Why the Modern Sonic Stories Just Don't Work

[CrownSlayers Shadow]

10 hours ago, Marco9966 said:

At least it tried to have a more serious story and world, it's a step in the right direction.

All they needed to make this game better is:

-No Classic Sonic

-No cringey jokes

It would take a lot more than that to make Forces story better.

It had a decent premise and way to build it, they just botched it in the most asinine way that no one who looked forward to it (such as myself) thought they would.

[Celestia]

That's kind of an odd complaint when it comes to Forces in particular. It has like, what, a few offhand quips from Sonic? Orbot and Cubot appear but don't really have many (or any, as I remember it) comic relief moments? I'm not even necessarily saying there should have been more comedy, just...there really wasn't much, so I'm not sure how removing any of it would change anything.

In fairness, let's look back at Colours for a second. In that case I can agree that removing jokes could genuinely improve it. They packed so many (usually "meh") jokes that it wouldn't hurt to cut tons of 'em out, especially if it was to add more substance. However, they toned it down so much in subsequent games that I feel that The Mere  Presence of Jokes is like, not even remotely the problem.

What is the problem then? I dunno, don't ask me! The way I'd describe it is, most mid-00s and onward Sonic stories have increasingly felt like first (or maybe second) drafts that they never got around to fixing up. LW and Forces are just the most recent cases of that. There are problems unique to the current direction for sure, nobody can deny that; most of us have had or seen that whole song and dance so I won't get into it. Really I'm just tired of arguments like this because it really does just boil down to trying to make it about "era vs era," when that's not actually how any of this works.

[Marco9966]

33 minutes ago, Celestia said:

That's kind of an odd complaint when it comes to Forces in particular. It has like, what, a few offhand quips from Sonic? Orbot and Cubot appear but don't really have many (or any, as I remember it) comic relief moments? I'm not even necessarily saying there should have been more comedy, just...there really wasn't much, so I'm not sure how removing any of it would change anything.

I don't think so. Forces had Sonic always making jokes even when imprisoned, or in front of Infinite (wtf  about "Do you like romantic walks on the beach!" or "It's not the smell of fear, it's just me sweating from running"), it undermines the stakes of the story. This is war!  There's a guy who managed to beat Sonic up! Eggman just conquered the fucking planet, Infinite just beat the shit out of Sonic! Sonic just knows to joke around Knuckles when Knuckles is the one that planned his whole rescue!!

The writing for Sonic in modern era was undeniably different in the Adventure era, just look at his jokes in SA2 or Black Knight, (example: talk about low budget flights) that's actually funny and doesn't come off as cringy like "Let's make like Eggman's hairline and recede".

Although I genuinely laugh at remarks like "The only thing that's gonna be conquered is your face Eggman", or "Let me stamp you before you go", one-line jokes are acceptable, but don't make ALL dialogues one-line jokes.

They can give games better vibes like SA2 or Unleashed, and they can add in one or two one-line jokes, not ALL lines have to be jokes.

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Really I'm just tired of arguments like this because it really does just boil down to trying to make it about "era vs era," when that's not actually how any of this works.

I have to disagree. I think it's good to differentiate between the eras so that we can better see what elements made an era different from another. And they could make the modern stories more like Adventure era by taking elements from it (like better characterization, good writing for villains, CHARACTER INTERACTIONS).

The best example of this era divide is the Riders series. Just how look how different is Free Riders (modern era) from the 2 original Riders games (Adventure era). It's huge downgrade.

I think Forces is a step in the right direction despite Neo-classic-mute-sonic and one-line-jokes. At least they tried to do darker premise and many characters.

[SenEDDtor Missile]

9 hours ago, Marco9966 said:

I don't think so. Forces had Sonic always making jokes even when imprisoned, or in front of Infinite (wtf  about "Do you like romantic walks on the beach!" or "It's not the smell of fear, it's just me sweating from running"), it undermines the stakes of the story.

To be fair, I think this particular scenario is a case of Sonic needing to be shown with something that makes it clear that he understands the stakes, as opposed to being inherently bad in it of itself. Making jokes in itself while in a bad position isn't an inherently bad thing as long as the scene still acknowledges that the character is not in strong state.

