The Canonicity of Sonic Characters!

[Kuzu]

An interesting topic, from ye ole Sega Forums.

I mean we know the characters exist, but are they canon(As in main characters that have appeared in the main series)

Here's the post from the forums:

No, not [censored] games, [censored] characters. Here, I look at which characters exist...and which ones have their existance under scrutiny. You may be surprised (unless you were in the [censored] Chronicles canonicity debate, in which case you won't).

Characters that absolutely do exist

* [censored]; Duh.

* Eggman; Duh.

* Tails; Duh.

* Knuckles; Duh.

* Amy; Duh.

* Metal Sonic; Duh.

* Shadow; Duh.

* Rouge; Duh.

* Big; Duh.

* Gamma; Duh.

* Tikal; Duh.

* Chaos; Duh.

* Maria; Duh.

* The Commander; Duh.

* Cream; Although her debut isn't canon, she has appearances in Heroes and Shadow, so she exists.

* Vector; Per Cream.

* Espio; Per Cream.

* Charmy; Per Cream.

* Silver [censored]; Sonic 2, enough said.

* Mecha[censored]; If S3 and K isn't enough said, his cameo in Adventure is.

* Chip; Appeared in one game, but it was a major role in a canon game, so yeah.

* Orbot; Appeared in Unleashed and Colours, both of which are canon.

* Cubot; Appeared in Colours, which is canon.

Characters that probably exist, although their exact details aren't known

* Emerl; [censored] Battle is either canon or the closest to canon that a non-canon game can be, I just put him here to be safe.

* Vanilla; While [censored] Advance 2 and [censored] Rush are considered non-canon, we have word that she was bled into the canon with Cream. However, whether this means that Vanilla has met anyone except Cream is something I don't know.

* Jet; While he's never been in a main game, the Riders series is considered conditionally canon. Most likely has met and raced Sonic and co, but not in the exact way the series depicts it, maybe?

* Wave; Per Jet.

* Storm; Per Jet.

* Blaze; I think we can say she exists due to the sheer number of games she's been in (even if they are all non-canon), but the exact events and background are, as of yet, unknown. Hazarding a guess, she probably met Sonic and Silver at some point, although I can't say how and when precisely.

* Silver; Same as Blaze, mostly, except his games are slightly less canon than her's. We know that he's managed to meet [censored] for the first time twice in the games, which is sort of unusual. Very probable that he's from the future.

* Eggman Nega; Similar to Silver and Blaze, but just at slightly more risk.

* Marine; She teeters between this and the lower category, but SEGA are keeping references to her, so for now, she can sit in the lowes rank of this category.

* Elise; Purely because while the events aren't canon, you can argue that all [censored] did that was canon was run in and see the festival, of which Elise was an attendee of. Still iffy.

Characters at real risk of not existing

* Gemerl; The rebuilt Emerl, except [censored] Advance 3 isn't considered canon and he's largely irrelevant to things, his only significant action is to end up being a maid to Cream and Vanilla.

* Shade; Her one game is non-canon. Could bleed into canon like Cream, but I'm not sure SEGA would want to do that.

* Fang; All his games are non-canon, and he hasn't appeared in modern times at all. His saving grace is that he appeared quite often in the past.

* Mighty; Per Fang, but he didn't appear as often, so is even higher risk.

* Ray; Per Mighty, except now limited to one game.

* Bean; Per Ray.

* Bark; Per Ray.

* Metal Knuckles; Per Ray.

* Tails Doll; Per Ray.

* Any exclusive boss from a non-canon game ever (except Nega); Compared to the protagonists, they can be considered superflous details. Examples of such are Ifrit, Wendy Witchcart and the Battle Kukku Birds.

* Mephiles and Iblis; They were wiped out of existance even in the game.

* Tiara, Honey and any character in a cartoon endorsement game. They haven't existed in the games in the first place, and will very likely never exist in the games in the future.

So yeah; Debate, discuss, and ask about any characters I may have forgotten.

Edited February 21, 2011 by Shadic93

[Diogenes]

Wait why the hell aren't the Advances and Rushes canon?

Honestly I'd move everyone in the probably canon section into the definitely canon, along with Gemerl, Iblis, and Mephy.

[Marcello]

* Silver; Same as Blaze, mostly, except his games are slightly less canon than her's. We know that he's managed to meet Sonic for the first time twice in the games, which is sort of unusual. Very probable that he's from the future.

