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So... What's so Bad About the Series' Current Direction?


Briraka

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And then the end was "haha, we saved the day Eggman! ya big dumb dumb!" while Tails and him brofist as Tails manages to save everyone in the world with his magic techie god powers.

I don't know why people are suddenly surprised that Tails understands machines. That's kind of always been his thing.
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Actualy, technicly Eggman saved the world, he was the one who shutdown the machine(admitedly after powering up the robot but still), though tails did reverse it, it might have been too late without eggman shutting it down first

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Most of the impression I get recently of Sonic saving the Earth or anything like that at this point is almost solely because its his "job" or something.

 

 

He says it himself :lol:

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I don't know why people are suddenly surprised that Tails understands machines. That's kind of always been his thing.

 

But it's always understandable that he's a kid, and his knowledge is pretty approximate. He makes an awesome biplane/jet fusion, but it has no landing gear. He builds a fake Chaos Emerald with "the same wavelength and properties" but it still manages to not be exactly the same nor nearly as powerful. 

 

While this quality is somewhat reflected in the cutscene where Tails puts Cubot's head on a Crabmeat, he also claims to have built complicated things out of inane cartoon-logic appliances, rendered the robo-mind-control-suit from Zeti useless, and then managed to fix everything caused in seconds without anyone's help, nor any backfire.

 

And all it amounts to is Tails bragging about how capable he is and Sonic isn't, and Sonic apologizes for being completely incompetent. That's the kind of crap I'm talking about. :v

 

He says it himself laugh.png

 

Ugh...

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I think one thing about SLW Sonic's reaction to the situation that disappointed me was when he finally found out that Eggman backstabbed him.

 

I was expecting a reaction a bit more satisfying than "The only thing that's gonna get conquered is your face Eggman!" which is just...cheesy.

Probably wasn't a shocking revelation in Eggman's case. Sonic knew from the outset that his truce with Eggman was temporary, and that as soon as the Zeti were out of the way, they'd go back to being enemies. It was just a question of when, not if.

 

could see him express surprise at Eggman being alive, granted, especially since he appeared to die while saving Sonic's life earlier. But I don't think Sonic would really be particularly surprised or even angrier than usual at Eggman immediately going right back to trying to rule the world. There was never any pretense that their partnership was to last past defeating the Zeti and stopping the planet-draining machine; And with both of those conditions met, the terms of their truce kind of officially ended anyway.

 

It's a bit different from Merlina, who Sonic didn't expect to be an enemy at all. I feel that Sonic reacted differently there because that revelation was framed differently; It made sense in that context, but wouldn't have so much here.

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Most of the impression I get recently of Sonic saving the Earth or anything like that at this point is almost solely because its his "job" or something. He's the hero, he kicks butt and beats up Eggman because Eggman's a bad ol' bad guy and he's a good ol' good guy ("Its what we do, Tails!").

 

I know he's supposedly caring enough of his friends and his planet to save the world, but it just doesn't seem like the cause means as much to him as the action at this point.

 

 

He has no special reason other than because its the goodness of his heart.

 

Elise: Why are you helping me?

Sonic: No special reason.

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He has no special reason other than because its the goodness of his heart.

 

Elise: Why are you helping me?

Sonic: No special reason.

 

 I'm not sure if I see how that was connected to what I was getting at as either an argument against me or in agreement. Either way, that statement is a nice sentiment of how Sonic does things, although his personality in 06 is the equivalent of a stale endpiece of white bread. :P

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Tails manages to save everyone in the world with his magic techie god powers.

 

While not exactly the same, Tails has been doing this shit since SA2 with the fake Chaos Emerald shit. If it is within the capabilities of an 8 year old to mimic the wavelength and properties (whatever that means) of a Chaos Emerald, to produce something that is virtually indistinguishable from the real thing, with the exception of how much power it actually produces, I think its fair that Tails was able to save the world by deactivating Eggman's Death-machine.

 

Certainly, for a child clever enough to partially recreate something which has been heavily implied to be the creation of some mythical entity, reprogramming a simple machine, should be as easy as breathing.

 

 

As for the rest of this issue.

The issue of Sonic's character is one that has been a problem for a long time. Every game has had causes some issue with Sonic's character. Yes even SatBK, where Sonic's intelligence is arbitrarily reduced for no reason, when he doesn't recognise that some child is actually Amy/Nimue in disguise (nitpicky, yes, but it was soooo obvious and Sonic had been pretty sharp up to and after that point). 

