Sonic's Schoolhouse

To do: Is there a way to trigger the debug menu? Document the differences between the 1.0 and 1.1 versions.

Sonic's Schoolhouse is a first-person educational game based on featuring Sonic the Hedgehog.

"Click on me for help!"

Unused Maps

Found in the MAP folder is five unused maps for the ring collecting minigame, all dated for the 5th of December, 1995.

Unused Videos

Present in four of the AVI files is a strange talking clock. According to writer and designer Britton Jackson, the game started as an original IP but was changed to a Sonic game last-minute at the request of Sega and Orion Interactive, ^[2] so this character may likely be a leftover from that early stage. The voice actor is unknown.

CC_HELP2.avi, CC_HELP3.avi, and CC_HELP4.avi

These three files, created on January 8, 1996, are all identical in content: an animation of a clock jumping up and rotating in midair while saying "Click on me for help!"

CC_HELP3 has noticeably blockier video quality than the other two, possibly as a test for video compression.

GUMC_.avi

Created on October 2, 1995, predating the aforementioned files. It contains the animation of the above files, played forward then in reverse until stopping on a still frame of the clock.

Unused Graphics

FT_BAP.PCX

The BAP Interactive logo on the bus screen.

AH0202.PCX

A cyan rectangle, possibly used for a sky.

AH0780.PCX, AH0781.PCX, AH0782.PCX, AH0783.PCX

Four images of a goldfish jumping.

Unused Audio

The voice clips used in-game are dated no earlier than May 6, 1996, suggesting that these two were placeholders from before the Sonic license was acquired.

Hidden Command Line Parameters

If you run the game from the command line, you can set the following parameters:

• CHEAT - Enables you to load any of the maps from a dialog box, add/remove PCX files from data files, record and play demos, and get all items (bus passes, minigame passes, etc.). Adding/removing PCX files and recording demos requires "BUILD" mode to be enabled as well.
• BUILD - This allows you to "build" the data used by the game, as seen in the "CHEAT" features.
• NODAT - Makes the game not load SONIC.DAT, and thus not load certain files, which can cause the game to crash.
• NOSOUND - Disables loading the sound subsystem.
• MSG - Takes a number from 40-200 and sets that as the controller poll frequency (not shown in the video).
• JOY - This one's functionality is strange. It takes a number from 0-100 (any other numbers will just cap it within that range) and if it's nonzero, what happens is that after the first time you press the "GO" stoplight button, it takes the number you put in and decrements it until it reaches 0. When it does, it plays the animation that plays when you press the "GO" stoplight button again. After that, the timer is never reset. This is the only time that happens. By default, this value is 0, so it never happens in-game normally anyways. This parameter has no other functionality.

Hidden Strings

Old Game Title

Present in various places in the executable are strings referring to the game as "Answer Hunt" or "AnswerHunt".

An error message is at 0x2FD74:

AnswerHunt - MCI Error

A reference to a TTF file is at 0x2F29E and 0x2F48E:

ANSWHUNT.TTF

And at seven different places (0x351E2, 0x3561A, 0x35842, 0x3594E, 0x359D6, 0x35DE2, and 0x35E12) is this:

A.n.s.w.e.r. .H.u.n.t.

(Note that those periods are 0x00 in the binary data, not 0x2E.)

Additionally, in the first line of all of the .BLK files is this:

Answer Hunt block database file version: 1.0

Internal Recess Minigame Names

At 0x2E440 are the internal names of the Recess minigames, as well as a third minigame.

TREASUREHUNT....MEMORYMATCH.SHAPEPUSH

(Note that those periods are 0x00 in the binary data, not 0x2E.)

The ring collecting minigame is also referred to here as "TREASUREHUNT".

Unused Grade

At 0x2CE38 is the names of all of the grades, as well as a fifth grade.

Kindergarten........
1st Grade...........
2nd Grade...........
3rd Grade...........
4th Grade...........
5th Grade

(Note that those periods are 0x00 in the binary data, not 0x2E.)

Debug Menu

At 0x34EB4 are strings for what seems to be a debug menu.

&Begin 
&Stop 
&Report Card
&Players
&One Player
&Two Players
&Controls
&Player One
&Keyboard - Right Side
&Keyboard - Left Side
&Mouse 
&Joystick 
&Joystick B
&Player Two
&Keyboard - Right Side
&Keyboard - Left Side
&Mouse
&Joystick 
&Joystick B
&Exit 
&Configure
&Difficulty
&Easy &Normal &Hard
&Graphics Quality
&Floors and Ceilings
&Lighting
&Low Resolution
&Test Frame Rate
&Sound 
&Sound Effects
&MIDI Music
&Hold Mouse Down to Move
&Help
&Help...
&About...
&Credits

Function Names

There exist error message strings used when loading SONIC.DAT for debugging purposes. These messages include what seem to be original function names for such. It all starts at 0x2AB54 in the executable.

DatafileOpen: unable to open file %s in mode %s
DatafileOpen: Bad read reading ID
DatafileOpen: Bad ID
DatafileOpen: Bad read index position
DatafileOpen: Bad seek
DatafileOpen: Bad read index count
DatafileOpen: Out of memory allocing index.
DatafileOpen: Bad read index sort flag
DatafileOpen: Bad read index
DatafileClose: Datafile file not open
DatafileGetData: seek error.
DatafileGetData: comp none read error.
DatafileGetData: Out of memory alloc'ing temp.
DatafileGetData: COMPRESSED read error.
DatafileGetData: unknown compression type %d.
DatafileAddData: Datafile entry %s already exists.
DatafileAddData: Out of memory allocing index.
DatafileAddData: Out of memory on index resize.
DatafileAddData: seek failure
DatafileAddData: comp none write failure
DatafileAddData: out of memory on temp alloc.
DatafileAddData: FAST COMPRESSED write failure
DatafileAddData: write failure
DatafileAddData: unknown compression type %d.
DatafileAddFile: out of memory on temp alloc
DatafileAddFile: read error.
DatafileExtractFile: file name not in index
DatafileExtractFile: out of memory on temp alloc
DatafileExtractFile: write file failed.
DatafileRemoveData: couldn't open temp file.%s
DatafileRemoveData: seek error.
DatafileRemoveData: couldn't remove old Datafile.
DatafileRemoveData: couldn't rename tempfile. %s
DatafileRemoveData: couldn't reopen Datafile. %s
DatafileRemoveByName: name not in index

Hidden Credits

Present at 0x2C080 in the executable is a credit for an "I3D Tool Kit". I3D was a toolkit used to create 3D applications in MS-DOS and Windows (see here for more).

I3D Tool Kit 2.1 (c)1993-94 Jim O'Keane

References