Case in point, take this scene from Transformers Prime:

Cliffjumper makes a short joke towards Starscream, but we can clearly tell that he's in pretty bad shape, so it comes off less as him being unaffected, but rather just being defiant towards a villain in the face of his impending death.

Taking the above into consideration, if Sonic had been shown lying on the floor of his cell, beaten up and breathing heavily or something like that, then when he makes jokes towards Zavok intending to execute him, it would seem less like he was not impacted by being imprisoned, but rather trying to maintain some sense of morale and keeping up a strong face despite his weakened condition.

And with the scene with Infinite, you could easily interpret that as him trying to probe Infinite about his weaknesses by acting casual and goofy, but admittedly I think a little moment where Sonic thinks "This guy's got an ego bigger than a mountain; Let's see if I can't get him to loosen his tongue about his weaknesses." and then deliberately starts not taking Infinite seriously to rile the guy up would have strengthened the scenario. It's not that different from how Spiderman actively uses taunts to unhinge and make his opponents' weakpoints more evident, even though deep down he's just about nearly crapping himself from dealing with dangerous foes.

[Celestia]

1 minute ago, Marco9966 said:

I have to disagree, Forces had Sonic always making jokes even when imprisoned, or in front of Infinite (wtf  about Do you like to walk on the beach! or "It's not the smell of fear, it's just me sweating from running"), it undermines the stakes of the story. This is war!  There is darkness!  There is violence! Eggman just conquered the fucking planet, Infinite just beat the shit out of Sonic! Sonic just knows to joke around Knuckles when Knuckles is the one that planned his whole rescue!!

The writing for Sonic in modern era was undeniably different in the Adventure era, just look at his jokes in SA2 or Black Knight, (example: talk about low budget flights)

In that regard, how is Sonic joking around as he escapes from a military helicopter any better than him, say, joking around with Knuckles after escaping from an Eggman prison? As you (sorta) pointed out, I think it more or less comes down to if you like a particular joke, and that's completely fine. Everyone's gonna have a different sense of humour. (I mean, I thought the receding hairline joke in Colours was literally the best line in the game, so. There ya go.)

I agree that they undermine stakes a lot, that's absolutely one of the problems that is unique to the current "era," and sometimes it's not even anything related to jokes specifically. It depends on context, y'know? Sonic snarking at villains? Not a problem. The bit near the end of LW where not long after demonstrating deep anger and sadness over what happened to his friends (and Eggman), he reacts to the Deadly Six--the group responsible for all that--with a bored "ugh, you guys again"?...Yeah.

[Almar]

Sonic Forces would have an underwhelming world/plot even with no jokes. What with Knuckles' forced role as commander, Infinite being such a weak character, Eggman's lack of global personality and presence, Tails' handling, much of the cast continuing their jobs as cheerleaders for Sonic...

[Marco9966]

39 minutes ago, Almar said:

Sonic Forces would have an underwhelming world/plot even with no jokes. What with Knuckles' forced role as commander, Infinite being such a weak character, Eggman's lack of global personality and presence, Tails' handling, much of the cast continuing their jobs as cheerleaders for Sonic...

What do you expect from writers who never played the Sonic Adventure games?

Bring  back Maekawa!

[SBR2]

You know what fuck it. I like the current games. They're funny, have genuine personality and feel like the writers are capable of weaving a coherent story. All things Adventure-Unleashed didn't have.

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So all you want is to run fast through a level over and over without any substance or story? That looks like a casual gamer's motivations at best

Also this gatekeeping shit really needs to stop. Some of us just don't care about the stories. I hate that people are so insistent every game has to have a deep winding narrative that whether or not it's actually fun falls to the wayside. Personally I can Replay Colors and Generations a million times and never get bored. Meanwhile SA2 after the Sonic/Shadow Stages are done it becomes tedious. That has nothing to do with the story just that I find those 2 way WAY more fun to play.

