Beavis and Butt-head In Hollywood Prototype (Get Big in Hollywood)

 

Controls

Controller 1 – Controls

• You must have an analog controller with the analog turned on to play this game. A digital controller will only cause Beavis and Butthead to walk forward and backward.
• Left Analog: Move around the screen
• L1/R1: Nothing
• L2/R2: Dodge left or right. This is contextual to which way they are facing. 
• Cross: Default punches. Once you activate an item, such as the hot dog, it will change to that item’s activity. If you punch the CPU-controlled friend, they will pummel you till you lose a life.
• Square: Makes you duck.
• Circle: Makes you jump. Intentional or not, you can jump on your partner’s head as needed.
• Triangle: Headbutts, which is a form of attack. Also used on objects to snag items.
• Select changes between the two characters. It will also bring you out of camera mode if using controller 2.
• Start brings up the Pause Menu.

Pause Menu

• Implemented/Continue – This changes wording based on the stage
• New Level – Takes you back to the debug level select screen
• Quit Game – Return you to the title screen
• Retry Level – Start the level you’re on over again
• Options – offers access to SFX and Music again. Neither does anything.

Controller 2 – Camera Controls

• Controller 2 acts like a photo mode, and would explain why all the promo shots for the game came from angles not normally shown. You gain free access to the entire stage, including beyond the level boundaries. 
• D-Pad Up / Down: Forward and Back
• D-Pad Left / Right: Spin Left, Spin Right
• L1 / L2: Pan Straight Up or Straight Down
• R1 / R2: Turn the camera clockwise or counterclockwise
• Cross & Triangle: Tilt the camera up and down
• Square and Circle: Slides the camera left or right

Known Items

• Boot – Turns Cross into a kicking action.
• Hot Dog (Or wieners, heh-heh) – When snagged, they can be thrown with the Cross Button
• Nachos (they rule!) – Can be picked up in some stages. Likely would have been health bonuses or lives. They do replenish some health in the prototype.
• Soda – Cross forces them to burp, not sure what its purpose is.
• Coffee – Turns Beavis into Cornholio. Only he can pick it up. Possibly an invincibility item?

 

Stages

The game counts the title screen as one of the stages, referred to in-game as the ‘Front End’.  Note that if you trigger the camera mode here with controller 2, you can spin away from Beavis and Butt-head to not only see the half humans as cameramen, but the selection, memory card, and controller screens are all hiding behind the in-game camera.

Title Screen

• New Level
• Start
  • 1 Player Game
  • 2 Player Game
    Here is where you can see the character select screen. Two-player mode does not work correctly due to controller 2 acting as the camera mode
  • Options
    The controller configuration screen is not completed. It also has the wrong information. The 3 commands shown are not what are in the game. The SFX and Music levels can be edited, but don’t actually change anything.
    • Memory Card
      The memory card function is not implemented. If you try to access the game with a card plugged in, you’ll get trapped in a loop with the card being accessed. A “This is not implemented” message will continue to be posted. I love that Butt-head’s name is scratched out to read ‘Butt-munch’. Leave it out.
    • Without Memory Card – You get the “Uh, there’s no memory card, dumb-ass” message. Followed by a “Butt-munch, you can’t save your game unless you start a save file,” message. Choose Start again to proceed to the first stage, the Backlot.

Backlot

The backlot is behind the motion picture studio; Beavis and Butt-head are outside their trailer. Here’s what can be found through the level.  

