A question about the Classic characters

[Splash the Otter]

38 minutes ago, DreamSaturn said:

Again, it's less than they're not allowed to and more that they don't really need to.

Just because they don't need to speak doesn't mean they shouldn't, and I think they should.

38 minutes ago, DreamSaturn said:

Quite frankly I prefer the more creative methods of story telling in Mania Adventures to the constant chatter of Heroes, Forces and TSR.

I don't. In fact, I find it obnoxious.

[StaticMania]

Talking can be obnoxious...

In fact, comparatively it is consistently more obnoxious due to being used more.

[Sonic Fan J]

Your not one for pantomime then I take it @Splash the Otter? If not, I'm kind of curious how you feel about pantomime cartoons but staying on franchise; how would you compare Sonic in the Sonic CD ending and his body language selling his attitude, personality, cockiness, ability, fears, and triumphs to Most Sonic games post Unleashed  where Sonic stands still spouting a whole lot of irrelevant nonsense most of the time?

Realistically I expect that most people would say that dialog tells you what they're thinking, but body language is so much more expressive to me than flatly delivered lines to the void. I would also disagree with mixing the two as just smashing them together with the exaggerated movements of pantomime to sell the emotions in the first place would make the characters' speech come across as overexaggerated. While mixing the two should be natural you have to dial back body language when combined with speech to maintain a sense of balance instead of overall wackiness. Now if one considers that Sonic is for all intents and purposes a cartoon animal who is supposed to be able to convey a sense of urgency or levity through his massive head and eyes with a body that can be twisted to meet any need then dialing back the freedom of that design just so he can say a corny line or two feels like a waste of his design to me. And since they bothered digging Oshima's design back up I say let them take advantage of the flexibility of the design to it's visual fullest and leave the talking to modern Sonic whose body is not quite as flexible and loses nothing for having a voice. Truthfully, I'd argue that Uekawa's design benefits from having a voice due his less extreme proportions.

[Your Vest Friend]

1 hour ago, Pengi said:

This is reason #347 why the Mario series is more universal and charming than all of its competitors.

The last few Mario games have been full of dialogue, it's only really the NSMB/SM3D games that omit it (and Mario Kart, but that's because it lacks any avenue for it to be there).

Compare the dialogue in Sonic to itself sure, but comparing to Mario in general is something I'd honestly say is a false dichotomy.  

[StaticMania]

Less dialogue and more Voice Acting....

To be more accurate.

[Your Vest Friend]

The debate going on is specifically dialogue vs no dialogue though, so that counts. 

[StaticMania]

I feel like whenever people say Mario has no dialogue, they just don't talk to the NPCs.

Not that there's much of interest to read, but yeah.

In the Main games.

[Splash the Otter]

35 minutes ago, Sonic Fan J said:

Your not one for pantomime then I take it @Splash the Otter? If not, I'm kind of curious how you feel about pantomime cartoons but staying on franchise; how would you compare Sonic in the Sonic CD ending and his body language selling his attitude, personality, cockiness, ability, fears, and triumphs to Most Sonic games post Unleashed  where Sonic stands still spouting a whole lot of irrelevant nonsense most of the time?

Realistically I expect that most people would say that dialog tells you what they're thinking, but body language is so much more expressive to me than flatly delivered lines to the void. I would also disagree with mixing the two as just smashing them together with the exaggerated movements of pantomime to sell the emotions in the first place would make the characters' speech come across as overexaggerated. While mixing the two should be natural you have to dial back body language when combined with speech to maintain a sense of balance instead of overall wackiness. Now if one considers that Sonic is for all intents and purposes a cartoon animal who is supposed to be able to convey a sense of urgency or levity through his massive head and eyes with a body that can be twisted to meet any need then dialing back the freedom of that design just so he can say a corny line or two feels like a waste of his design to me. And since they bothered digging Oshima's design back up I say let them take advantage of the flexibility of the design to it's visual fullest and leave the talking to modern Sonic whose body is not quite as flexible and loses nothing for having a voice. Truthfully, I'd argue that Uekawa's design benefits from having a voice due his less extreme proportions.

But dialogue isn't supposed to be flatly delivered...