[Marco9966]

23 minutes ago, SBR2 said:

feel like the writers are capable of weaving a coherent story. All things Adventure-Unleashed didn't have.

Lost World was a mess, and Forces have more plotholes and incoherences than any game before it.

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Also this gatekeeping shit really needs to stop. Some of us just don't care about the stories. I hate that people are so insistent every game has to have a deep winding narrative that whether or not it's actually fun falls to the wayside. Personally I can Replay Colors and Generations a million times and never get bored. Meanwhile SA2 after the Sonic/Shadow Stages are done it becomes tedious. That has nothing to do with the story just that I find those 2 way WAY more fun to play.

Well, is it not possible to have both? Having good story and good levels?

Plus, a good story is what gives motivation to go on to the next level, SA1 did that so well. It increases investment into the game by the player.

[DabigRG]

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8 hours ago, SenEDDtor Missile said:

To be fair, I think this particular scenario is a case of Sonic needing to be shown with something that makes it clear that he understands the stakes, as opposed to being inherently bad in it of itself. Making jokes in itself while in a bad position isn't an inherently bad thing as long as the scene still acknowledges that the character is not in strong state.

Taking the above into consideration, if Sonic had been shown lying on the floor of his cell, beaten up and breathing heavily or something like that, then when he makes jokes towards Zavok intending to execute him, it would seem less like he was not impacted by being imprisoned, but rather trying to maintain some sense of morale and keeping up a strong face despite his weakened condition.

And with the scene with Infinite, you could easily interpret that as him trying to probe Infinite about his weaknesses by acting casual and goofy, but admittedly I think a little moment where Sonic thinks "This guy's got an ego bigger than a mountain; Let's see if I can't get him to loosen his tongue about his weaknesses." and then deliberately starts not taking Infinite seriously to rile the guy up. It's not that different from how Spiderman actively uses taunts to unhinge and make his opponents' weakpoints more evident, even though deep down he's just about nearly crapping himself from dealing with dangerous foes.

Agreed.

I actually enjoyed Sonic's interactions with Infinite.

2 hours ago, Marco9966 said:

What do you expect from writers who never played the Sonic Adventure games?

Bring  back Maekawa!

Um, you do realize that Misters Pontac & Graff only wrote the story for Lost World and mainly just localized everything else, riiight?

1 hour ago, SBR2 said:

You know what fuck it. I like the current games. They're funny, have genuine personality and feel like the writers are capable of weaving a coherent story. All things Adventure-Unleashed didn't have.

 

Uuuuh, those last two points are debatable.

[Sonic Fan J]

This topic probably doesn't play well with my viewpoints, but I think the biggest problem that Forces had narratively (not touching plot holes or any of that) is a lack of pathos. The game never really gives us a reason to care. The characters are either underutilized or so absorbed in self pity that you're either left apathetic or irritated. Then it doesn't help at all that Sonic shows no interest in anything really beyond beat the bad guy and split. His own investment in the narrative is very reflective of the player's own. On top of that, the levels are not presented in anyway that makes the player feel like they have to stop Eggman. Even in the classics the stakes were always visible. Sonic 1; beat any enemy and you see you free an animal. That leaves an impression. Sonic CD; play it recklessly and you'll find yourself in a future taken over by Eggman and you see the ugliness of it. Sonic 3; Before you even reach the end of Angel Island Zone Act 1 you see the whole place get burnt down by Eggman. In the Adventure games the narrative and imagery work together to drive the point home. Adventure; Watch the opening sequence and you see what Chaos will become and then the narrative shows you that that is what Eggman is aiming for. Adventure 2; the game starts with Sonic on the run and the stakes just keep getting higher, with prison island getting blown up by Eggman and then seeing him destroy half the moon. You start trying to earn back Sonic's freedom and end by saving the world from the threat you see Eggman and Shadow presenting from earlier on. Same with Unleashed. You see Eggman break apart the world and know that you have to put it back together and that you will inevitably have to square off with Eggman to get it done. Then it also throws in Chip and his plight as well as Sonic's own with the Werehog transformation as attempts at getting the player to care so that they push forward to resolve the personal problems as well as the global one.

