Best/Worst Character Design

[Milo]

Archie Sonic's The Brotherhood of Guardians have the worst designs. I can't believe that Penders is trying so hard to get the rights to these characters.

.......toes on a Sonic character? I'm confident that it's not official artwork (not sure whether it is or not), because Sonic characters don't have toes (see Darkspine Sonic and promotional Sonic Adventure artwork).

[Your Vest Friend]

It's official Archie character artwork. You have to remember that they were using vastly different styles to SEGA up until very recently.

Case in point;

OH GOD WHAT THE FUCK.

Edit: Speaking of which, I'd like to nominate that abomination of a fox as the worst -specific- design of a character. As well as...

Anyone who reads Archie knows about this. :/

Edited September 15, 2011 by VEDJ-F

[Pawn]

^ LOL. I'm not sure which picture of Tails is worse. Those eyebrows...those feet. =X And...is he on Venom in the last one? XD

[Milo]

@Baby Tails........WTF is up with his feet? Hell, AoSTH actually had feet that looked normal by cartoon standards. And considering how "normal" that show is, that's kinda saying a lot. :/

Titan Tails doesn't bother me though...

Edited September 15, 2011 by Ananze

[midori]

It makes me wonder: Maya the Bee is a German invention and the Moomins are Finnish, yet what aired in my country when I was little was anime.

Yet Sonic was created in Japan and most media with him is not Eastern.

Why. ಥ﹏ಥ

If Sonic cartoons were of quality half as good as Maya or the Moomins, I bet Sonic would be more popular. But no. The Japanese can be such jerks sometimes.

[Your Vest Friend]

It's to do with the cultural climate Sonic was in when things happened. Back then, Japan had little interest in him, and DiC bought up rights to make cartoons of him because franchising was the done thing. Then an OVA came about presumably becaused SEGA hedged their bets. And then they wanted a cheap tie-in to advertise their games (Sonic Heroes, I think specifically), thus Sonic X.

Besides, it's not guaranteed that Sonic would get quality like that of Moomins even if the circumstances were favourable. Mario got a film and a fairy tale mini-series, and they combined the weirdness of AoStH with the OoCness of SatAM and the off-modelness of both.

Edit: And the ongoing Manga is even stranger. It stars Mario as a snarky, clumsy hero with his sidekick Luigi and the cute animal mascots Yoshi...and Bowser, if the covers are to be believed. :L

His own children look less chibi than he does.

Edited September 15, 2011 by VEDJ-F

[midori]

Yeah, it's kinda sad a lot of good stuff is overlooked because of sheer ignorance.

But that doesn't add anything to the topic. So, I'll insist that Honey's design is better than Amy's. Why, even her classic design looked better. I'd rather she was a pink Sonic recolor in a green blouse and orange skirt than a pink hedgehog in a red and white dress. Notice the color difference. She looks so bland now.

Honey at least has some yellow to make her look like more than a reddish blob. And these star-shaped decorations make her more interesting.

Blaze is also poorly designed. What's with that dress?

[SIXTH-RATE SOMA]

Tim Buckley would be proud.

[Nattala]

Wait we're allowed to point out the poor designs of the Archie characters?

Ok then I would say hands down, worst design is Sonic's mother from the comics, Bernie.

Reason being, she looks looks like Sonic in drag.

I'm not sure which ones of these pictures is her though.

[Dummy Bear]

Worst: I'm going to be completely honest. I hate Japanese Classic Sonic. Not his game sprite, no. I hate the art. I really hate how he looks like some cutesy poo wide eyed doofus, especially in that awful Sonic 4 mockup someone made. Now this doesn't mean I want Sonic looking like some weirdo weirdo with a mohawk. When it comes to C. Sonic I honestly prefer something like this:

Also another design I hate is SatAM Robotnik:

It's just so... blah...

