What ever happend the the name...

I hope you're saying that in differentiation to the people who prefer the unaltered version for reasons other than it being kawaii neko desu chan kun sama baka japanese crap, and who don't actually have to "go out of their way to use the orignal" name or whatever. What I find stupid is American marketing groups making bad decisions, or decisions for the wrong reasons, when importing foreign material. The decision to rename "Eggman" as "Robotnik" because "Eggman" "didn't sound evil enough" was pure retardation. It's not a matter of whether or not you like the way one sounds coming out of your mouth more than the other, but rather the fact that Eggman IS NOT the embodiment of all that is evil. If he was, he wouldn't look and act so goofy. Obviously that was something about his character that they wanted to come through from the start, otherwise Sonic Team wouldn't have presented him the way they did as early as Sonic 1 itself. The American marketing team obviously had their heads too far up their asses to realize that. I'll also make note of the difference between the Japanese/European soundtracks for Sonic CD, just for the sake of pointing out another conflict of interest between the marketing group and the actual developers. The group wasn't concerned with whether or not the music matched the gameplay, their reasoning in changing the soundtrack was to try and sell Sonic CD as a standard music CD in the American music market at the time, which I actually don't recall working out very well.

I prefer "Eggman", because it better suits the character, AND it serves to differentiate between the actual Eggman character and the other incarnations that were whipped up to go along with the name "Robotnik". Even in the newer games since the names were officially merged, he seems to like to refer to himself as Eggman. The difference between the different characters should certainly be taken into account, but it seems that at least some people think that if they call the actual Eggman character "Eggman", that they have to call the character in the American cartoon "Eggman" also. That character has always been "Robotnik" and will always be "Robotnik", and whether or not you also call Eggman "Robotnik", they will always be entirely different characters. I don't disacknowledge that "Robotnik" is now Eggman's actual family name, but it makes alot more sense to me and just feels more right to call him (Not American/European Robotnik) Eggman

Having said that, I'm also strongly against this sort of preference being swayed by "LOL JAPN ROXZ N IM KEWL 4 LIKIN IT" OR "ROFL AMERAC PRID AL TINGS FORIN SUCX". Mine are based on the above, more logical reasons

 

lol, amerac prid XD

 

You think only 3 name changes is bad? You haven't seen Darkstalkers then, have you?

Let's see...

Phobos became Huitzil, (Mexican robot)
Gallon became J.Talbain, (English werewolf)
Zabel became L.Raptor, (Australian ghoul/zombie)
Lei-Lei became Hsien-Ko, (Chinese ghost)
Bulleta became BB Hood, (the deranged storybook character)
and Victor apparently had 'Franken' planned as a name (wonder .

Why? Hell if I know, but maybe Capcom actually did it right, because the 'Western' names are generally better than their Japanese counterparts.

 

The three name changes refered to were not three characters getting NEW names, they were three characters whose names were SWAPPED, causing all sorts of confusion.



I don't even consider the cartoon and comic versions of Robotnik when saying what I call Sonic's arch-rival. They have no bearing on it. However, since I was 4 years old I knew him as Dr. Ivo Robotnik, and that I will always call him.

Also, it's not about sounding evil. It's about sounding realistic. Ivo Robotnik sounds more like a real name than Eggman.

 

Although in the end, it lost it's purpose.

 

Man people. How hard is this to grasp, or let go of?

Let me break it down:

Eggman = His Japanese name
Robotnik = Name he was given in the US
The two were merged in Sonic Adventure 2 for continuity's sake.
His real name is now cannonically Dr. Robotnik (as proven by Gerald and Maria Rototnik's names), and Eggman was used as a taunting nickname for him by Sonic and friends, until he part-way took it as a title for himself; an alias, if you will.

that's all there is to it. that's the official, cold hard facts. Now everyone can be happy, as was Sega's intention, instead of going "omgomg y r tehy caling him Eggman? Its Robotnik, U fackar".

 

Actually, it was SA.