• First order of business is to jump up the back left boxes and snag the two nacho chips on top of the trailer and the building’s vent system.
• Now jump up the closer right side boxes, jump to the other building’s vent system, and then jump over the fence towards the south. 
• Head left, jump up and over the left boxes and fence.
• You can headbutt the dumpster to the far left, but it only smokes. Hop onto it, and then over the fence to the next section
• Here’s the main area of the level. You’ll have three bottles sitting on top of boxes. A guard dog patrols the far left, on the other side of the fence. 
• You can grab the hot dog, and while the power is active, use it to break the three bottles. I broke the left one from where the hot dog was, and then jumped on Butthead’s head while he was near the other two. It doesn’t appear to trigger anything. Alternatively, you can jump from your partner’s head to the bottle’s resting place and, if aimed correctly, destroy it with a headbutt. 
• Once that’s taken care of, head to the right, up the boxes to the vent system, and then make a leap of faith to the top-most box to the right of the trailer. Jump to the trailer’s roof and head left. Jump to the yellow and silver railing of the left building, and carefully walk that to the rooftop. Note: The camera is fairly jittery once you reach a certain point on the roof. 
• If you drop down as close to the inner fence as possible, you can open the gate back to the area you were just in. Once the two are reunited, there’s a guard dog patrolling. It can be punched, causing it to spin around and leave you alone for a bit. There’s a floating nacho at the bottom of the screen, but it appears to be out of reach.
• Run back to the earlier area, up to the roof, and then jump over the far fence. Repeat with the other character so they’re together again. 
• In the alleyway, head north. There’s a hot dog in the dumpster, but it’s very limited in usage time. Not sure what it’s for. There is a floating cup of coffee in the way back, but no way to grab it. 
• Retrace your steps back a few, and to the left, you’ll find a path forward. 
• In this alleyway, there’s nothing on the ledge, but around the corner, you will find a box with a boot, a nacho chip hiding in the wall indent to the right, and a soda in the vending machine. 
• At the far end, there’s a police officer who can be kicked via the boot power-up, but you can move past him to the door. The level ends. 

 

From here, if you press continue game, you’ll just be presented with a black screen. Instead of touching the door, pause the game and choose New Level to skip past the broken stages.

Godzilla

Leads to a black screen. Files for it are on the disc.

Western

Leads to a black screen. Files for it are on the disc.

Per Russ:
“Yeah, I remember there being a western level that was kind of like a movie set thing and Beavis would go into Cornholio mode and he could jump up on the balconies only if he’d had his nacho power to give him Cornholio mode, something like that.  Spahn Ranch (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spahn_Ranch) was the inspiration.”

Sci-Fi

Appears to be the first boss fight in the game. The stage is a giant ring with 4 computers and a multi-tiered floating alien UFO. The bottom right monitor produces cylindrical containers or batteries, which can be thrown at the UFO to no effect. The UFO attacks by sticking out one of its arms with the drill attached. The characters do react to it. There doesn’t seem to be a way to defeat the UFO, but you can exit back to the New Level menu. 

• If you pick up controller 2 and activate camera mode, you can discover that this stage is actually several stories tall. There appear to be elevators – or at least background details – further up. It’s theorized there should have been an elevator or staircase where the orange door is in the back left of the starting point.
• In promotional shots, the characters are seen on the higher levels. Not sure how they got there.

Tar-Pits

Leads to a black screen. Files for it are on the disc.

Hollywood

Leads to a black screen. Files for it are on the disc. 

Per Russ Patterson:
“The Hollywood level the Hollywood Sign level was my favorite they’re animal Wranglers and they’re trying to chase down the NBC Peacock which is escaped and it’s on the Hollywood sign and they’re going up and down the back of the letters platformer Style and then California earthquakes happen and the letters fall down one at a time and it’s a timing thing to jump to the next letter to get the peacock and not get smashed but then after the Holly part of the Hollywood sign is all fallen, the camera pans around and and you just see the word wood up on the hill and then they Giggle and say “it says wood, uh-huh-huh-huh”. It may not be selectable in the build because GT interactive, their legal team, made us turn it off because they thought the Hollywood Sign was a copyrighted thing from the city of Hollywood and they checked with the city of Hollywood and they wanted 15% royalties which I think was more than we were going to get on the game so that was a no-go. So my favorite level of the game so far got killed by their legal team!”

Paparazzi

The level takes place outside some sort of celebrity party or swingers event, based on the window silhouettes. There are two ‘babes’ on either side of the pool. Two photo rolls can be picked up that activate as Exposures. Pressing Cross while they’re in inventory causes the player to take a snapshot. If you stand near and face the ‘babes, they’ll strike a pose. Likely one of the level’s missions was to take photos of them. 

