The Sonic the Hedgehog Continuity Thread of Love and Timelines

That's not how orbits work. If anything, the giant explosion that was facing the planet would have pushed the Death Egg away from the planet.

It only says he escaped the crashed Death Egg.

Nothing about him being on the Death Egg since the end of Sonic the Hedgehog 2, which is the crux of this. You can certainly infer it, and most certainly you would, but the amazing thing about context is if you add information, it can change.

But I've had this argument too many times, believe what you want. At least get your facts straight before claiming things, though.

 

Alright calm down folks it's Sonic lore, not even Sega gives a rat's ass.

Facts? Sonic can breathe in space but not in water. That's a fact

 

I get that, but what happens when they decide to create a Sonic 5? It would be "modern" like Sonic 4?
Or it would be "classic" like Mania, and acting as a prequel of its own prequel? That would be nice to see.

 

I know this is from pages ago, but it went completely unremarked upon and this drove me nuts reading it recently. That's not a reveal. The name Anakin Skywalker was used for Luke's father in Return of the Jedi, confirmed to be in the film at the time of its theatrical release and well before any Star Wars retconning happened, and said in the context of his transformation into Darth Vader. The prequel trilogy was built upon the premise of seeing how Anakin made that transformation. This was not new info established by the prequels.

Ok. Getting that out of the way, we gotta address another elephant in the room:

What plothole? Are you saying because we aren't given an explanation for why Eggman didn't do something, it's a plothole? That's not how that works. There's no hole other than the expectation on your behalf that he would've done that thing in that span of time. If the game's plot, as of Origins, tells you indirectly that he didn't go nab the Master Emerald then, your assumption is the writers screwed up because they didn't tell you why? Your disbelief about a character's actions does not dictate what their actions are supposed to be. This perspective of viewing fictional characters' actions logically is analysis poison, removing the fun of characters making bad decisions because of their fallibility.

The stories in Origins are self-contained and have been stated to be the new canon, so even though it's reasonable for you to prefer the old canon and view this new canon critically, it's unreasonable to give them incorrect criticism because you're viewing them with the old canon as foundation. If Sonic 3 & Knuckles in Origins doesn't include story information that the original canon did, and it doesn't contradict that lack of info within it own story, that isn't a plothole.

I'm being very blunt and pushy over this because this weird, nonsensical definition of plothole has been around for a while but started really catching on in the last decade, and it really muddies discussion around this stuff and makes talking about it a lot more frustrating. Don't fall into the trap of labeling missing information in fiction as a "plothole" when that information not being there doesn't actually create any issues within the story, only problems stemming from your own inability to suspend disbelief.

 

I have to imagine a "Sonic 5" would be "classic" like Mania, else, what would be the point of naming it "Sonic 5"? Of course, we thought the same about Sonic 4 way back, but that was all before Generations split the timeline and we started getting new "classic" games in the new timeline with Mania.

Though with Sonic 4 being "modern", and the next "classic" game after 3K being Mania, I imagine they just wouldn't ever name a game "Sonic 5". Unless they wanted to sweep Sonic 4 under the rug entirely and pretend Mania was "Sonic 4". I don't think anyone would be upset with that.

Speaking of, I forget, has Flynn been asked if Sonic 4 is still canon or not?

 

To explain, my point is the prequels reveal the twists of the original trilogy. Darth Vader is Luke Skywalker's father, Leia is his twin, etcetc.

While they're built upon this revelation, they shouldn't be revealing the twists themselves. People will watch them for the first time in that order and miss one of the greatest plot twists in cinema history because it's revealed early. The prequels should have been careful, at most using the original twist of "Obi-Wan killed your father" to cover the actual twist. A twist in a twist.

I consider it a plothole as Robotnik has no reason to be delaying just taking the Master Emerald. He had enough time to install giant thrusters onto the Death Egg, but not enough to go retrieve the Master Emerald?