Admittedly, everyone's mileage will vary with any level of presented pathos or imagery that encourages you to push forward, but having a reason to care is still important. In that regard I can't actually fault the modern games beyond Forces for failing to give me a reason to care. In Colors we see almost immediately that Eggman isn't just enslaving animals, but sentient beings who are fully aware. This shows the player immediately the stakes of leaving Eggman be and you just can't leave him be. Then in lost world, again you see Eggman enslaving sentient beings and that Sonic is still mid rescue mission to save the animals that Eggman has been capturing. In Generations Eggman is threatening to pretty much rewrite all of history in his image and the white space shows you the horror of what will happen to anyone Eggman decides to write out. The problem that these three games have is that inconsistent tone, improperly timed jokes, and painting Eggman as a non-threat undermines any attempts to create and maintain any pathos. But Forces even fails beyond that. There is no visual motivation, narrative motivation, character motivation, or even gameplay motivation to push the player forward. The icing on the cake is that the aspect they push hardest for the player to care about is just unlocking customization options for the avatar. They rely on player compulsiveness to get them through the game and skimp on everything else. A player can't be expected to care about anything if the only thing you give them are shiny baubles and no meat.

To summarize or TL;DR, the modern games lack pathos in visuals, gameplay, narrative, and characters, but outside of Forces not completely. The problem is that they constantly undermine their own attempts to create and maintain that pathos with strange aesthetic and gameplay choices (Lost World does this a lot) that takes the player out of the game, or narratively undermine themselves with poorly timed jokes and incoherent pacing and plot points. So it's not that the modern games can't work from a story standpoint, but more that their is no cohesion that makes people care. In short, there is no pathos, not because the stories inherently fail, but because the way everything is presented fails.

[SBR2]

4 hours ago, DabigRG said:

 

Uuuuh, those last two points are debatable.

Honestly I'd argue that Colors and up have stories that feel like the actually have a plotted course and actually Beginnings, Middle's and End's. Say what you will about the content but they feel more like actual stories they actually spent time writing. 

Meanwhile most of the older games feel like a bunchof events loosely tied together to form something that can technically be called a narrative. 

[CrownSlayers Shadow]

3 hours ago, SBR2 said:

Meanwhile most of the older games feel like a bunchof events loosely tied together to form something that can technically be called a narrative. 

This is a joke right?

Because if it’s not, it’s very easy to see how dishonest and false that claim is unless you’re referring to Heroes or ShTh. Especially if you’re talking about the Adventures and Unleashed, because you know full and well that no they are not loosely connected.

[Diogenes]

Unleashed is definitely just a bunch of loosely connected events for most of its story. It has a beginning and an end but the middle is just sort of...wandering around and doing stuff until you can wander somewhere new.

[SenEDDtor Missile]

Just now, Diogenes said:

Unleashed is definitely just a bunch of loosely connected events for most of its story. It has a beginning and an end but the middle is just sort of...wandering around and doing stuff until you can wander somewhere new.

It was proto-Colors in many ways, except it still had worldbuilding to at least sort of compensate. And less irritating jokes.

[CrownSlayers Shadow]

13 minutes ago, Diogenes said:

Unleashed is definitely just a bunch of loosely connected events for most of its story. It has a beginning and an end but the middle is just sort of...wandering around and doing stuff until you can wander somewhere new.

You mean like how every game after Colors is like? That’s not really loosely connected, then.

And that wandering around is mainly the player grinding for Sun/Moon medals, which is a gameplay thing, not a story one.

Like really, what constitutes as “loosely connected” because I highly doubt you’re even using that term right referring that to Unleashed.

[Diogenes]

8 minutes ago, Conquering Storm's Servant said:

That’s not really loosely connected, then.

If it's not loosely connected, then it's not connected at all, because it sure as hell isn't well connected.

8 minutes ago, Conquering Storm's Servant said:

And that wandering around is mainly the player grinding for Sun/Moon medals, which is a gameplay thing, not a story one.

