#a while ago there was a big thing about how sonic said 'i love you too shadow' in spanish and. yeah he says it in turkish too

[larabar]

been rewatching prime in turkish highly recommend

[neolynne]

Pit Babe episode 9 rewatch/live commentary (part 2)

When i say that Pavel was born to play this Babe, it's his emotional scene that first comes to my mind, both here and in ep 10. The rawness in his acting, the sadness and hurt in his face, his eyes and his voice....it's a masterpiece when it comes to portraying grief.

How much betrayal can someone go through before it break them entirely?

I like to thing that the reason Charlie isn't right there from the beginning is because he was calling Alan/Jeff to reassure them and to tell them that he found Babe.

I kwon that a lot of fan are saying that we were robbed of the kiss....but i kinda prefer that the scene end with Charlie just hugging Babe through his grief

Side note n°???? but it look like Pavel and Pooh give the best hug in the world

Now that was a cathartic scene....even if slapping you kid is a big no no

10 years, approximately ? .......And if that the case, why did Way wait so long to make a move ???? Why did Tony wait so long to ask Way to make a move ??????????????????

And that answer my question from episode three ..... i'm just an idiot who doesn't pay enough attention......or maybe i'm just so feed up with Tony and Way bullsh*t since my fist time watching PitBabe that i just ignored everything that this man said in this scene.................

And this is when i stop myself from doing a Sugar Daddy joke......

It break my heart every time Kenta watch Tony be violent toward one of the "golden child" and he has that expression of bewilderment. As if every time, he cannot process the fact that Tony violence can be directed toward anyone else but him......and yet we know that he assisted to thing that are far worse than that......

Does he (Tony) have power too ? And what is his subgender? (And if he's an enigma.......did he plan to......with Babe ?......Why did i ask myself this question, why ?!!!!!!)

At this point, even Hannibal could be a better adoptive father.....maybe............(yes, i rewatched Hannibal S1......sue me)

This expression on Kenta's face, he know what happen to people when Tony doesn't give them another chance

What does Way says to Babe in ep 10 ? that he would never hurt Charlie because he know that Babe's loves him? Well, guess that was a lie. Because i'm pretty sure that telling Tony about Charlie power, making Tony transfert his plan from Babe to Charlie, count as hurting Charlie and subsequently as hurting Babe.

Fuck you Way

Charlie.....you know that what you just say is not true.....

Babe is so tiny in this scene

"on my life" he says, while planning his own death.....

How long was Alan just standing there while NorthSonic just ignored him ?

They both so invested in this ! Trying to get Alan to say something

I really wish we had the scene where they learn what Way did

That some good advice, happy that Alan listened to them

Aaahhh he's so cute.....and they both look so fluffy

I can imagine Kenta reading Alan message like 😐🤨😑

Jeff look so young in this scene

Tell him Uncle !

2 minutes ago you didn't want him to read your text and now you give him your phone ???? Uncle.....

We need more daring/flirty Jeff

So, in Jeff vision we got : Dean attack on Babe, Kenta attack on Pete, Charlie in the ambulance, Jeff with the kids, Winner pointing his gun at Babe and Charlie, Tony with the katana, Winner after he got beaten....

Boys.............

Creep

Même Kenta il en crois pas ses oreilles

Whoever put Pavel in this black t-shirt, thank you

Hiiiiiii Dean!!!!!!!! I missed you so much!!!!! you're so cute

North is so happy

I wanted to believe him so badly 😭

And they had to throw that little look between Dean and Charlie

...................he seemed so sincere.................

😭😭😭

Happiness look so good on them (ft the original trio 🥹)

What type of content do you think they put on the Xhunter channel??? We already have the live streaming, the little interview.....Sonic fashion vlog "get ready with me for the next race" ?

And do you think that the people watching North and Sonic Youtube content ship them ??? Because i would ! And maybe they read the comment, read the fic and watch the edit while lying in bed, kicking they feet and giggling like little kids (and the most oblivious people on Earth)????? Or worse, they make the edit themself !!!!!

Yes he is !!!! So handsome, so cute.......

Babe is so gentle

His hand on Charlie stomach and the little caress

Échange de bons procédés j'ai envi de vous dire

And welcome back "mama"

it's the tongue for me

Pooh's voice.....🫠

Both "Now matter what happens, you're the only reason i'm here" and "He's still warm, Charlie must not be dead yet" sit at the same table. And this table is called "let's emotionally destroy a potato" (i'm the potato)

Hi Winner 🤭

Why is he so loud!

This scene is right on top of my s*x inf ront of a mirror list, just below the one from "My beautiful man/utsukushii kare~eternal~ the movie"(my other all-time favorite BL......really, if you have not watched it, you should...and don't let the whole stalker thing stop you, the main couple are both crazy for each other)

Charlie keeping his gaze on Babe....work of art

Yes Charlie, use your hand!!!

Thank you Pavel

Don't listen to him Charlie, you did good....also, even if winning would have been great, it wasn't really the plan, right ?

Give it to us!!!!!!!! Change, you have the opportunity do do something really great on the 17th

He sure did

🤭

And look, only 2 part for ep 9!!!! Even if that one is quite long.

I really, really like this episode, but now i have to prepare myself for ep 10 😭

[biolizardboils]

so heads up! im popping a LOT of Prime Season 3 posts into the queue--they'll start coming out one week from now, on January 22nd! if you can see this post and haven't watched it yet, here's some tags to block: #prime spoilers, #sonic prime spoilers, #sonic prime s3 spoilers, #sonic prime season 3 spoilers.

got all that? great! here's my final unorganized little rambles about the show:

shoutout to Rusty Rose's Birdie, who only appears in the very first and very last eps for some reason 😭 her speech about it not being her power source came outta nowhere too, but i loved the message behind it

when everyone arrives at the Grim, just before the ep ends, Nine starts breathing heavily and it. instantly reminded me of Movie!Tails when the bar was calling them freaks. fuck. its a nice reminder of where Nine's coming from

speaking of Nine his poses getting more unhinged over time!! hell yeah

i love that the final fight(s) felt like a kid smashing 3 different Lego sets together, real Robot Pirate Island shit

i laughed a little too hard when the Grim's dome started closing in cus Nine's citadel-thing already reminded me of a thing that happened in Fortnite once, but hell naw they had to add The Storm too sdfghj

METAL BIG DESTROYED ME LJKHGFDV im SO glad i wasnt spoiled about it!!! a while in i started finding it creepy instead of funny, which is an added bonus

i was spoiled about the Advance flashback and its clashing sprites though. the utter whiplash of seeing that without warning mightve made me choke on my hot cheeto puffs. someone's already remade it btw, check it out

i fistpumped at the small reprise of "me beauty" gfhjk ill miss you so much Dread

we're four years into the 2020's and Sonic has nearly died an agonizingly slow death 3 times in 3 different continuities! and dare i say it was delicious every time >:)

unless Word of God says otherwise I'm gonna assume that the giant shadow at the end was The Return Of Metal Big lpoihgfds

So... Twitter, huh? My spoiler filters there had some leaks, and I saw some discussion out of context that... actually made me kinda scared to finish the show. But then I did, and had fun with it just like the other two seasons, and I remembered that Twitter gets high-strung about things that don't matter so much, and that giving it sway over how much I enjoy things is silly lol.

Yes, I think the last season could've been paced differently so it wasn't 5 episodes of the same Final Boss Fight. Yes, I think the writing switches jarringly between gearing for a young new audience and for a seasoned old one. Yes, I think the 2D flashbacks look and move worse than what fans constantly make for free. Yes, I think the final episode doesn't do nearly as much housekeeping as it should (does the Shatterverse still exist or not??). Yes, I think declaring the show is canon to the games or whatever they said probably wasn't the best idea. And yes, I think Black Rose should've had a shoulder-parrot!Birdie to match the other Amys. All valid critiques! All sensible things to think when you've been around the Sonic bush!

But I swear to god, people on Twitter act like these things spoil the whole package. Where's the nuance? Why does every opinion there become an absolute worth tearing others down for? Is it the character limit? I bet it's the character limit.

There's so much I love about this show that were infeasible for the Sonic brand just 3-4 years ago. Externalizing the characters' facets to explore them in-depth. Said exploration spanning multiple episodes instead of being one-and-done. The sheer amount of genuine Sonadow food (and I don't actively do shipping, so me adding it here should hold a lot of weight). The snappy, playful, yet blistering fight scenes that, dare I say, feel like a successful TV-budget Spider-Verse. It was all so much fun!

But I guess stuff like Green Hill being the gang's "home" is a big deal-breaker?? Like?? I thought that was silly too, but not worth ratio'ing people with Mickey Mouse Clubhouse over? Get well soon, I guess??

Rambling over, shout-out to the entire country of Canada for giving me the most fun I've had with a Sonic show since X! I'm gonna go figure out how to address all this as The End lol

[fainthedcherry]

2024 Human Art VS 2019 Human Art !!!!!

AS PROMISED, HERE'S A POST WITH SOME NEW ART!!!

And also an art comparison, just to see, how much I improved in drawing the 2 bois <3

I'm MEGA tired despite having slept after work, but I WON'T let that deter me from writing a description!! YAPNADO AHEAD;

FINN AND MARCOOO. FINNANMARCO. BEEN A WHILE SINCE I'VE ACOUSTICALLY AND FERALLY YELLED ABOUT MY 2 FICTIONAL MEN WHOM ARE CLOSE TO MY HEART.