Then again, SEGA just think it's a shiny rock, so I guess Robotnik's just a magpie in an eggman's body.

Fair enough otherwise, it's not a plothole, just a terrible story.

 

@BlackHole was sort of correct though in this reveal as made in the first 2 sequels is an exact example of retroactive continuity.

In A New Hope, nobody ever mentions that Darth Vader and Luke's father are the same person even though this information would be relevant and useful to the plot. That's because it wasn't written yet. When it is introduced in the sequels, it requires a retcon to explain that even though this information was known to several people throughout the first film that the secret was being protected for various reasons, those reasons being the retcon.

You could certainly argue that the prequels exacerbate this by showing more characters who were privy to this information that could have spoken up, but I would argue the toothpaste was already long out of the tube on that one.

 

I mean, a prequel is a type of sequel. The twists of the original trilogy were common knowledge by the time the prequels were made. This is one reason why the Star Wars films definitely should be watched in production order and not chronological order. The twist that Vader is Luke's father is one of those that's so well known by this point that most people probably wouldn't even have to have seen any of the films to know about it. Somehow "going in blind" to Star Wars at this point in time would be an incredible feat.

 

I know four people who I've introduced to Star Wars blind. It's not as uncommon as you think.

I always make them watch the Original Trilogy first, to preserve the twist.

 

This came bubbling up out of my memory. Seems relevant!


I agree with @Zephyr, though. Twist or no twist, prequels can't really be expected to preserve the surprises of whatever came before them. Better Call Saul can't act like Breaking Bad doesn't exist.

 

They can and should. A good example is Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater. It shows how Naked Snake became Big Boss, hints at his displeasure with how things go, but in no way ruins the later twist in Metal Gear, where Big Boss is the villain who established Outer Heaven.

Fans will immediately click on to what's happening, while those playing or watching them in chronological order have the twist preserved. I'm not saying they need to ignore the original series, but they shouldn't be announcing loudly with a megaphone "HEY, ANAKIN IS DARTH VADER!" They should preserve the twist so that someone watching Episode III isn't prepared for Episode V well in advance.

Anyway, this is the Sonic the Hedgehog Continuity Thread. We should probably stop there, it's all a matter of opinion.

 

The inconsistencies from that era mostly stem from Sonic games being made by different teams within Sega, usually with little to no supervision from the core Sonic Team.

Sonic 2 and Sonic CD both have claims to legitimacy, with Naka and Yasuhara on the former and Ohshima on the latter. The only person who worked on both was Yamaguchi, and appropriately enough he was the only one who made a definitive statement during that time on how the games' stories relate to each other (CD taking place before 2), which has now been made canonical in-game with Sonic Origins.

The Game Gear games were made by separate teams, with the first game essentially being an alternate version of the "real" Sonic 1 and the sequels following the traditions of that game (the setting is South Island, there are 6 Chaos Emeralds, etc.). Somehow we ended up with an alternate Mecha Sonic and a Knuckles with his Sonic 3 status quo (a new rival for Sonic, tricked by Eggman), contradicting the story of Sonic 3 & Knuckles.

STI did their own thing with Sonic Spinball (16 Chaos Emeralds purely for gameplay reasons, but no Super Sonic, a completely different plane for Tails) while also incorporating elements from the cartoons that didn't even line-up with the shows themselves (Cluck and Scratch are mass produced Badniks in Spinball, rather than singular characters).

Chaotix did position itself as the canonical next chapter in the story, acknowledging the events of both Sonic CD and Sonic 3 & Knuckles, but the core Sonic Team members weren't involved and it went mostly unacknowledged.

It wasn't until the Sonic Adventure era that Sonic Team were able to supervise all of the games and maintain a certain degree of consistency. With Sonic Adventure they acknowledged the events of their own games (including Ohshima and Hoshino's Sonic CD), largely ignored the rest, and revised a lot of their previously established lore (Amy's age, the number of Chaos Emeralds, etc.). Sonic Heroes went a step further by reinventing Vector, Charmy and Espio, disregarding the events and character profiles of the 32X game.

