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Characterization in the Sonic Franchise

Discussion in 'General Sonic Discussion' started by Beamer the Meep, Apr 2, 2021.

What style of characterization do you prefer?

  1. Classic Era Characterization

    70 vote(s)
    56.0%
  2. Adventure Era (SA1 - SH) Characterization

    67 vote(s)
    53.6%
  3. Dark Era (ShTH - SU) Characterization

    17 vote(s)
    13.6%
  4. Modern Era (SC - SF) Characterization

    14 vote(s)
    11.2%
  5. Other

    14 vote(s)
    11.2%
Multiple votes are allowed.
  1. Laura

    Laura

    Brightened Eyes Member
    I don't think Amy's really ever had a good character though. Boom was good largely because there was more to her than fancying Sonic.
     
  2. Wraith

    Wraith

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    I think all that is true about Eggman but that still creates a character with basically no actual redeeming qualities. The specifics of why he made Little Planet uninhabitable don't really matter when he still did it and doesn't seem to have any second thoughts about the outcome.

    I think this is fine and makes him a good villain, but I find it hard to reconcile that with the portrayals where they try to play up the fact that he has morals sometimes like X or when they basically make him the funny next door neighbor in Boom.

    Eggman doesn't have much in the way of morals or empathy. He can still be an entertaining and funny in spite of this, but it's an important part of his character imo.

    That's the thing though. The capsule in SA2 was a pretty underhanded way to beat Sonic but he didn't mind because he was beating Sonic. Same with all the other completely lethal traps you encounter in the classic-Adventure games.

    You're right that I forgot about the times in the games where he let them get away for no reason though. IDW was probably just trying to explain that as best as they could.
     
  3. Tyson's point seems like he's not saying whether Amy's character was good or not, since that's subjective. But rather, the parts that made her who she was, for better or worse, are gone.

    It's kind of a trend in Modern Western media nowadays to portray heroines as having more than just stereotypical "girly" traits, but the flipside is that it feels like any trait that's considered "feminine" is looked down upon.
     
  4. Dek Rollins

    Dek Rollins

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    And yet, Boom removed everything that made her interesting. Funny how that works. It's almost as if the implication that fancying Sonic was all there was to her is reductive and inaccurate.
     
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  5. That's why I said that Sonic X affected her negatively. Even if Amy had good moments, they were completely overshadowed by her negative ones and that's what people focus on.

    Same with Shadow really when 2005 came around, and suddenly fans just wrote him off as an over the top edge lord.

    As well as Knuckles, who people wrote off as "a dumbass" after they played him getting tricked by Eggman too many times.

    Its even happening to Tails right now with people mocking his apparent cowardice in Forces.


    I feel like the fanbase and people in general have a nasty habit of taking one or two bad moments for a character and then exaggerating that to be all the character was; so now Amy was "a crazy stalker", Knuckles was "a dumbass", Shadow is "an edgelord", Tails is "a cowardly wimp". While ignoring the nuance of their personalities.

    Its really annoying how common it is too.
     
  6. Beamer the Meep

    Beamer the Meep

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    It's an interesting take that Eggman has morals, but I suppose I can kinda see it. Maekawa did give us a possible explanation of Eggman's motives in SA2 that I personally ascribe to, which is that he was greatly affected by what happened with Gerald. He says that Gerald was his hero and that he wanted to be a brilliant scientist just like him who worked to improve the world. After seeing how GUN unfairly imprisoned Gerald and violently shut down the ARK, it's not surprising that Eggman would be very disillusioned by the current state of world affairs. Due to his immense arrogance, he believes that under his rule, the world would be a much better place. Such a man probably would have some twisted sense of morality buried deep down. I do think it's important to remember that a good villain never sees themselves as the villain, they see themselves, however twisted, as the hero.

    As I said before in this topic, Sonic routinely makes fun of Eggman's brilliance, and being the arrogant straightman he is, Eggman is greatly insulted by it. He feels the need to one-up Sonic at every turn to prove he's the ultimate genius. That said, he's smart enough to realize that some situations could do with Sonic's help such as when the ARK was crashing into Earth or Metal Sonic was running amok. Granted, it's often played as if he's being a sniveling coward or scheming his way to backstab Sonic once his usefulness is at an end, but I'd say he's moral enough to not want complete genocide on his hands.