 

Lost Worlds and Colours before it, come from a couple of guys who are looking at the franchise from a fresh perspective. They're trying to inject some life into the franchise, after it had become so bland, and started taking itself far too seriously far too often. Its not ideal. Many improvements need to be made, but they're doing a damn good job considering the lack of information.

They've understood Eggman perfectly from the get go. Since Colours. Yeah, they've experimented with Sonic a little and it hasn't quite worked out, but they'll get there eventually.

 

Plus, we need an actual plot for the characters to actually do anything meaningful. If Sonic Team continue to make levels and ask the writers to fill in the blanks, the story will never be great, merely decent.

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But it's always understandable that he's a kid, and his knowledge is pretty approximate. He makes an awesome biplane/jet fusion, but it has no landing gear. He builds a fake Chaos Emerald with "the same wavelength and properties" but it still manages to not be exactly the same nor nearly as powerful.

Oh yes, he only approximately recreates a legendary magical stone of infinite power (the differences of which are undetectable by machine, and which is also designed to sabotage the Eclipse Cannon. Also he made it in probably less than a day while on the run from GUN). Exactly as you'd expect from a child, and proof that he couldn't possibly reprogram a machine.

 

Come on, man. We're well past the point where we should be surprised by something as simple as this.

 

And all it amounts to is Tails bragging about how capable he is and Sonic isn't, and Sonic apologizes for being completely incompetent. That's the kind of crap I'm talking about. :v
I don't know what story some of you guys are talking about but it sure as hell isn't SLoW.
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I do ant to say its fun to talk about my favorite character. But I dont think hes perfect ;p

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Oh yes, he only approximately recreates a legendary magical stone of infinite power (the differences of which are undetectable by machine, and which is also designed to sabotage the Eclipse Cannon. Also he made it in probably less than a day while on the run from GUN). Exactly as you'd expect from a child, and proof that he couldn't possibly reprogram a machine.

 

Come on, man. We're well past the point where we should be surprised by something as simple as this.

 

My point was that he's a genius but he's not flipping perfect. He can do insanely massive things sure, but there's gotta be some room for error in some way somehow.

 

You took my line about him being a kid specifically and just ran with it as what seemed to be an attempt to run my argument off course or something, I dun even know at this point.

 

 

I don't know what story some of you guys are talking about but it sure as hell isn't SLoW.

 

Yeah, it sure as hell is SLW.

 

vvv@Mechanovvv: My point was moreso that Tails is just able to do all these things with no sense of struggle, failure, or backfire, and then (joking or not) brags about it openly. It doesn't have much to do with the people he says it to as much as the action itself. It just seems like some culmination of strange writing for Tails and bad writing for plot points.

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I don't know what story some of you guys are talking about but it sure as hell isn't SLoW.

He might've meant that scene in Colors where Tails was like, "Good job to you on inventing a translator that allowed us to speak to the aliens and figure out exactly what we needed to do so we weren't running around the park looking like idiots. Oh, no wait, that was me."

 

But this was clearly good-natured joking around between friends. I didn't see that as Tails lording his intellectual superiority over Sonic or anything. Friends often do kid around with each other, and that's all what was happening here. Furthermore, I actually like that kind of interaction, because it makes Tails seem more like Sonic's friend and equal, rather than some doting sidekick with nothing but praise and admiration for Sonic. It's good character interaction, I say.

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Ignoring all the exposition at the beginning and the rawk at the end. All I hear in that is Griffith's awful screaming voice and the regular voice that I don't like anyway. I give credit that he's trying, but my general disdain for the voice doesn't really have me caring to much tbh.

 

And how is that scene from SLW not given any elaboration is beyond me, since we know why Amy and Knuckles almost died, since it was established in a scene before it. Im not going to act like that capitalized on it perfectly, but it's a 30 second scene that made me feel more then that does. And i know i mentioned this before a million times but when Tails gets kidnapped he spends the rest of the game being rather serious about it, actually displaying more emotions then people give him credit for.

 

Like Azo said, these are Sonic's best friends, people he has known for years and shared victories with. They are two of his closest companions. Yet, when he confronts the people responsible for what's happened to them? "Ugh, you guys again?" I mean, where's the emotion in that? He sounds less like a guy who's confronting these horrible beings for what they've done, and treating them more like an annoyance. Its almost insulting. 

 

Nobody is asking for him to get uber pissed, but damn. I kind of expect a little more emotion with this type of thing.

