Arin Hanson vs Sonic the Hedgehog

[Ryannumber1gamer]

Gonna have to agree, this is terribly out of context:

https://youtu.be/4KZExNrr0N8?t=449

[Tara]

Really, I think one thing we need to stop doing is pretending his comments on Game Grumps have any sort of validity or are based on a well-informed or foreplanned thought process.  Game Grumps is a show about people on a couch playing video games.  It's not an analysis or informational outlet.  It's two or more guys that are drugged up with Skittles and Monster energy drinks, playing games, telling jokes, sharing life stories, and just having fun being dorks.  That's it.  I remember a time in the Wind Waker HD playthrough, Arin continuously complained about not knowing how to set down an object, when an on-screen cue had been flashing in his face for five minutes.  When I'm playing games with my friends, we don't always make astute observations, either.  Because we're not in "analysis mode," if you will, and as a result, our outlooks are biased and based purely on what we find enjoyable.  Game Grumps are the same way, and I don't know why people take the comments Arin makes on the show to heart or outline them as official statements or thoughts about game design.

 

So, no, I don't think anything Arin says about Sonic holds any water, simply because the primary outlet for which he does these things is on a show about his enjoyment and his enjoyment alone.  Granted, his Sequelitis videos have some problems, too.  Sometimes he has great points, as in the case of his Mega Man X and Castlevania videos, but other times, his critiques seem incredibly subjective, lacking in professionalism, and one-sided.  I mean, there are so many things to critique about Sonic.  There are so many things wrong with this series and things I would be more than happy to admit to being detrimental to the experience of people who didn't grow up with it, and yet he focuses on absolutely none of those flaws.  Granted, he doesn't have to justify his opinions, but he does have a tendency to act pretentious about it.  I don't know if that's just part of the shtick or not, though.

 

Basically, I don't hold any ill will toward Arin for his criticisms towards Sonic.  If that's not what strikes his fancy, that's fair enough.  In regards to his Sequelitis videos, I just stopped looking at them as professional reviews (even if he likes to tote them as such) and moreso him rambling about the minute things that make him personally love or hate a game, which while not always well-informed are generally interesting to me.  I do hate that his opinion sort of has the consequences of having his die-hard fans absorb it and treat it as some pinnacle of game design ingenuity, which obviously has a tendency to fire back at the Sonic fandom, but I don't have a problem with Arin feeling a certain way about the games.

[Solly]

Really, I think one thing we need to stop doing is pretending his comments on Game Grumps have any sort of validity or are based on a well-informed or foreplanned thought process. 

[Celestia]

Uuugh...okay, look, I love Sonic. I really do. And while I haven't specifically watched the S3K videos, I have heard some of the stuff Arin's said about the series (in the past and in the stuff going on right now). I don't think I've agreed with any of it, aside from the more positive stuff that Mogtaki pointed out on the last page, so y'know, that I can understand. The thing I don't get is...why are we taking this so personally, to the point of (or so I hear, I'm scared to look honestly) tearing him a new one in the comments?

 

I've always just seen Arin's opinion on Sonic as...well...an opinion. The series just isn't for him, it's not a big deal. Yeah he's said some bizarre stuff, but it doesn't really affect me. At worst, maybe some of his fans will be like "HA HA SO TRUE!!!!", but frankly 1) he could say almost anything and they'd agree no matter what because that's what fanboys of anyone or anything do and 2) some of 'em are probably the type who have written off the series completely on their own, anyway.

 

Granted this doesn't mean fans shouldn't at least try to argue their case, but I hope people are being reasonable about it. I doubt it, because, you know, comments sections on the internet, but come on.

Edited June 7, 2015 by Celestia

[FriendBot]

What I feel why Sonic fans are taking it personally because EVERYONE DOES THE SAME FUCKING THING!

 

I mean sure I get a chuckle here and there for all the weird stuff Sonic does but when almost every single popular Internet personality just shits on Sonic, the joke wears thin and it becomes really annoying. 

 

And since this joke has been around since mid 2000s, it can be pretty aggravating.

 

I might sound really angry but I'm not, I can understand where the blasphemy comes from.

