Proto:Mega Man X3 (SNES)/August Prototypes/The Eight Mavericks
This is a sub-page of Proto:Mega Man X3 (SNES)/August Prototypes.
Contents
Blast Hornet / Explose Horneck
Minimap
August builds | Final |
---|---|
: Power-up : Boss room : Bit/Byte room : Sub-boss room : Ride Armor platform |
: Power-up |
There's an extra block to the left of the Ride Armor platform in the earlier minimap. This is just taken up by a solid 256x256 block in both versions, and since it's not something the player can actually access, it was removed from the final game's minimap.
Level Graphics
August builds | Final |
---|---|
A few changes on the default wall block, all of them on the left side. This (hopefully) keeps the player from noticing that the blocks are used throughout the stage.
August 9th build | Final |
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The helicopter inside the base was redrawn, and the simple fading cycling palette was changed to a slightly more complicated blue-to-orange cycle.
August builds | Final |
---|---|
Gravity Beetle's cargo ship doesn't have a Dr. Doppler logo in the August prototypes. That logo's palette made the yellow lights on the ship red.
Layout
August builds | Final |
---|---|
The floor to the right of the elevator shaft is raised in the earlier layout, but it's flat in the final version. That raised floor is where the camera locks in both versions, so this might have been done to make sure that X doesn't get stuck in the floor when the screen locks, but there doesn't seem to be a way to do this in any version of the game.
August 9th build | Final |
---|---|
An extra platform was placed before the pink Light Capsule.
In both versions, the player is expected to use the Hawk Ride Armor to get to this capsule. However, in the August 9th prototype, the player can also walk up to the capsule in the Ride Armor, something that the game doesn't know how to handle. Once the Light Capsule opens, X will be flung to the right side while still technically in the Ride Armor: At this point, he'll either fall through the floor or eventually get the enhancement chip. After getting the chip, X will be able to fire his weapons while still inside the Ride Armor. Exiting the Ride Armor will fix this glitch.
August 9th build | Final |
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The floor underneath the final conveyor belt in the first section extends enough to the left to let the player just drop off the belt and land safely below. In the final game, that floor is now horizontally level with the conveyor belt, so the player will fall in the pit if they're not paying attention. Like, maybe they fall asleep or something.
August builds | Final |
---|---|
There are two more raised(?) platform sections on either side of the Ride Armor room entrance in the August prototypes.
August builds | Final |
---|---|
The floor under the lift platform that leads out of the Ride Armor secret room was removed in the final version.
This was done to fix a glitch where X can trigger the Ride Armor and then quickly dash to the right, leave the Ride Armor on the floor, and then respawn the lift platform. This will push the Ride Armor into the left wall or the floor on the right. X can then get back into the Ride Armor, where he'll end up getting stuck in the floor or wall. If he's in the wall and jumps, he'll be pushed through the floor and die.
August builds | Final |
---|---|
There's a vertical boss shutter in the top-right of Blast Hornet's boss room. There's a placeholder vertical door object above that door in all versions, but it doesn't seem like X would use it; Rather, the door would open automatically as part of Blast Hornet's boss intro - this is probably why he pauses a bit before he drops down. Doesn't seems like that was ever programmed, though, so the final version just erases the boss door and makes the ceiling horizontally symmetrical.
Oh, and the netting in the foreground is more torn up in the final version.
Miscellaneous
- The Shurikein sub-boss went through a number of changes:
- It has 32 HP in the August builds and 18 HP in the final version.
