The mutability of the Sonic series

[WarioBone]

Uh, that's what I'm saying.

 

Storylines keep getting more convoluted and "mature".  Gameplay stays wonky and low-speed.  More and more and more playable/new characters.

 

If '06, as it is, was magically considered good, and the series kept going that route, I can safely say I'd be nowhere near it.

[Big Panda]

Would we have gotten a "Sonic Adventure 3" (in name) if the Dreamcast stuck around just a little bit longer?

[Badnik Zero]

I bet we would have got an SA3 something like Heroes (three characters), but that looked and played nothing like Heroes. It might have had a longer and more focused development period. It would have been polished for example.

Edited September 20, 2013 by American Ristar

[Jet Prower]

Ok reading this does make you think definately. The saturn was in trouble from the start mainly because of the bad practicies had done with it. Releasing it surprisingly to the public without warning and then limiting which retailers would carry it to where major retailers were mad and would not carry it later on at all. Sega just made many bad mistakes with the saturn, which is why the dreamcast didn't last long since those same angry retailers were still around, same with developers. If the saturn had done alot better, Sonic Xtreme or sonic adventure may have both been released there and the dreamcast much later. All speculation of course.

 

I've never really looked into xtreme too much, yet I always hear nothing but dread for the game and I dont get it really.

 

 

As for 06 being good, that would have been possible if the glitches had been ironed out, the load times during levels taken out, and if the story didn't revolve around a human. As long as these people understand we don't want humans in the sonic games or shows and such, they do tend to do alot better. Yes, humans may exist in their world, but most people are in the sonic series for the sonic fur mobians, not humans.

 

Also, I have played Sonic Jam. It is an ok game, but its basically just an early Mega Collection, that's it. If you own Mega Collection, there is no reason to get Jam unless you are a collector like myself.

[CrownSlayers Shadow]

I wonder where the series would have gone if 06 was actually good.

If by good as in, it had no glitches, was playable, enjoyable, and it's story and narrative weren't crap and everything about it was critically praised, we'd have some good and bad.

 

The good:

• The "Shitty Friends" epithet would have completely died out and we could have our favorite characters gain some spotlight
• We could have more variety of gameplay ideas, mechanics, and narrative
• We probably wouldn't have such reactionary responses towards the slightest things dark
• Sonic could have more flexibility

The bad:

• Too much variety would likely result in a loss of identity for the series
• There's no telling how they would treat Sonic as the principle character of the series
• They would probably bloat the cast even more

It's important to note that while Sonic 06 was going on they also had Sonic and the Secret Rings, which was generally different as far as tone and gameplay went. And even before these two titles was SA2 which was darker than SA1 before it when lighter and softer in Heroes, before going even darker than ever in ShTH.

 

So if Sonic 06 were actually good, there would be more of a rollercoaster of good and bad execution of concepts and ideas instead of things being one-sidedly bad that people would expect. That said, Sonic 06 served as a necessity in accentuating the bad execution of concepts to give the developers a kick in the ass so that they'd avoid doing something so terrible in the future. But now it's worked to a different extreme, and your mileage may vary over the good and bad of it.

[Splash the Otter]

Uh, that's what I'm saying.

 

Storylines keep getting more convoluted and "mature".  Gameplay stays wonky and low-speed.  More and more and more playable/new characters.

 

If '06, as it is, was magically considered good, and the series kept going that route, I can safely say I'd be nowhere near it.

We're not talking about the game being considered good. We're talking about it actually being good. As in, if there weren't any glitches, the story was a lot easier to understand, and the art direction was easier on the eyes.

 

As long as these people understand we don't want humans in the sonic games or shows and such, they do tend to do alot better. Yes, humans may exist in their world, but most people are in the sonic series for the sonic fur mobians, not humans.

Dr. Eggman is a human, you know. Or do you just mean that the cast shouldn't be overly saturated with human characters?

[Jet Prower]

 

Dr. Eggman is a human, you know. Or do you just mean that the cast shouldn't be overly saturated with human characters?