 

 

Regardless of how you feel about Griffith's voice, he conveys Sonic's emotions pretty damn well considering the context; disbelief at Merlina's betrayal,  refusal to accept her point of view, and defiance in the face of danger. All of that together is why I love that scene so much because of the emotions involved, it really does help sell the entire conflict.

 

LW tries to go for the same thing, but the script just downplays everything. The entire conflict is treated less like a fight to save a dying world and more like dealing with angry neighbors. The game expects you to take it seriously, but the script just doesn't allow it.

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My point was that he's a genius but he's not flipping perfect. You took my line about him being a kid specifically and just ran with it as what seemed to be an attempt to run my argument off course or something, I dun even know at this point.

At what point in SLoW is he any more "perfect" than he's ever been?

The kid has made a chaos emerald radar (S3 Japanese backstory), a transforming biplane/jet, a walker mech transformation for said biplane/jet, at least one spaceship (ShtH, if you don't count Fighters), a hoverboard, and a functional replica Chaos Emerald, and there's probably more I'm forgetting. It should not surprise anyone that he is capable of reprogramming a few machines successfully. He's not being treated like some kind of perfect Mary Sue technogod. He's just competent at a skill he's always had.

Like Azo said, these are Sonic's best friends, people he has known for years and shared victories with. They are two of his closest companions. Yet, when he confronts the people responsible for what's happened to them? "Ugh, you guys again?" I mean, where's the emotion in that? He sounds less like a guy who's confronting these horrible beings for what they've done, and treating them more like an annoyance. Its almost insulting. 

 

Nobody is asking for him to get uber pissed, but damn. I kind of expect a little more emotion with this type of thing.

The way I interpret it, at that point in the game, he's just tired of their bullshit. Shit's gone down, shit needs to get done, and he doesn't want to waste time with these clowns.
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As for the rest of this issue.

The issue of Sonic's character is one that has been a problem for a long time. Every game has had causes some issue with Sonic's character. Yes even SatBK, where Sonic's intelligence is arbitrarily reduced for no reason, when he doesn't recognise that some child is actually Amy/Nimue in disguise (nitpicky, yes, but it was soooo obvious and Sonic had been pretty sharp up to and after that point). 

 

Lost Worlds and Colours before it, come from a couple of guys who are looking at the franchise from a fresh perspective. They're trying to inject some life into the franchise, after it had become so bland, and started taking itself far too seriously far too often. Its not ideal. Many improvements need to be made, but they're doing a damn good job considering the lack of information.

They've understood Eggman perfectly from the get go. Since Colours. Yeah, they've experimented with Sonic a little and it hasn't quite worked out, but they'll get there eventually.

 

Plus, we need an actual plot for the characters to actually do anything meaningful. If Sonic Team continue to make levels and ask the writers to fill in the blanks, the story will never be great, merely decent.

 

My problem with them has nothing to do with their product being their own interpretation of the characters, but their style of writing in general. Its a style that conveys VERY limited emotion, and doesn't ask the audience to really care, and it makes the "drama" scenes extremely poor. Is it Sega's fault? Yea, it is. But that doesn't mean I can't criticize their writing for what it is, and that's exactly what I'm doing.

 

The current writing style is bad to me because it just kills the willing suspension of disbelief. The games take for granted that Sonic is going to win, and don't even try to hide it(and even joke about it), but at the same time try to make it seem like this epic adventure anyway. Basically, its a comedy that tries to be an epic...and its...not very good at it. And LW is the best example of it.

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Basically, its a comedy that tries to be an epic...and its...not very good at it. And LW is the best example of it.

 

Id love to see where in the hell you got that interpretation from with SLW's story. Just because it tired to experiment with different emotional tones other then lighthearted doesn't mean it was somehow reaching for a Lord of the Rings esque experience, not at all.

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Id love to see where in the hell you got that interpretation from with SLW's story. Just because it tired to experiment with different emotional tones other then lighthearted doesn't mean it was somehow reaching for a Lord of the Rings esque experience, not at all.

 

I reached that conclusion because it, yes it did try, it tried and just failed. It starts off strong enough and I really was expecting a pretty epic adventure. What I got was a lackluster one. I expected Sonic's mistake early in the game to lead a moment of character development for him, but that never came. I expected a pretty epic final battle with Sonic vs. the Deadly Six, and yet I got yet another Eggman final boss with the six unceremoniously booted. 

 

The game sets up a lot of things, and just doesn't capitalize on them in a meaningful way. Its sad really.

