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[Diesel]

What do you think of Amy & Shadow being hedgehogs, considering they both share Sonic's species & are more similar in appearance than Blaze & Big?

That's fine. Amy is meant to be a female counterpart to Sonic a la Minnie Mouse to Mickey Mouse, so it makes sense that she's a hedgehog. Shadow is meant to be a dark counterpart to Sonic, so it makes sense he's a hedgehog. Blaze and Big, on the other hand, aren't meant to parallel each other like this.

Going into further detail about Blaze and Knuckles are similar:

-Both are emerald guardians.
-Both have fire powers.
-Both get their emerald(s) stolen by Dr. Eggman.
-Both were initially loners.
-Both had their first fight with Sonic near the end of a game (Knuckles first fought Sonic near the end of Sonic & Knuckles. Blaze first fought Sonic near the end of Sonic Rush).
-Both were exhausted after their respective battles with Sonic. At that moment, they made up with Sonic and entrusted him to stop whoever the villain was:

(57:33-58:55)

1:45-7:06:

-And with that, they finally became allies with Sonic.

Edited August 29, 2015 by Diesel

[azoo]

On the note of comparing Knuckles and Blaze, If we're gonna bring up the whole "Knuckles has fire stuff" thing here, that's only because 2003 - 2006 started having him associate some of his moves and other weird crap with fire every now and then, and the only reason why was because he was red and they wanted him to fit the anime cliche of "fire = red = angry" which more or less consumed his character for a little while.

Black Knight, Free Riders, the comics, etc etc. Those do technically count you know. And even if 06 was bad, like you said, he was still the best character in it. Just because the overall game was bad doesn't mean there weren't parts about it that weren't good. 

Or more simply: 06 being terrible =/= Shadow being terrible in 06.

Shadow being the best character in 06 didn't mean much since he was still pretty bad. I mean, a GUN agent? For what reason other than to be there for badass points sake? DIdn't he have a pretty good reason to hate them? And if he got over it (as the ending of ShTH implied alongside that song "Never Turn Back"), why would he go out of his way to work with them?

And those other games? lol

Those are spinoffs and junk, with extremely minor appearances. And the comic isn't even game canon, so what's the reason for bringing that up?

I only really brought up Tails & Knuckles because Azoo did and just used them as an example. 

And yea, you can argue that Tails & Knuckles are less offensive than Shadow, but at the same time there are still points in the series where they haven't done much or were bad themselves, Tails in Lost World like you said. You yourself said Tails was pretty decent up until then.

So why is it that whenever someone tries to do the same for Shadow post-06, its just met with the same arguments against him that I always hear. Or rather, why is it that Shadow is not allowed to live down his follies despite making other appearances. 

Tails has had a major appearance in almost every single main Sonic game, with a bare few featuring him on the side as a minor character (and of course not Sonic 1 or CD). Only Lost World is notable for taking him and putting him way out-of-character. Tails also has very little backstory to him other than "he was bullied until he met Sonic and became his best friend", and everyone seems to like that for good reasons.

Knuckles has had a major appearance in 5/6 games (Sonic 3 & Knuckles, Sonic Adventure, Sonic Adventure 2, Sonic Heroes), and had a minor character role in 4 of them (Shadow, Sonic 06, Sonic Generations, Sonic Lost World). Even with character derail from later games he'd appeared in, Knuckles' base given in Sonic 3 & Knuckles and Adventure is still relevant to his character, and for that reason his character is still revered and given hope to be given better treatment someday.

Shadow has had a major appearance in 4 games (Sonic Adventure 2, Heroes, Shadow, Sonic 06) and 1 minor appearance (Sonic Generations). In 3 out of 4 of his major appearances, he (as well as games, coincidentally) were considered pretty awful. This wouldn't be so bad if it weren't for the fact that his entire backstory introduced for him in Sonic Adventure 2 (which was a bit crazy but also good) had been tampered with in Heroes and mostly ShTH, changing the entire character into something generally disliked by everyone except his very particular fanbase.

It's not that I don't want Shadow to be improved and made better, but would I want him to win over Tails? Knuckles? Blaze? Metal Sonic? Amy? Dr. Eggman? No way, man.