I'm SO glad, that in the new drawing, Marco finally looks like the twink he always was, but still enough meat on the bones to look NORMAL lmao, can't say that about the 4 other sketches of me trying to redraw this ref for years. xD (why yes, his wings took forever, why do you ask? /lh)

I'M MEGA SUPER DUPER GLAD, that Finn FINALLY looks like a chubby, wild bastard TOO, OH TOOTHPASTE MAN, HOW MANY HEARTACHES YOU GAVE ME OVER STRUGGLING TO DRAW AN ENDOMORPHIC BODY TYPE. BUT I CAN NOWWWWWWWwwww!!!!!

God this habit of loudly reading out my posts as I type them made me realise what a bad Schwarzenegger impression I do on accident bc I'm overly excited to post something after a month of silence SDKFSKLDG

ONE THING I ALWAYS WANTED TO DO. IS PUT EVERY DETAIL I NEEDED ON A BIG REF. SO I DID! I've drawn closeups of the boys's eyes, I've drawn Finn's tongue so that I don't need to constantly remind myself what his blush and flesh colours were sdfkldsgkl, I FINALLY denoted their heights, so people know that they're tall TALL dudes (and that Finn obviously will struggle w/ his lanky mfing legs, we LOVE giving a middle-aged man heart attacks once he reaches his 40's!!!)

ANNDDD ALSO SOME SIDE VIEWS OF THEM. The last side-view I had of F & M, looked REAL bad. Like, Marco's face looked WAY too stereotypically European (to my fault bc surprise surprise not many African people live in Europe so I had poor frame of reference but I've been fixing it via looking up images online instead, at least it helps but yeah, I have a hard time so far unfortunately💀), Finn's was just... B u c k e t. NOT LIKE HANDSOME BUCKET. BUT JUST BUCKET. IT NEEDED FIXING (fun fact I accidentally made Finn have the most attractive jaw shape for men according to beauty standards and I DIDN'T EVEN KNOW I JUST WANTED THIS MAN TO LOOK S Q U A R E AND THAT'S IT, MINECRAFT STEVE HAS MORE RIZZ THAN MOST MEN OFFICIALLY).

OH YEAH ALSO A CLAW REF AGAIN FOR FINN!!! His old ref looks too cool for me to give up on it tbh even as dated as it is sfjklsdglk, BUT I felt like I needed to redraw them properly.

FUNNILY ENOUGH A PERSON I COMMISSIONED SAID I HAVE SOME REALLY CLEAN AND NICE LINEART. I wish I heard that 5 years ago when I was really insecure about my bad lineart skills xD, I don't use lineart anymore nowadays outside of reference-drawings like these I don't plan to redraw in the next years unless necessary soooo yeah! They're gonna appear much rarer unless I go off and about making more ref sheets of all of my Sonc OC's sfklsdgsdfksdg

This drawing took 5 days to make btw. Not the hours spent on this LOL. 5 days of my life I'll never get back tho bc I care too much about my babies and I feel they deserve proper refs sdfklsdglk

WHAT ELSE SHOULD I MENTION.....HOPEFULLY I PLAN TO DRAW MORE HUMAN REFS IN THE FUTURE INSTEAD OF STAY IN MY COMFORT ZONE OF SONIC OCS ONLY. I for years wasn't confident in my ability to draw humans, but I can do so NOW at least!!!!!!!!!! Even if I'm like...3 years too late to how I wish my art looked back then already dsklfdsg, I have some high standards I need to continue to knock down as my 2024 resolution sdfklsdg

^IT'S BEEN WORKING THOUGH AS YOU CAN TELL BC I'VE BEEN UPLOADING SOME BAD DOODLES AND SKETCHES, BEEN DRAWING MORE GARBAGE AND BECAME MORE INVOLVED IN MY BELOVED FANDOMS. I wanna continue doing so! It was the most fun I've had with art ever. I hope to properly meet more fandoms I left in the past bc I thought it'd be embarrassing to share my passion for a franchise back then. I EMBRACE THE CRINGE NOW AS AN ADULT AT LEAST EVEN IF 7 YEARS TOO LATE ON THAT FRONT TOO. We all age and mature ig but I just become more silly year by year,,, c:

Oh yeah if you also see this btw lemme know, whether the new watermark tiles are subtle enough to not be noticed!!!! I know, watermarks are annoying and nobody likes them, but ever since AI invasions, I REFUSE to put my work online without ANY form of proof that somebody took it from my page. I just want people to stop lying on the internet for cloud and pick up a pencil. It's not that hard smfh. The only time I could excuse AI art is w/ amputees man. That's the only time I could empathise with someone, who wants to be an artist but LITERALLY can't bc they got dealt a bad hand in life. I digress my AI hate can be rambled about some other day, I know I love yapping and writing essays about THAT topic for sure sfklsdklg

I chose to post this ref to my Tumblr first tho, bc I still wanna work on my drawing of Abbacchio,,,, he is quite dear to me and I'd love to put effort into a doodle of him that won't take too long. Like 4 hours or 5 hours tops. I still have yet to figure out, if his cute star shape on his head is a hat or part of his hair. Bc I CAN'T TELL TBH AND I'VE BEEN DRAWING IT AS PART OF HIS HAIR PATTERN BUT I THINK IT'S A HAT NOW EVER SINCE I LOOKED AT MORE ASBR CAPS OF HIM I TOOK FOR REFERENCES. xD

Also another side-note, but I've ofc reduced down the lankiness of the dudes I draw™, but I in result wanted to sliiightly make larger feet/hands bc my Sonic phase will continue to possess me 'til the end of time /hj, if you also wanna lemme know what you think on that, bls do! I am messing about with stylization still. I am finding my footing with stylizing humans sOOO yeah!!!! I hope to some day be satisfied with my artstyle change of '24! So far it's been really rewarding and eye-opening to me and my journey as an artist for my 7 years of existing on the 'net w/ my silly goobers I like to scream about to in the void <3

Once again, tagnado also incoming below bc I dunno how to properly tag my art so lemme throw in things I THINK are relevant to this post sdkldsgkl

See you hopefully tomorrow w/ a lil doodle dump if I get around to it!!!! : D

[skaruresonic]

Was looking through your posts about the metal sonic shenanigans, and this part really caught my interest

"Metal doesn't really say anything to imply existential despair in Metal Madness. He more or less just brags about how he's going to take over the world"

The guy who complained about how "mean and condescending" the heroes are being sure ignored this part. They genuinely made something up and then acted like it's true.

Playing the games actually isn't enough. These people can look directly at the source material and still interpret it as something completely wrong. Sonic "fans" are simply hopeless

I didn't touch on this in my reply, but the supreme irony of "Sonic's picking on Metal, he's so impossibly smug and condescending" and "nobody listened to Metal" when Metal was actively trying to kill them is too much.

Let that sink in. Metal tries to conquer the world and murder the heroes, is a misunderstood bby boy. Sonic says something snarky to him and runs off, that's unacceptably mean.

I just.

Metal threatened to roast these characters on a spit and blasted fire in their faces. What are you talking about, "nobody listened to him"? How much would you feel like playing armchair therapist for someone who just pointed a flamethrower at you five minutes ago? Why is this deserving of "aw, poor baby"? What about Metal's actions or words suggest he's crying out for help? One throwaway line about how he's no longer afraid? Does that honestly negate the fact that he's trying to conquer the world and rule as its robot overlord? Where in the games does it suggest Metal went crawling back to Eggman to ask him to remove his voice? Because even if you go by IDW's account and nothing else, Eggman still managed to remove the "rebelliousness" from his coding. The page on which Neo Metal says this furthermore implies the process was nonconsensual; it shows an unconscious Metal hooked up to a bunch of wires, and Neo later checking a computer only to see a screen that reads "NO DATA." And barring the fact that, during the Metal Overlord fight, Metal essentially said all that was in the past... Does Sonic have to asspat every villain who comes for his blood? Really? I also really love (read: hate) how they said Sonic's answer to Metal's question of "But why can't I defeat you?" was a non-answer. Say what you will about how weird "Because we're Sonic Heroes!" is, it at least makes sense given the game's overall themes of teamwork. Heroes practically hits you over the head with it. You can't say Sonic didn't give him an answer when the answer is staring you right in the face.

The thing is, I was open to being proven wrong when I opened up YouTube and watched the Metal Madness fight. I don't remember exactly what Metal said off the top of my head. I haven't played Heroes in a long while. There are a lot of games where my memory needs a refresher. That's why I decided to double-check, because memory can often be unreliable.

So then, actually watching the video, I paid attention to his dialogue, and... Well. The evidence doesn't seem to support OP's claims. I didn't hear any instances of Metal screaming about how his constant battles with Sonic and co. were driving him insane. What I did hear, however, was a good dose of egotism justified by the slightest veneer of an identity crisis. That's not to say the identity crisis wasn't a factor, just not the most important factor. Hence I think it's reasonable to assume it's erroneous to paint it as the only thing motivating Metal in Heroes.

More broadly, I feel like the type of post that really gets big on this site is the one that appears galaxy-brained and appeals to our emotions, but hosts a conspicuous lack of sources and examples. Feels over reals, so to speak. They use loaded language, make declarative statements about the characters, and usually don't bother with nuance.