[Ryannumber1gamer]

Really, the reason I think people are making a big deal of this is because they are sick and tired of this common idea that Sonic was shit, and has always been shit, and Egoraptor makes that idea worse because of two things. 1. He has a massive fanbase, and 2. Most of his ''problems'' are massive nitpicks. When put together, that gives Sonic haters, and other people a bunch of new ammo to try claim that ''Sanic sucks ass''. It's the same way that some other people try to make videos expressively hating on the good Sonic games just to try say ''HAHA, SONIC SUCKS ASS, GIVE ME VIEWS :DDDDDDD'' and keeping it a joke.

 

I mean, as a Sonic fan, it's annoying to have someone keep nitpicking the good games and looking for every little thing they can use to claim the game is shit and always has been shit. If it was legitimate points and criticisms then it'd be fine, but when you keep making such silly nitpicks, or just keep blaming the game and how it was developed because you didn't bother to learn the controls, or because you're bad at it, it gets annoying

 

Even then, it wouldn't be so bad, but Egoraptor seems to just love to push his opinion on Sonic into viewers' faces. It's fine if he doesn't like Sonic, but by constantly shoving it into the viewer's face, or making nitpicky comments on a game, it just gets annoying, and we just don't need it being repeated 50 times over. It's not just people hating on Egoraptor for the sake of it, it's the fact that if anyone did this kind of bullshit, especially on nitpicky terms, it's going to get very annoying after a while, especially if you are a fan of that series.

[CottonCandy]

I have to honest, I don't think Arin's opinions about sonic should be taken so seriously. He may say things we all will disagree with but it's just his opinion at the end of the day. Sooooo... what else can we do about it? 

 

I agree he can be annoying with it at times but it doesn't bother me. I haven't been watching his stuff for years and I really don't care about gamegrumps so I don't really care what he says at this point. lol

[Tara]

I can more than empathize with all that.  The list of things that I never bring up here of all places because I know they will be treated to the same snarky BS without any sort of constructive criticism or reasoning other than "it's not my target demographic" gets bigger everyday, and I feel that a lot of us, including myself, are guilty of the same thing when it comes to lesser-received Sonic titles or things that generally aren't within our immediate sphere of influence (read: Call of Duty).  But the problem I'm addressing isn't that people are being annoyed at that, but that they're targeting the completely wrong item in order to make that point known.  No, I mean, feel free to stand up for yourself and your interests within reasonable bounds, and like I said, Arin's pretentious attitude towards it is more than enough to call him out on. But when we attack him based on something he says on a show that's not even meant to be informative or argumentative in the slightest, then we're not getting anywhere.

[ThePrinceOfSaiyans]

Yeah, that's my biggest problem with Arin's cynicism towards this franchise as a whole. Fine, Arin doesn't like Sonic, cool, but the way he conveys his opinion as if there's some verifiable truth to it just gives his fans the idea that these "flaws" make the franchise objectively bad. Arin honestly has no idea what he's contributing to. All this unsubstantiated hatred toward the franchise is making it nigh impossible to have a civil discussion regarding this franchise outside forums like this, which are specifically created to discuss Sonic the Hedgehog. I don't know how it is for anyone else, but all the time I see Sonic fans getting ridiculed for simply being involved with this franchise, and I'm sorta sick of it. Don't get me wrong, Sonic's in some shit right now, and I'd be lying if I said there weren't some major issues with the franchise as a whole, but the idea that this franchise is objectively bad is just creating this toxic atmosphere where you can't go 1 step without someone saying Sonic sucks, Sonic is dead, Sonic was never good, etc.

[Nepenthe]

I don't think his opinions can be dismissed because of the platform they exist under. Game Grumps is a comedy vehicle, but that doesn't suddenly create an objective line between his jokes and his actual feelings whenever he's talking, nor does such a barrier suddenly come to exist for his viewers in terms of interpreting his words, and I feel such a sentiment is how people and organizations are able to get away with misguided things. Plenty of times the Grumps have segued from comedy to make an actual point about what they were playing, and it would be fair in these contexts to take what they're saying at face value. Despite playing Sonic 3 for fun, his frustrations and attempts to reconcile them are genuine. Should fans thus frustrated with the cynical and blunt culture ignore these segues in lieu of the fact that they're being spoken of in a video meant for entertainment? I don't think so. I feel the moment a speaker can be reasonably assumed to be speaking their mind, they're at their most vulnerable to criticism in terms of a conversation about how those thoughts do nothing but aid the pervasiveness of a negative culture.

