The age group, thing again? You know, I'm really not sure how good an indication that is of what a person's interest and preferences would be as far as this franchise. I do think that a person's first exposure to this franchise CAN have a pretty big impact on what they like and want from it, but that is not necessarily always true. For example, I have ran into several people who's first game was Colors who now hate the so called "meta era..." ...including Colors. What is more, a person's age really doesn't have anything to do at all with what a person's first exposure will be, in part because that first exposure might not be what's current. It could be something that came out much earlier. And what is more, a person could be exposed to several "era's" of this franchise around the same time, so what type of fan are they going to be in such cases? Like, I'm 21 right? A "2000s" kid. But my first exposure to Sonic was the Genesis games ON A SEGA GENESIS because that was what my family had. And around the same time I was watching the old DiC cartoons because a relative saw I was into Sonic and thus got me DVD collections of those series. And it wasn't that long afterwards that I started watching X. And yet, none of this has any bearing at all over what I (currently) want out of this franchise. I'm a 2000s kid who has no particular admiration for the Adventure or Dark era games, in fact thinking they are very poorly designed. The Genesis games were my first exposure to the franchise and as video games I currently think they're decent at best. I have no interest in EVER watching Underground or AoStH again despite loving these when I was a kid and them being among my first exposure to Sonic. And everytime I have tried to sit down and watch X all the way through I have given up because I kept getting bored. No, my favorite Sonic game is a fangame I stumbled around recently. Like, REALLY recently. And that's what has the biggest bearing on what I want out of Sonic currently. I say all that to say that the age thing is an oversimplification of the issue... And also something I feel is used at times to dismiss and discredit people's opinions, saying they only like/dislike something based on their first exposure to the franchise rather than the qualities of the thing in question itself. It needs to stop.
Nobody's discrediting or dismissing anyone's opinion on anything. Yeah, it's not necessarily always true that what you played first will leave a huge impact on you, but it doesn't need to be necessarily always true in order to be relevant. Some people are going to prefer the Advance sprites, and I'd wager that a majority of those people probably aren't in the upper age group of Sonic fandom. And if that's true, it's totally fine. It's not a reason to dismiss those peoples' taste, and me making the very suggestion that things might shake out this way isn't a reason to get this preemptively defensive out of nowhere.
Its an oversimplification and an overused one at that, and I'm just as guilty of doing it too. But given how ardent some fans can be about their particular preferences about Sonic, its not completely unfounded either. The fact is, something is gonna stick out to you more as a kid in your formative years than it will as an adult, and there have been numerous points when new fans have jumped into the series; it could have been Sonic 2 on the Genesis, Sonic Adventure 2 on the Gamecube or Sonic Heroes going multiplat or even the movie. Fact is, every Sonic product is someone's first and that generally defines their preferences in the series. Its not all encompassing as you said, but its more of a general idea.
When I said that people may discredit others' opinions based on something like this, I wasn't referring to your comment specifically, Zephyr. You're good in my eyes. Instead, I was referring to something I've seen time and time again from other people who subscribe to this mindset. Heck, I used to see it from myself before I realized it and how dumb that is. Besides being innacurate, that is the main reason why I just don't think it's a good mindset to have. But yeah, I am aware of how big an impact a person's initial experience with this series can have.
About the sprites themselves, I do want them to come back, but that is not really because I like them (I feel completely neutral to them, neither particularly liking nor particularly disliking them) but mainly because of how I want them to be used. "How is that?" asks no one. Um... This is just one of those weird beliefs I can't give any real reason for holding but that I feel strongly about. And that is I want 2D Sonic to have a Megaman like situation from how I understand that situation to be. Having the Classic Series along stuff like X and Zero. Like I want 2D Sonic to "evolve" but I don't want Classic Sonic to "evolve." There's a feeling of "purity" to those games for me that I don't really want messed with. Gimmicks like Advance 2's boost mode, the trick system it introduced, the team gimmick as seen in Advanced 3, freaking combat like Freedom Planet, moves activated by doing motion inputs like what Advance started to do when it gave sonic an airdash activated by double tapping a direction... Aesthetic stuff like voiced cutscenes, vocal themes, and slightly more "serious" tones with more elaborate plots... Possible modes not tried yet like significantly altering stages to have "hard" versions of them, and throwing more SA2 styled missions in there and stuff... I'd be perfectly fine with stuff like this in a "modern Sonic styled'' 2D Sonic game. But I am somewhat strongly opposed to them appearing in a Classic 2D Sonic game with the art style, even if I think some of them would be good additions. It just would not feel right to me in a Classic Sonic game.
