Your Unanswered Sonic Questions

[Splash the Otter]

6 minutes ago, DabigRG said:

Yeah, I heard about that. Is that any notable difference(s)?

Well, he doesn't have the gold flickies...

[BaronGrackle]

I mean, Sonic Mania is a sequel that came out 23 years later. It wasn't S3&K's responsibility to foresee that.

[DabigRG]

FTCR brought up a decent point: weren't the Chaos Emeralds technically stuck in the center of the Earth?

[RedFox99]

1 hour ago, DabigRG said:

FTCR brought up a decent point: weren't the Chaos Emeralds technically stuck in the center of the Earth?

Oh, yeah that's good point. I'm guessing you're referring to Unleashed? 

[BaronGrackle]

2 hours ago, DabigRG said:

FTCR brought up a decent point: weren't the Chaos Emeralds technically stuck in the center of the Earth?

What was the question?

And can it be answered by, "The Chaos Emeralds rarely stay in the same place between games"?

[DabigRG]

1 hour ago, RedFox99 said:

Oh, yeah that's good point. I'm guessing you're referring to Unleashed? 

Yes.

59 minutes ago, BaronGrackle said:

What was the question?

And can it be answered by, "The Chaos Emeralds rarely stay in the same place between games"?

I realize that's the built-in justification grandfathered into the series, but it was a pretty good point. The Gaia Colossus was still fully operational as the plates reconnected

[Harkofthewaa]

On 2/26/2018 at 9:58 PM, DabigRG said:

The Gaia Colossus was still fully operational as the plates reconnected

Since you brought him up, I wonder if people are gonna rebuild the Gaia Temples after they went down in the planet's core along with Dark Gaia and the Colossus. You know, for when Dark Gaia reawakens some millions of years later.

[DabigRG]

10 hours ago, Harkofthewaa said:

Since you brought him up, I wonder if people are gonna rebuild the Gaia Temples after they went down in the planet's core along with Dark Gaia and the Colossus. You know, for when Dark Gaia reawakens some millions of years later.

That's a very good question. I would assume so or the Temples would eventually have to find their way back to their resting spots.

[AzureLakeSanic]

On 1/6/2018 at 12:19 PM, ClassicKnuckles said:

I thought that was kind of w e i r d

Sorry to bump it but lmao Infinite saying "It's delicious" combined with the voice Liam chose to use for him (that orgasming voice, man) made me feel w e i r d inside.

[DabigRG]

Which is technically more powerful: All seven Chaos Emeralds or the Master Emerald?

And while we're at it, where would the Sol Emeralds and the Jeweled Scepter fall in that?

28 minutes ago, AzureLakeSanic said:

Sorry to bump it but lmao Infinite saying "It's delicious" combined with the voice Liam chose to use for him (that orgasming voice, man) made me feel w e i r d inside.

When did he say that?

[Cuz]

52 minutes ago, DabigRG said:

Which is technically more powerful: All seven Chaos Emeralds or the Master Emerald?

I still have this awesome little image in my head, where all the super forms in this franchise rush Knuckles, and he just holds up the master emerald, and flips them off like a switch.

Might not be the classic era anymore but he's still got tricks.

[DabigRG]

According to a Japanese source, the Lost Hex is apparently parts of Sonic's World that broke off and collected together in the clouds. Do you think SEGA originally intended to explain and detail this in the story proper?

Just now, Cuz said:

I still have this awesome little image in my head, where all the super forms in this franchise rush Knuckles, and he just holds up the master emerald, and flips them off like a switch.

Ch'yeah, pretty much.  

[DabigRG]

In Sonic Drift 2, the character bio for Fang says that he is at home in the Special Zone. Do you think this was just an awkwardly phrased reference to his debut?

[Splash the Otter]

9 hours ago, Cuz said:

I still have this awesome little image in my head, where all the super forms in this franchise rush Knuckles, and he just holds up the master emerald, and flips them off like a switch.

Might not be the classic era anymore but he's still got tricks.

I think I just figured out how he was able to hit Super Sonic.

[BaronGrackle]

15 hours ago, Cuz said:

I still have this awesome little image in my head, where all the super forms in this franchise rush Knuckles, and he just holds up the master emerald, and flips them off like a switch.

Might not be the classic era anymore but he's still got tricks.

It can also power death eggs or super-form mechas.

My headcanon is that Heavy King could've used it for a pretty nice transformation.

[DabigRG]

1 hour ago, BaronGrackle said:

It can also power death eggs or super-form mechas.

My headcanon is that Heavy King could've used it for a pretty nice transformation.

Well, he does get a similar boost in Knuckles story

[BaronGrackle]

6 minutes ago, DabigRG said:

Well, he does get a similar boost in Knuckles story

Sure, but he didn't even change colors or gain invincibility. I think that, with more charging time, he could've resembled the final boss form that the Ruby gave him.

[AzureLakeSanic]

On 3/4/2018 at 1:12 PM, DabigRG said:

Which is technically more powerful: All seven Chaos Emeralds or the Master Emerald?

And while we're at it, where would the Sol Emeralds and the Jeweled Scepter fall in that?

When did he say that?

Flashback to when Avatar meets Infinite

[DabigRG]

43 minutes ago, AzureLakeSanic said:

Flashback to when Avatar meets Infinite

Oh my goodness, and I just watched Fall of the Crystal Empire earlier.