And. Like. If you scratch even just a little bit beneath the surface, you'd find the series holds more nuance than it's commonly given credit for. So to boil things down as people often do is needlessly reductive. It doesn't always paint a whole portrait. There was a recent post that rubbed me the wrong way as well because it was worded in this style, claiming that Shadow's character could be pinned down to his loyalty in his relationships to others. I found that analysis lacking because it neglected the fact that self-determination is an equally important part of his character, and portraying loyalty as his most critical trait risks defining him through his relationships with others. Stuff like this by its very multifaceted nature necessitates the use of asterisks. And in addition to games canon, Sonic Tumblr tends to be allergic to qualifiers that may risk diluting an otherwise "powerful" message.

This type of post isn't confined just to Sonic fandom. It happens in Half-Life too. I'm just more inclined to give it a pass for a couple of reasons. One of those being that HL's lore is more full of gaps than Sonic's, so in some instances your fanon is as good a guess as the next fan's.

But with Sonic, it's immensely frustrating because we're often looking at the simplest possible context, and yet folks continue to ignore it. People are so desperate to make the series seem Deep and Mature that they'll make shit up that just isn't there.

The only way I can explain it atm is by comparing it to the "blood orange, she's so pretentious, shut up it's fucking red" meme. It's not blood orange, it's red. The game said it was red. You're just saying blood orange because you think reframing something red as actually blood orange will make you sound more sophisticated, when in reality it makes you come off as ignorant at best and tryhard at worst.

I keep circling back to this example because it's always salient in my mind as the quintessential "you are pulling shit out of the deepest reaches of your rectum" take: Shadow was tortured on the ARK. Nothing in the games, Shadow's characterization, or the material SoJ recently published suggest he was ever experimented on by the researchers at any point. He holds no rage towards the researchers and harbors nothing but loyalty towards the ARK and its memory. Hell, in one ShTH ending he calls it "sacred." (And I'm sure some edgelord will be like "that's just evidence of Stockholm Syndrome." okay sure Jan) The claim becomes even more tenuous when you apply even a modicum of logic to it, from any angle. Yes, let's jeopardize Maria's one and only chance at a cure with unethical experiments. Let's waste resources and risk Gerald's wrath by treating his son like a guinea pig.

Literally all people base this on is this archetype of the Evil Research Facility, as though the ARK and Aperture Science are somehow interchangeable. They don't actually seem to consider the ARK's specific situation and instead superimpose this platonic idea of Evil Research Facility on it in order to "flesh" it out. Never mind the canonically shady shit the ARK got up to by developing weapons of mass destruction, something Shadow says out loud with his own mouth in SA2. No, games canon is not enough to work with. Shadow needs to suffer in new and innovative ways. Ow the edge.

Feels before reals, man. (takes stiff drag on imaginary cigarette)

[broadway-june]

Hey everyone! Happy 4/13!! I think I’ve been stuck working every 4/13 for about six years now XP

I wanted to take a moment to genuinely say hi to you (a fan or passerby of the blog). I usually try to stay in character but I wanted to be real for a bit.

Hi!!!! I’m June!!!! I’ve been legally June for a few months now. 5 years ago, I was a cishet guy who had his whole life figured out. Now I’m a 26 year old (bisexual?) transfem. 5 years from now? I have no idea, but I’m excited to find out.

I get sort of this, imposter syndrome when I talk about being trans. My story isn’t like a lot of other people’s: I didn’t know when I was younger. I didn’t even know when I graduated high school or flunked out of college. I didn’t know because I never hated myself, I never hated ‘being a guy’.

But I never loved it either. I never loved ‘me’. When people said ‘Mr. X’, that was never me. When people talked about ‘the guy over there’ or ‘this gentleman’, that was never me. When I looked in the mirror, the person looking back was never me. I never hated him, but I never loved him either.

Fast forward a couple years and (this is a true story that all my friends know) and my friends showed me… that’s right, the SnapCube fandub of Sonic 06. Anyway, one thing lead to another and Penny Parker was sort of my trans awakening.

After that, I waited about three months before transitioning both socially and medically. I told my family, friends, and coworkers, to which I’m extremely fortunate that it’s (mostly) positive.

It was roughly four/five months after I started transitioning that I was invited on as Broadway June. It was a time where I still looked masculine and I was scared to be out in public. Broadwaystuck was the first place I could be, well, me. ‘Hi! I’m a June, and I’m a girl!’

That was, hard for me to say back then. BWS gave me a place to be, and a place to express myself to you. It was never perfect, no, but it was a place where I didn’t have to do a song and dance to explain who I was to people.

This group is full of amazing and talented and funny people who care about each other, and it was exactly what I needed then.

And now, today! It’s been 15 months since I’ve transitioned. I’m almost exclusively called ma’am at work because of how awesome I look! And I love how I look! I’ll admit that there have been a few times I may have flirted with myself in the mirror. My name is legally changed, and I’ve still got a lot more progress to make!

These days, I’ve got all sorts of little projects and endeavors I want to focus on, that I can’t give BWS June as much attention as I could before. I wanted to leave earlier, but if I’m being honest, I didn’t want people to think it was attached to the stuff that happened earlier this year. Not talking about it of course, I just wanted everyone to know it was separate, so I waited a few months to make this.

As of today, I’m officially stepping away from the blog. A big part of me doesn’t want to, of course. Part of me wants to just, delete all this and put out another song. But… I’m, growing up. It’s hard… but I have to believe I’ll be ok, and I have to believe you’ll understand. Thank you to everyone who came here, even if it was just once or twice. It meant the world to me that I could sing to you, just for a while. And hey, who knows? Maybe one day we’ll bump into each other again!

The world is a big place after all. But with that said, that’s everything I wanted to tell you. Thank you to my listeners, thank you to BWS, and thank you to all the friends I made along the way.

This is Broadway June, officially retiring the ‘Broadway’. Good day, good afternoon, good night to all,

And just so you know, for anyone that needs it: it might not always feel like it, but it gets easier.

Goodbye <3

-June K.C

[violence-devil]

Sonic Frontiers and Letting Go

I was listening to One Way Dream earlier and decided to write this up because the story for Frontiers I feel is so much more poignant than just "wow the character dialogue is better now"! Since I'll be talking about the story and it's themes, expect spoilers.

I joke with friends about Frontiers being "peak mid" but there's just so much good there that makes me love it. It really does feel like a new start line for Sonic. Shit could be much better next time, but they got just enough right for me and many other people to like it. And One Way Dream even ties into the game's theme, despite being made as a message to fans from Sonic Team. It's so defyingly optimistic, and about only moving forward towards the good future you can make for yourself (I was gonna write more about how this connects to me being trans but I don't wanna make this TOO LONG lol). Lots of people wanted Crush 40 to return for Frontiers but I feel like that era of Sonic is long past and would feel out of place. Natewantstobattle did an amazing job on One Way Dream, and Kellin Quinn fucking KILLED IT for the 3 titan themes. The other 2 vocal themes are pretty good too. It's so representative of the beginning of a new era, instead of retreading the past. Which is why I kinda see now why Sega wanted to replace Sonic's VA for this game and honestly I think they shoulda. Roger did start to come into his own but his voice was weird in Frontiers. I appreciate the more serious take on Sonic, but he sounds 40 lol. The game's director said he was debating whether to even have boosting in this game and tbh I think they shoulda removed it yeah. He said he is still considering ditching it moving forward. Which would mean moving on from the boost formula which was introduced like 16 years ago. The boost was really understated in Frontiers already so I don't think it would be too hard. But, enough about external media and mechanics, time for the story itself!

So much abt this game is abt moving on. Amy seeming to have mellowed out and instead wanting to share love with the world and not just her crush on Sonic, Knuckles learning to ease up on his duties as the guardian of the Master Emerald, Tails once again stepping out of Sonic's shadow, and Sage learning that she should disobey her father in order to save him, even if it does ultimately cost her her life due to what she needs to do. Not just the main cast, but even the Kokos being basically recordings of spirits long dead endlessly doing what they last did when they were living until Sonic liberates their souls from their physical forms by helping them reach the conclusion they were attempting to make. So now they can finally let go. It was especially liberating seeing Tails go through this since they did have him admit he already went through this arc before, but reframes it as him still growing up. So, even if he did make a life altering realization, it was still possible for him to fall back into previous complacency.

The final thing I wanna touch on is the final boss. I think people take it too literally. In my opinion, I think it's a more abstract being rather than just a big evil thing to beat, and that this time it's just taking the form of a moon. I think there's a lot of symbolism there people ignore. Sonic has been compared to the sun in media before (or just nature in general), bringing new life across lands and liberating people from either machines or their old selves, and this incarnation of The End being the moon is actually pretty meaningful since the moon is a symbol representing the concept of death in Japan. It talks about bringing order to the universe, snuffing out the chaos and instability that life brings. The two are very much polar opposites, and I think having Sonic face something that's more conceptual like that is pretty cool.

Oh also Mike Pollock did the male voice for The End and while I'm sure it's sheer coincidence there could be a created connection here about Eggman. He lost Sage after letting her go do what she felt she needed to, his own daughter, possibly the only being he's been close to for years. And the stinger at the end of the game is the cherry on top. Because he didn't let go. He somehow accessed whatever dimension all of the spirits went to when they moved on which is where he found Sage again, and I think that this will set up perfectly for the sequel, this time with Eggman as the main antagonist again, representing the inability to move on while Sonic is all about change.

[rouge-the-bat]

was tagged by @princesstokyomoon owo, thanks for taggin me :3

Rules: List your top 5 favorite shows and tag 5 people!

