I never insisted Classic Sonic should quip like Jaleel White or that it'd need to be directed like the 2000s games. I just think outright removing the characters' voice boxes was always an unnecessary decision. The pantomiming argument doesn't really work for me in Generations/Forces' case where they hardly took advantage of it, to the point where it's hard to even get a grasp on Classic's personality especially in comparison to the Genesis games. I'm saying it's odd that Classic Sonic doesn't at least go ow when he gets hurt. I brought up CD because it's an example of maintaining the pantomime charm without making Sonic flat-out mute, or at least it was before they unnecessarily removed his lines in later releases.
I somewhat understand the angle, but I thought the point of Shadow was to contrast Sonic's vibes, right? If Sonic was 4-on-the-floor driving guitar/rock music, Shadow's being electronic music with more complex beats just seemed like a smart decision. Making his style of music like an edgier version of Sonic's music kinda went against their own intents to make him seem a more unique character lol. In turn this era also diluted Crush 40's sound to be pretty sludgey and metal-coated overall, which coincides with the moment they fell off and stopped doing Sonic OSTs. Just a funny thing to think about.. I guess the mid 2000s were just edgy and heavy sounding enough to completely shift the sound of the series, and even after leaving it behind, Shadow's identity has remained tied to it. A bit of a shame. Throw It All Away, Supporting Me, White Jungle and For True Story clear any Shadow-related songs released since. Only exception being the Generations For True Story remix, which ruled. But not the other remixes, imo lol.
Fair enough. That would be a fine compromise. On the other hand, I can't say I'd trust Sega to handle it with that much subtlety. Either way, I don't think having him not grunt and the like in-game is truly an offensive crime. It's kind of odd, but it seems like a very not big deal to me. One could bring up Sky Rail as a counter point; that shit shreds. Even if it's in the minority of Shadow's SA2 songs, it shows that Shadow doesn't need to be pigeonholed into one genre; he can have some blending and crossover. That said, this adds to your point, because leaning all in on metal isn't very much in the spirit of blending or crossing over, and drowns out what was more prevalent within his original musical identity.
I guess Jun just really wanted to win the "who's more metal?" contest against Nobuo Uematsu. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ I hope they keep evolving Shadow as a character. A lot of things (1, 2, 3) need to align to get the character right.
Given SA2 is his debut (and was originally going to be his ONLY game), but I think they hadn't quite figured out the type of character Shadow was going to be yet. In SA2, he's very much "evil Sonic", complete with the cockiness, and the smarmy attitude but uses that to hide his pain. Works very well. And I think when they brought him back, and decided that was going to be a permanent fixture in the series, that he would work as a better foil for Sonic if he was mostly serious (Which is what Knuckles originally was). I do wonder how the perception of him would change if he kept that initial attitude he had.
I feel like your dislike for a voiced Classic Sonic has at least something to do with you "wanting 2024 to be over". But hey that 'I guess' was purposeful.
It's endlessly amusing to me that you hate Shadow (no shade, so do I) but are rocking a Sephiroth avatar...
It's not even that I hate Shadow, I've said this before - I don't like what he represents. Sephiroth doesn't represent a massive change in direction for the franchise he's in, I don't see an equivalence.
Speaking of Shadow Now that SA2 is back in the popular eye, I really wonder just how willing most people will be to acknowledge how weak most of the framings for Shadow's backstory are narratively. I've always maintained that it was inherently something that weakens his entire story when held up to scrutiny, in spite of it being a pillar of his identity, but most people, or at least fans of the story, seem to have been satisfied enough without being critical of it. And that just lead to multiple people's adamant headcanons about what it really was about being uncritical in turn, given whatever material of the story that is highlighted/preferred, and in the process prevailed in the popular mindshare while skating by off positive memories of the emotional payoff and theming alone. Even Sonic X, which I feel like does multiple things worse in its SA2 adaption, including this scene, (I'm allowed to, Maekawa went on record that he had very little input on these seasons ) at least tried to add some more structurally sound reasoning to what was shown in-game. Like making it clear that Shadow himself doesn't think there's anything in the world worth saving, and technically admits out loud something possibly driving him more than an otherwise shaky promise he believes he made. It fits with the lyrics of Shadow's stages, so that's always been my interpretation as well, but given the absence of being explicitly told that, a lot of the mindshare just... doesn't address it and insists it really is just as simple as him believing that Maria told him to do bad thing, and now Maria told him to do good thing and so he will do good thing instead. It might be able to fly for diehard Sonic fans, but I feel like showing any self-discerning non-fan these events without offering some of the stronger interpreted framing will just easily lead to "that's weak as hell" either from a character or a writing perspective.