No I mean how between...I guess rescuing Pickle and Chip getting his memories back, basically nothing happens storywise. You're arbitrarily restricted on what countries you can visit, you're arbitrarily restricted in what order main levels open up, nothing is really done or said about Chip's memories or Sonic's werehog curse, Eggman barely even shows up...it's just the grunt work of running around getting the keys to open the temples to restore the emeralds and the planet without the story advancing in any way.

[CrownSlayers Shadow]

18 minutes ago, Diogenes said:

If it's not loosely connected, then it's not connected at all, because it sure as hell isn't well connected.

Yes, it is.

Just because it gives you a choice in which part of events in the story’s middle to do first or restricts you fron part of the game until you’ve completed certain objectives, doesn’t make it unconnected.

Regardless of whether you go to, say Chun-Nan first and Adabat second or vice versa, both events are still part of the story that happened regardless of which order you do them in. That’s unlike Shadow the Hedgehog, where some events are just “what ifs” that probably or definitely never even happened and you have no clue what part of the story’s middle actually happened after the end of the first level. That’s something that’s loosely connected.

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No I mean how between...I guess rescuing Pickle and Chip getting his memories back, basically nothing happens storywise. You're arbitrarily restricted on what countries you can visit, you're arbitrarily restricted in what order main levels open up, nothing is really done or said about Chip's memories or Sonic's werehog curse, Eggman barely even shows up...it's just the grunt work of running around getting the keys to open the temples to restore the emeralds and the planet without the story advancing in any way.

Which, again, isn’t a loose connection.

That’s just grinding.

[Diogenes]

2 minutes ago, Conquering Storm's Servant said:

Yes, it is.

Just because it gives you a choice in which part of events in the story’s middle to do first doesn’t make it unconnected,

...I don't think you even remotely understand what I'm trying to say here. The point isn't that you have a choice, the point is that the plot stalls out and doesn't pick back up until you do some arbitrary busywork. Things don't progress due to any kind of narrative logic, you just find whatever level you're supposed to go to and finish it because it opens the next level.

Unleashed is like if almost the entirety of SA was the part where Sonic and Tails go to Windy Valley, Casinopolis, and Ice Cap to get emeralds. You wander around to find what's open, you do a level to make another one available somewhere, but nothing is really happening. But SA, unlike Unleashed, actually has events in the middle; after Ice Cap you get into a fight with Knuckles and then Chaos 4, and then you see the Egg Carrier so you hop on the Tornado and Sky Chase it, then you get shot down and go looking for Tails but you run into Amy, then you get separated and she's chased by a robot so you look for her, then you see her captured and hauled off to the Egg Carrier so you chase it, then you reunite with Tails and do Sky Chase 2...like, you see how the state of the narrative is evolving and (you are/Sonic is) acting for specific immediate reasons at each step, yeah? And you don't just get this empty space of "do a level to do a level to do a level", right?

2 minutes ago, Conquering Storm's Servant said:

Which, again, isn’t a loose connection.

That’s just grinding.

I mean if that's the phrase you want to use to describe how shit the middle of Unleashed's story is that's your choice but it doesn't make the events any more connected.

[Skull Leader]

13 hours ago, Almar said:

Sonic Forces would have an underwhelming world/plot even with no jokes. What with Knuckles' forced role as commander, Infinite being such a weak character, Eggman's lack of global personality and presence, Tails' handling, much of the cast continuing their jobs as cheerleaders for Sonic...

There were jokes in Forces?

Otherwise I agree. Forces first trailers even start with the phrase "Even heroes need help"... Man if would it had been awesome if both Tails and Amy had shown up, ready to help and support Sonic like the two most important friends that they are. However, in typical Sonic Team fashion, they Sonic Team'd the premise by having instead fucking Classic Sonic show up... It's as if Modern Sonic learned from Roger Van Der Weide's parody video of Sonic Rush in X minutes and decided to be himself and ask help from his more respectable classic self, lol.

Then there was the PR talk promising how Sonic's friends would be involved in the fight and do stuff... except they didn't. Instead, they give us a blank slate of a character with no personality nor charisma to be Sonic's new BFF that everyone in the Resistance would kiss up to and praise about how awesome and oh so inspirational he was. Blergh.

