This seems relevant: I don't think it's all THAT surprising, considering "two worlds" was depicted outright in Sonic X, a show on which Naka was an executive producer, so its scenario would've had to go through him.
See, we keep seeing statements like that, but there's still nothing indicating it. Hell, there's more evidence against the scenario, with the continuity implying everything is just the one planet. I honestly think it's a mix-up somewhere along the line: Sonic's World and the Human World are both Earth, but it's like how the Europeans called the American continent "the new world" despite being the same planet. World is a funny word that is somewhat reliant on context. World can refer to planet. World can refer to a personal life ("Your whole world will come crumbling down."). And, as seen in the above reference, world can refer to lands outside of established lands. Apparently, the Japanese version takes it up a step: the future world is 'separate' enough to be considered its own world, despite literally being just the present world in the future, for instance. I don't know if it's Yuji Naka not explaining it properly in transfer, since Sonic Jam's Sonic: Man of the Year short shows us Sonic in the Human World long before Sonic X brought the concept that they're separate, or if Takashi Iizuka isn't explaining it properly, since thus far the games are showing more evidence of it being a single planet instead of two. Apparently he's said they're separate planets in separate dimensions that you travel between through Giant Rings? Do we have those interviews/statements on hand so we can take a look? Thank you kindly, it was just a curiosity of mine and it turned out to be fairly interesting. So (hypothetically) Sonic Colours calling Earth "the world" instead is actually the more common approach, and naming it Earth is the oddity. I wonder if that's something exclusive to the series or if other Japanese works take the same approach.
Hmm... Interesting take... Indeed, there could be only one planet, with two huge continents, the human continent and the anthro continent. Sonic could jump between continents (justifying him originally owning the Tornado) and travel all over the place.
There was that interview in which Naka was asked about about all the humans popping up in in Sonic Adventure, and he explained the reason for their absence in the MD games was that the action originally unfolded in places like Christmas Island, and it later moved to Station Square. He made absolutely no insinuation that there were two planets. So yeah, I think miscommunication between Naka and Iizuka was the most likely scenario.
Considering the Echidna society we see in Sonic Adventure takes heavy influence from ancient South American cultures, I would imagine the Anthros once occupied the South American continent at least, before the Humans moseyed on in after the Echidna ruined everything with the Chaos Emeralds and buggered off with a good chunk of the land. Then again, Sonic the Hedgehog 3 & Knuckles gives us Egyptian influence via Sandopolis...
For anyone keeping track, the text under Eggman Nega's Sonic Channel comic page smooths over some of the inconsistencies with the character: http://sonic.sega.jp/SonicChannel/comic/25th/20161014_001182/ It says that he's Eggman's descendant from the future, he blames Eggman's failures for his current situation, but he'll still team up with him to suit his own ambitions. In Sonic Rush he joined forces with Dr. Eggman and reached out to the world where Blaze lives. It could probably do with a proper translation, but that seems to be the gist of it. Incidentally, Yuji Naka was praising the show as recently as last year (he also watched it with his kids when it re-aired). https://twitter.com/nakayuji/status/1098981910452129795 https://twitter.com/SonicJPNews/status/1098984179226820609 Translation courtesy of @SonicJPNews: Also, it was at Naka's request that the show got a Sonic-specific opening song, unlike a lot of other anime where the song has nothing to do with the content of the show: https://twitter.com/nakayuji/status/320116875826720768
I'm interested to see Naka's thoughts on the OVA than. Since that had the original Sonic Team behind it and that also had the whole two lands concept (The Land in the Sky and the Land of Darkness).
It refers to the lands of Planet Freedom as two dimensions, but it seems more spacial dimension than actual dimensional planes. The Land of Darkness appears to be underneath the Land of the Sky, if we recall the scene where Sonic and Hyper Metal Sonic's fight knocks off a stalactite from something above Eggmanland. Basically, one planet, two lands. Ironically, Robotnik's the one coming from the different "dimension", while Sonic lives with the... people... But it's also implied the Land of Darkness (and consequently, Planet Freedom) is still Earth: the ruins they go through resemble New York City, alongside a sign clear as day saying "E 44 st" that, when put into Google, gives you Manhattan. And when they're talking about Hyper Metal Sonic going after the glacier connecting the Land of the Sky, the vision of the Land of the Sky being blown away shows a planet underneath that has a vague resemblence to Earth's continents. Though that one is possibly just coincidental. I do see North America on the left and the Eurasian continent on the right, though. So even then, what we're looking at is Sonic on Earth, just a very different Earth. (Incidentally, anyone know any good image hosting sites that use .png format?)
Based on what I've read over the last page, it's possible that Sonic X is the cause of this two worlds stuff. I do remember there being an interview with Naka that said the islands from the classic games are a part of the same world, but I can't recall a specific source (If anyone can find it, please post). If he held that position during SA2 and Izuka apparently inherited the concept, then something would have had to change between SA2 and 06, and Sonic X would be the most prime candidate for that. It might be further reinforced by Naka's statement that it's the closest to what the team envisioned later on. Either way, if this has been a thing since 2003, they really need to clarify it in the games themselves. It would probably feel contrived at this point, but you might as well rip the bandaid off and get it over with. Show us how these inconsistencies work under the lore or just revert it back to the way it seemingly was. Dancing on the fence about this doesn't delay any arguments, it just makes them worse. Commit to your ideas Sonic Team.
