Knuckles' design

I always thought of Sonic as a nod to America - Red, white, and blue.

 

There are other countries that have flags with those colors: French, UK, etc. It's more of a nod to western audience.

 

It was said on the GameTap retrospective that Sonic's shoes were designed after some of Michael Jackson's, and added red because of Santa Claus. Has nothing to do with America or any flag. I always though it was a worldwide appeal (UK, France, USA, Canada, Japan) all having red and white, with blue being sega's and adding to the ones that have blue as well but it's not true.

 

well I AM an ego maniac but...

when I "left" sega I had dreds..in fact the only guy at sega with dreads
while at sega I wore red nike vandals everyday
back then, ('90) I was the first to draw a logo hack of sonic - making him red and throwing up the devil horns hand gesture instead of the number 1 hand sign.
needless to say I wasnt "happy" during my post-sega blacklisting time - but knuckles is angry-ish


take with grain of salt - I'm the one who thinks tails' two tails are reflective of the "two tales" of the sonic franchise: the english and japanese.

 

I owned that guide and I can confirm this.

 

The Brady Games Sonic & Knuckles guide definitely did. (Incidentally it was leagues ahead of the Sonic 3 guide they did, which was toss.)

 

It would seem like that in the Sonic ova with that hat he had... I kind of miss it. but I miss ova/cd art more.

 

Unfortunately, I can't find the source of this information again, but the white mark on Knuckles' chest came as an inspiration from a deal between Nike and SEGA of America at the time. This might've been because the company released a couple pairs of Sonic & Knuckles branded Nike shoes, (I actually owned a pair of these.)

 

Even though that info came "straight from the horses" mouth", I still don't totally believe it (especially the Santa Claus part). Maybe there's no real reason why Sonic's shoes are red and white, and Naka just gave the press a random answer to keep them happy. Then again, Santa Claus can be seen in the background of a few Sonic the Screensaver pics, so maybe Sonic Team just likes Santa.

 

To me, this is highly believable, considering that most of Sonic's personality was crafted out of inspiration provided by certain influential figures in the United States at the time, mainly Bill Clinton and Michael Jackson. The Santa Claus bit is also believable because the Japanese are very fond of Christmas in a commercial way, so they particularly like all the visual bells and whistles that go along with it, including Santa Claus.

Besides, what reason would Naka have to lie about something like that? Seriously.

 

Santa is something that all kids (supposedly) love, so it does make sense. I think Sonic Team really likes the red and white design. Sonic's shoes, Tails' shoes, Knuckles fur, later Amy's new dress, which is always confunded with a Christmas' dress, etc etc.

Edit: Well since I was in the other thread marvelling at the Sonic 2 manga, I ended up going to this site:
http://sonicjam.wikidot.com/sisghzs:md-sonic2-cp1
More proof that it's related to Christmas. Tails loves it.

 

I assume the source for this info is this video. It's actually Ohshima who makes the claims, not Naka (what is this with Naka getting all the credit? =P)

I see no reason to not believe it. If you aren't going to trust the original designers at their word when they talk about their own motivations, who can you believe? Sonic was intentionally designed to strike a chord, and though I doubt Santa was the only factor in deciding to go with red and white (another may have been flag colours), if Ohshima says it was one of them, then I believe him.

We have to remember that even though we obsess over Sonic, the developers have mostly moved on. They have no interest in spreading false info just to stir up the community.

 

Hasn't anyone else thought that they used them simply because red and blue are primary colours? (except interestingly enough I haven't seen any green around except for Knux' "socks")

 

Damn those nonexistant green characters. DAMN THEM

 

Green isn't a primary colour.

 

It is if you're talking about the additive colors. Red, Green and Blue.