 

I like how I have the Shadow icon btw. lol

Edited August 29, 2015 by Azoo

[GamerGirl54321]

Alright, so by the logic that Blaze is a ripoff of Knuckles, it's safe to say that '06 Silver is also a ripoff of Knuckles because he was protecting a thing and his gullibility led him to help the main antagonist with his evil plan... Right?

[Celestia]

And the comic isn't even game canon, so what's the reason for bringing that up?

Uhhh, what does that matter exactly? Unless there's an arbitrary rule that you have to choose who you vote for in this poll on the games only. Frankly, if that's the case, I guess nobody should win because they've all been written badly at one time or another, right? :V

Edited August 29, 2015 by Celestia

[azoo]

Uhhh, what does that matter exactly? Unless there's an arbitrary rule that you have to choose who you vote for in this poll on the games only. Frankly, if that's the case, I guess nobody should win because they've all been written badly at one time or another, right? :V

It matters because this is the game cast we're comparing here...? I'm not gonna base Sonic's personality on his comic-canon traits, nor am I gonna do that for anyone else.

And as I just described in my enntiiiireee post, being characterized bad at one point is on a completely different league than being made bad to the core. :T

Edited August 29, 2015 by Azoo

[Nepenthe]

Alright, so by the logic that Blaze is a ripoff of Knuckles, it's safe to say that '06 Silver is also a ripoff of Knuckles because he was protecting a thing and his gullibility led him to help the main antagonist with his evil plan... Right?

Wait, GamerGirl.

Both are bad with girls, both are self-appointed guardians of something, both are very loyal to their perceived friends, both can use the Emeralds, both didn't know who the villains were and were specifically convinced Sonic was the bad guy, and throughout the entire game they proceeded to get in Sonic's way using their knowledge. That's far more similarities than between Knuckles and Blaze.

I proclaim that Silver is indeed a Knuckles rip-off.

But wait, there's more: Sega stated that Silver was in fact a Trunk rip-off in the game's design documents. Yet Trunks debuted in 1991, two years before Knuckles appeared. 

Conclusion: Knuckles is a retroactive Trunks rip-off.

[Oscillo]

That's fine. Amy is meant to be a female counterpart to Sonic a la Minnie Mouse to Mickey Mouse, so it makes sense that she's a hedgehog. Shadow is meant to be a dark counterpart to Sonic, so it makes sense he's a hedgehog. Blaze and Big, on the other hand, aren't meant to parallel each other like this.

Going into further detail about Blaze and Knuckles are similar:

-Both are emerald guardians.
-Both have fire powers.
-Both get their emerald(s) stolen by Dr. Eggman.
-Both were initially loners.
-Both had their first fight with Sonic near the end of a game (Knuckles first fought Sonic near the end of Sonic & Knuckles. Blaze first fought Sonic near the end of Sonic Rush).
-Both were exhausted after their respective battles with Sonic. At that moment, they made up with Sonic and entrusted him to stop whoever the villain was:

So how come those two characters being a gender counterpart & a dark counterpart aren't ripoff's, yet Blaze being an alternate dimension counterpart is a ripoff?

[Diesel]

You keep distilling their similarities into such broad, simplistic terms in order to keep trying to force this argument. "Opening up to others after he met Sonic" implies that he was closed off to everyone until Sonic brought about a positive change. This is nonsense that doesn't take into account the actual aspects of the narrative going on here. Knuckles was never closed off to people, he didn't trust people who he believed were the villains like every other hero ever. 

Knuckles was closed off to others until Sonic brought about a positive change. Dude had been guarding the Master Emerald all his life and had no friends up until that point.

The issue was that he simply didn't know who the villains were, and had he known from the outset he would've automatically been on Sonic's side. This is not the same as Blaze's character arc. You're completely retelling a story of gullibility into one of locked away emotions by stretching so much that holes are appearing in the fabric of your argument. 

He still didn't open up to others until after meeting Sonic, much like Blaze.

Alright, so by the logic that Blaze is a ripoff of Knuckles, it's safe to say that '06 Silver is also a ripoff of Knuckles because he was protecting a thing and his gullibility led him to help the main antagonist with his evil plan... Right?

Nope, Knuckles guarded emeralds. Silver did not.

One could argue that Silver's gullibility is a rehash of Knuckles' gullibility, though.

