The Sonic the Hedgehog Headcanon Thread of Lore and Time Stones

I think it's more that there was a pillar connected to the Master Emerald that distributed its energy to the island, as the early SA1 concept art from before they came up with the outdoor altar seems to suggest. There is what appears to be a pillar above the emerald altar:


The accompanying concept art depicted the Master Emerald (and the Chaos Emeralds) within the altar, implying that they're separate (but related) things.

 

That sounds ambiguous enough to me. If the pillar's purpose was transferring the ME's energy, then it would be fitting to call it the "Master Emerald pillar".

 

Maybe the SA1 concept art suggests that it was meant to be the same altar as the one in Hidden Palace, I don't know if the one in Chaotix 1995 manual is still meant to be the same altar.
Or Master Emerald's place of stay on the "upper altar" is meant to be a pillar too?

 

I don't think there was supposed to be more than one altar at that point, so I'd assume it's indeed the one from Hidden Palace.

 

Well, I don't know why they would refer to the Master Emerald as a "pillar" when it clearly wasn't one. Even the S3 level sketches depict it as a huge emerald, rather than a pillar. But regardless of what the original intention was, the SA1 concept art seems to have interpreted it as a crystal pillar connected to the emeralds' altar, coinciding with the wording in the S3 manual:

Well yeah. But it's uncertain whether it implies that Angel Island had two altars since the beginning, or that the devs changed their minds as to what the altar's location should be before S&K was finished.

It might also be a remnant of early plans where each zone would have had an underground temple per the level sketches. They even show the dragon legend's mural in the scrapped Mushroom Hill temple, suggesting that the altar would have been there.

Worth pointing out that the manual quote I just posted implies that the pillar was always intended to be connected to the emeralds.

 

Since the manual doesn't mention the Master Emerald
imo...
Can't "crystal pillar" actually refer to the Master Emerald's place of stay in Hidden Palace? On that altar, there are stones around the M.E, they resemble crystals
But that's what it's weird about the manual for me, isn't the mentioned altar meant to be the upper one? And the one in HP a backup altar?

 

Nah, that's just me misremembering, sorry. I just checked the sketches and they imply that Knuckles would have taken an underground path in each zone, but only a handful like Launch Base and Mushroom Hill would have underground temples.

 

Here's one: did Sonic go to Doosmday Zone as Super Sonic or Hyper Sonic?

 

I expected that one to be brought up, and that's why I asked that in this thread, cause I can only speak about it with headcanon

What is shown in S3&K suggests that the Super Emeralds are nothing more than just the Regular Emeralds upgraded
Christian Whitehad confirmed that as well, so the Super Emeralds aren't a different set.
So if they are the Chaos Emeralds, then what did Iizuka meant with his statement?

Well, it's important to note, the interviewer asked "what happened to the Super Emeralds?" and Iizuka asnwered "they are still in another dimension"
Now let's switch "super" with "chaos", and let me ask you, what would Iizuka have said if the question was about the Chaos Emeralds? And where are the Chaos Emeralds usually located in most games before the characters collect them? Exactly, in Subspace, the Special Stages dimension, ANOTHER DIMENSION. This is compatible with a statement made by Christian Whitehead about the "Super Emeralds" in Sonic Mania: "They're stone relics, created in their absence when the Chaos Emeralds once again drifted off into the Special Stage Dimension", note, "Chaos Emeralds"
So, what if Iizuka actually meant that the regular Chaos Emeralds are in another dimension? Cause they are the same as the Super Emeralds?