• There is a Nacho chip near the hotel that can be easily reached by jumping from underneath.
• Of curiosity are the ladders on either side of the hotel. It looks like there was going to be a Donkey Kong-like climb up the floor ledges, but you can’t normally interact with the ladder. If you carefully approach the right side ladder from its right side and press against its leg, you can clip onto it. Letting go of the analog stick will see Beavis or Butt-head slowly glitch up the wall. If you wait the 60 or so seconds, you can reach the top of the ladder and jump to the closest ledge. There doesn’t appear to be anything of value up here, but mention it for posterity.
• If you walk into the pool, the game glitches and starts adding multiples of all the pool floaties and both characters. This is also true if you pull the camera too far back with Controller 2.
• If you pull the camera outside the stage and move it down a bit, you’ll find a Nacho and a Camera roll just floating in the void.

Hog Round Up

This takes place on a farm backdrop. You’ll start inside the bees’ area. Head to the right, and the swarms will chase you. There is a swarm for each beehive, but it’s unclear what their purpose is. If you head right, you’ll find a corn maze, but back and to the left takes you to the farm and their trailer. You can find two nacho ships – one hiding behind their trailer, and one just beside the giant fake farm house background behind the corn maze.

• Items of note are the soda dispensed from the vending machine and the boot power-up closest to the pig.
• The pig can be punched, and it can retaliate. If you punch it and have it chase you out of the corn maze, it will stop at the trough outside and eat for a bit. Eventually, it returns to its original spot. The mud puddle may be related. 
• If you walk up to the chickens, they’ll eventually follow you, but they don’t seem to interact with anything. If you bump into them, they do attack.
• The bees never leave their area. If you carefully move in and around them, eventually they all converge into one swarm. 

Mule Round Up

This is the second farm stage, now featuring a mule, several crowd bleachers, chickens, and other odds and ends. The one bleacher has a boot power-up on a platform next to it, and attempting to reach it will cause barrels to fall from the sky and block you. A nice little Donkey Kong reference if ever.  

• There’s a back area that can run to and through, but nothing back there. 
• A possible scenario might have included the mule being knocked out by the barrels. He can be moved via headbutt. It’ll move and take up residence by the other bleacher. 
• There is a missing power-up or Nacho that should have been on the opposite bleacher.

Goat Round Up

We’re now inside the barn. And there are quite a few milking stations here. There is a ladder and path up (which can be reached via head jump or jump off the milk container to the 2nd floor) that encircles the structure. A lone goat is chilling in the milking machine area, but it doesn’t seem capable of movement. It will attack the boys if they approach it. 

• On the 2nd-floor catwalks, there is a red glowing button near the fenced-in hay area that does nothing. There’s also a curious stretch where various farm tools are shoved through the roof. 
• There would likely have been multiple goats in the fenced-in area, or at least on the other side. Gameplay would probably involve sorting out how to get all the goats to the milking machine.

Mansion

The mansion is HUGE, and would have likely been one of the last stages in the game. Note there is no clipping programmed into the ‘4th walls’ – so you can fall off into the void and never return. Just reload the level if you do. 

The room layout is as follows. 

• You’ll start in the green room. There’s a poster of someone on the wall. 
• Heading through the door on the left brings you to the living room. You have paths to the left and up the stairs. For now, we’ll go to the left.
• This brings you to the kitchen, where an object pile is corrupted and spinning infinitely. There are pots and pans on the floor, likely potential items to use in the full game. Going to the last room on the left brings us to a sauna. There’s a heat source in the middle and a very well-endowed woman walking around. If you stand still, she’ll collide with one of the characters and then follow you to at least halfway into the kitchen, and then turn around.
• Retrace your steps back to the living room and up to the second floor. Up here are two paths, left and right – there’s nothing to the right. We’ll go left for now. This brings you a room with three little dogs in it. They attack and yip at you if you get close. They *can* kill you if you can’t shake them. Carefully hug the top wall and move to the left. This time, arriving at the library. 
• The library would have likely been a puzzle room. There are clearly 3 books out of place on the far wall. If you head jump to them, your character gets stuck on them, so you’ll have to headbutt till you fall back to the floor.
• Continuing left brings you to the indoor swimming pool. There are two parrots in this room, one right where you walk in, and one flying lower down. They can attack and kill you, so be careful. Work your way to the left, and you’ll find yourself in the sparsely populated gym. Here, a boot power-up is present with a trainer blocking the door. The trainer will throw objects that resemble cans and carrots at you, which will cause damage. If you sneak past him, you gain access to the last room in the mansion.
• Alternatively, if you pick up the boot and then kick him two or three times, he’ll go still. 
• The bedroom holds the largest heart-shaped bed I’ve ever seen, what looks like a torture table, and lamps. 