...can i just list yu yu hakusho 5 times LOL god i fucking love that anime so much ive been hyperfixated on ever since i first watched it a few years ago gkdbjfbf that said, biiig surprise what my number one is:

1. Yu Yu Hakusho ⭐️

THIS SHOW CHANGED MY BRAIN CHEMICALS. I CANT PROPERLY EXPRESS HOW MUCH I ABSOLUTELY FUCKING ADORE THIS CAST OF CHARACTERS. THAT LIL DUDE IN THE MIDDLE?? HIEI, THE LOVE OF MY LIFE, I ADORE HIM SO MUCH, HES SUCH A WONDERFUL CUTE TSUNDERE BASTARD. literally the main cast is full of characters with "contradicting" traits that just work SO WELL in making them interesting and fun

kuwabara (the one in blue) is a precious himbo, a very loud delinquent kid who loves to fight but has an honor code he will ALWAYS abide by and has a cute little kitten he adores!!!

yusuke (the one in green) is similarly a delinquent and, honestly, is more of an asshole LOL but he despite his rudeness he doesnt hesitate to put his life on the line for others!

hiei MY LOVE is The Edgy One and always acts like they rest in the group arent his friends but he always is there to help when hes needed and clearly worries for their safety 🥰 and he has a sister hes very sweet and protective over!!! and hes also just Full Of Trauma that i wont get into as more of his backstory is revealed later in the show. and hes just an absolute badass and really hot,,, (forces myself to move on or ill just ramble endlessly about him)

THEN theres hieis lover partner kurama (the red head, and my big kin!!!!), whos by far the sweetest of the 4, is a total mamas boy, BUT hes also a centuries old fox demon known for his thievery and cruelty and was changed when he was almost killed and had to transfer his soul into an unborn human child to stay alive, where his human mom's love changed him to be kinder :'3 (none of that is a spoiler really, this is info he literally states very soon after his introduction) but even though hes changed, hes still can be absolutely RUTHLESS to his enemies. even hiei states early on that he chose kurama as his partner because he wouldnt want him as an enemy

AHEM okay. thats enough rambling about my hyperfixation for now i think fhkzhfjd i probably wont be rambling much about the other ones i just really really REALLY love yyh

the rest arent really in any particular order, and imma put em under the cut!

2. My Hero Academia

i was biiig hyperfixated on this show for a while there, i just absolutely LOVE stories that explore the gray areas of things, so when this show gets into that sorta shit with the hero society its a BIG fave. plus the characters are really fun, todoroki is my fave hehe

3. She-ra (reboot)

another previous hyperfixation, i just really love these characters and honestly theyre so fun to ship in a big ol poly pile lol. tbh i miss being fixated on this one, i had sooo much fun with it ♡

4. Talentless Nana

this was a shorter hyperfixation, but MAN this show gave me EMOTIONS. i dont wanna say too much about it because i think its best to watch the first episode without knowing too much about it, but there is a BIG TWIST at the end of the first episode, and the "genre" of the show completely shifts for all of the episodes after it. if you like darker series, i def recommend this one :3 i just hope itll get more seasons!! but at least theres the manga to continue on with after the first season!

5. Avatar the Last Airbender

an absolute classic from my childhood ♡ itll always be one of my faves!! the characters, the story, the world, i love it so much !!! i still wish i could be a water or fire bender ^w^

honestly it feels weird not putting up a sonic show on here, but when i think about it i never was the biggest on the shows and have always been way more attached to the games canon. though sonic x is def still a classic from my childhood too owo

ah shit i was about to post this without tagging anyone i almost completely forgot HFKSHGK uhh ill tag @megalo-station @catfuyus @transgaykurama @mageofcolors @l-lawliets-pussy @yoko-kurama-the-sex-god (i did 1 over 5 bc im a rebel 😈 JFLZJF)

[sonic2002sworld]

The creepypasta so far:

I was a Sonic the Hedgehog fan since childhood. I enjoy the newer games, sure, but I preffer the classics, being the original Sonic the hedgehog my favorite sonic game, for starting the whole franchise. I don’t think I had ever played a glitchy (if we ignore the newer sonic games) or hacked games before, though I don’t think I really want to play any after the experience I had on that day one day..

It all started on a nice summer afternoon a week ago. I was playing Sonic CD on a emulator, until I noticed out of my peripheral vision that the mailman had arrived and had putted something in my mailbox, as usual, and left. I paused my game to go see what I got in the mail. The only thing in the Mailbox was a small box and a note. I took it inside.

I looked at the note first to see who could've send me this, but there was no name attributed to it; it looked badly written and scratchy and somewhat difficult to read, as if the person was having a hard time writing it down and did it in a hurry.

It just had written in it "just a gift from your best friend."

Well, it certainly was pretty weird, after all, i don't know who could have sent this to me, i thought it maybe could've been kyle, one of my old friends, but the writing did not look much like his... even though there were many red flags to not open it, it was just a box, what could be so bad about a simple box

I opened the box and inside it had a CD-Case similar to a mega drive case, but it didn't have a art on it.. i opened the case, and it had a cartridge, a mega drive cartridge that had "SONIC.”, written in black marker on it, When I saw “SONIC” on the writing of the cartridge, I got pretty excited and wanted to play it, since, how you know, I’m a BIG Sonic fan.

I quickly ran to my room, quick saved sonic CD, turned my pc off, ran again to the living room, plugged my old childhood mega drive on the tv, putted the cartridge in the mega drive, turned it on, and after some seconds the title screen popped up and i noticed that it was the first Sonic game, and i thought “oh, heck yeah!” Because like I said earlier I loved the original Sonic the hedgehog; nothing was much out of the ordinary, though one of the first things i noticed of weird is that when i pressed start for one split second, it appeared like sonic had started staring at me, while grinning.. or something like that.

I didn't think much of it, as i thought it could have been just my imagination, which seemed the most probable and forgot about it; After that, the screen cutted to black and it stayed like that for about some seconds. Green hill zone act one started, nothing out of the common...there was some stuff which i found kinda weird, like how there was no spikes, and all badniks didn't move at all, but only face sonic... which was certainly weird. But i just saw it as a bug, as it was obviously one...

Then i reached the place the act would normally end, but... there was no ending sign, which i thought that, that was also pretty weird; i walked to the place where the sign would normally be, nothing happened. But i couldn't move sonic anymore. After some seconds, sonic faced the screen like if he were going to do his iconic idle animation, he weirdly enough didn't, he just faced the camera, and after some seconds the level ended... which made me realize that this cartridge must have been mistreated by the person who had sent it to me, as it was really REALLY glitchy.

Act 2 played the same way, having the badniks not moving but only looking at sonic, but some did try to attack sonic, or so as it seems, as they sometimes would start moving, but moving at the reverse direction sonic was, making it seem they were trying to run away from sonic, or something similar, something which kinda confused me, but i didn't think much of it, as it could have been a bug just like all the others so far. At the end of the level, there was still no finishing sign.. sonic faced the camera just like in act 1.. but instead of just looking at the camera normally untill the level ended.. sonic.. smiled, as soon as he started smilling, the camera seemed to zoom slowly at his face.. after some seconds of this, the level ended normally.. this.. pretty much creeped me out a tad bit, and that’s when I realized that this might not have been simply a glitchy game.. but a rom hack, i didn't know if rom hacks could actually run on actual hardware, but still.

After the level ended the screen stayed black for some more seconds, i thought the act 3 level card would play, but instead of that, a text appeared on screen, reading "you know what..let us cut it to the chase." i was pretty confused with what it meant, but didn't think much of it as the game had just been normal sonic the hedgehog, with some minor alterations, and as a extra that just proved this was a rom hack, after some seconds the text disappeared, the screen went black once again as i heard some kind of laughter , and then the level card, appeared, but.. i noticed there was some differences in it, the shapes in the title card were were simply gone, and there was only the act name, which was “FOX. ACT 1” a surely intringing name, as it was pretty vague, but oh well, this was simply just a rom hack, maybe the person that hacked this wasn't the most creative with names, i thought.

The screen faded in, and the level title vanished revealing Tails, Non in emerald hill Zone, the music was different though, it sounded like the typical emerald hill's song, but slowed down and simply off.  I thought "huh? Tails..? Well, awesome!" As tails was one of my favorite characters, and playing as his sounded nice, though i did get kinda uncomfortable because of the song at first, i just brushed it off not much after, as it was only a song, and nothing else.

I noticed in the start of level tails was seemed confused in a way, and even a bit scared, though that expression changed after a bit, which i found rather weird, i anyway I started playing, the level, which was pretty much just emerald hill ACT 1, but it seemed more linear than normal and with all badnicks missing.After some minutes, i got near what seemed to be the level's ending area, but there was no ending sign, something i didn't think was weird or something like that, as this was already becoming normal to me, also the area seemed to be longer than normal, it was also pretty much just ground, after some minutes of running through there, the peaceful music started to lower down into slow deep tones very slowly as I kept going.

I suddenly saw something and I stopped to see what it was; it was one of the flickies lying dead on the ground bleeding (that was when the music started to slow down), as soon i noticed that, i also noticed tails had a shocked and saddened look on his face, but simply thought the creator of this rom was a bit.. into gore, or something, or simply wanted the rom to be scarier, for some reason..so I had him move along, and he seemed slower than he was before the flicky and he also kept that worried look on his face. As he kept moving I saw more dead animals as Tails moved past them looking more and more worried as the music lowers and he moved past more and more dead flickies. I was honestly kinda shocked to see how they were all dead, They all looked like somebody killed them in rather gruesome ways; Which made me realise that who sended me this was really messed up in the mind, and surely wasn't kyle, which made me re-think once again.. why.. and who may have sended me this, but that didn't matter much to me at the time.. which.. surely should. After a few more seconds walking there were no more animals and the music seemed to have stopped, I still kept Tails to continue.