[Your Vest Friend]

*Bernie stuff*

Ah, yes, Bernie. I remember the days when she didn't look like a complete clone (she used to be PURPLE, believe it or not). No idea why she was changed to the worse design.

Speaking of characters who look like they're in drag, what's worse than the subject of drag being a homely mother?

The subject of drag being a femme fatale dominatrix. :X

Now, don't get me wrong, I actually think that Lien-Da looks fine most of the time. However, occasionally, art does pop up that makes her look...yeah.

[Xenos]

I....wow.

This is probably the best looking Classic Sonic to me. Looks like the one in Generations.

[Vertekins]

If there was one thing that bothers me about Bernadette's and Jules' designs apart from Bernadette's being incredibly creepy, it's that they have a tuft of hair on their foreheads that is a totally different colour from the rest of them. Bernadette is an interesting character who I like, it's a shame that she doesn't have a distinctive and feminine design.

Mobian Jules and Robian Jules is A-OK with me though, I think it's pretty cool to see the father-son resemblance and his Robian self is cool-looking. A nice nod to "The apple doesn't fall far from the tree" when it comes to his Mobian form's resemblance to his son.

[Milo]

I....wow.

This is probably the best looking Classic Sonic to me. Looks like the one in Generations.

I have to agree here.

Oh and Mephiles (Shadow recolor form) is quite bad as well.

Wait we're allowed to point out the poor designs of the Archie characters?

Ok then I would say hands down, worst design is Sonic's mother from the comics, Bernie.

Reason being, she looks looks like Sonic in drag.

I'm not sure which ones of these pictures is her though.

*imagines Sonic in drag* ....ew.

Edited September 17, 2011 by Ananze

[BADavid]

I can't really comment on Archie, as I'm really only familiar with the early days, when most of the original designs didn't really gel with the Sonic art aesthetic - while they were usually decent designs in and out of themselves, they often looked like they belonged in a different franchise entirely until some of them received redesigns in the last few years.

As far as the games go, I actually quite like Silver. Don't get me wrong, he's not my favourite, but I didn't have any real issues with his design; he's arguably more original than Shadow was so I can't fault it for originality, and I didn't really have a problem with his marijuana-leaf hairdo. On the topic of Sonic 06, obviously you have Elise and apparently-realistic-but-actually-highly-disturbing Eggman. Elise - I think everything has already been said. The execution was obviously poor, with the questionable graphics giving her orange legs and a face straight out of the Uncanny Valley, but her actual design fell somewhere between bland and unappealing, so it was a big failure across the board, in my opinion. Eggman... well, I don't mind it as much as some folks do, and his character is still arguably the best in the game (not saying a great deal), but there was just so much inherantly... wrong with it. Being able to see Eggman's eyes behind his glasses weirds me out in so many ways...

I know this is going to be an unpopular opinion, and it probably seems like I'm shooting myself in the foot after the comments I just made, but I really didn't like the humans in Sonic Unleashed. They were very... Pixar. Now, I love Pixar, but to me their designs were just unappealing and they still didn't feel like they belonged in Sonic. Really, I had no issues with the pseudo-anime humans in the Adventure games, but graphical limitations made their faults more palatable, I suppose... This is probably just born out of some personal desire to do away with the humans except for Eggman, and since we've not seen any since Unleashed (if I recall?), maybe we're getting somewhere... It's not a huge issue and it doesn't really bug me, there are usually far more pressing problems than character design, but it just feels wrong to me.

[Vertekins]

If there was one thing I disliked about Archie's character designs, it was massive inconsistency and difference between characters who are the same species.

I mean, compare Penelope and Bill. Both Platypuses yet vastly different design-wise. Mighty and Arlo are both Armadillo's. Again, extremely different. Bark and Auguste are both Polar Bears. Both look totally different.

But what I don't understand was the changing of Li Moon's design to a fox when it was so obvious that she was a Tiger.

[sonfan1984]

Wait we're allowed to point out the poor designs of the Archie characters?