[Pengi]

1 hour ago, VEDJ-F said:

The last few Mario games have been full of dialogue, it's only really the NSMB/SM3D games that omit it (and Mario Kart, but that's because it lacks any avenue for it to be there).

Compare the dialogue in Sonic to itself sure, but comparing to Mario in general is something I'd honestly say is a false dichotomy.  

I said bad dialogue. The dialogue in Mario games is, at its best, charming and full of personality, or, at its worst, functional and harmless. And it's all done with minimal voice acting.

You say Mario Kart lacks an avenue for dialogue - but Team Sonic Racing has dialogue shoehorned into the gameplay. The difference is, Nintendo knows that dialogue has no place in the middle of a racing game.

[SaturnWolf]

1 hour ago, Splash the Otter said:

Just because they don't need to speak doesn't mean they shouldn't, and I think they should.

I don't. In fact, I find it obnoxious.

So what are you suggesting? Having talking just for the sake of talking? That sounds like it would get way more obnoxious than not talking.

[Wraith]

Most stories don't 'need' voice acting but they don't need things like music either. I don't see why you'd give yourself an additional hurdle of getting the point across by taking it out just because it's not good in the actual game. These things are considered because they can enhance the impact of the story and make the characters feel more human. More tools to work with lets you handle more complicated stories. 

Classic Sonic characters don't NEED to talk but I would rather they did. It wouldn't really get in the way of how expressive they're animated. You even have the excuse you need to recast the characters with this alternate dimension nonsense, so go wild.

I also dislike this assertion that Modern Sonic's design is inherently less flexible than classic if only because they're literally the same design with some tweaks between them. Sonic's design is one that can be tweaked in a lot of ways and still keep it's potential for expressive and interesting movement. People continue to stifle this potential by dumping on the onethat has longer limbs when it's well suited for different types of action scenes and stunts. 

Sonic fans are dumb. 

[Your Vest Friend]

27 minutes ago, Pengi said:

I said bad dialogue. The dialogue in Mario games is, at its best, charming and full of personality, or, at its worst, functional and harmless. And it's all done with minimal voice acting.

Okay. Sonic just needs to improve the writing then, not have it nixed. 

27 minutes ago, Pengi said:

You say Mario Kart lacks an avenue for dialogue - but Team Sonic Racing has dialogue shoehorned into the gameplay. The difference is, Nintendo knows that dialogue has no place in the middle of a racing game.

The difference is Team Sonic Racing is team-based racing and thus mimicking the communication a team would have. Whatever you think of the execution, there is a reason it's there. 

[Dr. Detective]

Another thing I'd like to mention is that while its true that the Sonic CD ending didn't have him talking it also didn't really require him to talk either. If that scene had taken place in a Modern Sonic game where the characters talked, you could have kept Sonic either silent or his words extremely minimal to the point of him merely saying "What?" or "Come on...!" and it would have worked fine. I don't feel like any of what was animated there or expressed by his face or body movements would have been sacrificed had that happened. 

There's a balancing act at work here and should you have people with talent behind your stuff you should be able to make the dialogue come about when it's necessary and keep it from being obnoxious while still animating it well and keeping the characters expressive. 

There's so many siths here dealing in absolutes. It's odd. Unless the mere act of speech is something people find annoying than I can't really see why that alone would be an issue. I just figured the issue was that, like with everything else, Sonic Team and SEGA suck at handling it. Forces and Heroes aren't really what I would call the desired outcome of talented writers putting the best possible foot forward when it comes to these characters. I've read fan-fiction that had better dialogue than whatever the hell Forces was doing half the time.

[StaticMania]

35 minutes ago, Wraith said:

It wouldn't really get in the way of how expressive they're animated.

That's the desired outcome ain't it?

[Sonic Fan J]

Alright guys lets try to stay civil. No need to start slinging insults and getting accusatory over opinions.

That said, please allow me to point out that both the Oshima and Uekawa designs have been both used with pantomime and voice acting successfully (various voice clips in games as well as the OVA for Oshima's and Sonic 4, Night of the Werehog and the shorts in Unleashed for Uekawa's). Now, taking into account personal bias as well, Classic Sonic is typically affiliated with Pantomime while Modern Sonic is affiliated with voice acting. Now I personally prefer it that way as I do feel that Oshima's design lends itself better to pantomime than Uekawa's and pretty much all of my favorite voiced scenes use Uekawa's so there is definitely bias there.