- In the August prototypes, Shurikein uses a variation of the standard enemy damage table. In the final version, it uses Tunnel Rhino's damage table:
X.Buster | Acid.R | P.Bomb | T.Thunder | S.Blade | Ray.S | B.Hole | Frost.S | Tornado.F | |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
August builds | 3 (Normal) 5 (Half-charged) 8 (Charged) |
0 (Normal drop) 15 (Small drops) 6 (Charged) |
10 (Normal) N/A (Charged) |
30 (Normal) 32 (Charged) |
25 (Normal) 32 (Charged) |
1 (Normal) 1 (Capsule) |
N/A (Normal) N/A (Charged) |
5 (Normal) 5 (Charged) |
N/A (Normal) 1 (Charged) |
Final | 1 (Normal) 1 (Half-charged) 2 (Charged) |
3 (Normal drop) 2 (Small drops) 5 (Charged) |
N/A (Normal) 2 (Charged) |
N/A (Normal) 2 (Charged) |
1 (Normal) 1 (Charged) |
1 (Normal) 2 (Capsule) |
N/A (Normal) N/A (Charged) |
1 (Normal) 1 (Charged) |
N/A (Normal) N/A (Charged) |
- In the earlier versions, it's only invincible for 8 frames after taking damage. In the final version, this lasts a full 60 frames.
- The prototype Shurikein only rolls up the walls, and it will keep doing so until it's destroyed. In the final game it will either roll up the walls, roll back and forth, or bounce around the room. It also pauses a bit before switching patterns.
- The Z-Saber shockwave which should immobilize enemies in August prototypes will make prototype Shurikein invincible instead.
Blizzard Buffalo / Frozen Buffalio
Minimap
August builds | Final |
---|---|
: Power-up : Boss room : Bit/Byte room : Ride Armor platform : Vile capsule |
: Power-up |
No layout changes in the minimap, but it's nice that the early minimap properly marks both sections of the Blizzard Buffalo boss area.
Level Graphics
Earliest | Early | Final |
---|---|---|
The August prototypes' blizzard foreground layer is simpler than the one used in the final version, made up of fewer frames, and has a simpler snowfall animation. The final version is definitely an improvement, especially with those stationary white pixels gone.
The August 9th's version of the blizzard graphic is animated at half-speed, though the actual blizzard layer moves at twice the speed of other versions.
Early | Final |
---|---|
The wind that the blizzard machine spews out is different in the prototypes. It looks like it should come out as one continuous stream of wind, like the whirlpools in Launch Octopus's stage in Mega Man X, but in all versions the wind comes out about once every 7 frames. With the blizzard layer it almost works, but in the end they decided to redo the sprite anyway.
Layout
August builds | Final |
---|---|
There are more man-made structures in the foreground of the first part of the underground section of the level. There's also an additional layer of ice before the Bit/Byte shutters, which leads to an interesting glitch in both August prototypes.
If the player, as X, dashes towards the shutters and switches to Zero right before X is about to hit them, there will be just enough momentum to make Zero hit the shutters before the game tries to switch back to X. When this happens, the "Zero, I'll handle this" sequence will play with static in place of X's picture, and the player will maintain control of Zero for the rest of the stage. Zero can even fight Bit / Byte and Blizzard Buffalo!
August builds | Final |
---|---|
The same foreground changes seen in the underground section's entrance can be seen in the exit.
Miscellaneous
- In the August 9th build, switching characters during the blizzard section will make the snowfall layer start moving vertically, looping around the screen. This was fixed by the August 23rd prototype.
- The ice fragments that should appear when Blizzard Buffalo's Ice Bullets break are glitched in the August 23rd prototype only. The graphics for those fragments are in Blizzard Buffalo's tileset, it's just that the offsets the game uses for them seem to be incorrect. They work properly in the August 9th build.
- In the final version, Blizzard Buffalo will move back a bit to fire Ice Bullets at X if he continuously clings to one wall; This isn't coded in either of the August prototypes, so he'll try to ram into the wall again or shoot Ice Bullets into the wall, where they'll immediately break.
- This extra check seems to have introduced a new exploit in the final version: if X jumps over Blizzard Buffalo after he rams into a wall, then jumps again right after Blizzard Buffalo turns around to attack, he'll charge back into the wall again. This is not present in the prototype.
Gravity Beetle / Gravity Beetbood
Minimap
August builds | Final |
---|---|
: Power-up : Boss room : Bit/Byte room : Ride Armor platform |
: Power-up |
No minimap layout changes here.
Level Graphics
August builds | Final |
---|---|
The background is obviously a few blocks repeated over and over in the earlier versions. The final version's background fixes this by adding more light, missile, and crate tiles, as well as arranging them in a more interesting way.