Ok then I would say hands down, worst design is Sonic's mother from the comics, Bernie.

Reason being, she looks looks like Sonic in drag.

I'm not sure which ones of these pictures is her though.

[Kamicciolo]

When I saw that picture, I actually thought that IS Sonic in drag. I remember Sonic's mom looking different years ago.

[sonfan1984]

the pic on the right is actually Sonic in drag...

[Ferno]

I'm probably about to get alot of flak for this, and I'm probably stepping on people's childhoods and whatnot, but I never did like the way Sonic was depicted in Sonic The Comic. He always looked very chubby to me, and I never really liked how they always emphasized that ridge on his forehead that I guess is his top spine, in alot of shots.

Edited September 18, 2011 by Inferno

[Xenos]

I'm probably about to get alot of flak for this, and I'm probably stepping on people's childhoods and whatnot, but I never did like the way Sonic was depicted in Sonic The Comic. He always looked very chubby to me, and I never really liked how they always emphasized that ridge on his forehead that I guess is his top spine, in alot of shots.

[BADavid]

I'm probably about to get alot of flak for this, and I'm probably stepping on people's childhoods and whatnot, but I never did like the way Sonic was depicted in Sonic The Comic. He always looked very chubby to me, and I never really liked how they always emphasized that ridge on his forehead that I guess is his top spine, in alot of shots.

Now I'm not saying it's a "worst" character design, it's just a different style, and I can respect that, I'm just not too fond of it.

Actually, I agree - I've had folks tell me to check out Sonic the Comic but I find the design pretty distracting, in addition to the comic feeling even more remote from the games than Archie... It seems like, for some weird reason, the artists actually tried to emulate that hideous Sonic 3D boxart (which, funnily enough, is actually there on that cover...). It's probably my least-favourite Sonic look, even moreso than the goofy-looking Sonic from the classic US boxart (the Japanese version always looked more... refined, I suppose).

As for Amy in StC... yeah, I never really got the outfit. She herself actually looks okay, I always have time for classic Amy, but her clothing is, uh... questionable. It's not inspired by anything else and there was nothing particularly wrong with her in-game outfit, so I'm not sure why the artists felt the need to go for something different. Was it an attempt to make her less stereotypically feminine? IIRC her short-lived Sonic Adventure-style incarnation was wearing a grey hoodie...

[Blue Blood]

I'm probably about to get alot of flak for this, and I'm probably stepping on people's childhoods and whatnot, but I never did like the way Sonic was depicted in Sonic The Comic. He always looked very chubby to me, and I never really liked how they always emphasized that ridge on his forehead that I guess is his top spine, in alot of shots.

Now I'm not saying it's a "worst" character design, it's just a different style, and I can respect that, I'm just not too fond of it.

Not gonna argue with you there at all. The way the characters were drawn in StC was just awful. Everyone was fat and angry, and usually drawn with awful, awful perspective.

[Pawn]

As for Amy in StC... yeah, I never really got the outfit. She herself actually looks okay, I always have time for classic Amy, but her clothing is, uh... questionable. It's not inspired by anything else and there was nothing particularly wrong with her in-game outfit, so I'm not sure why the artists felt the need to go for something different. Was it an attempt to make her less stereotypically feminine? IIRC her short-lived Sonic Adventure-style incarnation was wearing a grey hoodie...

That's debatable. I think her Classic design was awful, but I agree that the way they went about it was worse. The whole deal with her using a crossbow felt awkward too. Like you say it was all an effort to make her less girly and I suppose more 'badass'. The art in general was well, like Blue Blood said. I liked the way some of it was coloured though XP.

EDIT: That was only the core art style too... The drawings in the side stories were a lot more funky.

Edited September 18, 2011 by Lungo

[midori]

Newsflash: Bernadette Hedgehog is now confirmed to be a character in Sonic Generations.

lol I'm sick and I had nothing better to do.