Going into the characters, Shadow again steals the spotlight by being the guy who kicks off the story as he bullies a mercenary with MEAN WORDS, causing him to get triggered, and instead of going after Shadow, Infinite decides to make him his b*tch by going after Sonic, who just like in 06, was just there... That's it, thr titular character was once again just there. And let's not forget the others: Knuckles is the commander just because of the ridiculous and stupid assumption that just because he appeared in Sonic 3, that means he's the 3rd most important character in the good guys' side. Terrible choice for a commander when they have Rouge, Vector or Amy, whom the new comics acknowledged as the one who would had done a better job. Amy once again goes underused both because of the trio favoritism that always puts Knuckles before her, hardly interacts with Sonic nor does she do things like trying to break him out of prision like she did in SA2. Tails loses the jerk aspect from SLW but is instead turned into a coward that won't do anything unless he has a Sonic by his side... ANY bloody Sonic, it doesn't matter because that's how much he cared about the one from his world, and that's something that not even the revised JP dialogues will fix.

And finally Eggman, the only character I could hope to at least deliver like he had steadily done over the last games, on this one occasion where he finally wins and has the good guys cornered, turns out to be dissapointing. This is the dullest characterization of Eggman, something I never thought would been possible... They don't even try to play with the situation like they did in Colors with those announcements he makes. Would had been great if instead of cutscenes we had been given TV ads like the ones from the original Robocop about how Eggman was "fixing" the world, but apparently the talent to pull it off was not considered in the budget of a game that was supposedly under development for four years.

If they want to tell something decent, they should consider getting Ian Flynn instead, but I'm pretty sure that ST will find a way to screw his work to fit their very particular set of standards in order to deliver dissapointment.

[CrownSlayers Shadow]

7 minutes ago, Diogenes said:

...I don't think you even remotely understand what I'm trying to say here. The point isn't that you have a choice, the point is that the plot stalls out and doesn't pick back up until you do some arbitrary busywork. Things don't progress due to any kind of narrative logic, you just find whatever level you're supposed to go to and finish it because it opens the next level.

No, I do understand what you’re saying.

I’m telling you that’s not loosely connected after giving you an example and a straight up definition of what is that you just ignored.

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I mean if that's the phrase you want to use to describe how shit the middle of Unleashed's story is that's your choice but it doesn't make the events any more connected.

You are really doing the most here.

I’d call Unleashed’s middle act “weak”, not shit.

Doesn’t change the fact that the game having you run around to collect medals in order to advance and get the keys is grinding.

[Diogenes]

If you still think what I'm saying has anything at all to do with medals then it's clear you're not paying the slightest bit of attention to what I'm actually saying, so I'm not going to waste my time further.

[CrownSlayers Shadow]

 

7 minutes ago, Diogenes said:

If you still think what I'm saying has anything at all to do with medals then it's clear you're not paying the slightest bit of attention to what I'm actually saying, so I'm not going to waste my time further.

...it didn’t. And I never said your point had to do with the medals. That’s just a fact of what the game does in restricting where you progress.

Do you just resort to strawmans every time an argument doesn’t go your way?

[MegasonicZX]

In unleashed's defense, I think the whole point of that middle section was mostly to give the player more freedom in stage selection since it had been pretty linear up until that point and the story was going on full blast. Besides maybe a couple of offhand scenes and maybe some nice filler moments between the cast (whether it'd be sonic and co or eggman) there really wasn't a whole lot you could add to the plot that would be of significance since the main goal was to go around the world and collect the emeralds at that point. The middle of the game is only weak if you think the game has to have that narrative backing but at the end of the day it would've just impeded on the gameplay itself more than it would've helped which is why it is as empty as it is.

[Diogenes]

6 minutes ago, Conquering Storm’s Servant said:

...it didn’t. And I never said your point had to do with the medals.

Do you just resort to strawmans every time an argument doesn’t go your way?

Then why are you even bringing them up? They have nothing to do with anything in this discussion.