Golf Cart

An all-new feature – driving! It’s just both characters and their glf courts in a sealed-off area. Forward moves you, back stops you, left and right turn you. That’s it for this area.

Boxing

A giant boxing ring, along with the empty area around it are here to inspect, but there’s nothing else going on. As an aside, there’s some great detail work going on with how the inside of the ropes is properly lit compared to the darker outside of the ropes. 

Krika

A cave of sorts with a glowing stage at the center. Players can run around outside the play area, but you’ll fall into the black abyss if you’re not careful. I misinterpreted this as a possible Lord of the Rings or Dungeons & Dragons reference, but it’s actually a Star Trek tribute. 

 

 

Screenshots

Missing Stages

On a whim, I looked up how to hack Level Select codes with a GameShark. Figured if I couldn’t access the Beavis & Butthead problem stages, I might as well try to guess why. Turns out…I can. And then I discovered a new mystery. But first, the explanation.

The game has two memory address locations that tie to each stage:

80080e6a 00??
8008f86c 00??

When the prototype loads a stage, the same value is written to both of these addresses. Backlot is 00, Paparazzi is 04, etc. After using the process of elimination to map out the accessible stages, I attempted to load each broken stage and noted those same addresses once the system soft-locked. In each broken stage’s case, the first value is still the Front End/Title screen’s.

There are assets for each of these stages on the disc, but if it’s only getting halfway to writing the memory values, there’s likely a typo somewhere that’s preventing the other stages.

Trying to correct the digits in Memory Editor or writing a GS code locks the game.

The new mystery? The game only has 15 locations, including the front end. Once they’re all mapped out, there is a mysterious empty slot for value 03. Trying to load that sees the system default to Paparazzi instead.

00 = Backlot
01 = Godzilla (typo? 0c, 01)
02 = Western (typo? 0c, 02)
03 = ??? (Default Loads Paparazzi)
04 = Paparazzi
05 = Hog Round Up
06 = Sci-Fi
07 = Tar Pits (typo? 0c, 07)
08 = Mule Round Up
09 = Hollywood (typo? 0c, 09)
0a = Goat Round Up
0b= Mansion
0c = Front End (Title Screen)
0d = Golf Cart
0e = Boxing
0f = Krika

So it looks like if our Secret Santa releases the prototype, hackers will at least have a starting point to work on unlocking those missing four known stages (Godzilla, Western, Tar-Pits, Hollywood).

For what it’s worth, there is also a file on the disc that acts like a table of contents. There are several typos at the bottom of the programming, with some very lengthy development timers set up. Programming is out of my league, but I wanted to mention that to give modders a good starting point. I also included some points of interest I found with the GameShark. The stage abbreviations, potential stage numbering, and other items.

Music

Beavis & Butt-head’s soundtrack plays as one long feed. The same song starts each level, and if you allow it, will run through all tracks and then all voice-overs.

The game disc contains a music folder with several .BIN tracks, but only one BIN is listed in the cue sheet. It could be possible to rebuild the cue sheet with the complete set of tracks so the soundtrack plays correctly.

Health and Item GameShark codes

GameShark Codes – These get turned off with “Restart Level.” They also crash other stages.

• (Backlot) Beavis Infinite Lives – 800D9444 0005
• (Backlot) Beavis Infinite Health – 800D9410 0064
• (Backlot) Butthead Infinite Lives – 800E0104 0005
• (Backlot) Butthead Infinite Health – 800E00D0 0064

The game isn’t consistent with the codes. They’re stage-specific, and only one character’s codes can be active. A better hacker will also be able to find the items, item time limits, and maybe the nacho and exposure counters.