[FriendBot]

So I managed a mistake and posted on that episode of the 3&K playthrough and I got this:

 

 

 

See, that's the problem. The Sonic games aren't polished. They're rushed. And Arin saying the game sucks isn't baseless when he's already pointed out what he doesn't like about them. He doesn't need to list every criticism every time he says it's a bad game. And I don't think you can have constructive/deconstructive criticism of a game that was finished 20 years ago. It's not like Sega is going to patch the game lol. His beef with Sonic is that speed is SUPPOSED to be the main draw for the game, but when you lose your momentum to just wait around on platforms, or for tails to pick you up, it loses it's speed-centric element and becomes a sub-par platformer. Ironically, the platforms are the only thing that keeps the game from being an infinite runner. I really don't know what you're talking about when you say Sonic does badass things. He runs, rolls into a ball, does a homing attack, grinds on rails sometimes... that's pretty much it. Those mechanics have been beaten to death. At least with Mario they keep it fresh and innovate every once in a while i.e. Sunshine, Galaxy, 3D World.

[ThePrinceOfSaiyans]

He runs, rolls into a ball, does a homing attack, grinds on rails sometimes... that's pretty much it. Those mechanics have been beaten to death. At least with Mario they keep it fresh and innovate every once in a while i.e. Sunshine, Galaxy, 3D World.

 

[PKGaming]

I mean...god damn, his Mario 64 playthrough made me realise just how flawed that game is and can understand why he hates that game so much. Holy crap that playthrough was hilariously frustrating to watch.

 

Arin can make any game he plays look flawed. I don't think I've ever seen anyone play Mario 64 that badly.

 

I generally don't agree with Arin's opinion on game design either. I even disagree with his Mega Man X video to an extent, considering through experience, I know not everyone can easily learn and pick up on things just from the game trying to push you in that direction. Some people learn in different ways. Some people do need to be told exactly what they can do and what to do in certain situations through tutorials. Doesn't mean that they're dumb, they just learn differently.

 

With Sonic, I can understand a few of his complaints. Like, I do think the traps in Sonic3&K is kinda BS. Stuff does come out of nowhere that you couldn't see coming and the Spin Dash can get you into a lot of trouble sometimes. I also hate levels that're way too claustrophobic and riddled with stuff that bumps you around because it doesn't feel like I'm in control. It kinda feels like the game's bullying me. It forces me to go very slowly and try not to run into anything dangerous, but then I end up running out of time... (particularly in Carnival Night Zone)

 

But Arin also complains about some of the stupidest stuff though. Like, in one of the videos, Jirard messed up and fell down in Ice Cap Zone, forcing him to redo what he did and climb back up. Arin commented how that was stupid that he had to redo everything. No...no, it isn't. Of course if someone messes up and falls from a high place, he'll have to do it again. It's called punishment for messing up! Then he nitpicks about the background being too blue and matching Sonic's color, calling the enemy's slow moving spike attacks stupid, and calling bad game design when Jirard was "forced" to fall on an enemy and get hurt. There was nothing forced about that. He landed straight on the enemy when he could've...oh I dunno...avoided it.

[Mr. Taxi]

I posted it here because I want to know if my counter-arguments are reasonable because I'm not really that well skilled when it comes to arguments. So did I do?

 

Chill, man. This argument isn't going anywhere. At this stage both you and this other person are talking about different things. Consider their points, think about them if you're uncertain about how they relate to your own views and concede if their point might turn against them. It's no use to reinforce your point with more impressive words, like "S3&K is literally perfect". Your point will get shot down just as easily.

 

On another note, I'm still against the notion that speed is a reward. It implies speed is capable of making you feel good, which I quite frankly don't believe it is. Suppose you manage to reach the end of a stage and then proceed to go all the way back, quite faster than you came - which is natural since you know the way. How is that speed a reward? There's nothing in the game that indicates you're doing better for doing so nor it is likely to make you feel rewarded all by itself.