 

Well, Dr. Eggman is seen as the bad person you are supposed to not like and people don't really mind that. He is the evil human trying to hurt the animals. Yet, look at the reaction when you have Chris and Elise. People went crazy that there are people around. I've seen that little trailer for Sonic X where all the people were furry instead. That honestly did look like it would have been alot better and it likely would have been if it stuck to being on Sonic's world and didn't try and immitate the games for half the show. Then with Elise, her kissing Sonic and being more important than Amy has people upset at her. I'm betting people wouldn't mind humans being in the background, it just doesn't seem people like them in the spot light, other than Eggman.

[CrownSlayers Shadow]

Um, yeah I happen to actually like humans being around, thank you. And I judge them the same way I would the Sonic characters if they were significant characters and not just background, not because of their species.

 

It's the same reason I would like or dislike other characters, because their interesting. Whereas I dislike Elise, I really like Prof. Pickle. Having humans around has no detrimental impact over this franchise anymore than non-humans do.

 

Now if you'd like more anthro characters populating this world, that's fine. It would make sense seeing that Sonic and his friends stand out compared to much of the world. But this franchise started out with a hedgehog and a human, so it makes little sense to single out humans for existing later on and not foxes, echidnas, bats, aliens, crocodiles, and bees for existing when they weren't present until succeeding entrees came along.

 

Seriously, enough with the goddamn double standards people.

Edited September 20, 2013 by ChaosSupremeSonîc

[WarioBone]

One thing I know is that if '06 had been critically praised, good or bad, we wouldn't have Lost World.

 

And I'd be an unhappy camper.

[Jet Prower]

Um, yeah I happen to actually like humans being around, thank you. And I judge them the same way I would the Sonic characters if they were significant characters and not just background, not because of their species.

 

It's the same reason I would like or dislike other characters, because their interesting. Whereas I dislike Elise, I really like Prof. Pickle. Having humans around has no detrimental impact over this franchise anymore than non-humans do.

 

Now if you'd like more anthro characters populating this world, that's fine. It would make sense seeing that Sonic and his friends stand out compared to much of the world. But this franchise started out with a hedgehog and a human, so it makes little sense to single out humans for existing later on and not foxes, echidnas, bats, aliens, crocodiles, and bees for existing when they weren't present until succeeding entrees came along.

 

Seriously, enough with the goddamn double standards people.

 

I know you don't like my opinions in any topic, but I don't have double standards against humans. I was just pointing out that it seems most people have dislike for humans and often think the series should focus more around the animals than humans. I do agree with that. This is a series about the animals and it likely should stay focused on them alot more than humans. Sonic fits alot better on a world where the animals are the primary species over the humans than the other way around.

[KittyNakajima]

One thing I think I can lend towards Sonic '06 approving is the general proportions of the characters. I remember from watching the cutscenes with Sonic and Elise that they mentioned Sonic was something like six feet tall by real life standards. That's fucking scary. I do not want to think of a bipedal blue hedgehog that can travel at the speed of sound coming at me from whatever direction. Then there was also the Final Fantasy type realism they tried to do when modeling both Elise and Eggman. As much as I dislike the former character, it was okay, but Eggman was just ehh after being so animated/loopy for so long.

 

I say that because it seems that they've kept the portions for humans and the general cast the same since Unleashed/Colors. Sonic and his friends are about half the size of the tallest human, and the humans themselves have a balance between realistic variation/cartoon-ish that it actually works. Like so:

 

 

 

 

 

Excuse the last one, I just really love that ad.

 

They seem to be sticking to this for Lost World and possibly the third unnamed title in their partnership with Nintendo, and I can only hope they stay with it since it just seems to work so well. They found a good balance between the insane surrealism that the levels can pull off and managed to create background characters that seemingly blend in well with it.

Edited September 20, 2013 by KittyNakajima

[CrownSlayers Shadow]

I know you don't like my opinions in any topic, but I don't have double standards against humans. I was just pointing out that it seems most people have dislike for humans and often think the series should focus more around the animals than humans. I do agree with that. This is a series about the animals and it likely should stay focused on them alot more than humans. Sonic fits alot better on a world where the animals are the primary species over the humans than the other way around.