Sorry, what? How is he "probably" from the future? He definitely 100% is from the future.

[Badnik Zero]

I happen to place the handheld games in canon, because they're just side adventures, usually with no impact on the series.

Except for the Tails spin-offs which yielded some never again mentioned characters.

The Sonic Advance games however are IN the Gamecube versions of DX and SA2 for the Chao garden, which makes them close enough to canon for me.

I have a problem saying Iblis and Mephiles are not canon. The characters are canon because they appeared in a major game. Canon has nothing to do with timeline.

I'm willing to put Shade in the same category as the old Chaotix. They were there in forgotten adventures. Chronicles was referenced in Winter Games.

The Kukkus, Ray the Squirrel, and Bean and Bark are out for this reason. Mighty sad to say is probably also out, but has a stronger case.

Nack is in for me because Triple Trouble was part of a series, and Nack appeared many times before the Dreamcast.

Characters from Riders are definitely in. Storybook characters are in for the same reason as Iblis and Mephiles. Silver and Blaze are no question in.

Tails Doll is questionable, but I took the character dolls in SA1 as a reference to them. A Metal Knuckles robot appeared in Advance so he's in.

My only real doubts are the Gizoids in Sonic Battle, and that's because I never played it much. Advance 3 is also a game I didn't play.

[Kuzu]

For those confused, ArchangelUK posted some info on the Sega Forums, concerning the canoncity of things.

Source:

http://forums.sega.com/showthread.php?355146-Do-you-consider-Sonic-Chronicles-to-be-canon&p=6491563#post6491563

[Core]

Wait why the hell aren't the Advances and Rushes canon?

Honestly I'd move everyone in the probably canon section into the definitely canon, along with Gemerl, Iblis, and Mephy.

This, basically.

However, the post quoted in the OP categorized characters into exist/don't exist, rather than canon/not canon. This is not exactly the same thing, since the author didn't say that Iblis and Mephiles weren't canon, he just said that they don't exist. But I agree that they are canon.

But I don't understand how Sonic Battle could be closer to canon than the Advances and Rushes. In fact I have some doubts about Sonic Battle's status, but that's mostly because of the contradictions between Sonic Battle and Shadow the Hedgehog. If Gemerl is canon, I guess there's not much choice.

I would put the Riders and storybook games as canon as well.

[Ekaje]

Why wouldn't the handheld games or the Storybook games be canon? They're all side adventures with no effect on the main "plot". Secondly, why would anyone care about the Sonic "storyline"?

I'm still amazed that SEGA has managed to take a series about a cartoon animal and turn it into an incompressible mess. At the very least, it seems that with Unleashed and Colors, they're going to be ignoring past plots and doing simple, self-contained stories.

Edited February 19, 2011 by Ekaje

[Vec]

Then, by what AAUK said in that thread, the Chaotix are canon because of Heroes and not Knuckles' Chaotix...well, I always found hard to add the story of that game within the main story. And so Riders, 06, Rush, Chronicles, Battle and Advance are also out of this

[Kiberbot]

Wait, why some games are considered to be canon, and some aren't? I mean, yeah, games like Battle, and some other handheld games contradict canon of the consoles games, but this does not mean that they are not canon. Rather, they are other canons, an additional, second. The story in Sonic games have always been split into multiple versions, the console version and the handheld version, at least. But all games are official, so they are all part of the canon. Or canons. If we are talking about the main canon, which began with the Genesis trilogy, there's another point.

[Badnik Zero]

AAUK is probably just simplifying it so the argument will be put to rest.

What he said about Riders and Advance is pretty much where I stand. There are two tiers of canon for me, main canon and supplement canon.

Main is obviously all the large releases, and the handhelds and others are like expanded universe stuff, side adventures.

What did Sonic do after '06? Well he dreamed that he went (or really did go) into the Arabian Nights and ran around for a while.

There's no reason to say it doesn't happen, but then it doesn't really change anything.

For all the games that don't appear main, side-series like Advance, Rush, and Riders, they are secondary canon. To me at least.

Sonic Battle strays into questionable territory for me because it feels kinda off, and does not belong to a series.

[Aquaslash]

I think the entire "canon" argument is a stupid one, especially in the case of Sonic the Hedgehog which barely struggles to hold itself together as it is. For the fandom, the whole "canon" argument exists solely to render characters and games that the OP (not this one) doesn't like as "not counting". As such, it's completely subjective!