Yeah no, it's not an "older age group hates these sprites" thing, that's dumb. Older fans loved the sprites when the games first came out. The instant they were ripped fangames started using them as they were the new hotness and sprite edits of the Advance-era sprites were super-popular. Nowadays there's no particular reason to use them over any other sprites, but they were never hated.
The only thing that bothered me about the Advance sprites were Sonic's top speed sprites in the first game, and the eyes for Tails & Knuckles. Really liked everything else, especially on how they got their movements down. This along with the set from Battle make them one of favorites in the series.
Yeah, Sonic's top speed sprites in Advance were really weird, what with him... talking while he runs? But other than that, and as far as modern designs go, I really like them.
My first game was Sonic 2 and I generally prefer classic Sonic to modern. I still like the Advance series’ sprite art and think it’s incredibly well done. I don’t think it has anything to do with age or the games you played first. Nearly everyone outside the fandom even maintains that the art of the Advance games is great. Top-speed Sonic in Advance 1 is a bit off though. But hey, they clearly agreed and that’s why it was changed with 2.
I really like Marble Zone, I couldn't put the reason why all into words so here are a few points. I like the slow pace, with the game putting this subtle message of "Hey, you can go fast, but you don't need to all of the time.", which I appreciated when I first played Sonic 1 at eight or so. It let my mind soak in the environment, music, and design of the zone. I took my time and as a result, I enjoyed being there, It trained me for the other zones to follow.
I'll go further: it's my favorite zone from Sonic 1.¹ It wouldn't work if it wasn't placed exactly where it was, sure, but I just love it. ¹ Probably
Marble Zone isn't the most fun thing to play, but it has some really nice ideas. The music and visual design is excellent. Like the other Zones in S1 other than perhaps GHZ, it's got a somewhat understated aesthetic to it. The main colour of the level is a muted purple-grey, with plenty of similarly muted greens for obstacles and decorations. S1 levels need more love. There's so much more than GHZ. When I did a bit of work with F4F, I suggested that the 25th Anniversary statue should be based on either Marble or Starlight, but they wanted to stick to something more iconic.
Fellow Marble Zone appreciator here. Labyrinth Zone is also fine, and way too many people shit on both. Neither are my favourite in the game (Spring Yard Zone would be that), but they're great nonetheless.
I agree, I enjoy Labyrinth as well, just not as much as all of the other zones in Sonic 1. Probably because of things that happened during the first time playing the zone when I was playing S1 on the Sonic Classic Collection on the DS, like constantly drowning at the boss section, getting a game over, and the game over music made freaked me out at the time. Though I still like it even after all of that, and after I conquered it after I beat Labyrinth's boss on the console version when I got a bit older.
To each their own but while I'm nicer to Episode 2 (honestly remove the half-baked Tails teamup moves and further fix the physics and I'd put it on the same level as the Advance games which I legitimately like), Episode 1 is probably my least favorite Sonic game; 06 and Shadow are at least enjoyably awful. The earlier games DIMPS handled I thought ranged from average to great, so I was definitely surprised at just how bad the first half of the Sonic 4 project wound up being. Like, even ignoring it's meant to be a sequel to the classic games and taking it as its own thing I feel it barely functions as a platformer, which explains why the homing attack needs to be abused so often just for the level layouts to function on some level. Colors DS came out the same year and was already leagues ahead of Episode 1 despite the important you'd assume a direct sequel to S3&K should get over a quick de-make of a console game. Agreed that renaming it 'Sonic the Portable', 'Sonic Roots' or even 'Sonic Advance 4', or anything else besides 'Sonic the Hedgehog 4' would've sidestepped a ton of the drama it got, but by DIMPS' standards it's still a shockingly sloppy product. Mania arguably has the same issue Sonic 4 does with originality in 2/3's of its zones, but the execution on every front is just so intensely polished I can see why SEGA just up and says it's the direct sequel to S3&K and just wants people to forget Sonic 4 happened in the first place. Sorta neat Episode 2's unique badniks show up now and then in the IDW comics tho and the remixes both OST's get are usually pretty pleasant to listen to, but otherwise I'm not that heartbroken SEGA's thrown both games into the closet in a way they haven't even for 06/Shadow.
I was with you until you said this... Possibly unpopular opinion: Spring Yard is the worst zone in Sonic 1. Marble might be my favourite. Personally I'd reorder the zones GHZ->LZ->SLZ->MZ->SBZ and either get rid of SYZ entirely or massively rework it so it's not 80% waiting for boxes to move and put it between MZ and SBZ.
