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Blinx: The Time Sweeper

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Title Screen

BLiNX: The Time Sweeper

Developer: Artoon
Publisher: Microsoft Game Studios
Platform: Xbox
Released in JP: December 12, 2002
Released in US: October 7, 2002
Released in EU: November 8, 2002


DevTextIcon.png This game has hidden development-related text.
GraphicsIcon.png This game has unused graphics.
ModelsIcon.png This game has unused models.
MovieIcon.png This game has unused cinematics.
ItemsIcon.png This game has unused items.
MusicIcon.png This game has unused music.
TextIcon.png This game has unused text.
DebugIcon.png This game has debugging material.
LevelSelectIcon.png This game has a hidden level select.
Carts.png This game has revisional differences.


Hmmm...
To do:
  • There are a few files with "Test" and "Beta" in the filename.
  • Earlier, simpler version of the loading save animation.
  • The texture for Blinx's jacket is a picture of someone's actual jacket, even with their hand partially visible.
  • 3 weird renders for Blinx.
  • Several unused objects and a few items with no icons are still in the game. "Bossbomb" and a plank are just a few of them.
  • The models should have a proper way to open them.
  • Several unused screens such as "Sound Test" and "Thank you for playing the BLiNX E3 Demo" still exist in the game's code.
  • The Platinum Hits release seems to use stages from an older demo build with slight modifications.
  • The unused internal names are used in an unused stage select on the title screen.
  • There are several unused lines of text within the tutorials and menu screens.
  • Check the Japanese release for differences from the Platinum Hits version, as they are very similar.
  • There is still more to find in the game's animations and model data when ripping characters is possible.

Microsoft's attempt at creating a mascot character for the Xbox. Because the last orange cat mascot worked out well.

Sub-Page

Blinx-GraphicsSubpage.png
Early Graphics
Thomas was everywhere.

Unused Videos

matu

Two alternate clips from the game's opening. Besides being longer and missing visual effects and audio, the first clip is reversed from the opening, and the second one has explosions. These can be seen in a trailer for the game.

Leftover Trailer from the Official Xbox Magazine and TGS 2002 (Xbox ISM) Demo Discs

blinx_pr001_jp.sfd blinx_pr001.sfd

What looks like an early intro video, but could also have been made as a trailer, since it shows a release date at the end.

E3 Opening

E3 Final

Audio couldn't be found for the E3 opening so the audio from the final game was used over it.

Notable differences:

  • Every gameplay segment was rerecorded, the final shows off more.
  • The font used for time controls was changed.
  • The Dust Keeper boss is colored red here instead of yellow. This seems to have been changed very late in development, as it appears red in all early footage, and even in the final game's prologue cutscene.
  • The Dust Keeper summons a large boulder instead of a 16-ton weight.

Time Square Music

The last 20 seconds of the music for the game's first round aren't played in-game, because it loops right before it.

Other tracks have something similar, however it's usually just an echo effect for a second.

Alternate Time Up Audio

A much longer and simpler version of the time up audio. Oddly, it's the last of the numbered tracks, the used version is one of the first.

Used Unused

Demo Leftovers

Hmmm...
To do:
There's more, hidden in the main menu graphics.

Used in the TGS2002 demo (Publicly released on the Xbox ISM 2002 disc).

Blinx-JPDemo2.png

Used in the Japanese demo released a month after TGS2002.
Blinx-JPDemo1.png

Used in both available demos for the US release of BLiNX: The Time Sweeper.
Blinx-USDemo.png

Save/Load?

Blinx-Load.png

Blinx-Save.png

It's not clear what these were used for, they likely were used for saving and loading the game, but could also have been used to debug the time control game mechanics and replays.

Unused Item

Elementary, my dear Cactus.
This needs some investigation.
Discuss ideas and findings on the talk page.
Specifically: This can be added in by replacing 0x0B (the flower pot near the second button in round 1-1) in the stage object table in the xbe at address 0x351EE0 with 0x53 (normal bullet). There is also "Bossbomb"(0x57, has no icon and works like a regular bomb), 2 piles of bricks (0x35 and 0x36) and "plank" (0x24).
Early Later
Blinx-Shop-Bullet"Early".pngBlinx-Shop-3Bullet"Early".png Blinx-Shop-Bullet"Final".pngBlinx-Shop-3Bullet"Final".png

Hidden Font Text

Blinx-font.png

Hidden within the font texture is text that shows the name and size of the font used.

Unused World Titles

In all versions of Blinx: The Time Sweeper there are unused internal names for all of the levels.

rd1 pelura 1 
rd1 pelura 2 
rd1 pelura 3
rd1 boss
rd2 canal 1 
rd2 canal 2 
rd2 canal 3
rd2 boss
rd3 cave 1
rd3 cave 2
rd3 cave 3
rd3 boss
rd4 kortam 1
rd4 kortam 2
rd4 kortam 3
rd4 boss
rd5 words 1
rd5 words 2
rd5 words 3
rd5 boss
rd6 valley 1
rd6 valley 2
rd6 valley 3
rd6 boss
bossrush 1
bossrush 2
bossrush 3
bossrush 4
rd7 sunless 1
rd7 sunless 2
rd7 sunless 3
rd7 boss
rd8 fwire 1
rd8 fwire 2
rd8 fwire 3
rd8 boss
last demo
rd10-1(ending)
-----
last boss

Revisional Differences

Hmmm...
To do:
Get screenshots and see if there are any other changes.

Later releases of the game added demos and previews of other games. Within the demo files is some dummied out text in the credits for NFL Fever 2003:

# CREDITS.TXT
#
# This file contains the data for the scrolling credits screen.
#
# How it works:
#
# Lines that start with a # are comments and will be ignored.
# Blank lines will also be ignored -- to have a blank line in the credit scroll,
# make a line containing a single space.
#
# Lines beginning with an @ are directives. The following directives
# are available:
#
# @align [left|right|center] : specify alignment of the scrolling text
# @font  [fontname]          : specify the font of the text. Valid values are:
#                                body, title, button, debug, quartz, body_small,
#                                help, script_title, bignums, online, bigtext
#                                Omit fontname for default
# @linespace [#]             : specify the number of pixels between lines, or
#                              omit for default 
#
# All other lines are scrolling text. A backslash (\) is used for formatting.
# The following formatting tags are available:
#
# \b  : toggle boldface
# \i  : toggle italics
# \n  : normal (boldface + italics off)
# \s  : toggle drop shadow (default = on)
# \c  : color (follow with 8 hex digits describing the color as AARRGGBB, or
#       00000000 to revert to default color)
# \\  : backslash (use if you actually want a backslash character)
# 
# Directives and formatting tags are case-insensitive.
#

# End of credits
(Source: Dr. Yay (Almost everything here), Techinicabor (Ripping blinx_pr001.sfd & blinx_pr001_jp.sfd), Blinxglitchesxboxgames (Looking through the game's memory for unused functions & objects))