The creator & Director of Gravity Falls are at Sega

[Badnik Mechanic]

I think this is an official account...

The director of Gravity Falls was also at Sega!

[Indigo Rush]

Oh. 

Oh my.

[Tracker_TD]

23 minutes ago, Detective Hogfather said:

I think this is an official account...

The director of Gravity Falls was also at Sega!

Of course he would have tagged along; he's a huge SEGA fan!

The guy's handle is RadRappy, referring to the Rappys from Phantasy Star Online, I've had several fun discussions about Sonic R with him. He's even a member on the SEGABits forums! If Alex, someone he's obviously friends with, gets the opportunity to go to SEGA, being a friend I think Alex would let him tag along.

 

Furthermore, these tweets suggest it was just a visit, not some crazy meeting thing. Finally, that "NDA" tweet in the OP is almost blatant sarcasm... though we already established we're bad at spotting that during the GeneHF debacle. 

[Dantemustdie00]

1 hour ago, Tracker said:

He also went to The Pokemon Company and Studio Trigger recently, so clearly he's writing Pokemon Sun and Moon, too!

...temper your expectations. I know we're bloody desperate, but c'mon. 

I knew he was at Studio Trigger, but I didn't know he was at the Pokemon Company too.

This got me very curious to what he's planning or what these companies may request of him.

[Tracker_TD]

Just now, Dantemustdie00 said:

I knew he was at Studio Trigger, but I didn't know he was at the Pokemon Company too.

This got me very curious to what he's planning or what these companies may request of him.

Nothing. He just visited them because I guess that's what you do after wrapping up production on a series. I vaguely recall someone else doing similar... Natasha Allegri? Hm. 

[Badnik Mechanic]

Yeah but... if he's just visiting... how come he's not allowed to comment on it?

[Tracker_TD]

Just now, Detective Hogfather said:

Yeah but... if he's just visiting... how come he's not allowed to comment on it?

He probably is, again that "cannot confirm rumours" thing is probably just sarcasm. 

[Nepenthe]

Or maybe it's literally that he doesn't know a damn thing about any upcoming projects because he didn't actually see anything on his tour, and thus he couldn't say anything even if he would be free to in such a situation.

[SBR2]

Ok I'd Love love Love Alex on Sonic but I just don't see it happening. Alex has a history of fucking with people for the heck of it and he also payed a visitto the Pokémon company earlier this year and no one made a big stink out of that.

[Tracker_TD]

SEGA does these plenty of times anyway; one of my former SEGABits co-workers went on a tour of SoA's offices the other day after GDC, too. Folks are putting too much stock in this. 

[Indigo Rush]

The only reason I feel like he's up to something with Sega is because of all these cryptic hints and codes we've been hit with the past few months. Coincidence? Sure. But see, this is the gimmick of Gravity Falls, putting decodable messages at the end of each episode. This is something Ruby's been doing a LOT lately, and I have to wonder if, at the very least, he's had his help in putting this ARG together. 

[Tracker_TD]

2 minutes ago, Indigo Rush said:

The only reason I feel like he's up to something with Sega is because of all these cryptic hints and codes we've been hit with the past few months. Coincidence? Sure. But see, this is the gimmick of Gravity Falls, putting decodable messages at the end of each episode. This is something Ruby's been doing a LOT lately, and I have to wonder if, at the very least, he's had his help in putting this ARG together. 

Nah. All those things have been self-contained, relating to their own things. It's just a coincidence. If they followed the same pattern as GF or had some kind of reference to GF within them, sure; but as it stands? I think you're reaching. 

I don't think he'd need "help," anyway; Aaron's not dumb.

[The Tenth Doctor]

4 hours ago, SonicDX said:

Whatever is going on, I hope we will get a great story writer for the next Sonic game(s). The past years were kinda boring in that point. And that post from Jun Senoue... I would love to see the character themes return! I really loved them from every Sonic game, and I'm sure if it comes to Jun Senoue, he'll do his very best! But... wait a minute, Sticks? Does this mean we will see Boom even in the anniversary game? Oh dear, why?! Please, Boom only exists since 2014, and it's been the worst Sonic product yet. Then why it is so necessary to put it into the anniversary game? Why all recent Sonic games are always related to it somehow? I don't understand why they don't stop dealing with Boom, it's such a failure in my opinion. If Sticks would be 'just' a character in the next game, it wouldn't be a problem, but I guess this means we'll see Boom character designs, too. Which are terribly bad and 'unSonical'.