Let's think about it, the interview was made prior to Frontiers' release
if we consider Iizuka's statement in a chronological context prior to Frontiers, then we have Sonic Lost and Sonic Forces, two games where the chaos emeralds don't appear (story-wise at least), where could them be during the events of these games? Somewhere in the world, or, in Subspace, there we go "They are in Another Dimension"
And even if we consider that his answer in a Post-Frontiers context, my headcanon could still work, because in the ending, when Super Sonic detransforms, we can see that the Emeralds split and fly to somewhere, possibly Subspace.
So if we take this to consideration, the Super Emeralds are indeed the Chaos Emeralds, and with "Another Dimension" Iizuka meant that the Chaos Emeralds went to Subspace, and that they are the Super Emeralds.
If this isn't what Iizuka meant, then otherwise it wouldn't make sense, because if the Super Emeralds are the Chaos Emeralds, then how are the "Super" in another dimension, if the "Chaos" aren't?
For me it just doesn't make any sense.
My headcanon is honestly the only way I can see this work.

And there is that another Whitehead statement, where a fan asked "Hyper Sonic happened?" and Taxman replied "I think you can say it happened. Visually the appearance of the Chaos Emeralds changed to a diamond shape in S3K and have remained so in subsequent games. But lore wise ST don't want to deal with multi-tier power level stuff so everything is just 'Super' now."
I believe there are many ways to interpret this
First "I think you can say it happened" he didn't say "it's canon", he clearly said "I THINK", so he doen't know if Hyper Sonic is canon or not, it's what he thought at the time.
"Visually the Chaos Emeralds changed to a diamond shape in S3&K and have remained so in subsequent games" this works with what I said about the Super Emeralds actually being nothigng more than the Chaos Emeralds
And there is "lore wise ST don't want to deal with multi-tier power level stuff", he clearly said "lore-wise", meaning that in-universe, Hyper Sonic doesn't exist, at least not anymore.
And that's where I ask, if Hyper Sonic was really canon, why would Whitehead bother to say "I think you can say it happened" if in the same reply he said "but lore wise ST don't want this"? For me this clearly sounds like that the former statement is something that he doesn't have any official info from, and he stated what he thinks, then the latter statement, is a official info.

And going back to his first statement, the emeralds not being at subspace, could be the reason for why the stone relics are without power in Mania, Sonic collects the emeralds to use them in Egg Reverie after all. (This also works with Non-lock-on & Knuckles, where the stone relics also are without power when you go to Hidden Palace face Knuckles), The Super Emeralds could actually be just the name of the Stone relics when powered, or it was the original name ST planned for them, but after S3&K, they changed up their minds and thought that Chaos is still cooler.

And don't forget that old statement made by Iizuka, where he said that the Super Emeralds were extra additions made for the lock-on S3&K
So if we consider this, Hyper Sonic was made after the split of S3&K into two games
In non-lock-on & Knuckles you collect the regular Emeralds only, and then, goes to Doomsday Zone, as Super Sonic, but if you don't collect the Emeralds, they won't appear in the altar in Hidden Palace.
So non-lock-on & Knuckles suggests that what happened in lock-on S3&K (in Hidden Palace, after you've collected the Emeralds in S3 Half) also happened in non-lock-on, except that it was off-screen, you collect the regular emeralds via regular subspace warp rings and the stone relics are without power during that cutscene.
This happens because they didn't want you to collect the same emeralds twice in lock-on S3&K, so if they would need to make a new upgrade for the emeralds, they would also need to cnage the way you collect them + that cutscene + Super Sonic
That's where Hyper Sonic enters.

So that's it, this is pure headcanon and for me this is the only way the Super Emeralds can work
other than that, if they are a different set, for me their existence and Iizuka's statement just doesn't make any sense, because S3&K clearly shows otherwise.
Plus, for me, Hyper Sonic is not canon, Sonic went do Doomsday Zone as Super Sonic
It doesn't make any sense Sonic not using Hyper form again imo, in Dragon Ball, when Goku needs to defeat the main villain, he uses his strongest form, not the weakest.

 

Iizuka changes his mind every time the Super Emeralds are brought up. I think it's fairly obvious that he makes up these answers on the spot.

Remember that when Taxman was asked about the Super Emeralds, he implied Hyper Sonic is non-canon. Also remember that Mania was intended to have the Super Emeralds at one point, and being its dev he would know the reason they were cut.

