Sorry, but also thanks for pointing out my mistakes. Mighty and Ray = BAD CHARACTERS. Just terrible, unfinished sprites of Knuckles and Tails, or Mighty is a gayer-looking Sonic.
Depending on circumstance, Sonic's friends are valuable. I think so far they've done a pretty decent job, though I think the friends should now stay as background characters otherwise they'll risk becoming too involved. I think Sonic Heroes introduced them in the perfect way- characters totally seperate from Sonic, Tails and Knuckles who'll occasionally meet the main team and give the Sonic series that nice feel that there's more to the world than just a few characters. As much as you all hate the characters, you seem to hate them more because you're worried more about the future, rather than what the characters brought previously- Big was a side story of no real importance other than to beat to unlock Super Sonic's levels and give the Chaos Story some depth, Rouge and Shadow were both pretty kick ass and brought a lot to the whole Dreamcast era, as well as further character development (ie; Rouge's little tiffs with Knuckles the loner), and most other characters aside from Silver and Blaze have been spin-off extras like Sonic Riders who you'd never even know existed had you not gone and played the games. What's most important now though, is that we have these characters, we know they exist, and as of late, they've had little impact on Sonic's games- Unleashed, Colours and Generations all handled them perfectly and we can look past the complex shit filled fest of 2006 and rest assured that you'l be much more Sonic, and far less minor characters. Sometimes it's cool tohave some extra characters though, Amy and Cream are a great little duo, Cream has been the best newcomer since Knuckles (In the 2D games) and quite honestly I feel that playing as Sonic alone doesn't always complete the experience. The Advance games felt perfect. Robotnik is bound to gain more enemies as he fucks with the world, and it's nice to kick his ass with other characters without taking that limelight away from Sonic.
Some of the characters seem to have rather pretentious roles in the series really, ones the story and games can't really use to full potential and as such they often get downgraded to generic heroes. I mean, what alliance was Rouge in SA2 exactly? She was a thief AND a trusted government agent? She just seemed like they were trying to add clever twists to her role but it ended up kinda conflicted and pretentious. Shame for Shadow, started off an anti hero with his own neutral goals then turned into a goody goody GUN agent, what's the point of having a 'dark' version of Sonic that's on the same side as him? Not to mention a lot of stories and genres seem to be refined more around them than being made around the original Sonic concepts. ie. turning the universe into a realistic grimdark surburbea to utilize Shadow's 'mature' persona, or the Final Fantasy rip off style for Silver's time travel story. It doesn't help a lot of characters seem to made solely to outdo their previous additions, Knuckles, Shadow, Jet all made to be Sonic's new rival and so the former gets downgraded. Cream becomes the new beginner character in place of Tails. The newer villains have little to no character BUT being the sinister horrific threat Eggman isn't, to the point they are outright generic and repetitive.
Somebody explain to me how Knuckles has ever acted as a rival He was a villain at first, if only for being duped, but I never saw him outright competing with Sonic in a rival-sort of way. Metal Sonic and Shadow fit that role far more than Knuckles EVER did. EDIT: Sonic Rivals games don't count
Quite fair enough. Their appearance there tended to be gratuitous and unnecessary. It was pretty silly and felt quite forced. The missions themselves were generally pretty nice though.
I don't see that making him a rival, especially considering that except for one scene, Knuckles never even MEETS Sonic in his own mode. It's just… y'know, Knuckles' story, nothing more to it. ô.ò
I quite liked Marine, she was annoyingly fun and didn't interrupt the gameplay. Sonic Rush Adventure cutscenes <3
I am aware of that but it doesn't particularly change my point, if you ask me. I never had reason to see Knuckles as a rival quite like Metal Sonic or Shadow have been Rivals.
I don't see what Ray can offer what isn't already offered by several other characters. and all Mighty has is a wall jump.
Some people tend to forget that Knuckles had his buttmonkey moments in his debut (let's consider it S3 and S&K), I mean he's bombed by an Eggrobo in two moments, tricked by the Doctor and quite shocked (oh god no...) when he discover the truth, also his exit in Launch Base wasn't exactly glamorous. And he's always chuckling, What he need is more cool moments not the lack of failure time, which is also a part of the character. I mean he reverted Super Sonic to his normal from with a punch, f**king Super Sonic, the Super Sayian of the Sonic World. The thing is how Sonic games are structured, these characters are made for the "character of the week" status (Knuckles included), and it feels when these characters appear on a environment that they don't belong. Or the characters evolve to something more than a one-sided personality (everything after Amy Rose needs to do this, her and yes Knuckles included) or they will feel bland or/and annoying, or really just really be the "character of the week" and never appearing again.