This just gets more and more interesting, I really can't wait to see what will turn out of this all!

 

@SonicDX The Jun stuff was fake man, sorry. Fake Twitter account, made me fall for it a few days back.

[Nepenthe]

Assuming that this is totally true, and that Sega was contacting Alex for the sole purpose of helping them create ciphers and clues to upcoming events and stuff: 

1.) Why is this the first time we're hearing about Alex visiting when Sega's shenanigans have been going on for months? Even if he was connected to a game, wouldn't he have been contracted to Sega far earlier than almost the end of March if we're assuming they've been working on this thing between Generations and Lost World? 

2.) Wasn't it basically confirmed that all of the codes and numbers that had been revealed to us before the convention were simply leading up to the July date with which the 25th Anniversary convention is taking place? Assuming that's the case, and that those are the codes being referenced in this conversation, Alex is right in that he wouldn't be able to confirm any rumors because he would've only been knowledgeable of the convention as per the rules of his being contracted in the first place, meaning- again- he would have no actual way of confirming any game rumors because Sega wouldn't have actually told him anything. It would be as useful as asking the security guard what's going on.

3.) Why are these clues of a different quality than the ones in Gravity Falls? The codes in Gravity Falls were fun messages that related to the themes of the episodes they appeared in or hinted at Bill's general nature and ultimate coup; they were understandable within the context of the show, only being cryptic because you had to do a little bit of legwork to either find them in the background or decode them from simple numerology. However, the codes Sega are using have no context because we've never had any idea what these codes are hinting at because they refuse to tell us anything, hence why no one who has actually poured any time into this actually predicted that a fucking convention was coming. There are no show episodes or characters to tie these random numbers to anything, and thus they're going to be far more undecipherable because there's nothing to compare them to. It's like trying to figure out the numerical sum of x + y = z. You'd think if they were trying to get Alex's input on this, they'd be doing a far better job of his shtick than this.

 

[goku262002]

Its probably nothing.

ooor maybe they were there to give Ken Pontac and Warren Graff some damn script writing advice.

[Indigo Rush]

@Nepenthe

Alright, those are all actually really good points. Hm.

I still think it's more than a coincidence with all these codes flying around, but it could just be that they caught his attention and he wanted to give kudos or something. idk

Still suspicious. But alright.

[Dr. Detective]

Even with a few of the people here trying so hard to ruin any excitement I could possibly squeeze out of the idea that he might actually have something to do with this I still have to say that this is the first real interesting tidbit of news I've heard connected to this anniversary. Even if it is just the creator of something really, really good, visiting the place of something that I love and also would like to see get really, really good ...and then doing nothing with it.

 

[Nepenthe]

Well, again, he has visited Nintendo recently. Does that raise your suspicion level on whatever Nintendo is working on right now?

It is more than likely just a coincidence that Aaron decided to go this marketing route while Alex decided to use his new-found cash flow to stop by the offices and hang around for a day. Alex can go places without being immediately expected of working on something simply because codes and secrecy were part of the nature of a show he worked on.

[Roger_van_der_weide]

I'm hoping for a Sonic and Sega All stars Gravity falls cross over.
Let's see Dipper and Mable deal with house of the Dead zombies, Satan, Dark Gaia,Wizeman, Death adder and the Yakuza causing havoc in town.
No doubt Soos accidently released them, he has a tendecy to release videogame characters in the real world.
Dr. Eggman can help Grunkle Stan in the store. Especially if the brings the hypno beam from Sonic Colors along.

[Failinhearts]

If Alex actually turns out to be the new writer for Sonic, I'd be pretty dang happy. I'm still kinda sour over Lost World's sorry excuse for a story, so I'd love to see the Sonic stories go more in-depth with characters, backstory and whatnot with Alex behind the wheel.