On the note of comparing Knuckles and Blaze, If we're gonna bring up the whole "Knuckles has fire stuff" thing here, that's only because 2003 - 2006 started having him associate some of his moves and other weird crap with fire every now and then, and the only reason why was because he was red and they wanted him to fit the anime cliche of "fire = red = angry" which more or less consumed his character for a little while.

Irrelevant; he still had fire powers, which makes him similar to Blaze. 

[Nepenthe]

He had no real friends because no one was really on the island aside from the animal buddies to be friends with, not because he was a deliberate shut-in. Therefore, it's not the fucking same in any meaningful way. This is what I mean by you distilling completely different circumstances and contexts into broad and subsequently useless comparisons. It's a shit argument and completely intellectually dishonest.

[Celestia]

It matters because this is the game cast...?

Yes, but all those characters exist in the comic (obviously), so I think it's relevant to whether or not at least some people would vote for a certain character. Especially characters like Shadow who don't really have a presence in the games at all anymore.

And as I just described in my enntiiiireee post, being characterized bad at one point is on a completely different league than being made bad to the core. :T

Fair enough. I can't say I agree with that with regards to Shadow though...I mean, I guess the Black Arms thing was bad, but I wouldn't really say that the character as a whole is bad to the core. Yeah, he hasn't been handled well in recent appearances (such as BK and Free Riders), but that goes for literally everyone depending on who you ask. inb4 "except Eggman"

Edited August 29, 2015 by Celestia

[Kuzu]

Shadow being the best character in 06 didn't mean much since he was still pretty bad. I mean, a GUN agent? For what reason other than to be there for badass points sake? DIdn't he have a pretty good reason to hate them? And if he got over it (as the ending of ShTH implied alongside that song "Never Turn Back"), why would he go out of his way to work with them?

And those other games? lol

Those are spinoffs and junk, with extremely minor appearances. And the comic isn't even game canon, so what's the reason for bringing that up?

Well for one, his best friend went missing; I'd imagine that'd be a large contributing factor to helping them out. Secondly, you just said he got over his hatred of them, so there's no real reason why he wouldn't work with them either. It was even implied in his own game like you said. 

The second point, a better question is why don't you consider spin offs valid interpretations? Does it really matter if its a mainline game or a spin off? in Black Knight, he's one of the three major boss fights and plays a role alongside other characters in the end game and in Free Riders, he's also prominent along with three other teams. I really wouldn't consider that the equivalent of "minor and inconsequential", you'd have a point if I was referring to his appearance in Colors DS, but notice how I didn't mention that. 

He doesn't have to be this major primary character for him to have a relevant role.

Tails has had a major appearance in almost every single main Sonic game, with a bare few featuring him on the side as a minor character (and of course not Sonic 1 or CD). Only Lost World is notable for taking him and putting him way out-of-character, and even with him being played out like that he manages to have very little backstory attached that would harm him as a character.

Knuckles has had a major appearance in 5/6 games (Sonic 3 & Knuckles, Sonic Adventure, Sonic Adventure 2, Sonic Heroes), and had a minor character role in 4 of them (Shadow, Sonic 06, Sonic Generations, Sonic Lost World). Even with character derail from later games he'd appeared in, Knuckles' base given in Sonic 3 & Knuckles and Adventure is still relevant to his character, and for that reason his character is still revered and given hope to be given better treatment someday.

Shadow has had a major appearance in 4 games (Sonic Adventure 2, Heroes, Shadow, Sonic 06) and 1 minor appearance (Sonic Generations). In 3 out of 4 of his major appearances, he (as well as games, coincidentally) were considered pretty awful. This wouldn't be so bad if it weren't for the fact that his entire backstory introduced for him in Sonic Adventure 2 (which was a bit crazy but also good) had been tampered with in Heroes and mostly ShTH, changing the entire character into something generally disliked by everyone except his very particular fanbase.

It's not that I don't want Shadow to be improved and made better, but would I want him to win over Tails? Knuckles? Blaze? Metal Sonic? Amy? Dr. Eggman? No way, man.

Once again, you are downplaying another character's flaws while inflating Shadow's. This is what I'm arguing against; you literally just said Knuckles' own character derailment is irrelevant because of his initially good appearances. Yet, Shadow's initial good appearances don't count for shit simply because his latter ones were bad? Do you not see just a little bit of hypocrisy here?