Layout
August builds | Final |
---|---|
There's an extra Wall Cancer on the left wall before the Bit/Byte room.
August builds | Final |
---|---|
The background of the Bit/Byte room was redone to add an opening in the foreground.
August builds | |
---|---|
Final |
The falling platform section of the stage uses the same foreground tiles as the rest of the stage in the August prototypes. In the final version, there are new purple and brown foreground tiles (seemingly copied from the new background in the first part of the stage) that only appear here.
August builds | Final |
---|---|
The platform before the special Light Capsule is higher in the final version; The Hawk Ride Armor can just barely get to the top of it in the August prototypes. Please see the Blast Hornet section for a refresher on why this is a bad idea.
August builds | Final |
---|---|
More foreground tile changes; The tiles seen in the final version appear in Gravity Beetle's boss area in both versions, but they're used again here to spice up the area. The new openings in the foreground allow another opportunity to reuse the orange cloud background seen earlier in the stage.
Miscellaneous
- Gravity Beetle's giant Gravity Well / Black Hole attack will not always be spawned at the center of the screen, and it can also completely overlap the top of the walls, which makes the fight harder.
Toxic Seahorse / Acid Seaforce
Minimap
August builds | Final |
---|---|
: Power-up : Boss room : Bit/Byte room : Ride Armor platform : Vile capsule |
: Power-up |
The most obvious change in this minmap is the underwater section that leads to a Vile Capsule, but the minmap layout by the special Light Capsule was changed as well. The earlier minimap is technically more accurate, but it makes it seem like the underwater section and the section immediately after are one continuous area.
Level Graphics
August builds | Final |
---|---|
There are extra slats in the August prototypes' ladders that appear in front of X / Zero in the prototype.
August builds | Final |
---|---|
The reason why those slats were removed is related to how the sewage graphics are handled in each version.
- In the August builds, the sewage is solid and will completely block out X and other objects.
- In the final version, the sewage has a new semi-transparent effect that only partially blocks out objects.
It's likely that in the final version the slats would only partially block out X , so they had to be removed.
Layout
August builds | Final |
---|---|
The first pit in the underwater section leads to a Vile capsule in the August prototypes! In the final version, that drop down was removed and it's just a bottomless pit. Having a Vile capsule every other stage makes more sense than having just three of them. Maybe they thought this location was too obscure?
Here's how that area looks when the Vile capsule isn't present in the level.
August builds | Final |
---|---|
The layout by the Light Capsule with the leg enhancement chip was changed for the final version. This doesn't seem to have been done to fix a glitch; Rather, it seems like they changed it so the player can mess around with their new double dashing abilities if they decide to pick up the chip.
August builds | Final |
---|---|
There's no Hotareeca sub-boss in either of the August prototypes. That sub-boss hasn't been coded or even drawn yet at this point, with the object in that slot (42) being a leftover Mega Man X2 object, and the graphics data (0x0E9927 in the August 23rd prototype and 0x0EA19C in the final version) being a 32 byte placeholder.
August builds | Final |
---|---|
There's an extra Head Gunner below the first Caterkiller in the early layout.
Miscellaneous
- In the exterior dam area, when the camera is locked on either the left / right side, the background will stop animating. Fixed in the final version.
Volt Catfish / Electro Namazuros
August builds | Final |
---|---|
: Power-up : Boss room : Bit/Byte room : Ride Armor platform : Vile capsule |
: Power-up |
Besides the usual minimap differences, there are no changes in the layout or level graphics of this stage between builds.
Crush Crawfish / Scissors Shrimper
Minimap
August builds | Final |
---|---|
: Power-up : Boss room : Bit/Byte room : Ride Armor platform : Vile capsule |
: Power-up |
Standard minimap icon changes.
Level Graphics
August builds | Final |
---|---|
The water in this background was rearranged in the final version. Note that the water in the August prototypes has no palette cycling.
August builds | Final |
---|---|
The large clouds in the background are less lumpy in the final version. Check the top part of the leftmost cloud closely.