[Your Vest Friend]

So I've not been resting on my assumptions regarding Espio's creator. I've been silently forking around, slowly chipping for information. 

-It's not Ohshima; he specifically said so.

-It's not Hoshino; when Espio is his answer to the question "who was your favourite Chaotix character out of the ones you didn't create?", then you know it's not him. 

-It's not any other Sonic Team designer; Iizuka has his finger on the creator of his redesign (Honda, as a refresher), but not any creatives on Chaotix as that was outside ST's scope. 

 

That at least confirms that Espio was made specifically for Chaotix and not created before and left in the vaults (like Vector and Charmy), but not who it is. 

I've referred back to the production credits, and one name in particular sticks out throughout the visual design section; Takumi Miyake. 

Checking any credits to his name, he didn't work on NiGHTS, so he probably wasn't one of the ones who was made to leave Chaotix's production partway through. Speaking of though, this storybook image is one that comes up when you look for him and find this random site;

Hmm...not implausible.

For the sake of a complete analysis, he's also the one behind this lovely image.

Metal Sonic Kai's influences are pretty apparent (he was a boss designer in Chaotix too). 

If Espio was created for the game, it does seem logical that the one overseeing the project on the graphical side the most would be the one to make him in the first place, as well as emphasise his appearance in-game (see: the "Featuring Espio the Chameleon" tag on the beta title screen, Espio being the one first partnered with Knuckles).

Okay, this is in this topic for a reason, because if this line of thinking is to be followed, there are some unanswered questions that make for good further probing.

1. How would we find what presence this guy has online to try and verify? Kusonoki was pretty hard to find any presence on as is, Miyake has done very little and hasn't been involved with the industry for decades. 

2. How did Espio survive the jump to modern when every other classic character not made by Sonic Team didn't? Miyake appears to have been mostly unknown to Sonic Team, especially since his only credit on a game with Sonic Team's involvement is Sonic 3D Blast (Kusonoki and Higashi both got to Adventure), so it's not like he personally had a rapport with them by the looks of it. 

...Hold up. My conclusion to the whole debacle over forgotten characters and their copyrights some years back was "SEGA have full control over their copyrights, Sonic Team just don't want to use them". And I said earlier that Hoshino called Espio his favourite of the characters in Chaotix he didn't make...could that fondness be the one reason Espio was kept around in the design docs while the rest were ditched? 

Looks like I'll be digging for a while yet. 

[Pengi]

2 hours ago, VEDJ-F said:

-It's not Hoshino; when Espio is his answer to the question "who was your favourite Chaotix character out of the ones you didn't create?", then you know it's not him. 

-It's not any other Sonic Team designer; Iizuka has his finger on the creator of his redesign (Honda, as a refresher), but not any creatives on Chaotix as that was outside ST's scope. 

 

Do you have links to these two? In Mega Drive/Genesis: Collected Works, Hoshino also says Espio is his favourite, but the question doesn't make any caveats about who created them.

[Your Vest Friend]

Hoshino I'll have to locate when I have more time later, but he was asked about the Chaotix before Collected Works and I remember it having that caveat. 

Iizuka's literally only became a thing yesterday, skip to 35:02;

If anything, that alone would be evidence that Hoshino didn't create him; they work so close all the time, Iizuka wouldn't be in the dark about that. 

Edit: Slight corrections to my last post; For one, Miyake is in the credits of NiGHTS...but only as a world artist, not a role that would require him to be taken off Chaotix. For another, his last credited role was in last year's Evil Within 2, so he's at least stick kicking around in the industry, if only infrequently.

[DabigRG]

Who do you think would've voiced Marine the Raccoon if anyone was cast?

[DabigRG]

Okay, so TVTropes claims that Generations has Blaze state that Crisis City is her fault --WTF?!

[Your Vest Friend]

7 hours ago, DabigRG said:

Who do you think would've voiced Marine the Raccoon if anyone was cast?

Honestly, I could see Cream's voice actresses (both before and after the replacement in 2010) doubling up to play Marine. That's what happened with Vector from 2007, and Marine seems even more candidate for it. 

3 hours ago, DabigRG said:

Okay, so TVTropes claims that Generations has Blaze state that Crisis City is her fault --WTF?!

Uh, no. She says that she's surprised by seeing it again, not that it's her fault for making it Crisis City. 

By the way, just to add a second addendum to the post above, I found a proper NiGHTS information hub, with scans of the storybook. 

I've taken some choice pickings from the book. 

Yeah, there's quite a few things that match up with the Chaotix manual doodles here;

-Very sketchy style.

-Very sketchy and basic representation of scenery when not up close or super focused when doodled. 

-Colouring that doesn't necessarily stay in the lines.

-The use of blue as the base shadow for white areas (even if grey is layered over it on occasion) as opposed to grey. 

-Highlights being done by not colouring in the desired highlight area. 

-The way the wings are coloured (between the Nightopians and Charmy). 

-The copious use of mixes of blues, greens and purples for backgrounds and scenery, unless there's danger or fire present in which case there's strong use of reds, blacks and oranges (ala the Final Boss and Bad Ending). Yeah, Miyake was also the attraction designer. 

That NiGHTS pic in particular looks like it could have been lifted right out of the manual. I think the manual doodles definitely have an artist to them now, at least.