Most people have a dislike for bad characters, but they go for the easiest thing to pin the blame on (like humans) because they don't like to put much effort in critical thinking. Screw thinking deep about the subject, let's just make a scapegoat and move on.

 

This series should focus on Sonic and the good guys stopping the bad guys, as it was never about the animals and more about Sonic vs. Eggman when the series first began. Especially when in this same world of "animals being the primary species" we've had three different species of aliens (the Wisps, the Black Arms, and I'm assuming the Zeti), several different godlike eldritch abominations (Chaos, Iblis, Dark Gaia, Solaris, Light Gaia), and Chao, yet it's the humans people cry foul over.

 

No, this is an arbitrary double standard. You wanna convince me otherwise? Stop giving a damn about it and simply demand for more animals to equally populate the world. We don't have to shrink one group for the other when a resolution can be reached with making the animals equal in number with the humans.

 

I mean really, notice how despite being around humans absolutely none of the bat an eye about a talking blue hedgehog? It's like the same case with Looney Tunes here when a talking rabbit, pig, or duck goes out to a city for a job or to play baseball, again, with a bunch of humans. I could pile on examples, but I've made my case - if we can have more than one animal, we can have more than one human in this series.

Edited September 20, 2013 by ChaosSupremeSonîc

[Chaos Incarnate]

Alright, this is going to seem a bit trivial, but I've seen this pop up occasionally.

 

What if you never played as the Werehog in Sonic Unleashed, but as Knuckles instead? Knuckles was apparently going to make an appearance in the game, as was Shadow, before being cut out. Imagine the beat em up/platforming gameplay being relatively similar (face a room of enemies, encounter a bit of platforming along the way, etc). You'd obviously have to alter Knuckles' combat moves from the Werehog's, and have to utilize his gliding ability, plus the plot would obviously be significantly altered, but do you think Unleashed would have been seen as better game among critics and fans? 

 

I really have no idea, to be honest. I had a pretty enjoyable experience with the Werehog, and don't really think it deserved such negative reaction. Then again, playing as Knuckles in Unleashed could have gone both ways, either being really fun or end up worse than the treasure hunting gameplay (really hard to do,)

 

I apologize if this is a bit of touchy subject, but I've come across various people that have brought it up. Thoughts? 

[CrownSlayers Shadow]

Half of it would be practically be no different because we'd still be walled off in specific sections forced to fight a certain number of enemies before we could progress. The other half would be broken exploration because since Knuckles can climb and glide over stuff he could theoretically climb the highest point and glide to the end, thereby skipping over entire sections the developers intended for you to go through.

 

Level design was also a major part of the Werehog, having levels specifically created for his style of play. Knuckles wouldn't be suitable for it unless you flat out change EVERYTHING on that half of the game. EVERYTHING, down't to one the central themes of the game which was duality; duality of Light and Dark, duality of Normal and Abnormal, and so forth.

 

So unless that's done, I doubt it would be significantly good enough among critics. Fans? They'd have eaten it up regardless.

Edited September 20, 2013 by ChaosSupremeSonîc

[Jet Prower]

Most people have a dislike for bad characters, but they go for the easiest thing to pin the blame on (like humans) because they don't like to put much effort in critical thinking. Screw thinking deep about the subject, let's just make a scapegoat and move on.

 

This series should focus on Sonic and the good guys stopping the bad guys, as it was never about the animals and more about Sonic vs. Eggman when the series first began. Especially when in this same world of "animals being the primary species" we've had three different species of aliens (the Wisps, the Black Arms, and I'm assuming the Zeti), several different godlike eldritch abominations (Chaos, Iblis, Dark Gaia, Solaris, Light Gaia), and Chao, yet it's the humans people cry foul over.

 

No, this is an arbitrary double standard. You wanna convince me otherwise? Stop giving a damn about it and simply demand for more animals to equally populate the world. We don't have to shrink one group for the other when a resolution can be reached with making the animals equal in number with the humans.

 

I mean really, notice how despite being around humans absolutely none of the bat an eye about a talking blue hedgehog? It's like the same case with Looney Tunes here when a talking rabbit, pig, or duck goes out to a city for a job or to play baseball, again, with a bunch of humans. I could pile on examples, but I've made my case - if we can have more than one animal, we can have more than one human in this series.