 

Your progress within a set of obstacles, however, is made easier if you can keep your momentum and thus you reach the end of a stage having faced less danger or having been able to cope with it more efficiently, thus having more lives. That, I believe, is the reward, for which you use speed.

 

It's a positive feedback. Being able to gain momentum actually makes the hazard less... hazardous and the hazards being less hazardous makes it easier for you to gain momentum. This culminates in incredible speedruns that make the game look so easy and fast when it's not actually the case for 90% of our own playthroughs. The opposite is true, though. It's really frustrating not to be able to use a stage's geometry or gimmicks to gain speed, which makes it harder to overcome any danger since, well, you need speed and momentum to effectively dodge and jump on stuff.

 

Take this example from Angel Island:

 

 

You've got two shimmering platforms. They are kinda tricky as they have such timing that you may be able to land on the first, but not on the second. So you have to pay attention to them and jump, correctly landing so as not to fall down and have to start over.

 

...Or you can just jump over the whole thing.

 

 

But doing so demands speed, see. It's not really all that hard to GATHER this speed (worst case scenario you can just spindash at any given time), but it takes either knowledge of the stage or trusting your guts or simply not being able to take it anymore to effectively do so.

 

Here's the key: Sonic would be an inferior platformer if it was made to be a rational one. But Sonic is a lot less rational than Mario, for example. In Mario you're given a big picture and you have to figure it out. In Sonic, you're given a set of abilities that will never change and you have to do what you can with it. This means measuring how much danger you think you're into if you stand still or keep running or jump over two platforms not knowing what you may find ahead. If you fall down, you get a second chance, now knowing that's not you're supposed to do - but that's okay. And, most important of all, jumping over the whole section demands less input but more skill and confidence than going through it like a regular platformer. In this sense Sonic is quite "badass", but it's not Sonic that's "badass". It's the player that has to be.

[Briraka]

I just got done watching the S3&K Grumpcade episodes and I feel that everyone's making a mountain out of an ant hill. So yeah, he doesn't like Sonic. The earth is still rotating, the cycle of life continues, and the fanbase is still divided as fuck. I mean, the way you guys make this sound is like he's constantly grumping about and nitpicking at shit, but he only does this a few times. And even then, one of those times I can agree with him, the part where Jirard runs into the spike ball in Marble Garden is a part where I pretty much do the same because I keep thinking I gotta go fast due the slope before the spike ball. But besides the little nitpicks, he sounds pretty enthusiastic about it anyways. Jirard trying to get Super Sonic, saying that he would go see Crush40 do a buttrock tour.

 

The posts in this thread just reek of insecurity. So what if his fanboys go on anti-Sonic rants like a bunch of sheep? Are these misinformed bouts of ignorance going to stop you from liking what you like? And are SEGA really listening to them? Even if they did, that would show an absurd lack of confidence on SEGA's part to change everything based on a few "Sonic Always Sucked" articles.

[Tara]

I don't think his opinions can be dismissed because of the platform they exist under. Game Grumps is a comedy vehicle, but that doesn't suddenly create an objective line between his jokes and his actual feelings whenever he's talking, nor does such a barrier suddenly come to exist for his viewers in terms of interpreting his words, and I feel such a sentiment is how people and organizations are able to get away with misguided things. Plenty of times the Grumps have segued from comedy to make an actual point about what they were playing, and it would be fair in these contexts to take what they're saying at face value. Despite playing Sonic 3 for fun, his frustrations and attempts to reconcile them are genuine. Should fans thus frustrated with the cynical and blunt culture ignore these segues in lieu of the fact that they're being spoken of in a video meant for entertainment? I don't think so. I feel the moment a speaker can be reasonably assumed to be speaking their mind, they're at their most vulnerable to criticism in terms of a conversation about how those thoughts do nothing but aid the pervasiveness of a negative culture.

