Should Sonic of kept the SOAP shoes for all the 2000s?

[Austroid]

Just a random thought: what if Sonic debuted in the Adventure era with the SOAP shoes, and kept them for the entirety of the 2000s? It would've made the era much more distinct from a design standpoint. Then in the 2010s, it would've been where they brought back his classic shoes to show they where combining the best of both designs and such. 

[DaBigJ]

Aren't SOAP shoes a real shoe brand that need a license to use?

[TheZekenator]

20 minutes ago, DaBigJ said:

Aren't SOAP shoes a real shoe brand that need a license to use?

Well, it could also be because another company called In-Stride purchased SOAP shoes in 2002 and they did nothing with the brand.  They basically killed the whole Soap shoe trend but of course, Sega probably wouldn't have paid for the license either (Maybe they'd do it who knows!). On the bright side we did in fact get Heely's from the same company! (But Sonic in Heely's wouldn't exactly have the same nostalgic feel to it)

Source:The Rise And Fall of Soap Shoes – Shoe Trends of the 90’s

Edited January 17, 2023 by TheZekenator

[MetalSkulkBane]

1) Comment above

2) No one planned that there will be 3 eras of Sonic. Some (scratch that, MANY) will argue there are only 2 eras

3) What, green eyes, lankier body and 3D wasn't enough of a change for you? Why won't 3rd era, IDK, makes Sonic shorter. That's merging 2 designs.

4) "to show they where combining the best of both"  That's very subjective and, you know, doesn't really accomplish much.

 

 

Basically you wonder if "Adventure Era" would have more personality with unique shoes. I think "eh, not really".

I would laugh if "dark era/ adventure era/ friends era" was remembered instead as "soap shoes era".

[GX -The Spindash-]

I think I need the SOAP shoes thing explained to me. Not what they are, I know that they're a brand of shoe designed for giving teenagers concussions, but... I effectively watched the internet absolutely lose its shit when they were announced for Frontiers in similar manner to when the gaggle of children mauled a store clerk when Malibu Stacey got a new hat.

I just see these and think that they're simply Sonic's shoes, but overdesigned in the way that everything in Sonic Adventure 2 is a bit overdesigned.

[Blue Blood]

1 hour ago, DaBigJ said:

Aren't SOAP shoes a real shoe brand that need a license to use?

SOAP is a real brand, although it went out of business during the 2000s and its now owned by Heely's. I don't think the brand really exists in any capacity nowadays however. The rights to the name and logo are owned, but not used. 

Anyway... No, SEGA don't need a license to use the shoes. Why? Take a look at the advertisement for the "SOAP shoes" on the Frontiers website:

Quote

Sign up by January 31, 2023 and take it back to the early 2000s to rail grind in style with your own pair of iconic shoes from Sonic Adventure 2, exclusively available to our newsletter subscribers*!

No mention of SOAP. And similarly, X called them something like "Hi-Speed Shoes". I think that that name was used somewhere else too. Either way, the point is that they aren't SOAP brand shoes at all. They're just grinding shoes of SEGA's own design, and SA2 has a SOAP sponsorship. The same goes for Shadow's shoes.

That's why SEGA doesn't have to pay any licensing fees to use them. SEGA own them. But they do have to remove anything mentioning SOAP in SA2 re-releases etc. 

-

Anyway... Nah. I like Sonic's regular shoes. The grinding shoes were a nice unique feature for SA2, but they're a big over-complicated for Sonic's simple design. 

I use them all the time in Frontiers though. There's a problem with Sonic's normal shoes in their current design in 3D. With the camera behind him when he's running, all that you see of Sonic's shoes are the white soles. But Sonic's supposed to have red highlights. They're supposed to be eye catching. White shoes however are boring to look at. The grinding shoes have way more detailed soles with more colours, so they look better when Sonic's running.