If you ask me, I think it's up to each and every player to string together the events of each game in a way that makes sense. You can either stick to the small list AAUK has provided (which makes a good 60% of the games completely useless), you can say the series stopped at adventure and make your own stories (for all you modern haters), or hell, you can tie every game together into one (somewhat) coherent story.

To be honest, I don't know why people are so hell bent on keeping themselves within such a tiny enclosure. Me, I like to think that in some way, every game has happened in some way, with maybe a few details changes here and there (for example, the events of Spinball can still happen with only the seven Chaos Emeralds). I'm sure all you hard core canon lovers will roll your eyes at this post, and to that I simply say:

EDIT: Oh! In direct reponse to the OP. Everyone exists. Period. It's a big big world out there! Why SHOULDN'T they exist?

Edited February 19, 2011 by Aquaslash

[Core]

AAUK is probably just simplifying it so the argument will be put to rest.

What he said about Riders and Advance is pretty much where I stand. There are two tiers of canon for me, main canon and supplement canon.

Agreed. I call games like Rush and Riders canon, but I don't put them on the same level as the main games. I used to call them "half-canon". Basically you can say the events of these games did happen, but they're never going to be referenced in th main games, so it doesn't matter much.

Still, I wish Sonic Team cared a bit more about the continuity. I don't like how Unleashed and Colors Wii don't make any references to previous games (aside from a few cameos in Unleashed). I kinda miss the SA2-Heroes-Shadow era. I know the games back then weren't all that great, but it felt like Sonic Team (USA) cared at least a little about the continuity.

[Phos]

If there is a document within Sega that officially declares anything as canon or not, it seems as any given developer can just ignore it and rely on Sega's resistance to delay games to prevent them from doing anything about it. That, or they just don't really care all that much. Sonic was wearing chip's neck Thingy at the end of unleashed, but it's never seen again. They don't really seem to care that much.

Basically it's up to whoever happens to be developing a game at the time.

[Kuzu]

I think the entire "canon" argument is a stupid one, especially in the case of Sonic the Hedgehog which barely struggles to hold itself together as it is. For the fandom, the whole "canon" argument exists solely to render characters and games that the OP (not this one) doesn't like as "not counting". As such, it's completely subjective!

If you ask me, I think it's up to each and every player to string together the events of each game in a way that makes sense. You can either stick to the small list AAUK has provided (which makes a good 60% of the games completely useless), you can say the series stopped at adventure and make your own stories (for all you modern haters), or hell, you can tie every game together into one (somewhat) coherent story.

To be honest, I don't know why people are so hell bent on keeping themselves within such a tiny enclosure. Me, I like to think that in some way, every game has happened in some way, with maybe a few details changes here and there (for example, the events of Spinball can still happen with only the seven Chaos Emeralds). I'm sure all you hard core canon lovers will roll your eyes at this post, and to that I simply say:

EDIT: Oh! In direct reponse to the OP. Everyone exists. Period. It's a big big world out there! Why SHOULDN'T they exist?

Oh goddamn it, the pony virus is here too?

[Mangoaxe5]

Shade is too cool to not be canon.

[Aquaslash]

@ Shadic93

While a bit offtopic, yes. There is no escape.

Edited February 19, 2011 by Aquaslash

[Ekaje]

Oh goddamn it, the pony virus is here too?

I swear, it's on every other forum and site I go to, and it's spreading.

On topic, I doubt SEGA really cares about the Sonic canon. If they want to use a character or reference a past event, they'll do it, regardless of whether or not it makes sense ('06), or they will never mention it again.

[Mangoaxe5]

I doubt SEGA really cares about the Sonic canon

They don't care. If they did we wouldn't have the Blaze/Silver/Eggman Nega mess.

[Barry the Nomad]

I'm not too bothered by story canon in game series like Sonic. Metal Gear Solid or (moving to other media) Star Wars, I can understand. But with Sonic, at least for me, it's:

Main series games = the main story

handheld games and in-universe spin-offs (Spinball, R, Riders, Storybook, Sonic the Fighters) = side stories, which sometimes cross over into the main story (Cream, Blaze)

crossovers and cameos (Superstars Tennis, SASASR, Mario & Sonic) = unrelated to the main story and side-stories, didn't really happen. they're just games

That's how I break it down. I prefer to keep things simple.