[DarkLight]

I think some of us here are forgetting that even if we are seeing a new writer taking the helm here, he/she still have to answer to Sega and what they personally want out of the series's overall direction. Dialogue could be improved, sure, not doubting that. But just because this particular writer did great stuff on Gravity Falls (never watched it myself) doesn't nor shouldn't mean future plots are going to actually get better if the constraints Pontaff had to go through remain around.

[Nepenthe]

A lot of the restraints Pontaff were bound by do not get them off the hook because a lot of the issues of these plots were caused by shitty dialogue. Even if we can't get better plots out of any changes in writers, I'd rather the guy who had a hand in wonderful characters like Dipper, Mabel, and Grunkle Stan be given the keys to the franchise's stories rather than the guys best known for fucking Happy Tree Friends.

[shdowhunt60]

12 minutes ago, Nepenthe said:

A lot of the restraints Pontaff were bound by do not get them off the hook because a lot of the issues of these plots were caused by shitty dialogue. Even if we can't get better plots out of any changes in writers, I'd rather the guy who had a hand in wonderful characters like Dipper, Mabel, and Grunkle Stan be given the keys to the franchise's stories rather than the guys best known for fucking Happy Tree Friends.

I don't think that DarkLight was saying that they do. I mean, it should be apparent that letting the guys who wrote for Happy Tree Friends write for Sonic is every bit as ill advised as letting Team Ninja do Other M. I think he was saying though, is that like with Other M, that they were only half the problem here. The other part is due to the fact that SEGA is at the reigns here, and at the end of the day having a better writer isn't going to fix all the atrocious writing.

I mean, Sonic is not exactly a stranger.Just look at the voice acting. Ryan Drummond had the right voice for Sonic, but shitty voice direction completely killed chance of him performing well. Roger Craig Smith is an extremely talented VA, but his voice for Sonic is an incredibly bad fit for the character.

[Badnik Mechanic]

Didn't we figure out recently that the writers dont really write the script so much as they offer a western translation of it? 

And even then we don't really know who actually pens the original source.

[Nepenthe]

8 minutes ago, shdowhunt60 said:

I don't think that DarkLight was saying that they do. I mean, it should be apparent that letting the guys who wrote for Happy Tree Friends write for Sonic is every bit as ill advised as letting Team Ninja do Other M. I think he was saying though, is that like with Other M, that they were only half the problem here. The other part is due to the fact that SEGA is at the reigns here, and at the end of the day having a better writer isn't going to fix all the atrocious writing.

I mean, Sonic is not exactly a stranger.Just look at the voice acting. Ryan Drummond had the right voice for Sonic, but shitty voice direction completely killed chance of him performing well. Roger Craig Smith is an extremely talented VA, but his voice for Sonic is an incredibly bad fit for the character.

It just seems to be that there's this unintended implication from the fact that since Pontaff don't have control of every facet of any story they work on (except SC which always seems excluded from these discussions), that subsequently the actual people writing the scripts don't matter much, or at least don't matter enough to justify the amount or the tone of the criticism leveled against them, and it's not an implication I agree with. Unleashed actually had roughly the same pacing and mechanical problems that Colors and Gens did, which is that by charging Sonic with cleaning up an overall mess consisting of addressing an arbitrary number of Macguffins without any overwhelming opposition from the villains, the second act becomes an absolute bore and the locations of the stages become a bit disconnected from the point of the narrative because each location has the same, interchangeable problem. And yes, that's a problem a person charged with just penning words and actions probably don't have any control over because it comes down to the game design. However, what makes Unleashed far more enjoyable is the actual script's attempt to give Sonic and Chip meaningful development, characterization that can juggle both comedic and dramatic moments, and to inject overarching themes in what is otherwise a basic "Do X this amount of times to win" game story. And the majority of this is indeed communicated through the script itself.

The point is, if Pontaff were replaced with better script writers, or at the very least ones who didn't treat the characters as perpetually sarcastic and stand-offish all the damn time or who could communicate a basic moral about responsibility competently, the stories would indeed be more enjoyable even if we still had the problem of disjointed scenarios. So while it's not a one size fits all solution, it's still a net benefit as far as I'm concerned.