SEGA launches the Sonic 2020 project, promises to release Sonic news on the 20th of every month

I don't understand why Sega loves Zavok so much.

 

Because they refuse to reuse the Hooligans and they don't have a deep villain bench. They got Eggman, Metal Sonic... and that's it. They don't use Eggman Nega anymore save for the Olympics games, most of Sonic's "villains" are friendly rivals at this point, and everyone else died. I'd say hey make a new villain, but that'd require them making a good character and I have 0 faith in that.

 

But they didn't actually need Zavok in Forces or TSR. In Forces, Chaos and Shadow were defeated in a blink of an eye. In TSR, the Eggpawns could be the third character of the team (and this would make much more sense than Zavok).

 

Appreciated. Still, it seems to me like yet more evidence that Sega just does not care about canon, or timelines, or any of that crap.

 

I haven't read IDW yet, or post-reboot Archie, so my only experience with Flynn is from pre-reboot Archie. But from what I read, I was far from impressed with his writing. While I wouldn't call him worse than previous Archie writers, I found his stories really unengaging, and he completely derailed some of the characters.

Unless he has gotten better since then (again, I have no experience with his more recent work), I wouldn't entrust him with the characters and stories.

 

That was paraphrased. The update to that post, with a direct quote from Balough, does not say that. All he said was that they were tying Sonic CD's plot into the numbered games.

 

I believe you, but the Sega Scourge (a Youtube channel) asked him about that and he confirmed it.
Around 8:30

 

They also have Jet, Wave, and Storm, which they could easily rework into villains in the main timeline. They're not super evil, but hey, Sonic villains should be kinda goofy anyway and not edgelord murderdudes

They really really should bring the Hooligans back. At least Fang.

 

^ That's what I mean, Jet, Wave, and Storm fall into that weird friendly rival category. Plus, much how Mighty, Ray, and friends are Classic only, the Rogues seem to be Riders only (and the Olympics games, but Jet only). But ya the weird character divisions are reallllyyyy stupid. TSR could have had like 3 other teams if they weren't so stubborn (Classic Sonic, Mighty, Ray; Hooligans; Rogues; Chaotix; swap out Vector on Team... Vector for Chaos or something idk).

That being said the Forces mobile game isn't as strict with characters. All the Riders characters exist in it, as do Blaze, Cream, Big, and Tikal even.

 

The problem with a modern Fang is that Rouge is already Fang with sex-appeal.

 

I always envisioned Fang as Shadow's nemesis, fwiw.

 

Fang would be a good rival for Rouge or the Chaotix (the Hooligans were their counterparts in Archie lore, they were essentially for-hire goons who often worked for Eggman. So basically they're the anti Chaotix). Especially because Rouge isn't really a villain anymore save for her jewel interest, so her and Knuckles are just like every other Sonic series rivalry. Fang's actually a villain, and this series desperately needs more recurring ones. Also wish they'd explore at least some relationships outside of Sonic and whoever. Like idk, have Shadow interact with Cream or Knuckles actually acknowledge the Chaotix exist.

Also ngl I'd love to see some more Metal versions of characters. They don't have to be recurring or anything but it'd be one way to make rival fights more interesting. Plus it'd be a work around for the other issue I've had with series rival fights - they all are granted powers you can never use while playing as them. If they're robots they can just do whatever who cares lol.

 

I’m personally fed up with:

1) Rival characters being introduced.
2) Random characters being introduced to supplement mediocre gameplay.
3) More pointless characters.

I’d rather that SEGA focused on the core characters and actually making them relevant again. I’d also like a full return to variations of different interesting robot enemies - Green Hill Zone alone has more variety than some recent games. Once they do that they can start by reintroducing other decent characters that haven’t been given a shot in forever, like Cream, Chaotix, and bring them up to standard in the modern era.

Some characters however were never that appealing and should not be removed from existence but should be very carefully considered for future appearances. I think a Fang / Nack cameo would be cool but let’s be honest he was just a Knuckles rip and doesn’t have much more going for him than, say, Espio.

Some characters are just downright generic and have nothing going for them beyond what we’ve already seen: The Deadly 6.

 

We already know how that turned out with Infinite

While we're dunking on villains, I'm still really annoyed at how Sega basically stopped basing the Badniks on animals. Most of the robots in the original 2D titles are robot animals that have animals inside them...that's way more interesting than the Egg Pawns or whatever.

 

Infinite's design is good (ditch the mask though), his writing just sucks.

Heroes was the first with Egg Pawns, right? I bet they were made so they wouldn't have to spend time making unique badniks for every zone X_X I guess modeling and animating them is far more work-intensive than sprite animating them.

 

I think the boost-formula (and Sonic Team's laziness) are the responsible for that.
They would have to think of new badniks for each zone and then the player will boost through them all and barely see any of it. It's not worth it.

 

Let's be real. None of the 3d games have enemy variety, with the exceptions of maybe Generations and Lost World (they weren't new for the most part but they were based off animals). Adventure 1 used some basic badniks on repeat, Adventure 2 had GUN mechs, like 2 Eggman badniks, and artificial chaos.

 

Adventure 1 has enough variety for me despite the repetition. It's after that when the badniks themselves seemed to get more generic and became removed from the animal/bug designs. Egg Pawns and the other generic robots need to go, but I can hardly hope for that when Sonic Team is concerned.

 

Under the boost formula Sonic Team has zero incentive to actually make unique badniks. Enemies in Forces are so perfunctory they exist solely as stuff to mow down, something Sonic Team thinks is far more exciting and thrilling than it...actually is.

Then again, even in the Adventure games, enemies were mostly just points-fodder

 

Iizuka has said that each game is supposed to be standalone. They put in references to past titles as a fun thing for the fans, but they don’t want fans to over think it.
Sonic Runners had a Black Knight special, where Omochao remembered the events of BK, but Sonic didn’t. In the same scene Sonic doesn't know who any of the BK characters are and needs Omochao to explain them. And when Omochao gives his explanation, he talks about the "blue wind" that helped them originally. This is a good example of how continuity in Sonic games works.

I know back in the GC days, there was more continuity between titles and they even followed story arcs, but I guess that's because Shiro Maekawa was the main story writer for most of the games. Since he left, they've switched to the standalone model.