I'm sorry, what?? Sephiroth didn't have massive ramifications for Final Fantasy? I hate going off topic, but damn. I had to comment on this.
Couldn't have said it any better. But you're right, 2024 won't last forever. And I hope @Sonic5993 is right about Sega understanding that Shadow works best in small doses, and as a contrast to Sonic's usual flavor. I don't think we'll get a repeat of the 2000s, where the next five years or so are just endless Shadow pandering. But nothing's ever for sure with this series.
Was there a FF7 subline spun off? Yes. Did the main series continue regardless? Also yes - 9 onwards (8 still has hangover, I'll grant) is very much in the same sort of vein as earlier titles were. I'm not looking at this from a "name a character from the franchise" view, I'm just looking at ongoing titles. Shadow is ongoing in the "main line", not a subseries. Regardless, this IS now going offtopic, so I'm ducking out here.
this kinda feeds into my actual hot take about Shadow, in that both Shadow fans and haters kind of put his SA2 version on a pedestal, and the character is more of a mixed bag with strong and weak moments across all of his appearances instead of "Oh he was good once and then never again." Same as any other Sonic character really. Maria borders on being a non-entity in the original title, which weakens the foundation of the character pretty significantly imo. Shadow the Hedgehog takes some steps to alleviate this some but it largely focuses on adding wrinkles that are uninteresting which is a mistake. Sonic Channel in recent times has been making a lot of the right moves here though, over 20 years after the fact. We get to see Maria more in her day to day, the things she liked to do, and what her and Shadow's relationship was actually like before the tragedy. It has me hopeful for Sonic x Shadow Generations. In contrast, I think most of his drama in 06 is genuinely compelling even if it's not what was expected of the character at the time. I'd be interested in seeing that angle of Shadow's self image explored more, whether he could actually have a clean slate after a stint as world-destroying supervillain.
You mean that grand total of two games which most people didn't like that Sega has outright refused to acknowledge in any capacity until very recently? Are you trying to say that Advance, Heroes, Rush or Riders were corrupted by Shadow's mid-2000s edginess? I don't see it. I think SA2 probably would have leaned a bit more "realistic"/dramatic even without Shadow considering SA1 as the starting point.
Having discourse like this about the series' direction is totally pointless if nobody agrees whether spinoffs count or not.
I agree that the scope of the game shouldn't really matter in terms of how significant they are to fans but we all kind of know some games "count" more than others to most folk. We distinguish the mainline games from the smaller titles for a reason. More people are going to play Frontiers than Superstars. The success of the former is going to affect the trajectory of the next game more. All that being said Shadow fever didn't really bother me that much for a few reasons: 1. I was the right age for the tonal shift to hit. 2. From the classics to the Adventures, to the Advance series there was plenty of Tails, Knuckles and Amy to go around. Focusing on new characters after the 10th anniversery seemed like a natural next step. 3. Shadow was cool.
Whether anyone likes or not, Shadow is the most well established character of the modern Era. The fact that he's gotten so much buzz despite being absent for so long just showed how stupid of a decision it was to sideline him to appeal to people who probably haven't touched this franchise past 1994 or people that can't stand the idea that a new character has soundly upstaged the old favorites. From a business standpoint, there is literally no reason not to utilize Shadow. Even putting aside the business side of it, it's ultimately better for the longevity of the series to get people invested in more characters than just the Classic ones. There has not been a character that has made as big of an impact as Shadow and that's kind of a problem imo.