August builds | Final |
---|---|
The graphics of the submarine's blown hatch is slightly different in the August samples.
August builds | Final |
---|---|
The walls in the submarine area are darker in the August prototypes.
August builds | Final |
---|---|
The underwater background is dark blue in the earlier builds and a brighter green-blue color in the final game.
Layout
August 9th build | |
---|---|
Final |
It's once again possible to reach a Dr. Light capsule while in a Ride Armor. Bad.
August 9th build | Final |
---|---|
There are two Wall Cancers here in the August 9th layout. Since the Wall Cancer on the right is pretty much harmless -- it can only attack fire up and down -- it was replaced by a Walk Blaster. The Walk Blaster in the room below was removed.
Miscellaneous
- The camera by the Ride Armor platform isn't locked at the bottom yet. This usually isn't a problem, but the charged Triad Thunder scrolls the camera down a bit, revealing where the foreground cuts off.
August builds | |
---|---|
Final |
- Both of the August prototypes have a different Hamma Hamma scene. X / Zero goes further onto the bridge before stopping, and when the Hamma Hamma falls down, the player maintains full control of X / Zero and starts falling with it.
- In the final version, X / Zero will stop before the area where the bridge is destroyed, and the player's controls are locked until the Hamma Hamma finally lands on the solid ground below.
- When the machine near the end of the stage is destroyed, the screen is tinted bright green for a single frame in both August prototypes. It's not clear what causes this.
Tunnel Rhino / Screw Masaider
Minimap
August builds | Final |
---|---|
: Power-up : Boss room : Bit/Byte room : Sub-boss room |
: Power-up |
There's an extra square at the start of the earlier minimap. That section is four squares long in both the prototype and final version, but it's not clear if this was just a mistake that was corrected or if the August minimap is from an even earlier stage design.
Level Graphics
August builds | Final |
---|---|
The entire stage's tileset changed massively between the August samples and the final version, and it affected more than just the backgrounds, but it's easier to just compare those for this section.
The earlier stage design uses only two backgrounds: One for the exterior parts of the level, and one for the interior. The final version discards the blue background with light filtering in for a brown background with animated waterfalls.
The final game does use a variant of the prototype background for the Heart Tank room, though it's simplified a bit to fit in VRAM - no more beams of light.
Layout
August builds | |
---|---|
Final |
The August prototypes have a detail that the final version lacks: Inactive versions of the sand-shooting machinery that appears later in the stage. It's likely those tiles had to be removed when the tileset was redone. The rocks on the foreground are different between versions, which is common in this stage. In general, the earlier design has fewer rocks in the walls. The first fence also goes past the left side of the screen in the August builds, which supports the earlier layout theory posted previously.
August builds | Final |
---|---|
The basic layout is the same, save for the ledge jutting out of the left wall in the tunnel leading out of this section, though the foreground decorations are vastly different. There are more pipes in the earlier stage, and fewer of those yellow crystals. There's also an opening in the foreground of the lower part of the section that had to be covered up when the background was redone in the final version.
August builds | Final |
---|---|
Every conveyor belt except for the first is longer in the final version. Other than that, the changes are similar to the ones seen in the previous area.
August builds | Final |
---|---|
Starting from the Bit/Byte room, the August prototypes have a different, more mechanical appearance, while the final version is about the same as the previous rooms. There are no openings in the foreground - these were likely added after the new background was finished.
August builds | Final |
---|---|
The same foreground changes are apparent here. The spike pit before the hanging boulder is 8 pixels wider in the final game. This was likely done to fix a bug where X can wind up partially embedded in the boulder if he uses the charged-up Triad Thunder on the left edge of the platform. All the player has to do is jump or walk right to get out, so it's pretty harmless, but it's best that it was fixed.
August builds | Final |
---|---|
The earlier layout is missing the rocks above the platforms in the Light Capsule area.
August builds | Final |
---|---|
The Hell Crusher boss room has the standard changes, but notice that the final version's room is very similar to the August prototypes' Bit/Byte room in structure. The boulders that the Hell Crusher break through aren't in yet, but the explosions they make are already present.
