Crisis City in Sonic Generations

[Nepenthe]

Well, Back to the Future makes sense because the consequences of their actions follow from the basic rules of its own time travel. xD! Generations just doesn't, because it mixes and matches rules for the sake of telling a generic Sonic story versus an actual time travel story. Which is fine, but if we're trying to insert it into canon seriously then it just makes things kinda icky, so I disregard it outright.

[KHCast]

I feel like had they used Kingdom Valley, they could have avoided all these headaches, as, even though the events revolving around that level in 06 were erased, the location itself was still intact, and since Sonic at the end of 06(the only likely canon part) was in Soleanna, it wouldn't be far fetched to assume he went sight seeing around the area.

[Nepenthe]

Well, Kingdom Valley was the result of the Solaris Project disaster, so you'd have to choose a more benign location like perhaps Radical Train or Dusty Desert. But those levels weren't the most popular so they didn't get in. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[KHCast]

Well the Soleanna festival was in respect to Solaris, and that was still going on after the time change, so who knows. With the amount of fucks 06 gives, Kingdom Valley still being around honestly wouldn't surprise anyone lol.

[shdowhunt60]

2 hours ago, Nepenthe said:

Well, Back to the Future makes sense because the consequences of their actions follow from the basic rules of its own time travel. xD! Generations just doesn't, because it mixes and matches rules for the sake of telling a generic Sonic story versus an actual time travel story. Which is fine, but if we're trying to insert it into canon seriously then it just makes things kinda icky, so I disregard it outright.

That's why it bugs me that they tried to portray it as a direct sequel to Colors and tried to contextualize it in the grand scheme of the Sonic Universe. If you're just going to half-ass it, then why bother?

[Salamander]

I have no idea if people are actually taking this silly game seriously or if this is all just a thought experiment.  Even if we ignore the fact that the developers clearly weren't interested in telling a conventional time-travel story and thus didn't establish any rules to their method of time-travel, it's still the case that we have no idea what time-travel rules Time Eater or White Space operate under, and thus cannot dissect them or say whether they make any sense.  As for the memories of the classic characters, I'd imagine they simply work on the same principle Doctor Who has established for multi-Doctor stories: The earlier versions of the characters forget the events of the story and don't remember it again until it's happened to the latest iteration of their self that participated in the story.  So Modern Sonic wouldn't have remembered Classic Sonic's experiences in Generations until during/after experiencing them as Modern Sonic.

[Hyp3hat]

I was just thinking about this, but then I realised (not sure that this has been brought up) that Crisis City is an alternate timeline (it's Sonic 06's Bad Future) within an alternate timeline - Sonic and Elise destroy Solaris, thus ensuring the events of the game never happen (and Silver ceases to exist).  

I need to go back to bed...

[Nepenthe]

9 hours ago, FFWF said:

I have no idea if people are actually taking this silly game seriously or if this is all just a thought experiment.  Even if we ignore the fact that the developers clearly weren't interested in telling a conventional time-travel story and thus didn't establish any rules to their method of time-travel, it's still the case that we have no idea what time-travel rules Time Eater or White Space operate under, and thus cannot dissect them or say whether they make any sense.  As for the memories of the classic characters, I'd imagine they simply work on the same principle Doctor Who has established for multi-Doctor stories: The earlier versions of the characters forget the events of the story and don't remember it again until it's happened to the latest iteration of their self that participated in the story.  So Modern Sonic wouldn't have remembered Classic Sonic's experiences in Generations until during/after experiencing them as Modern Sonic.

I'm taking it seriously insomuch as I honestly do think Gens' use of both unaltered and altered time travel is bad enough to have irreparable consequences on the rest of the canon if you take the game itself as canon. Also, we can glean that they're both using both rules for convenience's sake by observing the characters' actions the way the game is set up.