 

Why are you so concerned with picking on my simple opinion? I'm not trying to find a scapegoat in anything. I'm just stating something. I wish you would stop trying to say I'm such a horrible person for saying what I think OK!

 

Yes, there should be more animals in the universe OK! If you dont want the human population to shrink then fine, they don't have to ok. I'm just saying there should be alot more focus there and barely any in that other area because those just don't seem to fly well. I AM trying to think critically about this, so please at least be considerate of my opinion. Sorry to feel a bit fussy, just feels like I'm being picked on there.

Edited September 20, 2013 by Jet Prower

[CrownSlayers Shadow]

I wasn't saying you're a horrible person (I would've been a lot harsher than that if I was), I was just saying something that people often do, and people have a habit of looking for a scapegoat and making double standards out of things.

 

Although my problem with your simple opinion happened to be the double standard of it. You were talking about how this series should focus on the animals when 1) it already does that anyway when there are few major humans to focus on, 2) having humans other than Eggman get focus wouldn't be a bad thing anyway since they're still outnumbered by the anthros that get focus, and 3) we didn't need to take humans away in order to balance the population in the first place.

 

And while I'm not trying to pick on you, because really, you're not the only person who's believed that, it annoys me how we can have this flexible universe in a series where all sorts of crazy things happen, starting with multi-colored animals with superpowers all the way up to flat out gods and and godlike abominations. A world where you have floating islands and super powerful gemstones that can turn people into super sayains, where the fabric of reality can rip open and reveal an alternate dimension...yet throw humans into this mish-mash of a universe and some how it's not natural to a world that never intended to care about what kind of people live on it?

Edited September 20, 2013 by ChaosSupremeSonîc

[Splash the Otter]

One thing I think I can lend towards Sonic '06 approving is the general proportions of the characters. I remember from watching the cutscenes with Sonic and Elise that they mentioned Sonic was something like six feet tall by real life standards.

What? But isn't he supposed to be only a meter high?

 

I wasn't saying you're a horrible person (I would've been a lot harsher than that if I was), I was just saying something that people often do, and people have a habit of looking for a scapegoat and making double standards out of things.

 

Although my problem with your simple opinion happened to be the double standard of it. You were talking about how this series should focus on the animals when 1) it already does that anyway when there are few major humans to focus on, 2) having humans other than Eggman get focus wouldn't be a bad thing anyway since they're still outnumbered by the anthros that get focus, and 3) we didn't need to take humans away in order to balance the population in the first place.

 

And while I'm not trying to pick on you, because really, you're not the only person who's believed that, it annoys me how we can have this flexible universe in a series where all sorts of crazy things happen, starting with multi-colored animals with superpowers all the way up to flat out gods and and godlike abominations. A world where you have floating islands and super powerful gemstones that can turn people into super sayains, where the fabric of reality can rip open and reveal an alternate dimension...yet throw humans into this mish-mash of a universe and some how it's not natural to a world that never intended to care about what kind of people live on it?

Jet isn't saying anything about humans being out of place. All he's saying is that we need more anthros in the background. I for one agree with this, because as it is Tails and Espio might as well be the only fox and chameleon in the universe. On this note, I should probably mention that I don't want the anthros to replace the humans, but supplement them (if that's the right word) instead.

[Jet Prower]

 

Jet isn't saying anything about humans being out of place. All he's saying is that we need more anthros in the background. I for one agree with this, because as it is Tails and Espio might as well be the only fox and chameleon in the universe. On this note, I should probably mention that I don't want the anthros to replace the humans, but supplement them (if that's the right word) instead.

 

Yes, this is what I'm trying to say. If I said get rid of humans, then I'm sorry about that. I just do think their world should focus around more animals than it has in some of the games and shows. Look at unleashed, Sonic X and such like that. Most all the background characters are humans, yet in the comics the background characters are mostly animals. I have nothing against sonic being in our world, but it would be nice to focus on it being sonic's world a bit more to where the animals do tend to outnumber the humans alot more, like they do in the comics. Humans still exist, just on a lesser basis. The majority of the mainland is covered in the sonic style animals.

