The younger fandom, and how they learned from exactly none of our mistakes.

The prophecy is literally in Sonic & Knuckles though.

 

And then Gerald's journals in Sonic Battle expand upon that.

 

I like it, it fits the idea that Sonic is so cool he literally shapes the world around him.

 

Then again, being cool via destiny feels unearned (unless backwards causality, such as time travel, is involved), which is less cool than an earned coolness.

Though, if a writer is aiming for humor over coolness, then unearned coolness is probably easier to work with.

 

Ew, God please, no stable time loops. Stable time loops always implicitly bring up the question of how the got started and stabilized, and what happens if they're broken. They never, EVER make sense if you put even 5 seconds of thought into them.

Anyway, I'm cool with Shadow being based on the Hidden Palace mural, but I'm really glad they didn't choose to seriously pursue Sonic being the real Ultimate Lifeform. Even in SA2 it seemed like a throwaway idea that wasn't meant to be serious. And I don't think a cheery, cocky guy like Sonic should be tied to such a grimdark, edgy backstory.

 

Huh, I'm surprised how many folks took the line literally -- and I was that kid on the playground that took everything literally. I always took it in a figurative sense like "Sonic, you're the hero the world needs! You just might the true ultimate life form!" Like in a cheesy action film sense.

 

They make sense in an immutable timeline.

 

Again, no they don't. Whatever is the trigger of keeping it stable has no origin outside of the loop. Meaning something had to happen to trigger the loop in the first place, therefore the timeline isn't truly immutable. Look at the Terminator timeline. John Connor, leader of the resistance against Skynet, is only born because Kyle Reese, one of his followers, goes back in time to plow John's mom. And the computer chip recovered from the T-800 in T2 is what inspires Cyberdyne to create Skynet. So looking before the beginning of the loop, neither John Connor nor Cyberdyne exist, there's no impetus for the development of Skynet, and no reason for Kyle Reese to go back in time, meaning John Connor won't be born. What ridiculous contrivance caused the loop to start and stabilize? What would happen if the T-800 had actually killed Sarah in the first movie?

Hell, look at Sonic 06 and the blue Chaos Emerald! Either it only exists in the loop, meaning it just appeared out of nowhere when the loop began, or there's 2 blue Emeralds throughout the loop. The only way the game "fixes" this problem is that the loop is erased when Elise blows out Solaris' flame.

 

That actually does hold weight when you consider...

Spoiler

Shadow "Dies" after you beat the Final Hazard, leaving Sonic to defend the world.

 

There's a backup story in the strategy guide that also teases Sonic as ultimate life form, so the audience is suppose to take it literally, as a hook to find out if it was indeed true in the next game.

 

The point of this kind of time loop is that there was no impetus. It was and will always be that way. It's sort of a paradox. You're talking about this as if any time travel story makes sense, which none of them do.

 

See, I always saw that as fans misunderstanding the "Sonic you're Ultimate Lifeform" line during the final fight and applying to Rouge's research in the guide.

That part doesn't strike me as "Sonic is the true Ultimate Lifeform created by Gerald and he's 50 instead of 15." But what I really get from is "we killed Shadow in this game so this is one possible way we can bring him back just in case."

Obviously the plan changed with Heroes and Shadow's game, but it could've been a backdoor to having two Shadows out there for the possibility to bring back the character.

 

From memory, it was the other way around. Koji Chao translated the strategy guide on the old Sonic 2 Beta forums and then later fans found the line in the game (Because in the DC version, it takes a while before the line is played. Most people beat the boss before they get to the play point and so never hear it. I think it was a Sonic 2 Beta member who posted about the line and it created quite the stir).

Also, in the game we see Sonic do Chaos Control with a Fake Emerald, so it's not unreasonable to take Shadow's comments literally, especially as Shadow was pondering how Sonic could have done that.

 

To be honest I don't remember that part, but I do remember people talking in forums about that line and its meaning since the Dreamcast version came out.

Now the Chaos Control part and why Sonic could use it? That was interesting but I saw it more as Shadow being impressed that Sonic could rise to the challenge and match him, but not that there's some hidden truth to it.

Plus Chaos Control strikes me as technique or ability that can be unlocked going by other users or machines and not exclusive to Project Shadow/Black Arms.

Again, to me it was just the writers way of adding a little bit of mystery and a way out for future installments. I don't see Sonic Team giving or even hinting at Sonic's origin going down like that.

But this is a great question to ask Sonic Team next time there's a Sonic fan event or when they're guests on the stream.

 

Which is exactly my problem: The whole point is that, by definition, they don't work. Getting general time travel to work depends on the rules you put in place (which is why I like BttF's branching timeline rules, even if they fuck it up in some ways). But stable time loops CANNOT work.

 

You know? This type of time travel plot reminds me of one of the plot elements that failed for Kingdom Hearts with Dream Drop Distance. Same type of it was always suppose to be that way non sense. For those who played the series, you know what I'm talking about, with the Xehanort timeline. It's the same situation for Sonic games, such as Sonic 06. They seem to not have set up rules for the act of time travel, meaning everyone can just do as they please with time travel.

 

But again, you're treating the situation like other interpretations of time travel do work, which they don't. Time travel doesn't make actual sense under any circumstances. A stable loop actually makes the most sense out of any of them from a certain point of view, since in those cases, nothing was ever changed. The timeline moved on as it was supposed to.

 

I'd continue to argue that without the trigger appearing before the loop it wasn't "supposed to" happen that way, but I can feel Overlord coming to claim my soul for derailing the topic, so I won't.

 

This is why SA2 is such a good game in the eyes of so many people. It's not "because it's dark" or "Shadow is edgy". It's because it provides just enough to get people interested and holds back enough to keep people discussing it. It's the same mechanic that makes movies like The Prestige or Inception so great. Not that SA2 is on the same level as Inception, but the fact that kids are debating on the playground whether Sonic is in fact the Ultimate Life Form, or why did Gerald design Shadow to look like like Super Sonic. Or what actually happened at the end: did Shadow die, will he come back? It's the intrigue that makes this game a classic.

Take for example when Eggman fires Sonic out of the airlock. Sonic tells Tails to take care of Amy and finish the job. Then you see the capsule explode. You don't find out what happens until after Tails defeats Dr. Eggman (a particularly difficult boss fight for a kid who sucks at video games). The storytelling is legitimately good even if the story itself is contrived. That's why people still like it even 20 years later.

And on a side note: that why Sonic Heroes burned people so bad. SA2 had this great storytelling that held back information that we desparately wanted to know. And when Sonic Heroes teased that Shadow was back we expected an explanation. What we got was "something something androids... Maybe? Or clones?". It felt like they didn't even try to put in the effort to expand on the story they had across SA1 and SA2.