Edited February 19, 2011 by Barry the Nomad

[HunterTSF]

After reading through that SEGA Forums thread I can safely say that AAUK has no idea what he's talking about. Iizuka outright confirmed Chaotix as being non-canon himself in an interview, with Team Chaotix making their first canonical appearance in Heroes:

EGM: Team Chaotix's gameplay is quite different than the other three teams'. Why did you decide to bring back these characters and give them fun, silly goals like rounding up hermit crabs?

TI: In my mind, I didn't bring back the Team Chaotix characters from the past — instead, they're new characters who happen to fit into the game. I wanted to create at least one team that was totally different from how Team Sonic talks and acts. Those three characters, Charmy, Espio, and Vector… they're so unique in their actions, personalities, and goals. They add a lot of flavor and variety to the overall picture. There's also the fact that those characters have never been used by Sonic Team — we weren't involved with Knuckles Chaotix; some other internal sega Development team did that. So it's not a matter of bringing up old characters… we recreated those characters from the ground up. We want Sonic to be Sonic, and for the others to be supporting characters. I'm very happy with the way Team Chaotix turned out, so I hope they'll be brought back to another title in the future. You'll see more of them!

Blaze, Silver, and Eggman Nega are all canon, as are the Babylon Rogues, Marine and the Coconut Crew, and Vanilla. Yasushi Otake, the current head writer over at Sonic Team, considers Rush, Riders, and Rivals as all canon series in the games that he wrote for. Iblis/Mephiles/Solaris are canon, despite being effectively erased from the timeline. Elise is definitely canon, seeing as she appears post time-reboot in that main series game and the existence of Soleanna was further confirmed in World Adventure, another definite canon game.

Iizuka's stance of "if they're not from a Sonic Team game, they're not canon until we make it canon" (as was the case for Amy, Metal Sonic, and the Chaotix) is pretty much what I go by. With that being said - Mighty, Ray, Witchcart and her cohorts, the Battle Kukku empire, the SatAM/AoStH cameos, Fang, Heavy, Bomb, Bean, Bark, Tails Doll, and Metal Knuckles have never appeared in a Sonic Team game. Only third party outings. They have never even been as far as referenced in a Sonic Team game, so they're non-canon.

Emerl/Gemerl is all weird. Despite the impossibility of some of the events that took place in Battle (such as Shadow having his memory if the game took place directly before ShTH, and Central City not being in ruins if it took place after), Sonic Channel references him quite a bit, and he gets name-dropped in SatBK and Colors (...and possibly SRSSS, iirc?) in the save file menus. Rouge's Bat Cracker (which made its debut in that game) is a recurring item (but then again so is Amy's Piko-Piko hammer, despite that item's debut game being non-canon) too. So I dunno what's up with him.

Also Silver Sonic = Mecha Sonic. Bitches don't know 'bout his English regional name changes.

Oh goddamn it, the pony virus is here too?

Damn straight it is.

Edited February 19, 2011 by HunterTMLPFIMF

[Vec]

Oh goddamn it, the pony virus is here too?

Then let's try to counter it with something else

http://forums.sega.com/showthread.php?359995-Balough-Biker-Stache/page2

Also, it seems that Sonic CD isn't counted as canon

[Indigo Rush]

Then let's try to counter it with something else

http://forums.sega.com/showthread.php?359995-Balough-Biker-Stache/page2

Also, it seems that Sonic CD isn't counted as canon

http://forums.sega.com/showthread.php?355146-Do-you-consider-Sonic-Chronicles-to-be-canon&p=6491612&viewfull=1#post6491612

Yup Shadow definately happened, or should I say MOST of Shadow happened; I think a few details might have got tweaked over time but we're safe to assume Westopolis bit the dust for instance. Certainly Shadow coming to terms with his past via conflict with Black Doom occurred as that has shaped Shadow's current character - otherwise he wouldn't be a GUN agent by the time Sonic 06 rolled around or indeed Chronicles which was what this thread was all about in the first place.

Cero: Advance - No, at least not in events although some details have again bled over. Vanilla/Cream for instance. The handheld games in general even Sonic Colours DS as the Wii and DS stories can't BOTH have happened should all be considered non-canon. The only one that is I believe the one I forgot and that you mentioned, Sonic Battle. If that is not canon its as close as you can get without being. CD was intended to be covered in that class between S1-S3&K.

Read the whole topic before you jump the gun like that. We have enough drama in this fanbase as it is.