    I still maintain that a small touch of sadism can work for Eggman if you want it to, but ultimately he's supposed to be a quirky scientist with immense intelligence but not a lot of common sense, who's arrogance leads him to believe he's the best man for the job of ruling the world and is greatly insulted if it's made fun of.
     
  7. Laura

    Laura

    Brightened Eyes Member
    What traits did Amy really have other than fancying Sonic? Adventure 1 is different, but what did she do outside of those games? Not being snarky, I'd genuinely like to hear takes on it.
     
  8. Beamer the Meep

    Beamer the Meep

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    She saw the good in people. In SA1, despite the fact that Gamma was working for Eggman, she saw that he had a kind and caring heart. She believed in those traits so much that she stood in Sonic's way when he was about to smash him. Likewise in SA2, she sees there's good in Shadow and she tries to convince him that there's good in the people of the world even though there were selfish and cruel people down there. I think she says it best in that scene that those people are trying their best to be good and happy and so they should be given a chance to pursue it. Another way of putting it would be, she sees the best in people even when they might not and she actively wants and tries to give them a fair chance to prove themselves.

    A less touched-on trait that's talked about in the specific Amy topic is that she dabbles a bit in the arcane. Sadly it's only touched on in the JP CD manual and Sonic Chronicles.
     

  9. In Heroes, she's leading her own team to help Cream and Big find Chocola and Foggy respectively. Yes, she still fawns after Sonic, but the main reason she went out was to help her friends.

    Amy does treat Emerl as a her own child, even if it's mostly motivated to impress Sonic.

    I'm not saying Amy is one of the most fleshed out character in the series; she's rather underplayed given her relative promotion. But at the same time, its extremely reductive to just say she has no other traits beyond liking Sonic. She has plenty of traits that unfortunately don't get much attention because she is often relegated to a supporting character and never one of the main focuses of the story.
     
  10. ChaddyFantome

    ChaddyFantome

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    I never really saw the spin attack as some form of biological trait. It always just seemed like a Technique to me.
    Tails does it and he isn't a hedgehog.

    One of the things I typically associate with Amy is that she id a lot more "normal" for a lack of a better description to the other characters, and I always saw her not spinning and using her other skills and stuff like her hammer as a sort of extension of that.
    In any case, her spinning on the basis of "she is a hedgehog therefore should spin" just kinda rings hollow to me. We'd have to remove it from Tails or Ray on that basis then!
    More importantly, is how making her roll just kind of invalidates a lot of the use of her hammer, as it makes it so you have little reason to not just play it straight, at which point she just becomes a pink Sonic, which I dont think is particularly compelling either.
    If i were in a position where I had to let her spin, I would at the absolute most only give her the spin jump, while removing the ability to roll out of a run or spindash, handing her the Super Peel Out instead.
    That way there's a reason to actually use her hammer.

    It's actually a bit complicated.
    You see, while the word "torture" or any analogue wasn't used in the Japanese version, the English version wasn't trying to imply Sonic underwent any actual physical torture either.
    In the scene, Rouge talks about how Eggman had kept Sonic alive in order to show him his conquest and rub his nose in his victory, and Knuckles then proceeds to describe that as "torture" at 9:20

    The game talks about how Sonic is being tortured a first time at 5:24 without any context as to what it is.
    The confusion comes from people's minds running wild after they hear the word "torture", priming sets in, and by the time they get a proper description of what the "torture" was at 9:20, it's already too late.
    Language can be weird like that I suppose.

    Amy was the heart of the group. The one that worried about the people on the ground while the Heroes were dealing with the big picture. The one that would see the good in bad people or even those that didn't see the good I themselves. The one that would help encourage and help others in a hands on manner.
    She's go-getter that went after hat she believed and and worked hard to prove she is capable.
    I think Mania Adventure again does a good job showcasing the kinds of things i like about Amy in this particular regard to her empathy in particular.
    Its endearing.
    Well first I would disagree that Amy was ever just "fancying Sonic" to begin with. As for Boom Amy, what was there too her? When I hear people talk about her, it's only ever in context of her "secretly" liking Sonic anyway.
     