There's a fan translation: https://www.sonicnotes.info/2016/10/sonic-channel-comic-eggman-nega-evil-routine-work.html Indeed. The Land of the Sky also showed signs of the planet being a post-apocalyptic Earth: The Naka interview I mentioned was dated to 2011, so I don't think Naka ever viewed the games' world as having two planets. Come to think of it, couldn't it be that at some point during Sonic X's development, the team was discussing its dual world, which led to Iizuka getting the canons mixed up? He might have missed part of that conversation and become unaware they were talking about the anime, or he might have misremembered later on and incorrectly linked the talk to the games.
Wasn't there a reason they changed the voice cast over to the Sonic X dub voice cast? I think I recall something about bringing the franchise closer together, perhaps the reason given for the dub cast change might also be why there's apparently Two Worlds now? So for other continuity related concepts, apparently people have pieced togetherthe 'canonical' Shadow the Hedgehog path. For those not willing or unable to follow the link, the order is the "Together With Maria..." path: Westopolis - Neutral Shadow learns of Professor Gerald in the Neutral Westopolis to Glyphic Canyon cutscene. Glyphic Canyon - Neutral The logic is that Shadow wouldn't know who to trust, so would simply grab the Chaos Emerald. Prison Island - Dark Shadow regains some memories of the events of Sonic Adventure 2 and would probably lash out at G.U.N. The Doom - Hero Shadow remembers Maria, and would obviously help her. (Ironically, Black Doom showed him this to fully turn him against Humans. Whoops.) Iron Jungle - Hero This is where he considers that he might also be a Shadow Android. His siding with Omega makes sense for the character and subsequent boss. Cosmic Fall - Dark Shadow is confronted by the G.U.N. Commander, as established by the Last Story. He fights Robotnik at the end of the Dark path, not Black Doom, flowing into the Last Story better. Of course, the final cutscene has him decide to remain aboard the ARK to protect it, but it could still lead into the Last Story if Shadow simply warps to the comet to get all of the answers from Black Doom before committing to that, and then opting not to after those events. It's still a bit of a patchwork, but it flows better with the Last Story and gives us a more flowing continuity in comparison to the Pure Hero path. Here's a video of the path if you want to give it a look: I might patchwork Windii's translation videos together to see if I can get a Japanese version of this story, path cutscenes and Last Story included. See if it flows well in Japanese as well.
I’ve seen a lot of assertions in this thread that Sonic Colours was the start of the whole two worlds fiasco, but I saw it written on TVTropes today that the planet seen in Sonic Colours’ first CG cutscene (the elevator scene) is the same one seen in Sonic Unleashed’s opening, which would make it the human world. Can anyone confirm this? I’m unable to at the moment.
Actually, that's a good point. I've downloaded the textures of Terminal Velocity from the Texture Resource: The World in Sonic Colours. Now to compare to the World of Sonic Unleashed. (Relatedly, does anyone know where I could grab the planet model from Sonic Unleashed? I know there's a fully intact one used for the first menu before you play the game.)
Thanks! That's useful to have. I was talking about the background information below the comic though - not sure if anyone's translated any of those.
Ladies and Gentlemen, we've got it. It's the same planet, barring a few smaller details. Egg Planet Park looks to have been built between Apotos and Mazuri. Two planets, riiiight...
So does this mean we can all go home now and agree two worlds is bogus and SEGA licensing really ought to stop being so restrictive with the comic books?
Unfortunately, no. We need to determine what Iizuka's thoughts are on this, since we've been getting various conflicting words on it, such as people saying he said specific things about it, yet we've got things like this where, oh hey, it's the same world as the Earth of Sonic Unleashed.
https://twitter.com/IanFlynnBKC/status/1296921729974112257 No surprise, as Iizuka has said this several times in interviews over the past 10 years. I wouldn't put too much stock in a planet asset. We've established that the landmass of the world has changed from game to game (Shadow, Riders, Unleashed, Forces). And who's to say that the human world and the animal world can't have similar landmass? Going back to the Sonic Riders talk, Jet's Sonic Channel profile reuses the phrase about Sonic being the fastest, but it says 地上 (on the ground), not 地球 (Earth, the planet). http://sonic.sega.jp/SonicChannel/character/jet.html 地上最速と呼ばれるソニックに対してライバル心をむき出しにする。
There's also a globe in Egg Planet Park, which gives us a bit more of a look. That depiction is missing two continents, and Adabat looks like it's been rammed into Mazuri, but it also gives us what looks like Chun-nan and Adabat's landmasses. I'm thinking Robotnik didn't measure the landmasses correctly when he made that thing... Though why would he? Egg Planet Park's a trap and held together with duct tape. Is a globe not being measured out correctly going to be amiss amongst that? And yes, it's the globe that's wrong. You can see the Mazuri continent's western edge on the actual planet and it more closely matches the deception in Sonic Unleashed, not the weird Adabat/Mazuri hybrid on the globe. So we have two planets that look the same, where crossing between them is as easy as tripping over, communication between them is just as easy, otherwise Rouge's comment in Sonic Heroes about not hearing from the President recently would be odd due to communication issues between two dimensions, and have had absolutely no distinction made between them in the games, to the point that Rouge's newest outfit in Sonic Dash/Sonic Forces has a file noting that she's the "World's Greatest Thief", not "Greatest Thief on Two Worlds", from G.U.N, the organisation that would be the one letting her communicate between two worlds in Sonic Heroes and sent a fleet over to Sonic's World in Sonic Rush, establishing that they're well aware of the two worlds? Again, the evidence in the actual games is kind of stacking up against the two planets scenario...
