, you're in Dark City Zone Act 1, and you see buildings and such falling apart as you progress to the end, and then BAM, giant fuckin' airbase! Then, Grand Eggship Zone Act 2 goes all out with the crumbling city in the sky thing. And Act 3 would have Brak Eggman as was intended.

Then, the ERZ assets can be used for the first phase of Final Fight Zone (the Super Sonic boss, which I'm assuming will be a NiGHTS level)

I also agree with this. I mean, by this point the player has to know more or less how NiGHTS works, so why not?

 

[Jellybones]

Well, this is funny. There is a movie called Dark City and it has a major plot twist- the city that the inhabitants live in is actually a space ship traveling through space.

I have nothing useful to add, it's just an oddly wonderful coincidence.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0118929/

 

[akirahedgehog]

You could use scrolling textures in the skybox to make a very convincing blast off sequence using separate layers for clouds and maybe falling debris. If the city blasts off and then falls back how do our heroes ever make it to Egg Rock though?

 

[Unknownlight]

Who says it falls back?

 

[akirahedgehog]

Who says it falls back?

running from place to place as the city collapses and burns up in the atmosphere

That would suggest atmospheric reentry or just sections of it are falling off which would still complicate things.

 

[Unknownlight]

Ah. I was imagining a city being built on top of a spaceship, and the city gets slowly stripped away as the ship makes its way into space.

 

[Daywalker]

Entirely possible. Besides, if the Red Volcano Zone Act 2 was going to be Blue Mountain Zone earlier on I do not see why it would be counted out for reasons other than level design ideas and interest in making the Zone; it would be similar to how Sky Chase Zone and Wing Fortress Zone from Sonic 2 were to each other if they were combined.

Even though it feels like Egg Rock Zone took all of the good gimmicks that would work for it there are others that can work for it. A reoccurring gimmick that can show up in the regular acts could be a security system that can alter the path that you can take if you trip the lasers or other obstacles that would cause certain traps to be activated. Brak Eggman's rockets from 2.0 could be used as one of the gimmicks for Act 2 since that will be moreover to the ship portion. The collapsing sections makes me think of something more on the lines of how Egg Rocket Zone from Sonic Advance was. The current arena for Brak Eggman would still work in this type of level too since it would be right at home with the theme of the level, the backdrop may be the only thing to change to appear as more of an entrance to Egg Rock Zone or something if it needs to adjusted for whatever reason.

I would like to see the Zones happen still in some shape or form. I am interested in seeing this type of zone done properly in a OLDC to show that it is possible and that it can be a fun stage to play through that still would stand out if added to the official rotation.

 

[Metal96]

This is literally one of the coolest ideas to hit SRB2MB. The ship would be buried, thus it taking chunks of city with it as it lifts off. Besides just crumbling/falling gimmicks, you could also do construction gimmicks, where the level is "constructed" from floating pieces of city as you go through it. Slap some moving textures on the skybox, and you have it.

I'd say have act 1 move into the city from the surrounding area, e.g. mountain -> 1/2 way through city. Regular city gimmicks would be used here, and you could have that bridge from the Sonic movie (that brak was based on). Act II would begin normally, but suddenly RUMBLE: a cut-away cam triggers to a mini-model of the city away from the map proper where we see the centermost parts lift off with a rocket underneath. Cut back to our hero, and have collapsing/construction gimmicks, gravity things, etc. A part could also happen where you trigger an executor to drop "clouds" and change the sky to space... Act III would take place in a large control room/bridge type area, where we can see the Egg Rock through the front window.

Glorious.

HEY!

If you wanted to get REALLY fancy, the city rests atop the Death Egg mk. II (or III if you count S4E2 as a game) which lifts off and then merges with the asteroid, creating Egg Rock. That'd be sick but probably really impractical.

Hell, I've even got some ideas for execution:

Use scrolling textures/moving FOF's inside a skybox to simulate moving through the atmosphere. When liftoff occurs, a skybox with buildings as middle textures would have its floor drop, giving a parallax liftoff effect. Clouds would be FOFs that continuously fall at different rates, giving a random falling appearance. When the thick cloud cover is entered, the cloud FOF density would become thicker and darker, by appear/disappear-ing the appropriate FOFs. When the cloud cover is broken through, the exact same effect with the city could be executed, but instead the textures would be CEZ1's clouds turned upside down. When space is entered, it could be shown by having a skybox with an Earth/Mobius circular floor texture, so that if you look down, you see the planet beneath you without having to do a sky texture hack.

This can work. This can literally work.

 

[Boom Sanic]

Yeah, Act 1 would be the actual city. Act 2 would be getting in the Grand Eggship or just the ship itself. Finally, Act 3 would feature the boss with Brak with Egg Rock in the distance.

 

[Metal96]

I might try to mock something of this in the near future, just to see how it looks...With tallpatches, rendering out huge cloud/building textures would be no problem, easily making effective vertical parallax scrolling possible.