But you can't set up a character as being a loner who spends his life protecting the Master Emerald for him to then not care about it and bugger off. It's ok if he knows where Eggman is, but why would you leave this open to being stolen from a guy that has already tried to steal it before (twice).
Given the last time Eggman messed with it a massive ancient demon escaped from it and overpowered him ultimately, I don't think Eggman wants it anymore.
Let's look at this from each of the extremes, and how to possibly fix them: Forced Gameplay changing: Starting in Sonic Adventure, I hated all the new Sonic characters that completely changed the gameplay into something you wouldn't expect from Sonic (Big the Cat, I'm looking directly at you). This is like having a platformer turn into a Final Fantasy clone halfway through, and it stays like that for a good one-sixth of the game. It breaks the flow of the rest of game, and it makes people dread having to get through that part in subsequent replays. At times, it would have been better left out. I'd rather have characters with different moves that are unique to the character, but at the same time don't differ all that much from the main character. Sonic and Knuckles' gameplay from Sonic Adventure is a good example. Same levels, similar moves (with some exceptions), but different goals. I wouldn't mind seeing this return to Sonic games, if done correctly and if used sparingly (maybe three or four characters maximum). Cookie-cutter characters: Touched upon in Sonic Adventure 2, but taken to its extreme in Sonic Heroes; This just took a handful of characters, and copy-pasted them several times with a few minor edits. In Heroes, they could have replaced the four teams with an "Easy, Medium, Hard" difficulty selection (Teams Rose, Sonic, and Dark,) , with an extra "Mission based" mode for extra challenge (Team Chaotix). A game that uses this formula somewhat correctly is Sonic Riders, as a racing game, this is more comparable to the different weight/speed classes in the Mario Kart games, and unlockable Extreme Gear lets you pick a character and let him/her compensate for his weaknesses. Sonic only, No items, Final destination: Used straight in Sonic Colours (and Sonic 4 ep. 1) and somewhat zig-zagged in Sonic Unleashed and Sonic Generations (Technically there is only one Sonic in these games, just made different somehow to give the illusion of multiple characters, like the Warehog or Classic/Modern Sonics), this leaves Sonic as the only playable character. While this is fine and dandy, it feels somewhat empty. Powerups and multiple level missions could lengthen the game experience, but it also takes away the fact that it removes the potiental of making hidden routes that one character can see but can't reach like in Sonic 3& Knuckles. The Wisps fixed the problem of routes off of the beaten path by giving Sonic new abilities for a short time, and promoted exploration and experimentation to some degree, making the levels less linear. Only having Sonic playable removes most of the potential of having a 2-player mode, but Sonic Colours found a way around that with the Sonic Simulator. Sonic Generations promotes competition in a different way with its online rankings, You never see or interact with another player, but beating other people's times and getting your friends to try to beat yours is a good way to get competitive without having a multiplayer mode. Hey Sonic! Did you know you can press the "Jump" button to jump? Try it!: Ahh, the annoying "helper" characters. Starting in Sonic Adventure 1 with Tikal, and made even worse with Omochao in Adventure 2, and so on. As of Generations, all of Sonic's friends fall into this category. Their purpose is simple and righteous, to give you help. Sometimes the point out a weak spot on a boss, or they alert you about hazards you are going to meet, but they also give you advice that you should already know if you have played a video game before, or if you read the manual. If they are tied to the story, like Tikal, Chip, or even Tails, then they have somewhat of a reason for being around, but as far as Omochao goes... Thank goodness you can turn him off in Generations.
Isn't Knuckles always leaving the Island? He left it in Sonic Heroes (referenced that he'd better get back to the Master Emerald as Rouge had her eye on it), and he's helping destroy the Black Arms in Shadow The Hedgehog. He's with Sonic in 2006, and at his party in Generations. He either leaves the Master Emerald at the altar or brings it with him everywhere as it can shrink to any size. I'd like to see Knuckles more at Angel Island and less walking about doing little. He was good in Heroes but since then the Master emerald hasn't even been mentioned, and it's a major part of his character. Actually, I'd like to see far more Angel Island- that place is huge, seeing the Emeralds in HD this gen would be awesome, and I'm sure they can give us more places to go to and expand upon the island like they did for other places in Generations.