The simple solution really would be to make the soles of Sonic's shoes red with white borders. In fact, SEGA did this in the early versions of SA2 before the SOAP deal and new shoes were created. This of what they looked like in the early versions of SA2:

(Couldn't find an SA2 Trial picture, so that's actually from SADX mod. With the SA2 Trial textures) 

SEGA need to do this again. Sonic's got fantastic colour balance in 2D with the red shoes really selling his speed when he's running. But that doesn't work in 3D at the moment. Instead of being blue with red and white highlights, he's blue with white and grey highlights. It undermines his design somewhat. 

18 minutes ago, GX Echidna said:

I think I need the SOAP shoes thing explained to me. Not what they are, I know that they're a brand of shoe designed for giving teenagers concussions, but... I effectively watched the internet absolutely lose its shit when they were announced for Frontiers in similar manner to when the gaggle of children mauled a store clerk when Malibu Stacey got a new hat.

I just see these and think that they're simply Sonic's shoes, but overdesigned in the way that everything in Sonic Adventure 2 is a bit overdesigned.

It's just nostalgia, and some people think they look cool. SA2 was a very influential game for the series when it reached a while new audience on GameCube. But that was the only time Sonic wore those shoes in game until Frontiers don't twenty years later. 

[JezMM]

Once again we as fans get a bit attached to this idea that everything in Sonic just neatly organised into boxes because of how Generations structured itself - classic Sonic, dreamcast Sonic, modern Sonic etc.  But at the time, Sonic Adventure was just "more Sonic".  The characters did most certainly have redesigns, but the developers probably didn't think of them as being a major deal like we do, they were just rethinking how a talking, cinematic Sonic should look.

There also isn't really that much to say about the hypothetical.  Like, to answer the question of "what if", the answer is "he'd have different shoes I guess" and people would argue about which was better just like green and black eyes.  Worth mentioning though, to me at least, Sonic's Sonic Adventure shoes did feel kind of like a redesign in themselves because western Sonic media such as the cartoons and comics rarely depicted his shoes as having buckles or even soles sometimes.

[DaBigJ]

1 hour ago, Blue Blood said:

SOAP is a real brand, although it went out of business during the 2000s and its now owned by Heely's. I don't think the brand really exists in any capacity nowadays however. The rights to the name and logo are owned, but not used. 

Anyway... No, SEGA don't need a license to use the shoes. Why? Take a look at the advertisement for the "SOAP shoes" on the Frontiers website:

No mention of SOAP. And similarly, X called them something like "Hi-Speed Shoes". I think that that name was used somewhere else too. Either way, the point is that they aren't SOAP brand shoes at all. They're just grinding shoes of SEGA's own design, and SA2 has a SOAP sponsorship. The same goes for Shadow's shoes.

That's why SEGA doesn't have to pay any licensing fees to use them. SEGA own them. But they do have to remove anything mentioning SOAP in SA2 re-releases etc. 

Well I'll be, I didn't know that. Cheers!

Anyways yeah I agree that uh, no. Soap Shoes are a novelty but shouldn't of been the main shoes. That'd be like making the 2000s defined by, I dunno, Riders' gear or whatever. They're alternative outfits and they should remain like that, especially if you're just gonna revert to status quo in 2010 onwards.

Also something something cynical comment about 2000s era pandering if that happened i don't know.

[Shaddy Zaphod]

The soap shoes are okay, but they run into a problem in SA2 for me by being so big and rigid, with Sonic's animations clearly not designed around them to a degree that it looks like his feet should just snap off at many points. They look better in Frontiers, though the grind ridge is so deep that they still come off almost like platform shoes.

I agree that Sonic needs a new shoe design, though none of that youtube-bait "hot dog shape" crap that all your 14 year-old redditors parrot endlessly. I would go for something like the Sonic movie PUMA shoes, with maybe white trim instead of grey and a red sole, although with a different pattern than the SA2 trial one. Check out Spaziante's art in Archie Sonic #98 for a good example.