Tails: It's Eggman!
Eggman: Silence! I am Dr. Robotnik, the greatest scientific genius in the world!

Or something to that effect.

 

Right, but it didn't say that in the Japanese language track. At least I don't believe it did, as I recall. I'm pretty sure those lines were exclsuive to the dub. The name Robotnik was not mentioned once in the japanese track of SA.

SA2 is when it was officially merged internationally, as I said earlier.

 

Pauline is a completely different girl, just take a look at the cover of Donkey Kong for GameBoy.

I believe she signs as "Princess Toadstool, Peach" in the letter she sends Mario at the beginning of Super Mario 64. So her name is Peach and she has the charge of being Princess Toadstool.


This post sounded kinda geeky, didn't it?

 

In France, Dr Robotnik is much more used and well known than Eggman. I always name him as Dr Ivo "Eggman" Robotnik in details, or only Dr Robotnik to be short.

Actually, Robotnik sounds like "robot", even in french. Eggman is just too strange for the french common language. That might be a reason why Robotnik is more used here.

 

Stupid, and probably obvious question...

Is Robotnik's first name Julian? (Just for clarification)

 

No. That was the SatAM and Archie comic line's name for him. His first name hasnt ever been officially stated by Sega, but the most logical one to go by is Dr. Ivo "Eggman" Robotnik, going by the US Sonic 1 manual, which calls him Dr. Ivo Robotnik.

 

Yeah...wouldn't an instruction booklet be an official statement by Sega, seeing that someone at Sega made the instruction booklet?

 

I don't think you understood me correctly; I'm not talking about what people, informed or not, think about either name now that they're both out there. The marketing group at SOA had a fit about something they didn't put enough research into and gathered a group of people together to come up with a name that "sounds evil". American import groups (I can't speak for other countries) seem to be much more interested in making up their own targets and altering the content based on business-style "analysis" rather than understanding the content itself and preserving the developers' original work and intent to the best of their ability. This is very much apparant in the way they designed the characters and plot they gave to DiC and Archie, who's cartoons and comics might as well be named something else, but probably wouldn't have sold if they weren't labeled "Sonic"

I also wonder where realism becomes an issue when a smart but childish egg-shaped man always has the material for and is able to quickly build hundreds of robots and several large mech-style machines (and the Death Egg) at a time is being chased by a speedy blue semi-humanish talking hedgehog who was apparantly named "Sonic" from birth (assuming he was "born") for some reason that couldn't possibly have been apparant at the time, both of whom are after stones that contain an infinite ammount of energy that can be used to power machines or transform "normal" living beings into demigods :P

Sega America is a "sister company" to Sega Japan. Considering the nature of their relationship, it's more like the use of Sonic is LICENCED to Sega America, rather than Sonic belinging to Sega America the same way he belongs to Sega Japan. Saying that anything they say on their own is "official" is almost as if saying that anything Archie had to say was "official". For the longest time, Sega America hasn't actually been selling "Sonic", but rather something with his name on it. The marketing department and whoever else controls the money they put INTO developing the products re-designed by marketing are majorly responsible for any changes, such as the "Eggman" to "Robotnik" change, and the fact that all story content was stripped away along with color and other content to minimize the cost of printing the American manuals

 

Yeah, I know that Pauline was a completely different character, but I've seen many forums in which people were confused, stating that "Peach" had a "different name" back in the day. It's amazing what rumours do to corrupt people.

And I was going to add the thing about the letter in SM64, but I forgot how she ended the letter. I didn't know if it ended "Princess 'Peach' Toadstool" or the "Princess Toadstool, Peach" way. Wow. I'm a dork indeed.

 

Actually there are 3 names:

Robotnik: US name originally
Eggman: Japanese name originally
Robotonic: Sega's odd spelling (used in the complation games)

=P

 

Come now. That's bad translation at best.

 

And Flygon's spelling at worst.

 

It was "Robotonik" in Sonic Mega Collection (History of Sonic video), and "Robotonic" in Sonic the Fighters, still unfixed when it was used in Sonic Gems Collection.