Sonic Adventure was a hard line in the sand, the new standard. The old Sonic was gone.

In Sonic Generations, the return of the classic versions of Sonic, Tails and Eggman was supposed to be a one-off novelty for the sake of the 20th anniversary. Even then, the only pre-Adventure games that Generations acknowledged were the Sonic Team installments.

But as of Sonic Mania and Sonic Forces, the Classic Sonic we have now is a new paradigm. Classic Sonic now exists alongside the Sonic Adventure Sonic as an active part of the brand, especially in licensing. Many of the things that the Sonic Adventure re-invention got rid of are now allowed to be used within the Classic Sonic brand, and only the Classic Sonic brand. So it's now become a sort of time capsule for the era of Sonic where everything was loose-goosey. Sonic Mania and Sonic Origins have set some ground rules for the Classic Sonic universe, and beyond that, judging from Ian's comments, it sounds like they're taking a holistic but loose approach to the Sonic of 1991-1997. Sonic the Fighters' Bark and Bean are allowed, but the 8th Chaos Emerald is not. Sonic Triple Trouble's Fang is allowed, but Sonic first met Knuckles in Sonic 3. Sonic Spinball's Veg-O-Fortress is acknowledged, but the cartoon characters might not be. The pre-Adventure games, for the most part, weren't designed to fit together cohesively, and they were making things up as they went along. So if all of the Classic Sonic games are now part of the mix again, within the Classic Sonic universe, it'll likely be with the caveat of "ignore the bits that contradict the rules laid down in Sonic Origins".

 

And Sonic the Fighters, which introduced Amy Rose's Piko Piko Hammer and referenced this with the Fighter's Feather.

 

They didn't acknowledge the events of the Sonic the Fighters story. The used the hammer, they didn't use or acknowledge any of the story material.

He said it was in a semi-recent Bumblekast. I forget what the actual question was, because it was in response to a comment Kyle made.

 

They also don't acknowledge the events of Sonic the Hedgehog (Mega Drive) as far as I recall. Doesn't mean the events on South Island didn't happen, we simply assume they did under the collective, but evidence-wise, Sonic the Fighters has more.

 

Since apparently they are really trying to canonize nearly every game (except those few with legal problems), it's very much unlikely they are ever going to say Sonic 4 is non-canon.

 

I came across something I wrote as a 13-year old in 2002, where I attempted to provide explanations for various Burning Questions I saw among fans at the time. It's very silly.

We've collectively been going on about this stuff for quite a while. And oh, to live in a world where Traveler's Tales was as bad as it had ever gotten. xD

 

Ah, back in the first Two Worlds period.

The simplest answer for the eyes is that Sonic's always had green eyes, it's just not part of the artstyle. Like how Marge Simpsons has hazel eyes and Lisa Simpson blue eyes.

Kind of curious as to how you concluded this one, since Sonic the Hedgehog 3 & Knuckles has Sonic go Hyper Sonic in space...

 

Yeah, Mobius was one of the only universal constants in every single thing I'd always known about Sonic, so the idea that it could just NOT factor into Sonic Adventure's world didn't even occur to me.

I never liked this explanation, myself. Clearly. I needed more than that. :P But it did hold a lot more water back before the two different designs were standing next to each other in the same game, haha.

It was probably because I was a child. I don't know, maybe the Floating Island was UNDER Sonic the entire time he was in Doomsday! But nah, I was just trying to come up with some reason the Super Emeralds weren't still in play.

 

Nah, even then, but they didn't add the green eyes because then they'd have "It's not Classic Sonic!" all over the place.

Honestly, if it were me, I'd add a green tint to his eyes where the brown usually is in artwork, at the bottom. Subtle, but a hint.