I'm fine with people not liking Shadow, that's not my issue; my issue is how everyone seems to have selective memory in how these characters have been portrayed to justify any arguments against them. Someone argues that Knuckles isn't that good a character and people are quick to cite his appearances in the Sonic Adventure series about how great his character is and that he's "just a victim" of bad writing. Yet, if somebody else tries to do the same for Shadow, they'll just get met with "He should have died in Sonic Adventure 2 and serves no purpose" . Bonus points if people blame Shadow for what's happened to Knuckles as if the writing staff had nothing to do with it. 

 

Edited August 29, 2015 by Kuzu the Boloedge

[Diesel]

So how come those two characters being a gender counterpart & a dark counterpart aren't ripoff's, yet Blaze being an alternate dimension counterpart is a ripoff?

Blaze isn't an alternate counterpart of Knuckles.

Evil Knuckles from the comics would be an example of an alternate dimension counterpart to Knuckles, not Blaze: http://archiesonic.wikia.com/wiki/Evil_Knuckles

He had no real friends because no one was really on the island aside from the animal buddies to be friends with, not because he was a deliberate shut-in. 

He still didn't have any friends, though, much like Blaze. It's similar enough.

Edited August 29, 2015 by Diesel

[Badnik Mechanic]

 

Stuff I said about Blaze being a Knuckles rip off or something.

Blaze is nothing like Knuckles in any way. 

[Nepenthe]

Holy fucking shit. Is Tails a Sonic rip-off because they're mammals who run? That's similar enough.

[PaddyFancy]

Tails and Knuckles can move as fast as Sonic in the classic games. That's similar enough.

[Badnik Mechanic]

Holy fucking shit. Is Tails a Sonic rip-off because they're mammals who run? That's similar enough.

They also collect rings and wear shoes. Shoes that are red.

[Oscillo]

 

Irrelevant; he still had fire powers, which makes him similar to Blaze. 

To what degree are characters to share traits before they are too similar?

 

One could argue that Silver's gullibility is a rehash of Knuckles' gullibility, though.

But Silver was supposed to be naive, not gullible.

[Kuzu]

So any character with any similar traits are rips offs now? welp, that makes about 90% of characters rip offs then, you heard it here.

[Diesel]

Blaze is nothing like Knuckles in any way. 

Both are emerald guardians with fire powers and were loners until after they met Sonic.

They're very similar.

[Nepenthe]

They also collect rings and wear shoes. Shoes that are red.

Red and white shoes! And they can run through loops and collect rings too. And they don't like Eggman. And they have triangular ears. And they wear white gloves.

Wake up sheeple; Sega's been rehashing you the same character for 24 years.

 

 

[Badnik Mechanic]

Both are emerald guardians with fire powers and were loners until after they met Sonic.

Knuckles doesn't have fire powers.

Blaze wasn't ever a loner. She was the ruler of a Kingdom and had her own royal guard and subjects. This is explained in Sonic Rush and all material leading up to Sonic Rush and all material since Sonic Rush. 

You have played these games right?

[Dejimon11]

Holy fucking shit. Is Tails a Sonic rip-off because they're mammals who run? That's similar enough.

Nothing is original. Sonic rips off Dragon Ball which is a ripoff of Journey to the West. Sonic rips off Mario. Mario is a damn ripoff of Popeye the Sailor Man and Mickey Mouse. Who cares?  Im not targeting you I'm just getting tired of the whole "this thing took elements from something automatic ripoff" stigma especially when it comes to sonic it's old now.

[LindseyWalker]

I think people are getting a little over-heated here. No one's being 'intellectually dishonest', some just have different opinions. I don't think Blaze is a Knuckles rip off but they are similar in ways. They were both lone wolves to some degree before they met Sonic, regardless of the context, and they both were guardians of emeralds. It's not totally absurd to see similarities between the characters.

Like holy fuck guys, can we drop this attitude of 'my way or the highway', can't we just respect other people's opinions and disagree with them without taking the piss in a big group-up witch-hunt?  

[Kuzu]

EVERYTHING IS SHIT.

 

There, I saved us all a day of arguing.,

[Diesel]

Knuckles doesn't have fire powers.

Yes, he does. His uppercut punch in Sonic Advance, his Fire Dunk in Sonic Heroes, his Hammer Punch in Sonic Rivals and his Knuckle Slam in Sonic Rivals 2.

Blaze wasn't ever a loner. 

Yes, she was. She kept to herself and didn't trust others.