From a brand standpoint now though I would definitely choose to keep that distinction for as long as Classic and Modern are considered separate entities by SEGA. It creates identities within the separate branches making it easier to advertise the two and keep them from over mixing and goes along with the precedent set with Generations, Forces and Mania Adventures. Then there is also from a business standpoint that you save money by not having to pay your VAs for every Sonic product which always looks nice to investors.

So from personal bias, marketing perspective, and general bottom line perspective I would still choose to keep Modern voiced and Classic do pantomime. Just so we are clear though, if SEGA could actually blend both tastefully and with good and fitting dialog I'd be all for it, but this is SEGA we're talking about and most of their stuff works better the more hands off they are which they are anything but with Sonic.

Spoiler

On a total aside don't come at me with Jedi lines of accusing the Sith of thing only in absolutes when they are every bit as bad, the hypocrites. One must always be emotionally uninvolved and have no personal feelings for anyone as it leads to the Dark Side is pretty extreme school of thought and one that I find the Gray Jedi have every right to spit on the Jedi Council and their teachings for. [/hostility_&_disgust}

 

[Red Hot Jack]

8 hours ago, Pengi said:

I said bad dialogue. The dialogue in Mario games is, at its best, charming and full of personality, or, at its worst, functional and harmless. And it's all done with minimal voice acting.

You say Mario Kart lacks an avenue for dialogue - but Team Sonic Racing has dialogue shoehorned into the gameplay. The difference is, Nintendo knows that dialogue has no place in the middle of a racing game.

What games are we talking about? I find the dialogue quite simple and lame to be honest. Most dialogues are from random NPCs and not main characters. I do like Luigi, Bowser and Rosalina, maaaaybe Peach from the main characters. I really hate Mario mostly because of his lack of personality.

[StaticMania]

3 hours ago, Jack the Shadow said:

What games are we talking about?

Literally any non-main series Mario game that has dialogue.

Except for ONE.

As for Mario's personality, it doesn't really matter. It just means they can do anything and it'll work for that game.

[Splash the Otter]

8 hours ago, Sonic Fan J said:

From a brand standpoint now though I would definitely choose to keep that distinction for as long as Classic and Modern are considered separate entities by SEGA. It creates identities within the separate branches making it easier to advertise the two and keep them from over mixing and goes along with the precedent set with Generations, Forces and Mania Adventures. Then there is also from a business standpoint that you save money by not having to pay your VAs for every Sonic product which always looks nice to investors.

I get what you're saying, but...that means some characters will NEVER get a chance to speak, and that doesn't seem fair to them!

[Sonic Fan J]

Much as we love the characters, at the end of the day they are products of a business for us the consumer to consumer. One can't be fair or unfair to a product as it has no sense of self or autonomy to need fairness applied. Further, SEGA Sammy is a capitalist business and I can assure you fair at best would be a buzz word they would use to try get more out of your wallet. They don't care about fair, they care about cold hard numbers and how to generate the ones that land them and their investor's the most money. Still though this subject matter is going off topic and feels rather heartless to me so I'll abstain from pursuing it.

Not totally dropping the business aspect of things though, Mighty and Fang, or any Classic Locked character, making the jump to the modern branch can happen if there is evidence for an increase of revenue that far outweighs the production and marketing cost which include hand drawn art, CG renders, modeling, rigging, hiring VAs in multiple languages from around the globe, marketing, etc, etc. It's a rather expensive endeavor for a time period where SEGA is still uncomfortable using Sonic's friends in modern games outside of spinoffs to the point that Shadow is DLC while a face CAC is the first in game playable character other than Sonic in a Modern Platformer since a partially playable Tails since 2012. Now throw in the movie already riling up the hardcore fans who seem to be the most prolific consumers of the games and find yourself looking at a Sonic being perceived poorly in film and Modern branches in contrast to the Classic branch which has received mostly positive feedback.