After a minute passed after the music stopped, Tails was running up a hill and then he stopped, i got kinda confused for a second but then i noticed. Sonic was there on the other side of the screen with his back against Tails with his eyes closed. Tails looked happy to see Sonic, but then his smile faltered, obviously noticing that Sonic wasn’t responding to him, if acting as if he was totally oblivious of Tails’ presence, or didn't notice him. Tails walked slowly toward Sonic, and I noticed that I wasn’t even pressing any button to make him move, so this had to have been a cut scene or something like that.

Suddenly i felt a bit anxious as tails approached sonic and as i heard a faint static growing louder, after some moments Tails was but inches away from Sonic and stopped and stuck his hand out to touch him. Sonic oppened his eyes, looked at Tails as he started smiling once again, turned to Tails, as i thought that my mind was wrong in thinking that something bad were about to happen, then smiled.. and for what seemed to be a split second, sonic grinned while looking at me

It stayed black for some seconds and then white text appeared forming a message, saying, “finally..”

At this point I was kinda confused once again, but i just thought that maybe the next act was gonna be tails and sonic instead of just Tails or Sonic alone, but then i remembered about the flickies, which made me realise that whatever said that meant something worse. Then after some time, instead of being taken to a different level something just faded into the screen, something that seemed to be a cutscene, which seemed to just be tails falling unconsious in some kind of meat hole, which actually made me stop whatever i was doing for a second, as i thought that maybe i had all the reason to get anxious. After some time of Tails falling, Tails feel onto the bottom of the screen as it faded away.. then i was taken to a different level with the level title saying “Crimson line.”

After a little bit the title faded away and the act started.

The act looked very far away from anything i've seen in any sonic game, at most it was kinda similar to green hill or top hill. The sky was red slowly fading to black in the top, on the bottom theres black montains with a red glow, as if it was fire, slighty covered by what seem to be small hills, completely on the top there was smoke. And the ground are grey grassy hills

As the act started tails fell from the sky onto the floor. after a bit he got up, looked everywhere as if confused to where he was and then the act actually started as that was just another cutscene. He looked as though he was scared out of his wits this time. He actually looked at me and made frantic gestures to me as if he wanted to get out of the area he was in as fast as possible. Even if all this was just a rom hack and Tails had no actual emotions and this was just his idle animation.. it felt.. real, as if he actually wanted to get out of there, as if he genuinely wanted help, though i didn't get much freaked out from this afterall tails was still not real, even if it felt like it so i just felt a bit off.

So I started holding the right button to make tails run, I made Tails trek through the desolate hills, trying to help him escape from whatever he was trying to run from.

Suddenly I heard that creepy laugh again… that awful laugh… right after some seconds have passed, as I helped Tails run through the hills. I looked at the timer,  the timer was on 3. Then 2. Then1...as the timer turned to 0 a text appeared on screen, written "times up."

The music changed to that suspenseful and classic drowning theme but it seemed more tense, then i notice Sonic, right behind Tails slowly gain up on him FLYING; Sonic wasn’t running, he was actually FLYING! Though sonic didn't look normal at all, many details being different from what he normally looked like, the most noticeable change being his face, which was a human one, but it was very unlike Majin Sonic's face, something i was already aware of. His face felt.. familiar, in a way..?

Sonic had a deranged looking grin on his face, he looked as he was enjoying the torment he was giving the poor little fox as he gained up on him, and as Tails' ran, he was crying and had his eyes closed, sometimes he would open his eyes and look back at Sonic momentarily, then look back infront of him closing his eyes once again.

Suddenly, when Sonic got up to Tails, Sonic sped up and kept going as Tails tripped and as another cutscene started. The music stopped and sonic was nowhere to be seem. Tails started tumbling down as he tripped. after a while slowing down. Right infront of where he stopped, there was Sonic. I had no reaction.

Sonic then picked up Tails by the neck, with a serious face, and putted him up in the air, a grin slowly grew from his face as he looked right in the eyes of the horrified fox as Tails cried and cried more, i couldn't do anything but watch as i was kinda shocked at everything that was happening, and not sure of what would happen next, at the same time i felt it couldn't be good.

Sonic seemed to start tighting his grip around the fox's neck as Tails started moving everywhere trying to get out of there, i too pressed every button in the controller, trying to get Tails out of there myself. Then.. Sonic broke the fox's neck, for a second i could see Tails' expression change, the screen went black as i only saw their eyes in the darkness for a moment. there was a loud screeching like noise as the screen turned black followed by a loud, high pitched noise. After a bit a message appeared in the font of those end of act screens, "tails has passed" was the message as a low pitched, static like glitchy sound played in the background

I was so shocked by what had happened…did Sonic murder Tails? Even tho this was still only a rom hack, a very fucked up one for sure, it felt.. real, It felt like Tails' reactions weren't just "code" or just "sprites" it felt like he actually.. didn't want to die, and sonic, or whatever that was, felt like a actual maniac.

I shook the shock off after abit. But that shock came back quickly as a image of tails appeared on screen, his fur darkened, eyes completely white, he seemed to have no neck but somehow his head still was there as if it was being hold by something off screen or just flying, the image made me very unconfortable and it wouldn't go away doesn't matter what i pressed or how many time pressed, so i turned off the megadrive.

I honestly didn't know what to do next, i was kinda unconfortable, i thought of just hiding the cartridge, i also thought i could try to turn on the megadrive just to be sure if that was all, but after that i sincerally didn't want to know.. but yet, something inside of me told me to atleast try it, since if there wasn't anything left, maybe nothing would happen and if the game would restart from zero that maybe this time i could save tails.

[thatneilj]

Game of the Year 2017

Originally Posted in January 2018

*2024* - I have been writing these game of the year posts since 2017 but for some reason the little intro didn't make it into my archive for this year. Oops!

Honorables

Mario Odyssey

This game is joyful, expansive, and rewards exploration. Unfortunately, I have found that after 400+ moons, I still find the controls to be a bit frustrating. On top of that, while the capturing mechanic is fun, I find I most of the time I would rather some solid Mario platforming. That said, Uproot is the best!

Sonic Mania

The first video game I ever owned was Sonic the Hedgehog 2. While my love for Sonic has never truly gone away, I have skipped the majority of Sonic titles over the last 15 or so years. Sonic Mania is zeroing in on the old stuff I grew up with. Sonic Mania invites me back to my hometown to party with friends i’ve not seen since the 90s, and makes it feel like none of us ever drifted apart.

Wolfenstein: The New Colossus

If you told me 5 years ago that Wolfenstein would be a franchise that rises above killing Nazis to tell a story with some of the most well-realized characters in modern media I would have laughed at you. But here we are. Machine Games gave BJ Blazkowicz a backstory that makes him feel believable despite the insanity that is his world. This game is amazing, except for the part where the level design and difficulty get in the way of seeing the story play out.

5. CUPHEAD

I got to this game a bit later than most. Sure I had seen the fantastic art bringing that 1930s cartoon style to life. I had heard the soundtrack full of big band scores and incredible jazz that broke onto the Billboard charts. I had even heard the developers at Studio MDHR talking about their inspirations, including Megaman X, one of my favorite games of all time. Not until I put my hands on the game did I realize just how perfect it all is together.

The controls are tight and responsive in a way that prevents deaths from feeling like bullshit, despite the difficulty. The music can be frantic, mirroring perfectly the insanity on the screen, which helps draw you in without becoming distracting. And those smooth visuals truly do bring each boss to life. Often weird and creepy life, but that is right in line with those old cartoons. Seriously, some of those old things are the stuff of nightmares.

4. HELLBLADE: SENNUA’S SACRIFICE

 Hellblade was quite hard for me to play. While that sounds negative right from the jump, that is part of why I liked it so much. It wasn’t a hard game, it was a hard experience. It was hard for me to listen to these disembodied voices telling me I’m not good enough as they danced around my head. It was hard for me to watch Sennua break down and cry with such raw emotion. The game is a technical marvel at realizing Melina Juergens’ performance.

(https://www.polygon.com/2017/9/15/16316014/hellblade-senuas-sacrifice-mental-illness)

While the game’s depiction of psychosis has come under fire for some legitimate concerns, its depiction of the symptoms is impressive. And watching the Making Of short included in the game was rather fascinating. I cannot think of any other big studio taking the time and doing the research to try and get this stuff right. Hellblade was hard for me to play because it was effective in making those symptoms feel real and tangible in a way I simply don’t have in my normal life.

3. HOLLOW KNIGHT

Here’s what I knew about Hollow Knight when I was going in: “It’s kind of like a Metroid game.” Now, I have loved a lot of action-exploration games, particularly when they make some bigger changes to the tried and true formula. Hollow Knight had me unsure at the start from the art style, the floaty jump, and the mapping system. But as I played more of the game, I found myself getting drawn in deeper and deeper. I realized it is a blend of two series I love; Metroid and Dark Souls.