 

Is there any info on who had the idea of Hyper forms in Mania and who decided to cut it? The latter one I believe it was Iizuka due to obvious reasons
It's really hard to know how they interpreted the super emeralds at the time
At the time of S3&K it's clear that their purpose was only to make them to be upgraded Chaos Emeralds
But Mania's case is confusing, it makes it look like that they also interpreted the Super Emeralds as a different set.
In that 2013 interview Iizuka said that when SA1 was made they intended to make the number of Emeralds consistent
But didn't that happen since S3&K? If we look back at the mainline games released after S3&K and before SA1, the number of emeralds also was consistent in them
Only the 8-bit games didn't hold to that idea, but by that time the main-line games clearly agreed with that, you can even tell that by looking at Sonic R and Sonic 3D Blast (saturn), where the Emeralds evem have the "Super" intended size
The only exception is The Fighters, but that isn't a mainline title I guess?
I think the "number of emeralds was made consistent" is mostly being referent to the pre-S3&K mainline games only (the "chaos emeralds lie dormant here, but actually they also were lying dormant there" thing), of course, there are the 8-bits games, but I heard that ST was mostly not aware of them.
It was in SA1 where they made the "Super" Emeralds be small.

All of this is what makes me believe that the Super Emeralds were always meant to be just the current version of the Emeralds, with the exception that after S3&K, they renamed them back to "Chaos" and in SA1 they reduced their sizes.
So in my mind, there were 2 retcons
The first one being after S3&K, where the Emeralds would still be called "Chaos" and they should make Sonic only transform into Super.
And the second one being in SA1, where their sizes was reduced.
That's also why I believe Hyper Sonic is not canon, these retcons imply that Sonic went to Doomsday Zone as Super Sonic, the other way just doesn't make sense imo.

 

Here's one I thought about recently
The Modern Eggman symbol in the ending animation from Origins.
-It could be actually a effect from the Phantom Ruby caused by its actings in the "Future". The Sonic Forces Digital Comic Chapter 2 shows that the Phantom Ruby can indeed create illusions of entire Buildings that existed in the past, by creating a illusion of Pachacamac's village.
What if the Phantom Ruby can also create illusions of stuff that exists in the future?
The ending animation for Origins could lead up to Mania, as the Discovery motif even plays, and supposedly, the very initial events for Forces starts before Mania (this is actually weird as fuck to understand, but I think everyone got it XD), so there you go, the Modern Eggman symbol was actually a illusion created by Phantom Ruby of some broken Modern Eggman machine with his symbol.

-Actually Classic Eggman stood in the White Space with Modern Eggman for so long, that he started to like his visual, making he create a new symbol based on it, but he's still not sure about changing his own visual.

-It was really just a design mistake and they forgot that Classic Eggman have his own symbol

 

Theory time. Why does the end of level song in JP/EU Sonic CD go "TELEPORTATION YEAH"? Because originally, each act would have taken place in a different timezone. Act 1 = present, act 2 = past, act 3 = future (or something similar). So when you beat an act, you would be teleported to another era.

This is supported by the fact the devs stated that the reason the acts in Sonic CD are called "zones" is that the word stands for timezone in this instance. This doesn't make much sense in the final game, where the acts are just different areas of the current round and can be visited in multiple timezones, but it becomes more sensible if applied to the original structure.

So the act nomenclature and the level clear song are remnants of the original plans for the time travel gimmick.

 

Well, actually it looks like that this concept of time traveling between acts was for Sonic 2 only, It seems that Ohshima already wanted the time travel as how it works in the finalized Sonic CD from the start, with the exception that he didn't wanted the "cutscenes"
The act clear cue only says "TELEPORTATION YEAH" because the track reuses the vocals from the end credits theme "Cosmic Eternity ~ Believe in Yourself", which was likely composed prior to the entire game's soundtrack (as You Can do Anything)

 

Did they ever specify that CD's final time travel mechanism was planned since the beginning? All I know is that Ohshima didn't want there to be loading screens when changing timezones.