 

 

Also, I often call then Sonic style animals, since Anthro animals have a totally different style than sonic style animals. Yes, sonic characters are anthro, but sonic style and anthro style are two different styles totally.

[Amomynous]

The 'Sonic style' is very much a product of the materials Sega had to work with,indeed; the characters had to be designed around circumstance.

In 8 and 16 bit,characters' parts have to be bright to stand out, and Sonic's markings and clothes are helpful for making out his form in these more 'primative' graphics.
Coming a bit later than Mario, it's less obvious in Sonic then it is Mario, who began in 8 bit, the latter being practically colour-coded.

Who knows how such a franchise would look if it started later, both with technology and whats 'in-fashion' in mind; I would imagine no white gloves, or beige arms for Sonic, hedgehogs would probably have round ears, also likely is more of 'detailed' style; a bit less chibi, with more noticeable fur and rougher quills.
 

Edited September 20, 2013 by Amomynous

[CrownSlayers Shadow]

Jet isn't saying anything about humans being out of place. All he's saying is that we need more anthros in the background. I for one agree with this, because as it is Tails and Espio might as well be the only fox and chameleon in the universe. On this note, I should probably mention that I don't want the anthros to replace the humans, but supplement them (if that's the right word) instead.

And that's fine; in fact, that's what I suggested they do in the first place.

 

But even so, there's still this "get rid of humans" sentiment from other people that I feel often needs to be called out.

Edited September 20, 2013 by ChaosSupremeSonîc

[FriendBot]

After going through a bit in beta concepts of past Sonic games. I found that Sonic Adventure 2 was going to have branching levels like Shadow. At this time, only Sonic, Knuckles and Eggman were playable but you will see Tails in the story. My question is what would SA2 be like if this concept was used instead?

[Jet Prower]

And that's fine; in fact, that's what I suggested they do in the first place.

 

But even so, there's still this "get rid of humans" sentiment from other people that I feel often needs to be called out.

 

I guess I just never made that clear was all. I dont want to get rid of humans, but that they shouldn't likely be the focus is all. The series is about the animals, so shouldn't the main focus stay on them? And before, I was just commenting how it seems alot of people do hate the humans, since when you look at how people think of Chris and Elise, it shows. I can understand them though, since Chris pretty much steals alot of stuff that should be done by Tails or Amy, and Elise seems like, her role would have been fit better by another character that wasn't human is all.

[Komodin]

I guess I just never made that clear was all. I dont want to get rid of humans, but that they shouldn't likely be the focus is all. The series is about the animals, so shouldn't the main focus stay on them? And before, I was just commenting how it seems alot of people do hate the humans, since when you look at how people think of Chris and Elise, it shows.

 

Chris and Elise are hated because they were just bad characters as a whole. Their being humans probably didn't help matters all that much, but they almost certainly would've been just as bleh if they were... "Sonimals?".

[Jet Prower]

Chris and Elise are hated because they were just bad characters as a whole. Their being humans probably didn't help matters all that much, but they almost certainly would've been just as bleh if they were... "Sonimals?".

 

Which I get. I know that likely wouldn't have helped if they were sonic animals instead of humans. I just often see people latch onto that. Since, as Ive seen, Chris was added to allow kids to have someone to identify with. I've never understood that phylosophy, since having to have a human to connect to seems just odd to me. So many people that grew up in the nineties and eighties and such had animals everywhere without this excuse to add some humans to identify with into series.

 

With Elise, would it have mattered if she was animals instead of human, not likely, since many of her scenes could have been accomplished differently I see, especially at the end, where Amy would have likely fit alot better in there.

 

Yes I know alot of this is opinion, so please don't jump on me for it. It is just that those two haven't helped people's views of humans in the series at all.

[DarkLight]

For every "Chris and Elise give humans a bad rep" I gladly point to Prof. Pickle and every human from Unleashed as well as Eggman himself.

 

It's a real double-standard I feel that some wish Sonic characters could/should be written better, but as soon as humans get brought up, it's a big, fat "NO" just because they're humans and that Eggman gets a free pass because he's the villain and his species means jack-shit because of that.

Edited September 20, 2013 by DarkLight