Once I got the dash, movement started feeling good. Once I reached the City of Tears, the aesthetic had me catching my breath. Once I had all the maps… well, actually that damn map stuff is seriously annoying. I didn’t care anymore though, I was engrossed. The story of this bug-filled world is fascinating, and told at the edges for those who want to look. The action is can be punishing with big bosses, precision platforming, and combat that requires intention. This game had me yelling at some challenges, and yet I wanted more, even after the 35 hours I took to beat it.

2. A HAT IN TIME

3D platformers were back this year, back in a way I couldn’t even keep up with. First, we had Yooka-Laylee coming from a bunch of ex-Rare developers making a new Banjo. I missed this one, but heard mostly not-great things. At the end of the year we had Mario Odyssey, where the mission based worlds were done away with for free-form exploration and excitement. But right in the middle of those was A Hat in Time, a game that felt more like Mario 64 in structure, but with so much more.

I knew next to nothing about A Hat in Time when a friend gave it to me to check out. And I soon learned that Jon ‘JonTron’ Jafari had a cameo voice role in it. With that stink on the project I still found myself falling in love. From the very beginning you get a wonderful cartoon style that lends itself so well to the cuteness of Hat Girl. You go down to the first world and find personality dripping throughout the whole island of Mafia men. You meet mustache girl, become friends, and learn how crazy she is. And then, after all this, you get to go to a new world where two birds are competing to make you a movie star.

This game just made me happy the whole damn time I played it. And yet, it is full of choices that seem insane and shouldn’t work. Why not put a silly Metal Gear Solid stealth mechanic into this level? Why not give people an MSpaint mini-game just for fun? Why not pretend we’re a horror game for one mission? Apparently there is no reason not to do these things, if you do them right. Fact is, they did it all right while still giving us wonderful world design, fantastic platforming, genuinely funny writing, and the cutest character ever! If you dash and don’t jump out of it, Hat Girl will just lie on her belly and wiggle her feet in the air while she daydreams!

1. NIER: AUTOMATA

Nier: Automata is a very flawed game. The world you run through feels pulled out of a game from 2004 with all the invisible walls. The Platinum Games influence is clear in the combat, but in many ways feels stripped down and shallow in comparison to some of their past works. The most damning thing, though, is how long it takes to get through Route A. But if you push through all of this, if it gets its hooks in, it is a game that does something special.

Nier has, at its core, an ethos about the world. Not just through some story telling beats about the nature of androids. It goes so much farther. Where many sci-fi stories in more modern media look at how robots can be human, Nier ask what it is to even be human. Yet it does this in a story about androids who should be devoid of emotion. Entities with a task to fight a war that is never ending, on a world that refuses to forget people. A world that really doesn’t need people anymore anyway.

The game is thick with this pervading sense of despair. It isn’t just the crumbled buildings and rusted robots. It is every character you meet, each side story that seems to inevitably end in a place worse than before. It is in the loving couple that want to desert the war, it is in the thinking robots looking out over vistas, and it is in Father Servo who wants to be the best fighter. It is in the main story, when it takes you back through Route A from a different perspective. And it only becomes more intense in the later parts of the game.

This game is my game of the year because it is going to stick with me. Because I watched someone go against everything they stand for to save what they care about, only to lose it all from their own choices. Because I had to put down my controller for over 30 minutes, staring at my avatar idling in a dark and depressing room, trying to decide which choice I could live with. Because as each belief about the nature of the world was pulled away, showing me just how wrong I was, and how pointless trying to change it was. Their all robots right? They are programed for this.

This game is going to stick with me because, despite all of this and so much more, it managed to pull away the magic circle. It gave me an ending full of loss, full of satisfaction, and somehow full of hope.

[thelediz]

Sonic Underground 08: Tangled Webs

I’m watching Sonic Underground in search of inspiration to finish a fic I’ve been writing forever. It’s a sad state of affairs. See the recap of the first three episodes here, if you're interested!

The plot (for want of a better word): Sonic’s old friend Cyrus has turned traitor, hoping to exchange the Sonic Underground to save his father from Robotnik’s evil clutches! Will the Sonic Underground escape, and can they turn Sonic’s oldest friend back to the side of good?

I mean, of course they will, but lean into the drama for me a little, will you?

The first words are “Learning to trust” and I am already bracing myself because I just KNOW this is not going to be resolved satisfactorily.

Also we just had an episode about someone who can’t trust their own inventions and father like two episodes ago, so um…

Hey! The first glimpse we get of the Sonic Underground’s underworld bars. These are surprisingly common and apparently Sonic likes hanging out in them.

ALSO. QUEEN ALEENA SIGHTING. I CANNOT GET A CLEAR SHOT DUE TO MY OLD AND COMPRESSED VIDEO BUT APPARENTLY THE QUEEN ALSO HANGS OUT IN SEEDY BARS.

Cyrus! Cyrus always has terrible animation, but that’s because he’s on this show. I love Cyrus for the same reason I love all the Sonic Underground recurring OCs: he’s such a gold mine for interpretation, and absolutely nothing in his actual canon material.

And a quick scene between Robotnik and Sleet that is one of the reasons I love Sleet as a character. You might remember from early episodes that Sleet and Dingo are self-employed mercenaries that have been forced to work for Robotnik. Left to his own devices, Sleet is remarkably crafty and probably quite effective, but he will always echo Robotnik’s orders, and that makes him sloppy. This will continually bite him. It’s such a nice detail.

Yet another example of smiles in a supposedly stressful scene, and of Sonia trying to ‘stick to the plan’ while Sonic’s being irresponsible (waylaid by Cyrus) and Manic isn’t listening. Because Sonia is the Perfect Freedom Fighter, just ask the writers.

Hedgehogs aren’t rodents, Sleet.

Seriously, the animation this episode is atrocious.

Sonia’s superstrength! Counter +1

And Sonic effortlessly destroys the factory on his own. Why do we have his siblings in this show?

…so in this episode, Sonic is supposedly learning that “there is something to this plan stuff”. He will occasionally remember this, but only if it helps Manic look bad, but mostly he will remain an improvisor. It’s… tiring, if only because—as proven BY THIS EPISODE—Sonic doesn’t need plans! He will always win with or without plans, and most plans only make things unnecessarily harder. IT’S A PLOT HOLE I LIVE IN.

TREVOR. Who is here to introduce Sanctuary, a haven for orphaned kids run by the Resistance that will never be mentioned again.

But I have to say, Sanctuary is one of the reasons I like Cyrus. Because Cyrus ONLY betrays Robotnik when he hears there are kids involved. That’s his moral line – not his old friend, not his loyalty to queen and country, not even hatred of Robotnik, it’s just orphan kids. It seems basic and a very standard moral line, but in context, that gives him some interesting layers that I like to play with.

THE SONG: The Children Light the Way. Oh wow, the ballad about kids. These were so big in the 80s and 90s. This song would have gone off in the charts, you have no idea.

…and like I said, Sonic gets out of this by not sticking to the plan. Narratively, it’s because he’s the hero, but I will absolutely make it out as a plot point, honestly.

And Cyrus loses his dad. And that’s how we end the episode.

No, I say again, we end the episode by acknowledging the loss of a parent. That was so huge at the time and it went completely unacknowledged because this show and this episode are generally such a trashfire.

I so wish this episode had better animation, because if it did this would have been a really good and important episode, showcasing all the things I like about it. Instead, it’s… kind of urexample of everything that this show is: terrible animation, interesting characters, amazing worldbuilding, horrible plotholes.

I love it dearly.

The counters:

Sonic implying less than 100% American heterosexuality: 2

Sonia's super-strength: 2

Sonia's in love with Bartleby: 1/37

Manic's Thievery Is A Problem: 1

Come back tomorrow if you want to know more!

[soupum]

Parasocial Relationship? Sign me up!

I got tagged by @risu5waffles to participate in some ask game thing? I don't know, I'm too old for this. Seems fun, though, so I'll give it a go anyway.

Who were you named after?

Not gonna get into my actual name, because I don't feel like doxxing myself right now, but I will tell the story of my online name:

So, when I was a wee bab, My online username was basically just "Super[IRL First Name]". When I was about 14 and decided to abandon that name, I went with "Soup" because it's "Super" without the R, and because everyone like soup. I added the "'um" at the end because it sounded vaguely fantasy-esque to me.

Last time you cried?

Oof. That's a rough question. Think it was about a month ago, now? Had been having some serious issues with my body image for the past few weeks, and some hobby stuff went awry big time earlier in the day, and that just tipped me over the edge, and I broke down sobbing. I'm fine now, though. I got over it.

Do you have kids?

Nope! Not interested in having biological kids for personal reasons, but I have had idle thoughts about adoption before. Things would have to change big time for me before that's in the cards, though.

What sports do you play/did you play?

Speedrunning, I guess? I don't do it that much, because it hurts my hands, but I have contributed decently to speedrun communities before, and I do enjoy grinding a game once it has my attention.

I'd love to get into roller-skating or ice-skating one of these days, though. If you know my affinity for Sonic games, you can probably guess why, lol.

Do you use Sarcasm?

I think I use it the normal amount? Unless I seriously dislike you, I never mean to use it to hurt someone I know. Typically I use it to dunk on someone else who is already a tool, or for friendly ribbing with someone I already know.

First thing you notice about people?

Faces, I guess? I'm pretty bad with those, so I try to memorize them whenever I meet someone. After that, I guess clothes? I tend to notice tattoos, but I don't really process what they are most of the time.

Do you have any talents?