 

[DaBigJ]

I'm just saying SEGA, free of charge usage.....

[Blue Blood]

2 hours ago, Shaddy Zaphod said:

The soap shoes are okay, but they run into a problem in SA2 for me by being so big and rigid, with Sonic's animations clearly not designed around them to a degree that it looks like his feet should just snap off at many points. They look better in Frontiers, though the grind ridge is so deep that they still come off almost like platform shoes.

I agree that Sonic needs a new shoe design, though none of that youtube-bait "hot dog shape" crap that all your 14 year-old redditors parrot endlessly. I would go for something like the Sonic movie PUMA shoes, with maybe white trim instead of grey and a red sole, although with a different pattern than the SA2 trial one. Check out Spaziante's art in Archie Sonic #98 for a good example.

I don't know what you mean by this. Got an example? 

[ValiantIvashkov]

YES!!!! The soap shoes are so snazzy. They fit modern sonic so well.

[Dreadknux]

My head says, “no keep the shoes as they are” but my heart says “Soap shoes were the bomb being them back forever they look so cool!”

But really, Sonic’s current “stripe” shoes are his real iconic shoes, so I wouldn’t want SEGA to mess with that. Perhaps the best middle ground is to have optional ‘soap shoes’ customisation like the Frontiers DLC.

EDIT: I totally misread and didn’t notice the topic asked just for “all the 2000s” and not “for all of time”. I don’t think Soaps would have worked in Heroes, but I think they would have been a great mainstay for a continuing Adventure series.

18 hours ago, GX -The Spindash- said:

I think I need the SOAP shoes thing explained to me. Not what they are, I know that they're a brand of shoe designed for giving teenagers concussions, but... I effectively watched the internet absolutely lose its shit when they were announced for Frontiers in similar manner to when the gaggle of children mauled a store clerk when Malibu Stacey got a new hat.

I just see these and think that they're simply Sonic's shoes, but overdesigned in the way that everything in Sonic Adventure 2 is a bit overdesigned.

It’s simply nostalgia, that’s all it is. I was 16 years old(!) when Sonic Adventure 2 came out, and super hyped for all the news surrounding it at the time. I’m sure that was the case for many other kids my age back then too.

No doubt in 20 years we’ll see a Sonic game include Sonic’s gammy red corrupted arm from Frontiers as a customisable and the kids from today will equally lose their minds.

[Shaddy Zaphod]

15 hours ago, Blue Blood said:

I don't know what you mean by this. Got an example? 

Not exactly. I've just noticed the phrase "hot dog shoes" trending among the kind of people that get really into quill-length discourse or upsets over Sonic's exact shade of blue and such. Usually teen fans of mid-late 2000s Sonic, probably coming off a video from some Sonictuber I don't watch.

I'm not entirely sure what it means -- wanting Sonic's shoes to be longer and not as pointed, I guess? But the only game where I'd describe that having a precedent is 06 and maybe Secret Rings? But then I've always felt like I was losing my mind whenever someone says they want 06's design back, so maybe it's just me.

[SticksSuperFan14]

On 1/17/2023 at 7:10 AM, GX -The Spindash- said:

I think I need the SOAP shoes thing explained to me. Not what they are, I know that they're a brand of shoe designed for giving teenagers concussions, but... I effectively watched the internet absolutely lose its shit when they were announced for Frontiers in similar manner to when the gaggle of children mauled a store clerk when Malibu Stacey got a new hat.

I just see these and think that they're simply Sonic's shoes, but overdesigned in the way that everything in Sonic Adventure 2 is a bit overdesigned.

Heck, I don't think it was even that big of a deal since the shoes already appeared in Forces as an Avatar accessory. 

[Stormy Soup]

no, I like modern Sonic's normal shoes but if they brought it back as the main shoes for like a new Adventure game, I think that would be cool, it would honestly just be nice to see his appearance altered for specific games more, be that a slightly altered design or new art style