Pikmin 2

Pikmin 2 eschews the survival aspect of the first game in favor of money, money, and money. Olimar and Louie must erase their company's debt by collecting blatant product placement ancient artifacts and throwing Pikmin at anything that moves.

This article brought to you by DURACELL®.

Test Map
FVqTE3L1sTE A fully functional test map can be found on the disc at /user/Kando/map/newtest. While there's no known way to access it properly, the level model and object data can be swapped with The Perplexing Pool's (yakushima) on the disc with this RAR file:

Development Strings
These strings were never intended to be seen.

This message was moved (ID 1005) This message was moved (ID 1006)

Test Area (ID 8394) Test Area (ID 8394_01) Test Area (ID 8394_02) Test Area (ID 8394_03)

Filler Log Entries
This text is stored with the Piklopedia and Treasure Log template text.

Piklopedia
Stretches its neck to look for prey. When it finds Pikmin, it gobbles them up instead of chasing them.

Treasure Hoard
A hard, shiny rock. Highly valuable. Makes an excellent gift.

Test Messages
Test Message 9995 Test Message 9996 AquickbrownFoxJumpsoverthelazy

Treasure Log Alerts
These messages were seen in early versions of the game on the treasure collection screen.

It's been added to your Treasure Log!

You can't log this treasure until you reach the surface.

Development Text
Hidden in the ISO, along with some standard error messages, are these odd strings:
 * :  (Don't do that!)

Alternate Title Graphics
Present in /user/Kando/develop/sysres.arc.

Japanese Title


Title.bti

This is "Pikmin" in blue chrome(?).

English Title


Title2.bti

A very blue and electrified Pikmin 2 title.

Development Graphics
Graphics for two development programs are present in /user/Kando/develop.

Map Editor


mapeditor.arc

Map editor icons, including a mouse and zoom button, as well as GameCube buttons.



mapcode_tex.arc

Graphics for every type of surface on the main fields.

Route Manager


routeMgr.arc

Arrows to indicate the Pikmin's route settings.

Miscellaneous Icons


j2dtest.arc

Graphics from Mappy, which was developed by Namco, appear in the game files. They were likely just used for testing purposes, and not meant to appear in the final game. Interestingly, it uses the original power-up graphics.



/user/kando/texcaster/arc.szs

A really weird icon. It's either garbled, or just served as a test texture.

Map Screen Mockup
An early map screen is stored in /new_screen/jpn/worldmap.szs, texture name world_map_info_00. It is very different from the final map screen:
 * The top bar is entirely occupied by a Pokos count. 回収したお宝の金額 translates as "Number of recovered treasures".
 * The day graphic was moved to the lower-right, which is occupied by the Treasure Hoard and Piklopedia buttons in the mockup.
 * The buttons to access the Piklopedia and Treasure Hoard were changed from Y and X to L and R. The Treasure Hoard is called お宝図鑑, or "Treasure Encylopedia", in the mockup.
 * There are four caves with the same name: 最低最悪の洞窟, or "Absolute Worst Cave". This is an early name for the Dream Den. and is referred to as such in the configuration files. The map name is のぞみの大地, or "Land of Hope", the Japanese name for the Wistful Wild.

Perplexing Pool Wire-frame


This is a wire-frame image of the Perplexing Pool found in the Piklopedia. This is based on an earlier version of the Perplexing Pool: the starting area is noticeably different. It can be faintly seen decorating the background on the Piklopedia, but only a portion of it is shown. It's also on the file selection menu's files, for whatever reason.

Piklopedia Dummy Image
This dummy image is found in the Piklopedia, probably used in development for creatures that did not have a finished icon.

Treasure Hoard Carcass
This texture is found among the Treasure Hoard icon textures. It's present in all versions, and it's called teki_carcass.

Waterwraith Dummy Texture
A dummy texture present in the Waterwraith's model file. Because the Waterwraith's main look is created with frame buffer shaders, this underlying texture is never normally seen, and may have been present to warn the modeler that the shader is missing.

This texture is also used in The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess, where it presumably had the same purpose.

Weighted Platform Test Model


A test model for the weighted platforms can be found in /user/Kando/objects/downfloor/backup/downfloor.arc.

Unused Roulette Wheel slots
When you collect a cherry in 2-Player Battle, you get to use one power. These 3 textures are found alongside the possible powerup textures. It seems like they would drop the corresponding enemies on the opponent's army, but they might have been removed for being too cheap. These can be found in /user/Kando/vstex/arc.szs, and there's also a duplicate of teki_otakara.bti (the Dweevil one) under the name teki_otakara_old.bti.

Unused Lighting
All lighting files can be found in /user/Abe/cave.

Jyoou_light
Probably used for the Hole of Beasts at some point in development. (Jyoou means "Queen".)

Sirohana_light
"Sirohana" translates as "white flower", so it's a safe bet that these files were once intended for the White Flower Garden.

Other


Muraon_light_lv0 and muraon_light_lv3

While muraon_light files 1-2 and 4 are used, these variants are not.



Key_light_lv0

This is a slightly brighter version of the lighting used in the Snack Hall challenge level.



Light_blue and light_red

These lighting files use an earlier format than the others, so the only way to get these to work right is to import the RGB and light settings into a different file. It's possible that these settings were meant for Olimar and Louie, who would light the caves with their tracking beacons. Or they could just be test files.

Unused Corpse Values
The following enemies leave corpses and are not found above ground, leaving these seed values unused.

Unused Map Units
Caves are made up of randomly laid out map units (located on /user/Mukki/mapunits/units), specific to each sublevel. These units are unused:

Waterwraith Oddities

 * As mentioned above, the Waterwraith has a dummy texture.
 * In the game's files, all sublevels of the Submerged Castle contain a BlackMan_fue_pullout object. This is the Waterwraith (BlackMan) holding the Professional Noisemaker (pullout). It's weird that it's set to hold the Professional Noisemaker when you can't even harm it, on sublevels 1 to 4.
 * All sublevels have a timer setting that makes the creature spawn when it reaches 0. This timer is worth 15 on the last sublevel, as opposed to the others' 300. However, on the last sublevel, the Waterwraith can only spawn when you go inside the arena, leaving this unique timer unused.