Ecco 2 Prototype

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Level 3 Overview : Prototype Two Tides

  This is a prototype version of Two Tides. The rocks are grayish-brown instead of purple, and the format is a bit different. There are Crab on Strings not present in the final version, a dolphin who demands a fish, and an uncooperative exit. Also a few other oddities like a missing pulsar (placeholders there instead) and invisible spikes.  


 
Upon diving underwater you are immediately greeted by some shipwrecks with a gray Tethercrab attached to the top of the left mast. There's also an untethered, gray free-moving crab-on-a-string that appears at the top of a mast like the other, but it is mobile. If you sing at it, it will run away from you, even out of the water and into the sky. Amazing-- Crabs on Strings that are afraid of something. Both crabs have a lot of tail segments and the game will lag badly if they're allowed to meet onscreen. Both crabs show up as crabs on sonar, not Yellow hazard marks like the other breeds of Crab on a String do. Pretty menacing enemies. But hey, it's nothing some charge-sonar can't take care of, right?


Heading down a passage to the left, we find this small tunnel. Inside it, exactly where a Pulsar would be in the final version there are ... 3 Shelled Ones. They emit healing bubbles but they have no effect when they touch you. There were probably 3 because something so odd would stand out and remind the level designer to change it when the Pulsar was programmed and drawn.


Down the next passage on the left wall, there is a barrier glyph. We'll need a key song for this, so on to the rest of the level.


Entering the tunnel on the right side of the level, we find a cavern with falling rocks, just like Two Tides. The swirling starlike creatures at the entrance from the final version are not present, however.


As soon as you swim by this point, an earthquake begins and the level shakes. Was this meant to be used as the level where Ecco loses his powers, then Fault Zone was made later? Or was it just a test?


Past the earthquake area, there is a key glyph and a current pushing back against you, just like the final version. The bubbles, however, are much too large (as many are in this build).


After opening the Barrier Glyph (above) and progressing to the next area, we find this turtle, just like the final version. Pushing it down blocks the current, allowing us to go to the area below, which leads to the exit.


In the below cavern, there's some more remains of a ship, this is also congruent with the final version of Two Tides. The ship sprites all appear to be complete, and fit into the scenery rather nicely. This level clearly had a lot of work put into it by the time this this build was made. While we're here, take note of the fish Ecco is pointing at and how it's different from all the others. That'll be important in a second.


This obnoxious dolphin insists you give him a fish before he'll let you pass. The fish he wants is just over to the left-- it's different from all the others in the school (but not blue like the one in the final.) This dolphin is nowhere to be found in the final version of Two Tides. The final Two Tides ends with Trellia.


Sonar the fish over to him, and the lazy bastard says this. He then swims away. How would he know Ecco's name already? He didn't know him 2 seconds ago.


Swimming over to the right, it turns out he was guarding the exit for some reason. There's another Barrier Glyph here. There isn't another Key Glyph so you'll need to backtrack and get the Key song from the previously-mentioned glyph. Then you can proceed.


This is a very uncooperative exit; you have to push into it numerous times before it'll let you through. When the trigger finally picks you up, you're sent to a 3D Stage.

 Even if you lose here, you'll still repeat the 3D Stage, not return to Level 4. Same effect as if you had selected it from the Debug Menu.


 




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