August builds | Final |
---|---|
More of the same foreground changes.
An extra 256x256 block was added to the left of the long ladder to fix an oversight. If the player dashes just under the ceiling, they can briefly see a blank area with an empty lavender background.
August builds | Final |
---|---|
The two-step platform below the final ladder in the earlier layout was compressed into one taller step in the final version. In the August prototypes, the exterior background seen at the start of the stage is used in the uppermost part, while the final versions uses the standard cave background.
August builds | Final |
---|---|
Same old foreground changes. You have eyes, you can see them.
Miscellaneous
- In the August 9th build, the sand generators will only spew sand a single time after they come on-screen.
- In the August 9th build, the background music will stop playing after the Hell Crusher fight and won't resume until the player dies or faces Tunnel Rhino. Similarly, the background will stop animating after defeating Hell Crusher. Again, this is fixed if the player dies and continues the stage.
- In the August 9th build, the boss fight room lacks any background or foreground graphics.
Neon Tiger / Shining Tigerd
Minimap
August builds | Final |
---|---|
: Power-up : Boss room : Bit/Byte room : Sub-boss room : Ride Armor platform |
: Power-up |
Standard icon changes. No other changes.
Level Graphics
August builds | Final |
---|---|
The flashing lights seen in the latter part of the stage use a more complicated palette cycling pattern in the final game.
August builds | Final |
---|---|
The jungle background has a few more unique tiles than the final version, including small purple lights(?) found on each of the larger trees.
August builds | Final |
---|---|
A couple of insignificant tiles were trimmed from the underground background - compare the outermost brambles to see the barely noticeable difference.
Layout
August builds | Final |
---|---|
One of the leaf tiles near the upper right wall is missing in both prototypes. Yep. Several of the lower leaves in the upper half received a few extra pixels as well.
August builds | |
---|---|
Final |
There are more mess fence tiles and less foliage in the earlier layout. The thorn tiles in the August builds have the same dark green background color as the ones seen at the start of the stage, which clashes with the teal wall tiles seen here. The final version fixes this by adding some teal-backed thorn graphics to the stage's tileset. These new tiles take the place of the prototypes' additional background tiles.
August builds | Final |
---|---|
From here the themes of the stage change. The August versions use the jungle background and have openings in the foreground, while the final version switches to an interior theme and is completely closed in.
August builds | Final |
---|---|
Same as above. The August prototypes are still using the jungle background for the Worm Seeker-R boss fight, while the final game uses a cave background which, given the sub-boss's nature, makes more sense. Note that the room designs for the Worm Seeker-R room and Neon Tiger's room swapped between versions.
August builds | |
---|---|
Final |
After the Worm Seeker-R fight, the layouts and level theming is the same until after the Bit/Byte fight. From here on, the prototypes switch to underground background with a more industrial, closed-in foreground. The final game keeps the more natural and open jungle theming.
August builds | Final |
---|---|
Same as above. The final game doesn't have a ceiling in this section.
August 9th build | August 23rd build |
---|---|
In the August 9th build, it's possible to get to the Heart Tank in the upper-right corner of this room by dash-jumping off the wall above the shutters and climbing up the wall to the left. Later versions make this method impossible by extending that wall further up and to the left.
August builds | Final |
---|---|
See? Swapped. Since Neon Tiger is supposed to be a solar-powered poacher-hunting robot, at least according to the Rockman X3 sourcebook, it doesn't really make sense for his lair to be underground.
Miscellaneous
- In all versions, hitting the Tombort enemies with the Spinning Blade clips their wings, sending them crashing down. In the August prototypes, they sometimes stay on the ground for a few seconds, during which they're still solid and X can still stand on them, before exploding. In the final game, they explode immediately after hitting the ground.
- In the August samples, Neon Tiger's Ray Splasher fires off every 12 frames. In the final game, this was decreased to every 24 frames.
- Neon Tiger's dive attack is different in the earlier builds: he just dives down and doesn't slash at X like he does in the final version.