[SEGAMew]

All characters are canon in their respective canon universe.

[HunterTSF]

http://forums.sega.com/showthread.php?355146-Do-you-consider-Sonic-Chronicles-to-be-canon&p=6491612&viewfull=1#post6491612

Read the whole topic before you jump the gun like that. We have enough drama in this fanbase as it is.

I really doubt it is. It wasn't a Sonic Team game (it was developed by another internal SEGA division, as was Chaotix) and it's a total bitch to shoehorn into the classic trilogy's timeline anyways. Where would it take place in the Death Egg saga? It doesn't fit in-between Sonic the Hedgehog 2 and Sonic the Hedgehog 3, nor does it fit in between Sonic the Hedgehog 3 and Sonic and Knuckles. You could put it earlier in the timeline, but that only adds more unnecessary confusion.

Sonic Adventure retconned some events of Sonic the Hedgehog CD as happening with Amy's flashback, as did Heroes with Metal Sonic's complaints regarding his failure to fulfil his purpose - but I don't believe that Sonic CD is fully canon. Adventure and Heroes only confirmed that at some unspecified point in time in the past that Metal Sonic kidnapped Amy and that Metal Sonic had failed his task at defeating Sonic. That's all. There has been no further mention of the Time Stones or Little Planet in any way, shape, or form.

Oh, and Adventure was Amy and Metal Sonic's very first appearance in a Sonic Team game by the way. They were new characters in that game, they just retconned a little bit of stuff from their third-party source material.

All characters are canon in their respective canon universe.

Also this. The Battle Kukku Empire and Fang are both canon in Aspect's Sonic the Hedgehog Universe, as is Shade in Bioware's Sonic Chronicles Universe. Same goes for all of the other non-Sonic Team Universe cast members.

Aspect's Universe is actually pretty awesome. I wouldn't mind seeing some of the stuff from that 'verse integrated into the Sonic Team Universe. The Kukkus and Fang are pretty awesome, and Marve Shupopolus-Gou and Wood Buttarundorf need to make future appearances, if only for their crazy names.

Edited February 19, 2011 by HunterTMLPFIMF

[RDNexus]

Well, due to only finding now this topic, only now I'll make my statement about this matter...

About the characters' existence matter, I prefer to have them all exist, wether in canon or not. That counts mainly Metal Knuckles and Tails Doll...

About plotline, I have my own list, previously pointed out by me in other topic:

- The ARK Incident (50 years prior);

- Classic Games Events (which I prefer to treat them as a single, condensed and more epic story; from CD Metal Sonic, his race/showdown with Sonic and Amy would count in the story as well xD);

- The Chaos Incident;

- Shadow & The ARK (the so-called best 3D Sonic Game so far in terms of storyline);

- The Black Arms Invasion (I totally take out Sonic Heroes and list it as a side-story, too simple, too... incomprehensible...);

- Eggman Nega, Blaze & Emerl Events (I prefer to mix the Rush, Rivals and Battle Games into one more epic story xD);

- The Solaris Incident (Even it if was reset at the end, I still count it on the plotline... As long as it were a bit reworked...);

- Babylon Rogues' Incidents (Not sure if their stories could be set on this point in time, but I kinda count them as well);

- Shade, The Nocturne & ...? (Even if Chronicles, so far, doesn't have the end of the story per se, I count it too);

- And from here on...? Let's hope something better comes...

All others, to me, are nice side-stories that may have some weight in the overall plotline, but at least not to me...

Besides, I'll simply list here my personal list of Sonic Game Sagas:

|Chaos Legend|

Sonic Origins (1/CD/2/3K)

Sonic Adventure

|Project Shadow|

Sonic Adventure 2

Shadow the Hedgehog

|Nega Campaign|

Sonic Warriors (SBattle/SAd3/SRush)

Sonic the Hedgehog

|Babylon Rogues|

Sonic Riders (Shooting Star Story Included as Part2)

Sonic Free Riders

|Chronicles|

Sonic Chronicles: The Dark Brotherhood

Sonic Chronicles 2

|Team Chaotix|

Chaotix

Sonic Heroes

|Adventures|

Sonic Unleashed

Sonic Colors

|Mystic Tales|

S&tSR/S&tBK

*The last three Sagas are to me considered side-stories, with not much weight to the main plot (And yes, to me Unleashed and Colors are more like side-stories)

Edited November 29, 2011 by XRick