 

 

The only things I can say I liked about the game is Eggman, and the Deadly Six. But the former is almost always hailed as amazing, and the latter were sadly not as developed or interesting as I'd hoped.

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Id love to see where in the hell you got that interpretation from with SLW's story. Just because it tired to experiment with different emotional tones other then lighthearted doesn't mean it was somehow reaching for a Lord of the Rings esque experience, not at all.

Yeah, a lot of action comedies do this (heck the wonderful 101 does this and it works) so its not completely out of the question for the games to have a sense of threat while still being lighthearted.

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The way I interpret it, at that point in the game, he's just tired of their bullshit. Shit's gone down, shit needs to get done, and he doesn't want to waste time with these clowns.

 

Then SHOW it. If he was really that pissed off at them, then just have him cut the shit and just go straight into beating the shit out of them, no question asked. That would have conveyed a hell of a lot emotion than what actually happened.

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Then SHOW it. If he was really that pissed off at them, then just have him cut the shit and just go straight into beating the shit out of them, no question asked. That would have conveyed a hell of a lot emotion than what actually happened.

They bring out mecha-Tails almost right after he said it, which completely changes the situation. Unless you think rushing in and punching them the instant he saw them is the only reasonable response, I'm not sure what more you want.
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They bring out mecha-Tails almost right after he said it, which completely changes the situation. Unless you think rushing in and punching them the instant he saw them is the only reasonable response, I'm not sure what more you want.

 

YES, IT IS!!

 

 

If somebody killed my family and made my life a living hell, do you really think I would just act so casual about it? No, I would want fucking blood.

 

You're acting as if Sonic should not be allowed to lose his cool once in a while, weren't you the one arguing that he should show more emotion? I'd imagine that you would agree with the idea that Sonic would be more than a little upset at people who have caused him so much pain.

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They bring out mecha-Tails almost right after he said it, which completely changes the situation. Unless you think rushing in and punching them the instant he saw them is the only reasonable response, I'm not sure what more you want.

 

I thought Sonic was all about jumping head first and letting his emotions / thoughts take over. Him immediately seeing them and thus giving the beatdown in frustration would've set up the moment they pull out Mecha-Tails pretty well, since it would've added some tension.

 

Oh yeah, and absolutely everything Yakuzu just said. I tried to make that point earlier too, but it seemed like it was missed somehow.

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I reached that conclusion because it, yes it did try, it tried and just failed. It starts off strong enough and I really was expecting a pretty epic adventure. What I got was a lackluster one.

It tried to have have more of a story then done previously, but that doesn't mean it tried or was meant to be some grand epic adventure tale for the ages, it kinda sounds like you just set your expectations to high or was expecting a completely different kind of story to me.

 

 

 

I expected Sonic's mistake early in the game to lead a moment of character development for him, but that never came.

Except when Sonic fully acknowledges that Tails was kidnapped because of his recklessness, does that not count?

 

I'd imagine that you would agree with the idea that Sonic would be more than a little upset at people who have caused him so much pain.

 

Seen in the Zor enctouner cutscene where he was willing to dispense with the violence right from the get go.

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Well Sonic games haven't done in game dialogue for years, probably due to the backlash that type of thing gets..

 

Then again this is a moot point because in the aforementioned BK they gave you the option to turn that shit off if you wanted.

That didn't stop them from having the Deadly Six run their mouths every other level (and you can't even turn it off this time).

 

At what point in SLoW is he any more "perfect" than he's ever been?

The kid has made a chaos emerald radar (S3 Japanese backstory), a transforming biplane/jet, a walker mech transformation for said biplane/jet, at least one spaceship (ShtH, if you don't count Fighters), a hoverboard, and a functional replica Chaos Emerald, and there's probably more I'm forgetting. It should not surprise anyone that he is capable of reprogramming a few machines successfully. He's not being treated like some kind of perfect Mary Sue technogod. He's just competent at a skill he's always had.

So if I understand you correctly, Tails has always been a perfect Mary Sue technogod. Could you explain why this is a good thing, especially since nowadays it's pretty much the entirety of his character?

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It tried to have have more of a story then done previously, but that doesn't mean it tried or was meant to be some grand epic adventure tale for the ages, it kinda sounds like you just set your expectations to high or was expecting a completely different kind of story to me.

 

I like how when some people here just want some background info, some depth, or some sense of things actually happening with a sort of payoff from either the objective and/or character perspective, its interpreted as if we want a story as convoluted and massive as Lord of the Rings.

 

Hyperboles. Hyperboles everywhere.

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