The voiceless shorts have collected 6m, 3m, 2m, 2m, 1m, 2m, and 31m views (rounded down to nearest million) for episodes 1, 2, 3 ,4, 5, 6, and episodes 1-5 collected respectively. They have in the same order further collected 137k, 83k, 66k, 59k, 54k, 94k, and 155k likes with only 2k, 802, 657, 678, 678, 977, and 16k dislikes. To say that silent Classic characters are currently received overwhelmingly positively is possible based on these sample sizes (taken from the YouTube videos at the time of this post) compared to the harsh criticisms leveled against everything else right now. In light of that I could very easily see a fear of Classic characters making the jump being more of a thing to avoid cross contaminating the branch to maintain positive reception. If anything, if you have a preference for voices and the Uekawa art style you may soon find both becoming rarer just due to SEGA trying to keep their audience happy and to counter negative feedback against the movie and Modern branch right now. For that to change then Team Sonic Racing is going to have to really sell and have high demand for more characters attached to those sales, otherwise don't be surprised if you mostly find voiceless Classic pantomime adventures being the focus of 2020.

[Splash the Otter]

So what's your point?

[SaturnWolf]

5 hours ago, Splash the Otter said:

I get what you're saying, but...that means some characters will NEVER get a chance to speak, and that doesn't seem fair to them!

This isn't a matter of fairness. This is also a matter of branding. Classic Sonic has had a grand total of two voices, (three if you REALLY want to count Sonic CD) and those were all 20+ years ago. Most people know Classic Sonic for his games where he was silent anyway. Considering this franchise's pretty godawful track record with writing, I'd rather we not go through the trouble of casting, finding writers, let alone voice directors, all just for the sake of having them talk because they can.

That's not very practical.

[Sonic Fan J]

7 hours ago, Splash the Otter said:

So what's your point?

Is that fairness means nothing before business, marketing, brand, and investor needs and that further that the voiceless representation of the Classic brand is currently successful so there is no business need to change anything. There is nothing wrong with wanting it, but being fair is not a demand that will sway the hearts of anyone in the business who controls the brand when it is only cold hard numbers that speak to them.

 

[Splash the Otter]

Listen. I want to see the Classic series reach its full potential, and I don't want it to limit itself with a stupid "no talking" rule. I really don't think I'm being unreasonable by asking for this.

[StaticMania]

Apparently its full potential requires having stories where the characters need to talk.

That's called 110%

Its full potential is evolutionizing the classic gameplay by being new and interesting, anything else is to go above and beyond. It sounds nice doesn't it?

[Sonic Fan J]

11 minutes ago, Splash the Otter said:

Listen. I want to see the Classic series reach its full potential, and I don't want it to limit itself with a stupid "no talking" rule. I really don't think I'm being unreasonable by asking for this.

Pantomime is itself not a limitation, it actually takes a heck of a lot of work to make it appealing since you can't just fall back on dialog to solve all of your problems. It's simply a different approach and one that is currently successful for SEGA who looks at (and frequent misconstrues from all evidence) the market data and feedback and makes their decisions off of that. To SEGA, the full potential of the classic branch is in how much money it makes them and based on how they have treated the Classic branch so far dialog does not add into that equation.

Don't get me wrong, I have nothing against you wanting them to blur the line to reach what you see as the series full potential, I'm just trying to answer your thread query by pointing out that SEGA likely sees things differently. Of course that might be difficult to see with my personal biases being fine with how the branches are defined right now, but since the OVA, Classic branch with full voice work, is still one of my favorite things in this franchise I am not completely against it. Rather I'm not bothered with how things currently are as it makes the splitting of the brand more distinct and justifies the decision to do so and to me at least it works and I can see some business advantages to that.

4 minutes ago, StaticMania said:

Apparently its full potential requires having stories where the characters need to talk.

That's called 110%

Its full potential is evolutionizing the classic gameplay by being new and interesting, anything else is to go above and beyond. It sounds nice doesn't it?

You're thinking as an artist/creative and not as a business here. If SEGA had that level of respect for the artists/creatives of the Sonic franchise Naka would still be with SEGA and Sonic would probably be unrecognizable if compared to what we currently know. Remember, Sonic's full potentially artistically/creatively is not the same as his full potentially financially even though those two potentials do not have to be mutually exclusive. Unfortunately, SEGA to date has not shown that they are willing to handle/ gamble on the franchise that way. We can keep hoping, but hope doesn't make SEGA money and that's where the men in suits think from.