    Last edited: May 1, 2021
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  11. Dek Rollins

    Dek Rollins

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    I didn't say that other characters shouldn't be able to spin. My point is that hedgehogs roll into balls, in real life. It doesn't make sense for Amy to be incapable of spinning when she is a hedgehog, and last I checked she doesn't have any physical disabilities that would reasonably keep her from doing that. We have precedent that every other hedgehog character can spin, and many non-hedgehog characters can also spin. Amy lacking the ability to spin seems fairly arbitrary to me. Again, I would accept an explanation that she doesn't spin because she doesn't want to spin, but I don't think that sort of explanation has ever actually surfaced.

    This doesn't really matter that much to me, it just kind of bugs me a little.
     
  12. Sid Starkiller

    Sid Starkiller

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    Who's to say she can but doesn't want to because it would ruin her outfit or something?
     
  13. ChaddyFantome

    ChaddyFantome

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    Sorry if there was any confusion. I didn't say that you did. I said I don't really see it as mattering much since it hasn't been treated as a hedgehog exclusive technique that all hedgehogs just naturally do in the series since, well... ever. Even in Sonic 1, its talked about as a special technique Sonic employs as opposed to just a biological trait, even though it's obviously conceptually derived from hedgehogs rolling into a ball.
    I mean, it's not like all animal characters all exhibit advanced traits and super abilities based on their species or anything. Many are just civilians that are for all intents and purposes the same as normal people.
    Basically I'm saying its not as if in-universe the Spin Attack is treated as this innate hedgehog ability all hedgehogs just have.
    As for "disabilities", to be fair, she actually lacks the back spines that Sonic or Shadow have. That I guess counts for something. Though I always saw that as her employing personal grooming.
    Speaking of which, I always just liked to think Amy doesn't spin because she either isn't that great at it or doesn't want to. Probs to not ruin her clothes or something. But hey, that's just my headcanon.
    Silver didn't spin either though. As you said, many non-hedgehog characters spin, so it's kind of illogical to me to treat it as an ability inherent to hedgehogs when who does and doesn't spin isn't ever treated as something relevant to the animal type of the character. Au contraire, I find the idea that being a hedgehog means she has to spin to be the thing that's arbitrary. If it's about being "logical" in respects to the animal species, it seems selective to only do it one way imo.

    Speak of the devil :P
     
    Last edited: May 1, 2021
  14. Dek Rollins

    Dek Rollins

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    Classic Amy has a back spine! :V

    And that headcanon is perfectly fine, which is why I mentioned it.

    I guess I thought he did. Must be misremembering. To be fair I'm pretty sure Silver has been playable fewer times than Amy has.

    I brought this up in the post you quoted.
     
  15. Aerosol

    Aerosol

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    She...does spin. I swear she spins in Sonic Advance 3? And 2???
     
  16. Sid Starkiller

    Sid Starkiller

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    Aren't the handheld games generally non-canon though?
     
  17. ChaddyFantome

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    The only time Amy spins in games from what I've seen has been games that have a very streamlined gameplay that more or less necessitates it for the sake of consistency.
    Heroes and Advance 2 come to mind. Advance 3 she doesn't spin by default, but does when paired with Sonic.
    No reason to think this, at least not with the Advance games or Rush games. Otherwise, Blaze being from the Sol dimension as outlined in Generations kind of doesn't make sense.
    That said, Amy's appearance in Advance 2 isn't actually in the story iirc, and is relegated to being a secret unlockable. For whatever that's worth.
    It overall lends itself to the idea that she could but prefers not to, I suppose.
     
  18. Still, heroes is here, complete with spin and homing attack :p
     
  19. Beamer the Meep

    Beamer the Meep

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    From a gameplay perspective, I like Amy's apparent limitations (though I seem to be one of the few people who do). She could be a little faster in Adventure, but I think her presence in Advance 1 makes for a good hard-mode character.

    In terms of characterization, I'd be fine with the idea that she doesn't do it out of fear of ruining her dress or at the risk of immodesty. For as great as she looks in it, it's not exactly a practical garment. I do agree that it's a technique that some use and some don't irregardless of capability.
     
  20. Sui Eel

    Sui Eel

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    I feel like there is a good balance somewhere between the classics (mostly CD, since the cutscenes give a better reference for the personalities), SA1 and SA2, and Unleashed/Secret Rings/Black Knight in terms of characterization.

    As for Amy, I'm not a fan of her current form at all. She went from being able to provide anything from comedic relief to passionate monologues all while still having a distinct, upbeat personality. Now she just seems like a flat character to me.
     
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