Self-deprecation is for losers, so I'm gonna go as egotistical as possible on this one. My talents are graphic design, Italian cooking, troubleshooting tech issues, and lookin' damn sexy after a shower.

Scary Movies or Happy Endings?

Happy endings, I guess? I don't really watch scary movies (although I have been meaning to), but I don't typically enjoy outright downer endings. Bittersweet endings, sure, but every downer ending I've seen goes along the lines of "life is meaningless and everyone dies". If I wanted to smoke down some of that rhetoric, I could just look at Twitter.

Where were you born?

That's for me to know and you to find out, buddy.

What are your hobbies?

The line between "hobby" and "thing I like to consume" always gets real blurry for me, so apologies if this isn't quite the answer you're looking for. With that said:

Photography

Reverse-Engineering

Phone shopping (Give it a go sometime! Pick a price range and find the best performance to cost ratio you can!)

Blender renders

Digging through the Wayback Machine

Do you have any pets?

I used to. Not anymore.

How tall are you?

167 cm, or 5'5, for all you feet fans out there. I am tiny. Bite-sized. Fit me in your pocket and lemme rummage around a bit small.

What was your favourite subject in school?

This would imply I enjoyed any part of school, lol. Off the top of my head, probably physics?

Dream Job?

Vague phrasing! Big fan.

If we're talking "what would you like to do for the rest of your life", I'm torn. Probably just making fangames and little software toys?

If we're talking "what would you least detest doing to pay the bills?", then whatever you call what John Carpenter has going on is a strong contender. Just make a bunch of genre-defining art when I'm young and then kick back and play Xbox while the royalty checks roll in.

I don't really have enough of a "network" on here to immediately tag anyone. @hirunda-maxpw, maybe? Hirunda, if you're reading this, you don't have to participate if you don't wanna. Totally chill.

Well, bye.

[tomyo]

NiGHTS

So I forced my friend who previously beat this game to play it for me instead. Thanks Tonio.

I always played as Helen first to which the fish was horrible to fight. Ironically to learn how different two characters bosses are. The game is also surprisingly short with very little story bits or maybe that's just from coming off of KH3 not too long ago.

The gameplay is rough, in game graphics are a weird mix and the music is god tier. The funniest thing is that gets to me about the graphics is Helen looks horrible in the in game engine but will looks sort of better? If he were supposed to look like a Japanese boy it'd be fine but it's definitely likely he was supposed to be white. However the CG modelers rendered him with defining Japanese features in his cheeks and mouth that I couldn't get over, I jokingly kept calling him Kohei and his dad Yusuke. I promise this is mostly out of adoration for how artists will reference what they are familiar with which even on a professional level results in a blonde haired blue eyed Japanese boy.

The character designs also distinctly bring me back to the era where everyone was trying to be Square Enix. Sega had already been doing particularly well rendered CG scenes but the over designing of Helen especially hits home how games like Sonic 06, Twilight Princess and so on probably took on these traits to catch up with the popularity of final fantasy and Kingdom Hearts to some extent. Helen's playthrough unlocks the artbook and I'm a little sad I'm missing some pieces as the art is fun to look at in all its crunchy glory.

I didn't grow up with the original Nights but the second game definitely came out when I was Will and Helens age which is funny to say since I always perceived myself older than characters like them. Now that I'm an adult I definitely look to the very gender Nights who's playful and essentially a disappointment to their parents in more honor. My first experience with this series was the lovingly rendered key art plastered on Nintendo Power which was possibly also my first one. I remember being enchanted by the reflection in night's eyes. All the more funny to see how old the graphics feel even for the Wii era in comparison to that cover art. But I loved every moment of Nights being almost a fun loving big sibling and annoyed at the idea they should play their role for wiseman.

That being said and it could be because we played Will second, there is like, an air of sexism with Will and Helen. I read up that Nights had some intent for the original kids to represent the masculine womanhood and the feminine manhood and while the clothing they wear or the interests they have represented in their worlds being so gendered isn't as much my issue, the narrative value is. Helen gets the short end being that she is made bad for doubting Nights like Will did but where Will overheard Nights was a nightmaren and was comforted by the owl, Helen hears this from Reala who also paints Nights as on the nightmaren side. It felt a little off equating these two experiences as the same. Nights also only fights Reala in Will's dreams. And while they gave a recent reason for Helen struggling in Will's more straight forward dungeon, there was an ick that Helen was always the one to fall in gameplay to be saved by Will. Like I said I was the one actually playing either so my experience in that is a little limited but Tonio did point out that Will did things on his own in Bellbridge that Helen needed Will's help for. It seems to suggest Helen can't stand on her own and that just sucks.

Considering the in spiritual successor, Balan Wonder world, gave it's female lead no active factor like previous protags (a sport or physical hobby) in a game about theatrical performance, it seems to be a worsening issue. A full tangent on that but if you give the male lead the role of a dancer then why not make the girl a singer???? The other half of theatrical performance????? So weird.

[angelofdiamond]

@autisticshadowthehedgehog 1/? Finally someone said that Chris doesn't deserve this toxic hate, in the analysis however there is only one small thing that I don't agree with but nothing too "big" and that is the fact that Chris doesn't understand emotions others which I don't think is the case because I think that that time in the second episode he immediately wanted to justify himself in that way because he must have thought he had said something offensive and because he feared that his mother might get very scared (let's face it who would have believed it actually 😂?) also if you noticed , people often say that for them Helen would have been a better protagonist than Chris because she wouldn't have done what Chris would have done at the end of episode 26 and 51 but I don't think Helen would have been the best and don't misunderstand i love helen , i like her a lot but the reason i think this is that both are the same ; they have the same emotional and family situation with the only difference that Helen's parents have understood their mistake and are making it up to it while Chris's parents are not, still continuing to claim that he has to do this; feeling this way because it's the right thing to do; neglecting him and only worrying about him when he feels bad (which is why Chris snapped seeing how they had entered his room at the end only to argue with each other) they don't understand that in the end Chris hasn't constantly asked for their presence because he knows they are working and he respects them for this but at least one day or even just 5 minutes of their attention is all he asked for and the fact that his only happy memory with them was when they were at the lake when he was very small he makes it clear how much this thing is so important to him that even in adulthood it has remained imprinted on him. Chris has a really big heart of gold and is able to give boundless affection and to sacrifice himself even for his friends if the occasion requires it. He also proves to be very empathetic towards Shadow when he "reproaches" him about what he wanted to do by telling him that understands her suffering but it wasn't right that innocent people should pay for what other people did 50 years ago and that she should have given them the opportunity to be forgiven and be happy, that attitude...that big and kind heart shook him so much that in him he sees Maria: both wanted peace between the two races and harmony and coexistence between them and this thing is even more noticeable when for Chris it doesn't matter if Sonic and the others come from Earth's twin planet for him they are the same, they have no differences and there you also understand how big his heart is and that it's not that he doesn't know how to recognize true values. Above all, one important thing must be noted in his biography and it is the fact that he treasures every encounter he has and this statement is very important because it makes us understand that even if he suffers he does not take for granted the relationship he has with his friends and the 'love he feels for his family even if he sometimes shows indifference towards them because of the damage they have now caused him. [.....]

What was up with Chris Thorndyke, anyway?

I think it’s safe to say that Chris Thorndyke is one of the most hated characters in the Sonic the Hedgehog franchise, which is… a bit odd, when you think about it. In a world of Ken Penders’s Daddy Issues Personified and Octopus Who Kills Children For Fun (the latter of which basically being a fandom sexyman), why is a twelve-year-old boy so polarizing?

It would be easy to chalk this up to the bad 4kidz dub, but I don’t quite think that’s it. A lot of the complaints I’ve heard can go to “he got the main character slot in Sonic’s show” or “I just don’t like the human characters,” which are valid, but pale in comparison to basically all I’ve seen being: “He’s just annoying,” “I can’t fucking stand him,” etc. That’s basically all I hear, and when asking why, it usually boils down to two things: 1) his extreme attachment to Sonic and 2) his status as a rich white american only child basically puts any and all of his problems at “first world problems” at best. Those also seem like valid reasons, right?

Thing is, while on the surface it seems like this kid has no issues, as a kid with a, how you say, rough childhood, something stuck with me when I watched the show for the first time. I remember sitting through episode after episode, wondering, When does Chris stop being sympathetic and start being annoying? Since, you know, that’s his reputation.

It didn’t happen.

And it slowly became apparent to me that a lot of the things that made Chris “annoying” and “obsessive”… were just obvious symptoms of a traumatized kid.

Join me for my thesis presentation: Chris’s “annoying” traits are not a writing flaw, but an intentional character flaw brought about by severe neglect, which is resolved through his character arc, and why the fandom reaction to him is so furious.

Note: Throughout this meta, we will only be looking over the Japanese version of Sonic X, as it’s the original script and 4kidz did not translate it accurately. So if you see some lines you don’t remember being said, those are from the English subtitles/direct translation.

Once again, it is possible (also likely, we’ll discuss that a bit) that the kidification and cuts to Sonic X did a number on Chris’s likability, but for most of the meta we’ll be discussing his Japanese characterization with only a few references to cut scenes or lines in the dub.