That's fair enough, I guess.  I understand that negativity isn't confined solely to creative or conversational intent, and there's no doubt that his words have an impact no matter what the medium.  I guess my problem is that I'm really not sure what people are expecting or hoping to accomplish.  Are we hoping to change his and others' views on Sonic?  Get him and others to only point out what are, to us, legitimate flaws?  Get him and others to stop making cheap potshots because the Sonic fandom is an easy target (which I admit to being more than a little bit douchey)?  Again, I understand that this is a frustrating problem throughout the gaming community, but I don't know where we're going with this.

 

I just got done watching the S3&K Grumpcade episodes and I feel that everyone's making a mountain out of an ant hill. So yeah, he doesn't like Sonic. The earth is still rotating, the cycle of life continues, and the fanbase is still divided as fuck. I mean, the way you guys make this sound is like he's constantly grumping about and nitpicking at shit, but he only does this a few times. And even then, one of those times I can agree with him, the part where Jirard runs into the spike ball in Marble Garden is a part where I pretty much do the same because I keep thinking I gotta go fast due the slope before the spike ball. But besides the little nitpicks, he sounds pretty enthusiastic about it anyways. Jirard trying to get Super Sonic, saying that he would go see Crush40 do a buttrock tour.

 

The posts in this thread just reek of insecurity. So what if his fanboys go on anti-Sonic rants like a bunch of sheep? Are these misinformed bouts of ignorance going to stop you from liking what you like? And are SEGA really listening to them? Even if they did, that would show an absurd lack of confidence on SEGA's part to change everything based on a few "Sonic Always Sucked" articles.

I think the point here is less about it taking away enjoyment from us or influencing Sega, but the fact that the negativity transfers to all different parts of the internet and gives no positive space to talk about Sonic or identify as a fan of Sonic aside from dedicated message boards without the risk of having the topic derailed with either ridicule or nonconstructive piss shots.  I sort of feel that way about a ton of subjects on this particular message board and many others, in fact, so I can more than empathize.  It's not a matter of just being upset that someone dislikes Sonic the Hedgehog, as far as I see, as much a matter of feeling jaded at the overall gaming community to the point where you feel you have to simply not talk about your favorite subjects because why even bother?

[ThePrinceOfSaiyans]

That's fair enough, I guess.  I understand that negativity isn't confined solely to creative or conversational intent, and there's no doubt that his words have an impact no matter what the medium.  I guess my problem is that I'm really not sure what people are expecting or hoping to accomplish.  Are we hoping to change his and others' views on Sonic?  Get him and others to only point out what are, to us, legitimate flaws?  Get him and others to stop making cheap potshots because the Sonic fandom is an easy target (which I admit to being more than a little bit douchey)?  Again, I understand that this is a frustrating problem throughout the gaming community, but I don't know where we're going with this.

[Nepenthe]

There doesn't have to be any real end game to expressing frustration with parts of a culture you find problematic. If I could sit Arin down and have a debate where I was guaranteed to sway his thinking, I might take up the offer, and I say might because I know the entire situation is instead more the result Sega's games, the inability of gamers to care about the franchise beyond treating it like a punching bag, and general web culture, which is the result of many things we can't address directly without having a bigger megaphone on the Internet. Arin has little to do with that; he's just a contributor, mild as he may be.

It's like when I say, "Fuck that piece of shit Sean Hannity." This isn't a rallying cry to take down Fox News, the ultimate source of my annoyance, because it's relatively difficult to do and goes beyond Sean. Me expressing frustration that the people who talk the loudest about Sonic don't know a damn thing about him through targeting the most relevant example of the day is just venting.

[Tara]

here doesn't have to be any real end game to expressing frustration with parts of a culture you find problematic. If I could sit Arin down and have a debate where I was guaranteed to sway his thinking, I might take up the offer, and I say might because I know the entire situation is instead more the result Sega's games, the inability of gamers to care about the franchise beyond treating it like a punching bag, and general web culture, which is the result of many things we can't address directly without having a bigger megaphone on the Internet. Arin has little to do with that; he's just a contributor, mild as he may be.

It's like when I say, "Fuck that piece of shit Sean Hannity." This isn't a rallying cry to take down Fox News, the ultimate source of my annoyance, because it's relatively difficult to do and goes beyond Sean. Me expressing frustration that the people who talk the loudest about Sonic don't know a damn thing about him through targeting the most relevant example of the day is just venting.