The individual bits of Sonic history that Time Eater have displaced are talked about and presented as being exactly the same as their original incarnations (remember: Eggman can't change history if these areas aren't identical to the events in the older games) with any differences being chalked up to new gameplay and Sonic Team feeling creative, meaning they and presumably the rest of the canon are still operating in a linear A-to-B fashion but with the added perk being that you can simply jump to different moments in Sonic history by leaving the area and going to another one. White Space itself is also travelling in a linear direction but it's probably just super dilated compared to normal space-time: Sonic and co. are at a party, kidnapped by Time Eater, have their adventure, come back to the original party with changes that occurred before Time Eater showed up still intact (Sonic's hotdog is still warm with a bite taken off of it), and they still remember everything. 

From what we can observe, White Space is like the Hyperbolic Time Chamber with little islands that you can go to and experience that island's specific point in time as it was originally intended, and once it's dissipated the islands move back to where they were originally and leave the canon unchanged, which would logically include Classic Sonic and Tails forgetting they ever had the adventure once they step through that portal back home (which in itself is a plothole: Which Sonic is this? The one from S1 or the one from S2? By starting the game in Green Hill you get the idea that it's literally the S1 Sonic, but he knows Tails already. So why is he back at Green Hill, and why is Green Hill still overrun with Eggman's old robots? Wasn't the whole point to simply put all of these characters and events from their original games together?)

It makes sense until you get to Shadow and Silver who literally contradict all of this with their dumb behavior. When you meet them, it seems the Time Eater has displaced them from their original points in time a la Classic Sonic because they still have beef with you and allude to the original conflicts in their pre-boss dialogue. However, once you beat them they're magically on your side now and act like everything that's going on and interfering with their original issues is suddenly irrelevant. It contradicts just how passionate these characters were about their original end goals, almost as if they aren't the original Shadow and Silver but rather the Shadow and Silver that have grown to trust Sonic in the amount of time that passed since SA2 and Sonic 06 to Generations. If they are the originals, then their sudden change of heart doesn't make much sense and at the end of the game, the implication is that we have two Shadows and Silver running around in the present and that's probably gonna blow the universe up. If they are the current incarnations that lived through the games after their debuts, then them wanting to kill you makes absolutely no goddamn sense.

In short, it's impossible by looking at everything presented to insert the game neatly into canon without running into issues either with how the current universe is faring or without basically retconning every other game beforehand.

[Sparky]

Silver fights Sonic because of not knowing for sure if Sonic is really Sonic.

[Phos]

Sonic generations gives the impression that the developers couldn't decide if it was supposed to have a story or not, what with the aforementioned continuity hiccups, and how they raise the question of what the hub world actually is and then never answer it. They blur the lines between what's window dressing and what's meant to exist in world in a way that doesn't seem intentional. 

[AngelSlayerN64]

On ‎5‎/‎10‎/‎2016 at 9:45 AM, Sparky said:

Silver fights Sonic because of not knowing for sure if Sonic is really Sonic.

It's pretty likely that Silver's referring to the Doppelganger Races you've had up to that point. It's also possible that Silver's been on the sidelines, watching you race your Doppelganger to the goal. After wrapping your head around this, wouldn't you think every Doppelganger you raced in-game was a minion of the Time Eater? Look at Silver's quote again: "Are you Sonic, or an impostor sent for the Chaos Emeralds?!" 

It's only a theory, but since the Time Eater can't even touch the Chaos Emeralds because they emit spatial rifts at frequencies that the Time Eater would find disturbing, it creates Doppelgangers of Sonic to collect the Chaos Emeralds, and then destroy them, granting the Time Eater the opportunity to erase time and space at its leisure. The Doppelgangers might look like Sonic, but they're weaker or downgraded.

That's probably why Silver wanted to test you the first time when you meet him in the game, and why he doesn't give you the Chaos Emerald until after you beat him; because you've proven, once again, that the Sonic you're controlling is, in fact, the real Sonic. What this means is that Silver, not only has been watching your progress throughout the game, but also knows a thing or two about the Time Eater, implying that Silver has faced it at one point off-screen...