Continua a leggere

[funtimespringscare101]

{This is part 1 of my new Sonic.EXE OC’s Story: EX1LE.CHR Everything here is either inspired by the Source Material of Xeno, X etc, or completely new. Please show support if you like this}

Date: September 12th 2010

I always loved Sega’s Sonic Franchise. Well, at least as much as the next person… but today was the day I may have started thinking that Sonic may not be really a good thing to be hyper fixated on…

So I run a YouTube Channel with my friend Maya called “SonicBrosYT” where we do let’s plays of any new Sonic Game, and it’s going pretty well. A while ago, Maya called me about a pretty interesting Sonic Rom Hack that someone made, and I was excited so I asked her to send the link over Email. There was no turning back from that point.

I download the ROM Hack and I see it on my desktop, but alongside it, there was a file named Sonic.CHR. I just thought it was a cool little thing that whoever made the game did, and booted up the Hack.

I found out that in this Hack, Tails has become a hero in his own right and went Solo. The Game also had more detailed art of the OG levels from Sonic. I also noticed the new sprites for him had Goggles and a utility belt. I was near the end of Green Hill Zone when a red ring appeared and Tails fell through. The screen was black for a moment before a new title card came up, reading Flaming Hills.

And sure as hell, Green Hill Zone came up. On fucking Fire. “What the Hell?” I thought, “this is getting way too dark.” But I continued through the level and near the end of it, a cutscene played, there were bodies of Mobians and blood everywhere, whoever made this went all out with the gore.

And in right there was what I thought was Sonic at first but it was a dark shade of Purple, it had a duffel bag and a chocolate neckerchief with it too. Tails look surprised, “Sonic, Thank Mobius You are…” He paused weirdly, Sonic turned around and I could see the two eyelashes that told me that whoever she was was not Sonic. “Here…” Tails finished.

“Sonic” was terrified, crying tears of blood as she looked at Tails. “Where am I? This isn’t the void…” She said before she squinted her eyes at Tails and seemed surprised. “Hey, I recognize you! You’re Tails, Right? Sonic’s Sidekick?”

Tails looked uneasy, “umm, former sidekick, actually. Who exactly are you?”

“Oh, I’m… Xenatia. Sorry, I’m kind of a big fan…”

“That’s Okay,” Tails Replied, “Let’s just get you out of here. We can go to my Workshop and we can talk about how you got here…”

She Nodded, and Tails ran back, supposedly to the Tornado, but Xenatia… just stood there for a moment. The camera started zooming in on her. Then, she turned to face… me. The Screen turned to black and text reading, “Oh Hi There, What’s your name, Player?” appeared, “Do you want to play a game with me?” the Hack closed after that.

I’m still trying to piece together what happened, Xenatia spoke to me. ME. It may be just a little piece of gameplay from whoever created this thing but… how could she know I was there? I’ll keep playing the Hack and updating this as I go along…

See you on the next post.

Keith Westwood

[iwanthermidnightz]

Well hi.

I want to say thank you to Bart for introducing me in such a generous way and i want to say thank you to the NSAI for getting us all together for this event. For me, tonight feels brimming with a genuine camaraderie between a bunch of people who just love making stuff. Who love the craft. Who live for that rare, pure moment when a magical cloud floats down right in front of you in the form of an idea for a song, and all you have to do is grab it. Then shape it like clay. Prune it like a garden. And then wish on every lucky star or pray to whatever power you believe in that it might find its way out into the world and make someone feel seen, feel understood, feel joined in their grief or heartbreak or joy for just a moment.

I’ve learned by being in the entertainment industry for an extended period of time that this business operates with a very new, new, new, next, next, next mentality. For every artist or songwriter, we’re all just hoping to have one great year. One great album cycle. One great run at radio. And these days, one song that goes viral on TikTok. One glorious moment in the sun. Because on your next project you’ll probably have to invent a new thing to be. Think of all new things to say, and fresh ways to say them. You will have to entertain people. And the fact is that what entertains us is either seeing new artists emerge or established artists showing us a new side to themselves. If we are very, very lucky, life will say to us ‘your song is great’. The next thing life will say is ‘What else can you do?’

I say all of this because I’m up here receiving this beautiful award for a decade of work, and I can’t possibly explain how nice that feels. Because the way I see it, this is an award that celebrates a culmination of moments. Challenges. Gauntlets laid down. Albums I’m proud of. Triumphs. Strokes of luck or misfortune. Loud, embarrassing errors and the subsequent recovery from those mistakes, and the lessons learned from all of it. This award celebrates my family and my co-writers and my team. My friends and my fiercest fans and my harshest detractors and everyone who entered my life or left it. Because when it comes to my songwriting and my life, they are one in the same. As the great Nora Ephron once said, “Everything is copy.”

Twenty years ago I wrote my first song. I used to dream about one day getting to bounce around the different musical worlds of my various sonic influences, and change up the production of my albums. I hoped that one day, the blending of genres wouldn’t be such a big deal. There’s so much discussion about genre and it always usually leads back to a conversation about melody and production. But that leaves out possibly my favorite part of songwriting: lyricism.

And I’ve never talked about this publicly before, because, well, it’s dorky. But I also have, in my mind, secretly, established genres categories for lyrics I write. Three of them, to be exact. They are affectionately titled Quill Lyrics, Fountain Pen Lyrics, and Glitter Gel Pen Lyrics.

I know this sounds confusing but I’ll try to explain. I came up with these categories based on what writing tool I imagine having in my hand when I scribbled it down, figuratively. I don’t actually have a quill. Anymore. I broke it once when I was mad.

I categorize certain songs of mine in the ‘Quill’ style if the words and phrasings are antiquated, if I was inspired to write it after reading Charlotte Brontë or after watching a movie where everyone is wearing poet shirts and corsets. If my lyrics sound like a letter written by Emily Dickinson’s great grandmother while sewing a lace curtain, that’s me writing in the Quill genre. I will give you an example from one of my songs I’d categorize as Quill.

“How’s one to know

I’d meet you where the spirit meets the bones

In a faith forgotten land

In from the snow, your touch brought forth an incandescent glow

Tarnished but so grand”

Moving on to Lyricism category #2: Fountain Pen style. I’d say most of my lyrics fall into this category. Fountain pen style means a modern storyline or references, with a poetic twist. Taking a common phrase and flipping its meaning. Trying to paint a vivid picture of a situation, down to the chipped paint on the door frame and the incense dust on the vinyl shelf. Placing yourself and whoever is listening right there in the room where it all happened. The love, the loss, everything. The songs I categorize in this style sound like confessions scribbled and sealed in an envelope, but too brutally honest to ever send.

For Example:

“Cause there we are again in the middle of the night

We’re dancing round the kitchen in the refrigerator light

Down the stairs, I was there

I remember it all too well

And there we are again when nobody had to know

You kept me like a secret but I kept you like an oath

Sacred prayer, and we’d swear to remember it all too well”

The third category is called Glitter Gel Pen and it lives up to its name in every way. Frivolous, carefree, bouncy, syncopated perfectly to the beat. Glitter Gel Pen lyrics don’t care if you don’t take them seriously because they don’t take themselves seriously. Glitter Gel Pen lyrics are the drunk girl at the party who tells you that you look like an Angel in the bathroom. It’s what we need every once in a while in these fraught times in which we live.

Example: “my ex man brought his new girlfriend; she’s like ‘oh my god’ but I’m just gonna shake and to the fella over there with the hella good hair, won’t you come on over baby we can shake, shake, shake.”

Why did I make these categories, you ask? Because I love doing this thing we are fortunate enough to call a job. Writing songs is my life’s work and my hobby and my never-ending thrill. I am moved beyond words that you, my peers, decided to honor me in this way for work I’d still be doing if I had never been recognized for it.

Lately I’ve been on a joyride down memory lane. I’ve been re-recording my first six albums. When I go through the process of meticulously recreating each element of my past and revisiting songs I wrote when I was 13, 14, and 15, that path leads me right to music row. How my mom would pick me up from school and drive me to my co-writing sessions with dozens of writers (and some of you are in this very room tonight) who 15 years ago decided to give me their time, their wisdom, their belief before anyone thought writing with me was a productive use of an afternoon. I will never forget you, every last one of you.

Part of my re-recording process has included adding songs that never made the original albums, but songs I hated to leave behind. I’ve gone back and recorded a bunch of them for my version of my albums. Fearless, my version, came out last year and as I was choosing songs for it, I came across one I’d written with the Warren brothers when I was 14. I decided to record it as a duet with the brilliant Keith Urban. When I called the the Warrens up to tell them I was cutting our song 17 years after we’d written it, I’ll never forget the first thing they said. “Well, I think that’s the longest hold we’ve ever had.”

In 2011, just over ten years ago, my trusted collaborator and confidant Liz Rose came over to my apartment and I showed her a song I’d been working on. I was going through a rough time (as is the natural state of being 21) and had scribbled down verse after verse after verse, a song that was too long to put on an album. It clocked in at around 10 minutes. We set out editing, trimming, cutting out big sections until it was a reasonable 5 minutes and 30 seconds. It was called All Too Well. Last year when I re-recorded my 2012 album Red, I included this 10 minute version with its original verses and extra bridges. I never could’ve imagined when we wrote it that that song would be resurfacing ten years later or that I’d be about to play it for you tonight.

But a song can defy logic or time. A good song transports you to your truest feelings and translates those feelings for you. A good song stays with you even when people or feelings don’t. Writing songs is a calling and getting to call it your career makes you very lucky. You have to be grateful every day for it, and all the people who thought your words might be worth listening to. This town is the school that taught me that.

To be honored by you means more than any genre of my lyrics could ever say.

Thank you.